A remarkable but little commented on feature of the various discourses on India circulating today is the near total absence of its metaphysical heritage as a source of illumination into our contemporary condition. On the few occasions that this heritage is explicitly invoked, it is either as a subsidiary aspect of some purportedly larger concept such as religion, civilization, history, tradition etc., or as a set of quaint speculations fit for study as a tertiary branch of history of philosophy or (...) religion but with little claim to political relevance. But is this neglect as innocent as it appears? Or might it be that the metaphysical heritage confronts us with the disavowed -- indeed the unthinkable that lurks behind our current obsessions: progress and development; modernity and tradition; faith and secularism; history and myth; fundamentalism and tolerance? The central claim of this book is that the metaphysical heritage has an autonomy and dignity of its own not subsumable under any other concept whatsoever; and that furthermore, our national self-understanding and its place in the current system of global knowledge are founded on a wholesale effacing of this heritage. The collective contention of the papers in this volume is that a full and proper understanding of our ever lengthening catalogue of social afflictions and pathologies demands that we squarely confront the consequences of this fateful evasion, no matter how unsettling it might be to our vaunted notions about ourselves. Only in and out of such a self-encounter can we hope to break out of our thralldom to the currently hegemonic vision of humanitys future -- a vision that is already bankrupt in every respect, but which nonetheless seems able to reproduce itself without end. (shrink)

Ekphrasis is familiar as a rhetorical tool for inducing enargeia, the vivid sense that a reader or listener is actually in the presence of the objects described. This book focuses on the ekphrastic techniques used in ancient Greek and Roman literature to describe technological artifacts. Since the literary discourse on technology extended beyond technical texts, this book explores 'technical ekphrasis' in a wide range of genres, including history, poetry, and philosophy as well as mechanical, scientific, and mathematical works. Technical authors (...) like Philo of Byzantium, Vitruvius, Hero of Alexandria, and Claudius Ptolemy are put into dialogue with close contemporaries in other genres, like Diodorus Siculus, Cicero, Ovid, and Aelius Theon. The treatment of 'technical ekphrasis' here covers the techniques of description, the interaction of verbal and visual elements, the role of instructions, and the balance between describing the artifact's material qualities and the other bodies of knowledge it evokes. (shrink)

This study used experimental and correlational techniques to examine perceptions that university faculty hold regarding the practice of professorial selling of examination textbooks to wholesalers. Faculty members (n = 236) from 14 universities and community colleges and a wide variety of academic disciplines responded to a web-based survey. We presented hypothetical selling situations to respondents with manipulated variables consisting of solicitation status (unsolicited versus solicited) and use of money (for faculty or for student activities). Both main effects and the interaction (...) effect were significant such that respondents perceived it to be more ethical to sell an examination book when the book was unsolicited and when the money was being used to fund student activities. The variable most correlated with faculty members' beliefs that book selling is ethical and the faculty members' self-reports of whether or not they have engaged in bookselling was how widespread the practice appeared to be on campus. About 30 percent of faculty members sold textbooks over the past year at a dollar value of about $80 per professor. About 38 percent of respondents reported they believed the practice to be generally ethical. Implications for business ethics theory, students' moral development, and advancement of on-campus codes of ethics policies are discussed along with avenues for future research. (shrink)

Frequently the literature on questions in the classroom supposes that teachers should ask high-level questions in order to get high-level thinking from students. Reversing this notion, this paper presents a method for structuring class discussion which helps students learn high-level questioning skills. The author articulates a typology of classroom conversations, arguing that the most desirable type is a “Problematical or Dialectical Discussion”. Characterized by “right answers” emerging as the most reasonable ideas that students work towards in discussion, the downside of (...) such discussions is they may result from a one-sided view of the issue or from a lack of student interest. In such cases, it is desirable to introduce alternative viewpoints into the discussion and the author argues that the best way to do this is the Devil’s Advocate approach. By asking students to argue against their own individual positions specifically, students learn to question their own views and thereby internalize the structure of communal, critical inquiry. The author argues that this method facilitates student autonomy, a key goal of education, since learning to ask the right questions allows students to become their own teachers. (shrink)

Frequently the literature on questions in the classroom supposes that teachers should ask high-level questions in order to get high-level thinking from students. Reversing this notion, this paper presents a method for structuring class discussion which helps students learn high-level questioning skills. The author articulates a typology of classroom conversations, arguing that the most desirable type is a “Problematical or Dialectical Discussion”. Characterized by “right answers” emerging as the most reasonable ideas that students work towards in discussion, the downside of (...) such discussions is they may result from a one-sided view of the issue or from a lack of student interest. In such cases, it is desirable to introduce alternative viewpoints into the discussion and the author argues that the best way to do this is the Devil’s Advocate approach. By asking students to argue against their own individual positions specifically, students learn to question their own views and thereby internalize the structure of communal, critical inquiry. The author argues that this method facilitates student autonomy, a key goal of education, since learning to ask the right questions allows students to become their own teachers. (shrink)

Journal Name: Apeiron Issue: Ahead of print.

