have recently provided a compelling demonstration of enhanced attentional control under post-hypnotic suggestion. Using the classic color-word interference paradigm, in which the task is to ignore a word and to name the color in which it is printed (e.g., RED in green, say ''green''), they gave a post-hypnotic instruction to participants that they would be unable to read. This eliminated Stroop interference in high suggestibility participants but did not alter interference in low suggestibility participants. replicated this pattern and further demonstrated (...) that it is not due to a visual strategy (such as blurring or looking at a different location). As a historical footnote, we describe a ''case study'' from 18 years ago in which we observed the same result using a hypnotic instruction to a single highly suggestible individual that he could not read. The elimination of Stroop interference has important implications for both the study of attention and the study of hypnosis. (shrink)

The fundamental task of Filosofía de la realidad histórica (Philosophy of Historical Reality) is to put forth historical reality as the ultimate manifestation of reality, as the proper object of philosophy. Ellacuría develops the concept of historical reality as the synthesis of the Hegelian-Marxian dialectic and Xavier Zubiri’s radicalization of Scholastic realism. Historical reality is physical, not conceptual; material, not ideal; concrete, not abstract. Historical reality encompassesthe material, biological, individual, and social moments of reality. And when it is considered in (...) its totality, as a dynamic and differentiated structure of its moments, functions, and relations, historical reality forms a transcendental system—intramundane metaphysics. (shrink)

These two books are among the most recently published tomes of a projected twenty comprising the first French edition of the Complete Works of Kierkegaard. Such a work represents the life-long dedication of Paul Tisseau, Kierkegaard's principal French translator. Many of Tisseau's translations have already been published in various other places, and it is generally known that he undertook to publish on his own several of the less commercially appealing religious works. After his death in 1964, his daughter completed his (...) work by correcting published and unpublished manuscripts and by translating the few works her father had not been able to do. The present edition was indeed worth waiting for; it is at once an artful translation and an excellent scholarly tool, complete with marginal pagination of the definitive Danish edition, the Drachmann, Heiberg, Lange of 1920-1926, plus location of each separate work in the first and third Danish editions. Jean Brun provides to-the-point introductions containing a wealth of historical material and ample footnotes referring to significant textual variations, subtleties of translation, and related passages in other works. Volume thirteen contains the Edifying Discourses in Various Spirits, Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing, The Lilies and the Birds, and The Gospel of Sufferings; volume eighteen, Two Discourses at the Communion on Fridays, The Woman that Was a Sinner, The Unchangeableness of God, For Self-Examination, and Judge for Yourselves.--C. M. R. (shrink)

Offers, in an informal and somewhat undisciplined and repetitive manner, suggestions for answering such questions as: What is form? What kind of atomism will future scientific endeavour emphasize? Are there further, as yet unexplored and unexploited possibilities of evolution? How should a biologist or physicist account for man's creative abilities? etc.--C. M.

In this source study of the hermetic and prophetic poetry of William Blake, Kathleen Raine adds strength to the theory that it takes a poet to explain one. The present volumes, expanded from the 1962 Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts, are the result of twenty years' research; in scholarship and in style, they well might serve as a model for all source studies to come. Raine traces Blake's borrowings from Neoplatonism, from alchemy, from classical and hermetic sources, from gnosticism (...) and Christianity. Her development avoids the rigid chronological installment method so often used and moves along lyrically in chapter divisions sometimes source inspired, more often determined by particular characters created by Blake himself. Two very complete indexes, both of Blake's works and of general subjects, allow for immediate reference within the author's rather fluid organization. Mention must be made also of the beautiful plate reproductions which encourage a more integrated appreciation of Blake's two media of expression. Raine communicates the universal nature of visionary poetry, the basic sources of which have not changed significantly throughout the centuries. She thus opens up for the reader the possibility of understanding a whole tradition of the most awesome and most inaccessible literature.--C. M. R. (shrink)

After introductory remarks concerning Hartshorne’s contribution to contemporary thought, Gragg takes on the task of exposition of Hartshorne’s work, both as an original thinker and as an interpreter of Whitehead. He does this by a three-step analysis of Hartshorne’s metaphysics, moving from the question of the really real to that of man to that of the supreme reality. Dealing with the central metaphysical question—What is really real?—Gragg summarizes Hartshorne’s method, his position of panpsychism and his social conception of the universe. (...) He then moves to a description of Hartshorne’s ideas about man through a discussion of the issues which usually become central whenever process philosophy is contrasted with the classical tradition: self-identity, volition, personal immortality. The Hartshornian doctrines of sociality and altruism are also given some attention here. Chapter IV completes Gragg’s unpacking of the scheme. He elaborates on the supreme reality as established by Hartshorne’s "metaphysics of love." Here the dipolar God, a pantheistic deity with categorical supremacy, emerges as the resolution of the tension between classical theism on the one hand and atheistic humanism on the other. (shrink)

Consists largely of fragments from the works of poets, prophets, and philosophers, particularly the author's teacher, Charles E. Garman, all expressive of a kind of anti-dogmatic theism.--C. M.

