This chapter contains sections titled: “Solid Objects” and Its Interpretations Towards an Alternative Interpretation “Solid Objects” as a reductio ad absurdum of One Kind of Aesthetic Theory Rapture does not Suffice.

This chapter contains sections titled: “Solid Objects” and Its Interpretations Towards an Alternative Interpretation “Solid Objects” as a reductio ad absurdum of One Kind of Aesthetic Theory Rapture does not Suffice.

In Three Guineas, first published in June, 1938 Virginia Woolf set about answering three questions. How should war be prevented? Why does the government not support education for women? Why are women prevented from engaging in professional work? Many at the time saw the matter of how best to prevent war as entirely unconnected with “women’s issues”; Woolf linked together the answers, and connected them too with discussions of such matters as social class, in what has come (...) to be acknowledged as a landmark both of feminist and of anti-war writing. Included in the first and other early editions—and integral to the work—was a series of five photographs of men of high position wearing garments that mark their status . Unlike most editions available today, this facsimile edition includes the illustrations as well as the text of the original. (shrink)

A Mystical Philosophy contributes to the contemporary resurgence of interest in Spirituality, but from a new direction. Revealing, in an original and provocative study, the mystical contents of the works of famous atheists Virginia Woolf and Iris Murdoch, Donna Lazenby shows how these thinkers' refusal to construe worldviews on available reductive models brought them to offer radically alternative pictures of life which maintain its mysteriousness, and promote a mystical way of knowing. This book makes a daring claim: (...) that a return to 'pure' experience is sufficient to demonstrate, for the contemporary imagination, the irreducibly mystical contents of everyday life: and, therefore, the enduring appropriateness of theological conversations. Lazenby reveals how these atheist thinkers offer crucial spiritual-intellectual advice for our times: a warning against reductive scientific and philosophical models that impoverish our understanding of our selves and the world, and a powerful endorsement of ways of knowing that give art, and a restored concept of contemplation, their consummative place. (shrink)

When Ann Banfield argued in The Phantom Table1 that the debate about modernism should take into account its revolutionary conception of the objects of sensation, and turned to Bertrand Russell’s 1914 theory of knowledge to do so, she challenged on the one hand the critics’ near ignorance of the Cambridge Apostles’ influence on Bloomsbury, and on the other, the “assumption of contemporary understanding of modernism—that the only philosophy of relevance to twentieth-century art and literature is continental.”2 Following her example, (...) daunting as it may be, I will challenge this last assumption and argue that the philosophy of relevance to the understanding of Woolf’s work is not necessarily continental but British.My .. (shrink)

Nearly two hundred years ago, Mary Wollstonecraft wrote what is considered to be the first major work of feminist political theory: A Vindication of the Rights of Women . Much has been written about this work, and about Wollstonecraft as the intellectual pioneer of feminism, but the actual substance and coherence of her political thought have been virtually ignored. Virginia Sapiro here provides the first full-length treatment of Wollstonecraft's political theory. Drawing on all of Wollstonecraft's works and treating them (...) thematically rather than sequentially, Sapiro shows that Wollstonecraft's ideas about women's rights, feminism, and gender are elements of a broad and fully developed philosophy, one with significant implications for contemporary democratic and liberal theory. The issues raised speak to many current debates in theory, including those surrounding interpretation of the history of feminism, the relationship between liberalism and republicanism in the development of political philosophy, and the debate over the canon. For political scientists, most of whom know little about Wollstonecraft's thought, Sapiro's book is an excellent, nuanced introduction which will cause a reconsideration of her work and her significance both for her time and for today's concerns. For feminist scholars, Sapiro's book offers a rounded and unconventional analysis of Wollstonecraft's thought. Written with considerable charm and verve, this book will be the starting point for understanding this important writer for years to come. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Virginia Woolf, Time, and the RealJane DuranCritical appraisal of the work of Virginia Woolf has tended to focus on feminist concerns, or on issues revolving around the actual facts of her upbringing and the extent to which she might have been thought to be a victim of abuse. Although some commentators have noted that Woolf's high modernist style lends itself to a number of (...) readings with respect to sense of self, the passage of time, and a sort of phenomenological reflection, philosophical concerns have, in general, not played a large role in Woolf scholarship to date.In this article I shall argue that some of Woolf's best known work—especially To the Lighthouse—exemplifies a concern for time, reality and a sense of interior life-as-lived that is overtly philosophical in its construction, and even somewhat didactic. Furthermore, I will claim, it is part and parcel of modernism as it is ordinarily conceived to address these issues in some fashion, even if, in many cases, they are not addressed as thoroughly as they are in Woolf's work. Even if we can be certain that a great deal of Woolf's mental disturbance, or mental illness, was the result of childhood abuse, or even inherited tendencies, it still does not detract from the power with which she was able to use depictions of inner turmoil to give us a sense of the fleeting and transitory nature of the real. Indeed, such a sense is one of the hallmarks of Woolf's work and is acknowledged by most of her critics, even if it is not termed a philosophical concern. I will analyze constructs of time and the chronological through a view of To the Lighthouse.IA number of philosophers have offered conceptions of time; these efforts range from those of antiquity to the more technical articulations [End Page 300] of the twentieth century. One of the most haunting evocations of the power of time is in the work of one whose thought is seldom cited in this regard, Simone de Beauvoir. In Old Age, she offers a phenomenological account of the passage of time that reflects an emphasis on the internally-felt disparity between the past and the present that is a frequently-remarked upon aspect of old age.1 There is a paucity of experience-of-the-present among the very elderly, and a reliance upon the past. Concomitantly, there is a foreshortening of the future. As Beauvoir writes: "How far does memory allow us to retrieve our lives? The images... are far from possessing the richness of their original object. An image is the seeing of an absent object by means of an organic and affective analogue" (p. 147). Despite the fact that these images may lack the richness of the original, the somewhat paradoxical effect of being older is that these images predominate.In To the Lighthouse, Woolf plays with time in a way that allows for a development of the internally-sensed structure of time on the parts of the various characters. Although many have remarked upon the well-known middle section, "Time Passes," this aspect of the felt sensation of time as an internal phenomenon, and one on which her characters seem to draw at regular intervals, is a somewhat little remarked feature of the rest of the book. It is present from the outset: James's first thoughts about the trip to the lighthouse highlight time in a sort of reversal of the way that Beauvoir has indicated for the elderly; James's conception of the passing of time is altered in another sense, since he is only six. He has projected himself forward so intently to the trip to the lighthouse that everything else has seemed somewhat unreal. As Woolf writes, "he had looked forward, for years and years it seemed...."2Although the differences between the felt constructions of time between, for example, childhood and old age might seem to partake of the commonplace, Beauvoir is among those philosophers who have used the notion of the truncation of time and the foreshortening of the future among the elderly to make philosophical commentary. By the same token... (shrink)

