Albert the Great’s theological and exegetical-biblical works often reshape naturalphilosophical doctrines derived from his earlier Aristotelian paraphrases. Accordingly, Albert’s caveats, distinguishing the treatment of topics in physicis and in theologicis, are not abstract disciplinary borderlines but point out to his Dominican students that he will return to crucial matters of the peripatetic paraphrases, recontextualizing them in later works. This article illustrates such interdisciplinary dynamics by analyzing Albert’s commentary on Gen., 1, 20-23, the fifth day of creation, as discussed in STh., (...) II, xi, 60. Albert questions the seeming asymmetry arising from a single element, water, giving rise to two different outcomes: birds for the sublunar sky and reptiles for the earth. The arguments put forth by opponents and Albert’s solution draw upon earlier natural-philosophical works of his, namely De animalibus, De vegetabilibus, and De sensu et sensatu. Notably, Albert reuses his doctrine of humiditates in living bodies and generative processes (such as humidum seminale, humidum vaporativum, humidum spirans, humidum manens). Additionally, Albert analyzes the processes of subtiliatio and digestio, which transform siccum terreum into the matter required for the formation of animate bodies. (shrink)

Today, the persistence of infantile attitudes into adulthood seems to have become a way of life associated with enjoyment and the renunciation of social obligations. Contemporary society, crossed by the emotional culture of Social Media, favors the example of parents who are friends with their children, of teachers who are enemies of their parents and of young people who are far from authority and traditional morality. Distances between parents and children and between teachers and pupils are eliminated. Today's adolescent is (...) represented with the image of Narcissus because within the affective family he grows up with the idea that success is the goal for achieving happiness and personal satisfaction. What future prospects can you imagine for young people? How to tackle adult frailty? The pedagogical debate could reflect on new educational systems that concern the affective and relational dimension of young people and the orientation skills of adults. By accepting the new needs of young people, adults could carry out that progressive process of affectivity, the acceptance of new educational, affective and relational functions. (shrink)

This essay examines the biblical discourse on animals in Job 38-41, as interpreted by Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas in their 13th-century biblical commentaries. In God’s first reply to Job twelve species of animals are introduced and realistically described, including accurate details of their behavior. Subsequently, chapters 40 and 41 introduce two more complex animals, Behemoth and Leviathan, in which realistic and symbolic features intertwine. This peculiarity of the book of Job – long sequences dedicated to descriptions of animals (...) – allows to investigate to what extent and how the availability of Aristotelian zoology, whose study was prescribed in the Dominican program promoted and practiced by Albert himself, became an instrument for a renewed biblical exegesis, different from the allegorical and theological moralizing hitherto prevailing in the Christian tradition of commentaries on Job. (shrink)

