In the last 25 years increased violence against Black Americans by police and white vigilantes has led to a resurgence in lynching discourse. This article examines two strains of twenty-first century lynching discourse in America with attention to questions of historical erasure and racial appropriation. The move from justificatory discourses of lynching to rhetoric stigmatizing its practice led to two distinct discursive forms: a rhetoric of memorialization that reads Black women as part of the lynching archive and a rhetoric of (...) white aggrievement and victimhood that leverages the moral authority of Black trauma to evade justice. By mapping the shift from justificatory discourses of lynching and rhetoric professing its ‘end’ to discourse memorializing victims and rhetoric professing lynching’s persistence, this article illumines how the term lynching circulates in the twenty-first century American discourse. (shrink)

‘To attempt to say anything new about Horace may seem absurd.’ To attempt to say anything new about the Roman Odes may seem still more absurd; my purpose, nevertheless, is to reconsider the lines ofCarm. 3.3 set out above, and to reinterpret an argument begun by the editor of the Delphin Horace (1691) in which the authority of Bentley is against me. My question is: what does Horace mean the reader to understand by describing Augustus as drinking nectar ‘purpureo ore’?

‘To attempt to say anything new about Horace may seem absurd.’ To attempt to say anything new about the Roman Odes may seem still more absurd; my purpose, nevertheless, is to reconsider the lines of Carm. 3.3 set out above, and to reinterpret an argument begun by the editor of the Delphin Horace in which the authority of Bentley is against me. My question is: what does Horace mean the reader to understand by describing Augustus as drinking nectar ‘purpureo ore’?

Proposant quelques réflexions suggérées par 1a Lettre de 1896 sur fond de questionnement contemporain , J.-M. Aveline examine d'abord le rapport entre théologie chrétienne et dialogue interreligieux, et l'évolution de la toute récente théologie des religions depuis Vatican II. L'intérêt de la relecture de Blondel dans cette perspective est d'abord de prévenir les facilités, impasses et illusions dans lesquelles la vieille apologétique s'était enferrée, et de donner les conditions d'un véritable dialogue. Pour dépasser les limites d’un pluralisme conçu comme simple (...) juxtaposition tolérante des opinions privées, la reprise de la thématique de la vérité est capitale, en quoi le maître d’Aix s’avère d’autant plus pertinent qu'il permet de poser philosophiquement le problème religieux. Permettant du même coup de tenir avec rigueur la distinction entre immanentisme exclusiviste et transcendance qui procure le salut, Blondel établit de manière féconde la distinction et le rapport entre philosophie et théologie. Proposing some reflections suggested by the Lettre of 1896 on the background of contemporaneous questions , J.-M. Aveline first examines the relationship between Christian theology and interreligious dialogue, and the evolution of the very recent theology since Vatican II. The interest in rereading Blondel in this perspective is first to point out the simplicity, the dead ends, and the illusions to which the old apologetics was bound, and to give the conditions for a true dialogue. To go beyond the limits of a pluralism understood as a simple juxtaposition that is tolerant of private opinions, the return to the theme of truth is capital, about which the master of Aix shows himself all the ore pertinent by posing the religions problem philosophically. While holding rigorously the distinction between exclusive immanentism and a transcendence that brings salvation, Blondel establishes, in a fertile way, the distinction and relationship between philosophy and theology. (shrink)

The application of λκθος ànd its derivatives and the Latin terms ampullae and ampullari to the turgid or elevated style of poetry or oratory has provoked such a variety of explanations amongst modern and ancient commentators that it would be a tedious business to examine them all in detail. The ancient commentators on Horace, Ars Poetica, 11. 93–7 interdum tamen et vocem comoedia tollit, iratusque Chremes tumido delitigat ore; et tragicus plerumque dolet sermone pedestri Telephus et Peleus, cum pauper et (...) exsul uterque proicit ampullas et sesquipedalia verba… were not even in agreement on the question of the precise correspondence of the two words, for while Porphyrion said that proicit ampullas was imitated directly from the ληκθειος Mοcomflex;σα of Callimachus, Pseudacron's note makes no reference to ληκθζειν at all, but merely connects the metaphor with the inflated appearance of the Roman ampulla. And though modern scholars do not question the fact that the two words do correspond in some degree, there has been a wide divergence of opinion on the derivation and meaning of the metaphor. Ritter and Wilkins, for example, held that the meaning ‘paint-pots’ was indicated by the conjunction of ληκθος with pingere in one of Cicero's letters to Atticus, and that in Horace, Epistles 1. 3. 12–14. (shrink)

