Based on specific documentary evidence, historian Lionel Jensen reveals how 16th- and 17th-century Western missionaries used translations of the ancient RU ...

Two currently much discussed views about truth, truth pluralism and truth relativism, are found in Sellars’s writings. I show that his motivations for adoping these views are interestingly different from those shared by most of their recent advocates. First, I explain how Sellars comes to embrace a version of truth pluralism. I argue that his version overcomes a difficulty confronting pluralists, albeit at a serious cost. Then I argue that Sellars’s truth pluralism isn’t motivated by his interest in domains of (...) discourse beyond the “matter-of-factual.” Rather, the key to his truth pluralism, his analysis of truth as “semantical assertibility,” is motivated by the same consideration that leads him to adopt truth relativism. This is his interest in applying semantic notions to discourse that embodies conceptual structures other than ours. Despite their common motivation, I conclude that Sellars’s relativism is independent of, and indeed stands in tension with, the analysis of truth that underlies his pluralism. (shrink)

Surveys Western literature and thought to reveal the evolution of the ideals of sincerity and authenticity.

This important collection of essays includes Professor Hart's first defense of legal positivism; his discussion of the distinctive teaching of American and Scandinavian jurisprudence; an examination of theories of basic human rights and the notion of "social solidarity," and essays on Jhering, Kelsen, Holmes, and Lon Fuller.

El método de la “libre investigación científica del derecho” propuesto por François Gény ha marcado toda una generación de juristas. Tratado con detenimiento a lo largo de su extensa y compleja obra, la libre investigación científica se presenta como un método completo destinado a orientar al jurista en la creación, interpretación y aplicación del derecho positivo. Por desventura, el clima ambiente en el que nació su obra y en el que tuvo que desenvolverse con posterioridad, dominado por la escuela de (...) la exégesis, no ha sabido extraer de la obra de Gény más que elementos dispares no haciendo justicia a su método. En la actualidad, el redescubrimiento de su método de la libre investigación científica permitirá combatir el anquilosamiento dogmático, evitar los excesos formalistas, y aportar elementos de interés para la investigación iusfilosófica de nuestro tiempo. El método de la “libre investigación científica del derecho” propuesto por François Gény ha marcado toda una generación de juristas. Tratado con detenimiento a lo largo de su extensa y compleja obra, la libre investigación científica se presenta como un método completo destinado a orientar al jurista en la creación, interpretación y aplicación del derecho positivo. Por desventura, el clima ambiente en el que nació su obra y en el que tuvo que desenvolverse con posterioridad, dominado por la escuela de la exégesis, no ha sabido extraer de la obra de Gény más que elementos dispares no haciendo justicia a su método. En la actualidad, el redescubrimiento de su método de la libre investigación científica permitirá combatir el anquilosamiento dogmático, evitar los excesos formalistas, y aportar elementos de interés para la investigación iusfilosófica de nuestro tiempo. (shrink)

Current empirical evidence does not seem to confirm that an improvement in living conditions is the cause of the shift in the human mindset toward innovation and long-term risky investment. However, it may well be one of the conditions for greater tolerance of income inequality in exchange for a steady increase in average income.

Laborie and Hessayon bring rare prophetic and millenarian texts to an international audience by presenting sources from all over Europe (broadly defined), and across the early modern period in English for the first time.

Respublica literaria, eller de lärdes republik, är ett begrepp som framför allt förknippas med de nya former för vetenskaplig kommunikation och lärda nätverk som introducerades vid slutet av 1600-talet och som sedan kom att spela en betydelsefull roll i 1700-talets intellektuella värld. Denna tänkta gemenskap av lärda är central för vår förståelse av den tidigmoderna epokens idé-, kultur- och vetenskapshistoria. Lärdomsrepubliken var ett ideal för de lärdas verksamhet, ett slags kunskapsproducerandets utopi, där den ideala kommunikationen präglades av jämlikhet, rationalitet och (...) filosofisk frihet, ofta i tydlig och uttalad kontrast mot en mer krass verklighet där de lärdas gemenskap tvärtom byggdes på en grundval av politiska, ideologiska, ekonomiska och religiösa intressen. I Lärda samtal behandlas vitt skilda aspekter av begreppet respublica literaria, dess kommunikation och dess materialitet: det handlar om den lärda republikens statsskick, de lärdas institutioner och praktiker, seder och bruk, uppfostran genom samtal, kvinnors och barns plats i republiken, och mycket mer. Boken är en festskrift till Erland Sellberg, professor i idéhistoria vid Stockholms universitet. (shrink)

