La Physique d’Aristote est travaillée par un problème souterrain. D’après ses principes, ce qui est mû ne saurait mouvoir : un mû est en puissance et un moteur est en acte, de sorte qu’un moteur essentiellement mû est une contradiction. Le présent livre montre l’importance de ce problème dont la solution n’apparaît qu’avec le concept d’instrument élaboré au XIIIe siècle par Thomas d’Aquin. Si l’instrument chez Thomas correspond au « moteur mû » aristotélicien, l’Aquinate ne s’en tient pas à cette (...) formule lorsqu’il produit une théorie détaillée de la causalité instrumentale. À l’analyse, la notion de moteur mû se dissipe et l’instrument apparaît comme ce qui agit en vertu d’un autre. Cela signifie que l’agent principal donne son pouvoir (virtus) à l’instrument, qui le reçoit selon un être intentionnel (esse intentionale). Cette doctrine délicate ne se comprend qu’à condition de restituer la physique qu’elle dépasse et la métaphysique des pouvoirs à laquelle elle aboutit. (shrink)

The following paper proposes a critical reading of conventionalism in sacramental theology (“causalité-pacte”), to underline, by contrast, the theoretical merits of its main competitor, Aquinas’s instrumental causality. It shows that conventionalism, to make the sacrament truly efficient, assigns to the sacrament itself the power of convention, a power compared to the royal seal, which is naturally efficacious qua effect formally identical to its cause. This supports Aquinas’s conviction: rules are powerless, only things have powers.

In thirteenth-century philosophical psychology, it is commonly held that the powers of the soul, responsible for a living being’s various operations, “flow” from the soul’s essence. The phrase is used systematically by Albert the Great, who imports it from Avicenna. It suggests that the soul, considered as a separate substance, is ontologically distinct from its powers. This is how Albert understands Avicenna, and how modern interpreters understand both Avicenna and Albert. The aim of this paper is to call into question (...) such an understanding, as a reading of Avicenna and as a philosophical doctrine. It argues that an ontological distinction between the soul and its powers isn’t intended in Avicenna, and isn’t successfully established in Albert. It further argues that psychological emanation yields such a distinction only in Aquinas, where the soul is no longer considered a separate substance, but a material form. (shrink)

Should engineering ethics be taught? Despite the obvious truism that we all want our students to be moral engineers who practice virtuous professional behavior, I argue, in this article that the question itself obscures several ambiguities that prompt preliminary resolution. Upon clarification of these ambiguities, and an attempt to delineate key issues that make the question a philosophically interesting one, I conclude that engineering ethics not only should not, but cannot, be taught if we understand “teaching engineering ethics” to mean (...) training engineers to be moral individuals (as some advocates seem to have proposed). However, I also conclude that there is a justification to teaching engineering ethics, insofar as we are able to clearly identify the most desirable and efficacious pedagogical approach to the subject area, which I propose to be a case study-based format that utilizes the principle of human cognitive pattern recognition. (shrink)

Technologies allowing for the modifications of genes and gene expression are constantly expanding. With these technologies, comes the possibility of new treatments and cures for a number of serious diseases; however, they also pose serious ethical issues that must be addressed. One difficulty with discussing such dilemmas is that most people lack either the scientific or ethical foundations necessary to fully comprehend these issues. It will therefore be necessary for scientists and ethicists to discuss these matters and work together to (...) understand their implications. Herein, we describe a collaborative project that was conducted jointly between an upper-division chemistry class and a capstone ethics course. In this project, the chemistry students provided expertise regarding the technological background and current research applications of technologies related to the modification of genes and gene expression which they share with the ethics students. The ethics students then take this understanding and use it to provide information about ethical systems that can be used to help understand the implications of these technologies. We will describe the genesis of this assignment, the assignment itself, and student and faculty views on the efficacy of this collaborative learning opportunity. (shrink)

Sussman et al. state that auditory systems exploit linear correlations in the sound signal in order to identify perceptual categories. Can the auditory system recognize linearity? In bats and owls, separability of emergent features is an additional constraint that goes beyond linearity and for which linearity is not a necessary prerequisite.

