The Issue of Abortion in America is an interactive multi-media CD-ROM created by the award winning Carnegie Mellon team that brought us A Right to Die?: The Dax Cowart Case. In this ground breaking CD-ROM, The Issue of Abortion in America gives users an opportunity to see and hear women and couples speak of the emotional struggles and moral dilemmas they face in their consideration of continuing or terminating a pregnancy. It also places the issue of abortion in the (...) larger social context of medical, legal, philosophical, and religious considerations. The information on the CD is presented in three student friendly sections: * Introduction: offers an introduction to the project as well as an overview of the program. * Case Histories: a set of interactive multimedia modules present situations in which women and couples describe their decisions to continue or terminate a pregnancy. * Resources: Reviews the background context that informs the discussion of the issue of abortion in America along with a summary section of the case histories. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The phrase “Enlightenment rhetoric” typically denotes discourses bent on rejecting classical oratorical styles in favor of purportedly scientific ones. Likewise, scholars often associate Enlightenment rhetorical styles with the scientific epistemologies that emerged in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This article reconsiders Enlightenment rhetoric by analyzing David Hume’s 1742 essay “Of Eloquence.” More specifically, the article argues that the Scottish Enlightenment context necessitated a rhetoric that compensated for the discursive limitations of new scientific worldviews. In so doing, the (...) article argues that Hume verbalizes the transcendent dimension of classical eloquence in ways commensurate with the emphasis on perspicuity emerging in English culture, a rhetorical maneuver that the author calls discursive transcendence. Hume’s “Of Eloquence” thus serves as a case study demonstrating how an Enlightenment writer advanced a rhetoric that both rejects and pulls from prior rhetorical traditions, constituting a new understanding of Enlightenment rhetoric. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic and the quarantine undergone by children in many countries is a stressful situation about which little is known to date. Children and adolescents' behaviors to cope with home confinement may be associated with their emotional welfare. The objectives of this study were: to examine the coping strategies used out by children and adolescents during the COVID-19 health crisis, to analyze the differences in these behaviors in three countries, and to examine the relationship between different coping modalities and (...) adaptation. Participants were 1,480 parents of children aged 3–18 years from three European countries. The children's mean age was 9.15 years. Parents completed an online survey providing information on symptoms and coping behaviors observed in their children. The most frequent coping strategies were accepting what is happening, collaborating with quarantine social activities, acting as if nothing is happening, highlighting the advantages of being at home, and not appearing to be worried about what is happening. Compared to Italian and Spanish children, Portuguese children used a sense of humor more frequently when their parents talked about the situation. Acting as if nothing was happening, collaborating with social activities, and seeking comfort from others were more likely in Spanish children than in children from the other countries. Compared to Portuguese and Spanish children, Italian children did not seem worried about what was happening. Overall, an emotional-oriented coping style was directly correlated with a greater presence of anxious symptoms, as well as to mood, sleep, behavioral, and cognitive alterations. Task-oriented and avoidance-oriented styles were related to better psychological adaptation. Results also show that unaffected children or children with a lower level of impact were more likely to use strategies based on a positive focus on the situation. This study provides interesting data on the strategies to be promoted by parents to cope with the COVID-19 health crisis in children. (shrink)