Dans cet article, nous analysons comment et dans quelle mesure les changements dans les modalités d’allocation des financements publics génèrent des transformations dans les pratiques, les temporalités et l’organisation de la recherche en histoire. Face aux deux thèses qui s’affrontent autour de cette problématique, l’une soutenant l’hypothèse de la déprofessionnalisation et de la perte d’autonomie des chercheurs, et l’autre celle d’une recomposition de la profession académique, le travail d’enquête réalisé dans trois laboratoires d’histoire en France montre qu’il n’y a pas (...) de modèle unique d’adaptation des équipes et des chercheurs par rapport à la montée en puissance des financements sur projet (FSP). La prise en compte du niveau organisationnel, avec ses spécificités contextuelles, se révèle essentielle pour saisir les modalités d’ajustement des laboratoires et des chercheurs face au renforcement des mécanismes de contractualisation. Par ailleurs, contrairement aux disciplines nécessitant des dispositifs expérimentaux coûteux, le niveau plus modeste des ressources mobilisées pour la conduite des recherches en histoire permet plus facilement aux historiens d’adopter une position de repli face aux FSP. Cette posture est également renforcée par le système de reconnaissance de la qualité académique propre au champ historiographique qui accorde une importance particulière au travail individuel et à l’investissement de longue durée. (shrink)

This book presents an approach to spirituality based on direct personal experience of the sacred. Using the language and insights of depth psychology, Corbett outlines the intimate relationship between spiritual experience and the psychology of the individual, unveiling the seamless continuity between the personal and transpersonal dimensions of the psyche. His discussion runs the gamut of spiritual concerns, from the problem of evil to the riddle of pain and suffering. Drawing upon his psychotherapeutic practice as well as on the experiences (...) of characters from our religious heritage, Corbett explores the various portals through which the sacred presents itself to us: dreams, visions, nature, the body, relationships, psychopathology, and creative work. Referring extensively to Jung's writings on religion, but also to contemporary psychoanalytic theory, Corbett gives form to the new spirituality that is emerging alongside the world's great religious traditions. For those seeking alternative forms of spirituality beyond the Judeo-Christian tradition, this volume will be a useful guide on the journey. (shrink)

According to metaphysical coherentism, grounding relations form an interconnected system in which things ground each other and nothing is ungrounded. This potentially viable view’s logical territory remains largely unexplored. In this paper, I describe that territory by articulating four varieties of metaphysical coherentism. I do not argue for any variety in particular. Rather, I aim to show that not all issues which might be raised against coherentism will be equally problematic for all the versions of that view, which features far (...) more nuance and diversity than is typically ascribed to it. (shrink)

Wikipedia est devenue en quelques années un outil de diffusion d'informations scientifiques de premier plan, utilisé par élèves, professeurs et chercheurs (parmi ces derniers, un sur dix reconnaît y contribuer). Malgré un système d'édition relativement complexe, le ' wiki de la connaissance ' a gagné en popularité (15 millions d'articles, 270 langues, 100 000 contributeurs bénévoles). On en sait davantage sur son fonctionnement : son taux d'erreur factuel est relativement similaire à celui de l'encyclopédie payante Britannica ; les articles sont (...) souvent rédigés par un petit nombre de contributeurs (5 % des contributeurs sont à l'origine de 90 % du contenu) ; une série d'' administrateurs ' jouent les pompiers ou les gendarmes, non sans s'attirer les foudres d'une partie des contributeurs ; dynamique communautaire et positionnement identitaire sont les deux motivations principales pour contribuer ; les sources scientifiques sont d'autant plus citées dans Wikipedia qu'elles le sont déjà dans le monde scientifique (le ' facteur d'impact ' est involontairement reproduit)... Comparée à ses concurrents, Citizendium et Knol, l'encyclopédie contributive se démarque par son développement insolent, mais l'éventualité d'une stabilisation du nombre d'articles (on assiste aujourd'hui à une sorte de plafonnement) laisse imaginer qu'à l'avenir les contributeurs se concentreront davantage sur la qualité des articles. (shrink)

