The purpose of this study is to explore the ethical orientations of Taiwan's school leaders by means of a questionnaire survey of 573 school leaders. A multidimensional ethical framework, including utilitarianism, justice, care, critique, and virtue, was used. The results demonstrate that the most frequent ethical orientation of Taiwan's school leaders is justice. Second, the ethical orientation of Taiwan's school leaders is influenced by Confucian ethics to some degree, especially in terms of virtue ethics. However, the ethical orientation of school (...) leaders significantly varies depending on gender, age, position, years of teaching experience, and educational administration ethics training. (shrink)

The question of whether there is identity between erroneous thinking and existence is attributable to the question of whether there is identity between thought and existence. As has been pointed out, denial of the identity between erroneous thinking and existence leads to negation of the identity between thought and existence and also to recognition of the identity between partial thinking and existence. Some comrades recognize the identity between thought and existence, on the one hand, and deny the identity between erroneous (...) thinking and existence, on the other. This is contradictory. The question of whether there is identity between erroneous thinking and existence is in fact the question of whether the law of the unity of opposites can be applied to the relationship between thought and existence, between correct thinking and existence, and between erroneous thinking and existence. This is also the question of whether we have to stick to the Marxist theory of reflection, that is, the question of whether the Marxist theory of reflection can be applied to correct thinking and erroneous thinking. In other words, this is the question of whether erroneous thinking can reflect and react on objective existence. (shrink)

The coal industry exercises a pervasive influence upon mining communities in Appalachia even though it makes minimal contributions to employment. Miners rarely participate in movements that fight against coal companies for better working conditions. One explanation for this paradox is the depletion of social capital. In this article, I first use the existing body of literature to build a theoretical framework for discussing bonding social capital. Second, I analyze how the United Mine Workers of America in Harlan County, Kentucky at (...) the beginning of the twentieth century worked to generate social capital. The results show that these coalfield residents demonstrated a high degree of social capital in terms of a strong shared sense of reliability and a dedication to collective activities and intimate networks. The union during that period engaged in strategies that were instrumental in creating this high level of social capital: holding regular meetings, organizing collective actions, promoting collective identity, and electing charismatic leaders. (shrink)

Explanation to 500 questions on Western philosophy, philosophers, and their works.

This paper presents the results of the authors’ study of the philosophical heritage of the Ancient Chinese philosopher Pan Maoming, who played an essential role in the development of spiritual culture, as well as Philosophy and Science of Ancient Southern China. The authors carried out historiographical research of currently available ancient and modern sources, which contain data on the life and philosophical ideas of Pan Maoming; reconstructed the Pan Maoming’s intellectual biography; revealed the main features of his worldview. The authors (...) reconstructed the social, cultural, and philosophical context of the historical epoch in which Pan Maoming’s philosophical and scientific views arose and developed; clarified the philosopher’s historical role in the development of local culture in the Southern region of Ancient China.The article contains the author’s description and interpretation of the main philosophical ideas of Pan Maoming, the main amid which the authors consider the ethical concept of “peace and emptiness,” the concept of “clumsiness”; the idea of “monasticism for the happiness of the people.” The authors compared Pan Maoming’s philosophical ideas with Lao-tzu’s philosophical doctrine and came to the conclusion that Pan Maoming formed his own unique and original elaboration of Taoist philosophy, significantly developed its linguistic apparatus and worldview. The authors paid particular attention to the description and analysis of Pan Maoming’s cosmological views, which include the doctrine of “Inner alchemy”, the doctrine of “chaos, order and causality.” The authors concluded that Pan Maoming’s cosmological ideas significantly developed a way of understanding the Universe, the relationship between “inert” and “living” matter, the “world of nature” and the “world of human” in the Taoist philosophical culture. The authors also presented and substantiated their point of view that some philosophical and cosmological ideas of Pan Maoming have not only of historical value but can also be used for developing and enriching the local spiritual culture of Guangdong Province in the form of ethical and educational practices, as well as practices of strengthening cultural unity and identity. (shrink)

