(1997). Education and the philosophy of the subject (or constitution of self) Educational Philosophy and Theory: Vol. 29, No. 1, pp. v-xi. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-5812.1997.tb00523.x.

This article explores the various senses in which the framers of the Constitution were motivated by a pragmatist philosophical framework, and how this pragmatism influenced their vision of the best interests of the American economic system. We argue that, on various grounds, the framers would have disapproved of the excessive regulation that characterizes the current business environment.

relation between, say, a lump of clay and a statue that it makes up, or between a red and white piece of metal and a stop sign, or between a person and her body? Assuming that there is a single relation between members of each of these pairs, is the relation “strict” identity, “contingent” identity or something else?1 Although this question has generated substantial controversy recently,2 I believe that there is philo- sophical gain to be had from thinking through the (...) issues from scratch. Many of the charges and countercharges are based on the following dichotomy: For any x and y that are related as the lump of clay is to the statue that it makes up, either x is identical to y, or x and y are separate entities, independent of each other. By giving up this dichotomy, we will be able to begin to make sense, I hope, of an intermediate unity relation that holds promise for solving a raft of philosophical problems, including the problem of how persons are related to their bodies.3 And if I am correct, then this relation—constitution without identity—is ubiquitous and interesting in its own right, apart from the light that it sheds on human persons. (shrink)

Ludwik Fleck’s theory of thought-styles has been hailed as a pioneer of constructivist science studies and sociology of scientific knowledge. But this consensus ignores an important feature of Fleck’s epistemology. At the core of his account is the ideal of ‘objective truth, clarity, and accuracy’. I begin with Fleck’s account of modern natural science, locating the ideal of scientific objectivity within his general social epistemology. I then draw on Fleck’s view of scientific objectivity to improve upon reflexive accounts of the (...) origin and development of the theory of thought-styles, and reply to objections that Fleck’s epistemological stance is self-undermining or inconsistent. Explicating the role of scientific objectivity in Fleck’s epistemology reveals his view to be an internally consistent alternative to recent social accounts of scientific objectivity by Harding, Daston and Galison. I use these contrasts to indicate the strengths and weaknesses of Fleck’s innovative social epistemology, and propose modifications to address the latter. The result is a renewed version of Fleck’s social epistemology, which reconciles commitment to scientific objectivity with integrated sociology, history and philosophy of science. (shrink)

In these three lectures, Cavell situates Emerson at an intersection of three crossroads: a place where both philosophy and literature pass; where the two traditions of English and German philosophy shun one another; where the cultures of America and Europe unsettle one another. "Cavell’s ’readings’ of Wittgenstein and Heidegger and Emerson and other thinkers surely deepen our understanding of them, but they do much more: they offer a vision of what life can be and what culture can mean.... (...) These profound lectures are a wonderful place to make [Cavell’s] acquaintance."—Hilary Putnam. (shrink)

This paper concerns Hegel's early treatment of the productive imagination in his 1803–1804 Faith and Knowledge. I show how he articulates that activity in terms of a pair of speculative unities, which solve lingering problems of self-knowledge and self-constitution from Kant's B-deduction. On the one hand, I argue that the familiar unity of spontaneity and receptivity makes possible knowledge of the moment of self-positing. On the other hand, I contend that Hegel's talk of imagination as both an “organic idea” (...) and an “intuitive intellect” refers to a self-constituting capacity that intellects like ours possess. I show that self-constitution is possible, for Hegel, only in so far as intellects like ours possess a capacity to unify possibility and actuality in thought, or to think themselves into being. (shrink)

According to the received view, Marxian (ideology) critique and Foucaultian (genealogical) critique constitute two divergent approaches of critical theory that have remarkably different goals and little in common. In this article, however, we identify a guiding thread that connects the Marxian and Foucaultian traditions and motivates a distinctive approach within critical theory we call the ‘critique of constitution’. The problem of restricted consciousness, we show, is the core problem in common between Michel Foucault's critical history of thought and Georg (...) Lukács's theory of reification which underlies the tradition of Western Marxism and Frankfurt School critical theory. The problem concerns the limits of intelligibility and, by the same token, the apparent inevitability of the given social ontology. Our sense of what is possible depends on what we are able to think. But we know from the history of sciences that the limits of intelligibility change, thereby also altering our sense of what is possible. This becomes a political problem in connection with the intelligibility of social reality, because our restricted consciousness limits the alternatives we can so much as consider and seek to bring about. The critique of constitution, then, aims to expand the scope of possibility by revealing the contingent formation of the given limits of intelligibility. We argue that this is the paramount political task for Foucault and Lukács alike, other important differences notwithstanding. (shrink)

