The papers in this volume reflect much of the current unease of a world that perceives itself once more at the edge of chaos. The authors present different vistas of that experience and their inherent dialectic, expressed in numerous and ceaseless conflicts between ordering and disordering processes. They can be read as comments on the ongoing processes that lead toward greater complexity.

ExcerptTimothy W. Luke, Screens of Power: Ideology, Domination, and Resistance in Informational Society, revised edition. Foreword by Ronald J. Deibert. Candor, NY: Telos Press Publishing, 2020. Pp. xxiii + 340.

Since the 9/11 terrorist attacks and subsequent Terror War, Jean Baudrillard has written a series of reflections on the contemporary moment that have evoked the excitement and controversy of his earlier work. For many years, Baudrillard had complained that the contemporary era has been one of “weak events,” that the energies of history seemed to be depleted, and that politics has become increasingly banal and boring. He claimed in an essay "Anorexic Ruins," published in 1989, that the Berlin wall was (...) a sign of a frozen history, of an anorexic history, in which nothing more can happen, marked by a "lack of events" and the end of history, taking the Berlin wall as a sign of a stasis between communism and capitalism. Likewise, at one time, Baudrillard read the New York Twin Towers of the World Trade Center as symbols of the stasis of global capitalism and a frozen history in which the two superpowers develop a system of binary regulation. (shrink)

During the past decades, the culture industries have multiplied media spectacles in novel spaces and sites, and spectacle itself is becoming one of the organizing principles of the economy, polity, society, and everyday life. An Internet-based economy has been developing hi-tech spectacle as a means of promotion, reproduction, and the circulation and selling of commodities, using multimedia and increasingly sophisticated technology to dazzle consumers. M edia culture proliferates ever more technologically sophisticated spectacles to seize audiences and augment (...) their power and profit. The forms of entertainment permeate news and information, and a tablodized infotainment culture is more and more popular. New multimedia that synthesize forms of radio, film, TV news and entertainment, and the mushrooming domain of cyberspace, become spectacles of technoculture, generating expanding sites of information and entertainment, while intensifying the spectacle-form of media culture. Political and social life is also shaped more and more by media spectacle. Social and political conflicts are increasingly played out on the screens of media culture, which display spectacles like sensational murder cases, terrorist bombings, celebrity and political sex scandals, and the explosive violence of everyday life. M edia culture not only takes up expanding moments of contemporary experience, but also provides ever more material for fantasy, dreaming, modeling thought and behavior, and constructing identities. Of course, there have been spectacles since premodern times. Classical Greece had its Olympics, thespian and poetry festivals, its public rhetorical battles, and bloody and violent wars. Ancient Rome had its public offerings of bread and circuses, its orgies, its titanic political battles, and the spectacle of Empire with parades and monuments for triumphant Caesars and their armies, extravaganzas put on display in the 2000 film Gladiator.. (shrink)

In this article, I reply to commentators Leonard Feldblyum, Robert Holub, and David Owen on my article “The Biology of Evil.” While I concede that Nietzsche often invoked standard degenerationist rhetoric about breeding, I argue that Nietzsche, unlike other degenerationists, never offered any concrete plans for such breeding and was not interested in raising the capacities of average citizens, but rather was concerned with the exceptional few. I argue that these “strokes of luck” do not readily lend themselves to planned (...) breeding programs. I concede that Nietzsche did not favor societies that allowed for the integration of foreign elements, but rather some alternation between regimented hierarchical societies and motley societies. However, against Holub's and Feldblyum's contention that Nietzsche was interested in the alleged Jewish problem of his day, I expand on my claim that, for Nietzsche, the current malaise is more a product of the workings of the ancient than the modern Jews. And against Owen and Holub, I defend the claim that degeneration theory was fundamentally Manichean and that Nietzsche resisted this Manichean tendency. (shrink)

This brief paper asks how Lorenzo Cañás Bottos could bring himself to write comments on Nigel Rapport, after his Key Concepts in Social and Cultural Anthropology, with Joanna Overing! The title of my paper may be a bit misleading, but I present two futures for Argentine families, which start out similar, relating their conceptions of society to British anthropology.

