The disagreement over whether Aristotle recognized rights in some form unavoidably involves disagreement over what rights are, and the theory of rights itself is still highly contested. There is no consensus concerning how " right'? is to be defined, how rights are to be theoretically grounded, or how rights theory is to be applied in particular circumstances. This is not, however, a good reason to dismiss the issue of whether there are rights in Aristotle: for Aristotle, like modern rights theorists, (...) is concerned about the moral and legal status of the individual within the community, and he expresses this in terms of claims of justice. The issue is worthy of study not only because it can lead to a deeper understanding of Aristotle's conceptions of justice and the common good, but also because it may shed valuable light on the theoretical foundations of human rights, since he offers a theory of political justice which is based on a metaphysical theory of human nature. (shrink)

The first-ever multivolume treatment of the issues in legal philosophy and general jurisprudence, from both a theoretical and a historical perspective. The work is aimed at jurists as well as legal and practical philosophers. Edited by the renowned theorist Enrico Pattaro and his team, this book is a classical reference work that would be of great interest to legal and practical philosophers as well as to jurists and legal scholar at all levels. The work is divided in two parts. The (...) theoretical part, consisting of five volumes, covers the main topics of the contemporary debate; the historical part, consisting of six volumes, accounts for the development of legal thought from ancient Greek times through the twentieth century. The entire set will be completed with an index. Volume 6: A History of the Philosophy of Law from the Ancient Greeks to the Scholastics 2nd revised edition, edited by Fred D. Miller, Jr. and Carrie-Ann Biondi Volume 6 is the first of the Treatise’s historical volumes and is dedicated to the philosophers’ philosophy of law from ancient Greece to the 16th century. The volume thus begins with the dawning of legal philosophy in Greek and Roman philosophical thought and then covers the birth and development of European medieval legal philosophy, the influence of Judaism and the Islamic philosophers, the revival of Roman and Christian canon law, and the rise of scholastic philosophy in the late Middle Ages, which paved the way for early-modern Western legal philosophy. This second, revised edition comes with an entirely new chapter devoted to the later Scholastics and an epilogue on the legacy of ancient and medieval thought for modern legal philosophy, as well as with updated references and indexes. (shrink)

Much critical attention to the Dialectic of the Critique of Pure Reason is devoted to two related concerns. The first is Kant's skeptical attack on the claims of pure reason to epistemic authority, where the focus is on the paralogisms and the antinomies of pure reason. The second involves Kant's refutation of idealism. These two concerns are of course intimately connected with one another and there are various ways to express that interconnection. Perhaps most generally it can be said that (...) Kant's assessment of reason in these two contexts is negative: it argues for the limitation of reason's claim to unbridled application and views reason as a faculty whose native propensity to seek such employment must be checked. Reason, as it turns out, is the great metaphysical impostor, whose representations, the ideas, have no epistemic warrant whatsoever. For it is the essence of Kant's position in the Dialectic that metaphysical conundra cannot be solved so long as reason arrogates to itself a direct and unrestricted epistemic or cognitive role and that reason ought to forebear from assigning itself any such status. Such a self-restriction of reason is, additionally, transcendentally necessary because it is that very limitation, Kant argues, that constitutes transcendental critique. (shrink)

DEBATE CONTINUES OVER WHETHER AN “Aristotelian philosophy of mind” is still credible. Recent commentators wonder whether Aristotle’s view lies somewhere in the constellation of modern theories of mind, or whether he might point to an uncharted theory. Because he viewed his own account as an alternative to both Platonic dualism and Presocratic materialism, moderns seeking a middle way between Cartesian dualism and reductionist physicalism have looked to Aristotle for inspiration. As Jonathan Barnes observes, “Philosophy of mind has for centuries been (...) whirled between a Cartesian Charybdis and a scientific Scylla: Aristotle has the look of an Odysseus.”. (shrink)

A MAJOR THESIS OF CONTEMPORARY LIBERAL PHILOSOPHY is that its theory of justice, which incorporates strong rights to negative liberty, must be prior to and independent of a theory of the good. This priority is necessary, according to liberal theorists, in view of the requirement that any adequate theory accommodate a plurality of contending views of the good, no one of which is capable of eliciting public assent to it. Recent critics of liberalism have disputed this thesis, maintaining instead that (...) there is indeed an objective good, rather than a plurality of contending goods, which at least seriously compromises and possibly undermines the negative liberty with which liberals traditionally associated their theories. Variously called communitarians, virtue theorists, or republicans, these critics have presented an important challenge to contemporary liberalism whether of the individualist or welfare state variety. (shrink)