This volume is based on the talks given at the Workshop on Infinity and Truth held at the Institute for Mathematical Sciences, National University of Singapore, from 25 to 29 July 2011. The chapters are by leading experts in mathematical and philosophical logic that examine various aspects of the foundations of mathematics. The theme of the volume focuses on two basic foundational questions: (i) What is the nature of mathematical truth and how does one resolve questions that are formally unsolvable (...) within the Zermelo Fraenkel Set Theory with the Axiom of Choice, and (ii) Do the discoveries in mathematics provide evidence favoring one philosophical view over others? These issues are discussed from the vantage point of recent progresses in foundational studies. The final chapter features questions proposed by the participants of the Workshop that will drive foundational research. The wide range of topics covered here will be of benefit to students, researchers and mathematicians interested in the foundations of mathematics. (shrink)

This paper explores how to explain the applicability of classical mathematics to the physical world in a radically naturalistic and nominalistic philosophy of mathematics. The applicability claim is first formulated as an ordinary scientific assertion about natural regularity in a class of natural phenomena and then turned into a logical problem by some scientific simplification and abstraction. I argue that there are some genuine logical puzzles regarding applicability and no current philosophy of mathematics has resolved these puzzles. Then I introduce (...) a plan for resolving the logical puzzles of applicability. (shrink)

The autophagy initiation complex is brought about via a highly ordered and stepwise assembly process. Two crucial signaling molecules, mTORC1 and AMPK, orchestrate this assembly by phosphorylating/dephosphorylating autophagy‐related proteins. Activation of Atg1 followed by recruitment of both Atg9 vesicles and the PI3K complex I to the PAS (phagophore assembly site) are particularly crucial steps in its formation. Ypt1, a small Rab GTPase in yeast cells, also plays an essential role in the formation of the autophagy initiation complex through multiple regulatory (...) pathways. In this review, our primary focus is to discuss how signaling molecules initiate the assembly of the autophagy initiation complex, and highlight the significant roles of Ypt1 in this process. We end by addressing issues that need future clarification. (shrink)

© 2015, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.Genetic studies have identified single nucleotide polymorphisms associated with the risk of prostate cancer. It remains unclear whether such genetic variants are associated with disease aggressiveness. The NCI-SPORE Genetics Working Group retrospectively collected clinicopathologic information and genotype data for 36 SNPs which at the time had been validated to be associated with PC risk from 25,674 cases with PC. Cases were grouped according to race, Gleason score and aggressiveness. Statistical analyses were used to compare the frequency (...) of the SNPs between different disease cohorts. After adjusting for multiple testing, only PC-risk SNP rs2735839 was significantly and inversely associated with aggressive and high-grade disease in European men. Similar associations with aggressive and high-grade disease were documented in African-American subjects. The G allele of rs2735839 was associated with disease aggressiveness even at low PSA levels in both European and African-American men. Our results provide further support that a PC-risk SNP rs2735839 near the KLK3 gene on chromosome 19q13 may be associated with aggressive and high-grade PC. Future prospectively designed, case-case GWAS are needed to identify additional SNPs associated with PC aggressiveness. (shrink)

Although many studies have demonstrated an influence of uniform colors on sports performance, there are still more questions than answers regarding this issue. In our study, participants from Poland and China watched a two-minute video of a semi-professional boxing match. The participants viewed six different versions of the same fight - the original was modified to change the colors of the boxers’ trunks. We experimentally confirmed that “black wins” and “red wins” effects exist, but in a way that caused an (...) erroneous perception of the number of blows landed by boxers wearing red and black trunks fighting against boxers in blue trunks. We also showed that both effects are similarly strong even in Chinese culture, where the color red has different connotations from those in Western cultures. Additionally, our results suggest that context might play a very important role in the assessments of the boxers - color only influenced the perception of the weaker boxer. Finally, our findings suggest that the topic of the influence of colors on sports competitions has not been thoroughly investigated and further studies are necessary. (shrink)

