This book examines Platos account in the Timaeus of a third kind and its cosmic members, a material principle and place.

Plato’s chief argument against rhetoric is epistemological. Plato claims that rhetoric accomplishes what it does on the basis of experience,not knowledge. In this article I examine Plato’s criticisms of rhetoric in the Gorgias and the Phaedrus. I argue that Plato is right to identify rhetoric’s empirical basis, but that having this epistemic basis does not constitute an argument against rhetoric. On the contrary, Plato’s criticism of rhetoric serves to give us an epistemological explanation of rhetoric’s success.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Age of Grace: “Charis” in Early Greek PoetryDana R. SmithThe Age of Grace: “Charis” in Early Greek Poetry, by Bonnie MacLachlan; xxi & 192 pp. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992, $29.95.Bonnie MacLachlan has two concerns in this book. First, she sees early charis, conventionally and inadequately translated as “grace,” as the result of feeling, concrete action, and sometimes concrete objects, fused in such a way that early (...) Greeks did not clearly distinguish these as separate aspects. Second, she focuses on the experience of beauty or pleasure as a crucial part of reciprocity in charis, and argues that many of the now-fashionable models from the social sciences, such as those dealing with reciprocal exchange of goods and favors, are insufficient to account for this particular dynamic of allurement. What later ages sensed, and what we sense, as two or more different kinds of charis “may not have been sensed as such by the archaic Greek mind.” Rather, the early Greeks possessed an integrated sense of these fragments as part of a single experience. “A charis-event, provoked by moral or aesthetic beauty, was disarming; it broke down the barriers of the self, and it demanded that the beneficiary reach out to another.” This study combines extremely able discussions of different sides of this crucial concept with a large vision of their integration into a coherent whole: “[Charis] was the moral glue of their society, linking such other central moral ideas as timê [“honor,” “prerogative,” “price”], dikê [“due portion,” “justice”], themis [“unwritten law”], xenia [“requital of gifts and hospitality”], and aidôs [“reverence,” “awe”].”How well does MacLachlan demonstrate this twofold idea? She deserves high praise for setting forth the essential passages of her authors clearly and succinctly, for giving numerous insights into them, for adducing much pertinent scholarship, and certainly for furthering the development of her important thesis. Her discussion of the earliest conception of charis (chap. 2, “The Charis of Achilles”), focused mainly on Homer, with material from the Homeric Hymns and Hesiod, gives a sensitive and persuasive account of relations among charis, timê, and dikê. She makes excellent points about specific perceptions of beauty, especially visual, although one comes away a bit uncertain as to how these aspects all cohere, and also as to whether there are differences in charis between the Iliad and the Odyssey. Her discussion of the cult dimensions of charis (chap. 3, “The Charites”), while fascinating in itself, contains little direction for using this information so as to understand the thesis. She gives careful readings of her examples of erotic and social charis (chaps. 4 and 5, “Erotic Charis” and “Social Charis”), clearly identifying types that contrast with the earlier prototypical experience, although sometimes her criticism of these is more implicit than stated. A more forceful definition of the “problem” of erotic charis, for example, would have helped unify this discussion with that of erotic charis in Aeschylus. Her discussion of Pindar and Bacchylides (6, “Epinician Charis”), perhaps the high point of the book, shows the richest ties to the multi-dimensional Homeric charis; here we return clearly to the topic of [End Page 172] beauty, see the pertinence of some of the cult information, and sense the transformational dynamics of charis as profoundly important for this genre of poems. She leaves somewhat open, however, the question of whether charis is a single thing in Pindar. The chapter on Aeschylus (7, “Charis in the Oresteia”) presents a powerful reading of different kinds of charis in conflict, private versus public, resulting in a unified view of the trilogy as a whole. Once more we note different senses of charis, but in a way that highlights their collision: the duality of charis is further brought into relation with other dualities, such as that of dikê. This chapter connects well with other parts of the book; erotic and false charis become important issues.If there is a criticism to make of this book, it is that MacLachlan does not do quite enough to work out the relations between her provocative thesis and her discussions of particular poems. Some sections are too dissertation-like in presenting evidence, and more thought about the... (shrink)

We examine the influences of social capital, source credibility, and fairness perceptions on the judgments of experienced compensation committee members who are considering a proposal to reduce management’s performance targets in the middle of a compensation cycle due to difficult circumstances. Eighty-nine U.S. public company CC members participated in a 2 × 2 experiment with social capital and source credibility each manipulated as low or high, and outcome fairness to management, process fairness to shareholders, and outcome fairness to shareholders included (...) as measured variables. While social capital and source credibility are not significant, we find that outcome fairness to the CEO and outcome fairness to shareholders are significantly related to CC members’ support for reducing performance targets during a compensation cycle. In addition, we find that more experienced CC members are less supportive of changing the performance targets. The significant interactions include one between outcome fairness to shareholders and process fairness to shareholders, which suggests that CC member support for the proposal relies on both process and outcome fairness being present. Finally, the participants’ qualitative responses reflect arguments both for and against adjusting performance targets. Overall, the results highlight the important roles of fairness and director experience in boardroom decisions and provide important insights into factors affecting CC judgments. (shrink)

This is a collection of essays, many of which were given originally as papers at a conference on Ancient Method held at Amherst College in 1994. Few directly address the subject of method in ancient philosophy. Readers whose primary interest is this subject and have high hopes for this new volume from Oxford University Press will be somewhat disappointed. Yet those of us whose interests in ancient philosophy are broader will find not a few excellent essays on important questions by (...) some of the leaders in the field. (shrink)