Pomeau has condensed a lot of material for this pocket-size introduction to the life and works of Diderot, which he has attempted to simplify by providing parallel classifications of the excerpts from Diderot's works with his own presentation of Diderot's philosophy. These divisions are entitled: the Adventure of Diderot's thought, On Nature, On Man, Morality, Aesthetics, Politics, and the Contemporary Import of Diderot's Philosophie. Pomeau, a Voltaire scholar, displays a knowledge of the intellectual history of the period and a wide (...) acquaintance with his immediate material. His selections are beautifully chosen, for they provide a generous survey of Diderot's work, including even a short passage from the most recently published marginalia of Hemsterhuis. This sort of presentation cannot but entice the beginner to further examination, for the passages range from the most poignant to the most witty Yet there is matter to frustrate the serious beginner; the passages are not dated, nor are they identified by work in the index. Pomeau engages in gratuitous psychologizing in his exposition of Diderot's life, and has made a blatant error in attributing to Diderot the authorship of the article "Encyclopédie." These shortcomings unfortunately mar a text which contains excellent analyses of the evolution of Diderot's religious and biological thought.—C. M. R. (shrink)

This edition, providing the only available English language access to Collin de Plancy's long-forgotten Dictionnaire infernal, is directed to the reader who likes the reinforcement of being able to get through a whole book in an hour or so, whizzing through clean pages at incredible speeds. Perhaps the most misleading aspect of this flashy volume is the fact that the publishers never mention that it is abbreviated at all; it contains 177 truncated versions of Collin de Plancy's 2,400 plus entries, (...) which filled in the 1825-1826 edition of four volumes of text and one of plates. Wade Baskin, a master of condensation, does cover a lot of ground in his two and one-half page introduction. This, unfortunately, serves as little but a teaser to the reader interested in more than a mere mention of Collin de Plancy's colorful, success-oriented career, his filiations with spiritual brothers like Nodier, and his influence on other writers of the Romantic period. One can begrudge this sort of holding back with good reason, for Collin de Plancy is a name unfamiliar today even to French scholars. Baskin's translation is, as usual, excellent.—C. M. R. (shrink)

In this revised and expanded edition of his well-known study of Denis Diderot's life and works, Crocker combines solid scholarship with a vivid portrayal of his subjects. Leaving firm ground only occasionally, Crocker masterfully reconstructs Diderot's life by weaving into his narrative the testimony of Diderot's contemporaries and the philosopher's own anecdotes of the more picturesque episodes of his life. The author never departs from firm ground, however, in his presentation of Diderot's works. With a rare blend of erudition and (...) a lively critical sense, he sets them forth in the light of eighteenth-century currents of thought, highlighting Diderot's most significant contributions to materialism, sensualism, and experimentalism, while at the same time preserving, in quite readable summaries, the integrity of individual writings. His extensive consideration of the twenty years Diderot devoted to the Encyclopedia is particularly stimulating. By contrast, his summary presentation of Diderot's novels is somewhat disappointing, especially since he gives all too brief mention to Diderot's innovations in that genre. A needed index is lacking, but in spite of this and other minor shortcomings, Crocker's efforts have resulted in what is clearly the best complete English biography of one of the eighteenth century's most colorful geniuses.—C. M. M. (shrink)

An unusually effective introduction to metaphysics in the form of a brief account of the discovery of the two questions by which, according to the author, the domain of metaphysica generalis may be delimited: What is unity? What is being? A short essay, addressed primarily to a German student audience, the scope of its discussion is restricted, focussing on the progressive clarification of the notions of unity and universality in Greek philosophy. Platonists may disagree with the author's view of Aristotle (...) as developing, rather than suggesting an alternative to, the Platonic conception of unity, but this will not prevent them from admiring the clarity and sanity of the author's presentation of basic metaphysical issues. -- C. M. (shrink)