Contextual affective information influences the processing of facial expressions at the relatively early stages of face processing, but the effect of the context on the processing of facial expressions with varying intensities remains unclear. In this study, we investigated the influence of emotional scenes on the processing of fear expressions at different levels of intensity during the early stages of facial recognition using event-related potential technology. EEG data were collected while participants performed a fearful facial expression recognition task. The results (...) showed that the recognition of high-intensity fear expression was higher than that of medium- and low-intensity fear expressions. Facial expression recognition was the highest when faces appeared in fearful scenes. Emotional scenes modulated the amplitudes of N170 for fear expressions with different intensities. Specifically, the N170 amplitude, induced by high-intensity fear expressions, was significantly higher than that induced by low-intensity fear expressions when faces appeared in both neutral and fearful scenes. No significant differences were found between the N170 amplitudes induced by high-, medium-, and low-intensity fear expressions when faces appeared in happy scenes. These results suggest that individuals may tend to allocate their attention resources to the processing of face information when the valence between emotional context and expression conflicts i.e., when the conflict is absent or is low. (shrink)

The dissertation studies the mathematical strength of strict constructivism, a finitistic fragment of Bishop's constructivism, and explores its implications in the philosophy of mathematics. ;It consists of two chapters and four appendixes. Chapter 1 presents strict constructivism, shows that it is within the spirit of finitism, and explains how to represent sets, functions and elementary calculus in strict constructivism. Appendix A proves that the essentials of Bishop and Bridges' book Constructive Analysis can be developed within strict constructivism. Appendix B further (...) develops, within strict constructivism, the essentials of the functional analysis applied in quantum mechanics, including the spectral theorem, Stone's theorem, and the self-adjointness of some common quantum mechanical operators. Some comparisons with other related work, in particular, a comparison with S. Simpson's partial realization of Hilbert's program, and a discussion of the relevance of M. B. Pour-El and J. I. Richards' negative results in recursive analysis are given in Appendix C. ;Chapter 2 explores the possible philosophical implications of these technical results. It first suggests a fictionalistic account for the ontology of pure mathematics. This leaves a puzzle about how truths about fictional mathematical entities are applicable to science. The chapter then explains that for those applications of mathematics that can be reduced to applications of strict constructivism, fictional entities can be eliminated in the applications and the puzzle of applicability can be resolved. Therefore, if strict constructivism were essentially sufficient for all scientific applications, the applicability of mathematics of mathematics in science would be accountable. The chapter then argues that the reduction of mathematics to strict constructivism also reduces the epistemological question about mathematics to that about elementary arithmetic. The dissertation ends with a suggestion that a proper epistemological basis for arithmetic is perhaps a mixture of Mill's empiricism and the Kantian views. (shrink)

This article attempts to motivate a new approach to anti-realism (or nominalism) in the philosophy of mathematics. I will explore the strongest challenges to anti-realism, based on sympathetic interpretations of our intuitions that appear to support realism. I will argue that the current anti-realistic philosophies have not yet met these challenges, and that is why they cannot convince realists. Then, I will introduce a research project for a new, truly naturalistic, and completely scientific approach to philosophy of mathematics. It belongs (...) to anti-realism, but can meet those challenges and can perhaps convince some realists, at least those who are also naturalists. (shrink)

Après une présentation de l’évolution du solde commercial sino-étasunien ( Partie I ), cet article proposedeux méthodes de mesure de l’échange inégal entre les États-Unis et la Chine, l’une considérant le contenu en travail directement incorporé dans l’échange ( Partie II ), l’autre, inspirée de Ricci (2018), centrée sur la valeur internationale et mobilisant des tableaux entrées-sorties ( Partie III ), permettant d’esquisser une synthèse d’analyse sectorielle ( Partie IV ).

I argue that the most popular versions of naturalism imply nominalism in philosophy of mathematics. In particular, there is a conflict in Quine's philosophy between naturalism and realism in mathematics. The argument starts from a consequence of naturalism on the nature of human cognitive subjects, physicalism about cognitive subjects, and concludes that this implies a version of nominalism, which I will carefully characterize. The indispensability of classical mathematics for the sciences and semantic/confirmation holism does not affect the argument. The disquotational (...) theory of reference and truth is discussed but rejected. This argument differs from the Benacerrafian arguments against realism, because it does not rely on any specific assumption about the nature of knowledge or reference. It differs from the popular objections to the indispensability argument for realism as well, because it can admit both indispensability and holism. This argument motivates a new, radically naturalistic and nominalistic approach to philosophy of mathematics. (shrink)