Much of the attention of philosophy of science, history of science, and psychology in the twentieth century has focused on the nature of conceptual change. Conceptual change in science has occupied pride of place in these disciplines, as either the subject of inquiry or the source of ideas about the nature of conceptual change in other domains. There have been numerous conceptual changes in the history of science, some more radical than others. One of the most radical was the chemical (...) revolution. In the seventeenth century, chemists believed that the processes of combustion and calcination involved the absorption or release of a substance called phlogiston. On this theory, when an ore is heated with charcoal, it absorbs phlogiston to produce a metal; when a metal is burned, it releases phlogiston and leaves behind a residue, or calx. The concept of phlogiston derived from a quite complex Aristotelian/medieval structure that included three concepts central to chemical theory: sulphur, the principle of inflammability; mercury, the principle of fluidity; and salt, the principle of inertness. All material substances were believed to contain these three principles in the form of earths. The phlogiston theory held that in combustion, the sulphurous earth (phlogiston) returns to the substance from which it escaped during some earlier burning process in its history, and that in calcination the process is reversed. However, chemists also knew that a calx is heavier than the metal from which it was derived. So, the theory implies that phlogiston has a negative weight, or a positive lightness. This did not present a problem, though, because it was compatible with the Aristotelian elements of fire and air (the others being earth and water), which were not attracted towards the center of the earth. The development of the oxygen theory of combustion and calcination by Lavoisier in the late eighteenth century has been called the chemical revolution because it required replacing the whole conceptual structure with, for example, different concepts of substance and element and new concepts of oxygen and caloric. In the new system, it was no longer possible to believe in the existence of substances with negative weight. According to the oxygen theory, oxygen gas is released in combustion and absorbed in calcination. Thus calx is metal (substance) plus oxygen, rather than metal minus phlogiston. The concept of phlogiston was eliminated from the chemical lexicon. The reconceptualization of chemical phenomena that took place in the chemical revolution made possible the atomic theory of matter, which, as we know, posits quite different constituents of material substances from the principles central to the earlier conceptual structure. Just what constitutes conceptual change, how it relates to theory change, and how it relates to changes in belief continues to be a subject of much debate. Clearly, though, as the preceding example demonstrates, the three are significantly interrelated. (shrink)

Few details in Virgil's description of the underworld have elicited more comment than his treatment of the sinners Ixion and Pirithous quid memorem Lapithas, Ixiona Pirithoumque? quos super atra silex iam iam lapsura cadentique imminet adsimilis; lucent genialibus altis aurea fulcra toris; epulaeque ante ora paratae regifico luxu; Furiarum maxima iuxta accubat et manibus prohibet contingere mensas exsurgitque facem attollens atque intonat ore.

Le sentiment que j'ai de moi-meme a-t-il rien de commun avec la perception que les autres ont de moi? Et ce corps, qui me precede toujours, que dit-il a autrui de ma vraie nature, de mes gouts, de mon etre secret? Ainsi, aussi inseparable que je sois de mon apparence, celle-ci signale immanquablement celui que je ne suis pas tout a fait. En d'autres termes: mon corps est-il l'expression de mon moi ou mon moi est-il le prisonnier clandestin de mon (...) corps? Entre moi et ce qui est mien, la relation est donc bien moins d'ordre ontologique que linguistique ou stylistique. C'est ce qui fait du snobisme ou du dandysme deux figures de cet effort que chacun entreprend pour tenter de paraitre ce qu'il voudrait etre, et pour tenter d'affacer ce qui volontairement sien. N. G. (shrink)

J. M. Shorter; X*—Personal Identity, Personal Relationships, and Criteria, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 71, Issue 1, 1 June 1971, Pages 165–1.

C'est "par ce qu'elle sous-entend ou dévoile à sa limite - par son contenu latent ou inconscient - que la phénoménologie est en consonance avec la psychanalyse", écrit Maurice Merleau-Ponty en 1960, dans la préface à l'ouvrage de Angelo Hesnard L'Oeuvre et l'esprit de Freud. Singulière euphonie, que celle ici entendue entre deux disciplines habituellement opposées dans leurs définitions : l'une centre en effet ses recherches sur la conscience, l'autre sur l'inconscient ; la première s'en tient à la description la (...) plus fidèle de ce qui apparaît, la seconde accorde le primat aux "tendances supposées" sur les "phénomènes perçus" ; celle-là radicalise le partage diltheyen des sciences de la nature et de l'esprit, et se positionne résolument du côté des secondes, celle-ci puise à la biologie ou à la thermodynamique tout autant qu'à l'herméneutique. Quelle serait donc cette harmonie entre phénoménologie et psychanalyse, dans quel système tonal se définit-elle et quelles modulations connaît l'intervalle mélodique entre les deux? Philosophie de la forme, existentialisme, phénoménologie de la perception, de l'inapparent, puis philosophie de la chair, le parcours de Merleau-Ponty semble poser, de manière à chaque fois plus fine, la question d'une paradoxale phénoménologie de l'inconscient, située à la double orée de la phénoménologie et de la psychanalyse. Il semble pertinent d'analyser ici cette traversée de la phénoménologie et de tenter de voir ce qu'elle trouve à ses confins - psychanalyse, ontologie ou métaphysique? Si la relecture merleau-pontyenne de la phénoménologie s'accompagne d'une lecture inédite de la psychanalyse, ce double remaniement ne manque pas de faire surgir bien des questions. C'est probablement là le sens des commentaires que quatre psychanalystes, J.-B. Pontalis, André Green, Jacques Lacan et Cornélius Castoriadis formulent à l'endroit de la phénoménologie de Merleau-Ponty. Ces quatre critiques soulignent la grande proximité du philosophe avec la psychanalyse, mais n'en mettent pas moins en exergue les limites d'un abord phénoménologique de l'inconscient. En effet, si la démarche de la phénoménologie consiste à aller de l'indéterminé vers plus de détermination, à instituer le sens de ce qui auparavant restait inconscient, comment appliquer cette visée à l'inconscient psychanalytique sans le réduire par là même? Que signifie alors un "inconscient" paradoxalement thématisé à partir de la perception? Cette étude propose de confronter les lectures respectives qu'effectuent Merleau-Ponty de la psychanalyse puis ces quatre psychanalystes de l'oeuvre du philosophe. Un examen des positions originales de Merleau-Ponty permet de mesurer l'incontestable rapprochement esquissé avec l'oeuvre de Freud. La réponse des psychanalystes à cet appel pointe toutefois les limites d'une lecture résolument philosophique de la psychanalyse, n'instaurant, entre les deux, qu'une cadence évitée : à l'issue de ce dialogue, nulle impression de repos, et la phrase musicale semble relancée sur d'autres lignes harmoniques. (shrink)