Gebharter has proposed using one of the best known Bayesian network causal discovery algorithms, PC, to identify the constitutive dependencies underwriting mechanistic explanations. His proposal assumes that mechanistic constitution behaves like deterministic direct causation, such that PC is directly applicable to mixed variable sets featuring both causal and constitutive dependencies. Gebharter claims that such mixed sets, under certain restrictions, comply with PC’s background assumptions. The aim of this article is to show that Gebharter’s proposal incurs severe problems, ultimately rooted (...) in the widespread non-compliance of mechanistic systems with PC’s assumptions. This casts severe doubts on the attempt to implicitly define constitution as a form of deterministic direct causation complying with PC’s assumptions. (shrink)

It is argued that at the center of Hegel’s phenomenology of consciousness is the notion that experience is shaped by identification and sacrifice. Experience is the process of self - constitution and self -transformation of a self -conscious being that risks its own being. The transition from desire to recognition is explicated as a transition from the tripartite structure of want and fulfillment of biological desire to a socially structured recognition that is achieved only in reciprocal recognition, or reflexive (...) recognition. At the center of the Hegelian notion of selfhood is thus the realization that selves are the locus of accountatibility. To be a self, it is concluded, is to be the subject of normative statuses that refer to commitments; it means to be able to take a normative stand on things, to commit oneself and undertake responsibilities. Key Words: commitments • desire • experience • G.W.F.Hegel • identity • recognition • risk • sacrifice • self -consciousness • self - constitution. (shrink)

The chances of the project of a “cosmopolitan order” being successful are not worse now than they were in 1945 or in 1989–1990. This does not mean that the chances are good, but we should not lose sight of the scale of things. The Kantian project first became part of the political agenda with the League of Nations, in other words after more than 200 years; and the idea of a cosmopolitan order first received a lasting embodiment with the foundation (...) of the United Nations (UN). This process points toward a continuation of the Kantian project. We can still take our cue from Kant's idea of a cosmopolitan condition if we simply construe it in sufficiently abstract terms. I wish to show first of all why I consider the Kantian alternative between a world of republic and a league of nations to be incomplete (section I) and will then go on to outline how we can reconceptualize the Kantian project under contemporary conditions (section II). And I shall close by addressing an actual challenge to which that project might well offer the most promising response (section III). (shrink)

Aristotle was the first philosopher in the Western tradition to address politics systematically and empirically, and he remains a central figure in political theory. This essential volume presents Aristotle's complete political writings—including his Politics, Economics, and Constitution of Athens—in their most authoritative translations, taken from the complete works that is universally recognized as the standard English edition. Edited by Jonathan Barnes, one of the world’s leading scholars of ancient philosophy, and with an illuminating introduction by Melissa Lane, an (...) authority on ancient political philosophy, this compact but comprehensive volume will be invaluable for all students of politics, philosophy, classics, or Western thought. (shrink)

이 논문은 2018년 시작된 개헌 논의에 맞추어 ‘도래할’ 헌법(constitution to come)이 담고 있어야 할 정치철학의 내용이 무엇인지, 한나 아렌트의 헌정이론을 이론적 틀로 삼아 ‘새로운 시작’과 ‘인민헌정주의’라는 개념을 중심으로 논한다. 도래할 헌법이 반영해야할 혁명 정신의 근거로서 ‘2016-17년 촛불혁명’에서 시작하는 이 논의는 다음 세 단계를 거친다. 첫째, 초일상의 정치로서 혁명과 헌법의 관계를 논하고, 헌법이 지니는 ‘새로운 시작’의 기능에 대해 살펴본다. 둘째, 도래할 헌법의 정치철학적 기초로서 인민헌정주의의 특징을 ‘헌정민주주의’와 ‘포스트주권’의 개념을 통해 제시한다. 셋째, 인민헌정주의에 기초를 둔 새로운 시작이란 관점에서 ‘대한민국 기본질서를 어떻게 (...) 규정할 것인가’와 ‘자발적 동원의 혁명정신을 헌법에 담을 것인가’라는 두 논쟁을 분석하고 대안을 제시한다. 마지막으로 헌법의 혁명정신을 보존하기 위해서는 헌법제정 과정에서 시민들이 헌법의 공동저자(constitutional authorship)가 될 수 있는 제도적 채널이 확보되어야만 한다고 주장한다. (shrink)