Since its original publication in Chinese in the 1930s, this work has been accepted by Chinese scholars as the most important contribution to the study of their country's philosophy. In 1952 the book was published by Princeton University Press in an English translation by the distinguished scholar of Chinese history, Derk Bodde, "the dedicated translator of Fung Yu-lan's huge history of Chinese philosophy" (New York Times Book Review). Available for the first time in paperback, it remains the most complete work (...) on the subject in any language. Volume I covers the period of the philosophers, from the beginnings to around 100 B.C., a philosophical period as remarkable as that of ancient Greece. Volume II discusses a period lesser known in the West--the period of classical learning, from the second century B.C. to the twentieth century. (shrink)

Implicit theories refer to assumptions people hold about different domains, also known as mindsets. There are two implicit theories on the malleability of one’s ability: entity theory and incremental theory. They constrain and regulate people’s understanding and responses to an individual’s behavior, leading to different social cognitive patterns and behavioral responses. Resilience is a positive adaptation in highly stressful situations that represents mechanisms for coping with and transcending difficult experiences, i.e., a person’s ability to successfully adapt to change, resist the (...) adverse effects of stressors, avoid significant dysfunction, and be chronically affected by considered a protective factor for mental health. Although previous studies showed that individuals’ implicit theories are associated with resilience, this relationship has received little attention in the nursing population. It is unclear which variables may contribute to explaining the relationship between implicit theories and resilience. Therefore, the current study aims to deeply explore the relationship between implicit theories and the resilience of Chinese nurses. In addition, we also seek to demonstrate the chain mediating effects of grit and meaning in life on this relationship. We surveyed 709 Chinese nurses through online questionnaires using the self-made demographic questionnaire, the Implicit Theories Scale, the Short Grit Scale, the Meaning in Life Questionnaire, and the 10-item Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale. After controlling for demographic variables such as age, gender, educational background, marital status, professional title, and working years, the results reveal positive associations between Chinese nurses’ implicit theories and their resilience, and grit and meaning in life play a partial mediating role in this relationship, respectively. Furthermore, grit and meaning in life play a chain mediating role between implicit theories and resilience. These findings contribute to understanding the psychological impact mechanism of implicit theories on nurses’ resilience and provide a theoretical basis for nursing managers to formulate strategies to improve nurses’ psychological resilience. (shrink)

The Kripkean metaphysical modality (i.e. possibility and necessity) is one of the most important concepts in contemporary analytic philosophy and is the basis of many metaphysical speculations. These metaphysical speculations frequently commit to entities that do not belong to this physical universe, such as merely possible entities, abstract entities, mental entities or qualities not realizable by the physical, which seems to contradict naturalism or physicalism. This paper proposes a naturalistic interpretation of the Kripkean modality, as a naturalist’s response to these (...) metaphysical speculations. It will show that naturalism can accommodate the Kripkean metaphysical modality. In particular, it will show that naturalism can help to resolve the puzzles surrounding Kripke’s a posteriori necessary propositions and a priori contingent propositions. (shrink)

We study type 1 premice equipped with supercomplete extenders. In this paper, we show that such premice are normally iterable and all normal iteration trees of type 1 premice has a unique cofinal branch. We give a construction of an KC type model using supercomplete type 1 extenders.

Within the research framework of pragma-dialectics, this study analysed and assessed strategic manoeuvring by dissociation in corporate crisis communication, exemplified by the 2017 United Airlines’ Passenger Dragging-off Incident. As shown from the analysis of the public statements issued on its official website and Twitter, United Airlines adopted dissociation using the lexical item “volunteer” in the different stages of argumentation: bringing forward a standpoint, maintaining a standpoint and mitigating a standpoint. In so doing, the corporation strategically manoeuvred the topical potential and (...) the presentational devices to meet the demands of its primary audience, i.e. the international general public. Whereas employing dissociation of the notion “volunteer” seemed to be reasonable and served the corporation’s interests best, its argumentative effectiveness was called into question based upon the general rules for critical discussion and the institutional context. (shrink)

