The dual-continua model of mental health provides a contemporary framework for conceptualising and operationalising mental health. According to this model, mental health is distinct from but related to mental illness, and not the opposite or merely the absence of psychopathology symptoms. To examine the validity of the dual-continua model, previous studies have either applied variable-based analysis such as confirmatory factor analysis, or used predetermined cut-off points for subgroup division. The present study extends this contribution by subjecting data from an African (...) sample to both CFA and latent class analysis to test the dual-continua model in Africa. We applied CFA separately for the Mental Health Continuum—Short Form and Patient Health Questionnaire—9 ; and LCA on combined item responses. College students from Ghana, Kenya, Mozambique, and South Africa completed the MHC-SF and PHQ-9. With minor modifications to the measurement models, the CFA results of this study confirm the three-factor structure of the MHC-SF, and a unidimensional solution for the PHQ-9. LCA results show the presence of three distinct latent classes: languishing with moderate endorsement of depressive symptoms, flourishing with low endorsement of depressive symptoms, and moderate mental health with high endorsement of depressive symptoms. These findings further contribute to affirming the evidence for the dual-continua model of mental health, with implications for the assessment of mental health, to inform policy, practise, and future research in community and clinical settings in Africa. (shrink)

Adequate measurement is an essential component of the assessment of mental health disorders and symptoms such as depression and anxiety. The present study investigated sex-specific differences in the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 and Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7. This comprehensive cross-sectional design study pursued four objectives: measurement invariance of PHQ-9 and GAD-7 between male and female; depression and anxiety prevalence differences; cross-sex differences in the relationship between depression and anxiety; and a comparison of symptom heterogeneity. A sample of 1966 students from South Africa (...) completed the PHQ-9 and the GAD-7. Data analyses for measurement invariance, latent class analysis, inter-variable correlations and group comparisons were conducted in Mplus. The two-dimensional PHQ-9 achieved scalar invariance, while the GAD-7 yielded metric invariance. The somatic and non-somatic latent dimensions of depression were compared and showed no significant difference between male and female groups. The positive relationship between depression and anxiety was also not significantly different between the two groups. While the PHQ-9 symptoms formed three classes in the male group, and four classes in the female group, the GAD-7 had the same number of classes and a similar pattern between the two groups. These findings hold implications for the measurement, assessment and understanding of symptom manifestation and distribution, as well as the treatment of depression and anxiety in South Africa. (shrink)

In his sermon to the directors of the London Missionary Society (LMS) in London in 1840, in ‘othering’ the Batswana (Africans), Moffat engages in biblical discourse. He uses biblical descriptions to ‘other’ them and the land they occupied. This article analyses the 1840 sermon by Moffat, and in it I will argue that through his sermon, Moffat engaged in biblical discourse and performed epistemic privilege in his exposition of the Batswana to his audience, namely the directors of the LMS. At (...) the same time, he used biblical texts and imagery to create in the mind of his listeners an image of heathenism and uncivility. In doing so, I argue that he further located the Batswana within the realm of the ‘damnés’. In the article, I apply two analytical lenses, namely decoloniality and critical race theory, as hermeneutical tools. Contribution: It is argued in this article that in doing so, Moffat further located the Batswana within the realm of the damnés. (shrink)

The incredible achievements of modern scientific theories lead most of us to embrace scientific realism: the view that our best theories offer us at least roughly accurate descriptions of otherwise inaccessible parts of the world like genes, atoms, and the big bang. In Exceeding Our Grasp, Stanford argues that careful attention to the history of scientific investigation invites a challenge to this view that is not well represented in contemporary debates about the nature of the scientific enterprise. The historical record (...) of scientific inquiry, Stanford suggests, is characterized by what he calls the problem of unconceived alternatives. Past scientists have routinely failed even to conceive of alternatives to their own theories and lines of theoretical investigation, alternatives that were both well-confirmed by the evidence available at the time and sufficiently serious as to be ultimately accepted by later scientific communities. Stanford supports this claim with a detailed investigation of the mid-to-late 19th century theories of inheritance and generation proposed in turn by Charles Darwin, Francis Galton, and August Weismann. He goes on to argue that this historical pattern strongly suggests that there are equally well-confirmed and scientifically serious alternatives to our own best theories that remain currently unconceived. Moreover, this challenge is more serious than those rooted in either the so-called pessimistic induction or the underdetermination of theories by evidence, in part because existing realist responses to these latter challenges offer no relief from the problem of unconceived alternatives itself. Stanford concludes by investigating what positive account of the spectacularly successful edifice of modern theoretical science remains open to us if we accept that our best scientific theories are powerful conceptual tools for accomplishing our practical goals, but abandon the view that the descriptions of the world around us that they offer are therefore even probably or approximately true. (shrink)

