I argue here that r. Van straaten's four modifications of f. Sommers' 'rule for enforcing ambiguity' are based upon a misunderstanding of the basis of the rule and a failure to see the spanning/predicability distinction. The effect is that none of van straaten's several counterexamples are telling against the rule. In place of van straaten's modifications I offer the following simple but important changes in the rule: the restriction of things to individuals and the reading of 'makes sense to predicate' (...) and similar phrases in terms of the spanning relation. (shrink)

This paper demonstrates the central role of the Socratic elenchus in the Sophist. In the first part, I defend the position that the Stranger describes the Socratic elenchus in the sixth division of the Sophist. In the second part, I show that the Socratic elenchus is actually used when the Stranger scrutinizes the accounts of being put forward by his predecessors. In the final part, I explain the function of the Socratic elenchus in the argument of the dialogue. By contrast (...) with standard scholarly interpretations, this way of reading the text provides all the puzzles about being (241c4–251a4) with a definite function in the dialogue. It also reveals that Plato’s methodology includes a plurality of method and is more continuous than what is often believed. (shrink)

I argue that, although Aristotle himself does not say it in so many words, the Phaedrus has a deep influence on the three books of Aristotle’s Rhetoric. I also show that this influence is not only negative, as some scholars believe, but that Aristotle draws and expands on some of the results and propositions of the Phaedrus. After demonstrating how influential the Phaedrus is for the Rhetoric, I return in my conclusion to the difference between the two works.

This article delves into Captain Samuel Alfred Warner’s dogged campaign to sell two inventions – his submersible mine and “long range” missile – to the British government in the 1840s and 1850s. Departing from a historiography that dismisses Warner as a fraudster, it clarifies how he managed to generate widespread interest in his weapons technologies for nearly twenty years. I therefore analyze three key elements of his self-promotion: his personal branding, his pitch, and his simultaneous embrace and rejection of publicity. (...) Neither elite nor highly educated, Warner ran up against a culture of “polite science” that distinguished disinterested practitioners from profit-minded schemers. To establish his credentials, he emphasized his practical maritime experience and represented himself as a martyr willing to bear the scorn of a disbelieving establishment. In pitching his devices, Warner capitalized on alarmism over border security and the integrity of the empire; he declared that they could hobble France’s modernizing navy and quickly end colonial conflicts. When skeptics began to fret over the proliferation of his destructive weapons, Warner flipped the script and lauded the threat of mutual annihilation as a deterrent to needless warfare. The issue of publicity, however, would ultimately be Warner’s professional undoing. Despite successful demonstrations, his clashes with official investigators and his refusal to disclose his chemical secrets led critics to dispute the originality of his discoveries. An examination of Warner’s self-promotional strategies, his fraught interactions with the British state, and the ambivalent public reaction to his contraptions provides insight into how scientific authority was acquired and lost in this period. (shrink)

The Limits of Cognition and the Shape of Being Based on the Thought of Karl Jaspers The article points out the elements of Karl Jaspers’ epistemological conception that cross out the possibility of a comprehensive account of being. The key issue here is the limits of cognition, which take the form of object cognition. The theme of limits points to the inadequacies of human thinking in the context of quantifiable and absolutist representations of reality. The impossibility of adequately grasping the (...) totality of reality will be illustrated here by means of the criticism Jaspers levelled at absolutising metaphysics. In connection with the description of the structure of cognition proposed by Jaspers, the article points out the conceptual proximity of the issue of worldview and metaphysics in the light of the thought of the cited author. (shrink)