Faculty members at Canadian business schools were surveyed regarding their ethical perceptions of behaviours related to undergraduate instruction. Fifty-five behavioural statements were listed and respondents were asked to rate the extent to which they felt each behaviour was ethical or unethical. The only item that respondents endorsed as unequivocally unethical (90% indicated it was definitely unethical) was Becoming sexually involved with an undergraduate in one of your classes. We also compared the results of our sample to those of an American (...) sample. Overall, an interesting pattern of differences emerged between the responses obtained in Canada and the U.S. In general, the direction of the significant differences was such that Canadian professors viewed the behaviours in question as less ethical than did their American counterparts. (shrink)

This article recalls the historical evolution of training in humanities and social sciences (SHS) in French engineering schools as that of the research’s implementation before presenting the current situation of HSS research in these schools. The progressive passage of the humanities in the HSS including the human training of the engineers does not have anything linear nor obvious, not more than are to it the links of schools with the university research. The committed efforts since the 1950’s to develop these (...) trainings, in spite of the renewal of the debates in 1990s very scarcely allowed thinking of the science and technique as human and social realities. In addition, the schools historical situation compared to that of the universities and their long opposition to the latter did not facilitate a research development in the schools. The disparity is strong today between the schools both as regard the training in HSS as the research in HSS which remain overall not very present, in spite of the challenges which interdisciplinary collaborations between HSS and sciences and technology of speciality take on. (shrink)

The focus of this Perspective article is on the comparison of two of the most popular initial applicant screening methods: Resumes and application forms. The viewpoint offered is that application forms are superior to resumes during the initial applicant screening stage of selection. This viewpoint is supported in part based on criterion-related validity evidence that favors application forms over resumes. For example, the biographical data inventory, which can contain similar questions to those used in application forms, is one of the (...) most valid predictors of job performance, whereas job experience and years of education, which are often inferred from resumes and cover letters, are two of the least valid predictors of job performance. In addition to validity evidence, making decisions based on application forms as opposed to resumes is likely to help organizations defend against claims of discriminatory hiring while enhancing their ability to hire in a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive manner. For example, applicant names on resumes can lead to screening bias against members of identifiable subgroups, whereas an applicant’s name can be easily and automatically hidden from decision-makers when reviewing application forms. Despite these convincing arguments focused on applicant quality and diversity, a substantial research–practice gap regarding the use of resumes and cover letters remains. (shrink)

Behaving ethically depends on the ability to recognize that ethical issues exist, to see from an ethical point of view. This ability to see and respond ethically may be related more to attributes of corporate culture than to attributes of individual employees. Efforts to increase ethical standards and decrease pressure to behave unethically should therefore concentrate on the organization and its culture. The purpose of this paper is to discuss how total quality (TQ) techniques can facilitate the development of a (...) cooperative corporate culture that promotes and encourages ethical behavior throughout an organization. (shrink)

A survey of 830 faculty members at 89 AASCB-accredited business schools throughout the United States was conducted in Fall 2002 to develop a snapshot of perceptions of ethical and unethical conduct with regard to undergraduate business instruction across a wide range of business disciplines. These behaviors fell into such categories as course content, evaluation of students, educational environment, disrespectful behavior, research and publication issues, financial and material transactions, social relationships with students, and sexual relationships with students and other faculty. Of (...) the 55 behaviors, two were almost universally perceived to be unethical. Eight behaviors were controversial in that there was wide variance on whether the behavior was perceived to be unethical. In addition, females' ethical perceptions differed significantly from males on three behaviors; older participants differed from younger participants on seven behaviors; participants at research-oriented institutions differed from participants at teaching-oriented institutions on one behavior; and tenured, untenured tenure-track, and untenured non-tenure-track participants differed on three behaviors. The findings of this study and the detailed comments of the respondents provide a starting point for discussing more systematic means to consider ethical issues within collegiate schools of business. (shrink)