Analyzes the relationship of power, bureaucracy, and change in modern society.

Bloom's now famous manifesto for the salvation of American academia ("Back to the classics!") is worthy of serious consideration. His appraisal of current trends, such as the tendency to move away from theoretical traditions and towards practical or technical degrees, is often penetrating. (A good example is his discussion of the MBA degree: the degree itself is unobjectionable; but the value modern society places on it is a reflection of the "values" of modern society -values which have a (...) destructive side to them.). (shrink)

My note on McShane's “Implementation” article indicates what I have learned from it (a) about its author, (b) about Lonergan, and (c) about implementation of Lonergan’s transcendental method. My sheaf of quotations from the article may offer a focus – not distorting, I hope – different from the reader’s own.

Understanding the hadiths requires not only knowing the language well but also knowing the intention of the narrator, the environment and context in which the word is uttered. Furthermore, within a language, the presence of the words which have entirely disconnected from their real meaning due to the metaphoric and idiomatic use of them developed in time requires making more efforts to understand them. In this respect, the expression ‘Aqrā-Ḥalqā’ used by Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) for Ṣafiyya in the Farewell Sermon (...) when he was leaving Mecca, is mostly attributed to inauspiciousness and thus, requires special investigation. Determination of the correct meaning and use of the expression will prevent any misunderstanding. However, only the literal equivalences of the expression have been used in its annotations and translations until now. By including the annotations and translations of the expression in dictionaries and Ġarību'l- Ḥadīth books, which were written with a more specific purpose, this study aims to find the most suitable meaning by considering all these data and the data which compatible with the sunnah.Summary: Before the leaving of Prophet Muhammad after the Farewell Sermon, he learned that one of his wife Ṣafiyya is in her period (ḥayḍ). After hearing this, he used the expression ‘Aqrā-Ḥalqā’. These statements are not frequently used in the Arabic language. The expressions, which we encounter in some ancient Arab poems, were mentioned several times in some hadiths while narrating the stories of the past societies (ummah), and as far as we can see they were used only for Ṣafiyya by the Prophet. The reason for Prophet's expression was because after he was informed that Ṣafiyya was in period, he thought that she did not make the obligatory circumambulation. Depending on this, the Prophet thought that they could not returning to Medina immediately; thus, he said this word with the confusion and anxiety caused by the difficulty of staying in Mecca for a while with a crowded pilgrim group. With regard to the meaning of these words, both the diversity in the translations and some negative comments and inferences in the annotations, this study was written.There is a sufficient amount of information about the meanings of this expression in classical dictionaries and works such as Ġarību'l- Ḥadīth. These works state that they have meanings such as death, injury, infertility, illness, bad luck and mourning at the root of the words. Although the fundamental roots of the words have these meanings, the expressions have undergone a change and transformation. As with some other examples in the Arabic language, these words have lost their relevance for their meaning root gradually and have been used more often for astonishment. This information is included in both classical sources and contemporary studies on the subject.Despite the fact that the expression has become independent from their root meaning and has an astonishing sense used in case of confusion, negative emphasis comes to the fore both in Turkish translations and in some commentaries. In Turkish translations, the