Standard philosophical methodology which proceeds by appeal to intuitions accessible "from the armchair" has come under criticism on the basis of empirical work indicating unanticipated variability of such intuitions. Loose constitutivity---the idea that intuitions are partly, but not strictly, constitutive of the concepts that appear in them---offers an interesting line of response to this empirical challenge. On a loose constitutivist view, it is unlikely that our intuitions are incorrect across the board, since they partly fix the facts in question. But (...) we argue that this ratification of intuitions is at best rough and generic, and can only do the required methodological work if it operates in conjunction with some sort of further criteria of theory selection. We consider two that we find in the literature: naturalness (Brian Weatherson, borrowing from Lewis) and charity (Henry Jackman, borrowing from Davidson). At the end of the day, neither provides the armchair philosopher complete shelter from extra-armchair inquiry. (shrink)

There is nowadays consensus in the community of didactics of science regarding the need to include the philosophy of science in didactical research, science teacher education, curriculum design, and the practice of science education in all educational levels. Some authors have identified an ever-increasing use of the concept of ‘theoretical model’, stemming from the so-called semantic view of scientific theories. However, it can be recognised that, in didactics of science, there are over-simplified transpositions of the idea of model. In (...) this sense, contemporary philosophy of science is often blurred or distorted in the science education literature. In this paper, we address the discussion around some meta-theoretical concepts that are introduced into didactics of science due to their perceived educational value. We argue for the existence of a ‘semantic family’, and we characterise four different versions of semantic views existing within the family. In particular, we seek to contribute to establishing a model-based didactics of science mainly supported in this semantic family. (shrink)

Michael Rea and Jeffery Brower have offered a provocative new model of the Trinity on the analogy of the Aristotelian solution to the problem of material constitution. Just as a fist and a hand can be distinct entities composed of a common matter and yet numerically the same object, so the persons of the Trinity can be distinct entities (persons) composed of a common "matter" (the divine essence) and yet numerically the same object (God). I express doubts about the (...) degree to which this analogy sheds light on the doctrine of the Trinity due to the disanalogy that neither God nor the Trinitarian persons are to be thought of as composed of any sort of stuff and to the model’s lack of explanatory power as to how a common matter can be simultaneously imbued with seemingly incompatible forms to constitute one object. (shrink)

The Constitution of the United States was constructed by men influenced by fundamental ideas of what a republic should be. These ideas hark back to the ancient philosophers and historians, and were further articulated and developed in modern times. From time to time scholars have sought to collect and reprint selections from the classical, biblical, and modern sources upon which the Founding Fathers fed. Remarkably, however, the best anthology of these sources to understand the republican idea that undergirds the (...) Federal Constitution was prepared on the eve of the Constitutional Convention by John Adams, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, then in London as American envoy to Great Britain and eventually the second President of the United States. I refer to Adams' A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America, against the attack of M. Turgot, in his letter to Dr. Price, 22 March, 1778. (shrink)

When the first Conte government began converting the Five Star Movement and Lega’s manifestos into expenditure items for the 2019 budget law, it quickly became obvious that Italy’s macroeconomic po...

