In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:In Memoriam: Eleanor V. Stubley (1960–2017)Roberta LambIt is dusk in the desert—that bewitching hour when the intensity of today’s unrelenting heat suddenly lifts with the hint of a breeze and a promise of darkness. Worn and weary with dust trailing my every movement, I am inexorably drawn forward by the distant sounds of drums and community. I am curious to see what lies ahead, but for one brief (...) minute I look back from where I have come. A single window penetrates the gloom. It opens on a small room, cluttered with mementos celebrating a long history of great artistry. I feel the weight of this history, even at this distance; but what captures my attention is the music making in the only uncluttered corner of the room where four musicians are poring over a recently discovered score of a late Beethoven string quartet. While the music making appears to be motivated and bound by the score, it is as if the musicians are searching for something that lies beyond the score. At times, the searching seems to question the shape or presence of a particular note or melodic motive; other times, it appears to be a quest for “the work,” the string quartet written by Beethoven. As I continue to eavesdrop, I am struck by the way in which the searching in both instances ultimately seems to evolve into a question of ensemble. It is as if the musicians are not only trying to discover the music implied by [End Page 203]the score notations, but also trying to find themselves, trying to get a sense of who they are in relationship to this music. It is a phenomenon that I have encountered frequently in my travels, and I wonder, as the sounds in the distance reenter my consciousness, why of all possibilities the window of my mind opened on this particular room.1Thus, Eleanor V. Stubley began a moving evocation of body, sound, and shifting identities in philosophical argument. It remains my favorite opening of any philosophical essay I have ever read, even though her skill and artistry grew immensely in the subsequent nineteen years. To be honest, the connection with this particular essay comes from my bond with Eleanor at a particular time and particular place, when each of us was establishing our career in a recognized university. We shared a lot through extensive phone calls and my visits to Montreal. While Eleanor was able to travel, we also shared conference spaces together, when I often functioned as her advocate as well as her friend. As I re-read this essay and the others, I remember fondly particular conversations where we discussed ideas and feelings about music, teaching, and life. We shared our health challenges and their effects on our lives and work. We talked about being female in the academy; she shared issues around disability; I around homophobia. I see sources in the endnotes for this essay resulting from those conversations and the ideas Eleanor worked out as we chatted. I find similar memories in her other philosophical essays. I am happy to have contributed to the thinking that came out of this heady time. We were slaying dragons!Eleanor (and I must be personal because we were friends) contributed an original and strongly philosophical base to music education within a handful of articles. She never wrote the book she intended in those earlier years. Instead, she refocused her career outside of music education, partly because she realized she had much to say, do, and create within a limited lifespan and partly because music education did not have room for such brilliance and creativity. In fact, music education gave Eleanor a not so gentle shove. She worked nearly all of the last two decades of her life in the departments of musicology and performance. In addition, she served McGill’s students as Associate Dean of Graduate Studies. She knew she had no time to slay music education’s dragons. Even so, Eleanor continued to contribute philosophical columns to the Canadian Music Educator. She wrote regularly for volumes 42–44 (2001–2003) and intermittently before and after those years. These thirteen columns... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Meditations on the Letter A:The Hand as Nexus Between Music and LanguageEleanor V. StubleyThe image is that of a little girl. She stands alone, center-stage, her lips moving quietly as she rehearses the letters of the alphabet so that her forthcoming performance will be fresh and perfect. Her name is called. She takes a deep breath and begins, haltingly, doh,... doh, ray,... doh, ray, me,.... Her tongue catches at (...) the beginning of each sound as if it were a new found delight, but it is the sequence, the linear progression that is the focus of her concentration. And slowly, her recitation begins to take on its own rhythmic fluidity, each sound's name becoming stronger and more confident than the one before. Then just as quickly as it began, it is over, and she stands tall in the glory of the final doh's resonance, proud in her belief that having mastered the letters of the alphabet, she has at long last discovered the key to unlocking music's deepest and darkest mysteries.The alphabet—I begin its story with the hand behind the hieroglyphic markings of our ancient ancestors, the hand that discovered in the tracings of its own aimless movements across the sand a capacity to replicate the arc of the moon, the flowering branches of a shrub. It was a hand pre-occupied with the visual, its scratchings serving to extend the communicative power of its own reach by calling forth the image of a thing not immediately present. Meaning, as such, was typically a matter of a one-to-one correspondence inferred on the basis of shape and form, with concepts such as speed and light portrayed by animals and natural objects that one would associate with each (for instance, a running cougar, a stylized sun). But as language and the art of storytelling evolved, the emergence of concepts lacking precise visual associations required the development of a variety of phonetic strategies that, often working through pictographic puns (that is, belief, bee+leaf), used the visual to invoke the sound of the human voice.1 The effect, David Abrams suggests, was that of magic, the word having seemingly been "drawn" from the silence of thin air.2 And, like all tricks, the hand disappeared behind the magic. Where initially voice and hand had worked as extensions of one another, the voice serving to bring people together,3 the hand pointing to that which was voiced, the word as name now sounded alone.The story continues with the artistry of the storyteller. It was the artistry of a rhapsodist, one who used the voice to spin a tale of a "remembered present" from [End Page 42] the remnants of the hand's scratchings that had withstood the ravages of time.4 I say "remembered present" because the voice was valued for its expressive qualities and worked in and through a battery of memorized melodic embellishments that allowed it to stitch one image to the next on the basis of the storyteller's own experience and knowledge.5 It was a voice, consequently, that worked in the moment, a voice that drew energy and inspiration not only from the hand's scratchings but also from those that had gathered to listen. The first alphabets did little to change the dynamics of the event, they being nothing more than crudely assembled compilations of idiosyncratic phonograms (that is, z = buzzing bee) designed to define the possibilities of language as a vocabulary of names.6 Etched into bark, tree, stone, and parchment, however, they came to have a longevity that allowed the sounding codes they represented to be carried "word of mouth" from place to place. Where the spoken word had once been both fleeting and fluid, gone before it was fully sounded, it now had a repeatability that served to fix both its spellings and its meanings. And it was not long before the spinning of a tale had become a matter of second sight, the work of an extraordinary memory able to "recall" that which the storyteller had not been present to hear.7The gift worked through a self-conscious awareness of oneself as... (shrink)

