In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Martin Heidegger and OntologyEmmanuel Levinas (bio)The prestige of Martin Heidegger 1 and the influence of his thought on German philosophy marks both a new phase and one of the high points of the phenomenological movement. Caught unawares, the traditional establishment is obliged to clarify its position on this new teaching which casts a spell over youth and which, overstepping the bounds of permissibility, is already in vogue. For once, (...) Fame has picked one who deserves it and, for that matter, one who is still living. Anyone who has studied philosophy cannot, when confronted by Heidegger’s work, fail to recognize how the originality and force of his achievements, stemming from genius, are combined with an attentive, painstaking, and close working-out of the argument—with that craftsmanship of the patient artisan in which phenomenologists take such pride. In this study, it is important for us to understand, above all, the true intentions of our author, to illuminate what he thinks really needs to be said, and to surmise what is most critical for him.To get to the heart of Heidegger’s system, it seems fitting to begin with a problem that is generally familiar. We choose the problem of knowledge, a deeper understanding of which takes us to the very threshold of Heidegger’s thought. For this problem, central to modern philosophy, is one of the main obstacles of modern philosophy that Heidegger wishes to surmount. Neo-Kantianism, which takes knowledge as the philosophical problem of the first rank, is the movement against which Heidegger rebels with all his strength. We have, thus, every chance of gaining access to his thought by the main door, so to speak. Once inside the system we will try to trace its outlines, 2 reserving, for a second part of our work, the determination of Heidegger’s place in the history of ideas, especially in the phenomenological movement, as well as of his relations with the philosopher to whom he owes so much—Edmund Husserl. 31In its most general form, the problem of the theory of knowledge has a critical significance. It consists in delineating a domain where knowledge can be certain and in determining the criteria for the legitimate scope of knowledge. But this problem, as normal and as simple as it may appear, has deeper roots. That knowledge should need a criterion at all presupposes that truth is not identical to all that is known and that the course [End Page 11] of things can fail to correspond with the course of thought. “How does knowledge correspond to being?” is a more profound formulation of the problem of knowledge.But we are not going to touch anymore on the primordial phenomenon that generates the problem. The problem of correspondence between thing and thought presupposes a free activity of thought and its isolation in relation to the object. It is precisely this presupposition which renders their harmony and even their contact problematic. “How does the subject take leave of itself to attain the object?” is what the problem of knowledge, in the last analysis, boils down to. Its true source is thus the concept of “subject” as elaborated by modern philosophy. The cogito presided over the subject’s birth. The cogito was the affirmation of the privileged nature of the subject’s immanent sphere, of its unique place in existence; hence, the cogito was the specificity of the subject’s connection to the rest of reality, the sui generis nature which opens up the passage from immanence to transcendence, the passage from ideas contained in the thinking substance to 4 their “formal existence.”The concept of the subject, understood as a substance having a specific position in the entire domain of being, presents us with difficulties of two kinds. First, how do we understand this leave-taking from the self which the thinking substance brings about and which displays an entirely original aspect? Indeed, we could say that thought, in reaching out toward objects, does not actually take leave of itself, since its objects—considered as ideas and contents of thought—are, in a certain sense, already within it. In order to make sense of this paradox, Descartes... (shrink)

The essays collected in this new volume reveal Isaiah Berlin at his most lucid and accessible. He was constitutionally incapable of writing with the opacity of the specialist, but these shorter, more introductory pieces provide the perfect starting-point for the reader new to his work. Those who are already familiar with his writing will also be grateful for this further addition to his collected essays. The connecting theme of these essays, as in the case of earlier volumes, is the crucial (...) social and political role--past, present and future--of ideas, and of their progenitors. A rich variety of subject-matters is represented--from philosophy to education, from Russia to Israel, from Marxism to romanticism--so that the truth of Heine's warning is exemplified on a broad front. It is a warning that Berlin often referred to, and provides an answer to those who ask, as from time to time they do, why intellectual history matters. Among the contributions are "My Intellectual Path," Berlin's last essay, a retrospective autobiographical survey of his main preoccupations and "Jewish Slavery and Emancipation," the classic statement of his Zionist views, long unavailable in print. His other subjects include the Enlightenment, Giambattista Vico, Vissarion Belinsky, Alexander Herzen, G.V. Plekhanov, the Russian intelligentsia, the idea of liberty, political realism, nationalism, and historicism. The book exhibits the full range of his enormously wide expertise and demonstrates the striking and enormously engaging individuality, as well as the power, of his own ideas. "Over a hundred years ago, the German poet Heine warned the French not to underestimate the power of ideas: philosophical concepts nurtured in the stillness of a professor's study could destroy a civilization."--Isaiah Berlin, Two Concepts of Liberty , 1958. (shrink)

Four recent turns in social thought are discussed and related to the four dimensional schema of dialectical realism the author has recently outlined. It is shown how ontology matters, and indeed is not only necessary but inevitable, The nature of the reality of ideas is demonstrated and the most prevalent mistakes in the metatheory of ideas and ideation analysed. The significance of categorical realism and the character of those specific types if ideas known as ‘ideologies’ are then (...) discussed. Finally some good and bad dialectical connections of ideas and related phenomena are sketched. (shrink)