In the growing body of academic literature on biography that has developed in the last few decades, Virginia Woolf's essay, "The New Biography,"1 has come to occupy a central place—mentioned, discussed and quoted from, I would estimate, more often than any other piece of writing on the subject. Virginia Woolf's distinctive view of the nature and limitations of biography has thus had, and continues to have, a deep and wide-ranging influence on the way the genre is (...) discussed by critics and theorists. My aim in this essay is to present a detailed analysis of Virginia Woolf's thinking about biography in order to make clear why I believe its influence on contemporary theorising about biography is, on the whole, a misfortune. As is often pointed out, Virginia Woolf's views on biography are closely connected with—indeed, to an extent that I hope to make clear, they are simply an application of—her views on fiction. In the light of this, I have tried to trace some of the most striking features of her thinking about biography back to her earlier thoughts on fiction, as presented in both her novels and her essays. The result, I hope, will be that, while the attractions of her way of looking at fiction and biography are recognised and revealed, the manifest flaws in her thinking on these subjects are clearly exposed. (shrink)

How is feminism changing the way women and men think, feel, and act? Virginia Held explores how feminist theory is changing contemporary views of moral choice. She proposes a comprehensive philosophy of feminist ethics, arguing persuasively for reconceptualizations of the self of relations between the self and others and of images of birth and death, nurturing and violence. Held shows how social, political, and cultural institutions have traditionally been founded upon masculine ideals of morality. She then identifies a (...) distinct feminist morality that moves beyond culturally embedded notions about motherhood and female emotionality. Examining the effects of this alternative moral and ethical system on changing social values, Held discusses its far-reaching implications for altering standards of freedom, democracy, equality, and personal development. Ultimately, she concludes, the culture of feminism could provide a fresh perspective on--even solutions to--contemporary social problems. Feminist Morality makes a vital contribution to the ongoing debate in feminist theory on the importance of motherhood. For philosophers and other readers outside feminist theory, it offers a feminist moral and social critique in clear and accessible terms. (shrink)

A modern form of narrative, comic books are used to communicate, discuss, and critique issues in business ethics and social issues in management. A description of comic books as a legitimate medium is followed by a discussion of the pedagogical uses of comic books and assessment techniques. The strengths of the pedagogy include crossing cultural barriers, understanding the complexity of individual decision-making and organizational influences, and the universality of dilemmas and values. We provide an initial source for educators on the (...) topics, comic books, plotlines, and other commentary for consideration of use in the classroom from high school to graduate business ethics and social issues in management courses. (shrink)

Aristotle's Eudemian Ethics has been unjustly neglected in comparison with its more famous counterpart the Nicomachean Ethics. This is in large part due to the fact that until recently no complete translation of the work has been available. But the Eudemian Ethics is a masterpiece in its own right, offering valuable insights into Aristotle's ideas on virtue, happiness and the good life. This volume offers a translation by Brad Inwood and Raphael Woolf that is both fluent and exact, and (...) an introduction in which they help the reader to gain a deeper understanding both of the Eudemian Ethics and of its relation to the Nicomachean Ethics and to Aristotle's ethical thought as a whole. The explanatory notes address Aristotle's many references to other works, people and events. The volume will be of interest to students and scholars of the history of ethics, ancient and moral philosophy, and Aristotle studies. (shrink)