This paper brings together cutting-edge, quantitative corpus methodologies and discourse analysis to explore the relationship between text complexity and subjectivity as descriptive features of opinionated language. We are specifically interested in how text complexity and markers of subjectivity and argumentation interact in opinionated discourse. Our contributions include the marriage of quantitative approaches to text complexity with corpus linguistic methods for the study of subjectivity, in addition to large-scale analyses of evaluative discourse. As our corpus, we use the Simon Fraser Opinion (...) and Comments Corpus, which comprises approximately 10,000 opinion articles and the corresponding reader comments from the Canadian online newspaper The Globe and Mail, as well as a parallel corpus of hard news articles also sampled from The Globe and Mail. Methodologically, we combine conditional inference trees with the analysis of random forests, an ensemble learning technique, to investigate the interplay between text complexity and subjectivity. Text complexity is defined in terms of Kolmogorov complexity, that is, the complexity of a text is measured based on its description length. In this approach, texts which can be described more efficiently are considered to be linguistically less complex. Thus, Kolmogorov complexity is a measure of structural surface redundancy. Our take on subjectivity is inspired by research in evaluative language, stance and Appraisal and defined as the expression of evaluation and opinion in language. Drawing on a sentiment analysis lexicon and the literature on stance markers, a custom set of subjectivity and argumentation markers is created. The results show that complexity can be a powerful tool in the classification of text into different text types, and that stance adverbials serve as distinctive features of subjectivity in online news comments. (shrink)

According to the conceptualist view in the philosophy of perception, we must possess concepts for all the objects, properties and relations which feature in our perceptual experiences. In this paper, I investigate the possibility of developing an argument against the conceptualist view by appealing to the notion of attention. In Part One, I begin by setting out an apparently promising version of such an argument, a version which appeals to a link between attention and perceptual demonstrative concept possession. In Part (...) Two, however, I show how the conceptualist can challenge what appears to be the key premise of the argument, and I go on to describe, in Part Three, an important further difficulty which we face if we attempt to overcome this challenge in a particular way. My conclusion will be that the conceptualist's challenge to the argument is convincing and hence that the argument remains inconclusive. (shrink)

(2013). Hope and Fear: The Theological Side of Framing Environmental Change. Ethics, Policy & Environment: Vol. 16, No. 2, pp. 152-155. doi: 10.1080/21550085.2013.801187.

The place of religion in society has changed profoundly in the last few centuries, particularly in the West. In what will be a defining book for our time, Taylor takes up the question of what these changes mean, and what, precisely, happens when a society becomes one in which faith is only one human possibility among others.

A pesar de la legitimación cívica de los Estados constitucionales, la población sigue reproduciendo las identidades de una nación cultural. El enfoque unilateral sobre la legitimidad jurídica de los Estados modernos obvia su anclaje en una identidad cultural particular. De ese modo, no se cumplen las premisas universalistas del Estado racional, ya que nos encontramos con una implícita aceptación de la nación cultural. Frente a ello, la reflexión hegeliano sobre las premisas culturales de Herder indica hacia a una posible salida (...) de este dilema. Hegel sitúa su Estado en un concepto dinámica de sociedad que posibilita anclar el Estado racional en la diversidad cultural de la población. (shrink)

This essay explores forms of religious narrative that shape self-understanding and engagement with the world through the idea of redemption. An analysis of the landscape of religious perspectives within the context of globalization shows a bifurcation between competing notions of redemption in fundamentalist and postmodern narratives. Where fundamentalism uses meta-narrative that is hyper-theistic, postmodernism uses contextual narratives that deconstruct narrative and can lose a sense of the transcendent. The purpose of the essay is to show how these two competing notions (...) can become entrenched and destructive to the very redemption they seek. Using Paul Tillich’s understanding of courage, these positions are placed into a dialectical tension that points to a third understanding of redemption as the perpetual mediation between the desire for belonging to a community and the desire to recognize the limitations of any individual or community’s perspective and understanding of the world in relationship to the holy. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: International Yearbook for Tillich Research Jahrgang: 11 Heft: 1 Seiten: 81-104.