I argue that Berkeley's distinctive idealism/immaterialism can't support his view that objects of sense, immediately or mediately perceived, are causally inert. (The Passivity of Ideas thesis or PI) Neither appeal to ordinary perception, nor traditional arguments, for example, that causal connections are necessary, and we can't perceive such connections, are helpful. More likely it is theological concerns,e.g., how to have second causes if God upholds by continuously creating the world, that's in the background. This puts Berkeley closer to Malebranche (...) than to Hume. -/- As far the what I call the "first strategy;" defending the passivity of ideas by ordinary introspection, I refer to the work of the French psychologist Albert Michotte,(1940) and those now extending his experiments, to show that (1) there is an immediate and quite robust visual impression of causality, (admitted in fact by Berkeley, Malebranche and Hume) and (2) of more importance, the impression isn't due to projecting into nature expectations gained from experienced regularities. (shrink)

The turn to Spinoza by many Marxists combines the classic problem of Marxism, that of base and superstructure, economy and ideology, with Spinoza’s challenging assertion of the identity of order of connection of ideas and things. This paper looks at two contemporary neo-Spinozists, Frédéric Lordon and Yves Citton, examining the ways in which their works intertwine economy and ideology, desire and imagination. The point, however, is not to just read Marx with Spinoza, but to use both together to (...) make sense of the imaginary and affective dimension of changes within the economy. (shrink)

The history of ideas deals with the elemental unit-ideas which for Lovejoy are components of systems distinguished by their patterns. Special histories explain how a particular form of human history developed. General histories draw on special histories to document or explain social contexts. Since patterns influence philosophers, the history of ideas contributes little to the history of philosophy, a discontinuous strand within a period's continuous intellectual history. By accepting cultural pluralism, denying the monistic position that there always (...) are internal connections among all or some strands of intellectual and cultural history, both continuity and change in philosophy can be best understood. (shrink)

One of the greatest of Hume's philosophical achievements, which becomes in its turn an assumption presupposed by some of the others, is perhaps best stated at the end of the First Enquiry : ‘If we reason a priori , anything may appear able to produce anything. The falling of a pebble may, for aught we know, extinguish the sun; or the wish of a man control the planets in their orbits. It is only experience, which teaches us the nature and (...) bounds of cause and effect, and enables us to infer the existence of one object from that of another’ 164). (shrink)

Historians generally see ideas as the product of circumstances, looking beyond the idea to the external factor which influenced its acceptance. Behind an idea there are acknowledged or, more commonly, unacknowledged clusters of assumptions shared by a social group. Although these clusters influence thoughts, they cannot be traced as direct causal agents. In the connection between situations and ideas, how the situation is perceived is more important than what is objectively true. Rough causal laws can be outlined (...) by correlating types of social conditions with types of states of mind. Sets of ideas point beyond themselves to the background against which they were framed. (shrink)

Hume is not a philosopher who has been viewed, on the whole, with excessive sympathy. Slips and inadequacies of argument, which are the inevitable consequence of human fallibility, are treated by his critics not with charity but with delight; and there are few who think it necessary to state his argument at its strongest before proceeding to refute it. A striking example of this procedure may be found in Antony Flew's paper ‘Another Idea of Necessary Connection’. The example is (...) striking because Flew is normally one of the most sympathetic of Hume's critics and he might have been expected, in dealing with Humes view of causal necessity, to have proceeded with exceptional fairness, the incidental being identified and discarded and the essential view standing forth at its strongest. This, as I shall show, is not what occurs; but first let us consider what we are to take the essential view to be. (shrink)

The history of ideas is most prominently understood as a highly specialized group of methods for the study of abstract ideas, with both diachronic and synchronic aspects. While theorizing the field has focused on the methods of study, defining the object of study – ideas – has been neglected. But the development of the theories behind material culture studies poses a sharp challenge to these narrow approaches. It both challenges the integrity of the notion of abstract (...) class='Hi'>ideas and also offers possibilities for enlarging the scope of the ways in which we can study ideas historically. It is proposed here to regard ideas as mental relations deeply connected to human communication by both thinking and doing. This connection of ideational thought to human production and behavior is a deep foundation for the history of ideas as an interdisciplinary historiographic means of understanding moral life. (shrink)