usages which are related directly to the word itself and emphasizing its meaning for bad luck are dominant, but sometimes translations that give the meaning of astonishment, sometimes translations that are not related to the word have been made, and sometimes they have been contented with latinizing the word instead of translation. Additionally, the malediction used in searching the correct meaning to the word leads to an emphasize toward negativity.While most of the annotations do not give much information about the expressions, it is seen that some authors give a negative meaning to the words and accordingly, they make a comparison between Ṣafiyya and ‘Ā’isha. Because of the special situation of ‘Ā’isha, she was upset that she could not make umrah and she conveyed this situation to our Prophet. Hence the Prophet produced a solution for her to complete her umrah. In the one hand, producing a solution to ‘Ā’isha by the Prophet and comforting her, on the other hand, his expression ‘Aqrā-Ḥalqā’ for Ṣafiyya in a similar situation led some scholars to conclude that Ṣafiyya was not as valuable as ‘Ā’isha in the eyes of the Prophet. However, this result is not acceptable. Although there is no evidence for this, in another annotation, it is conveyed that the Prophet had said these words to her by its meaning for “her tongue is long” because Ṣafiyya spoke to the Prophet with disrespect. Another commentary based on this promise makes the provision that a man can talk heavily to his wife when she delays something.The implications that depend on the assumption these words have negative meanings and produce results related to this assumption are incompatible with other data of circumcision. It could not be possible that the Prophet, who defended Ṣafiyya against the criticism against Ṣafiyya and who even guided him to defend himself, had a bad word for his wife. If the meaning of bad luck is given, then the Prophet will be the first person who disregards his own word “there is no bad luck”. Besides, the Prophet's good communication with the women in all areas of his life makes it impossible for him to say "damn" to one of his wives. It seems it is not logical for the Prophet to say this word to his wife, who is waiting in sorrow in front of his tent even after special worship Hajj.The translations, which are opposed to both the basic principles of religion and the guide life of Prophet, bring many problems. This translations, on the one hand, are drawing a portrait of a prophet who is intolerant to women and their specific situations, degrading women, and able to say rude and bad words whenever he wishes, on the other hand, are reflecting an image for the Prophet who does not comply with his own warnings. However, based on the information provided by the classical dictionaries, translations such as "Alas!" to indicate the magnitude and gravity of the situation that the word is currently facing, or "Wow!" to express the astonishment, will prevent all these negative consequences.As in many other fields, the translation of religious texts, especially hadiths, appears as an area that needs to be carefully considered in this regard. Thus, the expression ‘Aqrā-Ḥalqā’ was chosen as the main theme of this study. The translation of hadiths has an essential function and the only way for those who do not speak Arabic is to learn about the life of the Prophet. For this reason, one of the main results of the study is that only knowledge on grammar is not sufficient for the translation of the hadiths. On the contrary, the persons who will translate hadiths must have many competencies in the field such as the reasons for hadiths, their relationship with other hadiths, and understanding the hadith in line with the basic principles. Beyond this knowledge, it should be expected to master areas that require particular studies such as strange words in the language, meaningful constrictions, enlargements and shifts over time, proverbs and idiomatic expressions. Otherwise, it will be impossible to prevent a biased and wrong prophet representation. (shrink)

