From Empédocle to Paul Celan, there have always been poets, artists whose works lead to the surpassing of the limits of meaning. They rub shoulders with absolute reality and get lost in it. On the other hand, there are those so-called "mad" mental patients who, in their insanity and delirium, desperately try to expel the symptom that strikes them. If, for the former, their works are based on inconsistencies that bring them to the extreme limit of tearing, for the latter, (...) it is on the contrary a matter of sealing the tear that is tearing them apart. (shrink)

L'art n'explique pas le monde, il en fait partie. Cet essai est un parti pris contre l'historicisme et contre l'idée d'une fin de l'art. Chaque oeuvre envisagée est un événement, une énigme, un "coup de dés". C'est en cela qu'elle échappe à toute détermination, à toute adaptation : l'art est sans pourquoi.

Conscious experience is one of the most difficult and thorny problems in psychological science. Its study has been neglected for many years, either because it was thought to be too difficult, or because the relevant evidence was thought to be poor. Bernard Baars suggests a way to specify empirical constraints on a theory of consciousness by contrasting well-established conscious phenomena - such as stimulus representations known to be attended, perceptual, and informative - with closely comparable unconscious ones - such (...) as stimulus representations known to be preperceptual, unattended, or habituated. Adducing data to show that consciousness is associated with a kind of global workplace in the nervous system, and that several brain structures are known to behave in accordance with his theory, Baars helps to clarify many difficult problems. (shrink)

info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion.

This article is extracted from a discussion between Camel Gupta, Jay Bernard and Sita Balani. We took as our starting point ‘Becoming visible: Black lesbian discussions’ (Carmen et al, 1984), featured in the 1984 special issue of Feminist Review on black feminism. Here, we reflect on the political, cultural and technological transformations of queer life since the publication of ‘Becoming visible’. The original discussion focused on questions of identity, safety, the public and the private, and the tensions between race (...) and sexuality. The discussants took personal and political risks to be active organisers. As the beneficiaries of that activism, we interrogate not only the broader ideas of race, sexuality and feminism, but critique some of the discussions circulating within our own ranks. We also consider our responsibility to follow our predecessors and to learn from their mistakes. We are more visible than ever, but at what price? What has been gained and lost? Beyond visibility, what is our responsibility? In an attempt to understand these questions we cover contemporary notions such as QTIPOC, monolithic whiteness and online activism. (shrink)

The goal of human life, according to Plato, Aristotle, and the Bible, is to become as much like god as possible. This book, written in vivid and lucid English, illuminates Greek philosophy by showing how it grows out of ancient Greek religion and how it compares to biblical religion.

Intentionalism is the claim that the phenomenological properties of a perceptual experience supervene on its intentional properties. The paper presents a counter-example to this claim, one that concerns visual grouping phenomenology. I argue that this example is superior to superficially similar examples involving grouping phenomenology offered by Peacocke (Sense and Content, Oxford: Oxford University Press), because the standard intentionalist responses to Peacocke’s examples cannot be extended to mine. If Intentionalism fails, it is impossible to reduce the phenomenology of an experience (...) to its content. (shrink)

Bernard Berofsky addresses that metaphysical picture directly.Nature's Challenge to Free Willoffers an original defense of Humean Compatibilism.

Ethical aspects of management control systems are attracting increasing attention among scholars and practitioners. Much of the work centers on their aims. We complement this scholarship by applying the ethical principle of “no harm,” i.e., non-maleficence, to examine how those aims are achieved. We illustrate this approach by exploring the effects of four MCS designs on job-related stress drawing on the differentiation of stress into two dimensions: a challenge and a threat dimension. Results from a lagged field-survey with 471 managers (...) and employees from the UK and the U.S. support key predictions and offer first insights into designing MCS based on a “no harm” ethics. Our study highlights the benefits of interdisciplinary research in business ethics and hopefully encourages more work on MCS from a perspective based on the non-maleficence principle. (shrink)

Later reprinted by Deborah Charles Publications (and not available from Amazon), this book expounds and comments on the application of Greimasian semiotics to a legal text, as found in the article by Greimas and Landowski in Greimas, Sémiotique et Sciences Sociales (1976), compares this with the semiotic presuppositions of Hart, Dworkin, MacCormick and Kelsen, and offers my own analysis of the implications of such semiotic analysis for legal theory, including some more recent radical non-positivist accounts.

