Parue en 1994, l'impressionnante synthèse de Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch sur les femmes dans les sociétés africaines contemporaines est un livre pionnier dans l'historiographie française. S'appuyant sur une considérable bibliographie (notamment en anglais) et sur ses propres recherches, l'auteur dresse le bilan des connaissances accumulées depuis deux décennies et s'attache à établir une cartographie des incertitudes et des lacunes qui demeurent. « Ce qu'il importe de comprendre, c'es..

Je remercie tout d'abord chaleureusement l'équipe de rédaction de la revue Clio d'avoir pris avec ce numéro un double risque : celui d'aborder, avec les Africaines, un sujet quasi ignoré de l'historiographie francophone, et en sus d'avoir pour la première fois confié la responsabilité du thème à une historienne invitée ­ heureusement pilotée par l'une d'entre elles, Françoise Thébaud. L'histoire des femmes d'Afrique (par un raccourci curieux, les sciences sociales françaises réservent ..

In this unconventional article, Sarah Banet-Weiser, Rosalind Gill and Catherine Rottenberg conduct a three-way ‘conversation’ in which they all take turns outlining how they understand the relationship among postfeminism, popular feminism and neoliberal feminism. It begins with a short introduction, and then Ros, Sarah and Catherine each define the term they have become associated with. This is followed by another round in which they discuss the overlaps, similarities and disjunctures among the terms, and the article ends with how (...) each one understands the current mediated feminist landscape. (shrink)

The concept of mutual aid is central to the anarchist tradition, but also a source of controversy. This book’s intervention is to consider solidarity and mutual aid at the intersection of politics and biology, developing out of the work of Catherine Malabou.

Ohad Nachtomy restates the main points of “Plenitude and Compossibility” with admirable fidelity and economy. His proposed revisions, based on the distinction between incomplete and complete substances and on the mind-relativity of relations, are intriguing additions to his earlier paper in Studia Leibnitiana and deserve careful consideration. Some brief remarks on the context of the problem, will, I hope, help to set the stage for the assessment of our various views.

Ohad Nachtomy restates the main points of “Plenitude and Compossibility” with admirable fidelity and economy. His proposed revisions, based on the distinction between incomplete and complete substances and on the mind-relativity of relations, are intriguing additions to his earlier paper in Studia Leibnitiana and deserve careful consideration. Some brief remarks on the context of the problem, will, I hope, help to set the stage for the assessment of our various views.

In the 17th century the microscope opened up a new world of observation, and, according to author Catherine Wilson, profoundly revised the thinking of scientists and philosophers alike. Focusing on the earliest forays into microscopical research, from 1620 to 1720, this book provides us with both a compelling technological history and a lively assessment of the new knowledge.

Catherine Zuckert examines the work of five key philosophical figures from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries through the lens of their own decidedly postmodern readings of Plato. She argues that Nietzsche, Heidegger, Gadamer, Strauss, and Derrida, convinced that modern rationalism had exhausted its possibilities, all turned to Plato in order to rediscover the original character of philosophy and to reconceive the Western tradition as a whole. Zuckert's artful juxtaposition of these seemingly disparate bodies of thought furnishes a synoptic view, (...) not merely of these individual thinkers, but of the broad postmodern landscape as well. The result is a brilliantly conceived work that offers an innovative perspective on the relation between the Western philosophical tradition and the evolving postmodern enterprise. (shrink)

Faced with the difficult task of discerning Plato’s true ideas from the contradictory voices he used to express them, scholars have never fully made sense of the many incompatibilities within and between the dialogues. In the magisterial _Plato’s Philosophers_, Catherine Zuckert explains for the first time how these prose dramas cohere to reveal a comprehensive Platonic understanding of philosophy. To expose this coherence, Zuckert examines the dialogues not in their supposed order of composition but according to the dramatic order (...) in which Plato indicates they took place. This unconventional arrangement lays bare a narrative of the rise, development, and limitations of Socratic philosophy. In the drama’s earliest dialogues, for example, non-Socratic philosophers introduce the political and philosophical problems to which Socrates tries to respond. A second dramatic group shows how Socrates develops his distinctive philosophical style. And, finally, the later dialogues feature interlocutors who reveal his philosophy’s limitations. Despite these limitations, Zuckert concludes, Plato made Socrates the dialogues’ central figure because Socrates raises the fundamental human question: what is the best way to live? Plato’s dramatization of Socratic imperfections suggests, moreover, that he recognized the apparently unbridgeable gap between our understandings of human life and the nonhuman world. At a time when this gap continues to raise questions—about the division between sciences and the humanities and the potentially dehumanizing effects of scientific progress—Zuckert’s brilliant interpretation of the entire Platonic corpus offers genuinely new insights into worlds past and present. (shrink)