Hume seems to tell us that our ideas are copies of our corresponding impres-sions, that we have an idea of necessary connection, but that we have no corresponding impression, since nothing can be known to be really necessarily connected. The paper considers two ways of reinterpreting the doctrine of the origins of ideas so as to avoid the apparent inconsistency. If we see the doctrine as concerned primarily with establishing conditions under which we possess an idea, there (...) is no need for an idea’s “corresponding” impression to be one of which the idea is true. It would be enough that the impression be in some way appropriate for making us master of the idea. Alternatively, if we see the doctrine as concerned primarily with fixing the content of ideas, we might see it operating in the case of causation rather as it must in the case of secondary qualities, conceived in a certain distinctive way. Even if there is “really” no red in the objects , we may regard the idea of red as properly ascribed to any object apt to cause typical sensations in us . Likewise, we may regard the idea of necessary connection as properly ascribed to any pair of objects apt to cause typical habits in us . This view may do justice to Hume’s wish to affirm both that there is such a thing as necessity, resident in the mind, and that there are no knowable necessary connections.Hume parece nos dizer que nossas idéias são cópias de nossas impressões correspondentes, que temos uma idéia de conexão necessária, mas que não temos nenhuma impressão correspondente, visto que nada pode ser conhecido como estando realmente conectado necessariamente. O artigo considera dois modos de se reinterpretar a doutrina das origens das idéias de forma a evitar a aparente inconsistência. Se interpretarmos a doutrina como dizendo respeito fundamentalmente ao estabelecimento das condições sob as quais possuímos uma idéia, não há nenhuma necessidade de uma impressão “correspondente” da idéia ser aquela da qual a idéia é verdadeira. Seria suficiente que a impressão fosse, de alguma maneira, apropriada para que apreendêssemos a idéia. Caso contrário, se interpretarmos a doutrina como interessada fundamentalmente em fixar o conteúdo das idéias, poderíamos ver isto como operando no caso de causação mais propriamente que no caso de qualidades secundárias, concebido de certo modo característico. Mesmo que “realmente” não exista vermelho nos objetos , nós podemos considerar a idéia de vermelho como bem aplicada a qualquer objeto capaz de causar sensações típicas em nós . Igualmente, podemos considerar a idéia de conexão necessária como bem aplicada a qualquer par de objetos apropriado para nos causar hábitos típicos . Esta visão pode fazer justiça à intenção de Hume de afirmar tanto que há tal coisa como necessidade, residente na mente, como que não há nenhuma relação necessária que se possa conhecer. (shrink)

Originally published in 1904, this book examines the connection between two of Plato's most famous theories, the Theory of Ideas and the Theory of the Immortality of the Soul, and assesses the development of Plato's thinking concerning the nature of the soul and its connection to the body. Gaye looks at pre-Platonic views on immortality and the place of immortality in Plato's overall philosophical structure. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in Platonic (...) philosophy. (shrink)

In _The New Order and Last Orientation,_ Eric Voegelin explores two distinctly different yet equally important aspects of modernity. He begins by offering a vivid account of the political situation in seventeenth-century Europe after the decline of the church and the passing of the empire. Voegelin shows how the intellectual and political disorder of the period was met by such seemingly disparate responses as Grotius's theory of natural right, Hobbes's _Leviathan,_ the role of the Fronde in the formation of the (...) French national state, Spinoza's _Tractatus Theologico-Politicus,_ and Locke's _Second Treatise,_ the blueprint of a modern middle-class society. By putting these responses and the thought of Montesquieu, Hume, and others in the context of the birth pains of the national state and the emergence of a new self-understanding of man, Voegelin achieves a brilliant mixture of political history and profound philosophical analysis. Voegelin's verdict of modernity is pronounced most powerfully in the opening part of "Last Orientation," in the chapter entitled "Phenomenalism." His discussion of the intellectual confusion underlying the modern project of scientistic phenomenalism is the most original criticism leveled against modernity to date. It is at the same time the first step toward a recovery of reality through philosophy conceived as a science of substance in the spirit of Giordano Bruno. Voegelin's first example of such an effort at recovering reality is the chapter on Schelling, one of the spiritual realists who has not been affected by the prevailing rationalist or reductionist creeds that are part of the modern disorder. Schelling's indirect yet powerful influence on Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and Freud more than justifies Voegelin's interest in his philosophy and character, even though Voegelin would later distance himself from some of Schelling's positions. The volume's concluding chapter, "Nietzsche and Pascal," applies the understanding gained from the study of Schelling to the thought of the most powerful critic of the age, Nietzsche. Nietzsche's self-avowed affinity with Pascal provides the key to an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of his thought and reaffirms the connection that links the beginning of modernity with its most recent crises and the efforts to overcome them. (shrink)

Husserl's phenomenology provides theory for empirical science and other practices in the form of transcendental philosophy after Kant. This phenomenology is a reflection on mental objects in relation to mental processes, some of which are shared in culture: a theoretical framework that grounds and co-ordinates theory-production for empirical practice. The importance of the original work of Edmund Husserl for contemporary empirical psychology is that it provides the conceptual justification for the methods employed and the interpretative stances taken. Informed theoretically by (...) Husserl's phenomenology, empirical psychology is thus a discipline grounded and co-ordinated by essences. Essences are about the being of consciousness connected with other consciousness and mental senses, expressed as various forms of intentionality in connection with sense and meaning. The aim of this paper is to clarify some key features of Ideas I rather than to comment on the quality of the translation by Dahlstrom or the closeness of the readings of leading phenomenological psychologists to the original. (shrink)

A wave of recent publication connected to Hugh Trevor-Roper offers cause to take stock of his life and legacy. He is an awkward subject because his output was so protean, but a compelling one because of his significance for the resurgence of the history of ideas in Britain after 1945. The article argues that the formative period in Trevor-Roper's life was 1945–57, a period curiously neglected hit her to. It was at this time that the pioneered a history of (...) ideas conceived above all as the study of European liberal and humanist tradition. Analysis of the relative importance of contemporary and early modern history in his oeuvre finds that, while the experience of Hitler and the Cold War was formative, it was not decisive. Trevor-Roper was at heart an early modernist who did not abjure specialization. However, he insisted that specialized study must be accompanied by “philosophical” reflection on the working sofa constant human nature present throughout history, a type of reflection best pursued by reading classical historians such as Gibbon and Burckhardt. Yet this imperative in turn fostered purely historical research into the history of historical writing–another branch of the history of ideas. (shrink)