RESUMEN Introducción: El proceso de cuidar es el resultado de una construcción propia de cada situación, se origina con la identificación de los problemas de salud y las necesidades reales o potenciales de las personas, familia y comunidad que demandan cuidado. Objetivo: Evaluar el impacto del Diplomado Prevención del Síndrome de Burnout, en el autocuidado del personal de enfermería de la Atención Secundaria de Salud de la provincia Camagüey. Métodos: Se realizó un estudio descriptivo observacional, en el Hospital Amalia Simoni (...) Argilagos de Camagüey, durante el Diplomado Prevención del Síndrome de Burnout dirigido al personal de enfermería de la Atención Secundaria de Salud. Para ello se aplicó una encuesta y el Test Psicológico de Maslach y Jackson al inicio y al final de la aplicación del Diplomado. Los datos aportados por estos instrumentos se complementaron con los provenientes de la aplicación de la técnica del PNI. Resultados: Predominó el sexo femenino. El total de los cursistas son licenciados en Enfermería. Con la ejecución del diplomado se constatan cambios importantes en cuanto a la autopreparación, el rendimiento, los hábitos de descanso, satisfacción personal y realización de ejercicios físicos. Discusión: La aplicación del diplomado logró transformar estilos de trabajo, afrontamientos al estrés, así como una mejor satisfacción personal y colectiva. ABSTRACT Introduction: The process of taking care is the result of a proper construction of every situation, it originates with the identification of the problems of health and the real or potential needs of the persons, family and community that demand care. Objective: To evaluate the impact of Postgraduate Course Prevention of the Syndrome of Burnout, in the self-care of the personnel of infirmary of the Secondary Attention of Health of the Camagüey province. Methods: a descriptive, observational study was carried out in the Hospital Amalia Simoni Argilagos of Camagüey, during Postgraduate Course Prevention of the Syndrome of Burnout directed to the personnel of infirmary of the Secondary Attention of Health. For that reason, a survey and the Psychological Test of Maslach and Jackson was applied at the beginning and at the end of the application of the course. The information contributed by these instruments complemented itself with the originated ones from the application of the technique of the PNI. Results: The sex that predominated was the feminine one. All of the students are licensed in Infirmary. With the execution of the course important changes are stated as for the self-preparation, the yield, the habits of rest, personal satisfaction and achievement of physical exercises. Discussion: The application of the course managed to transform styles of work, confrontations to the stress, as well as a better personal and collective satisfaction. (shrink)

This paper has had the following theses:One can't be moral without choosing a particular moral style.A style is a specific balance of Type I and Type II risks of error.There are just four alternative moral patterns, defined in terms of beneficiaries.Sacrifice is the basic moral relation.A moral style is a balance of risks of error in choosing beneficiaries.The categorical imperative limits the range of styles that can be accepted as moral.One's moral style (...) is not chosen by logic but by feelings, just as one chooses art. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Agents in Frankfurt-style counterexamples only appear to be responsible insofar as they act willingly in the actual sequence, but would need to be manipulated against their will into forming the relevant intention in the alternative sequence. This difference appears ineliminable and unavoidably morally significant. ‘Neo-Frankfurtians’ concede that the sequences must be physically differentiated, but deny their moral differentiation. In contrast, I explore whether the alternatives could be physically undifferentiated, despite their moral difference. The reason there is an (...) ineliminable moral difference is because there is an ineliminable causal one: The agent’s choice must be caused by his own inclinations in one sequence, but by Black’s manipulation in the other. Whether this causal difference entails a physical one depends on whether we suppose causal relations conform to Humean supervenience. The denial of the latter requires us to either reject any broadly Humean view of causation, or else to suppose that we can individuate events or their qualities independently of the physical facts. If these are coherent possibilities, such examples may show that physically differentiated alternatives are not required for moral responsibility. This could support compatibilism, but only if such examples adequately parallel determinism, and I remain sceptical on this point. (shrink)

Given the great importance of morality and values in modern sports, especially among young athletes, in this pilot study, we sought to broaden the exploration of the factors that may play role in these contexts, which have not been widely researched to date. Accordingly, the study tested the relationships between sport type (team or individual) and parenting styles (authoritative vs. non-authoritative), and moral decision-making in sport and sport values among 110 adolescent athletes whose age ranges from 11 to (...) 22 (M= 16.04,SD= 2.86). The findings indicated that participants with authoritative parents, as compared to those with non-authoritative parents, are significantly less accepting of cheating in sport, while they also tend more to keep winning in proportion and hold significantly stronger moral values toward sports. Moreover, participants whose main sport is a team sport type tend to accept more cheating and gamesmanship than participants whose main sport is an individualistic sport type. While no differences were recorded between these groups in moral values, team athletes tend to value status in sport more than individual athletes, while the latter tend to value competence regarding their sport. The implications of the findings are discussed in light of no interaction between the effects of parenting styles and sport type on moral and sport values. (shrink)