Recent extensions of mechanistic explanation into psychology suggest that cognitive models are only explanatory insofar as they map neatly onto, and serve as scaffolding for more detailed neural models. Filling in those neural details is what these accounts take the integration of cognitive psychology and neuroscience to mean, and they take this process to be seamless. Critics of this view have given up on cognitive models possibly explaining mechanistically in the course of arguing for cognitive models having explanatory value independent (...) of how well they align with neural mechanisms. We can have things both ways, however. The problem with seamless integration accounts is their seamlessness, not that they take cognitive models to be mechanistic. A non-componential view of mechanisms allows for cognitive and neural models that cross cut one another, and for cognitive models that don’t decompose into parts. I illustrate the inadequacy of seamless accounts of integration by contrasting how “filter” models of attention in psychology and of sodium channels in neuroscience developed; by questioning whether the mappings generated by neuroimaging subtraction studies achieve integration; and by reinterpreting the evidence for cognitive models of memory having been successfully integrated with neural models. I argue that the integrations we can realistically expect are more partial, patchy, and full of loose threads than the mosaic unity Craver describes. (shrink)

Philosophy long sought to set knowledge on a firm foundation, through derivation of indubitable truths by infallible rules. For want of such truths and rules, the enterprise foundered. Nevertheless, foundationalism's heirs continue their forbears' quest, seeking security against epistemic misfortune, while their detractors typically espouse unbridled coherentism or facile relativism. Maintaining that neither stance is tenable, Catherine Elgin devises a via media between the absolute and the arbitrary, reconceiving the nature, goals, and methods of epistemology. In Considered Judgment, she (...) argues for a reconception that takes reflective equilibrium as the standard of rational acceptability. A system of thought is in reflective equilibrium when its components are reasonable in light of one another, and the account they comprise is reasonable in light of our antecedent convictions about the subject it concerns. Many epistemologists now concede that certainty is a chimerical goal. But they continue to accept the traditional conception of epistemology's problematic. Elgin suggests that in abandoning the quest for certainty we gain opportunities for a broader epistemological purview--one that comprehends the arts and does justice to the sciences. She contends that metaphor, fiction, emotion, and exemplification often advance understanding in science as well as in art. The range of epistemology is broader and more variegated than is usually recognized. Tenable systems of thought are neither absolute nor arbitrary. Although they afford no guarantees, they are good in the way of belief. (shrink)

This edited volume of 13 new essays aims to turn past discussions of natural kinds on their head. Instead of presenting a metaphysical view of kinds based largely on an unempirical vantage point, it pursues questions of kindedness which take the use of kinds and activities of kinding in practice as significant in the articulation of them as kinds. The book brings philosophical study of current and historical episodes and case studies from various scientific disciplines to bear on natural kinds (...) as traditionally conceived of within metaphysics. Focusing on these practices reveals the different knowledge-producing activities of kinding and processes involved in natural kind use, generation, and discovery. -/- Specialists in their field, the esteemed group of contributors use diverse empirically responsive approaches to explore the nature of kindhood. This groundbreaking volume presents detailed case studies that exemplify kinding in use. Newly written for this volume, each chapter engages with the activities of kinding across a variety of disciplines. Chapter topics include the nature of kinds, kindhood, kinding, and kind-making in linguistics, chemical classification, neuroscience, gene and protein classification, colour theory in applied mathematics, homology in comparative biology, sex and gender identity theory, memory research, race, extended cognition, symbolic algebra, cartography, and geographic information science. -/- The volume seeks to open up an as-yet unexplored area within the emerging field of philosophy of science in practice, and constitutes a valuable addition to the disciplines of philosophy and history of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. -/- Contributions from a diverse group of established and junior scholars in the fields of Philosophy and History and Philosophy of Science including Hasok Chang, Jordi Cat, Sally Haslanger, Joyce C. Havstad, Catherine Kendig, Bernhard Nickel, Josipa Petrunic, Samuli Pöyhönen, Thomas A. C. Reydon, Quayshawn Spencer, Jackie Sullivan, Michael Wheeler, and Rasmus Grønfeldt Winther. (shrink)