On Berkeley’s immaterialist ontology, there are only two kinds of created entities: finite spirits and ideas. Ideas are passive, and so there is no genuine idea-idea causation. Finite spirits, by contrast, are truly causally active on Berkeley’s view, in that they can produce ideas through their volitional activity. Some commentators have argued that this account of causation is inconsistent. On their view, the unequal treatment of spirits and ideas is unfounded, for all that can be observed (...) in either case are mere patterns of regularity; Berkeley should therefore adopt a full-blown occasionalism and follow Malebranche in holding that God is the only true cause. Other commentators have argued that Berkeley denies the tenet that causes necessitate their effects – that is, the idea that causation involves necessary connection – and that in this way he can avoid inconsistency. This paper argues that Berkeley can subscribe to the thesis that finite spirits are truly causally active without falling into inconsistency, even if it is granted that Berkeleyan causes necessitate their effects. His differing treatment of spirits and of ideas is well founded, since ideas are transparent in a way our notions of spirits are not. (shrink)

The virtual community under consideration is called theNigerian Village Square, ‘…a marketplace of ideas’. As an online discussion forum, NVS combines the features of listservs and newsgroups with a more elegant and user-friendly interface. While computer-mediated communication technologies augment political discourse in established democracies, new media and mobile technologies create avenues for a virtual sphere among Nigerians. Therefore, the ideal virtual sphere guarantees equal access to all connected netizens, equal right for all languages in netizens’ linguistic repertoire, and it (...) fosters democratic deliberation through policy debates, public dialogues and ‘online polylogues’. By linguistic marketing is meant discourse as a vehicle for ‘promotional acts’ and for ‘selling’ particular cultures and ideologies to multicultural and multilingual readers/audiences. One interpretation of this is in terms of asserting language rights and linguistic equality. The use of Nigerian languages with Nigerian Pidgin online is promotional and forexistential negotiation. This results in language mixture which is an instantiation of freedom of speech, freedom of switch and freedom to switch. The underlying pragmatic motivation for top-down language mixture and alternation in Nigerian virtual discourse is attention-getting with the aim of inducing an interdiscursive writer-reader cognitive as well as communicative interaction. Other pragmatic functions of code switching discussed in the paper include allusive textuality, amusing phaticity, anticipated interactivity, affective expressivity and audience affiliation or alienation, among others. Thus, intertextuality is an explanatory technique for investigating previously unexplored phenomena in digital code switching. (shrink)

EDITOR’S ABSTRACTThis paper compares speculative or textbook philosophy with kite flying risking to lose touch with the topic of reflection. The alternative that Chen defends here is a more experience-grounded, concrete, and imaginary reflection on less often discussed ideas and on allegories. He carves out this approach from four related disciplinary methodologies: the “philological” focus on textual matters, the “history of thought” focusing on past eras, “scholastic history” connecting past ideas with their future, and “history of philosophy” immediately (...) searching Chinese equivalents for Western notions. The experience that Chen stresses is that of the text’s original authors and later interpreters. This approach can also leads toward universal insights and the pleasure of an unending interpretive dialogue. (shrink)

For centuries, philosophers, political scientists, and jurists have struggled to understand the possibilities for justice and peace among a multiplicity of sovereign states. Like Dante, who sought to organize the world under the authority of the Holy Roman Empire, many theorists have tried to explain how sovereign states should be governed to ensure stability and peace in the absence of any established higher authority. Theories of World Governance traces the various conceptual approaches to world harmony from the close of the (...) Middle Ages to today. Considering the immediate problems of order in a decentralized world community, Cornelius F. Murphy, Jr., outlines what he believes are the essential long-term conditions for world peace. Covering a wide range of disciplines -- from theology and philosophy to jurisprudence, ethics, and sociology -- Murphy explores how theorists have reflected upon the necessary components of an effective global order. At the outset, the thought of Christian Europe was shaped by a belief in a natural order established by the Creator of the universe. However, with the advent of the Enlightenment, the connections between the human and the transcendent were severed. There was a movement from a theocentric understanding of the powers of the human mind to an intellectual outlook that blurred the distinctions between the divine and human. This study in the history of ideas examines the profound effects of the fundamental shift from transcendence to immanence upon the development of international theory. Murphy discusses the thought of Leibniz, Wolff, Kant, Hegel, and Phillip Allott, among others. The study concludes with an extended reflection on the importanceof a sound political philosophy to the future well-being of the global community. Possible improvements in the existing arrangements, such as reform of the United Nations, are discussed. Murphy suggests that in order for a society of sovereign states to be transformed into a world political community, human rights and self-governance within states must first be strengthened and, at the same time, individuals of all states must begin to realize their responsibilities toward the whole human family. (shrink)

As to the misconceptions: In the first place, the existence of "undecidable propositions" or "unsolvable problems" has only remote connections with the failure of excluded middle. More precisely, from the fact that a certain problem is unsolvable, one cannot infer that the affirmative and negative answers to that problem are both incorrect. Both Gödel's and Church's theorems were originally proved for systems with the excluded middle, i.e. for systems in which 'p or not p' is provable for every proposition 'p'; (...) though in the light of Gödel's theorem there are propositions 'p' such that neither 'p' nor 'not p' is provable in those systems. Careful distinction should be made between the following locutions. (shrink)