Society has historically not taken a benign view of genetic disease. The laws permitting sterilization of the mentally re tarded~ and those proscribing consanguineous marriages are but two examples. Indeed as far back as the 5th-10th centuries, B.C.E., consanguineous unions were outlawed (Leviticus XVIII, 6). Case law has traditionally tended toward the conservative. It is reactive rather than directive, exerting its influence only after an individual or group has sustained injury and brought suit. In contrast, state legislatures have not (...) been inhibited in enacting statutes. Many of their products can be characterized as hasty, unnecessary, ill-conceived, and based on the heart rather than the head. Moreover the lack of expert consultation sought has also been remarkable. One state legislature, for example, has advocated immunization for sickle cell anemia! Many others have enacted laws for the screening of inborn errors of metabolism, e.g., phenylketon uria, but have poorly defined the lines of responsibility to secure compliance. A spate of specific disease-related bills has emerged in the u.S. Congress, each seeking recognition and appropriations. Sickle cell anemia, hemophilia, Cooley's anemia and Tay-Sachs disease have been among the front-runners for support. Finally, in 1975, Congress has begun to examine an omnibus bill concerning all forms of genetic disease. The bill, termed the National Genetic Diseases Act is, however, still far from being enacted. (shrink)

My initial education in philosophy was in Oxford and in the philosophy of ‘ordinary language’ and the philosophy of language. My heroes were Wittgenstein and H.P Grice. I was intrigued by showing how metaphysical or ontological theories could be disposed of as lacking meaning. While I was studying for an M.A. at the University of East Anglia, I was taught by Martin Hollis who led me to read C.I. Lewis’s Mind and The World Order. The book was a challenge and (...) I doubt that I understood all of it. The footnotes to that book took me to Peirce’s writings and later to spending a year at Harvard writing a book on his work. His writings and using him as a teacher in how we should do philosophy have occupied most of my... (shrink)

In this article, I show that attending to Nietzsche's views about breeding and human enhancement reveals two important ways in which Ken Gemes's account of Nietzsche's uses of the rhetoric of degeneration and Verjüdung must be modified. First, attending to Nietzsche's views about breeding reveals that methods like isolation, quarantine, excision, and extermination are not merely for the weak, as Gemes claims. In fact, for Nietzsche such methods are crucial for producing and maintaining healthy, strong people and societies. More generally, (...) such methods play a vital role in Nietzsche's philosophy, including with respect to his conception of health. Second, contrary to Gemes's claim that Nietzsche was not interested in the actual Jews of his time, I show that Nietzsche was very interested in them, and thought they were important precisely for their relevance to his interest in breeding a new European aristocracy. (shrink)

Guy Debord _Comments on the Society of the Spectacle_ Translated by Malcolm Imrie London and New York: Verso, 1998 ISBN 1859841694.

The article comments on the epistemological foundations of medieval Arabic science and philosophy, as presented in five earlier communications, and attempts to draw some guidelines for the study of its social history. At the very beginning the notion of "Islam" is discounted as a meaningful explanatory category for historical investigation. A first part then looks at the applied sciences and notes three major characteristics of their epistemological approach: they were functionalist and based on experience and observation. The second part (...) looks at the theoretical sciences and notes that their epistemology was based on geometrical as well as (b) syllogistic modes of proof, and that the particular approach of scientists and philosophers was determined by (c) whether the motivations of each were scientific or non-scientific (e.g., religious, dogmatic, eristic, etc.). A third part concludes that for medieval Arabic-writing scholars with a scientific motivation the epistemological bases of their work were common to scientists to all cultures, and that the causes of advance or decline of Arabic science and philosophy have to be sought in social factors. In this regard three factors are presented as instrumental: (a) the level of patronage and wealth in any given society within the medieval Islamic world, (b) the cultural attitude of ideological laissezfaire in Sunni Islam which neither imposed nor adopted authoritative solutions in scientific and philosophical issues, and (c) the temporal and local specificity of scientific activity that makes the social contextualization of each science necessary in historical work. (shrink)

For the first time, Guy Debord's pivotal work Society of the Spectacle appears in a definitive and authoritative English translation. Originally published in France in 1967, Society of the Spectacle offered a set of radically new propositions about the nature of contemporary capitalism and modern culture. At the same time it was one of the most influential theoretical works for a wide range of political and revolutionary practice in the 1960s. Today, Debord's work continues to be (...) in the forefront of debates about the fate of consumer society and the operation of modern social power. In a sweeping revision of Marxist categories, the notion of the spectacle takes the problem of the commodity from the sphere of economics to a point at which the commodity as an image dominates not only economic exchange but the primary communicative and symbolic activity of all modern societies.Guy Debord was one of the most important participants in the activities associated with the Situationist International in the 1960s. Also an artist and filmmaker, he is the author of Memoires and Commentaires sur la société du spectacle. A Swerve Edition, distributed for Zone Books. (shrink)