This study used experimental and correlational techniques to examine perceptions that university faculty hold regarding the practice of professorial selling of examination textbooks to wholesalers. Faculty members (n = 236) from 14 universities and community colleges and a wide variety of academic disciplines responded to a web-based survey. We presented hypothetical selling situations to respondents with manipulated variables consisting of solicitation status (unsolicited versus solicited) and use of money (for faculty or for student activities). Both main effects and the interaction (...) effect were significant such that respondents perceived it to be more ethical to sell an examination book when the book was unsolicited and when the money was being used to fund student activities. The variable most correlated with faculty members' beliefs that book selling is ethical and the faculty members' self-reports of whether or not they have engaged in bookselling was how widespread the practice appeared to be on campus. About 30 percent of faculty members sold textbooks over the past year at a dollar value of about $80 per professor. About 38 percent of respondents reported they believed the practice to be generally ethical. Implications for business ethics theory, students' moral development, and advancement of on-campus codes of ethics policies are discussed along with avenues for future research. (shrink)

This article presents a discussion about using one’s body – in its several occurrences, forms and meanings – for sex, affection and money transactions, within and beyond the scope of prostitution. It results from research carried out with young women involved in prostitution in two Brazilian north-eastern towns. The women’s views, conceptualisations and experiences reveal a prolific construction of discursive differentiation categories, which are linked to a set of moralities within local/regional economies and within notions of family. Through the women’s (...) personal narratives and experiences, our study demystifies the persistent idea of victimisation; it aims at understanding the young women prostitutes in their own contexts – loci that are highly stigmatised and seen as needing to be controlled or ‘developed’. We collected data that allows us to build a counter-discourse to oppose the ever-present attempts at weakening these voices and effacing their meaning-making. Within this context of knowledge production, our research is meaningful and purposeful in addressing the situation of young women in contexts of prostitution. Our main argument is that in certain contexts, such as those studied in this project, sex, affection and kinship are structured as normative – rather than exceptional – ways for women to have access to money. (shrink)

There are three main types of atonement, namely the ‘classic’ type where Christ is a Victor, the ‘Latin’ type where Christ is satisfaction and the type of ‘humanism’ in which God is Love. These three types contain language of violence. However, the most striking language of violence is the ‘Latin’ type, where God is seen as the Angry one, who is thirsty for blood and asking to be satisfied. The sacrifice of redemption is seen as the idea of ‘bribe to (...) God’. Some theologians reject this idea and look for other alternatives. This article aims to find other alternatives while maintaining the idea of redemption sacrifice. The author uses a Jewish perspective in reading the Bible. From the entire Bible metanarrative, the authors construct the theory of atonement by focusing on the idea of Besorat Hageulah, the Gospel of redemption. On the cross is the sacrifice for redemption that expresses God’s justice and love. The bloodshed on the cross is not to satisfy God, who is angry, but as a sign of God’s love for humans according to the demands of justice ‘life shall go for life’ (KJV, Dt 19:21).Contribution: This article is interdisciplinary in the sense that it touches on issues such as redemption, mercy and peace. In this article, the author has shown how redemption brings peace and love. The implication is in the life of the nation and state as God’s creatures. (shrink)

This study examines the shame that drives the rite of confession of guilt and sin in the Toraja tradition and then dialogues with the Christian faith. In this study, a qualitative research method was used with an ethnographic approach. Observations and interviews were conducted with figures who knew the topic. The results show that Toraja people experience collective shame when community members commit moral violations. A sense of shame before others or social shame is felt. However, spiritual shame is an (...) aspect that cannot be ignored. Behind the social violations, there are efforts to interpret the relationship with God (Toraja language, Puang Matua), which needs to be brought back to lead people to repentance. Contribution: This article combines tradition and theology, particularly missional and contextual theology. The results of this study are expected to increase the efforts of each respondent to interpret God in every social violation committed to lead people to repentance. (shrink)