The article explores the informal side of the idea of the proof. The word "idea" is used in a sense dating back to Plato. Proof is understood as a precisely established connection of precisely formulated and objectively existing ideas. This connection of ideas belongs to the realm of the possible and can be present in some possible worlds and absent in others. Attempts to interpret the proof as a procedure of convincing argumentation are criticized. It is (...) shown that the proof is not necessarily convincing, and that persuasiveness may be inherent outside the proof-based forms of argument. The genesis of the idea of the proof is briefly traced from its origins to the present day. Arguments are made in favor of the thesis of the idea of the proof in Pythagorean philosophy. The question of why the idea of the proof has not been rediscovered anywhere and never is discussed. The problem of the time gap between the appearance of the proof and the exact definition of the concept of the proof in modern logic is considered. An accessible example substantiates the inseparability of the idea of the proof from its formal presentation in one or another logic. A list of some basic informal predicates of the proof is given and a brief description is given. (shrink)

The investigations of Aza A. Takho-Godi, devoted to the evolution of concepts and terms in European culture, were ahead of their time and, as it turns out today, paved the way for historical semantics, which turned out to be a kind of independent version of the “history of concepts”: a direction of humanitarian thought aimed at identifying cultural, social, and political functions concepts in their historical dynamics and in relation to a wide field of cultural interactions of a particular era. (...) The impressive results of “historical semantics” in the version of Takho-Godi are connected not only with the masterful and strictly substantiated identification of the developing conceptual core of lexemes, not only with the penetrating intuitions of the living word, but also with the vision of an absolute spiritual context in which semantic worlds are driven not by mechanical causality and not by historical chance, but by a kind of teleology. (shrink)

Nominal concepts represent things as tokens of types. Recent research suggests that we represent principled connections between the type of thing something is (e.g., DOG) and some of its properties (k‐properties; e.g., having four legs for dogs) but not other properties (t‐properties; e.g., being brown for dogs). Principled connections differ from logical, statistical, and causal connections. Principled connections license (i) the expectation that tokens of the type will generally possess their k‐properties, (ii) formal explanations (i.e., explanation of the presence of (...) k‐properties in tokens of a type by reference to the type of thing it is), and (iii) normative expectations concerning the presence of k‐properties in tokens of the type. The present paper investigates the hypothesis that representing principled connections requires representing properties as aspects of being the relevant kind of thing (Aspect Hypothesis). Experiment 1 provides a direct test of the Aspect Hypothesis. Experiments 2 and 3 provide indirect tests of the Aspect Hypothesis. All three experiments provide support for the Aspect Hypothesis. Experiment 4 investigates a prediction of the Aspect Hypothesis concerning the manner in which formal explanations are licensed by principled connections. Finally, Experiment 5 investigates a prediction of the Aspect Hypothesis concerning the nature of the normative expectations licensed by principled connections. Together these results provide strong evidence for the idea that representing principled connections involves representing a property as being an aspect of being a given kind of thing. The results also help clarify the manner in which formal explanation differs from other modes of explanation. Finally, the results of the experiments are used to motivate a proposal concerning the formal structure of the conceptual representations implicated by principled connections. This structure provides a domain‐general way of structuring our concepts and embodies the perspective we take when we think and talk of things as being instances of a kind. (shrink)

At the center of Gauker's book stands two inter-connected theses: First, that concepts are dependent on language; second, that this requires rejecting the traditional idea that linguistic communication involves a transmission of thoughts. I argue that we cannot afford to reject the traditional conception of communication and that Gauker's alternative ‘cooperative' conception is unsatisfactory. However, I also argue that Gauker is wrong to suggest that the language dependency thesis of concepts is incompatible with the traditional view of communication.

A new reading of Plato’s political thought Plato famously defends the rule of knowledge. Knowledge, for him, is of the good. But what is rule? In this study, Melissa Lane reveals how political office and rule were woven together in Greek vocabulary and practices that both connected and distinguished between rule in general and office as a constitutionally limited kind of rule in particular. In doing so, Lane shows Plato to have been deeply concerned with the roles and relationships between (...) rulers and ruled. Adopting a longstanding Greek expectation that a ruler should serve the good of the ruled, Plato’s major political dialogues—the Republic, the Statesman, and Laws—explore how different kinds of rule might best serve that good. With this book, Lane offers the first account of the clearly marked vocabulary of offices at the heart of all three of these dialogues, explaining how such offices fit within the broader organization and theorizing of rule. Lane argues that taking Plato’s interest in rule and office seriously reveals tyranny as ultimately a kind of anarchy, lacking the order as well as the purpose of rule. When we think of tyranny in this way, we see how Plato invokes rule and office as underpinning freedom and friendship as political values, and how Greek slavery shaped Plato’s account of freedom. Reading Plato both in the Greek context and in dialogue with contemporary thinkers, Lane argues that rule and office belong at the center of Platonic, Greek, and contemporary political thought. (shrink)