I look at the ‘flavour-oscillation clocks’ proposed by D. V. Ahluwalia and two of his arguments suggesting that such clocks might behave in a way that threatens the geometricity of general relativity (GR). The first argument states that the behaviour of these clocks in the vicinity of a rotating gravitational source implies a non-geometrical element of gravity. I argue that the phenomenon is best seen as an instance of violation of the ‘clock hypothesis’ and therefore does not threaten the geometrical (...) nature of gravitation. Ahluwalia’s second argument, for the ‘incompleteness’ of general relativity, involves the idea that flavour-oscillation clocks can detect constant gravitational potentials. I argue that the purported ‘incompleteness-establishing’ result is in fact one that applies to all clocks. It is entirely derivable from general relativity, does not result in the observability of the potential, and is not at odds with any of general relativity’s foundations. (shrink)

The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Physics is a comprehensive and authoritative guide to the state of the art in the philosophy of physics. It contains 54 self-contained chapters written by leading philosophers of physics at both senior and junior levels, making it the most thorough and detailed volume of its type on the market – nearly every major perspective in the field is represented. The Companion’s 54 chapters are organized into 12 sections. The first seven sections cover all of (...) the major physical theories investigated by philosophers of physics today, and the last five explore key themes that unite the study of these theories. I. Classical Mechanics II. Special Relativity III. General Relativity IV. Non-Relativistic Quantum Mechanics V. Quantum Field Theory VI. Quantum Gravity VII. Statistical Mechanics and Thermodynamics VIII. Explanation IX. Intertheoretic Relations X. Symmetries XI. Metaphysics XII. Cosmology. (shrink)