Introduction: Platonic dramatology -- The political and philosophical problems. Using pre-Socratic philosophy to support political reform: the Athenian stranger ; Plato's Parmenides: Parmenides' critique of Socrates and Plato's critique of Parmenides ; Becoming Socrates ; Socrates interrogates his contemporaries about the noble and good -- Paradigms of philosophy. Socrates' positive teaching ; Timaeus-Critias: completing or challenging Socratic political philosophy? ; Socratic practice -- The trial and death of Socrates. The limits of human intelligence ; The Eleatic challenge ; The trial (...) and death of Socrates -- Conclusion: Why Plato made Socrates his hero. (shrink)

But in this book, Catherine Malabou proposes a more radical meaning for plasticity, one that not only adapts itself to existing circumstances, but forms a ...

Catherine Rowett presents an in depth study of Plato's Meno, Republic and Theaetetus and offers both a coherent argument that the project in which Plato was engaging has been widely misunderstood and misrepresented, and detailed new readings of particular thorny issues in the interpretation of these classic texts.

There is a vast literature within philosophy of mind that focuses on artificial intelligence, but hardly mentions methodological questions. There is also a growing body of work in philosophy of science about modeling methodology that hardly mentions examples from cognitive science. Here these discussions are connected. Insights developed in the philosophy of science literature about the importance of idealization provide a way of understanding the neural implausibility of connectionist networks. Insights from neurocognitive science illuminate how relevant similarities between models and (...) targets are picked out, how modeling inferences are justified, and the metaphysical status of models. (shrink)

Experimental investigations of cross-cultural music perception and cognition reported during the past decade are described. As globalization and Western music homogenize the world musical environment, it is imperative that diverse music and musical contexts are documented. Processes of music perception include grouping and segmentation, statistical learning and sensitivity to tonal and temporal hierarchies, and the development of tonal and temporal expectations. The interplay of auditory, visual, and motor modalities is discussed in light of synchronization and the way music moves via (...) emotional response. Further research is needed to test deep-rooted psychological assumptions about music cognition with diverse materials and groups in dynamic contexts. Although empirical musicology provides keystones to unlock musical structures and organization, the psychological reality of those theorized structures for listeners and performers, and the broader implications for theories of music perception and cognition, awaits investigation. (shrink)

Is Leo Strauss truly an intellectual forebear of neoconservatism and a powerful force in shaping Bush administration foreign policy? _The Truth about Leo Strauss_ puts this question to rest, revealing for the first time how the popular media came to perpetuate an oversimplified view of a complex and wide-ranging philosopher. In doing so, it corrects our perception of Strauss, providing the best general introduction available to the political thought of this misunderstood figure. Catherine and Michael Zuckert—both former students of (...) Strauss—guide readers here to a nuanced understanding of how Strauss’s political thought fits into his broader philosophy. Challenging the ideas that Strauss was an inflexible conservative who followed in the footsteps of Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Carl Schmitt, the Zuckerts contend that Strauss’s signature idea was the need for a return to the ancients. Through their work, they conclude that Strauss was a sober defender of liberal democracy, aware of both its strengths and its weaknesses. Balanced and accessible, _The Truth about Leo Strauss_ is a must-read for anyone who wants to more fully comprehend this enigmatic philosopher and his much-disputed legacy. “_The Truth about Leo Strauss_ is the most balanced and insightful book yet written about Strauss’s thought, students, and political influence. It dispels myths promulgated by both friends and foes and persuasively traces the conflicting paths that American thinkers indebted to Strauss have taken.”—William Galston, Brookings Institution. (shrink)