Dispositional essentialists hold that the world is populated by irreducibly dispositional properties, called “potencies,” “powers,” or “dispositions.” Each of these properties is marked out by a characteristic stimulus and manifestation bound together in a metaphysically necessary connection. Dispositional essentialism faces an old objection from David Hume. Hume argues, in his Treatise of Human Nature, that we have no adequate idea of necessary connection. The epistemology of the Treatise allegedly rules the idea out. Dispositional essentialists usually respond by attacking (...) Hume’s epistemology. In this paper, I give an alternative response. I argue that we can draw an idea of necessary connection from the Treatise’s relations of ideas. We are able, therefore, to overcome Hume’s objection without needing to attack his epistemology or its related principles. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:217 HUME'S IDEAS ABOUT NECESSARY CONNECTION 1. Introduction Hume asks, "What is our idea of necessity, when we say that two objects are necessarily connected together"? He later says that he has answered this question, but it is difficult to see what his answer is, or even to see precisely what the question was. Currently there are two main ways of understanding Hume's views about our idea (...) of necessary connection. These interpretations divide on the question whether Hume allows that we can speak meaningfully of an objective and necessary connection between two events. The one interpretation, which I will call epistemological, says that Hume does allow meaning to that phrase. On this view, justification is the only topic of Hume's negative message about necessary connection. We can mean what we say when we talk about necessary connection, but we cannot justify what we (meaningfully) say. That, according to this interpretation, is the negative outcome toward which Hume aims his investigation of the origin of our idea of necessary connection. He isn't denying we have that very idea; he is denying that its origin allows us to justify applying it to anything. The other interpretation, which I will call psychological, says that Hume does not allow meaning to the phrase, "an objective and necessary connection between two events." According to this interpretation, once we see the origin of our idea of necessary connection, we realize that we cannot mean by "necessary connection" what we thought we meant. Those words allow us to speak only of a certain 218 feeling in our minds, not of an objective feature of the world. Of course, the psychological interpretation partly resembles the epistemological one: it, too, denies that we can justify saying objective necessary connections exist. But on the psychological interpretation this follows a fortiori from the central negative claim, a claim which itself concerns meaning, not justification. In what follows, I will present these two interpretations more carefully and critically, and then I will advance my own. I think Hume was trying to express a view very different in kind from either of the two I've just mentioned. I think we can get a good idea of the kind of view Hume had by looking at Newton's treatment of gravitational force. Roughly, Newton thought that while there certainly are gravitational forces in objects, we can say nothing about them except that they are whatever it is that accounts for a specific set of observable regularities. Hume's views about necessary connection, or causal power, are roughly parallel. He does not doubt that we may speak meaningfully of objective necessary connections — rE we mean just some unknown quality in objects that underlies the constant conjunction of their sensible qualities. Inevitably we try to mean something more than this, but any such attempt is doomed to failure. Showing that we cannot mean something more is the point of investigating the origin of the "idea." I will be arguing that with this interpretation we can handle the sets of texts and problems that undercut the prevailing two interpretations, and reconcile those sets of texts with one another, despite their apparent inconsistency. This interpretation also has the advantage of attributing to Hume a view closely connected with a 219 distinctively eighteenth-century way of setting up these problems. Finally, I think the interpretation brings out nicely an instructive and central failing of Hume's views about necessary connection. 2. The Epistemological View Although there are hints of this kind of interpretation in other books, it is really articulated and defended only in Barry Stroud's book, 2 Hume. In what follows here, I mean to be sketching out and commenting on that interpretation. Hume wants to find out what our idea of necessary connection is. He conducts his investigation according to the dictum, "as we have no idea, that is not deriv'd from an impression, we must find some impression, that gives rise to this idea of necessity, if we assert we have really such an idea." (T 155) He argues, of course, that among our experiences of causes and effects, there are no impressions of necessary connection. Our experiences of... (shrink)

This paper focuses on the relationships that Derrida establishes between three analytic discussions and three autoimmunities. The analytic discussions are (1) the antinomy of hospitality, related to what happens when the subject faces demands from strangers; (2) the antinomy of the death penalty, related to the meeting between the right to life and the right to end the life of another; (3) the antinomy of animality related to laws and what lies beyond them. The autoimmunities are (1) the autoimmunity of (...) inclusion: democracy is open only to its sovereign citizens while it claims to welcome all who are excluded; (2) the autoimmunity of rights and liberties: in liberal democracy, rights and liberties are meant to challenge sovereignty’s absolutism, but any attack on sovereignty is an attack on rights and liberties; (3) the autoimmunity of globalization: for democracy to work it requires protection provided by a supersovereignty, which limits the sovereignty of states, and hence, democracy. The paper follows Derrida’s connections between the questions of hospitality, the death penalty, and animality on the one hand, and the autoimmune aspects of democratic politics on the other, to argue that his deconstruction of democracy is an ethicization of democracy activated by the concept of sovereignty, and a deconstruction of sovereignty via ethics. (shrink)

This essay assesses the degree to which the deaf were regarded as a disabled population in medical, religious, and legal thought during the Renaissance, chronologically identified with the period between approximately 1500 and 1650. The primary geographic focus rests on the German-speaking lands of central Europe. Analysis shows that the idea of deafness as a disability here was composite one, making connections between inability to hear and intellectual impairment, moral deficiency, and disease. This contrasts with recent findings elsewhere in Europe, (...) where intellectuals were more focused on sign languages as a means of integrating the deaf into hearing society. (shrink)