There are different kinds of terrorism as there are of war. It is unpersuasive to make the deliberate targeting of civilians a defining feature of terrorism, and states as well as non-state groups can engage in terrorism. In a democracy, voters responsible for a government’s unjustifiable policies are not necessarily innocent, while conscripts are legitimate targets. Rather than being uniquely atrocious, terrorism most resembles small war. It is not always or necessarily more morally unjustifiable than war. All war should be (...) avoided, but some war is more unjustifiable than other war. Comparable judgments should be made about terrorism. It is appropriate to compare civilians killed by those seeking political change and those using violence to prevent such change. Sometimes the debate should focus on the justifiability or lack of it of the aims sought. While violence should always be used as little as possible, those in power are responsible for making other means than violence effective in achieving justifiable political change. When considering the likely causes of violence, one that has received inadequate attention is humiliation. Humiliation is not the same as shame. Causing humiliation can and should be avoided. (shrink)

Intellectuals such as William James and Aldous Huxley have thought it possible to develop a technique to apply to this world the mystical-type insights gained during drug-enabled experiences. Particularly, Huxley claimed that the visionary experience triggered by psychedelics could help us rethink our relationship with technology and promote a much-needed cultural change. In this article, we explore this hypothesis. To do so, we build a philosophical framework based on Günther Anders's philosophy of technique, presenting human beings as morally blind (...) when facing technological development. Mystical experiences are then proposed as a means to improve our moral faculties—and psychedelic drugs as tools to enable them. We finally explore the empirical feasibility of such a hypothesis by thoroughly reviewing the recent scientific literature on the nature of the psychedelic experience, concluding that the long-term effects in the personality domain openness and in nature relatedness point to the emergence of a morally improved agent, thus providing substance to an application of mysticism. (shrink)

This 2001 translation makes one of the most important texts in ancient philosophy available to modern readers. Cicero is increasingly being appreciated as an intelligent and well-educated amateur philosopher, and in this work he presents the major ethical theories of his time in a way designed to get the reader philosophically engaged in the important debates. Raphael Woolf's translation does justice to Cicero's argumentative vigour as well as to the philosophical ideas involved, while Julia Annas's introduction and notes (...) provide a clear and accessible explanation of the philosophical context of the work. This edition will appeal to all readers interested in this central text in ancient philosophy and the history of ethics. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Transformed Lives: Making Sense of Atonement Today by Cynthia S. W. CrysdaleVirginia W. LandgrafTransformed Lives: Making Sense of Atonement Today Cynthia S. W. Crysdale new york: seabury books, 2016. 192 pp. $16.00Cynthia Crysdale aims to show how atonement can have meaning for modern and postmodern Christians who reject the idea that God wills Jesus's violent death. She starts with stories of people who were estranged from God but (...) have been given grace to love God anew. Their subsequent lives are not perfect and involve multiple deaths of the old self and resurrections into the new. Yet there is a reconciliation not present beforehand: not a change in God, who has always loved us, but a change in us. Crysdale seeks to navigate between two undesirable positions: a penal substitutionary doctrine of the atonement, which she thinks posits a violent God, or a rejection of the idea of atonement altogether. She sees atonement as not only moral influence showing an example but a relationship that involves our whole being.Crysdale then presents a historical overview to show that this understanding of atonement is a plausible interpretation of scripture and tradition. Biblical sacrifices were not intended to propitiate an angry deity but to expiate human sin. New Testament writers who saw Jesus's death on the cross in continuity with these sacrifices were not implying that God was punishing Jesus. Jesus's statements about giving his life as a ransom prophesied the subversion of patron–client power relations rather than predicting a transaction whereby Jesus would pay for sin. Subsequent writers who saw Jesus as gaining victory over the devil saw God and Jesus as united against the powers and Jesus as attaining justice by love. Even Anselm, sometimes blamed for the penal substitutionary view, intended to avoid the idea of the crucifixion as God's punishment of Jesus. In the honor code of the time, either satisfaction or punishment was required. Therefore, Jesus's act of making satisfaction is precisely not punishment. Crysdale sees subsequent conflations of satisfaction and punishment as distorting Anselm's original intent and implying that God requires violent punishment of sin. [End Page 208]Crysdale then takes readers on a tour of changes in scientific, historical, and epistemological consciousness in the modern era to ask how theology might be done today. Drawing on Bernard Lonergan, she describes multiple dimensions of conversion that are all instances of grace when they occur. She then interprets the incarnation as indicating God's offer of friendship with humanity and Jesus's death and resurrection as indicating the transformation of power and oppression. Believing that an abstract atonement over the heads of human beings does not exist, she concludes with further stories of lives transformed by an encounter with God, including Martin Luther King Jr. and Dorothy Day.This book is suitable for educated lay adults, advanced undergraduates, or introductory seminary courses. Protestant audiences may find it typically Catholic, even though Crysdale is an Anglican, because it emphasizes changed lives rather than God's act of justification prior to any change in us. Theologically, it does not deal with every possible objection to its thesis. Those concerned with cultures of impunity, where malevolent lawlessness gets its way, may think that rejecting any sense of punishment of sin in the crucifixion throws the baby out with the bathwater. Recently, Fleming Rutledge (in The Crucifixion), drawing on Karl Barth, has made a point of retaining punishment as one meaning of the atonement even while emphasizing that God's wrath is always in the service of God's love. Transformed Lives does not have the last word on the atonement and would not claim to, since Crysdale wants to invite readers to do theology befitting their changing context. However, readers at many levels will benefit from its accessible treatment of its topic and invitation to reflection that befits a loving, reconciling, evil-opposing God.Virginia W. LandgrafAmerican Theological Library AssociationCopyright © 2018 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