A second, corrected edition of the 1948 original, plus preface and a third appendix on the import of Pascal for the present day. The work consists of a number of brief considerations centered around the theme of "common sense," essential to a study of history as sacred. Castelli writes in a climate interpreted as threatening to lead us to a state of "second innocence". Against this threat, Castelli lays the groundwork for a theological existentialism, based on a "sense of revelation," (...) a personal "common sense" commitment arising from the realization of one's own insufficiency. In an age where Catholic theologians are developing a political basis for their thought, Castelli's book appears perhaps even more apropos than in the late 1940's. It opposes modern solipsism resulting from subjectivist tendencies in philosophy since Descartes, as well as analogues in the political sphere--monologue and violence--and proposes as an alternative a theologically based human solidarity.--C. M. R. (shrink)

Intended to give "a graphic picture of the development, relationship and relative importance of Chinese philosophical schools," this booklet contains 7 charts outlining the Ancient, the Middle, the Modern, the Sung, the Yuan and Ming, the Ch'ing, and the contemporary periods.--C. M.

In this exposition of Boehme's key conceptions, the author tries to show that the seventeenth-century Silesian mystic's work can and should be viewed as an original, coherent philosophic system. Includes detailed biographical sketch, bibliography, indexes, illustrations and diagrams.--C. M.

Part of the Philosophes series, this very useful introduction to Locke opens with a little ceremony which really does seem necessary in order to assure French readers of the relevance of foreign thinkers. It takes the form here of Voltaire's praise of Locke in his thirteenth Lettre philosophique. Voltaire's consecration however does serve to cast some eighteenth century light on Locke, which is an excellent way to begin the subject. There follows an outline of Locke's life and philosophy, with brief (...) considerations of the Letter on Tolerance and Two Treatises on Government, and an extended treatment of the four books of the Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Leroy uses a method of paraphrase with very limited commentary, a good device for getting inside a subject but one which involves a sacrifice in perspective. Some sixty pages of excerpts from the Essay are well chosen, indexed, and provided with topic headings. A minimal bibliography follows.--C. M. R. (shrink)

This volume forms part of the series of the Princeton Studies in Humanistic Scholarship in America, under the general editorship of Richard Schlatter. Uitti's exposition of theories of language and literature from ancient Greece to contemporary America is oriented toward the proposal for a coordination of studies of language and literature in a sort of modern trivium of grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic. In the first part of the book, the author concentrates on Platonic "symbolic" and Aristotelian "analytic" ideas about language, (...) and then traces these two currents throughout the Middle Ages, paying special attention to Priscian, Anselm, Abelard, Petrus Hispanus, Dante, and the grammatica speculativa. He then brings the survey up to modern times, examining Descartes, the Port-Royal grammar, Du Marsais, Diderot, and Rousseau. Condillac and Coleridge are treated in detail as representing two modern theories of expression/communication, the one analytic and linguistic, the other synthetic and aesthetic. The second part of this work deals with a history of both linguistics and of American literary criticism, stressing I. A. Richards' descriptivism, new critic theories of metaphor and irony, and Wellek and Warren's Theory of Literature. Uitti singles out Roman Jakobson as being most prophetic in outlining future cooperation of linguistics and literary theory, and in this light analyzes various papers in Style and Language, in particular C. F. Voegelin's and Michel Riffaterre's. This survey of the contemporary American scene points to the fact that ours is a sign-oriented culture, and that recent studies in linguistics and in literary criticism of the poetics type have been sharing the same philosophical assumptions. The author thinks that language and literature studies would function best in the future as disciplines united in the broad matrix of cultural process, and using linguistic categories. He thus shares an oft-expressed hope for a cumulative literary "science," in which individual studies are oriented toward the broader construct. This book is addressed to the nonspecialist, but the expert will profit from Uitti's generous style which opens up new vistas on every page.--C. M. R. (shrink)

A well put together introduction to twentieth century philosophy and philosophers. Trotignon has achieved a good balance by dividing his book into two parts, the first containing twenty- to thirty-page summaries of Sartre and Merleau-Ponty, the second paragraph-long to eight-page presentations of lesser figures. Sartre and Merleau-Ponty are set at two extremes of Husserlian existentialist phenomenology through a series of polarizations : e.g., Sartre's Husserl is the Husserl of Ideen I, Merleau-Ponty's the Husserl of Erfahrung und Urteil, Méditations cartésiennes, and (...) the Krisis. Trotignon's précis of minor figures, consistently to the point, fall into three categories: "Phenomenological currents" "Philosophy of history", and "Twenty years after or the crisis of philosophy". In concluding, Trotignon announces Structuralism, a new "Practical subjectivity," as the philosophy of the future. There follows a three-page bibliography of primary sources for minor figures, with primary and secondary sources for Sartre and Merleau-Ponty.--C. M. R. (shrink)