The article discusses two bioart projects that bring the symbolically core human substances of blood, sweat and tears into technologically mediated relationships with plants and fungi to explore human kinship with other species: Tarah Rhoda’s BS&T (short for ‘blood, sweat and tears’) and OurGlass, and Saša Spačal’s MycoMythologies: Patterning. The article analyses the art projects through the lens of the molecular gaze and different perspectives on kinning, bringing anthropological conceptualizations of kinship together with Haraway’s pathways to connect with other species. (...) How can bioart use technologies to explore interspecies kinship through a molecular gaze? And may such artworks contribute to the toning down of human exceptionality in the face of a precarious future? We find that artworks providing a molecular gaze on interspecies biological processes may risk a decontextualized approach to complex relational processes but may also create new visions of filiation even with biological organisms imagined to be genetically distant from humans, thus spurring awareness of the fragile interrelationships among species. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS 145 Luther on Thomas Aquinas: The Angelic Doctor in the Thought of the Reformer. By DENIS R. JANZ. Veroffentlichungen des Instituts fiir Europiiische Geschichte Mainz, Abt. Religionsgeschichte, Bd. 140. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1989. Pp. ii + 124. DM 38 {cloth). As Denis Janz, specialist in the late medieval context of Luther's thought (Luther and Late Medieval Thomism, 1983), points out in the "Prospectus," a study of (...) Luther's understanding of Thomas has an inherent appeal, for, " rightly or wrongly, Thomas and Luther are inevitably regarded as the standard-bearers of Roman Catholicism and Protestantism" {p. 1). The recent completion of the necessary critical indices has made the task possible, and the result is a fine and necessary contribution to the work of all scholars interested in the thought of these two pivotal Christian thinkers. The method of Janz is straightforward: assemble the references to Thomas in Luther's works, organize them into appropriate categories, exegete their meanings, and discern important tendencies or perspectives common to these texts. Then "the accuracy of Luther's understanding and the cogency of his critique " can be evaluated from the perspective of twentieth cenrtury historical knowledge {p. 2). Janz recognizes that there are significant hermeneutical difficulties inherent in such a study and that any evaluation " may well imply a notion of history as progress, perhaps even a confidence in the intellectual superiority of modernity over the past " (p. 3). The result bears out the soundness of his approach. Chapter I examines "Luther on the Person of Thomas." Luther, sharing in and contributing to his time's distinctive theological polemic, had no shortage of epithets for Thomas, from " Sophist " to " beggarly paunch " {p. 4). The remarkable thing is the surprising number of complimentary things he has to say. At different times of his career Luther referred to Thomas as " this holy man " or " a man of ' great genius '... woefully misunderstood " {p. 5). A most interesting example is the different uses he makes of a story of Thomas's struggle with despair when near death, when Thomas faced his Anfechtung by holding the Bible and saying "I believe what is in this book" (p. 8). Sometimes Luther cites it as an example of the weakness of implicit faith; but other times he makes no critical comment on Thomas, and the story implies the victory of faith over despair. These different uses show the ambiguity of Luther's attitude toward Thomas as a person, and what in balance seems to be " grudging respect " for an " example of how great persons can at the same time be seriously mistaken " (p. 10). 146 BOOK REVIEWS Chapter U, which comprises the bulk of the hook, carefully examines the substantive issues on which Luther mentions and responds to Thomas: experience, the use of Aristotle, Scripture, penance and indulgences, the Lord's Supper, monasticism, justification, law, baptism, angels, papal authority, purgatory, and the veneration of images. On some of these issues Janz sees only a minor critique of Thomas by Luther and sometimes little real difference between their positions. Both Luther and Thomas give primacy to the literal sense of Scripture, and "both teach that the Church and theology stand under the authority of Scripture" (p. 30). On this question Luther's critique has more to do with the Thomists than Thomas. In regard to penance and indulgences Luther criticizes Thomas's view, though here again there is distortion of Thomas by the Thomists, which Luther correctly suspects (pp. 44-45). Though Luther disagrees with Thomas's understanding of the Lord's Supper, he feels Thomas was entitled to his opinion; what he cannot bear is how Thomas has been raised " to the level of an infallible teacher," with his opinions transformed "into articles of faith" (p. 48). Justification, the heart of Luther's thought, is "a relatively insignificant issue " in his critique of Thomas, as Luther eventually comes to understand better the key place Thomas gave grace (pp. 60, 61). Luther sees Christ as the " abrogation " of the law and criticizes Thomas for not seeing it this way; however, this is a linguistic misunderstanding of Thomas, probably based on Gabriel Bicl's teaching, so that Thomas and Luther are... (shrink)

Digital technologies can be an asset to serving communities and societies through data analytics and management to achieve greater good. However, care must be exercised in that societies without digital access do not get overlooked or, worse, face abuses of privacy disclosure or exploitation. Regulations exist to prevent this happening, but ethical considerations are important in deciding in what is allowable and what is not. The further risk of artificial intelligence where computers start to make autonomous decisions and the vulnerabilities (...) we are exposed to is considered. Steps are proposed to develop an ethics-based digital strategy and how to mitigate cyber risk. (shrink)