Der Band enthält Beiträge von Medizinern, Juristen, Philosophen und Naturwissenschaftlern aus Estland, Polen, den Niederlanden und Deutschland zu Themen der Ethik und Wissenschaftstheorie der Medizin. Diese Beiträge sind im Rahmen des «Arbeitskreises für Ethik und Wissenschaftstheorie der Medizin in Ostmitteleuropa» entstanden, der auf einer Kooperationsvereinbarung des Interdisziplinären Zentrums für Ethik der Europa-Universität Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder) und des Instituts für Geschichte und Ethik der Medizin der Universität Halle-Wittenberg beruht. Sie befassen sich u. a. mit der Gesundheitsreform in Polen, Tschechien und Ungarn, (...) mit ethischen Problemen bei Abtreibung, HIV-Infektion, Drogenkonsum, Sterbehilfe und Gentechnik sowie dem Theorie-Praxis-Verhältnis in der Medizin. (shrink)

Building on recent work, I present sequent systems for the non-classical logics LP, K3, and FDE with two main virtues. First, derivations closely resemble those in standard Gentzen-style systems. Second, the systems can be obtained by reformulating a classical system using nonstandard sequent structure and simply removing certain structural rules (relatives of exchange and contraction). I clarify two senses in which these logics count as “substructural.”.

ABSTRACT:‘Race’ has long searched for a stable, suitable idea, with no consensus on a master meaning in sight. What I call deflationary pluralism about the existence of race recognizes that various meanings may be true as far as they go but avoids murky disputes over whether there are races in some sense. Once we have rejected the notion that racial essences yield innate cognitive differences, there is little point to arguing over the race idea. In its place, I propose the (...) idea of socioancestry, which jettisons racial thinking yet recognizes the social dynamics of color. For example, Black Americans, many of whom have traceable non-African ancestry, constitute an Africa-identified, socioancestrally black subgroup. ‘Race’ talk is not needed to sustain legitimate color-conscious approaches to social identity and social justice. Long-standing fixation on the race idea has obscured the simple truth that visible continental ancestry is the root of the social reality of color consciousness. (shrink)

Development of the shapes of living organisms and their parts is a field of science in which there are no generally accepted theoretical principles. What form these principles are likely to take, when they emerge, is a subject in which there is a wide gulf of disagreement between physical scientists and experimental biologists. This book contains both an extensive philosophical commentary on this dichotomy in views and an exposition of the type of theory most favoured by physical scientists. In this (...) theory living form is a manifestation of the dynamics of chemical change and physical transport or other physics of spatial communication. The reaction-diffusion theory, as initiated by Turing in 1952 and since elaborated by Prigogine and by Gierer and Meinhardt among others, is discussed in detail at a level that requires a good knowledge of a first course in calculus, but no more than that. The great growth of molecular biology has tended to overshadow the increase in our understanding of the nature of these kinetic processes. This book seeks to reawaken interest in dynamics in the hope that a better balance between the importance of things and the importance of actions may emerge in the biology of the 21st century. (shrink)

Deflationists about truth seek to undermine debates about the nature of truth by arguing that the truth predicate is merely a device that allows us to express a certain kind of generality. I argue that a parallel approach is available in the case of logical consequence. Just as deflationism about truth offers an alternative to accounts of truth's nature in terms of correspondence or justification, deflationism about consequence promises an alternative to model-theoretic or proof-theoretic accounts of consequence's nature. I then (...) argue, against considerations put forward by Field and Beall, that Curry's paradox no more rules out deflationism about consequence than the liar paradox rules out deflationism about truth. (shrink)

Representing the thinking of philosophers, psychologists, sociologists, coaches, and sports writers, these essays bring together a wide range of approaches to ...