Pomiędzy filozofią a resztą kultury rośnie przepaść. Podczas gdy filozofowie są całkowicie przekonani o ważności swojej dziedziny i doniosłości tego, co się w niej robi – jej pytań, jej argumentacji, jej odpowiedzi, jej wynalazków pojęciowych, jej błyskotliwych idei, to niefilozofowie coraz powszechniej ważność tę kwestionują, w doniosłość powątpiewają, argumentacji nie cenią, błyskotliwości nie dostrzegają i w ogóle nie pojmują o co cały ambaras. Wszak filozofia drwa nie narąbie, wirusów z komputera nie usunie, cen w sklepach nie obniży, w rubryce „patenty (...) i wdrożenia” napisze „brak”. Zapytajmy więc: po co naszej kulturze filozofowanie? Nie filozofowie i nie instytuty filozoficznych badań i kształcenia filozoficznego, ale właśnie – filozofowanie. Żeby odpowiedzieć na takie pytanie, potrzeba nie tylko filozofii, ale także dobrych narzędzi z innych dziedzin nauki. Trzeba zapytać, jakiego rodzaju grą kulturową jest filozofowanie? Ilu z nas w nią gra? I co się wtedy dzieje? Czy filozofujemy na co dzień, czy tylko od święta? Niniejsza książka ani nie popularyzuje, ani nie przybliża tego, co robią filozofowie. Zamiast tego prowadzi Czytelników od rozmów w pociągach do teorii czerpanych z filozofii i socjologii wiedzy, od lektury nagłówków prasowych do teorii kultury, od obrazów epidemii i biografii Spinozy do studiów nad nauką. Stara się przy tym na pytania wyżej postawione jak najogólniej odpowiedzieć, a przepaść zasypać, pokazać przy tym, że filozofia od swego kulturowego otoczenia nie jest i nigdy nie była odizolowana. Przeciwnie, filozofowanie tak bardzo i w tak licznych miejscach w tkankę kultury wrosło, że bez niego tkanka ta porozrywałaby się na strzępy, że dla kultury współczesnej filozofowanie w najrozmaitszych przejawach jest czymś koniecznym, jest warunkiem trwania, życia i rozwoju. (shrink)

W artykule O wątpliwej moralności pewnych rozpowszechnionych form modlitwy Saul Smi- lansky rekonstruuje założenia moralnie niedopuszczalnej modlitwy. Założenia te dotyczą sposobu, w jaki Bóg wysłuchuje próśb modlących się ludzi, moralnego poziomu bóstwa i tych, którzy się modlą, a także natury relacji między modlitwą a wysłuchaniem jej przez Boga. W niniejszym artykule, podaję powody, dla których uważam, iż dokonana przez niego rekonstrukcja nie jest poprawna. Argumentuję, że niedopuszczalna moralnie modlitwa, o jakiej pisze Smilansky, w ogóle nie jest możliwa. Wskazanych przez niego (...) założeń nie da się odnaleźć wśród założeń faktycznie modlących się ludzi. Nawet gdyby dało się je odnaleźć, niemożliwe jest ich łączne występowanie. Każdy, kto się modli, robi tym samym coś dobrego. Krytyka Smilansky’ego skierowana jest przeciwko czemuś, co faktycznie nie istnieje i nie może istnieć, dlatego nie dostarcza powodów, dla których należałoby uznać za niedopuszczalną jakąkolwiek modlitwę. (shrink)

In the whole theory of the Latin tenses there is no more popular item than this explanation by Roby of the use of the pluperfect indicative in unreal conditional sentences. Far the most familiar instance is that in Horace , ‘me truncus illapsus cerebro sustulerat, nisi Faunus ictum dextra leuasset.’.

Investigations apropos of the passage in Ovid to which we shall ultimately come have revealed that one kind of Latin genitive at least is still far from satisfactorily charted by authorities more eminent even than M'Turk. This is the genitive of material. More often than not grammarians and commentators do not distinguish this usage from the genitive of definition. So for instance at Ovid, Met. 3. 315 the phrase lactis alimenta is identified by Bomer ad loc. and by H. J. (...) Roby , ii. § 1302) as genitive of definition. This is correct as far as it goes, in the sense that lactis defines the alimenta; but the definition is what they were made of, their material. So again at Met. I. III flumina iam lactis, iam ftumina nectaris ibant the rivers consisted of milk and nectar. This passage, however, was classified by J. N. Madvig , p. 249) under expressions involving number, measure or quantity. This is not unreasonable, but Madvig's examples illustrate the need for care in drawing the line. They include, for instance, aceruus frumenti and uini tres amphorae. Now a heap may be thought of as containing its constituents, but it also consists o/them, which is not true of a vessel and its contents. Thus, though there is some semantic justification for including both these expressions, as Madvig did, under the ‘measure or quantity’ rubric, they are nevertheless grammatically distinct. The fluidity of the borderlines in this area is evident also in flumina lactis, an undeniable genitive of material which is, however, clearly analogous to a not uncommon class of expressions such as riuus/fons aquae, lapidum imber, uolumina fumi, campus harenae, silicum uenae, δατος ος, κρνη δατος, ργρου πηγ, etc., in which the notion of quantity as well as composition is present. (shrink)