The idea of the numinous is often raised in psychoanalytic and psychodynamic contexts, but it is rarely itself subjected to close scrutiny. This volume examines how the numinous has gained currency in the post-modern world, demonstrating how the numinous is no longer confined to religious discourses but is included in humanist, secular and scientific views of the world. Questions of soul and spirit are increasingly being raised in connection with the scientific exploration of the psyche, and especially in the (...) context of psychotherapy. The contributors to this volume are interested in exploring the numinous in the human psyche, in clinical work, world events, anthropology, sociology, philosophy and the humanities. They originate from multi-disciplinary and multi-cultural backgrounds, bringing a variety of approaches to subjects including: · Witchcraft: the numinous power of humans · Jung and Derrida: the numinous, deconstruction and myth · Accessing the numinous: Apolline and Dionysian pathways · The role of the numinous in the reception of Jung The Idea of the Numinous will fascinate all analytical psychologists, psychoanalysts, and psychotherapists interested in investigating the overlap between therapeutic and religious interests. (shrink)

The Enlightenment invented a new unique format for philosophical thinking, turning philosophy into a force that affects the real world. The author calls for recognition of the productive forces of the Enlightenment, which appear as defenders of rational transparency and intellectual honesty. By rejecting the teleological context and focusing on formal aspects, Enlightenment ideas lead to a loss of connection with concrete reality and the purpose of actions. The last decades have seen a revival of the classical tradition, (...) but there are difficulties in understanding the physical order and its relationship with the moral order. The author agrees with the criticism of the Enlightenment project, but opposes the rejection of any universalist project in general. Considering value pluralism as a result of the late Enlightenment, the author points out that the universalist project is opposed by various forms of relativism. It is in this context that tradition should resume its role. (shrink)

The need for fair and just AI is often related to the possibility of understanding AI itself, in other words, of turning an opaque box into a glass box, as inspectable as possible. Transparency and explainability, however, pertain to the technical domain and to philosophy of science, thus leaving the ethics and epistemology of AI largely disconnected. To remedy this, we propose an integrated approach premised on the idea that a glass-box epistemology should explicitly consider how to incorporate values and (...) other normative considerations, such as intersectoral vulnerabilities, at critical stages of the whole process from design and implementation to use and assessment. To connect ethics and epistemology of AI, we perform a double shift of focus. First, we move from trusting the output of an AI system to trusting the process that leads to the outcome. Second, we move from expert assessment to more inclusive assessment strategies, aiming to facilitate expert and non-expert assessment. Together, these two moves yield a framework usable for experts and non-experts when they inquire into relevant epistemological and ethical aspects of AI systems. We dub our framework ‘epistemology-cum-ethics’ to signal the equal importance of both aspects. We develop it from the vantage point of the designers: how to create the conditions to internalize values into the whole process of design, implementation, use, and assessment of an AI system, in which values (epistemic and non-epistemic) are explicitly considered at each stage and inspectable by every salient actor involved at any moment. (shrink)

First published in 1946, History of Western Philosophy went on to become the best-selling philosophy book of the twentieth century. A dazzlingly ambitious project, it remains unchallenged to this day as the ultimate introduction to Western philosophy. Providing a sophisticated overview of the ideas that have perplexed people from time immemorial, it is 'long on wit, intelligence and curmudgeonly scepticism', as the New York Times noted, and it is this, coupled with the sheer brilliance of its scholarship, that has (...) made Russell's History of Western Philosophy one of the most important philosophical works of all time. (shrink)

The book aims to provide a process-philosophical perspective philosophizing itself. It employs the perspectives of process philosophy for elucidating the historical development of philosophical ideas. The doctrine of historicism in the history of ideas has it that each era and perhaps even each thinker employs philosophical ideas in such a user-idiosyncratic way that there is no continuity and indeed no connectivity of public access across the divides of space, time, and culture. In opposition to such a view, (...) the present processist deliberations see the development of ideas as a matter of generic processes that have ample room for connectivity and recurrence, permitting the very self-same conception to be shared by philosophers of different settings. Beyond arguing this histico-processism on general principles, the book presents a series of case studies of significant philosophical topics that illustrate and elaborate upon the developmental connectivities at issue. (shrink)

