This article proposes 3 principles and 3 imperatives as the philosophical foundations of a global journalism ethics. The central claim is that the globalization of news media requires a radical rethinking of the principles and standards of journalism ethics, through the adoption of a cosmopolitan attitude. The article explains how and why ethicists should construct a global journalism ethics, using a contractualist approach. It then formulates 3 "claims" or principles: the claims of credibility, justifiable consequence, and humanity. The claim of (...) humanity is developed further by the formulation of 3 imperatives: to act as a global agent, to serve world citizens, and to enhance nonparochial understandings. The article concludes by considering some implications of a cosmopolitan attitude for the practice of journalism. (shrink)

The Protestant reception both of Aristotle and of the concept of natural law have been the object of renewed attention. The present article aims at a cross-fertilization of these two recoveries: did a specifically Aristotelian approach to natural law play a significant role in classical Protestant thought? The article answers this question by means of a review of the Protestant commentaries on Aristotle’s natural law-passage in Nicomachean Ethics V, 7. Reformation and post-Reformation scholars sometimes offered original readings of this text, (...) but above all they cultivated the various approaches to the passage that had been developed during the medieval period. (shrink)

This article has two objectives. Firts, it is my aim to outline some medieval views concerning the acts that oppose one's better judgment. I will use Aristotle's term aktasia to denote the moral state of an agent behaving in this way. John Burdidan's (1285-1349) treatment of akrasia is especially relevant here. Second, it will be argued that some important philosophical ideas proposed receently by Donald Davidson, in his influential study 'How is Waekness of the Will Possible?', are anticipated in the (...) medieval discussion. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis essay argues that retrieving insights from the ancient Stoic philosophers for Christian ethics is much more difficult than is often assumed and, further, that the “ethics of retrieval” is itself something worth prolonged reflection. The central problem is that in their ancient sense both Christianity and Stoicism are practically dense patterns of reasoning and mutually incompatible forms of life. Coming to see this clearly requires the realization that the encounter between Stoicism and Christianity is a conflict of lived traditions. (...) Precisely because we cannot simply extract Stoic insights from the lives in which they belong, the task of determining how Stoicism is useful for Christianity is exceptionally challenging. Indeed, doing justice to the Stoics has more to do with facing an alternative to Christianity than it does with appropriating insights for our own use. These points are developed in conversation with Elizabeth Agnew Cochran's recent article on the Stoic influence upon Jonathan Edwards. (shrink)

This paper tries to demonstrate that some passages of Pliny's Naturalis historia on metallurgical materials are influenced by the Stoic philosopher Posidonius' view that surfaces possess a physical existence. Indeed, Pliny reports that copper surfaces are material, both acting towards drawing a patina to themselves, and being acted upon; i.e. they are both chemically modified by air and fire, and subject to mechanical removal. Also relatable to Posidonius, namely to his view of the interaction between soul and body, is Pliny's (...) account of lead and tin, which can be united thanks to the action they mutually exert on each other, since each metal holds together both itself and what is outside itself. A further influence from the ‘aetiologist’ Posidonius is also betrayed in the care Pliny exercises in describing not only metal corrosion and soldering, but also their causes. Both the scientific and the philosophical imports of these passages are compared with passages by Plato and Plutarch on metallurgical subjects; they are also discussed in the light of the theories on ‘mixture’ propounded by Aristotle and by the Old Stoics. It is shown that Pliny's account compares favorably with Posidonius' doctrine, whereas it is at striking variance with the other ancient reports. Introduction Philosophical and literary evidence 2.1 Pliny 2.2 Posidonius 2.3 Plato and Plutarch Discussion Conclusion. (shrink)

The aim of the article is to analyze the double movement around the legal construct “Señor Natural” that takes place in Las Siete Partidas by Alfonso X, a key concept in the wise King’s political program. On the one hand, the concept of “Señor natural” is reworked and becomes legal, placing the king above any other order; on the other, the obligation regarding the “Señor natural” is established as the best of all “natural obligations”. All this conflates into a new (...) concept of “Señor natural” based on men and the land, which becomes a natural obligation in Partidas, a monarch’s reinforcement to exercise dominium in the totality of the kingdom. (shrink)

In recent years substantial effort has been expended by scholars to better understand the nature of the ancient interest in divination. This study will argue that the Stoic philosopher Epictetus’ views of divination have been largely overlooked and mistakenly defined by his modern interpreters. While often portrayed as being opposed to the art, it is proposed that he envisages divination can be beneficially employed: namely in highlighting certain moral actions, and in motivating individuals to commence philosophical study.