TheFederalist, written by in 1787-1788 in defense of the proposed constitution of the United States, endorses a fundamental principle of political legitimacy: namely, This essay argues that this principlemay be traced back to Plato. Part I of the essay seeks to show that Plato's Statesman offers a clearer understanding of the rule of reason than his more famous Republic, and it also indicates how this principle gave rise to the ideal of constitutionalism, which was adopted and reformulated by Aristotle, Polybius, (...) and Cicero, as well as moderns including Locke and Montesquieu. Part II argues that TheFederalist agrees with Plato when it argues that popular sovereignty must be tempered by the rule of reason. A proper distance should be maintained between the people and the actual exercise of power in order that political decisions be based on reason rather than passion. The people must therefore act through a federal system divided between national government and state governments, and these governments must themselves possess separated powers which control each other by means of checks and balances. Indeed, federalism itself may be viewed as a modern counterpart of Plato's which unites naturally disparate and opposed parts of the city-state into a concordant whole. In declaring, TheFederalist concedes that politics is the art of the possible. But statesmanship is not an exercise in pragmatism devoid of principles. Here shares Plato's vision of politics as a that is, an attempt to approximate the ideal of rational governance as far as possible in ordinary politics. (shrink)

Fichte was at the height of his philosophical activity and influence during the last decade of the eighteenth century in Jena. It was during this period that he developed his idea of a Wissenschaftslehre or a “science of knowledge.” A Wissenschaftslehre is an ongoing investigation by subjects of their subjectivity which may be captured only imperfectly in medias res in the form of a written document, but which is crucially not identical with any written philosophical text. So Fichte distinguishes between (...) Wissenschaftslehre and its presentations. In the Jena period Fichte completed two such presentations. The first, the Grundlage der gesammten Wis-senschaftslehre [WL], contains the famous analysis of the preconditions for consciousness in terms of the posits of I and not-I and their reciprocal limitation. Fichte became dissatisfied with his treatment of the central problems in the 1794 version and began working on a second version in 1796. Only two introductions and the first chapter of this new presentation appeared in print. Due to his dawning belief that philosophy was appropriately done solely in oral or dialogic form and the psychic toll of the “atheism controversy” that led to his dismissal from Jena in 1799, by the early 1800's Fichte abandoned plans to publish the entire second presentation. Lectures on the entire second presentation given in 1796-9, the Wissenschaftslehre nova methodo [WLnm], are preserved, however, in two sets of student notes. The importance of the discovery of these notes is difficult to overestimate. WLnm develops new and more convincing positions on such fundamental issues as the nature of subjectivity, the unity of reason, and the relation between self-consciousness and intersubjectivity that greatly enhance Fichte's historical status and his relevance to contemporary debates on a variety of philosophical concerns. (shrink)

A central idea in moral and political philosophy, 'autonomy' is generally understood as some form of self-governance or self-direction. Certain Stoics, modern philosophers such as Spinoza, and most importantly, Immanuel Kant, are among the great philosophers who have offered important insights on the concept. Some theorists analyze autonomy in terms of the self being moved by its higher-order desires. Others argue that autonomy must be understood in terms of acting from reason or from a sense of moral duty independent of (...) the passions. Autonomy seems closely related to the notion of freedom, but in what sense: freedom from coercion, freedom from psychological constraints, or freedom from material necessity? Various approaches to these and similar questions yield different implications for public policy. Is capitalism, social democracy or socialism more favorable to autonomy? The essays in this volume address these important questions. (shrink)

In Loren Lomasky's wry understatement, which serves as this book's motto, "A century that has witnessed the Holocaust and the Gulag is not one which can be aptly characterized as paying too much heed to basic rights". In opposition to twentieth-century statism, there arose libertarianism, a political philosophy committed to individual rights. Following the decline and collapse of the Soviet Union and other communist states and amid growing doubts about the welfare state, the editors and contributors to Liberty for the (...) 21st Century take the fin de siècle as an occasion for a new statement of libertarian theory, with the hope that it may become the dominant voice in the next century. (shrink)

As I look back, my career seems to have followed two intertwining paths: ancient Greek philosophy and modern public policy. This may seem puzzling, but I will try to explain how these diverse intellectual pursuits converged in my case to lead to a memorable journey. I will conclude with some remembrances of companions and friends who have helped me on the way.