Discussions of psychiatric nosology focus on a few popular examples of disorders, and on the validity of diagnostic criteria. Looking at Anorexia Nervosa, an example rarely mentioned in this literature, reveals a new problem: the DSM has a strict taxonomic structure, which assumes that disorders can only be located on one branch. This taxonomic assumption fails to fit the domain of psychopathology, resulting in obfuscation of cross-category connections. Poor outcomes for treatment of Anorexia may be due to it being pigeonholed (...) as an Eating Disorder, when a disturbance of body perception may be a more central symptom than food restriction. This paper explores the possibility of restructuring the DSM taxonomy to allow for a pluralist classification of disorders. This change could improve treatment and research without requiring any changes to diagnostic criteria. (shrink)

Can you draw a clear line through American history from the Puritans to the "Nones" of today? On the surface, there is not much connective tissue between the former, who often serve as shorthand for a persistent religious fanaticism in the United States, and the almost one quarter of the population who now regularly check the "None" or "None of the above" box when responding to surveys of religious preference. But instead of seeing a disconnect between these two groups separated (...) by time, historian Catherine Albanese insists there is a deep connection that spans the centuries. With a targeted romp through American history from the seventeenth century to the present, Albanese ties together these seemingly disparate groups through a shared and distinctively American preoccupation with delight and desire. Albanese begins our journey with the role of delight and desire in the brand of Calvinism championed by renowned Puritan minister Cotton Mather and later Jonathan Edwards. She then traces the development of these themes up through the present, treating the reader to revelatory readings of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Horace Bushnell, Andrew Jackson Davis, William James, Emma Curtis Hopkins, Elizabeth Towne, and others, revealing the contours of an evolving theology of desire. The result is an original and entertaining take on an underexamined through line in American history. (shrink)

Is Leo Strauss truly an intellectual forebear of neoconservatism and a powerful force in shaping Bush administration foreign policy? _The Truth about Leo Strauss_ puts this question to rest, revealing for the first time how the popular media came to perpetuate such an oversimplified view of such a complex and wide-ranging philosopher. More important, it corrects our perception of Strauss, providing the best general introduction available to the political thought of this misunderstood figure. Catherine and Michael Zuckert—both former students (...) of Strauss—guide readers here to a nuanced understanding of how Strauss’s political thought fits into his broader philosophy. Challenging the ideas that Strauss was an inflexible conservative who followed in the footsteps of Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Carl Schmitt, the Zuckerts contend that Strauss’s signature idea was the need for a return to the ancients. This idea, they show, stemmed from Strauss’s belief that modern thought, with its relativism and nihilism, undermines healthy politics and even the possibility of real philosophy. Identifying this view as one of Strauss’s three core propositions—America is modern, modernity is bad, and America is good—they conclude that Strauss was a sober defender of liberal democracy, aware of both its strengths and its weaknesses. The Zuckerts finish, appropriately, by examining the varied work of Strauss’s numerous students and followers, revealing the origins—rooted in the tensions within his own thought—oftheir split into opposing camps. Balanced and accessible, _The Truth about Leo Strauss_ is a must-read for anyone who wants to more fully comprehend this enigmatic philosopher and his much-disputed legacy. (shrink)

Is contemporary continental philosophy making a break with Kant? The structures of knowledge, taken for granted since Kants Critique of Pure Reason, are now being called into question: the finitude of the subject, the phenomenal given, a priori synthesis. Relinquish the transcendental: such is the imperative of postcritical thinking in the 21st century. Questions that we no longer thought it possible to ask now reemerge with renewed vigor: can Kant really maintain the difference between a priori and innate? Can he (...) deduce, rather than impose, the categories, or justify the necessity of nature? Recent research into brain development aggravates these suspicions, which measure transcendental idealism against the thesis of a biological origin for cognitive processes. In her important new book Catherine Malabou lays out Kants response to his posterity. True to its subject, the book evolves as an epigenesis – the differentiated growth of the embryo – for, as those who know how to read critical philosophy affirm, this is the very life of the transcendental and contains the promise of its transformation. (shrink)