The Metaphysical Society was founded in 1869 at the instigation of James Knowles (editor of the Contemporary Review and then of the Nineteenth Century) with a view to "collect, arrange, and diffuse Knowledge (whether objective or subjective) of mental and moral phenomena" (first resolution of the Society in April 1869). The Society was a private club which gathered together a latter-day clerisy. Building on the tradition of the Cambridge Apostles, they elected talented members from across the Victorian intellectual spectrum: Bishops, (...) one Cardinal, philosophers, men of science, literary figures, and politicians. The Society included in its 62 members prominent figures such as T. H. Huxley, William Gladstone, Walter Bagehot, Henry Edward Manning, John Ruskin and Alfred Lord Tennyson. The papers they produced are key primary sources which shed new light on the ideas of their authors on the burning subjects of the day, ranging from the existence and personality of God to the nature of conscience or the existence of the soul. They are a legacy of a period when intellectuals were wondering how, and what, to believe in a time of social change, spiritual crisis, and scientific progress. The dissolution of the Society in 1880 did not diminish the value of the papers: they illustrate a tradition of private, open discussion among famous men of the most widely varying views; they offer detailed insight into the evolution of the relationships between different schools of Victorian scientific and religious thought; and they bring to light heretofore under-represented points of conflict and harmony. All 95 papers are included, accompanied by introductions and scholarly notes that set each paper into their proper context. (shrink)

Physicians and patients rely on medical journals as trusted sources of medical information. Unfortunately, conflicts of interest may undermine the credibility of the medical literature. Improved policies and practices at journals should address the conflicts of interest of authors, reviewers, editors, and journals. Medical journals should manage and eliminate conflicts, not just improve the disclosure of financial relationships.

To mark the centenary of the 1910 to 1913 publication of the monumental Principia Mathematica by Alfred N. Whitehead and Bertrand Russell, this collection of fifteen new essays by distinguished scholars considers the influence and history of PM over the last hundred years.

I outline some of my work and results on my matter-gravity entanglement hypothesis, according to which the entropy of a closed quantum gravitational system is equal to the system’s matter-gravity entanglement entropy. The main arguments presented are: that this hypothesis is capable of resolving what I call the second-law puzzle, i.e. the puzzle as to how the entropy increase of a closed system can be reconciled with the asssumption of unitary time-evolution; that the black hole information loss puzzle may be (...) regarded as a special case of this second law puzzle and that therefore the same resolution applies to it; that the black hole thermal atmosphere puzzle can be resolved by adopting a radically different-from-usual description of quantum black hole equilibrium states, according to which they are total pure states, entangled between matter and gravity in such a way that the partial states of matter and gravity are each approximately thermal equilibrium states ; that the Susskind–Horowitz–Polchinski string-theoretic understanding of black hole entropy as the logarithm of the degeneracy of a long string cannot be quite correct but should be replaced by a modified understanding according to which it is the entanglement entropy between a long string and its stringy atmosphere, when in a total pure equilibrium state in a suitable box, which ) goes over, at strong-coupling, to a black hole in equilibrium with its thermal atmosphere. The modified understanding in is based on a general result, which I also describe, which concerns the likely state of a quantum system when it is weakly coupled to an energy-bath and the total state is a random pure state with a given energy. This result generalizes Goldstein et al.’s ‘canonical typicality’ result to systems which are not necessarily small. (shrink)