In this 1976 volume, Professor Ziman paints a broad picture of science, and of its relations to the world in general. He sets the scene by the historical development of scientific research as a profession, the growth of scientific technologies out of the useful arts, the sources of invention and technical innovation, and the advent of Big Science. He then discusses the economics of research and development, the connections between science and war, the nature of science policy and the moral (...) dilemmas of social responsibility in science. Each topic is introduced by reference to easily understandable particular examples, with a large number of illustrations chosen to bring out the concreteness and reality of science as a human activity. Professor Ziman gives a chapter-by-chapter list of suggested topics for oral and written discussion, intended to provoke critical, sceptical attitudes to simplified solutions to real issues, and comments briefly on relevant books and other sources. (shrink)

SummaryScholars have pointed to Montesquieu's influence on Rousseau's work generally. Other scholars, who focus more intently on the Letter to d'Alembert, discern a crucial but limited influence of Montesquieu in two of Rousseau's teachings there: first, that some practices, including the theatre, can be appropriate and even wholesome for some societies, while noxious for others; and second, that mores are important in determining what types of laws and institutions a given people can tolerate and maintain. Careful consideration of Rousseau's Letter (...) in light of Montesquieu's Persian Letters and Spirit of the Laws reveals a much more pervasive influence, however. Rousseau's depictions of the theatre as well as his discussions of the role of women in both French and English society reveal that the Letter bears a striking resemblance to, and, in fact, appears to be a response to, aspects of Montesquieu's thought. Montesquieu's captivating depictions of the sociability that the French theatre can engender was surely an obstacle for Rousseau's opposition to its influence in Geneva. In resisting such influence, Rousseau counters many of Montesquieu's specific arguments and judgements. (shrink)

Book Symposium on Cheryl Misak's Cambridge Pragmatism: From Peirce and James to Ramsey and WittgensteinCheryl Misak's Cambridge Pragmatism is posited on the thought that the link between belief and action is a pragmatist hallmark. It is this central commitment that Misak sees running through the work of the towering figures of the two Cambridges—C.S. Peirce, William James, Bertrand Russell, Frank Ramsey, and Ludwig Wittgenstein. It is on this basis that Misak holds that these figures can be termed 'pragmatists.' My objective (...) in this comment is to make two arguments in light of Misak's hallmark thesis. The first argument is that if Misak is right, then the term 'Cambridge... (shrink)

Avant-garde theatre is often invoked as the bellwether for a society that has become postdramatic – fragmented, alienated, and critical of efforts to create collectively shared meanings. A theatre whose sequenced actions have no narrative (so the story goes) mirrors a social world where the most conflictual situations no longer appear as drama but merely as spectacle: a society where audiences look on without any feeling or connection. Because only half right, these theses about postdramatic theatre and (...) society are fundamentally wrong. As modern societies have expanded and differentiated, the elements that compose performances have become separated and often fragmented in both theatre and society. If they can be brought back together again, performances are viewed as authentic and meaningful. If (re)fusion cannot be achieved, performances fail to communicate meaning. The aim of this essay is to demonstrate that a shared ambition to (re)fuse fragmented performative elements has defined the most important strain of avant-garde theatre over the last two centuries. Most radical theatrical innovation has sought to open live drama back up to the telos of myth and ritual. Neither in theatre nor social life can the world transcend dramaturgy; it is fundamental to the search for meaning in a world beyond cosmological religion. (shrink)

The main goal of part 1 is to challenge the widely held view that Poincaré orders the sciences in a hierarchy of dependence, such that all others presuppose arithmetic. Commentators have suggested that the intuition that grounds the use of induction in arithmetic also underlies the conception of a continuum, that the consistency of geometrical axioms must be proved through arithmetical induction, and that arithmetical induction licenses the supposition that certain operations form a group. I criticize each of these readings. (...) More fully, I argue that the justification Poincaré offers for the use of the group notion in geometry appears to extend to set-theoretic notions that would suffice to put arithmetic on a logical foundation, thus undermining his own case for the necessity of intuition in arithmetic. In part 2, I offer an interpretation of intuition’s role on which it justifies the use of group-theoretic, but not set-theoretic, notions. (shrink)