This is a wonderful book. It is, in my opinion, the best book on Aristotle’s treatment of the physical world to appear in recent years. Still, this book is not one that can be read through on a Sunday afternoon. It resembles a text of Aristotle in the compactness of argument, though not, I am happy to report, in clarity. Like a guide raised in the wild, Lang leads us through a large sector of the forest of arguments in the (...) Physics and De Caelo. This analogy brings me to the following point: Lang’s perspective on Aristotle is extraordinary. Lang is the author of another excellent book, Aristotle’s Physics and Its Medieval Varieties. Discussions of Aristotle’s philosophy of nature through the lens of medieval philosophy and science are not uncommon. These discussions, however, face the peril of attributing, in one way or another, viewpoints to Aristotle that are actually those of his medieval successors. For this reason most work on Aristotle is now done without reference to medieval thought. Perhaps this is as it should be. But one of the great difficulties in understanding Aristotle’s conception of the world is how we are to interpret what he says. Our perspective on the world is largely formed on the basis of early modern rejections of medieval Aristotelian views. That is to say that built into our perspective is a negative response not to Aristotle directly but to medieval interpretation of Aristotle. This fact makes it extremely difficult for us to see Aristotle clearly. Here lies the advantage of knowing the “medieval varieties” of Aristotle’s natural philosophy when we try to make sense of Aristotle. Knowing this helps us distinguish more clearly between our own perspective and its roots and Aristotle’s. Aristotle’s perspective is in fact fundamentally different from ours. For example, Lang points out that to insert the notion of “speed” into Aristotle’s discussion of motion is “seriously misleading” because speed is conceptually distinguishable from moving bodies and is so treated, whereas motion, for Aristotle, is always the actualization of a capacity intrinsic to a moved body; therefore motion can neither be quantified nor abstracted from what is moved. (shrink)

It is difficult to write clearly about any aspect of Plotinus’ thought. There are many reasons for this. One reason is that he is a very systematic thinker. So, for example, to treat his aesthetics one must also discuss his metaphysics, psychology, and his ethics. Anther reason is his well-known subtlety and obscurity of expression. Kuisma’s book on Plotinus’ aesthetics, however, shows that it is possible to write clearly, accurately, and succinctly about Plotinus. This book is a pleasure to read. (...) Kuisma argues against a modern, widely held interpretation of Plotinus’s aesthetics which claims that “Plotinus, in contrast to Plato, accepted the possibility of the artistic imitation of intelligible Forms,” thus giving “a new direction to Platonic art theory”. His thesis is, instead, that “the objects of artistic imitation are limited to the sphere of perceptions,” although this limitation can be overcome to some extent by “the use of symbols and symbolic conventions”, inasmuch as symbolic representations do not convey on the basis of sameness of form. He calls the common view “strong mimesis,” and his own view, “weak mimesis”. Clearly, Kuisma’s view shows Plotinus to be a traditional Platonist. Indeed, it would be odd if Plotinus, of all people, should discount Plato’s doubts about the ability of sensibles to represent eternal form. (shrink)

Factors such as subsistence turnover, warfare, or interaction between different groups can be major sources of cultural change in human populations. Global demographic shifts such as the transition to agriculture during the Neolithic and more recently the urbanization and globalization of the twentieth century have been major catalysts for cultural change. Here, we test whether cultural traits such as patri/matrilocality and postmarital migration persist in the face of social upheaval and gene flow during the past 150 years in postcolonial South (...) Africa. The recent history of South Africa has seen major demographic shifts that resulted in the displacement and forced sedentism of indigenous Khoekhoe and San populations. During the expansion of the colonial frontier, the Khoe-San admixed with European colonists and enslaved individuals from West/Central Africa, Indonesia, and South Asia, introducing novel cultural norms. We conducted demographic interviews among Nama and Cederberg communities representing nearly 3,000 individuals across three generations. Despite the history of colonial expansion, and the subsequent incorporation of Khoe-San and Khoe-San-descendant communities into a colonial society with strong patrilocal norms, patrilocality is the least common postmarital residence pattern in our study populations today. Our results suggest that more recent forces of integration into the market economy are likely the primary drivers of change in the cultural traits examined in our study. Birthplace had a strong effect on an individual’s odds of migration, distance moved, and postmarital residence form. These effects are at least partially explained by the population size of the birthplace. Our results suggest that market factors local to birthplaces are important drivers of residence decisions, although the frequency of matrilocal residence and a geographic and temporal cline in migration and residence patterns also indicate the persistence of some historic Khoe-San cultural traits in contemporary groups. (shrink)

This volume explores the themes of vanishing matter, matter and the laws of nature, the qualities of matter, and the diversity of the debates about matter in the early modern period. Chapters are unified by a number of interlocking themes which together enable some of the broader contours of the philosophy of matter to be charted in new ways. Part I concerns Cartesian Matter; Part II covers Matter, Mechanism and Medicine; Part III covers Matter and the Laws of Motion; and (...) Part IV covers Leibniz and Hume. Bringing together some of the world’s leading scholars of early modern philosophy, as well as some exciting new researchers, _Vanishing Matter and the Laws of Motion _stakes out new territory that all serious scholars of early modern philosophy and science will want to traverse. (shrink)

We argue that mereological essentialism for events is independent of mereological essentialism for objects, and that the philosophical fallout of embracing mereological essentialism for events is minimal. We first outline what we should consider to be the parts of events, and then highlight why one would naturally be inclined to think that the object-question and the event-question are linked. Then, we argue that they are not. We also diagnose why this is the case and emphasize the upshot. In particular, we (...) argue that the way we evaluate modal claims which concern events differs from the way we evaluate modal claims which concern objects. Ultimately, then, to our title question we say: the answer does not matter as much as you might think. (shrink)