Investigations apropos of the passage in Ovid to which we shall ultimately come have revealed that one kind of Latin genitive at least is still far from satisfactorily charted by authorities more eminent even than M'Turk. This is the genitive of material. More often than not grammarians and commentators do not distinguish this usage from the genitive of definition. So for instance at Ovid, Met. 3. 315 the phrase lactis alimenta is identified by Bomer ad loc. and by H. J. (...) Roby, ii. § 1302) as genitive of definition. This is correct as far as it goes, in the sense that lactis defines the alimenta; but the definition is what they were made of, their material. So again at Met. I. III flumina iam lactis, iam ftumina nectaris ibant the rivers consisted of milk and nectar. This passage, however, was classified by J. N. Madvig, p. 249) under expressions involving number, measure or quantity. This is not unreasonable, but Madvig's examples illustrate the need for care in drawing the line. They include, for instance, aceruus frumenti and uini tres amphorae. Now a heap may be thought of as containing its constituents, but it also consists o/them, which is not true of a vessel and its contents. Thus, though there is some semantic justification for including both these expressions, as Madvig did, under the ‘measure or quantity’ rubric, they are nevertheless grammatically distinct. The fluidity of the borderlines in this area is evident also in flumina lactis, an undeniable genitive of material which is, however, clearly analogous to a not uncommon class of expressions such as riuus/fons aquae, lapidum imber, uolumina fumi, campus harenae, silicum uenae, ὔδατος ῥος, κρνη ὔδατος, ργρου πηγ, etc., in which the notion of quantity as well as composition is present. (shrink)

Teksty są co najmniej w dwójnasób transcendentne. Z jednej strony poprzez język, tworzywo tekstu, który konstytuując się w diachronii i funkcjonując w synchronii, transcenduje – żeby użyć sformułowania Karla Jaspersa – przeszłą rzeczywistość w postaci powstałych wtedy znaków i ich znaczeń w nieznaną z tamtej perspektywy przyszłość, a więc i w naszą teraźniejszość. Z drugiej zaś istniejące już teksty wchodzą z sobą w interakcję, co powoduje, że tworzą się niejako hiperteksty w czasie i w przestrzeni. Jest jeszcze i trzeci wymiar (...) – to autor tekstu i czytelnik, którym tekst pozwala – jak mówi Gerhard Kurz – wyjść „poza siebie”, bo tylko wtedy odczuwamy potrzebę powrotu do „własnego ja”, odrzucając po drodze kolejną maskę. W artykule pokazano to na przykładzie tekstów Franza Kafki. Spośród wielu poruszonych tam wątków ograniczmy się tutaj jedynie do toposu syren, które zniewalały żeglarzy swym śpiewem. U Kafki syreny już definitywnie nie śpiewają, wobec czego Odyseusz niepotrzebnie kazał zatykać sobie uszy woskiem. Kafka stawia tylko kropkę nad i, bo już i we wcześniejszej literaturze niemieckiej ten śpiew cichł coraz bardziej. I tak w znanej pieśni Heinego Loreley poeta już nie jest pewny skuteczności śpiewu syren – on jedynie chce w to wierzyć: „Wierzę, że fale w końcu pochłoną i żeglarza i łódź”. Bo w czasach nihilizmu śpiew – i sztuka w ogóle – traci swą moc. W balladzie Rybak Goethego syrena wprawdzie jeszcze tryumfuje, ale to nie za sprawą śpiewu. Śpiew bowiem dominuje w drugiej zwrotce, natomiast rybak pogrąża się w odmętach morza dopiero w czwartej zwrotce, gdzie dominuje perswazja słowna. Ta inwersja – notabene brak jej w polskim tłumaczeniu Hanny Januszewskiej w Dziełach wybranych J. W. Goethego – nie mogła być u Goethego przypadkowa: symbolizuje ona typową dla lustrzanego odbicia odwróconą proporcję – rybak tak naprawdę ujrzał własne odbicie w wodzie, biorąc je za postać syreny. Śmierć w odmętach morza była ceną za brak samowiedzy. Nie darmo zatem napis na świątyni Apollina w Delfach głosił: „Γνῶθι σεαυτόν – Poznaj samego siebie”. (shrink)