With the publication of three significant books in 1967, La voix et le phénomène, L'écriture et la différence, and De la grammatologie, Derrida is proving himself a noteworthy figure in French philosophy, and a diversified one as well. La voix et le phénomène is a scholarly reinterpretation of Husserl centered around his theory of the sign, which Derrida sees as playing a secret but decisive role in his phenomenology. Derrida attacks chiefly two Husserlian prejudices: his theory of language as the (...) dimension of absolute proximity-to-self, and his privileging of the "expression" meaning of the sign over the "index" meaning. These mesh with Husserl's notion of the transcendent voice present-to-itself, a central idea of his intuitionism. Thus, according to Derrida, Husserl's phenomenology really rejoins a traditional metaphysics--philosophy of presence--it had set out to criticize. This book will be valuable not only as an original interpretation of Husserl, but as a springboard into Derrida's philosophy as well.--C. M. R. (shrink)

A posthumous edition of Jordan's unrevised and unfinished draft of a metaphysics, with a complete bibliography of works by and about Jordan, and a preface outlining the course of his life and thought. For those who are unacquainted with Jordan's earlier writings this book is difficult to follow and to evaluate. It is extremely polemical and often dogmatic in tone; we are told that... "religion and science are the two forms of scepticism that have posed as the philosophy of the (...) modern period," and Jordan keeps harping on this string without really developing a more complete justification for his assertion that both these enterprises are restricted by their commitment to human interest and utility, and that they can for this reason not attain to an "objective metaphysics." Such an objective metaphysics he aims to develop through a novel theory of categories in which quality, relation and substance stand no longer contrasted, but are shown to be both absolute and relational and "analogically identical."--C. M. (shrink)

John Findlay's eminently readable book should be a valuable addition to the library of anyone who reads Kant as a protopositivist, a Marburg-type epistemologist, as having been primarily concerned to dialogue with David Hume, or as significant merely as the precursor of absolute idealism. Taking Kant seriously in his own right, Findlay presents an overview of the Critical corpus which seeks to demonstrate the continuity of Kant's metaphysical commitment, his insistence on the "thinkable continuity between the phenomenal and the noumenal, (...) and the necessity of the latter to the understanding of the former". Kant's philosophic concerns are shown to come out of the metaphysical tradition of Leibniz and Wolff and always presume a rational world order within which the possibilities of finite human knowledge and of morality are to be grounded. (shrink)

A sensitive, carefully demonstrated interpretation of Nietzsche's entire philosophy as culminating in, unified by, and also self-directed through the theory of eternal recurrence. The doctrine of the superman is shown to be the presupposition of the doctrine of eternal recurrence, for only the man who has surpassed himself can will the eternal recurrence of all being. The author also shows that, for Nietzsche, eternal recurrence is both "the way of the world" and moral task, and that, though Nietzsche struggled in (...) all his works to make these two "interpretations" of eternal recurrence coincide, in fact the notion of eternal recurrence remains ambiguous, revealing through its ambiguity that Nietzsche failed to reconcile man with the cosmos. --C. M. (shrink)

The Modern Library, which used for its 1941 monolingual edition of the combined Pensées and Provincial Letters the Trotter translation of the former work, has chosen for this bilingual edition of the Pensées the artful translation of H. F. Stewart. The work is divided by Stewart into a major Apology and chronologically arranged Adversaria which he considers to lie outside the scope of the original work. Stewart's scholarly introduction surveys both the incredibly confused situation of existing manuscripts and the evolution (...) of Pascal's thought. Stewart has arranged the material in accordance with Pascal's own plan, which was reconstructed by Filleau de la Chaise and by Pascal's nephew the abbé Périer. One could argue, as does Brunschvicg, whose own arrangement reveals a prime consideration of accessibility to the modern reader rather than historical accuracy, that the authority of Filleau de la Chaise and the abbé Périer is indeed questionable. For their reconstruction of the plan was made some eight years after Pascal had announced it in a lecture at Port Royal in 1658. Moreover, this initial arrangement could not take into account modifications made while writing during the last four years of the author's life. Stewart has nevertheless relied on both the Brunschvicg facsimile of the autographed manuscript and the Tourneur reading of the First Copy, and has consulted several editions of the Pensées. The result is certainly the best edition in English of this momentous work. Stewart's translation is superb, reproducing eloquently Pascal's paradoxical, contrapuntal phrases without losing any of his delightfully subtle wit.—C. M. R. (shrink)

A rather elementary survey of the tasks of the philosopher in the modern world. American philosophers, the authors claim, by withdrawing from the social and moral concerns of our age, have failed to exert their influence where it is most required, in education.--C. M.