By the time of his death in 2006, Sir Peter Strawson was regarded as one of the world's most distinguished philosophers. Unavailable for many years,_ Scepticism and Naturalism_ is a profound reflection on two classic philosophical problems by a philosopher at the pinnacle of his career. Based on his acclaimed Woodbridge lectures delivered at Columbia University in 1983, Strawson begins with a discussion of scepticism, which he defines as questioning the adequacy of our grounds for holding various beliefs. He then (...) draws deftly on Hume and Wittgenstein to argue that we must distinguish between 'hard', scientific naturalism; or 'soft', humanistic naturalism. In the remaining chapters the author takes up several issues in which sceptical doubts play an important role, in particular the nature of transcendental arguments and including the objectivity of moral philosophy, the mental and the physical, and the existence of abstract entities. _Scepticism and Naturalism_ is essential reading for those seeking an introduction to the work of one of the twentieth century’s most important and original philosophers. This reissue includes a substantial new foreword by Quassim Cassam and a fascinating intellectual autobiography by Strawson, which together form an excellent introduction to his life and work. (shrink)

First published in 1987. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The 19th-century missionary literary genre provides us with a window into how the missionaries viewed African cultural systems, such as polygamy. In their minds, polygamy was one of the obstacles to converting Africans to Christianity. Baptism functioned as a theatre of power and submission. To access baptism, a convert had to abandon and strip themselves of that which made them Africans and adopt Western colonial Christian norms and principles. In this article, we argue that the condemnation of polygamy by missionaries (...) was a wielding of power within the colonial matrix of power. We further maintain that the decolonisation of Christianity cannot be achieved without a critical analysis of the impact of the missionaries in the deformation and labelling of African cultural identities as heathen and uncivilised. Contribution: The cultural transfer that was achieved through Christianisation, civilisation and colonisation has led to what Biko referred to as the flight from the black self and what Du Bois referred to as double consciousness. The article applies the intersectionality of theoretical lenses of Africana critical thought, Foucauldian notion of power, negritude and decoloniality. (shrink)

The 1840 gospel of Luke as translated by Moffat presents us with the cultural and imperial surveillance performed by a patriarchal system through the institutionalisation of motherhood and womanhood (bosadi). Motherhood or womanhood (bosadi) as a patriarchal institution has been a space in which patriarchal discursive practices have been realised through an act of politicising motherhood or womanhood. At the centre of this act of politicisation of motherhood or womanhood (bosadi) is the ability to carry and bear children (pelegi). The (...) institution of motherhood or womanhood has facilitated a binary between motherhood (bosadi) and bareness (moopa). The womb/popelo as a symbol of fertility becomes the space of mothering women, of labelling, categorising and naming women that the system locates as moopa or barren. The article seeks to reread the narrative on childbearing in the 1840 gospel of Luke from a decolonial framework. I will argue that childbearing, as a patriarchal institution, has been a space in which the gaze of patriarchy has been produced to subjugate women through cultural and imperial masculinist gaze. I will also argue that there is a need to decolonise and liberate such a space (womb) as not a determinant of motherhood. (shrink)

Ngwao ya Setswana [tradition and customs] has two dimensions: tumelo [belief system] and thuto [education]; it is found in cultural practices and observances such as bogwera [the rite of initiation], letsemma [ploughing], dikgafela [harvesting], bongaka [diviner-healers] and botsetsi ba ntlha le botsetsi jwa bobedi [first menses and first experience of childbirth] to name but a few. These practices were observed through the slaughtering of animals, usually cows, and sheep and were condemned and regarded by missionaries as hindrances to Christianity. Letters (...) to Mahoko a Becwana, a 1883–1896 newspaper, points to the use of biblical scriptures such as 1 Corinthians 10:1–33 by the missionaries to condemn these practices. The 1840 English-Setswana New Testament is a colonial product. Texts such as 1 Corinthians 10:21–22 point to the discursive practice employed by the translator for the purpose of foreignising Setswana cultural concepts, re-domesticating these cultural concepts as new concepts separate from their original meaning and domesticating anglicised concepts. At the centre of the discursive practice, I would argue, are foreignisation, redomestication and domestication. This version of the Bible depicts the impact of colonialism on the cultural practices of the Batswana. The debates in the letters to Mahoko a Becwana, point to the dichotomy of those Batswana who converted to Western colonial Christianity. The debates further depict the choices made by the Batswana when accepting the Christian practices expressed in Western culture, and renouncing all that made them a Motswana. The argument in this article is that in his translation of the Bible into Setswana, Moffat uses ideological strategy as a discursive tool to foreignise and redomesticate the concept of Badimo as a Badimoni [devil] and to domesticate the Western colonial Christian concept of heathen into Setswana vocabulary as baeteni, thus producing a dichotomy within the Batswana. Decolonial and post-colonial translation theories are used as the theoretical framework for this article. (shrink)