Some terms from Outlines of Pyrrhonism are problematic for Ukrainian translation. The commentary justifies the Ukrainian equivalents for those terms, in particular, "uyavlennia" for phantasia, "pidvplyvnyi stan" for pathos, "pomirnopidvplyvnist" for metriopatheia, "neosiagnennist" for akatalepsia.

This article aims to show that Sophocles anticipates questions about the autonomous subject and “ownership” of the self that are central to contemporary discourse. It suggests that Sophoclean self-killing, often considered quintessentially individualistic, in fact reflects a preoccupation with the autocheir, a less definite figure than our “suicide,” since s/he may also be a kin-killer. Also, that where Sophocles attempts to distinguish self-killing from kin-killing, it is to isolate and explore the nature and implications of autocheiria. Close readings of scenes (...) from Antigone, Ajax, and Trachiniae demonstrate that this is achieved through the elision or obscuring of the moment of self-destruction, and the posthumous analysis of self-killing in the “verbal post-mortem.” A strand of metacriticism suggests that editors committed to a model of suicide as unequivocal act intentionally performed by a single agent have sometimes oversimplified the complexity evidenced by the transmitted text. (shrink)

Augustine’s theory of first movements has provoked many controversies over the years. When discussing Augustine’s position in preliminary passions, some scholars maintain that he misunderstands the Stoics, whereas some others argue that he grasps their works rather well and his accounts are consistent with Stoic teaching. This article examines how Augustine transforms his predecessors’ conception of first movements into his own theory, with particular focus on whether Augustine misinterprets his predecessor’s doctrine in his approach. The first section introduces the recent (...) disputations on Augustine’s misunderstanding of the Stoic concept of the first movements. The second section compares Augustine’s opinions in his early, middle, and late writings to determine whether changes occur in his interpretation. Based on the above observations, this essay argues that Augustine is familiar with the Stoic doctrines, but in his later works, he ‘deliberately’ deviates from their concept of the first movements in order to refute their ‘pride’ and to defend his Christian position on the psychology of preliminary passions. These deliberate new changes of terms by Augustine do not derive from a misunderstanding, but rather follow from his attempt at constructing a new dynamic theological framework of addressing passions during his later thought. The article concludes with a third section that revisits the modern critiques and responds with a consideration of the significance of Augustine’s views on preliminary passions. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis essay is a response to C. Kavin Rowe's critique of my 2011 argument that certain dimensions of Roman Stoic ethics are at work in Jonathan Edwards's moral thought. Rowe raises questions about the act of selectively retrieving ideas from a philosophical tradition to support constructive work in another tradition. I argue for the importance of acknowledging how Christian thought has been shaped by what Jeffrey Stout describes as moral bricolage, the selective retrieval of ideas from various traditions, and I (...) contend that this bricolage can continue to be a fruitful means through which Christian ethics engages external traditions. Moreover, the importance of Stoicism's retrieval in early modern philosophy makes the work of eighteenth‐century theologians such as Edwards a particularly valuable resource for exploring the plausibility of Christian engagement with the Stoics. (shrink)

The contemporary revival of virtue ethics has focused primarily on retrieving central moral commitments of Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, and the Neoplatonist traditions. Christian virtue ethicists would do well to expand this retrieval further to include the writings of the Roman Stoics. This essay argues that the ethics of Jonathan Edwards exemplifies major Stoic themes and explores three noteworthy points of intersection between Stoic ethics and Edwards's thought: a conception of virtue as consent to a benevolent providence, the identification of virtue (...) as a singular and transformative good, and an account of moral formation as simultaneously self-directed and received. Common ground between Edwards and the Stoics illustrates the value of recognizing Stoic moral thought as a philosophical framework that can enhance and undergird Christian ethicists' understandings of moral development and the nature of virtue. (shrink)

