Hedonism, driven by mass culture and widespread consumerism, is a salient factor in the modus vivendi of contemporary Western civilization. This general psychological and behavioral backdrop is exploited in the article as an opportunity to both reinvigorate and re-appraise the theoretical underpinnings of modern hedonism as developed by John Stuart Mill in his Utilitarianism. The article proceeds in two steps: Firstly, a detailed exposition of Mill’s arguments for the principle of utility is undertaken, with an accompanying elucidation of the core (...) notions of utility, expediency, happiness, and pleasure. Secondly, five points of criticism (logical, phenomenological, and analytical in method) are raised to challenge what the author thinks are the weakest links in Mill’s syllogistic chain. (shrink)

Humanity is moving towards a new world order, a “meta-civilization” with common values, processes, and organization, where cultural, national, and religious conflicts based on cultural differences are so easy to ignite and difficult to put out. In a world like this it is necessary to trace the origins of such differences, and study the conditions of their appearance. It is important to raise the awareness of the representatives of diverse civilizations and to encourage them to look for common grounds to (...) foster intercultural understanding. With regard to the newly emerging world, philosophers do not keep aloof, they do rise from their cozy armchairs and confront the factual world where it is most problematic. “Innovative” ideas put forward today by the experts of international relations who emphasize the role of different civilizations in the global world, in fact were generated by the Honolulu movement of comparative philosophy much earlier. The members of the movement were already aware of the vital need to bring together foreign, often conflicting, civilizations and search for common intellectual footage between them. As a response to the problem they proposed the idea of a “world philosophy.” The article presents a typology of six distinguishable meanings of a “world philosophy” that were developed and circulated by the Honolulu movement of comparative philosophy, with a brief critique of each meaning. (shrink)

The article examines and criticizes Paul Karl Feyerabend’s seminal work entitled, “How to Be a Good Empiricist—A Plea for Tolerance in Matters Epistemological” which persuasively argued for a pluralistic view of scientific knowledge and theoretical truth. Throughout the article, a number of polemical points, analytic elaborations, and broader philosophical concerns are raised regarding the notions of consistency condition, meaning invariance, theoretical alternatives, and the very principle of theoretical pluralism. The article concludes that Feyerabend’s call for a plurality of theories as (...) the surest path to the progress of science is in need of numerous conceptual qualifications, provoking the reader into critical thinking about the deeper underpinnings of science while providing very few ready-made answers to the problems enunciated. (shrink)

The article explores a special mode of the human mind outlined in the writings of Max Scheler under the notion of the functionalization of essential (a priori) knowledge. While the concept of a priori was given its profound elaboration in the writings of Immanuel Kant, Scheler applies it with a number of significant modifications. Along with the a priori of objective reality, which is the mind’s first step in grasping the autonomous world, Scheler comes to posit a species of a (...) priori that is subjective. A person’s exposure to an objective essence exercises a special kind of influence on that person’s mind: what was once an objective a priori is appropriated as a subjective a priori, the thing thought becomes a “form” or pattern of thinking, the thing liked becomes a “form” or manner of liking. “Functionalization” characterizes precisely the mind’s ability to transmute the essential knowledge of autonomous reality into subjective a priori forms of knowing and anticipating that reality. This transmutation unfolds on three intuitive planes: that of meaning which is known, that of value which is perceived or apprehended, and that of existence which is encountered in the resistance of objects to the will of the percipient. (shrink)