A collection of texts, otherwise not easily accessible, indispensable to students of comparative religion and comparative literature, reprinted from the Princeton Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament. Includes hymns, prayers, myths, epics, etc. Each text is provided with a brief introduction; a short bibliography and index to Biblical references is also included.--C. M.

Seven lectures, in which some of the major issues of post-Kantian theology and philosophy of religion are discussed in the course of a critical examination of the contributions of Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Buber, and Barth to religious inquiry. The author's choice of the subject-object relation as the "perspective pinhole" through which to look at the modern theological scene is a good one. It is not entirely clear, however, whether "the larger problem of insight into the nature of the truth of the (...) Christian religion is...served" because, although individual critical comments are well taken, the concluding lecture is somewhat inconclusive.--C. M. (shrink)

Barfield considers the light the studies of history, language, and literature shed upon each other. He focuses his attention on the development of a theory of the emergence of individual consciousness. Barfield disputes some prevalent ramifications of evolutionist theories which hold that in language, literature, and history, a period of "active subjectivity" preceded one of "passive subjectivity." This would mean, according to Barfield, that in language, literal meaning preceded figurative meaning, just as imagination was prior to inspiration in the creation (...) of literature, and individual mental activity prior to a period of social consciousness. Barfield is convinced that the opposite is true. Using semantics as a springboard into the study of history and literature, he contends that the basic assumptions of any age are contained in the meaning of its most common words, and that ideas change because "human consciousness itself—the elementary human experience about which the ideas are being formed—the whole relation between man and nature or between conscious man and unconscious man—has been in the process of change." In this sketchy development of his theory of subjectivity as a form of consciousness that has "contracted from the periphery into individual centers," Barfield draws on a wide range of background material to come up with some genuinely fresh insights. But he carries his arguments only so far and leaves the reader with the memory of a few briefly illuminated new paths. In the final analysis, the topic seems just too vast to receive anything but a schematic treatment in even the most distinguished of essays.—C. M. R. (shrink)

In two lively and independent essays, Rosset builds a good case for an appreciation of Schopenhauer's importance in the history of philosophy by treating those aspects of his thought which signal a definitive rupture with classical philosophy and merit his being aligned with the spirit of modern times. These aspects, each the subject of one of the essays, are the genealogical treatment of ideas and the intuition of the absurd. The author establishes Schopenhauer's originality in both of these areas, outlining (...) Schopenhauer's direct influence on Nietzsche, his parallels with Marx, and his possible links with Freud. At no point does he inflate the influence of Schopenhauer's but vaguely formulated ideas which invite comparison with their more developed expressions in other philosophers. Rosset does, however, contend that Schopenhauer was most original in his central intuition of the absurd, being the first to construct a philosophy upon this vision. In this regard, the author's consideration of the Schopenhauerian themes of finality, desire, necessity, and static time is excellent. He maintains convincingly that the usual interpretation of Schopenhauer, which emphasizes the Romantic themes of pessimism, esthetic idealism, and a morality of pity and renouncement, stresses only secondary aspects of his thought. A more balanced picture of Schopenhauer reveals an almost Beckettian tragi-comic [[sic]] view of life.—C. M. R. (shrink)

The new epilogue entitled "Original Sin, Natural Law and Politics," in which the philosophic contributions of Niebuhr and Lippman are discussed and disposed of is somewhat disappointing.--C. M.

Like other works in the Philosophes series, this one has a tripartite presentation of life, philosophy, and excerpts; as Mme. Davy points out, Simone Weil did not prepare her own work for publication. About half of Weil's now published works are represented, with a selection from Attente de Dieu on the beauty of the world, and one from the Cahiers on the relation between God and man receiving the most attention. Unfortunately, the author's introduction, though lengthy, is quite inadequate and (...) often naïve, and the reader finds himself wishing she had directed her efforts to a more generous selection of primary material. Mme. Davy's treatment of Simone Weil's colorful life is cloudy, and her extraordinary subject remains a fairly anonymous elle. As for the exposition of Weil's philosophy, Mme. Davy wastes time on superficial rhetorical considerations like: "Was Simone Weil a philosopher? Did she have a metaphysic? Was she a religious thinker?" Only at moments, as for example in her discussion of some aspects of Weil's mystical and social thought, does Mme. Davy's text prove helpful.—C. M. R. (shrink)