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Books ReceivedThe Ambitions of Curiosity: Understanding the World in Ancient Greece and China. By G.E.R. Lloyd. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Pp. xvi + 175. Price not given.The Art of the Han Essay: Wang Fu's Ch'ien-Fu Lun. By Anne Behnke Kinney. Tempe: Center for Asian Studies, Arizona State University, 1990. Pp. xi + 154. Paper $10.00.The Autobiography of Jamgön Kongtrul: A Gem of Many Colors. By Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrön (...) Thayé and translated by Richard Barron (Chökyi Nyima). Ithaca, New York: Snow Lion Publications, 2003. Pp. xxii + 549. Price not given.Awesome Nightfall: The Life, Times, and Poetry of Saigyō. By William R. LaFleur. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003. Pp. xiii + 173. Paper $14.95.Becoming the Compassion Buddha: Tantric Mahamudra for Everyday Life. By Lama Thubten Yeshe, edited by Robina Courtin, and foreword by Geshe Lhundub Sopa. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003. Pp. xi + 194. Paper $14.95.Between Two Worlds East and West: An Autobiography. By J. N. Mohanty. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2002. Pp. ix + 134. Hardcover RS 525.00.The Chinese Face of Jesus Christ. Edited by Roman Malek, S.V.D. Sankt Augustin, Germany: Institut Monumenta Serica and China-Zentrum; and Nettetal, Germany: Steyler Verlag, 2002. Pp. 391. EUR 40.00.Chinese Medicine in Contemporary China: Plurality and Synthesis. By Volker Scheid. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2002. Pp. xiv + 407. Hardcover $69.95. Paper $23.95.Confucian Feminist: Memoirs of Zeng Baosun (1893-1978). Translated and adapted by Thomas L. Kennedy. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 2002. Pp. xxi + 170. Price not given.Consciousness Studies: Cross-Cultural Perspectives. By K. Ramakrishna Rao. Jefferson (North Carolina) and London: McFarland and Company, 2002. Pp. 367. Hardcover $65.00.Constituting Communities: Theravāda Buddhism and the Religious Cultures of South and Southeast Asia. Edited by John Clifford Holt, Jacob N. Kinnard, and Jonathan S. Walters. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003. Pp. viii + 224. Hardcover $65.50. Paper $21.95.Developments in Indian Philosophy from Eighteenth Century Onwards: Classical and Western. By Daya Krishna. Volume X Part 1 of History of Science, Philosophy and Culture in Indian Civilization, edited by D. P. Chattopadhyaya. New [End Page 110] Delhi: Centre for Studies in Civilizations, 2001. Pp. xxiii + 417. Hardcover RS 1200.East and West: Identità e dialogo interculturale. By Giangiorgio Pasqualotto. Venezia: Marsilo Editori, 2003. Pp. 210. EUR 16.00.Effortless Action: Wu-wei as Conceptual Metaphor and Spiritual Ideal in Early China. By Edward Slingerland. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xii + 352. Price not given.Encountering Kā lī: In the Margins, at the Center, in the West. Edited by Rachel Fell McDermott and Jeffrey J. Kripal. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2003. Pp. xviii + 321. Hardcover $55.00, £37.95. Paper $21.95, £15.95.Encyclopedia of Chinese Philosophy. Edited by Antonio S. Cua. New York and London: Routledge, 2003. Pp. xx + 1020. Hardcover $150.00.Essays on Indian Philosophy. By J. N. Mohanty and edited by Purushottama Bilimoria. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2002. Pp. xxxvii + 347. Paper RS 525.00.Faith, Humor, and Paradox. By Ignacio L. Götz. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger Publishers, 2002. Pp. 136. Hardcover $61.95.Four Illusions: Candrakīrti's Advice for Travelers on the Bodhisattva Path. Translated by Karen C. Lang. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xv + 240. Price not given.The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory. By David R. Loy. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003. Pp. 223. Paper $16.95.The Hidden History of The Tibetan Book of the Dead. By Bryan J. Cuevas. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xi + 328. Price not given.Huang Di nei jing su wen: Nature, Knowledge, Imagery in an Ancient Chinese Medical Text. By Paul U. Unschuld. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2003. Pp. xii + 520. Hardcover $75.00, £52.00.In Dewey's Wake: Unfinished Work of Pragmatic Reconstruction. Edited by William J. Gavin. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003. Pp. vi + 249. Hardcover $71.50. Paper $23.95.Knowledge and Freedom in Indian Philosophy. By Tara Chatterjea. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2002. Pp. xvi + 159. Hardcover... (shrink)

En ce moment propice aux débats sur la Constitution, la souveraineté du peuple, la démocratie directe, cet essai veut donner un aperçu historique, politique et philosophique du problème, à partir d'une seule idée directrice repensée dans la perspective de la "théorie mimétique" de René Girard : l'opposition établie par Giovanni Lobrano entre le "modèle ancien ou romain", seul vrai modèle républicain, et le "modèle moderne ou germano-anglais", d'origine féodale.