In her article on ‘translating ngaka’ (diviner-healer), Musa Dube argues that in the writings of Robert Moffat and subsequently in his translation of the Bible into Setswana, the person of the ngaka, rather than being portrayed as occupying a central and positive role in Setswana culture, is relegated to a marginal position and is even depicted as evil and an imposter. The article seeks to argue that firstly, there is a fundamental connection between ngaka and bogwera in Setswana tradition. This (...) is because ngaka performed the rite of initiation and was a central figure in the circumcision (rupa) of those undergoing the rite of imitation. Secondly, in his 1857 English–Setswana Bible Moffat alters the word bogwera in Luke 2:21. In representing and translating bogwera as circumcision in Luke 2:21 Moffat rewrites and reorders the political, economic and religious beliefs of Batswana. It is in the transmogrification of bogwera in Luke 2:21 that an act of hybridisation and creolisation takes place through the ordering of the Batswana cosmology and culture. I would further argue that not only did this marginalisation colour the perceptions of the Batswana regarding bogwera, but also that the translated text was used as a tool to disrupt, marginalise, replace, subvert and colonise the spiritual spaces of the Batswana. Furthermore, the article attempts to critically engage with the translated text from an ideological criticism within postcolonial theory, engaging with the fundamental question: why did Moffat translate and alter bogwera as circumcision rather than using the proper word which is rupa (circumcision)? Selected letters published in the newspaper Mahoko a Becwana (Words of Batswana) are quoted and discussed, as it is in these letters that we are confronted with an act of hybridisation and creolisation. The letters also point to the effects of such a translation and transmogrification as a discursive tool to reorder and to pervert the Batswana cosmology and culture. In translating and altering circumcision as bogwera Moffat performs an act of mutation of meaning. It is in this morphing of bogwera into something that is charged with negativity in order to reorder and rewrite through an exercise of transmutation that Moffat attempts to subvert and to indoctrinate, resulting in the subversion of the spiritual spaces of Batswana. (shrink)

This book discusses the study and analysis of the physical aspects of social systems and models, inspired by the analogy with familiar models of physical systems and possible applications of statistical physics tools. Unlike the traditional analysis of the physics of macroscopic many-body or condensed matter systems, which is now an established and mature subject, the upsurge in the physical analysis and modelling of social systems, which are clearly many-body dynamical systems, is a recent phenomenon. Though the major developments in (...) sociophysics have taken place only recently, the earliest attempts of proposing "Social Physics" as a discipline are more than one and a half centuries old. Various developments in the mainstream physics of condensed matter systems have inspired and induced the recent growth of sociophysical analysis and models. In spite of the tremendous efforts of many scientists in recent years, the subject is still in its infancy and major challenges are yet to be taken up. An introduction to these challenges is the main motivation for this book. (shrink)

Priyanshu Prabal Upadhyaya, b. 1919, Sanskrit scholar; contributed articles on various aspects of Indic philosophy, Vedic and Sanskrit literature.

This practical and essential text, co-authored by an engineer and an ethicist, covers ethical dilemmas that any engineer might encounter on the job, emphasizing the responsibility of a practicing engineer to act in an ethical manner. To illustrate the complexities involved, the authors present characters who encounter situations that test the engineering code of ethics. The dialogue between the characters highlights different perspectives of each dilemma. As they proceed through the book, students see how the code of ethics can help (...) in decision making, as well as the implications of various decisions. The philosophical theory that supports the ethical situations encountered is presented as boxed material following each section. Important Notice: Media content referenced within the product description or the product text may not be available in the ebook version. (shrink)

By the time of his death in 2006, Sir Peter Strawson was regarded as one of the world's most distinguished philosophers. Unavailable for many years,_ Scepticism and Naturalism_ is a profound reflection on two classic philosophical problems by a philosopher at the pinnacle of his career. Based on his acclaimed Woodbridge lectures delivered at Columbia University in 1983, Strawson begins with a discussion of scepticism, which he defines as questioning the adequacy of our grounds for holding various beliefs. He then (...) draws deftly on Hume and Wittgenstein to argue that we must distinguish between 'hard', scientific naturalism; or 'soft', humanistic naturalism. In the remaining chapters the author takes up several issues in which sceptical doubts play an important role, in particular the nature of transcendental arguments and including the objectivity of moral philosophy, the mental and the physical, and the existence of abstract entities. _Scepticism and Naturalism_ is essential reading for those seeking an introduction to the work of one of the twentieth century’s most important and original philosophers. This reissue includes a substantial new foreword by Quassim Cassam and a fascinating intellectual autobiography by Strawson, which together form an excellent introduction to his life and work. (shrink)