In 2022, the Camden Coalition Medical-Legal Partnership began providing civil and criminal legal services to substance use disorder patients at Cooper University Health Care’s Center for Healing. This paper discusses early findings from the program’s first year on the efficacy of the provision of criminal-legal representation, which is uncommon among MLPs and critical for this patient population. The paper concludes with takeaways for other programs providing legal services in an addiction medicine setting.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 41.3 (2003) 414-415 [Access article in PDF] Gregorio Piaia, editor. La presenza dell'aristotelismo padovano nella filosofia della prima modernità: Atti del Colloquio internazionale in memoria di Charles B. Schmitt (Padova, 4-6 settembre 2000). Rome and Padua: Antenore, 2002. Pp. 488. Paper, € 38.00.Dedicated to the impact of Paduan Aristotelianism on early modern philosophy, this volume, edited by Gregorio Piaia, presents the proceedings of (...) a much-anticipated conference held in memory of Charles B. Schmitt at the University of Padua on September 4-6, 2000, jointly co-sponsored by Padua's Department of Philosophy, the Centro per la Storia dell'Università di Padova, the Seminar für Philosophie und Geistesgeschichte der Renaissance of the University of Munich, the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Natural Philosophy of the Catholic University of Nijmegen, and the Foundation for Intellectual History of London. It was indeed Schmitt's merit (one thinks first and foremost of The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy he edited in 1988) to have revised in the most critical and convincing way the image historians of philosophy had of Renaissance Aristotelianism as a backward-looking movement unable to express any vitality, to say nothing about its influence on later philosophers. Obviously, the Paduan Aristotelians did not achieve the same impact as Descartes and they did not produce the sharp reactions the libertins provoked. Yet, their impact was substantial, as many contributors show, with a concentration in the north of central Europe, i.e., in Germany and in Scandinavia.The volume opens with a paper by Stefano Perfetti on the physician, statesman, and philosopher Giulio Cesare Scaligero, who belongs among the Paduan Aristotelians because he received his education at Padua. The works of the "pure Aristotelian" (following the definition of this movement provided by Wilhelm Risse) Giacomo Zabarella, surely the most celebrated of the group, is the subject of papers by Francesco Bottin, Ian McLean, Sachicko Kusukawa, Daniel A. Di Liscia, Heikki Mikkeli, Merio Scattola, David A. Lines, Antonino Poppi, Paul Richard Blum, Giovanna Varani, Gregorio Piaia, and Giuseppe Micheli. They have looked into the impact of Zabarella's philosophy, logic, and theory of demonstration (the celebrated regressus) in contexts such as Lutheran Germany and Scandinavia, Reformed Germany and Holland, and Catholic Italy and France during the impressive span from the publication of Melanchthon's Dialectic in 1520 to that of Kant's Critique of Judgment in 1790. Less known today, but quite influential until 1648, was the "eclectic Aristotelian" (to use Schmitt's phrase) and colleague (and antagonist) of Zabarella, Francesco Piccolomini, whom Jill Kraye, Heikki Mikkeli, Merio Scattola, and David A. Lines consider in their papers. Piccolomini became famous for his mediation between Aristotelianism and Platonism. He revived "the soul of Aristotle and the spirit of Plato," as a contemporary said. Pierre Bayle and Jakob Brucker highlighted Piccolomini's efforts to combine Aristotelian and Platonic philosophy; and modern scholars have identified many [End Page 414] Platonizing elements in his Aristotelianism. In the hope of producing a more accurate and complete picture of eclectic Aristotelianism within the context of Renaissance moral philosophy, Jill Kraye's paper explores a neglected side of Piccolomini's ethical thought, namely his careful account of Stoicism. Finally, a group of papers with a more general scope needs to be mentioned, namely Heinrich C. Kuhn's survey of works of Paduan Aristotelians in German libraries, Charles H. Lohr's paper on the sources of Calvinist theories of science, and Ekhard Kessler's paper on the relation of logic to hermeneutics. As a last remark, of the seventeen contributions to this important volume, which no research library should be without, eight are in Italian, six in English, and three in German. Riccardo Pozzo Università di Verona... (shrink)

Industry-funded religious liberty legal groups have sought to undermine healthcare policy and law while simultaneously attacking the rights of sexual and gender minorities. Whereas past scholarship has tracked religiously-affiliated healthcare providers’ growing political power and attendant transformations to legal doctrine, our account emphasizes the political donors and visionaries who have leveraged religious providers and the U.S. healthcare system’s delegated structure to transform social policy and bureaucratic agencies more generally.

Both the concept of a Darwinian tree of life (TOL) and the possibility of its accurate reconstruction have been much criticized. Criticisms mostly revolve around the extensive occurrence of lateral gene transfer (LGT), instances of uptake of complete organisms to become organelles (with the associated subsequent gene transfer to the nucleus), as well as the implications of more subtle aspects of the biological species concept. Here we argue that none of these criticisms are sufficient to abandon the valuable TOL concept (...) and the biological realities it captures. Especially important is the need to conceptually distinguish between organismal trees and gene trees, which necessitates incorporating insights of widely occurring LGT into modern evolutionary theory. We demonstrate that all criticisms, while based on important new findings, do not invalidate the TOL. After considering the implications of these new insights, we find that the contours of evolution are best represented by a TOL. (shrink)