As media reports have made widely known, in November 2009, the ethics committee of St. Joseph’s Hospital in Phoenix, Arizona, permitted the abortion of an eleven-week-old fetus in order to save the life of its mother. This woman was suffering from acute pulmonary hypertension, which her doctors judged would prove fatal for both her and her previable child. The ethics committee believed abortion to be permitted in this case under the so-called principle of double effect, but Thomas J. Olmsted, the (...) bishop of Phoenix, disagreed with the committee and pronounced its chair, Sister Margaret McBride, excommunicated latae sententiae, “by the very commission of the act.” In this article, I take the much discussed Phoenix case as an occasion to subject the principle of double effect to another round of philosophical scrutiny. In particular, I examine the third condition of the principle in its textbook formulation, namely, that the evil effect in question may not be the means to the good effect. My argument, in brief, is that the textbook formulation of the principle does not withstand philosophical scrutiny. Nevertheless, in the end, I do not claim that we should then “do away” with the principle altogether. Instead, we do well to understand it within the context of casuistry, the tradition of moral reasoning from which it issued. (shrink)

The Prague Philosopher Bernard Bolzano (1781-1848) has long been admired for his groundbreaking work in mathematics: his rigorous proofs of fundamental theorems in analysis, his construction of a continuous, nowhere-differentiable function, his investigations of the infinite, and his anticipations of Cantor's set theory. He made equally outstanding contributions in philosophy, most notably in logic and methodology. One of the greatest mathematician-philosophers since Leibniz, Bolzano is now widely recognised as a major figure of nineteenth-century philosophy. Praised by Husserl as “one (...) of the greatest logicians of all times,” he has also been recognised by Michael Dummett as one of the first modern analytic philosophers and by Alberto Coffa as the founder of the “semantic tradition.” This volume contains English translations of the essay “On the Mathematical Method,” a concise introduction to Bolzano’s logic and philosophy of mathematics, as well as substantial selections from his correspondence with Franz Exner, Professor of Philosophy at the Charles University in Prague in the 1830s and 40s. It will be of interest to students of Austrian philosophy, the development of analytic philosophy, the philosophy of language, and the history and philosophy of logic and mathematics. (shrink)

This book reviews the classical schools of jurisprudence with particular reference to their linguistic presuppositions, and summarises an alternative account based on Paris school semiotics. Detailed ToC available from linked web page. NOT available from Amazon.

Bernard Boxill has bought together eighteen contemporary articles to explore the nature of race and racism, and their far-reaching social and political implications. Both highly contested ideas, this new book covers a wide variety of viewpoints that make clear that the way we resolve them will determine whether we judge controversial social policies like affirmative action, racial profiling for potential criminals and current immigration policies to be justified and wise.

Après avoir présenté une conception radicale des recherches participatives, ce texte montre que les savoirs produits dans un tel cadre sont de nature hybride et peuvent être qualifiés de transdisciplinaires, au sens fort de ce qualificatif qui souligne que ces savoirs vont au-delà de toute catégorisation de savoirs constitués. Cette transdisciplinarité forte pose la question de la vérité et de l’objectivité des énoncés ainsi produits. La réponse à cette double question conditionne à la fois l’excellence épistémique et la pertinence sociale (...) de ces énoncés, qui ont pour vocation de déboucher sur des actions aptes à répondre aux attentes cognitives et sociales de toutes les parties prenantes. Une telle vocation implique une conduite inédite de l’évaluation des savoirs impliqués, du point de vue de leur pertinence épistémique comme de celui de leur pertinence sociale. (shrink)

This book examines the question of what parental obligations procreators incur by bringing children into being. Prusak argues that parents, as procreators, have obligations regarding future children that constrain the liberty of would-be parents to do as they wish. Moreover, these obligations go beyond simply respecting a child’s rights. He addresses in turn the ethics of adoption, child support, gamete donation, surrogacy, prenatal genetic enhancement, and public responsibility for children.