There are three major theses in Plantinga’s latest version of his evolutionary argument against naturalism. (1) Given materialism, the conditional probability of the reliability of human cognitive mechanisms produced by evolution is low; (2) the same conditional probability given reductive or non-reductive materialism is still low; (3) the most popular naturalistic theories of content and truth are not admissible for naturalism. I argue that Plantinga’s argument for (1) presupposes an anti-materialistic conception of content, and it therefore begs the question against (...) materialism. To argue for (2), Plantinga claims that the adaptiveness of a belief is indifferent to its truth. I argue that this claim is unsupported unless it again assumes an anti-materialistic conception of content and truth. I further argue that Plantinga’s argument for (3) is not successful either, because an improved version of teleosemantics can meet his criticisms. Moreover, this version of teleosemantics implies that the truth of a belief is (probabilistically) positively related to its adaptiveness, at least for simple beliefs about physical objects in human environments. This directly challenges Plantinga’s claim that adaptiveness is indifferent to truth. (shrink)

After Liberation I did not undertake a really serious criticism of my past philosophical thought. It basically remained in my mind unchanged. I thought that if I simply did not concern myself with it any longer, it would be fine. In fact, that did not work. Even when you don't want to be concerned with something like that, it will concern itself with you. This was my thought system, and by my not thoroughly criticizing it, it remained my world view. (...) When someone has a particular world view, he inevitably looks at the world through that world view, as if he were wearing a pair of colored glasses. Everything he sees is inevitably distorted accordingly. I thought that in my further studies of the history of Chinese philosophy I could simply ignore my own philosophical thought. But wearing that pair of glasses, it was impossible to look at the history of Chinese philosophy without distortion. (shrink)

In 1925, I went to Yanjing University to teach courses in the history of Chinese philosophy. It was from this period on that I began to seriously study the history of Chinese philosophy. At the time, this was not what I really wanted to do. I had originally wanted to work with bourgeois philosophy in preparation for founding a system of my own. To work in the history of Chinese philosophy was at the time, I felt, a kind of academic (...) duty, a kind of burden. But after working with it for awhile, I felt that there was also much that could be done in this field of the history of Chinese philosophy. That is to say, while lecturing on the history of philosophy, I also found it possible to develop my own idealist philosophical thought. (shrink)

In a recent debate, Rosenberg claims that only the methods of natural science can deliver genuine knowledge, while Williamson rejects Rosenberg’s extreme methodological naturalism and insists that we have genuine philosophical and humanistic knowledge not achievable by hard-scientific methods alone. This paper responds to the debate. I will argue that physicalism, together with contemporary neurocognitive and evolutionary knowledge, implies that some of our intuitions and mental simulations used in the humanities and philosophy are justified methods for achieving knowledge but are (...) practically irreplaceable with hard-scientific methods. That is, extreme methodological naturalism is in conflict with physicalism. The argument also shows that some moderate version of methodological naturalism can be consistent with physicalism. Physicalism is the strong version of ontological naturalism and is supposed to be accepted by strongly committed naturalists like Rosenberg. Therefore, to be self-consistent, these naturalists should adopt physicalism plus a moderate version of methodological naturalism, rather than Rosenberg’s extreme version. (shrink)

The class origins of my neo-rationalism were very clear to others. But for myself, it was only after going through the examination and analysis mentioned above that it became clear to me. But even though I do now have a sense that this is true, my understanding is certainly still quite lacking. I can at least say that I do feel that the criticism in recent years of various comrades concerning this aspect of my philosophical thought has been basically correct. (...) I understand that fully now. (shrink)

My formal study of philosophy began in 1915 when I entered the Philosophy Department of Beijing University. Not only was the content of what we studied at the time composed entirely of Chinese feudal philosophy; it was furthermore still presented in the form of the various traditional topics such as, "study of the Classics," "Song dynasty studies," etc. The professor who lectured on the history of Chinese philosophy began with the legendary Three Emperors and Five Kings, and in one year (...) of lecturing reached only as far as the Duke of Zhou [founder of the Zhou dynasty, some 500 years before Confucius]. We asked him: if your lecture method continues like this, when will you finish? He replied that there was no such thing as finishing or not finishing, that if he wanted to finish the course he could do so in a single sentence, and that if he did not want to finish it he could go on lecturing forever. (shrink)

In 1923, there was a debate in Chinese philosophical circles on the view of life [also known as the science versus metaphysics controversy]. In the introduction to A View of Life, I described the situation at the time.