“The Bodhisattva’s Practice of Enlightenment” interprets a Los Angeles Times newspaper opinion piece by Thich Nhat Hanh as a contemporary image of enlightenment with far-reaching implications. Written in response to the brutal police beating of Rodney King and not intended for a Buddhist audience, this brief newspaper article nevertheless provides glimpses into the contemporary meaning of enlightenment. The chapter considers Thich Nhat Hanh’s comments in relation to the basic principles of Buddhist ethics before turning to the Vimalakīrti sūtra, a classical (...) Mahayana Buddhist scripture, to extend an understanding of what it would mean to experience the world through an in-depth awareness of “no-self.” Dwelling on the bodhisattva’s effort to cultivate generosity of spirit, the chapter considers the kinds of human relations that Thich Nhat Hanh’s sense of enlightenment entails. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 41.3 (2003) 414-415 [Access article in PDF] Gregorio Piaia, editor. La presenza dell'aristotelismo padovano nella filosofia della prima modernità: Atti del Colloquio internazionale in memoria di Charles B. Schmitt (Padova, 4-6 settembre 2000). Rome and Padua: Antenore, 2002. Pp. 488. Paper, € 38.00.Dedicated to the impact of Paduan Aristotelianism on early modern philosophy, this volume, edited by Gregorio Piaia, presents the proceedings of (...) a much-anticipated conference held in memory of Charles B. Schmitt at the University of Padua on September 4-6, 2000, jointly co-sponsored by Padua's Department of Philosophy, the Centro per la Storia dell'Università di Padova, the Seminar für Philosophie und Geistesgeschichte der Renaissance of the University of Munich, the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Natural Philosophy of the Catholic University of Nijmegen, and the Foundation for Intellectual History of London. It was indeed Schmitt's merit (one thinks first and foremost of The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy he edited in 1988) to have revised in the most critical and convincing way the image historians of philosophy had of Renaissance Aristotelianism as a backward-looking movement unable to express any vitality, to say nothing about its influence on later philosophers. Obviously, the Paduan Aristotelians did not achieve the same impact as Descartes and they did not produce the sharp reactions the libertins provoked. Yet, their impact was substantial, as many contributors show, with a concentration in the north of central Europe, i.e., in Germany and in Scandinavia.The volume opens with a paper by Stefano Perfetti on the physician, statesman, and philosopher Giulio Cesare Scaligero, who belongs among the Paduan Aristotelians because he received his education at Padua. The works of the "pure Aristotelian" (following the definition of this movement provided by Wilhelm Risse) Giacomo Zabarella, surely the most celebrated of the group, is the subject of papers by Francesco Bottin, Ian McLean, Sachicko Kusukawa, Daniel A. Di Liscia, Heikki Mikkeli, Merio Scattola, David A. Lines, Antonino Poppi, Paul Richard Blum, Giovanna Varani, Gregorio Piaia, and Giuseppe Micheli. They have looked into the impact of Zabarella's philosophy, logic, and theory of demonstration (the celebrated regressus) in contexts such as Lutheran Germany and Scandinavia, Reformed Germany and Holland, and Catholic Italy and France during the impressive span from the publication of Melanchthon's Dialectic in 1520 to that of Kant's Critique of Judgment in 1790. Less known today, but quite influential until 1648, was the "eclectic Aristotelian" (to use Schmitt's phrase) and colleague (and antagonist) of Zabarella, Francesco Piccolomini, whom Jill Kraye, Heikki Mikkeli, Merio Scattola, and David A. Lines consider in their papers. Piccolomini became famous for his mediation between Aristotelianism and Platonism. He revived "the soul of Aristotle and the spirit of Plato," as a contemporary said. Pierre Bayle and Jakob Brucker highlighted Piccolomini's efforts to combine Aristotelian and Platonic philosophy; and modern scholars have identified many [End Page 414] Platonizing elements in his Aristotelianism. In the hope of producing a more accurate and complete picture of eclectic Aristotelianism within the context of Renaissance moral philosophy, Jill Kraye's paper explores a neglected side of Piccolomini's ethical thought, namely his careful account of Stoicism. Finally, a group of papers with a more general scope needs to be mentioned, namely Heinrich C. Kuhn's survey of works of Paduan Aristotelians in German libraries, Charles H. Lohr's paper on the sources of Calvinist theories of science, and Ekhard Kessler's paper on the relation of logic to hermeneutics. As a last remark, of the seventeen contributions to this important volume, which no research library should be without, eight are in Italian, six in English, and three in German. Riccardo Pozzo Università di Verona... (shrink)