Rather than using literary texts to evidence an analytic argument, within this piece we read Julia McNair Wright's (US, 1840?1902), Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette's (France, 1873?1954), and Willa Cather's (US, 1873?1947) texts through theoretical lenses that expose their educational meaning and value and that create conversation among them concerning girls? and women's educations. While we do not claim that one can generalize these women's works and lessons to every life, we contend that these women and the literary products they created offer girls (...) and women powerful lessons about resistance, subversion, and nurturing one's intellect, lessons that in some ways transcend class and race in particular. First, we define and explain Bruner's concept of the more using Rosenblatt, Gallagher, and Gardner's theories and findings to illuminate his concept. Next, we identify and examine three themes that emerge across these authors? texts?subverting through the everyday, becoming one's own steward, and moving from survival to self-actualization. Establishing these themes first in Wright's texts, we then use them to frame Colette's and Cather's fiction and support these themes by focusing on one lesson that emerges from each author's work(s). Finally, we ask what one might learn about educating girls and women from these texts and others whose educative meaning and value remain hidden. (shrink)

This paper critically compares the philosophy of Günther Anders and the contemporary transhumanists, like Julian Savulescu, Ingmar Persson, or Thomas Douglas. The Andersian concepts of moral blindness, promethean gap, and promethean shame will be discussed in order to understand human beings’ outdatedness; parallel to this, we will also expose the transhumanist analysis on the unfitness of human beings in evolutive and cognitive terms. We will show that much of the transhumanist analysis is a reformulation of the Andersian thesis, now (...) under scientific terminology. Finally, we will approach the transhumanist proposal of moral enhancement, explaining and confronting some critics raised on the grounds of freedom and moral responsibility. (shrink)

This book revisits, and sheds fresh light on, some key texts and debates in ancient philosophy. Its twin targets are 'Old Chestnuts' – well-known passages in the works of ancient philosophers about which one might have thought everything there is to say has already been said – and 'Sacred Cows' – views about what ancient philosophers thought, on issues of philosophical importance, that have attained the status of near-unquestioned orthodoxy. Thirteen leading scholars respond to these challenges by offering new (...) perspectives on familiar material and challenging some prevailing orthodoxies. On authors ranging from the Presocratics to Plotinus, the book represents a snapshot of contemporary scholarship in ancient philosophy, and a vigorous and illuminating affirmation of its continuing interest and power. The volume is dedicated to Professor M. M. McCabe, an inspiring scholar and teacher, colleague and friend to both the editors and the contributors. (shrink)

Wittgenstein's remarks on mathematics have not received the recogni tion they deserve; they have for the most part been either ignored, or dismissed as unworthy of the author of the Tractatus and the I nvestiga tions. This is unfortunate, I believe, and not at all fair, for these remarks are not only enjoyable reading, as even the harshest critics have con ceded, but also a rich and genuine source of insight into the nature of mathematics. It is perhaps the fact (...) that they are more suggestive than systematic which has put so many people off; there is nothing here of formal derivation and very little attempt even at sustained and organized argumentation. The remarks are fragmentary and often obscure, if one does not recognize the point at which they are directed. Nevertheless, there is much here that is good, and even a fairly system atic and coherent account of mathematics. What I have tried to do in the following pages is to reconstruct the system behind the often rather disconnected commentary, and to show that when the theory emerges, most of the harsh criticism which has been directed against these re marks is seen to be without foundation. This is meant to be a sym pathetic account of Wittgenstein's views on mathematics, and I hope that it will at least contribute to a further reading and reassessment of his contributions to the philosophy of mathematics. (shrink)

Increasingly, companies implement social and environmental standards as instruments towards corporate social responsibility in supply chains. This is based on the assumption that such standards increase legitimacy among stakeholders. Yet, a wide variety of standards with different requirement levels exist and companies might tend to introduce the ones with low exigencies, using them as a legitimacy front. This strategy jeopardizes the reputation of social and environmental standards among stakeholders and their long-term trust in these instruments of CSR, meaning that all (...) expenses for their implementation are of no avail for the companies. Therefore, this paper highlights which criteria are important for the selection, implementation and improvement in order to achieve a company's aim, but also to strengthen the legitimacy of social and environmental standards. This research is based on conceptual thought and some existing empirical research, comparing four different social and environmental standards, revealing weaknesses and strengths. It exposes the basic conditions for the success of such standards among stakeholders and identifies the need for more empirical data. (shrink)