Concepts: Core Readings traces the develoment of one of the most active areas of investigation in cognitive science. This comprehensive volume brings together the essential background readings on concepts from philosophy, psychology, and linguistics, while providing a broad sampling of contemporary research. The first part of the book centers around the fall of the Classical Theory of Concepts in the face of attacks by W.V.O. Quine, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Eleanor Rosch, and others, emphasizing the emergence and development of the Prototype (...) Theory and the controversies it spurred. The second part surveys a broad range of contemporary theories—Neoclassical Theories, the Prototype Theory, the Theory-Theory, and Conceptual Atomism. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Der Beitrag widmet sich der Entstehung des Faches Religionsgeschichte in Frankreich. Die Vorgeschichte zu diesem Prozess beginnt mit Benjamin Constants Religionsphilosophie der 1810–1820er Jahre, in der die lokalen und diachronen Veränderungen des allgemein menschlichen religiösen Gefühls als ein Schlüssel zur Religionsgeschichte verstanden wurden. Nach einer langen Pause wird das Thema des religiösen Gefühls in Albert Révilles liberaltheologischem Projekt wieder aktuell. Ausgehend von Schleiermachers Voraussetzungen hoffte Réville dadurch die Apologetik zu modernisieren wie auch den Weg zum theologischen Inklusivismus zu bahnen. (...) Sein Sohn Jean, ebenfalls Theologe, neutestamentlicher Forscher und Sentimentalist, arbeitete mit dem Vater zusammen an der Institutionalisierung des Faches Religionsgeschichte in Frankreich. Albert Réville leitete von 1886 bis zu seinem Tod 1906 die fünfte (religionswissenschaftliche) Sektion der École Pratique des Hautes Études, gleichzeitig war Jean Réville seit 1884 Herausgeber der Fachzeitschrift Revue de l’histoire des religions. Révilles theoretischer Standpunkt wurde von É. Durkheim und seinen Gleichgesinnten H. Hubert und M. Mauss, die die weitere weltanschauliche Säkularisierung förderten, nach 1898 stark kritisiert. Diese Serie von Erwiderungen zeigt die Kluft zwischen der Methodologie der (dem Ursprung nach) evangelischen Religionsgeschichte und der durkheimischen Religionssoziologie. (shrink)

Recent discussions of emergence in physics have focussed on the use of limiting relations, and often particularly on singular or asymptotic limits. We discuss a putative example of emergence that does not fit into this narrative: the case of phonons. These quasi-particles have some claim to be emergent, not least because the way in which they relate to the underlying crystal is almost precisely analogous to the way in which quantum particles relate to the underlying quantum field theory. But there (...) is no need to take a limit when moving from a crystal lattice based description to the phonon description. Not only does this demonstrate that we can have emergence without limits, but also provides a way of understanding cases that do involve limits. (shrink)

The article shows that Borisov’s direct solution to the problem of skepticism about meaning using a special type of introspection is associated with the assumption of the agent’s direct access to their own consciousness. This assumption has two complicating consequences: the analogy with Moore’s paradox and the Platonic concept of meaning. It is also shown that direct access to meaning as a way of Borisov’s direct solution of the skeptical paradox significantly uses the performativity of the speech act, narrowing the (...) scope of analysis of the original problem. The little-studied problem of distinction in the analysis of the skeptical paradox of meaningful and formalized mathematics is noted. (shrink)

Sexuality education is fundamental in higher and tertiary education institutions (HTEIs). Evidence suggests that its effective education is through translations into the first language of learners. However, in global and multilingual cultural communities such as HTEIs, the foundations for these translations are still a researchable area. Notably, in HTEIs adolescents, young adults and adults co-exist and therefore, any translations must be toned to balance across these groups. The aim of this study was to establish strategies that could enable sexuality educators (...) to effectively transfer information that is steeped in indigenous language, religious and cultural meaning without precipitating stigma and taboo issues. The study setting was the National University of Science and Technology where a cross section of indigenous cultures, languages and religions co-existed with other global cultures. A University Community-based Participatory Research (CBPR) methodology was administered by the researchers using a Delphi research approach to students and staff. Multilingual, multilayered, multireligious, and multicultural nature of the setting presented serious challenges that compromised the prevention of stigma and taboo issues when dealing with sexuality education. We recommend that the strategy to present sexuality education in indigenous languages to the generality of HTEIs population should, in the first instance, involve systematic identification of appropriate interventions that are religious, cultural, and language-specific. Contribution: This research reveals paramount ethical and religious violations that have a potential to precipitate opportunistic sexual relationships that may lead to impediments in capacity building for learners. This research can be utilised by academics on the field of Practical Theology, specifically youth ministry and pastoral care. (shrink)