The paper investigates the video game discourse of the Russian state media from 2011 to 2015. Critical discourse analysis serves as a methodological framework for this work, and Foucault’s power/knowledge model is used to explain the logic behind the «grotesque discourses». In the Russian press, video games are described as an instance of inculcation, provoking overintense emotions and forcing individuals to commit symbolic acts impossible from the standpoint of “normal” pedagogy. The paper problematizes the mythologization of violence in video games (...) and identifies the main tropes used to establish the connection between video games and violence (murders) as “natural” and “obvious”. Particular attention is paid to the publications of Aleksandr Minkin, a reporter at “Moskovskij Komsomolets” (“Moscow Komsomol Member”) and one of the most prominent critics of video games, as well as to the media coverage of the first school shooting in Russia (shooting at school № 263 in 2014). It is shown that video games are used in the media discourse as an explanatory principle that allows a shift from the crime to the criminal, to those acts which reveal moral depravity or psychological disorder, and those circumstances which foster criminalism. Pointing to the games helps restore the “normal” connection between social and moral qualities, explaining the crime committed by an honours student from a “good family” as being the result of the depictions of violence in video games affecting the child’s psyche. Video games are also described as a factor in shaping the “digital generation” or “generation of gamers” — odd and politically dangerous. The dangers that games create for both gamers and society in general (the non-distinction between the “real” and the “virtual”, the illusion of a “possible restart”) allow the journalists and experts to insist on strengthening measures of supervision and protection, and expanding legal and medical control. (shrink)

The article proposes a new approach to understanding gamification. Its feature lies in taking into account the criticism expressed against gamifi­cation to date. The article examines in detail the history of gamification, it is shown that at its first stage (before 2015) approaches oriented towards extrinsic motivation prevailed, while at the second stage (after 2015) ap­proaches oriented towards intrinsic motivation began to prevail. Ignoring this point just leads to the fact that the criticism expressed in the early 2010s (its main (...) idea was that gamification is a new form of exploitation and manipulation) seems relevant today, although in fact it is no longer so. But it’s not just about rethinking criticism, it’s also about taking a fresh look at gamification itself, which has continued (since 2011) to be defined as «the use of game design elements in non-game contexts”. And this is even despite the fact that such a definition no longer corresponds to the current situation. First, it is confusing by mixing gamification with seri­ous games. Second, it is confusing by limiting gamification to non-game contexts. Third, it is silent about why gamification is used. Fourth, it does not explain exactly which elements are being implemented. Alternatively, we propose our own definition: gamification is a methodology for using metagame elements and mechanics to correct human behavior by creating a favorable emotional background. (shrink)

Developing an intellectualist account of skill, Stanley and Williamson define skill as a kind of disposition to action-guiding knowledge. The present paper challenges their definition of skill. While we don’t dispute that skill may consist of a cognitive, a dispositional, and an action-guiding component, we argue that Stanley and Williamson’s account of each component is problematic. In the first section, we argue, against Stanley and Williamson, that the cognitive component of skill is not a case of propositional knowledge-wh, which is (...) typically indexical. In the second section, we seek to show that Stanley and Williamson face difficulties in arguing for a generic claim about skill as a kind of disposition, and they fail to defend intellectualism about skill based on the dispositional account. In the third section we argue that Stanley and Williamson need a more detailed account of the action-guiding aspect of skill to avoid several difficulties, including a threat of a regress. We close with some lessons for the debate over intellectualism and anti-intellectualism about skill. (shrink)

A growing body of research suggests that scientific and religious beliefs are often held and justified in different ways. In three studies with 707 participants, we examine the distinctive profiles of beliefs in these domains. In Study 1, we find that participants report evidence and explanatory considerations (making sense of things) as dominant reasons for beliefs across domains. However, cuing the religious domain elevates endorsement of nonscientific justifications for belief, such as ethical considerations (e.g., believing it encourages people to be (...) good), affiliation (what loved ones believe), and intuition (what feels true in one's heart). Study 2 replicates these differences with specific scientific and religious beliefs held with equal confidence, and documents further domain differences in beliefs’ personal importance, openness to revision, and perceived objectivity. Study 3 replicates these differences, further finding that counter‐consensus beliefs about contentious science topics (such as climate change and vaccination) often have properties resembling religious beliefs, while counter‐religious beliefs about religion (e.g., “There is no God”) have properties that more closely resemble beliefs about science. We suggest that beliefs are held and justified within coherent epistemic frameworks, with individuals using different frameworks in different contexts and domains. (shrink)