The Russo Williamson thesis (RWT) states that a causal claim can be established only if it can be established that there is a difference-making relationship between the cause and the effect, and that there is a mechanism linking the cause and the effect that is responsible for such a difference-making relationship (Russo & Williamson, 2007). The applicability of Russo and Williamson’s idea was hugely debated in relation to biomedical research, and recently it has been applied to the social sciences (Shan (...) & Williamson, 2021). While many philosophers and social scientists have advocated the use of different kinds of evidence for causal discoveries, others have criticised this approach. With this paper, I aim to defend RWT from criticisms and to show its importance in the social sciences. The paper is structured as follows. After a brief introduction, in Sect. 2, I will summarise RWT, and in Sect. 3 I will describe how this approach can be applied to the social sciences. In Sect. 4, I will reconstruct two main criticisms of this thesis proposed in the philosophy of the social sciences literature: namely (i) RWT is not used in the social sciences, (ii) RWT does not work. For each criticism I will provide a defence of RWT. My defence will be based on two general considerations: (i) RWT appears perfectly in line with the research methods used in the social sciences and (ii) RWT can be applied successfully to establish causal claims. In Sect. 5, moreover, I will examine the causal accounts that have motivated such criticisms and I will argue that they should be rejected to endorse RWT and a causal account able to accommodate the current use of mechanistic and difference-making evidence in the social sciences. Section 6 will conclude with a note on the relevance of RWT in both its descriptive and normative form. (shrink)

Increasingly, companies implement social and environmental standards as instruments towards corporate social responsibility (CSR) in supply chains. This is based on the assumption that such standards increase legitimacy among stakeholders. Yet, a wide variety of standards with different requirement levels exist and companies might tend to introduce the ones with low exigencies, using them as a legitimacy front. This strategy jeopardizes the reputation of social and environmental standards among stakeholders and their long-term trust in these instruments of CSR, meaning that (...) all expenses for their implementation are of no avail for the companies. Therefore, this paper highlights which criteria are important for the selection, implementation and improvement in order to achieve a company's aim, but also to strengthen the legitimacy of social and environmental standards. This research is based on conceptual thought and some existing empirical research, comparing four different social and environmental standards, revealing weaknesses and strengths. It exposes the basic conditions for the success of such standards among stakeholders and identifies the need for more empirical data. (shrink)

This article analyses the accusation of nihilism that F. H. Jacobi made against Fichte in a letter of mars. 1799, imputation that lays on the personal conception ofJacobi about the reason as a negative capacity which only can destroy its objects. The letter in question implicates two different types of nihilism: a)The cosmological one, accepted by Fichte and named acosmism by him. It is only a reformulation of the sensible world from practical principIes, but doesn't suppose an annihilation or scorn (...) of this world. Qn the contrary, the religious view, for example, shows the world as a manifestation of godlite and, hased on moral exigencies, doesn~t admit the existence of death. Of course, the immortality isn't for a particular soul but for the order of moral actions (= God). b) The radical one, which doesn't exist in Fichte and lays on a bad interpretation of bis intellectual intuition assumed from a point of view next to Schelling. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Coloration of Aristotelian Eye-Jelly: A Note on On Dreams 459b–460aRaphael WoolfThe purpose of this paper is to make a small contribution to a recent lively debate concerning Aristotle’s philosophy of mind. This debate has centered on a paper published by Myles Burnyeat,1 which argued that Aristotle’s philosophy of mind, being hopelessly anachronistic, could not serve as the prototype of any contemporary theory: in particular, it could (...) not be seen as proto-functionalist, as Nussbaum and Putnam had proposed.2 The grounds given by Burnyeat for the anachronism of Aristotle’s philosophy of mind focus mainly on Aristotle’s notion of perceptual awareness. According to Burnyeat, perceptual awareness is for Aristotle a primitives3 and essential4 property of the relevant organ of perception. In Burnyeat’s view, Aristotle’s theory denies that there is any further level of analysis that can be undertaken. When an eye comes to perceive an object, the potentiality of the eye for seeing is actualized, but there is nothing further to be said. In particular, there is no physiological change taking place in the eye, in which the psychological change is realized. Thus, when Aristotle says in the De Anima that the eye becomes “in a way coloured”5 when it sees a coloured object, for Burnyeat this means no more [End Page 385] than that it registers awareness of colour,6 not that it becomes literally coloured itself.On this last point, Burnyeat takes issue with the view of Richard Sorabji,7 who maintains that for Aristotle the eye does undergo physiological change when it does some seeing: in particular, if it sees, for example, a red object, then the jelly inside the eye literally becomes coloured red. On this view, Aristotle does indeed have a theory, congenial enough to modern perspectives, whereby each psychological change is realized physiologically.8There are several large questions which my paper does not attempt to address. Firstly, it offers no view on what implications Burnyeat’s position would have, if correct, for the interpretation of Aristotle as a proto-functionalist. Secondly, it does not offer a view on how necessary the correctness of an interpretation such as Sorabji’s is to the case made by the advocates of Aristotle as a proto-functionalist.9 Thirdly, it makes no adjudication between any of the competing parties’ interpretations of Aristotle’s De Anima, his main work on psychology and the chief textual battleground in the debate I have been outlining.This paper’s aim is a much more modest one. It is to draw attention to a short passage in Aristotle’s work On Dreams, which in my view incontrovertibly suggests that Aristotle did believe that the eye becomes literally coloured during perception of a coloured object. I shall therefore be presenting one piece of evidence in favour of Sorabji’s view; but I shall not be arguing that Sorabji’s view is conclusively the right one (which would require consideration of all the relevant evidence), nor drawing any conclusions about the implications of this evidence for interpretations of Aristotle’s philosophy of mind. It is, however, [End Page 386] reasonable to suggest that if Sorabji’s view is right then Burnyeat’s view is in severe difficulties, since its main underpinning—the claim that psychological change has no physiological counterpart in Aristotle’s theory—will have been removed. The evidence I have to present, then, is, albeit indirectly, support for the view that Aristotle’s philosophy of mind is not hopelessly anachronistic, at least in the way that Burnyeat claims.Here is the evidence from On Dreams (459b23–460a26):That the sense-organs rapidly perceive even slight differences is shown by what happens with mirrors. Indeed, anyone who would give his attention to it might look into that subject too and explore the problem. At the same time, it is clear from this case that, just as the organ of sight is affected by, so too it acts upon, its object. For in extremely clean mirrors, when women look into them during their menstrual period, the mirror surface takes on a sort of blood-red cloud. In fact, if the... (shrink)