Discussions concerning whether there is a natural right to health care may occur in various forms, resulting in policy recommendations for how to implement any such right in a given society. But health care policies may be judged by international standards including the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The rights enumerated in the UDHR are grounded in traditions of moral theory, a philosophical analysis of which is necessary in order to adjudicate the value of specific policies designed to enshrine (...) rights such as a right to health care. We begin with an overview of the drafting of the UDHR and highlight the primary influence of natural law theory in validating the rights contained therein. We then provide an explication of natural law theory by reference to the writings of Thomas Aquinas, as well as elucidate the complementary “capabilities approach” of Martha Nussbaum. We conclude that a right to health care ought to be guaranteed by the state. (shrink)

Wedin considers the relation between the ontological commitment in the Categories and the semantical theory of underlying ontological configurations for standard categorical statements. According to Wedin, Aristotle's fourfold division of beings, which divides things according to whether they are, or are not, said of, and/or present in a subject, is a meta‐ontology that is concerned with beings per se, i.e. the fundamental things that are. Wedin explains that the primacy of c‐substance involves an asymmetry in the relation between c‐substance and (...) everything else, or between the substantial and the nonsubstantial. This is because there is an ontological dependence of non‐substances, and also of secondary substances, on substances: everything is either said of, or in, primary substance. The argument of this chapter, then, is that the world of the Categories is a world of individuals: all ontological relations needed for semantics can be accommodated by appeal to individuals only. (shrink)

Wedin argues that Aristotle makes form the substance of c‐substances because it is the essence of the c‐substance. Much of this chapter consists of a careful examination of a passage in Metaphysics Zeta 4, which Wedin calls the ‘New Primacy Passage’, that is crucial to Wedin's overall thesis, because here Aristotle appeals to a notion of definitional primacy, as opposed to the ontological primacy of the Categories. Z.4 focuses on this claim that form must be essence: Wedin argues that essence (...) is a certain kind of form, a form of a genus ; this does not mean ‘species’, as some commentators have thought. This is because the species is a combination of form and matter, whereas the genous eidos, Wedin argues, is the formal part only of the definition that applies to the thing. On Wedin's account, Aristotle introduces the notion of explanatory primacy of form in Z.4. (shrink)

Wedin offers an interpretation of Metaphysics Zeta 13, a very important and difficult chapter, where Aristotle apparently denies that substance is a universal, having, on most accounts, already claimed that form is substance, and that form is a universal. This interpretation of the argument of Z.13, Wedin argues, threatens the possibility of attaining a definition of substance, and places in doubt what has gone before in the treatise. According to Wedin, what Aristotle is concerned with in Z.13 is not the (...) denial that substance is a universal but rather with the denial that anything predicated universally of a c‐substance is the substance‐of the c‐substance, which Wedin calls ‘Weak proscription’. In Wedin's account of Z.13, then, Aristotle is continuing to pursue issues first raised in Z.10–11 that have to do with the relations between form and definition, and form and the universal. Wedin also argues that the dilemma at the conclusion of Z.13, regarding the definability of substance, is resolved in Z.16, with the notion of ‘Dual Complexity’, according to which the parts of a form exist potentially in the form, just as the parts of the c‐substance exist potentially in the c‐substance. (shrink)