In Moral Animals, Catherine Wilson develops a theory of morality based on two fundamental premises: first that moral progress implies the evolution of moral ideals involving restraint and sacrifice; second that human beings are outfitted by nature with selfish motivations, intentions, and ambitions that place constraints on what morality can demand of them. Normative claims, she goes on to show, can be understood as projective hypotheses concerning the conduct of realistically-described nonideal agents in preferred fictional worlds. Such claims differ (...) from empirical hypotheses, insofar as they cannot be verified by observation and experiment. Yet many, though not all, moral claims are susceptible of confirmation to the extent that they command the agreement of well-informed inquirers. With this foundation in place, Wilson turns to a defense of egalitarianism intended to address the objection that the importance of our non-moral projects, our natural acquisitiveness and partiality, and our meritocratic commitments render social equality a mere abstract ideal. Employing the basic notion of a symmetrical division of the co-operative surplus, she argues that social justice with respect to global disparities in well-being, and in the condition of women relative to men, depends on the relinquishment of natural and acquired advantage that is central to the concept of morality. (shrink)

A commonly raised criticism against celebrity culture is that it celebrates people who become famous without any connection to their skills, talents or achievements. A culture in which people become famous simply for being famous is criticized for being shallow and inauthentic. In this paper we offer a defence of celebrity by arguing against this criticism. We begin by outlining what we call the Talent Argument: celebrity is a negative cultural phenomenon because it creates and sustains fame without any connection (...) to the accomplishments that arise from an expression of talent or skill. By appealing to the metaphysics of talent and skill, we argue against the Talent Argument and propose that being a celebrity requires the skills that are necessary to acquire and maintain one’s status as a celebrity. A celebrity is more likely to be talented and successful in their expression of these skills, and even celebrities who are ‘famous for being famous’ will often display talents and skills that give rise to their fame. This means that those who critique celebrity culture should not do so by appealing to the Talent Argument. We show how our account of celebrity, talent and skill works to reject both the strong version of the Talent Argument, as well as a weaker and more plausible version of the argument we call the Valuable Talents argument. We conclude by noting that our analysis has demonstrated the need to explore more closely the kinds of skills that are necessary to cultivate celebrity status. This allows for a more nuanced understanding of what a celebrity is, and the values that are attached to celebrity culture. (shrink)

John Rawls is one of the most influential thinkers of the twentieth century. Contemporary political philosophy has been reshaped by his seminal ideas and most current work in the discipline is a response to them. This book introduces his central ideas and examines their contribution to contemporary political thought. In the first part of the book Catherine Audard focuses on Rawls' conception of political and social justice and its justification as presented in his groundbreaking A Theory of Justice. This (...) includes sustained examination of Rawls' moral philosophy and its core thesis, the primacy of justice, the complex relation between Rawls' views and utilitarianism, and his most famous concept, the Original Position Device. In the second half of the book, Audard explores Rawls' more practical concerns for stability and political consensus, citizenship and international justice, and shows the continuity between these concerns and his earlier work. Throughout, Audard contextualizes Rawls' ideas by giving a sense of their historical development, which underlines the intellectual cohesion of his thought. The move between ethics and politics so characteristic of Rawls' work, and which makes for the richness of his philosophy, is shown to also create for it significant problems. John Rawls combines clear exposition with insightful analysis and provides an interpretative and critical framework that will help shape ongoing debates surrounding Rawls' work. (shrink)

In the wake of the digital, some have recommended that we abandon the tedium of teaching handwriting to children in service of promoting “more creative” digital literacies. Others worry that an early diet of keyboard and screen may have deleterious effects on children's social, emotional, and cognitive development, as well as their physical well-being. Yet in this debate, the algorithmic scripts and digital surfaces underwriting these new reading, writing, and mathematical practices are, with a few notable exceptions, almost exclusively ignored. (...) In this essay, Catherine Adams asks whether the digital, and the reading and writing spaces it affords, are of consequence to our habits of thinking and ways of being, particularly in light of the possible obsolescence of pen and paper in schools. She shows that writing using a word processor is no mere mechanical pressing of keys, but an intricate ballet of writerly reading eyes and readerly writing hands, caught up in a dynamic environment of algorithmic paratexts and copy-cut-paste thinking. (shrink)