This book suggests a link between the citizen-philosopher Socrates and the radical, disobedient, and nonviolent Socrates. Ramin Jahanbegloo explains how these two complementary characteristics were transmitted to nonviolent reformers and practitioners Henry David Thoreau, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and Albert Camus.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Adam Smith and the Virtues of EnlightenmentFred D. Miller Jr.Charles L. Griswold. Adam Smith and the Virtues of Enlightenment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. Pp. xiv + 412. Cloth, $59.95.For over a century, scholars have been vexed by the so-called "Adam Smith problem," which concerns the relationship between the two works which Smith published during his lifetime: The Theory of Moral Sentiments (TMS) in 1759, and An Inquiry (...) into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (WN) in 1776 (citations are to the Liberty Classics reprints of the Oxford University Press editions). Many have regarded them as discordant: while TMS is apparently concerned with classical ethics, WN seems to assume that humans are basically egoistic, although they can be directed toward the public good by means of the "invisible hand." It is tempting to view Smith as a transitional author: TMS is the swan song of virtue ethics, whereas WN is a pioneering work in a new tradition of political economy.Griswold challenges this temptation in this brilliant study, arguing that Smith had a coherent and integrated philosophical viewpoint encompassing TMS, WN, and other surviving writings. Griswold views Smith as offering a virtue ethics and "throwing in his lot with the ancient moralists" (65). He argues, "We cannot grasp Smith's diagnosis of and therapy for the modern age without devoting considerable attention to his analysis of the virtues (especially the virtue of justice) as well as to the theory of the emotions, of the impartial spectator, and of sympathy" (20). Smith tried to reconcile a traditional ethics with modern skepticism and the new values associated with commercial society and religious secularism. Griswold's book illuminates a wide range of themes in Smith's moral philosophy: his view of rhetoric, method, and system underlying TMS (chapter 1); sympathy and self-interest (chapter 2); moral psychology and the theory of the impartial spectator (chapter 3); Smith's skepticism and reservations about philosophy (chapter 4); virtue theory (chapter 5); justice (chapter 6); the relationship between TMS and WN (chapter 7); and nature versus artifice in ethics (chapter 8). The epilogue critically discusses whether Smith's moral theory falls into subjectivism, and whether [End Page 439] Smith goes too far in excluding philosophers such as Socrates from ordinary moral discourse.A brief review cannot do justice to Griswold's compelling interpretation, and I shall focus on his solution to "the old problem of how the moral theory and the political economy mesh" (21). Griswold argues, "Smith sees himself as synthesizing an ancient view about the nature of virtue with a modern approach to the problem of the source of moral value. Consequently the moral psychology (especially the notions of sympathy and the impartial spectator) and the virtue theory must be understood in light of each other" (181). Further, "The virtue theory is the moral foundation of Smith's political economy, political theory, and 'natural jurisprudence.' Hence the virtue theory is closely tied to his doctrine of liberty as well as to his views about the pursuit of wealth. However 'ancient' the virtue theory may in some respects be, Smith combines it with a modern view of the social and political institutions appropriate to virtue" (ibid.). With impressive erudition Griswold argues that "taken together... TMS and WN form complementary parts of a larger whole" (265), and that Smith thinks "the virtues of a free and commercial society" may be defended on the basis of views espoused in WN: skepticism of state interference in economic and social matters, anti-utopianism, and the doctrine of the invisible hand (21). Yet WN does not place blind faith in laissez faire but advocates social justice, compulsory public education and greater taxes on the rich (254, 264, 359).Has Griswold, then, finally solved the Adam Smith Problem? There remains the problem that WN apparently neglects central themes of TMS: sympathy, the impartial spectator, and benevolence. In TMS virtue has distinctive components: "Concern for our own happiness recommends to us the virtue of prudence: concern for that of other people, the virtues of justice and beneficence" (TMS 262). These constitute perfect virtue: "The man who acts according to the rules of perfect... (shrink)