This chapter focuses on the different styles of moral relativism. The history of moral relativist thinking features different branches to the family tree, each representing a different impetus to relativism, and so producing a different style of moral relativist thought. At the root, however, is a broadly subjectivist parent idea that morality is at least in part the upshot of a shared way of life, and shared ways of life tend to vary markedly from culture to (...) culture. The discussions cover the branches of moral historicism, moral reasons, moral truth, and moral plurality. (shrink)

Frankfurt-style cases are supposed to constitute counter-examples to the principle of alternate possibilities, for they are cases in which we have the intuition that an agent is morally responsible for his action, even though he could not have done otherwise. In a recent paper, Swenson rejects this conclusion, on the basis of a comparison between standard FSCs, which typically feature actions, and similar cases involving omissions. Because the absence of alternate possibilities seems to preclude moral responsibility in the cases (...) of omissions, and because there is no morally relevant difference between the cases of actions and omissions, Swenson concludes that agents are not morally responsible in standard FSCs. In the present paper, I argue that Swenson’s argument fails because there are at least two very important differences between both types of cases. First, there is a difference about whether agents in such cases actually perform the relevant action: while agents actually perform the relevant action in standard FSCs, they do not in FSCs supposedly involving omissions, for omissions require the possibility to have done otherwise. Second, while the agent’s behavior in standard FSCs actually explain that he performed the relevant action, the agent’s behavior in FSCs including omission actually fails to explain why the agent did not perform the relevant action. Beyond Swenson’s argument, I end up discussing what factors ultimately explain our intuitions about FSCs involving omissions. (shrink)

Previous research has shown that parenting style is intricately linked to cyber-aggression. However, the underlying mechanisms of this relationship remain unclear, especially among young adults. Guided by the social cognitive theory and the ecological system theory, this study aimed to examine the effect of parenting style on cyber-aggression, the potential mediating role of moral disengagement, and the moderating role of moral identity in this relationship. Participants comprised 1,796 Chinese college students who anonymously completed questionnaires on parenting style, (...) class='Hi'>moral disengagement, moral identity, cyber-aggression, and demographic variables. After controlling for sex and age, parental rejection and over-protection were positively related to cyber-aggression; however, parental emotional warmth was non-significantly related to cyber-aggression. Mediation analysis revealed that parenting style was related to cyber-aggressive behavior through moral disengagement. Moderated mediation analysis further indicated that the indirect effect of parenting style on cyber-aggression was much stronger in college students with higher moral identity. The study carries important practical implications for parents and educators concerned about the destructive consequences of cyber-aggression. (shrink)

Frankfurt-Style Cases (FSCs) seem to elicit the intuitive judgment that an agent is morally responsible despite being unable to act otherwise, which is supposed to falsify the Principle of Alternative Possibility (PAP). Recent empirical studies have shown that the inclination toward this intuitive judgment is shared among people, which seems to reinforce the argument against the PAP. However, some scholars have argued for Descriptive Anti-Intuitionism (DAI) — intuitive judgments have never played an evidential role in philosophy — and thus denied (...) the philosophical significance of such empirical findings. I point out that although DAI fails in its literal claim for FSCs, an associated insight remains potent: an intuitive judgment is so fragile that it can be easily defeated by further arguments. Nevertheless, I argue, empirical studies are significant in uncovering the general principles to which we are committed in our practice concerning moral responsibility. I clarify how such findings can play a robust evidential role in philosophical debates concerning moral responsibility by tracing the literature written by Frankfurt and philosophers. (shrink)