The purpose. Explore the major ideological patterns of development of a socially philosophies of education in the context of the problems of institutionalization of knowledge about human and social development. To analyse system-integration aspect of social philosophy and education management in interaction of concepts of an instrumentalism of a pragmatism and a neopragmatism with model of «new humanism» in formation of socially valuable orientations. Methodology. Classification existing in the western philosophy of education and education of directions is spent, proceeding from (...) basic principles of philosophical school or a current, first of all considering those the purpose and means which are really involved by them in process of education, social development and socially-moral education and being based on the basic installations, the purpose expressed by that or other direction, how its supporters imagine the person, its requirement, a social role, модус behaviour which the education system and education urged to form. Scientific novelty. In conditions when against crisis of an education system of the government of the USA and the leading countries of Europe are compelled to begin its long-term reform, its theorists substantially pay attention to democratic workings out of concepts of an instrumentalism of a pragmatism/neopragmatism in modern social philosophy of education, in particular on their aspiration to introduce in process of social development, education and education idea and practical model both educational, and a social equality. Considering growing requirement of a practical embodiment of ideas of freedom, justice, aspiration to realization of the human rights proclaimed a society, supporters of the concept of «new humanism» see the main objective in blocking a way to conformism, to a manipulation behaviour of the person and to create conditions for its free self-expression, for realization by the person of a fundamental choice of acts in a concrete situation and by that to warn danger of formation of the unified form of behaviour. In it principles of «new humanism» approach with a position of «new humanism» instrumentalism and neopragmatism. Conclusions. Before social philosophy of education/education it is necessary to define a problem factors which cause achievement of its main objective, to state an estimation to moral principles and personal qualities with which actually the education/education theory connects realization of the problems, to show, why these, instead of any other principles and qualities open to the person possibility to choose in a concrete situation socially powerful both morally defensible and comprehensible line of conduct in public the relation. Statement of a question on necessity of the philosophical analysis of problems of education and education in a social context serves as an indicator of understanding philosophers, teachers of an increasing role of the human and moral factor in society development. And, at last, the aspiration to develop socially-philosophical bases of pedagogics in general and education in particular, testifies that the western and domestic philosophers, teachers, representatives of social and psychological sciences, at least, the majority of them, have realized the public importance of an education system and education, its global character. (shrink)

In what way to understand of the idea of freedom is one of the major factors determining world outlook of a society. There are too many concepts of freedom. That kind of differences appears in individual, group and national level. But the major differences appear in perspectives of civilization understanding, in eastern and western world outlook. In eastern approach the idea of freedom is mostly individualistic, idealistic, spiritual one. In comparison with the eastern understanding, in the western thinking realistic and (...) pragmatic concept of freedom has always been prevailed. It stands on difference of philosophical understanding of the world. In the eastern philosophical thought the idea of freedom mostly connected with mental perfection, higher moral-spiritual values, and the understanding of Truth. However, in the western philosophy freedom has been searched in human researches; in realization of his individual ability in scientific, cultural, political, social, economical spheres of life. Seeking freedom both in internal and external world are two extremes of one phenomenon – human freedom. Each of these extremes has some shortages. In a time of dialogue of civilizations it would be very beneficial for ideas to research in a lightof essence of a life of the human being. Mutual understanding of those who carry different ideas and approaches would be essential step for peace and harmony in the world. (shrink)

In what way to understand of the idea of freedom is one of the major factors determining world outlook of a society. There are too many concepts of freedom. That kind of differences appears in individual, group and national level. But the major differences appear in perspectives of civilization understanding, in eastern and western world outlook. In eastern approach the idea of freedom is mostly individualistic, idealistic, spiritual one. In comparison with the eastern understanding, in the western thinking realistic and (...) pragmatic concept of freedom has always been prevailed. It stands on difference of philosophical understanding of the world. In the eastern philosophical thought the idea of freedom mostly connected with mental perfection, higher moral-spiritual values, and the understanding of Truth. However, in the western philosophy freedom has been searched in human researches; in realization of his individual ability in scientific, cultural, political, social, economical spheres of life. Seeking freedom both in internal and external world are two extremes of one phenomenon – human freedom. Each of these extremes has some shortages. In a time of dialogue of civilizations it would be very beneficial for ideas to research in a lightof essence of a life of the human being. Mutual understanding of those who carry different ideas and approaches would be essential step for peace and harmony in the world. (shrink)

In this collectively written article, the authors interrogate contemporary power constellations that run between control and connectivity. Regimes of individualism, hierarchies of assumed classifications and imperialistic subjectivities sustain the basis for political control that organises connections and divisions used to justify hierarchical dominations and distributions. This makes anti-oppression practices that value differing forms of connectivity and intra-dependence (between humans, more than humans, disciplines, all things considered to be of different bodies) nearly unimaginable. The authors offer/reconfigure/understand connectivity as a practice acting (...) in and at odds with those controlling political regimes that organise and classify matter(s), while experimenting with their own writing methodology aimed at staying connected. Informed by new materialist feminist practices and ideas, the authors discuss the political stakes of multiple ideas of connectivity within three empirical scenarios: academic labour practices, social media and a digitally established mutual aid community. We trace entangled forces of separation and control shaped by global imperialism, processes of individuation and technological apparatuses and how they perform within these scenarios. This approach is mirrored in our practice of writing together. In an alternative to traditionalised ways of writing, we expand upon an embodied praxis, elaborating on multiple engagements while offering our own connections with these differing situated knowledges. In light of this, the authors write in a diffractive, collective fashion that lies somewhere between a conversation and the strict linearity of typical narratives. (shrink)

This book offers introductory entries on 80 ideas that have shaped the study of language up to the present day. Entries are written by experts in the fields of linguistics and the philosophy of language to reflect the full range of approaches and modes of thought. Each entry includes a brief description of the idea, an account of its development, and its impact on the field of language study. The book is written in an accessible style with clear descriptions (...) of technical terms, guides to further reading, and extensive cross-referencing between entries. A useful additional feature of this book is that it is cross-referenced throughout with Key Thinkers in Linguistics and the Philosophy of Language, revealing significant connections and continuities in the two related disciplines. Ideas covered range from Sense Data, Artificial Intelligence, and Logic, through Generative Semantics, Cognitivism, and Conversation Analysis, to Political Correctness, Deconstruction, and Corpora. (shrink)