Clinical Ethics Committees (CECs), as distinct from Research Ethics Committees, were originally established with the aim of supporting healthcare professionals in managing controversial clinical ethical issues. However, it is still unclear whether they manage to accomplish this task and what is their impact on clinical practice. This systematic review aims to collect available assessments of CECs’ performance as reported in literature, in order to evaluate CECs’ effectiveness. We retrieved all literature published up to November 2019 in six databases (PubMed, Ovid (...) MEDLINE, Scopus, Philosopher’s Index, Embase and Web of Science), following PRISMA guidelines. We included only articles specifically addressing CECs and providing any form of CECs performance assessment. Twenty-nine articles were included. Ethics consultation was the most evaluated of CECs’ functions. We did not find standardized tools for measuring CECs’ efficacy, but 33% of studies considered “user satisfaction” as an indicator, with 94% of them reporting an average positive perception of CECs’ impact. Changes in patient treatment and a decrease of moral distress in health personnel were reported as additional outcomes of ethics consultation. The highly diverse ways by which CECs carry out their activities make CECs’ evaluation difficult. The adoption of shared criteria would be desirable to provide a reliable answer to the question about their effectiveness. Nonetheless, in general both users and providers consider CECs as helpful, relevant to their work, able to improve the quality of care. Their main function is ethics consultation, while less attention seems to be devoted to bioethics education and policy formation. (shrink)

This paper sets out to re-examine the famous Wax Tablet model in Plato's Theaetetus, in particular the section of it which appeals to the quality of individual souls' wax as an explanation of why some are more liable to make mistakes than others (194c-195a). This section has often been regarded as an ornamental flourish or a humorous appendage to the model's main explanatory business. Yet in their own appropriations both Aristotle and Locke treat the notion of variable wax quality as (...) an important part of the model's utility in dealing with mistake. What, then, is its status for Plato? I shall argue that the section on variable wax quality is there to suggest to the reader a tempting way of misinterpreting the model. This will highlight the distinctive character of the model in its original version, and provide an unusual example of a philosopher describing how not to read one of his own doctrines. (shrink)

_ Source: _Volume 10, Issue 3, pp 413 - 432 This essay provides an extended commentary on Richard Evans’ book _Altered Pasts_ from the perspective of a historian of a much earlier period, the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The essay considers much of the literature discussed by Evans, explores the “scope” and “range” of counterfactual arguments, and offers suggestions as to how and when legitimate counterfactual historical thinking itself came into being. The essay also argues that the problems inherent in (...) counterfactual history lie less in the logic of their arguments than in the use that is made of them: specifically that a device useful, heuristically, in evaluating the impact of certain factors on events has been stretched by some historians beyond the weight it will bear. In the final section, the relation between fictional and nonfictional counterfactuals is explored. (shrink)

History from Loss challenges the common thought that 'history is written by the winners' and explores how history makers in different times and places across the globe have written histories from loss, even when this has come at the threat to their own safety. A distinguished group of historians from around the globe offer an introduction to different history-makers' lives and ideas, and important extracts from their works which highlight various meanings of loss: from physical ailments to social ostracism, exile (...) to imprisonment, and from dispossession to potential execution. Throughout the volume consideration of the information 'bubbles' of different times and places helps to show how information has been weaponised to cause harm. In this way, the text helps to put current debates about the biases and weaponization of platforms such as social media into global and historical perspective. In combination, the chapters build a picture of history from loss which is global, sustained, and anything but a simple mirror of history made by victors. The volume also includes an Introduction and Afterword which draw out the key meanings of history from loss, and which offer ideas for further exploration. History from Loss provides an invaluable resource for students, teachers, and general readers who wish to put current debates on bias, the politicization of history, and threats to history makers into global and historical perspective. (shrink)