Charles Beitz rejects two highly influential conceptions of international theory as empirically inaccurate and theoretically misleading. In one, international relations is a Hobbesian state of nature in which moral judgments are entirely inappropriate, and in the other, states are analogous to persons in domestic society in having rights of autonomy that insulate them from external moral assessment and political interference. Beitz postulates that a theory of international politics should include a revised principle of state autonomy based on the justice (...) of a state's domestic institutions, and a principle of international distributive justice to establish a fair division of resources and wealth among persons situated in diverse national societies. (shrink)

Human rights have become one of the most important moral concepts in global political life over the last 60 years. Charles Beitz, one of the world's leading philosophers, offers a compelling new examination of the idea of a human right.

In this revised edition of his 1979 classic Political Theory and International Relations, Charles Beitz rejects two highly influential conceptions of international theory as empirically inaccurate and theoretically misleading. In one, international relations is a Hobbesian state of nature in which moral judgments are entirely inappropriate, and in the other, states are analogous to persons in domestic society in having rights of autonomy that insulate them from external moral assessment and political interference. Beitz postulates that a theory of international (...) politics should include a revised principle of state autonomy based on the justice of a state’s domestic institutions, and a principle of international distributive justice to establish a fair division of resources and wealth among persons situated in diverse national societies. (shrink)

Fundamental Buddhist teachings -- Main features of some western ethical theories -- Teravāda ethics as rule-consequentialism -- Mahāyāna ethics before Śāntideva and after -- Transcending ethics -- Buddhist ethics and the demands of consequentialism -- Buddhism on moral responsibility -- Punishment -- Objections and replies -- A Buddhist response to Kant.

Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species is unquestionably one of the chief landmarks in biology. The Origin (as it is widely known) was literally only an abstract of the manuscript Darwin had originally intended to complete and publish as the formal presentation of his views on evolution. Compared with the Origin, his original long manuscript work on Natural Selection, which is presented here and made available for the first time in printed form, has more abundant examples and illustrations (...) of Darwin's argument, plus an extensive citation of sources. (shrink)

Charles Babbage was an English mathematician, philosopher and mechanical engineer who invented the concept of a programmable computer. From 1828 to 1839 he was Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge, a position whose holders have included Isaac Newton and Stephen Hawking. A proponent of natural religion, he published The Ninth Bridgewater Treatise in 1837 as his personal response to The Bridgewater Treatises, a series of books on theology and science that had recently appeared. Disputing the claim that science disfavours (...) religion, Babbage wrote 'that there exists no such fatal collision between the words of Scripture and the facts of nature'. He argues on the basis of reason and experience alone, drawing a parallel between his work on the calculating engine and God as the divine programmer of the universe. Eloquently written, and underpinned by mathematical arguments, The Ninth Bridgewater Treatise is a landmark work of natural theology. (shrink)

The collapse of historicism was not merely the demise of an academic tradition but signified a shift in the understanding of hermeneutics and metaphysics. Whereas earlier books have explored the rise and dominance of historicism within academic history, this is the first to trace its collapse and to show how it was shaped by larger philosophical and scientific concerns. Charles R. Bambach's lucid account of the demise of historicism within the context of German metaphysics provides a rich new perspective (...) on the development of the young Heidegger's concept of "historicity" and on the origins of postmodern thought. Bambach reconstructs the methodological debates arising from a pervasive sense of crisis among German philosophers in the late nineteenth century. He details the divergent attempts by the Neo-Kantians, Nietzsche, and Dilthey to overcome the limitations of historical relativism. Heidegger's view of "historicity," Bambach shows, radically transforms the problematic of historicism into a discourse concerning the crisis of philosophical modernity. (shrink)