Le problème posé par la pluralité des religions au sein des sociétés comme problème politique n'est-il pas, plutôt que celui des rapports entre pouvoirs religieux et politiques, celui du type d'unité qu'il convient de réaliser au sein de la société et de la manière de le réaliser politiquement? Une pensée éclaire d'un jour nouveau cette interrogation intempestive : celle de Stanislas Breton, prêtre de la congrégation des passionistes. Une pensée qui puise paradoxalement dans la lecture de Spinoza son idée régulatrice (...) : "l'essence éthique du théologique implique le politique, le politique comme pouvoir implique la détermination du théologique comme éthique". (shrink)

Until today, an externally imposed epistemological paradigm is dominant in most educational curricula at universities in Africa. Despite ongoing Eurocentrism and Western hegemony in mainstream agricultural trainings in Africa, Indigenous knowledge on agriculture still exists: it has been preserved for generations by farmers and wise elders in rural communities who often are knowledge authorities on African agrarian Indigenous knowledge, values and practices. An imposed epistemological paradigm on the African continent reinforces epistemic injustice by dominating and ignoring Indigenous African ways of (...) doing and knowing, which is deeply dehumanizing. Inspired by Paulo Freire’s ‘humanising pedagogy’ and Mogobe Ramose’s call for mothofatso in human relations, we explore a re-humanising pedagogy for African agrarian philosophy, which addresses the following questions: Can African agrarian philosophy contribute to re-humanization by reviving and restoring Indigenous agricultural knowledge, values and practices? If so, what pedagogy and educational methods are appropriate? In search for answers to these questions, we reflect on a two-week educational program on an endogenous approach to community resilience in Ghana, as a pedagogy that is emerging. In doing so, the chapter is firmly rooted in African soil, both practically—through trainings in Ghana—and theoretically—through African agrarian philosophy. By connecting educational experiences with insights from theory, seven themes for a pedagogy for African agrarian philosophy come to the front: an African agrarian philosophy with memory; a dialogical student–teacher relation; the value of lived experiences; intergenerational and spiritual methods of education; relationality of human beings and Mother Earth; unity between theory and practice; critical consciousness about people’s rights. The thesis defended is that African agrarian philosophy is without relevance if it remains a theoretical exercise that is not developed and put to use with farmers, wise elders and youth in the communities. Instead, when combined with a re-humanising pedagogy, African agrarian philosophy can contribute to reconnecting and reviving African agricultural knowledge, values and practices, which subsequently contributes to transforming African food systems that heals the environment and produces enough food to feed communities. (shrink)

Au-dela des idees convenues, comment penser les fondements d'une crise sociale inscrite dans le temps long? La guerre civile perpetuelle evalue dans plusieurs domaines les ravages politiques de la philosophie de la modernite. Cette etude examine d'abord sa capacite a detruire a la racine la possibilite du lien social naturel, pour tenter par la suite de le recreer au moyen de divers artifices. Loin de se limiter au simple constat d'echec, l'originalite et la force de cet ouvrage resident dans l'analyse (...) des causes d'un processus logique qui tend a imposer sa violence intrinseque au coeur de la relation sociale. Avec les contributions de: Miguel Ayuso Torres, Guillaume Bernard, Jacques Bonnet, Danilo Castellano, Bernard Dumont, Gilles Dumont, Jose Miguel Gambra, Carlo Gambescia, Isabelle Huten, Aude de Kerros, Teodoro Katte Klitsche de la Grange, Marc de Launay, Pierre de Lauzun, Alain Mescheriakoff, Dalmacio Negro Pavon, Monica Papazu, Claude Polin, Christophe Reveillard, Giovanni Turco. (shrink)

Henri Maldiney est ancien élève de l’Ecole normale supérieure. Il fut prisonnier en Allemagne pendant la guerre. Il est un des représentants en France du courant philosophique de la phénoménologie. Ses champs de réflexion concernent la maladie mentale, l'art et, bien sûr la philosophie. Il a influencé nombre de psychiatres, de philosophes et d'artistes. La meilleure façon de proposer une introduction à la pensée de Henri Maldiney, c’est peut-être de faire partager une expérience personnelle de rencontre. Bernard Rigaud, en (...) travaillant sur différents sujets, a croisé et recroisé de façon régulière la pensée de ce philosophe. À chaque occasion, il a eu le sentiment d’être éclairé et inspiré. Partant des différentes modalités du mal-être, la pensée d’Henri Maldiney devient une pensée sur l’être. Mais comment penser ce qui est? Le philosophe nous conduit sur les voies de l’art, et sur les voies des dysfonctionnements, de la folie, de la dépression... (shrink)