Many contemporary scholars debate whether war should be conceived as a relative evil or a morally neutral act. The works of Augustine may offer new ways of thinking through the categories of this debate. In an early period, Augustine develops the distinction between evil done and evil suffered. Augustine's early treatments of war locate the saint as detached sage doing only good, and immune from evil suffered. In a middle period, he develops a richer picture of the evil suffered on (...) the occasion of the loss of historical goods but fails to develop the implications of this picture as concerns war. Finally, without abandoning emphasis on the avoidance of doing evil, Augustine comes to highlight how evil suffered in war prevents us from speaking simply of good wars. Augustine's ability to hold together senses of evil and their moral significance provides a useful avenue for new thought on this issue. (shrink)

En su comentario al Segundo libro de las Sentencias de Pedro Lombardo, Tomás de Aquino enfrenta el problema de la materia desde distintos puntos de vista. En este artículo, algunos textos relevantes del Comentario sobre las distinciones 3, 12 y 18 son analizados con un triple propósito. En primer lugar, se presenta la perspectiva temprana de Tomás de Aquino sobre la materia, con particular atención a sus implicaciones físicas y metafísicas. En segundo lugar, las tesis del Aquinate son rastreadas hasta (...) sus raíces peripatéticas, con la finalidad de mostrar el papel crucial que juegan Avicena y Averroes en su replanteamiento de la física y metafísica aristotélicas. En tercer lugar, el pensamiento de Tomás de Aquino es puesto en el contexto del debate sobre la materia que surgió desde la recepción de la Física y la Metafísica del Aristóteles latino. Desde esta triple perspectiva, se puede apreciar la consistencia y originalidad de la propuesta temprana de Tomás de Aquino sobre la materia. (shrink)

Stoicism was one of the new philosophical movements of the Hellenistic period. The name derives from the porch (stoa poikilê) in the Agora at Athens decorated with mural paintings, where the members of the school congregated, and their lectures were held. Unlike ‘epicurean,’ the sense of the English adjective ‘stoical’ is not utterly misleading with regard to its philosophical origins. The Stoics did, in fact, hold that emotions like fear or envy (or impassioned sexual attachments, or passionate love of anything (...) whatsoever) either were, or arose from, false judgements and that the sage—a person who had attained moral and intellectual perfection—would not undergo them. The later Stoics of Roman Imperial times, Seneca and Epictetus, emphasise the doctrines (already central to the early Stoics' teachings) that the sage is utterly immune to misfortune and that virtue is sufficient for happiness. Our phrase ‘stoic calm’ perhaps encapsulates the general drift of these claims. It does not, however, hint at the even more radical ethical views which the Stoics defended, e.g. that only the sage is free while all others are slaves, or that all those who are morally vicious are equally so. Though it seems clear that some Stoics took a kind of perverse joy in advocating views which seem so at odds with common sense, they did not do so simply to shock. Stoic ethics achieves a certain plausibility within the context of their physical theory and psychology, and within the framework of Greek ethical theory as that was handed down to them from Plato and Aristotle. It seems that they were well aware of the mutually interdependent nature of their philosophical views, likening philosophy itself to a living animal in which logic is bones and sinews; ethics and physics, the flesh and the soul respectively (another version reverses this assignment, making ethics the.. (shrink)

Este artículo presenta algunas de las visiones filosóficas más influyentes sobre la memoria, la verdad y la justicia en el Medioevo cristiano. En todasellas están presentes, en proporción diferente, las dos tradiciones dominantes, el neoplatonismo y el aristotelismo. San Agustín, Avicena y Tomás de Aquino encarnan perspectivas crecientemente desplatonizadas sobre la memoria. En cuanto al concepto de verdad, tanto el modelo teocéntrico de Agustín como el adecuacionista de Tomás son expresiones de una corriente principal que declina en el siglo XIV. (...) Finalmente, mientras que Agustín introduce de modo crítico la definición ciceroniana de la justicia, basada en la teoría grecorromana de la ley natural, Aquino coordina sistemáticamente teísmo cristiano, ley natural y naturalismo político aristotélico. (shrink)