This paper aims to clarify the role the double plays in the constitution of identity, focusing on the movement between the individual and the collective level. Notably, the latter today is often considered through the lens of identity politics. The double, I argue, poses an alternative to this type of politics, by showing the interdependence of groups. As a case study, this paper focuses on the complex relationship between the anti-Semite and the Jew as depicted by Sartre. I begin (...) with a psychoanalytical examination of the figure of the double,follow on with an analysis of Sartre's work in the light of the double, and conclude with Girard's theory of mimetic desire. (shrink)

The Intelligent Mind conceives the psychological reality of thought and language, explaining how intelligence develops from intuition to representation and then to linguistic interaction and thinking. Overcoming the prevailing dogmas regarding how discursive reason emerges, this book secures the psychological possibility of the philosophy of mind.

America, and the postmodern West in particular, are experiencing a moral and intellectual crisis, according to E. Robert Statham, Jr. In The Constitution of Public Philosophy, Statham argues that Walter Lippman was correct in locating this crisis in the impoverished nature of public philosophy, and he attempts to constitute a role for reason in contemporary America. Statham suggests that the negative rule of law via a written constitution requires the positive rule of reason, or political (...) class='Hi'>philosophy, in order to flourish. (shrink)

How is it possible, that after the exhilarating start of democratic transitions in the late 1980s and 1990s, today authoritarian–populist options seem to be emerging in many new, as well as old democracies? Why does populism, that in most of its historical varieties has been anti-institutional and anti-procedural, turn to constitution making and constitutional rhetorics as one of its main arenas of contestation? The answers to these questions are related. In the following, in the form of six theses, I (...) start with what I mean by ‘populism’. Next, I wish to point to the two deficits of liberal democracy that provides the context for the rise of populist politics. These deficits according to me have been intensified in many of the new democracies. I continue by stressing populisms own deficits as the reason for turning to the constituent power. I end with a consideration of what liberal democrats can do to address the causes of the populist temptation. (shrink)

The paper traces, historically and systematically, the influence of Carnap’s philosophical program on the writings of Nelson Goodman, focusing on the relationship between Carnap’s Aufbau and Goodman’s Structure of Appearance. In particular, drawing on unpublished material from the Carnap Research Archives, I show that Carnap had already anticipated Goodman’s criticism of the method of quasi-analysis and that Goodman misconstrued the status of this procedure on several counts. I also argue that Carnap’s anti-metaphysical stance left his approach with an explanatory deficit (...) which Goodman’s pragmatist pluralism is able to address. (shrink)

The aim of my paper is to focus our attention on the effect of technologies in the constitution of the objects in our world following a Husserlian approach. I will analyze the relation among the subject, technology and world in order to clarify how the technologies are deeply involved in the constitution of the perceived object by the modification of its content in its “richness” and its inner horizon. Indeed, some devices become instruments to better and sharpen the (...) subject’s perceiving skills and they are designed to create a sort of symbiosis with the perceiving subject by introducing themselves into the perceptual pole, classically constituted by the sole “naked” subject. The world becomes technologically embedded and a place where any kind of “nudity” is only an abstraction. (shrink)

For the role of utilitarianism in the ethics of war and peace, Shaw suggests there is a Utilitarian War Principle (UWP) and argues that the principles of the just war theory should be treated as intermediate principles that are subordinated to UWP. He also argues that the state should be the primary legitimate authority to wage war and holder of the right of national defense. I argue that the utilitarian approach should be specifically linked with contingent pacifism, a new understanding (...) of pacifism from within the just war tradition, and the utilitarian contingent pacifism only endorses individual self-defense but not national defense. This finding is not only theoretically important but has practical implications for the debate on Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution. Utilitarian contingent pacifism supports the idealist position that Article 9 is morally significant because it makes Japan a pioneer of the new kind of pacifism. (shrink)

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In this paper, we criticize what we dub the “pruning view” of self-constitution, championed widely by philosophers, mainly though not exclusively in the Kantian tradition, and instead defend an alternative view inspired by psychoanalysis. We argue that normative assessment comes much too early on the pruning view, so early that it interferes with achieving deeper self-understanding that can produce lasting change. On the proposal we advocate, self-constitution must begin with a non-moralizing attempt to truly understand why one has (...) undesirable and unwanted propensities. We call this the “understanding first” principle. Only after deeper self-understanding has been achieved are attempts to liberate oneself from unwanted elements likely to succeed. (shrink)