The revisionary approach to semantic paradox is commonly thought to have a somewhat uncomfortable corollary, viz. that, on pain of triviality, we cannot affirm that all valid arguments preserve truth (Beall2007, Beall2009, Field2008, Field2009). We show that the standard arguments for this conclusion all break down once (i) the structural rule of contraction is restricted and (ii) how the premises can be aggregated---so that they can be said to jointly entail a given conclusion---is appropriately understood. In addition, we briefly rehearse (...) some reasons for restricting structural contraction. (shrink)

En affirmant que "tout philosophe a deux philosophies : la sienne et celle de Spinoza", Bergson exprime avant tout que le philosophe se doit de rompre avec une pensée dogmatique qui n'a plus lieu d'être et que Spinoza incarne tout particulièrement. Le spinozisme manifeste la pente de l'intelligence lorsqu'elle suit sa logique propre sans être rectifiée par le recours à l'expérience. Or, c'est cette démarche systématique que la philosophie doit désormais abandonner. Bergson est néanmoins hanté par la pensée de Spinoza (...) et le rapport qu'il entretient avec lui, en particulier dans ses cours au Collège de France, met en évidence un lien bien plus complexe et subtil qu'un simple rapport d'opposition. Contre la tendance à la clôture et à la systématicité, Bergson va alors privilégier chez Spinoza la tendance à l'ouverture et au mysticisme. En mettant en lumière cet aspect, cet ouvrage montre la sympathie intellectuelle qui réunit ces penseurs autour des notions de joie et de liberté. C'est pourquoi la figure du Christ va constituer un modèle non seulement éthique mais ontologique. Le terme de mysticisme, chez ces deux auteurs, ne désigne ni le refus de l'expérience ni celui des sciences positives mais renvoie à un rationalisme élargi jusqu'à l'amour du réel."--Page 4 of cover. (shrink)

L’objectif, éminemment politique, de cet ouvrage est de proposer pour 2012 une alternative aux programmes court-termistes et consensuels qui pourraient être développés par les candidats lors de la campagne officielle pour les élections présidentielles. Il vise à offrir une perspective de long terme de ce à quoi la société pourrait ressembler d’ici trente à cinquante ans si nous prenons un véritable virage écologique et humain et si nous opérons un changement concret de paradigme. Si, ces dernières années, un grand nombre (...) d’ouvrages et de films ont dénoncé les pires crises que traverse l’humanité, si d’autres se sont évertués à mettre en lumière des alternatives, force est de constater que très peu se sont attelés à la tâche d’offrir une vision articulée, écologique et positive de l’avenir. Loin des “yaka-fokon” et des déclarations d’intention pleines de bonne volonté, cet ouvrage met en lumière des solutions qui ont fait leur preuve, à petite comme à grande échelle, dans la plupart des domaines de la société. Pour chaque thématique, une personnalité “experte”, ayant développé une vision du sujet - voire souvent conduit ou observé une expérimentation -, propose en quelques pages des voies de transition concrètes, ainsi que les moyens à disposition de tous, qu’ils soient citoyens, élus ou entrepreneurs, pour les mettre en action. Chacune de ces propositions s’appuie sur un “cas pratique” : un exemple concluant mené à l’échelle d’un territoire européen (canton, département, région...). Au-delà d’une simple compilation, ces propositions sont mises en relation comme un véritable projet de société. (shrink)

This study clarifies the need for a renewed account of the body in physiotherapy to fill sizable gaps between physiotherapeutical theory and practice. Physiotherapists are trained to approach bodily functioning from an objectivist perspective; however, their therapeutic interactions with patients are not limited to the provision of natural-scientific explanations. Physiotherapists’ practice corresponds well to theorisation of the body as the bearer of original bodily intentionality, as outlined by Merleau-Ponty and elaborated upon by enactivists. We clarify how physiotherapeutical practice corroborates Merleau-Ponty’s (...) critical arguments against objectivist interpretations of the body; particularly, his analyses demonstrate that norms of optimal corporeal functioning are highly individual and variable in time and thus do not directly depend on generic physiological structures. In practice, objectively measurable physical deviations rarely correspond to specific subjective difficulties and, similarly, patients’ reflective insights into their own motor deficiencies do not necessarily produce meaningful motor improvements. Physiotherapeutical procedures can be understood neither as mechanical manipulations of patients’ machine-like bodies by experts nor as a process of such manipulation by way of instructing patients’ explicit conscious awareness. Rather, physiotherapeutical practice and theory can benefit from the philosophical interpretation of motor disorders as modifications of bodily intentionality. Consequently, motor performances addressed in physiotherapy are interpreted as relational features of a living organism coupled with its environment, and motor disorders are approached as failures to optimally manage the motor requirements of a given situation owing to a relative loss of the capacity to structure one’s relation with their environment through motor action. Building on this, we argue that the process of physiotherapy is most effective when understood as a bodily interaction to guide patients towards discovering better ways of grasping a situation as meaningful through bodily postures and movements. (shrink)