The archive produces a linear time that reaches towards ‘what could be’ by asserting ‘what has been’, providing us reassurance of our existence through the assertion of a reliably past past. But the Anthropocene is an era of uncontained material ramifications, where the past juts into the future and temporality warps as change accelerates unexpectedly. As an ecological and geologic epoch, documentation of the Anthropocene inherently has a relationship to natural history museums and archives. These institutions, however, troublingly rest on (...) what Elaine Graham calls ‘ontological hygiene’ – the separateness of the human subject from ‘nature’. The Anthropocene however, challenges the western post-Enlightenment binary of man vs. nature, as it (supposedly) naturalizes humans into an earth systems force. As such, documentation of this epoch might resist ontological sanitation. This article outlines an artistic research practice to create artefacts of the Anthropocene – one that invites material idiosyncrasies, objects-in-becoming, ephemerality, and decay. I suggest that artistic ‘anarchices’ prioritize process over objects, and resist linear and static representation in lieu of material, embodied and sensory artefacts. These include relational encounters with waste materials, reworked forms of ‘geology’, edible artefacts and multimedia works at landfills and feral sites. The anarchives are interpolated by a rejection of hegemonic logic, positivism and ‘objective’ truths about environmental phenomena; Situated, ambiguous and material knowledges are inwrought into the so-called Anthropocene (and any alternatives to this term). By focusing on waste as an analytical category, I explore some of the ontological breakdowns present in the Anthropocene and question how to unorder systems and disturb materiality. (shrink)

Kripke-Armstrongovim argumentom tvrdi se da branilac postojanja temporalnih delova materijalnih objekata ne može da utvrdi da li usamljeni homogeni disk sačinjen od kontinuirane materije rotira oko svoje ose ili miruje. Perdurantista ne može da razlikuje dve mogućnosti pozivajući se na različite trenutne brzine trenutnih temporalnih delova diska, zbog toga što bi time prekršio tezu hjumovske supervenijencije. U ovom radu ću, sledeći Džeremija Baterfilda, pokazati kako se na KripkeArmstrongov izazov može odgovoriti zadržavajući hjumovsku supervenijenciju: pozivanjem na različite trenutne brzine netrenutnih temporalnih (...) delova Kripke-Armstrongovog usamljenog diska. (shrink)

Religious tolerance is a sociopolitical necessity. Social and political pressures alone cannot be expected to nurture a genuine attitude of religious tolerance; in the West, secular and religious documents rely on the concept of conscience for this nurture. In this essay I ask what claims people make on each other as they attempt to live in accordance with what they believe to be true and good. To answer this question, I examine the Pauline concept of conscience and argue that Paul (...) interpreted conscience through an ethic and theology of accommodation. (shrink)

Max Weber discussed Islam in various places in his sociology of religion, but there was no sustained or systematic commentary unlike his other work on the religions of China and India. What he did have to say about Islam was, even by the standards of his own analysis of value neutrality, judgmental. Subsequently his sociology of Islam has been criticized as Orientalist. While he provided positive interpretations of Protestant inner-worldly asceticism and Old Testament prophecy as radical and charismatic, his commentaries (...) on Islam were by contrast negative and critical. He regarded Islam as a warrior religion in which the salvation drive was turned away from the individual soul and the energy of the Muslim community was directed towards imperial conquest. His arguments did not for example provide a valid account of how Islam spread peacefully in South and South East Asia through Sufi traders. The article however notes an ironic justification for Weber’s analysis through the growth of urban ascetic piety in so-called post-Islam. Finally the article, turning away from Weber’s focus on economic ethics of the world religions, argues that Weber’s work is better understood as an ethical reflection on the perennial conflict between religion (the ethic of absolute ends) and politics (the ethics of responsibility). (shrink)

Two protechnology arguments, the “hopeful principle” and the “automatic escalator”, often used in bioethics, are identified and critically analysed in this paper. It is shown that the hopeful principle is closely related to the problematic precautionary principle, and the automatic escalator argument has close affinities to the often criticised empirical slippery slope argument. The hopeful principle is shown to be really hopeless as an argument, and automatic escalator arguments often lead nowhere when critically analysed. These arguments should therefore only be (...) used with great caution. (shrink)

Facsimile of miscellaneous Persian and Arabic texts in Mullā Ṣadrā's handwriting.