This collection of original articles draws from a cross section of distinguished scholars of ancient Greek philosophy. It is focussed primarily on the philosophy of Aristotle but comprises as well studies of the philosophy of Socrates, Plato, and Epicurus. Its authors explore a range of complementary topics in value theory, moral psychology, metaphysics, natural philosophy, political theory, and methodology, highlighting the rich and lasting philosophical contributions of the thinkers investigated. Opening with an engaging intellectual autobiography of its honoree, Fred (...) D. Miller, Jr., the volume offers treatments of Socrates as a citizen; Plato’s attitude towards poetry; Socratic self-knowledge; Plato’s conception of law in his Republic; explorations of reason, goodness, and moral conduct in Plato; Platonic metaphysics; Aristotelian causation; Aristotelian metaphysics and normativity; natural philosophy in Aristotle; Aristotelian logic; political theory and approaches to justice in Aristotle’s Politics; methodological reflections on how best to approach Aristotle’s indefensible ideas; and closes with a reconsideration of Epicurus on death and the art of dying. Altogether, the volume reflects the richness of the ongoing community of philosophical scholars dedicated to reconstructing, assessing, and criticizing the principal philosophers of the ancient world, whose epoch-forming explorations of the key elements of human life—considered socially, politically, psychologically, and metaphysically—remain topics of lively investigation today. It will be of interest to philosophers of many stripes, including those with a primary interest in ancient philosophy but extending as well to those with systematic interests in the themes it explores. This volume will be a valuable addition to all libraries serving communities dedicated to researching and studying the origins of Western philosophy. (shrink)

Fred D. Miller, Jr.'s stated goal for his new translation for the Oxford World's Classics series is, 'to provide a clear and accessible translation of Aristotle's psychological works while . . . conveying something of his distinctive style'. Not only does Miller achieve these goals in spades, but he also provides something more. His translation of Aristotle's De Anima and Parva Naturalia (the 'short works concerning nature'), along with twenty-three selected fragments from Aristotle's lost works and his 'Hymn to (...) Hermias', is elegant, philosophically sensitive, and informed by some of the best recent scholarly work on Aristotle's psychology and biology. (shrink)

Designed for courses in environmental ethics, this reader is also an attractive supplement to contemporary moral issues or any applied ethics courses. It features readings in environmental ethics, including Paul Taylor's seminal essay The Ethics of Respect for Nature and works by Vice Preseident Al Gore, Jr. and J. Baird Callicott. Features: * Includes only readings of highest quality, chosen to be accessible to students who do not have an extensive knowledge of philosophy. * Exposes students to all major areas (...) of environmental ethics, including wilderness, pollution and animals. * Ideal length is appropriate as a core text or supplement to a variety of contemporary ethics courses. * Extensive bibliography provides a unique resource for research materials in this growing field. * Essays contain philosohical arguments as well as critique. * Presents an agenda of protection and stewardship that involves students in the management of our planets ecosystem. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Adam Smith and the Virtues of EnlightenmentFred D. Miller Jr.Charles L. Griswold. Adam Smith and the Virtues of Enlightenment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. Pp. xiv + 412. Cloth, $59.95.For over a century, scholars have been vexed by the so-called "Adam Smith problem," which concerns the relationship between the two works which Smith published during his lifetime: The Theory of Moral Sentiments (TMS) in 1759, and An Inquiry (...) into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (WN) in 1776 (citations are to the Liberty Classics reprints of the Oxford University Press editions). Many have regarded them as discordant: while TMS is apparently concerned with classical ethics, WN seems to assume that humans are basically egoistic, although they can be directed toward the public good by means of the "invisible hand." It is tempting to view Smith as a transitional author: TMS is the swan song of virtue ethics, whereas WN is a pioneering work in a new tradition of political economy.Griswold challenges this temptation in this brilliant study, arguing that Smith had a coherent and integrated philosophical viewpoint encompassing TMS, WN, and other surviving writings. Griswold views Smith as offering a virtue ethics and "throwing in his lot with the ancient moralists" (65). He argues, "We cannot grasp Smith's diagnosis of and therapy for the modern age without devoting considerable attention to his analysis of the virtues (especially the virtue of justice) as well as to the theory of the emotions, of the impartial spectator, and of sympathy" (20). Smith tried to reconcile a traditional ethics with modern skepticism and the new values associated with commercial society and religious secularism. Griswold's book illuminates a wide range of themes in Smith's moral philosophy: his view of rhetoric, method, and system underlying TMS (chapter 1); sympathy and self-interest (chapter 2); moral psychology and the theory of the impartial spectator (chapter 3); Smith's skepticism and reservations about philosophy (chapter 4); virtue theory (chapter 5); justice (chapter 6); the relationship between TMS and WN (chapter 7); and nature versus artifice in ethics (chapter 8). The epilogue critically discusses whether Smith's moral theory falls into subjectivism, and whether [End Page 439] Smith goes too far in excluding philosophers such as Socrates from ordinary moral discourse.A brief review cannot do justice to Griswold's compelling interpretation, and I shall focus on his solution to "the old problem of how the moral theory and the political economy mesh" (21). Griswold argues, "Smith sees himself as synthesizing an ancient view about the nature of virtue with a modern approach to the problem of the source of moral value. Consequently the moral psychology (especially the notions of sympathy and the impartial spectator) and the virtue theory must be understood in light of each other" (181). Further, "The virtue theory is the moral foundation of Smith's political economy, political theory, and 'natural jurisprudence.' Hence the virtue theory is closely tied to his doctrine of liberty as well as to his views about the pursuit of wealth. However 'ancient' the virtue theory may in some respects be, Smith combines it with a modern view of the social and political institutions appropriate to virtue" (ibid.). With impressive erudition Griswold argues that "taken together... TMS and WN form complementary parts of a larger whole" (265), and that Smith thinks "the virtues of a free and commercial society" may be defended on the basis of views espoused in WN: skepticism of state interference in economic and social matters, anti-utopianism, and the doctrine of the invisible hand (21). Yet WN does not place blind faith in laissez faire but advocates social justice, compulsory public education and greater taxes on the rich (254, 264, 359).Has Griswold, then, finally solved the Adam Smith Problem? There remains the problem that WN apparently neglects central themes of TMS: sympathy, the impartial spectator, and benevolence. In TMS virtue has distinctive components: "Concern for our own happiness recommends to us the virtue of prudence: concern for that of other people, the virtues of justice and beneficence" (TMS 262). These constitute perfect virtue: "The man who acts according to the rules of perfect... (shrink)