Autonomy is a vital principle in medical law and ethics. It occupies a prominent place in all medico-legal and ethical debate. But there is a dangerous presumption that it should have the only vote, or at least the casting vote. This book is an assault on that presumption, and an audit of autonomy's extraordinary status. This book surveys the main issues in medical law, noting in relation to each issue the power wielded by autonomy, asking whether that power can be (...) justified, and suggesting how other principles can and should contribute to the law. It concludes that autonomy's status cannot be intellectually or ethically justified, and that positive discrimination in favour of the other balancing principles is urgently needed in order to avoid some sinister results. 'This book is a sustained attack on the hegemony of the idea of autonomy in medical ethics and law. Charles Foster is no respecter of authority, whether of university professors or of law Lords. He grabs his readers by their lapels and shakes sense into them through a combination of no-nonsense rhetoric and subtle argument that is difficult to resist.' Tony Hope, Professor of Medical Ethics, Oxford University 'This book is unlikely to be in pristine state by the time you have finished reading it. Whether that is because you have thrown it in the air in celebration or thrown it across the room in frustration will depend on your perspective. But this book cannot leave you cold. It is a powerful polemic on the dominance of autonomy in medical law, which demands a reaction. Charles Foster sets out a powerful case that academic medical lawyers have elevated autonomy to a status it does not deserve in either ethical or legal terms. In a highly engaging, accessible account, he challenges many of the views which have become orthodox within the academic community. This will be a book which demands and will attract considerable debate.' Jonathan Herring, Exeter College, Oxford University 'This is a learned, lively and thought-provoking discussion of problems central to the courts' approach to ethical issues in medical law. What principles are involved? More significantly, which really underlie and inform the process of seeking justice in difficult cases? Charles Foster persuasively argues, and demonstrates, that respect for autonomy is but one of a number of ethical principles which interact and may conflict. He also addresses the sensitive issue of the extent to which thoughts and factors which go to influence legal decisions may not appear in the judgments.' Adrian Whitfield QC. 'Introducing the Jake La Motta of medical ethics. Foster is an academic street-fighter who has bloodied his hands in the court room. He provides a stinging, relentless, ground attack on the Goliath of medical ethics: the central place of autonomy in liberal medical ethics. This is now the first port of call for those who feel that medical ethics has become autonomized.' Julian Savulescu, Uehiro Chair in Practical Ethics, University of Oxford. "This important book offers a robust challenge to anyone, whether lawyer or 'ethicist', who sees respect for autonomy as the only game in town. It argues eloquently and effectively that, on the one hand, despite the reverence paid to it by judges, in practice the law, even in the context of consent, weaves together a number of moral threads of which autonomy is merely one, in the pursuit of a good decision. It argues on the other hand, that were the day-to-day practice of law to be guided primarily by respect for autonomy, this would be wrong. Foster concludes that whilst, 'any society that does not have laws robustly protecting autonomy is an unsafe and unhappy one', so too would be a society in which too much emphasis was placed on respect for autonomy at the expense of other important moral principles. This is essential reading for anyone interested in the role of autonomy and indeed of medical ethics, in the law." Michael Parker, Professor of Bioethics, University of Oxford. (shrink)

Introduction Comparative psychology can generally be defined as the branch of psychology that studies the similarities and differences in the behavior of organisms. Formal definitions found in textbooks and encyclopedias disagree whether comparative psychologists restrict their work to the study of animals or include the study of human behavior. This paper offers an opinion on the major problem facing comparative psychology today – where we will find the next generation of comparative psychology students. Something must be done before we lose (...) access to an entire generation of psychology undergraduates. It is not enough to say that comparative psychology is being “absorbed” in other academic units such as “integrative biology”, “integrative study of animal behavior”, “evolutionary psychology”, “comparative cognition”, or “animal cognition.” Indeed, many of these topics are not primarily studied in psychology departments, wherein comparative psychology students have traditionally received joint training in the principles of behavior and comparative analysis, as applied to both humans and other animals. Consider, for example, the difference between comparative psychology and comparative cognition. Comparative cognition includes features of comparative psychology, but they are not identical. Comparative cognition represents a very specific theoretical position whose validity is based on certain suppositions such as the belief (by definition) that the internal cogni... (shrink)

La Valeur inductive de la relativité est sans conteste l'ouvrage le plus méconnu de toute l'oeuvre «philosophique» de Gaston Bachelard. Au silence presque total, à l'absence de lectures, ne répondent que des interprétations du« premier genre», appuyées sur un certain ouï-dire discursif, mais qui font l'autorité des pseudo-standards. Les positions bachelardiennes sont ici confrontées à La Déduction relativiste d'Émile Meyerson. Le poids de l'analyse portera essentiellement sur un dépl(o)iement du dispositif bachelardien d'induction et de construction. L'appareillage « inductif » doit (...) être pensé sur le modèle électromagnétique, et la position «constructiviste» est toujours liée au travail de synthèse. Enfin, c'est une véritable métaphysique que semble dès lors devoir engendrer cette « pensée des sciences ». (shrink)