To explain the meaning of the Prometheus the late Dr. Walter Headlam quoted the famous lines from theAgamemnon:‘ Sing praise; ’Tis he hath guided, say, Man's feet in Wisdom's way, Stablishing fast for learning's rule That Suffering be her school….’ ‘This,’ he said, ‘is the school in which Prometheus himself is being gradually taught the wise humility; at present he is still in the rebellious stage. And it is with this idea that Io is introduced into the Prometheus Bound; she, (...) too, is an example of the seeming cruelty of Zeus; but it is a blessing in disguise, for she is to be the mother of the blessed Epaphus, and it is a son of Zeus by Alcmena, a descendant of her own, that is to set Prometheus free.’. (shrink)

To explain the meaning of the Prometheus the late Dr. Walter Headlam quoted the famous lines from theAgamemnon:‘ Sing praise; ’Tis he hath guided, say, Man's feet in Wisdom's way, Stablishing fast for learning's rule That Suffering be her school….’ ‘This,’ he said, ‘is the school in which Prometheus himself is being gradually taught the wise humility; at present he is still in the rebellious stage. And it is with this idea that Io is introduced into the Prometheus Bound; she, (...) too, is an example of the seeming cruelty of Zeus; but it is a blessing in disguise, for she is to be the mother of the blessed Epaphus, and it is a son of Zeus by Alcmena, a descendant of her own, that is to set Prometheus free.’. (shrink)

This article argues that xing 性 in the Zhuangzi 莊子 should not be understood as “human nature” but as “human condition.” It introduces the problem of interpreting xing as “human nature” by surveying relevant English-language literature before detailing the interpretive paradigm of Chinese accounts showing how the latter’s appropriation of the language of substance ontology hinders an accurate portrayal of Daoist xing. It argues that xing should be interpreted in connection to the concept of ming 命understood as contingent, natural, and (...) temporal “external conditions”. It argues that xing are “internal conditions” that function in conjunction with ming as “external conditions” where “habit” (xi 習) mediates their interaction. (shrink)

In a paper recently published in this Review, I tried to show that part of the formal beauty of the Hercules Furens is due to a subtle treatment of the familiar doctrine that the tyrant's wealth and power are of trifling value compared with Sophrosune, the gain that is really gain. Perhaps some further notes on the dramatic use made by Euripides of these familiar ideas may be of interest. One object with which I started was to observe the use (...) of the word τúραννος in Greek drama. Though the poets frequently enough use it merely as a convenient equivalent for βασιλεúσetc., popular feeling made it easy to suggest the meaning ‘tyrant,’ ‘bad King,’ or ‘Usurper’; and the poets use the ambiguity with great subtlety and in a manner which enables them to obtain fine effects of irony and scorn. What is more important is the fact that the notion of a tyrant with which we are acquainted in later Greek literature was already common-place in the fifth century, and that many dramatic effects depend on the recognition by the audience of the commonplace as such. Indeed, it is often the adaptation by the poet of the familiar ideas that lends formal beauty to compositions which, if we think simply of the plot, appear at first sight jerky or ‘epeisodic.’. (shrink)

Ship design needs to respond to and attract an ever more design conscious society. However, little research has been conducted into perceptions of beauty and pleasure and how such perceptions can be usefully absorbed into ship design. Aesthetic consideration, is seen as a distraction from the bespoke nature of the ship design process and is often avoided, second guessed or left for external consultancy. The ship design discipline requires the nurturing of its own aesthetic methods, for future development, and to (...) adapt some of the aesthetic ideals found in architecture, art and design. This paper argues that philosophy can be effective in interpreting what the passenger finds attractive and pleasurable. To illustrate the philosophical approach proposed, the `Elbe SWATH’ and the `Oasis of the Seas’ are investigated and compared using theoretical resources from the culturally focused philosophy of `Functional Beauty’. Conclusions suggest that the interpretation of the end users most valued appreciations can lead to design directives that deliver subjective qualities of beauty - beauty similar to those seen in the pure aims of the Elbe SWATH’s purposeful work craft, or comparable to nature’s beauty and purity in aim. (shrink)