A motivational system approach to avoidance behavior is presented. According to this approach, a motivational state increases the probability of relevant response patterns and establishes the appropriate or “ideal” consummatory stimuli as positive reinforcers. In the case of feeding motivation, for example, hungry rats are likely to explore and gnaw, and to learn to persist in activities correlated with the reception of consummatory stimuli produced by ingestion of palatable substances. In the case of defense motivation, fearful rats are likely to (...) flee or freeze, and to learn to persist in activities correlated with consummatory stimuli produced by flight from a dangerous place. Defense system activation is distinct from alarm reactions. The latter prepare the animal for probable noxious events, involve relatively intense negative affect and extinguish rapidly in situations where the noxious event no longer occurs. In contrast, defense system activation potentiates innate and modified defense reactions, thus preparing the animal for possible, but not necessarily probable, noxious events; it involves little or no negative affect and extinguishes very slowly when the noxious event no longer occurs. With these assumptions and the resulting model we attempt to resolve several long-standing problems in avoidance learning, including the low correlation between negative affect and avoidance performance, differential rates of extinction for avoidance performance and conditioned emotional responses, and evidence that some avoidance responses are much more easily learned than others. In addition, the model has implications for the study of parallels between appetitive and aversive motivation, sign tracking in aversive conditioning, and orientation of flight responses. Historical antecedents and alternative approaches are discussed. (shrink)

Introduction to philosophical issues such as free will and morality. Includes suggestions for further reading at the end of each chapter.

Introduction to philosophical issues such as free will and morality. Includes suggestions for further reading at the end of each chapter.

A discussion is going on in cognitive science about the use of representations to explain how intelligent behavior is generated. In the traditional view, an organism is thought to incorporate representations. These provide an internal model that is used by the organism to instruct the motor apparatus so that the adaptive and anticipatory characteristics of behavior come about. So-called interactionists claim that this representational specification of behavior raises more problems than it solves. In their view, the notion of internal representational (...) models is to be dispensed with. Instead, behavior is to be explained as the intricate interaction between an embodied organism and the specific make up of an environment. The problem with a non-representational interactive account is that it has severe difficulties with anticipatory, future oriented behavior. The present paper extends the interactionist conceptual framework by drawing on ideas derived from the study of morphogenesis. This extended interactionist framework is based on an analysis of anticipatory behavior as a process which involves multiple spatio-temporal scales of neural, bodily and environmental dynamics. This extended conceptual framework provides the outlines for an explanation of anticipatory behavior without involving a representational specification of future goal states. (shrink)