The Church, as an institution, has pioneered ground-breaking interventions, although some of these interventions were also a vehicle for imperial colonisation. Through its missionary activities, the Church has exercised such a form of power over its flock. This article intends to analyse the extent of the knowledge that pastors in Thulamela Municipality, Limpopo Province, have concerning HIV/AIDS and the prejudices associated with the illness. The article applies a qualitative approach in ascertaining the extent of such knowledge as well as the (...) pastoral approaches utilised. In this qualitative phenomenological study, the authors explored the knowledge of these pastors regarding HIV/AIDS. A semi-structured interview guide was used to direct the collection of data. Following thematic analysis, the knowledge of pastors regarding HIV/AIDS emerged as the theme of the study. The findings revealed that difficulties relating to providing pastoral care to people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWH) were exacerbated by a lack of knowledge and limited training offered to pastors. The article will further argue that there is a need for a partnership between the churches and public health services.Contribution: This article strives to expose biblical discourse exhibited by pastors because of a lack of theological formation and to suggest a way forward in collaborating the church as a religious institution and public health institution for combating HIV/AIDS. (shrink)

Do the ethical features of an artwork bear on its aesthetic value? This movie endorses misogyny, that song is a civil rights anthem, the clay constituting this statue was extracted with underpaid labor—are facts like these the proper bases for aesthetic evaluation? I argue that this debate has suffered from a false presupposition: that if the answer is yes (for at least some such ethical features), such considerations feature as pro tanto contributions to an artwork's overall aesthetic value, i.e., as (...) merits or flaws which make something have more or less overall aesthetic value. As the case of ethically laden, aesthetic evaluation makes clear, however, good aesthetic judgement is irreducibly multi-dimensional, e.g., "the movie has an engaging soundtrack, tasteful camera work, and takes a misogynistically prurient perspective on its female lead.'' Such a "non-summative" judgement refuses to reduce those various dimensions of aesthetic value to a single aggregate aesthetic evaluation, like "it's a 6/10" or "it's a pretty good movie!" I defend both the modest claim that such non-summative evaluations are not mistaken and the extremist claim that summative (i.e., unidimensional) aesthetic evaluation is defective by considering other domains of normative assessment in which summing seems inappropriate, notably including evaluations of people's character. (shrink)

Our aim in this entry is to articulate the state of the art in the moral psychology of personal identity. We begin by discussing the major philosophical theories of personal identity, including their shortcomings. We then turn to recent psychological work on personal identity and the self, investigations that often illuminate our person-related normative concerns. We conclude by discussing the implications of this psychological work for some contemporary philosophical theories and suggesting fruitful areas for future work on personal identity.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be (...) preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

The book offers an overview of experiences, theories and conceptions of time in the Graeco-Roman world. It presents the results of new research on neglected medical texts, relating to time management, aging and times of life, and the importance of t.

This volume presents twenty-two uncollected philosophical essays by Sir Peter Strawson, one of the leading philosophers of the second half of the twentieth century. The essays (two of them previously unpublished) are drawn from seven decades of work, from 1949 to 2003. They span the broad range of Strawson's work: metaphysics, epistemology, philosophical logic, philosophy of language, ethical theory, and history of philosophy, along with metaphilosophical reflections and intellectual autobiography.

The article compares the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change in terms of natural characteristics of the crisis triggers as well as of socio-political responses.

Do epistemic requirements vary along with facts about what promotes agents' well-being? Epistemic instrumentalists say 'yes', and thereby earn a lot of contempt. This contempt is a mistake on two counts. First, it is incorrectly based: the reasons typically given for it are misguided. Second, it fails to distinguish between first- and second-order epistemic instrumentalism; and, it happens, only the former is contemptible. In this book, Nathaniel P. Sharadin argues for rejecting epistemic instrumentalism as a first-order view not because it (...) suffers extensional failures, but because it suffers explanatory ones. By contrast, he argues that epistemic instrumentalism offers a natural, straightforward explanation of why being epistemically correct matters. What emerges is a second-order instrumentalist explanation for epistemic authority that is neutral between competing first-order epistemic theories. This neutrality is an advantage. But, drawing on work from cognitive science and psychology, Sharadin argues that instrumentalists can abandon that neutrality in order to adopt a view he calls epistemic ecologism. Epistemic Instrumentalism Explained will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working in epistemology, ethics, and philosophy of mind. (shrink)