A pathogenic connection between autoreactive T cells, fungal infection, and carcinogenesis has been demonstrated in studies of human autoimmune polyendocrinopathy-candidiasis-ectodermal dystrophy as well as in a mouse model in which kinase-dead Ikkα knock-in mice develop impaired central tolerance, autoreactive T cell–mediated autoimmunity, chronic fungal infection, and esophageal squamous cell carcinoma, which recapitulates APECED. IκB kinase α is one subunit of the IKK complex required for NF-κB activation. IKK/NF-κB is essential for central tolerance establishment by regulating the development of medullary thymic (...) epithelial cells that facilitate the deletion of autoreactive T cells in the thymus. In this review, we extensively discuss the pathogenic roles of inborn errors in the IKK/NF-κB loci in the phenotypically related diseases APECED, immune deficiency syndrome, and severe combined immunodeficiency; differentiate how IKK/NF-κB components, through mTEC, T cells/leukocytes, or epithelial cells, contribute to the pathogenesis of infectious diseases, autoimmunity, and cancer; and highlight the medical significance of IKK/NF-κB in these diseases. IKK/NF-κB regulates the expression of many genes that encode proteins involved in many crucial biological functions, such as immunity, tissue homeostasis, and fungal/bacterial/viral infections. Also, IKKα plays anti-tumor activities in many organs independently of NF-κB pathways. Thus, an inborn error in one of these gene loci can cause severe human diseases through these complicated mechanisms. (shrink)

This paper considers how players of Magic: The Gathering (MTG) limited draft turn their acquired gameplay style or disposition (their MTG “gamer habitus”), with respect to drafting, into an object of knowledge. This is done in order to then consciously rework it, to respond to new formats and to the changing metagame. I will focus on a particular case study: how streamer Chord_O_Calls' instructional video shows his own re-evaluation of certain cards. Evidently, it is a process requiring reflexivity, although I (...) aim to be specific with regard to the particular “form of reflexivity” involved. I distribute this outward to the MTG “habit assemblage” (an ensemble of techniques, things, relations) and argue that any individual player's instantiation of this reflexivity involves a practice-based synthesis of paratexts from the MTG habit assemblage that is not codified but is shaped by the assemblage. This leads to a consideration of the “intelligence” and limits of not only particular habits but that of the MTG “habit assemblage” itself. I argue that the broader socio-technical significance of the form of reflexivity that is being proliferated here is one which is defined by its flexibility, by an attentional style of delayed and shifting categorization. (shrink)

This paper explores the role of ethics in design. Traditionally, ethical questions have been seen as marginal issues in the design of technology. Part of the reason for this stems from the widely held notion of technology being “out of control.” This notion is a barrier to what I call “ethical design” because it implies that ethics has no role to play in the development of technology. This view, however, is challenged by recent work in the field of Science and (...) Technology Studies (STS). Looking into the dynamics of technological change, STS scholars argue that human choices are present at every stage of a technology’s development and, furthermore, that human values are reflected in the very design of artifacts. This alternative view suggests that ethics can and should be included in the design process. Drawing on examples from the privacy arena. I point to some of the potential advantages of addressing ethical concerns early on in the design of a technology. I conclude with some general strategies for bringing ethics back into design. (shrink)