: At the center of Catherine's Malabou's study of Hegel is a defense of Hegel's relation to time and the future. While many readers, following Kojève, have taken Hegel to be announcing the end of history, Malabou finds a more supple impulse, open to the new, the unexpected. She takes as her guiding thread the concept of "plasticity," and shows how Hegel's dialectic--introducing the sculptor's art into philosophy--is motivated by the desire for transformation. Malabou is a canny and faithful (...) reader, and allows her classic "maître" to speak, if not against his own grain, at least against a tradition too attached to closure and system. Malabou's Hegel is a "plastic" thinker, not a nostalgic metaphysician. (shrink)

This book is one of the most important recent books on Hegel, a philosopher who has had a crucial impact on the shape of continental philosophy. Published here in English for the first time, it includes a substantial preface by Jacques Derrida in which he explores the themes and conclusions of Malabou's book. _The Future of Hegel: Plasticity, Temporality and Dialectic_ restores Hegel's rich and complex concepts of time and temporality to contemporary philosophy. It examines his concept of time, relating (...) it to perennial topics in philosophy such as substance, accident and the identity of the subject. Catherine Malabou's also contrasts her account of Hegelian temporality with the interpretation given by Heidegger in _Being and Time_, arguing that it is the concept of 'plasticity' that best describes Hegel's theory of temporality. The future is understood not simply as a moment in time, but as something malleable and constantly open to change through our interpretation. The book also develops Hegel's preoccupation with the history of Greek thought and Christianity and explores the role of theology in his thought. Essential reading for those interested in Hegel and contemporary continental philosophy, _The Future of Hegel _is also fascinating to those interested in the ideas of Heidegger and Derrida. (shrink)

The experience of the impossible churns up in our epoch whenever a collective dream turns to trauma: politically, sexually, economically, and with a certain ultimacy, ecologically. Out of an ancient theological lineage, the figure of the cloud comes to convey possibility in the face of the impossible. An old mystical nonknowing of God now hosts a current knowledge of uncertainty, of indeterminate and interdependent outcomes, possibly catastrophic. Yet the connectivity and collectivity of social movements, of the fragile, unlikely webs of (...) an alternative notion of existence, keep materializing--a haunting hope, densely entangled, suggesting a more convivial, relational world. Catherine Keller brings process, feminist, and ecopolitical theologies into transdisciplinary conversation with continental philosophy, the quantum entanglements of a "participatory universe," and the writings of Nicholas of Cusa, Walt Whitman, A. N. Whitehead, Gilles Deleuze, and Judith Butler, to develop a "theopoetics of nonseparable difference." Global movements, personal embroilments, religious diversity, the inextricable relations of humans and nonhumans--these phenomena, in their unsettling togetherness, are exceeding our capacity to know and manage. By staging a series of encounters between the nonseparable and the nonknowable, Keller shows what can be born from our cloudiest entanglement. (shrink)

The rapid growth of next-generation genetic sequencing has prompted debate about the responsibilities of researchers toward genetic incidental findings. Assuming there is a duty to disclose significant incidental findings, might there be an obligation for researchers to actively look for these findings? We present an ethical framework for analyzing whether there is a positive duty to look for genetic incidental findings. Using the ancillary care framework as a guide, we identify three main criteria that must be present to give rise (...) to an obligation to look: high benefit to participants, lack of alternative access for participants, and reasonable burden on researchers. Our analysis indicates that there is no obligation to look for incidental findings today, but during the ongoing translation of genomic analysis from research to clinical care, this obligation may arise. (shrink)

The process of inception, development and refinement during the creation of a new dance work is described and explored. The account is based on annotated video of the professional choreographer and dancers as they create and sequence new movement material, as well as weekly journal entries made by one of the dancers. A 24-week chronology is reported. We analyse the choreographic process using the Geneplore model of creative cognition as an organising framework and identify generative and exploratory processes including problem (...) finding and problem solving, metaphorical thinking, non-linear composition, and multi-modal imagery. An analytical tool adapted from the discipline of music analysis is used to explore relationships between recurring themes and visual, visceral, spatial and tactile images. Ideas for experimental work relating to choreographic cognition are discussed. (shrink)