The paper presents semantics for a subset of generics, so-called “characterizing sentences”. It is argued that claims about the relationship between the truth of characterizing sentences and claims about the distribution of properties among individuals can be viewed independently of considerations about logical form. Some extant approaches are presented and criticized, and a positive analysis of characterizing sentences in terms of normality is introduced and defended. The main innovation is that a notion of normality enters into the analysis in two (...) separate but connected places, not just one as competing accounts suggest. (shrink)

In this largely nontechnical book, eminent physicists and philosophers address the philosophical impact of recent advances in quantum physics. These are shown to shed new light on profound questions about realism, determinism, causality or locality. The participants contribute in the spirit of an open and honest discussion, reminiscent of the time when science and philosophy were inseparable. After the editors' introduction, the next chapter reveals the strangeness of quantum mechanics and the subsequent discussions examine our notion of reality. The spotlight (...) is then turned to the topic of decoherence. Bohm's theory is critically examined in two chapters, and the relational interpretation of quantum mechanics is likewise described and discussed. The penultimate chapter presents a proposal for resolving the measurement problem, and finally the topic of loop quantum gravity is presented by one of its founding fathers, Carlo Rovelli. The original presentations and discussions on which this volume is based took place under the auspices of the French "Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques". The book will appeal to everybody interested in knowing how our description of the world is impacted by the results of the most powerful and successful theory that physicists have ever built. (shrink)

The renowned Christian theologian Bernard Lonergan was also a professor, teaching courses on theological method at universities in Canada, the United States, and Italy. This volume records his lectures and teaching materials, thus preserving and elucidating his intellectual development between the publication of Insight in 1957 and Method in Theology in 1972. The present volume contains a record of the lectures delivered in 1962, 1964, and 1968. This is the most 'interactive' volume yet published in the Collected Works series. (...) The audio recordings of the 1962 and 1968 lectures are now available on the website www.bernardlonergan.com, as are PDF files of original papers from his 1964 institute at Georgetown. These lectures help to elucidate the development of Lonergan's ideas on such key notions as horizon, conversion, and meaning, as well as his evolving opinion on how best to divide theology into fields of specialization. (shrink)

Cet article étudie les notions de honte (αἰσχύνη) et de retenue (αἰδώς) dans la Stoa, les raisons pour lesquelles elles s’y trouvent opposées (la première comme passion, la seconde comme bon sentiment) et ce que la critique stoïcienne de la honte (définie comme peur de la mauvaise réputation) doit à l’origine à l’influence du cynisme sur Zénon. Dans un deuxième temps, l’auteur montre que la critique de la honte doit se comprendre dans le cadre plus large de la doctrine stoïcienne (...) de la διαστροφή ou perversion de la nature humaine, doctrine qui identifie l’influence du jugement de la foule (par l’intermédiaire de la pratique ordinaire du blâme et de l’éloge) comme l’une des deux principales sources de corruption de l’homme. Dans la dernière partie, l’auteur étudie le traitement des notions de honte ( pudor ) et de retenue ( reuerentia ) dans les Lettres à Lucilius 10 et 25 de Sénèque, où la honte est présentée comme une forme de contrainte positive à l’égard du non sage, contrainte qui doit toutefois ultimement s’effacer au profit de la retenue comprise comme respect de soi (de la raison) chez le sage. (shrink)

Most academics write in a dispassionate, third-person voice. That stylistic choice is so expected in academic contexts that when an evocative, first-person voice is used instead, it feels unsettling and out of place to many of us. But why should we react so negatively to such a subversion of expectations? Is it because of the subversion itself, or is it because of an inherent incompatibility between evocative writing and realist analytical traditions? In this paper I’ll show that the freedom of (...) first-person, evocative writing in autoethnography is a strength to be embraced rather than something to be avoided. I’ll further show how offering readers a more complete sensory understanding of experience and meaning isn’t incompatible with realist analytical traditions. I will do this through an exploration of my current research on childhood sexual abuse, which has inspired me to set aside my initial unease with evocative writing and embark on a journey from autoethnographic skeptic to advocate. (shrink)