Nearly thirty years ago, Robert Alexy in his book The Concept and Validity of Law as well as in other early articles raised non-positivistic arguments in the Continental European tradition against legal positivism in general, which was assumed to be held by, among others, John Austin, Hans Kelsen and H.L.A. Hart. The core thesis of legal positivism that was being discussed among contemporary German jurists, just as with their Anglo- American counterparts, is the claim that there is no necessary connection (...) between law and morality. Robert Alexy has argued, however, that the law, besides consisting conceptually of elements of authoritative issuance and social efficacy, necessarily lays a claim to substantial correctness, which is derived from analytical arguments. Furthermore, if this claim to substantial correctness necessarily requires the incorporation of moral elements into law, then the ‘necessary connection thesis’, as defended by non-positivism, can be justified. Some of the most significant objections to this sort of claim, stemming from the Anglo-American world, are those introduced by Joseph Raz. In his ‘Reply’ to Robert Alexy, Raz raises at least three interesting criticisms, including, first, the ambiguity of ‘legal theory in the positivistic tradition’, second, the indeterminate formulations of the ‘separation thesis’, and, third, the necessary claim of law to legitimate authority as a moral claim. As a point of departure, I will argue that Raz’s three criticisms are misleading. For they do not enhance our understanding of the genuine compatibility or incompatibility between legal positivism and non-positivism. Despite the frequently reformulated theses of legal positivism and the various kinds of opponents responding thereto, the essential divergence between legal positivism and non-positivism was and remains the answer to the question of the relation between law and morality. Furthermore, I will clarify that in the strictest sense there can be three and only three logically possible positions concerning the relation between law and morality: the connection between them is either necessary, or impossible (i. e. they are necessarily separate), or contingent (i. e. they are neither necessarily connected nor necessarily separate). The first position is non-positivistic, while the latter two positions are, indeed, both positivistic, but in different forms: one may be called ‘exclusive’ legal positivism, the other ‘inclusive’ legal positivism. I will continue by showing that these three positions stand to one another in the relation of contraries, not contradictories, and that, taken together, they exhaust the logically possible positions concerning the relation between law and morality, never mind the tradition or authority from which these positions are derived. Raz mentions, however, many changeable formulations of the separation thesis, which even leads him to acknowledge ‘necessary connections between law and morality’. One who is trying to understand legal positivism would no doubt be puzzled by this claim. Nevertheless, I will argue that this is an alternative strategy of legal positivism, and it points to naturalistically oriented view. Although this necessary separation between law and morality, understood naturalistically, strikes one as strengthening the separation, in the end it leads to a weakened notion of necessity. This weakened necessary separation thesis, however, cannot be justified through the so-called claim of the law to legitimate authority, defended by Raz, for it is difficult to answer the question of whether a normally justified but factual authority can gain legitimate authority. Finally, the necessary connection between law and morality in a strong sense can still be justified by the claim of law to correctness, as per Alexy’s argument. (shrink)

Howell Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 89, 348–358 and Mizrahi and Morrow Ratio, 28, 1–13 offer a group of reductio arguments to rebut the CP thesis, i.e., the hypothesis that ideal conceivability entails possibility. Each of them has a conceivability premise: it is ideally conceivable that CP is false. According to the same CP, one can infer that CP’s being false is possible, from which it follows that CP is false. In other words, CP is shown to be self-defeating and therefore false (...) if any of these reductio arguments is proved sound. In this paper, I aim to disprove these arguments. I first show that neither Howell nor Mizrahi & Morrow provide adequate justification for their conceivability premises. I go on to argue that these reductio arguments face a dilemma: either their conceivability premises cannot be adequately justified, or they are redundant. Finally, I argue that, although this dilemma resists the reductio arguments against CP, on the other hand, it also reveals that CP lacks epistemic fruitfulness: it is of no practical use in the realm of apriority as well as necessity. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In this essay I develop a feminist anti-colonial critique by reading two eighteenth-century literary texts that discuss Middle Eastern and Indigenous gender and sexual practices at length: Montesquieu's Lettres Persanes (1721) and Diderot's Supplément au Voyage de Bougainville (1772). While Montesquieu and Diderot are often heralded as anti-imperial European Enlightenment thinkers, the specific ways in which Montesquieu and Diderot use gender and non-European women's bodies to construct their political-theoretical arguments show us two distinct colonial logics, one imperial and the (...) other settler-colonial. I show that whereas Montesquieu uses Persian and Muslim sexual and gender practices to put forward an imperial vision premised on the superiority of French political order over a despotic ‘oriental’ order, Diderot uses Indigenous sexual practices to denote a settler-colonial logic premised on the erasure of conquest and pacification of Indigenous women's bodies. In doing so I build on existing feminist and post/anti-colonial scholarship to develop gender and sexuality as central analytics of imperial and settler-colonial politics. (shrink)