Trudy Govier argues in The Philosophy of Argument that adversariality in argumentation can be kept to a necessary minimum. On her ac-count, politeness can limit the ancillary adversariality of hostile culture but a degree of logical opposition will remain part of argumentation, and perhaps all reasoning. Argumentation cannot be purified by politeness in the way she hopes, nor does reasoning even in the discursive context of argumentation demand opposition. Such hopes assume an idealized politeness free from gender, and reasoners with (...) inhuman or at least highly privileged capabilities and no need to learn from others or share understanding. (shrink)

A fresh and unusual perspective on the literary, Catherine Pickstock argues that the mystery of things can only be unravelled through the repetitions of fiction, history, inhabited subjectivity, and revealed event.

This landmark study examines the role played by the rediscovery of the writings of the ancient atomists, Epicurus and Lucretius, in the articulation of the major philosophical systems of the seventeenth century, and, more broadly, their influence on the evolution of natural science and moral and political philosophy. The target of sustained and trenchant philosophical criticism by Cicero, and of opprobrium by the Christian Fathers of the early Church, for its unflinching commitment to the absence of divine supervision and the (...) finitude of life, the Epicurean philosophy surfaced again in the period of the Scientific Revolution, when it displaced scholastic Aristotelianism. Both modern social contract theory and utilitarianism in ethics were grounded in its tenets. Catherine Wilson shows how the distinctive Epicurean image of the natural and social worlds took hold in philosophy, and how it is an acknowledged, and often unacknowledged presence in the writings of Descartes, Gassendi, Hobbes, Boyle, Locke, Leibniz, Berkeley. With chapters devoted to Epicurean physics and cosmology, the corpuscularian or "mechanical" philosophy, the question of the mortality of the soul, the grounds of political authority, the contested nature of the experimental philosophy, sensuality, curiosity, and the role of pleasure and utility in ethics, the author makes a persuasive case for the significance of materialism in seventeenth-century philosophy without underestimating the depth and significance of the opposition to it, and for its continued importance in the contemporary world. Lucretius's great poem, On the Nature of Things, supplies the frame of reference for this deeply-researched inquiry into the origins of modern philosophy. (shrink)

At the center of Catherine's Malabou's study of Hegel is a defense of Hegel's relation to time and the future. While many readers, following Kojève, have taken Hegel to be announcing the end of history, Malabou finds a more supple impulse, open to the new, the unexpected. She takes as her guiding thread the concept of “plasticity,” and shows how Hegel's dialectic—introducing the sculptor's art into philosophy—is motivated by the desire for transformation. Malabou is a canny and faithful reader, (...) and allows her classic “maître” to speak, if not against his own grain, at least against a tradition too attached to closure and system. Malabou's Hegel is a “plastic” thinker, not a nostalgic metaphysician. (shrink)

Despite tremendous advances in neuroscience, the topic “brain, sex and gender” remains a matter of misleading interpretations, that go well beyond the bounds of science. In the 19th century, the difference in brain sizes was a major argument to explain the hierarchy between men and women, and was supposed to reflect innate differences in mental capacity. Nowadays, our understanding of the human brain has progressed dramatically with the demonstration of cerebral plasticity. The new brain imaging techniques have revealed the role (...) of the environment in continually re-shaping our brain all along our lifetimes as it goes through new experiences and acquires new knowledge. However, the idea that biology is a major determining factor for cognition and behavioral gender differentiation, is still very much alive. The media are far from being the only guilty party. Some scientific circles actively promote the idea of an innate origin of a gender difference in mental capacities. Experimental data from brain imaging, cognitive tests or genetics are often distorted to serve deterministic ideas. Such abuse of “scientific discourses” have to be counteracted by effective communication of clear and unbiased information to the citizens. This paper presents a critical analysis of selected examples which emphasize sex differences in three fields e.g. skills in language and mathematics, testosterone and financial risk-taking behavior, moral cognition. To shed light on the data and the methods used in some papers, we can now—with today’s knowledge on cerebral plasticity—challenge even more strongly, many false interpretations. Our goal here is double: we want to provide evidence against archaic beliefs about the biological determinism of sex differences but also promote a positive image of scientific research. (shrink)