According to commitment accounts of assertion, asserting is committing oneself to something’s being the case, where such commitment is understood in terms of norms governing a social practice. I elaborate and compare two version of such accounts, liability accounts (associated with C.S. Peirce) and dialectical norm accounts (associated with Robert Brandom), concluding that the latter are more defensible. I argue that both versions of commitment account possess a potential advantage over rival normative accounts of assertion in that they needn’t presuppose (...) any notion of an assertion’s correctness. Additionally, I show how dialectical norm accounts can explain relations between assertion and truth. After setting forth objections that have been raised against commitment accounts, I argue that responses are available on behalf of dialectical norm accounts. Finally, I propose that a liberalized dialectical norm account can illuminate phenomena sometimes seen as supporting truth relativism. (shrink)

Innocence is a notion that can prove controversial. Claims of innocence typically support not imposing burdens on the innocent when their conduct is relevantly unobjectionable. This paper examines innocence in the context of violent conflict between states or groups. Many thinkers about the morality of such violence want to establish a principle that would protect innocent civilians. Yet the common view in just war theory does not affirm the moral innocence of civilians. Similarly, the common view that soldiers have an (...) equal right to kill does not affirm their equal moral culpability. (shrink)

Although a great deal of attention has been paid to the history of intellectual property in Great Britain, very little has been said about the history of intellectual property law in the British colonies. This Article attempts an overview, focusing on the nineteenth century. The author argues that there was no apparent imperial strategy as to the development of colonial intellectual property laws, and that, as a consequence wide variations existed between the laws operative in Britain and the colonies. One (...) exception to this picture existed in relation to literary copyright, where, for reasons that were never clearly articulated, British law had been extended to its colonies from 1814. The overall picture was otherwise one of "legal fecundity," with capacity for variation and experiment by the colonial legislatures constrained more by internalized notions of what was appropriate than by formal, external, limitations imposed from Britain. However, towards the end of the nineteenth century, there appeared a growing desire both in Great Britain, and amongst many of the colonies and self-governing dominions, for a greater level of uniformity. (shrink)

Can we ever experimentally disentangle phenomenal consciousness from the cognitive accessibility inherent to conscious reports? In this commentary, we suggest that (1) Block's notion of phenomenal consciousness remains intractably entangled with the need to obtain subjective reports about it; and (2) many experimental paradigms suggest that the intuitive notion of a rich but non-reportable phenomenal world is, to a large extent illusory – in a sense that requires clarification.

This introductory chapter attempts to clarify the philosophical, empirical, and theoretical bases on which a cognitive neuroscience approach to consciousness can be founded. We isolate three major empirical observations that any theory of consciousness should incorporate, namely (1) a considerable amount of processing is possible without consciousness, (2) attention is a prerequisite of consciousness, and (3) consciousness is required for some specific cognitive tasks, including those that require durable information maintenance, novel combinations of operations, or the spontaneous generation of intentional (...) behavior. We then propose a theoretical framework that synthesizes those facts: the hypothesis of a global neuronal workspace. This framework postulates that, at any given time, many modular cerebral networks are active in parallel and process information in an unconscious manner. An information becomes conscious, however, if the neural population that represents it is mobilized by top-down attentional amplification into a brain-scale state of coherent activity that involves many neurons distributed throughout the brain. The long-distance connectivity of these `workspace neurons' can, when they are active for a minimal duration, make the information available to a variety of processes including perceptual categorization, long-term memorization, evaluation, and intentional action. We postulate that this global availability of information through the workspace is what we subjectively experience as a conscious state. A complete theory of consciousness should explain why some cognitive and cerebral representations can be permanently or temporarily inaccessible to consciousness, what is the range of possible conscious contents, how they map onto specific cerebral circuits, and whether a generic neuronal mechanism underlies all of them. We confront the workspace model with those issues and identify novel experimental predictions. Neurophysiological, anatomical, and brain-imaging data strongly argue for a major role of prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate, and the areas that connect to them, in creating the postulated brain-scale workspace. (shrink)