Charles Avison's Essay on Musical Expression, first published in 1752, is a major contribution to the debate on musical aesthetics which developed in the course of the 18th century. Considered by Charles Burney as the first essay devoted to 'musical criticism' proper, it established the primary importance of 'expression' and reconsidered the relative importance of harmony and melody. Immediately after its publication it was followed by William Hayes's Remarks (1753), to which Avison himself retorted in his Reply. Taken (...) together these three texts offer a fascinating insight into the debate that raged in the 18th century between the promoters of the so-called 'ancient music' (such as Hayes) and the more 'modern' musicians. Beyond matters of taste, what was at stake in Avison's theoretical contribution was the assertion that the individual's response to music ultimately mattered more than the dry rules established by professional musicians. Avison also wrote several prefaces to the published editions of his own musical compositions. This volume reprints these prefaces and advertisements together with his Essay to provide an interesting view of eighteenth-century conceptions of composition and performance, and a complete survey of Avison's theory of music. (shrink)

Much current theorizing about literature involves efforts to renew our sense of aesthetic values in reading. Such is the case with new formalism as well as recent appeals to the notion of “surface reading.” While sympathetic to these efforts, Charles Altieri believes they ultimately fall short because too often they fail to account for the values that engage literary texts in the social world. In Reckoning with the Imagination, Altieri argues for a reconsideration of the Kantian tradition of Idealist (...) ethics, which he believes can restore much of the power of the arguments for the role of aesthetics in art. Altieri finds a perspective for that restoration in a reading of Wittgenstein’s later work that stresses Wittgenstein’s parallel criticisms of the spirit of empiricism. Altieri begins by offering a phenomenology of imagination, because we cannot fully honor art if we do not link it to a distinctive, socially productive force. That force emerges in two quite different but equally powerful realizations in his reading of John Ashbery’s “Instruction Manual,” which explicitly establishes a model for a postromantic view of imagination, and William Butler Yeats’s “Leda and the Swan.” He then turns to Wittgenstein with chapters on the role of display as critique of Enlightenment thinking, the honoring of qualities like sensitivity and the ability to attune to the actions of others, the role of expression in the building of models, and the contrast between ethical and confessional modes of judgment. Finally, Altieri produces his own model of aesthetic experience as participatory valuation and makes an extended argument for the social significance of appreciation as a way to escape the patterns of resentment fundamental to our current mode of politics. A masterful work by one of our foremost literary and philosophical theorists, Reckoning with the Imagination will breathe new life into ongoing debates over the value of aesthetic experience. (shrink)

Complementing the publication of Darwin's notebooks and correspondence, this work provides access to the last remaining unpublished source of Darwin manuscript materials. It is a catalog to and a complete transcription of the marks and annotations he made in the margins of his books. The margin comments throw light on Darwin's immediate reactions to his reading matter; further comments on slips of paper stuck inside the covers of the books reveal more considered evaluation. These comments are also fully transcribed. Annotation (...) copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR. (shrink)

Substantially increased wealth inequality across the developed world has prompted many philosophers, economists and legal theorists to support comprehensive taxes on all forms of wealth. Proposals include levying taxes on the basis of total wealth, or alternatively the change in the value of capital holdings measured from year-to-year. This contrasts with most existing policies that tax capital assets at the point they are transferred from one beneficiary to another through sale or gifts. Are these tax reforms likely to meet their (...) aims of greater economic and political equality? We argue that these policies are likely to fail because, following neoclassical economic theory, they are based on a conception of capital as possessing given values in what amounts to a static equilibrium. This mischaracterizes the dynamic and subjective character of market economies and the contested value of real instantiations of capital goods. This makes them very difficult, often impossible, to value apart from at the point of voluntary transfer or profit realization. This means most taxes levied on a mark-to-market basis will be arbitrary and unfair. We propose alternative policies based on an income realization approach to taxation that are more likely to curb excessive wealth holdings. This includes introducing international treaties that prohibit preferential tax treatment for individual companies and specific sectors, and broadening the income tax base to include the imputed rent of personal housing wealth. (shrink)