Cognitive science's basic premises are under attack. In particular, its focus on internal cognitive processes is a target. Intelligence is increasingly interpreted, not as a matter of reclusive thought, but as successful agent-environment interaction. The critics claim that a major reorientation of the field is necessary. However, this will only occur when there is a distinct alternative conceptual framework to replace the old one. Whether or not a serious alternative is provided is not clear. Among the critics there is some (...) consensus, however, that this role could be fulfilled by the concept of a 'behavioral system'. This integrates agent and environment into one encompassing general system. We will discuss two contexts in which the behavioral systems idea is being developed. Autonomous Agents Research is the enterprise of building behavior-based robots. Dynamical Systems Theory provides a mathematical framework well suited for describing the interactions between complex systems. We will conclude that both enterprises provide important contributions to the behavioral systems idea. But neither turns it into a full conceptual alternative which will initiate a major paradigm switch in cognitive science. The concept will need a lot of fleshing out before it can assume that role. (shrink)

Multitrait-multimethod (MTMM) analysis is one of the most frequently employed methods to examine the validity of psychological measures. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) is a commonly used analytic tool for examining MTMM data through the specification of trait and method latent variables. Most contemporary CFA-MTMM models either do not allow estimating correlations between the trait and method factors or they are restricted to linear trait-method relationships. There is no theoretical reason why trait and method relationships should always be linear, and quadratic (...) relationships are frequently proposed in the social sciences. In this article, we present two approaches for examining quadratic relations between traits and methods through extended latent difference and latent means CFA-MTMM models (Pohl et al., 2008; Pohl and Steyer, 2010). An application of the new approaches to a multi-rater study of the nine inattention symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in children (N = 752) and the results of a Monte Carlo study to test the applicability of the models under a variety of data conditions are described. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to examine F. S. C. Northrop's approach to Russian Communism via his analysis of (1) the fundamental types of all possible concepts and (2) how an exposition of the basic concepts of Russian Communism enable us to understand not only the past performances of the Soviet Union but also to predict what they are likely to do in the future. This goal is accomplished by an examination of three essays that Northrop penned over a (...) period of 14 years. Although a few critical remarks are tendered, my essay tends to be descriptive in an effort to introduce those unfamiliar with Northrop to the work of this vast mind. Readers of this journal will no doubt profit from exposure to Northrop's entire corpus. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to examine F. S. C. Northrop's approach to Russian Communism via his analysis of the fundamental types of all possible concepts and how an exposition of the basic concepts of Russian Communism enable us to understand not only the past performances of the Soviet Union but also to predict what they are likely to do in the future. This goal is accomplished by an examination of three essays that Northrop penned over a period of (...) 14 years. Although a few critical remarks are tendered, my essay tends to be descriptive in an effort to introduce those unfamiliar with Northrop to the work of this vast mind. Readers of this journal will no doubt profit from exposure to Northrop's entire corpus. (shrink)

Borrett, Kelly and Kwan claim to provide neural-network models of important aspects of subjective human experience. To sidestep the long-standing and assumedly insurmountable problems with providing models of inner experience, they turn to a body-centered interpretation of experience, drawn from the work of Merleau-Ponty. This body-centered interpretation makes experience more tractable by linking it closely with bodily movement. However, when it comes to modeling, Borrett et al. ignore this body-centered interpretation and revert back to the traditional view of inner experience (...) as existing apart from the body. The result is uninteresting on two counts. The models that they present cannot be taken seriously as models of real inner experience. Additionally, these models do not apply to or extend the idea of a different, body-centered interpretation of experience either. (shrink)

Van Gelder presents the distinction between dynamical systems and digital computers as the core issue of current developments in cognitive science. We think this distinction is much less important than a reassessment of cognition as a neurally, bodily, and environmentally embedded process. Embedded cognition lines up naturally with dynamical models, but it would also stand if combined with classic computation.

This important volume explores alternative ways in which those involved in the field of speech communication have attempted to find a philosophical grounding for rhetoric. Recognizing that rhetoric can be supported in a wide variety of ways, this text examines eight different philosophies of rhetoric: realism, relativism, rationalism, idealism, materialism, existentialism, deconstructionism, and pragmatism. The value of this book lies in its pluralistic and comparative approach to rhetorical theory. Although rhetoric may be the more difficult road to philosophy, the fact (...) that it is being traversed by a group of authors largely from speech communication demonstrates important growth in this field. Ultimately, there is recognition that if different thinkers can have solid reasons to adhere to disparate philosophies, serious communication problems can be eliminated. _Rhetoric and Philosophy_ will assist scholars in choosing from among the many philosphical starting places for rhetoric. (shrink)