The supple and ever-present search for the possibilities offered by the narrative form in fictional writing corresponds to the use of the narrative as a mode of understanding and explaining our being-in-the-world in philosophy. The intimate liaison between the realm of fictional imagination and that of human everydayness inspires writers to seek ways to tackle issues of temporality, the conflicting character of human drives, and the ultimately unresolvable tension between finitude and infinitude. As a literary and philosophical category, the (...) narrative remains an inexhaustible space for the exploration of the way we understand our lives. I propose a hermeneutic investigation of the interactions between the art of narration and the categories of space, presence/absence, and (be)- longingness as evoked in Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway. This article engages Martin Heidegger’s hermeneutics of facticity, and, more specifically, his notions of homelessness and homecoming, to shed light on the inimitable character of Woolf’s artistic representations of the spatial dimension of human existence, reality viewed as both tremulous and solid, as well as of human embodiment and the disparity/closeness between the corporeal and the spiritual. (shrink)

This book does not demand continuous reading; but at whatever place one opens it, one will find matter for reflection. The most useful books are those of which readers themselves compose half; they extend the thoughts of which the germ is presented to them; they correct what seems defective to them, and they fortify by their reflections what seems to them weak. It is only really by enlightened people that this book can be read; the ordinary man is not made (...) for such knowledge; philosophy will never be his lot. Those who say that there are truths which must be hidden from the people, need not be alarmed; the people do not read; they work six days of the week, and on the seventh go to the inn. In a word, philosophical works are made only for philosophers, and every honest man must try to be a philosopher, without pluming himself on being one. This alphabet is extracted from the most estimable works which are not commonly within the reach of the many; and if the author does not always mention the sources of his information, as being well enough known to the learned, he must not be suspected of wishing to take the credit for other people's work, because he himself preserves anonymity。. (shrink)

This volume analyses, from a computational point of view, how culture may arise, develop and evolve through time. The four sections in this book examine and analyse the modelling of culture, group and organisation culture, culture simulation, and culture-sensitive technology design. Different research disciplines have different perspectives on culture, making it difficult to compare and integrate different concepts and models of culture. By taking a computational perspective this book nevertheless enables the integration of concepts that play a role in culture, (...) even though they might originate from different disciplines. Culture is usually regarded as something vague and qualitative and thus difficult to deal with in a computational and formal setting. Taking a computational approach to culture thus encompasses a twofold risk: taking a too simplistic approach to cultural influence on behaviour; or trying to capture too much, hence not leading to useful computational tools. However, the approaches and insights in this collection show how different perspectives by leading researchers described in thirteen chapters still can form a coherent picture. The book thus illustrates the potential of using computing systems to better understand culture. By describing methods, theories and concrete application results about the integration of cultural aspects into computer systems, this book provides inspiration to researchers of all disciplines alike and presents the start of an interdisciplinary dialogue on culture. (shrink)

I will treat feminist ethical theory as a distinct type of theory. Although some feminists are skeptical about the need for theory as distinct from cultivating practices of being morally perceptive and sensitive, many others argue for the theory they see as needed. Feminist ethical theory usually includes, but is not limited to, the concerns that have been developed under the heading of ‘the ethics of care’ or ‘care ethics’. Care ethics are usually contrasted with ethics of justice, such as (...) Kantian and utilitarian moral theories. Instead of being a theory primarily focused on right action, an ethic of care seeks moral evaluations of relations between persons, and reinterprets both personal and political relations in light of the value of care. I will show how feminist ethical theory differs from virtue theory as well as from Kantian and utilitarian theories. (shrink)

Feminism is sometimes equated with demands for equal rights for women. Mary Wollstonecraft in the eighteenth century argued, against Rousseau, that women should be accorded the same rights and freedoms based on rational principles that were being demanded for men. In the nineteenth century, John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor Mill, rejecting prevailing views of the time, called for an end to the subjection of women through an extension to women of equal rights and equal opportunities. Women, they argued, should (...) have the same rights as men to own property, to vote, to receive education, and to enter any profession. In the twentieth century, women's movements often focused their attention on winning for women the right to vote, achieved in the United States in 1920, in England in 1918 and 1928, in France in 1946, and in Switzerland only in 1971. The second wave of the women's movement in the United States, starting in the late 1960s, placed strong emphasis on achieving an Equal Rights Amendment to the US Constitution (the amendment failed to be ratified by the required number of states), and on ending discrimination against women in all its forms. Arguments for welfare rights, valid independently of feminism, were seen as particularly important to women: how could a person enjoy rights to freedom or equal protection of the laws without assurance of the means to stay alive and to feed her children? Either employment and child care must be available, or persons must have access by right to the basic necessities of life. Negative freedoms from discriminatory interferences are insufficient; positive enablements to be free and equal agents must also be assured by rights. (shrink)

According to Bertrand Russell, philosophy should “teach how to live without certainty, and yet without being paralyzed by hesitation.” Recent natural and human-made disasters have confronted business leaders to act decisively without certainty in circumstances with profound implications for ethical well-being. This article introduces a Special Topic Forum on Extreme Operating Environments, defined as times of great uncertainty and/or crisis which challenge human capabilities, organizational operations, and social institutions.