Wedin addresses the debate over whether nonsubstantial individuals, that inhere in a subject but are not said of a subject, i.e. accidents, such as the pallor of Socrates, are nonrecurring particulars or a kind of determinate universal. Wedin examines the secondary literature on this topic and divides it into two schools of thought, determined by the contributions of J.L. Ackrill and G.E.L. Owen. According to Ackrill, individuals in non‐substance categories are particular to the substance they are in; Owen critiques Ackrill's (...) view, and proposes that these items can recur in more than one subject and hence are a sort of universal. Wedin finds Owen's thesis unsatisfactory, even after supplementing it with an improved version due to Michael Frede; instead, Wedin argues for a revised version of Ackrill's interpretation of nonsubstantial individuals as nonrecurrent particulars. According to Wedin, Aristotle is committed to individuals only—e.g. to Socrates and to the particular bit of pallor in him: this conclusion has an important bearing on the ontological status of individuals and on the primacy of substance to nonsubstantial items. (shrink)

Wedin considers the problem of the compatibility of the Categories account of primary substance with the theory of substantial form of the Metaphysics. Wedin collects from the secondary literature the most important arguments for incompatibilism, and offers some proposals for restoring their harmony. While admitting the evident differences in the way Aristotle treats the question of substance in each treatise, Wedin is keen to argue that these differences are not sufficient to conclude that the treatises are incompatible. Wedin singles out (...) for particular attention, and criticism, Michael Frede and Gunther Patzig's account of Metaphysics Zeta, according to which the primary substance of the Metaphysics and the basic subject of predications is the form. Wedin considers two ‘philosophical’ arguments and one ‘Aristotelian’ argument for the subjecthood of forms, and argues that the textual evidence does not support the claim that form is the subject of accidents. (shrink)

Chapters 10 and 11 are critical to the argument of Metaphysics Zeta: these chapters are concerned with the purification of form. Z.10 introduces the apparatus of part and whole and consists of an argument to the end that form and its parts have priority over the other internal structural components of c‐substances, i.e. matter and the compound of form and matter; while in Z.11 Aristotle argues that form and its parts cannot involve any admixture of matter. Wedin argues that the (...) causal role of form presupposes its purity: if form is to explain why a certain portion of matter constitutes a c‐substance of a given kind, then matter—whether this latter is understood as functional, or remnant matter—cannot already be contained in the form. This is the ‘purity thesis’, as Wedin calls it: matter cannot be included in the definitions of natural organisms, Wedin points out, because that would make the explanandum a part of the principle that explains it. Wedin also argues that form must be sufficiently complex to provide definitions of the natures of particular compounds, which are complex, even though form itself is a kind of universal. (shrink)

In the Metaphysics, Aristotle often says that ‘form is substance’: in this chapter, Wedin argues that ‘substance’ in this context means the ‘substance‐of’ c‐substances. Wedin begins by examining Aristotle's use, and retention, of the framework of the Categories in Metaphysics Zeta, before turning to discuss Z.3, which is crucial to understanding the relation between the Categories and Metaphysics theories of substance, because it is usually thought that here Aristotle departs from the substance of the Categories. Wedin denies that Z.3 involves (...) a rejection of the Categories subjecthood criterion for primary substance: Aristotle rejects only the claim that one thing is the substance of another simply if it is the primary underlying subject of the other. Wedin argues that in Z.3 Aristotle introduces the idea of the ‘substance‐of’ a thing, and identifies as candidates for the substance of c‐substances the internal structural components form, matter, and the compound of form and matter. (shrink)

Wedin discusses Aristotle's claims in Metaphysics Zeta 6 that the essence of a thing is to be sought among its per se attributes, and that each thing that is primary and spoken of per se, e.g. primary substance, is the same as its essence. Wedin argues that the Zeta 6 Thesis, i.e. that the essence of a thing is the thing's immediate essence, is a crucial requirement of the explanatory role of essence as the substance of c‐substances. According to Wedin, (...) Aristotle introduces this requirement in order to establish that a thing's essence cannot depend on another essence. Form must be the essence; if form cannot explain the nature of the thing of which it is the form, there would be the threat of a regress of explanatory forms. At the end of the chapter, Wedin considers the problem that the identity of a thing and its essence is a requirement that can be met by non‐substance items, but he denies that this leads to a dilution of the conception of substance. (shrink)