This paper proposes an original account, based on the capabilities approach, that explains which kinds of attachment to natural resources are sufficiently morally weighty to give rise to special resource rights. The paper provides a critique of current attachment theories, which fail to provide a clear way to differentiate between what is a preference and what is a legitimate attachment, and thereby justify overreaching resource rights. It then examines Armstrong’s welfarist account of natural resources justice, and argues that the capabilities (...) approach can be used to specify the relevant dimensions of well-being, as elements of human flourishing. A capabilities-based account is appealing because it is more limited in scope than existing attachment theories, and able to make finer distinctions regarding the scope and content of individuals’ rights claims. Attachment claims are legitimate when the valuable basic capabilities held by individuals depend on their relationship to specific natural resources. By using capabilities as a mediating concept, we can detect more precisely when attachment claims are normatively significant and can ground special resource rights. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Songs of Degrees: Essays on Contemporary Poetry and PoeticsVirginia A. La CharitéSongs of Degrees: Essays on Contemporary Poetry and Poetics, by John Taggart; 254 pp. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1994, $29.95 paper.John Taggart is a highly respected American poet whose passion for objectivism permeates his critical reading as well as his own creative works. The volume Songs of Degrees: Essays on Contemporary Poetry and Poetics represents the (...) first time that his various critical articles have been collected into a single work. Of the eighteen essays, all but one were previously published in various journals between 1975 and 1989; the eighteenth is an essay or “A Preface” on one of his own collections of poetry, Peace on Earth. By addressing his own poetry, Taggart’s volume cleverly includes himself as poet in this study of what he considers valuable in a work of art. [End Page 398]Finding a poem to be a simple composition of words (principle) and an image suggested by that composition (process), Taggart adopts the title Songs of Degrees from Louis Zukofsy’s seven short poems published in 1956 as Some Time. A song is then a poetic form, a continuing complete statement which actualizes the separate entities (words) of its expression. However, and most importantly, a song does not begin as a visual report; rather, a song moves towards being visualized. Consequently, everything depends on technique and everything turns on its structure, as the mind coordinates the information received by the eye. Degrees, then, emerge as variations of consonance and dissonance or word-sound functions. To write down is to compose; to compose is to create. Hence, a song of degrees is both an actual object and a metaphor for that object.Under the poetic of objectivism, Taggart’s essays are primarily concerned with poets whose work is in accord with his own: George Oppen (three essays), Frank Sampori, William Bronk, Louis Zukofsy (three essays), Bruce Andrews, Susan Howe (two essays), Robert Duncan, Charles Olson, and Theodore Enslin. Taggart demonstrates here that he is a sensitive and intellectually alert reader. These essays on criticism are in actuality essays on Taggart’s concept of poetics. Implicit is Taggart’s bias as an objectivist poet who insists that poetry has a spiritual value in the visionary tradition of Robert Lowell and Robert Duncan and to an extent Wallace Stevens.But perhaps of even greater interest than Taggart’s superb readings of his poetic colleagues—and it can be justifiably argued that perhaps only Taggart can read these poets with the sympathetic eye that they deserve—is the inclusion of three essays on other arts: dance (Trina Collins), stained glass (Mark Rothko), and jazz (John Coltrane). By including these essays with those of literary criticism, Taggart expands the terms poetics and poetry to any text or object which is a moving line and complete at the same time. Form comes from language; language is then based on experience, not belief, and the resulting image is what is revealed and reflected, what is seen. A work (poem, song, text) is valuable because its visionary imagination captures the collective conscience to regain spiritual ascesis. The process of objectification is the metaphor or song, which emerges in degrees of interaction. The song has substance, it is tangible, and it has an objective existence of its own. To be critical is to objectify the composition or structure at hand. Critical is another term for technical, and indeed it is the technical aspect of writing poetry which Taggart so deftly elucidates in his volume of essays.For anyone interested in objectivist poetry, Taggart’s collection of essays is mandatory reading. His insights into this kind of cerebral poetry are invaluable, for he blends appreciation with analysis, information with inspiration, and logic with imagination. His own sensitivity to the struggle which is the poetic process brings a new consciousness to the poetics of poetry.Virginia A. La CharitéUniversity of KentuckyCopyright © 1995 The Johns Hopkins University Press... (shrink)

The Axial Age is an expression invented by Karl Jaspers to refer to a period around the middle of the first millennium, or running from the middle of the first millennium to its end, during which a range of major religions either emerged or were transformed in different places around the world: Confucianism and Taoism in China, Hinduism and Buddhism in India, Zoroastrianism in Persia, Platonism in Greece, and prophetic Judaism in Palestine.1 Platonism, to be sure, is not exactly a (...) religion, and its emphasis on dialogical argument clearly sets it off from the other traditions with which, nevertheless, it bears important affinities. The religions or philosophies of... (shrink)