Morally unequal treatment of different nonhuman species, like pigs and dogs, can seem troublingly inconsistent. A position Todd May calls moral individualism and relationalism appears to justify the moral discomfit attending such species-differentiated treatment. Yet some of its basic assumptions are challenged by a philosophical style Roger Scruton called narrative philosophy. Expanding upon Christopher Cordner’s discussion of narrative philosophy, this paper develops a narrative-style philosophical critique of Todd May’s moral individualism and relationalism, especially its reductionist understanding of (...) moral reasons, consistency, and relevance. Such criticism opens up the possibility that the unequal treatment of nonhuman species like pigs and dogs is perfectly consistent and even justified. However, the paper then presents a narrative-style argument that such species-differentiated treatment may be morally inconsistent and unjustified after all. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Moral Synonymy: John Stuart Mill and the Ethics of StyleDan BurnstoneI“A common language in which values may be expressed”: this is a phrase John Stuart Mill might well have used to describe utility—the common denominator of different ethical values in utilitarian moral reckoning. In fact, this is Mill’s phrase describing money as a circulating medium. 1 In utilitarianism, utility is the ubiquitous form of moral currency; (...) like money in the capitalist economy, it functions as the “universal equivalent” in the moral economy. 2 It is therefore unsurprising that economic idioms abound in discussions of utilitarianism, with their talk of trade-offs, calculation, and costs. But it is not the parallel with economic exchange that I want to focus on in this article. Mill’s reference to “a common language” points succinctly to a different connection which will be the center of attention, and that is between forms of ethical and linguistic equivalence.It is this conjunction that the term “moral synonymy” is intended to capture. By moral synonymy I want to indicate a particular conjunction of perspectives on ethics and language, or more precisely, style—a conjunction which, I shall argue, Mill’s work can help us both to see and to see through. A bare and schematic anticipation of my approach would be to say that what a belief in commensurability is to the realm of ethics, a belief in synonymy is to the realm of language. This article will explore the interrelationship of these two ideas. In the end I shall suggest that the collaboration between ethics and style denoted by moral synonymy imposes severe limitations on thinking about ethics and literature, and that an examination of moral synonymy and its [End Page 46] implications should be part of the currently revived attempts to work out the relationship between ethics and literature.Synonymy is the idea that identical meaning can be expressed in different linguistic forms. Style—as linguistic form of expression—can be varied or discarded without altering the body of sense it clothes. 3 To believe in moral commensurability is to believe that there is some common value by means of which different values can be measured against each other, and conflicts between them rationally decided. One leading candidate for the role of common value is, of course, utility, and utilitarianism will be taken here as typical of a commensurabilist approach. So, to outline the parallel between ethics and style that we will focus on: just as the believer in synonymy thinks that distinct linguistic styles may be shown to be so many different vehicles for expressing common meanings, so the utilitarian thinks that distinct values turn out ultimately to be so many forms for conveying the common value of utility. Utilitarians, as commensurabilists, happily commit the ethical variety of the “heresy of paraphrase.” They are happy to reduce different values merely to styles of utility. This is why I want to call utilitarianism a kind of moral synonymy.IIWe can understand ethical commensurability more clearly by turning briefly to Mill’s work. Mill relies on utility as the single criterion for settling ethical conflicts. In Utilitarianism he proposes happiness not as one among the ends or criteria of morality, but as the only one. He argues that “to desire anything except in proportion as the idea of it is pleasant, is a physical and metaphysical impossibility” (X, p. 238). Such assertions are the source of familiar difficulties for Mill’s moral theory, for there would seem to be ends other than happiness under the title of which people desire things. Moreover, some of these ends are arguably not only irreducible but also prone to come into conflict with utility (autonomy is a good example of one such value). So it is improbable that happiness is the unique categorial end. 4 There is in fact a tension—vital to Mill and to this article—between Mill’s formal philosophical adherence to utility and his practical recognition of the diversity of values; but nevertheless, he always professes ultimate allegiance to the idea that utility can be considered as the “common umpire” in ethical disputes (X, p. 226). [End Page 47]We... (shrink)

The moral vision of the "Analects" notably includes among our moral responsibilities the need to style behavior such that the propriety of one's dispositions is evident in one's manner and demeanor. While the sage effortlessly fulfills this responsibility, the moral learner must actively strive to shape her demeanor and manner. This essay considers her resources for doing so where becoming effortlessly sagely is a distant, if not unreachable, possibility. While the "Analects" clearly proffers the li as the (...) principal mechanism for developing an appropriate style, the models provided by Zigong and Zilu, two of the text's most vividly depicted moral learners, demonstrate what an improvement in the domain of style requires and significantly indicate an account of moral style in which formal propriety must be vouchsafed by the personally revelatory. (shrink)

The decision making process is an important aspect of the managerial function that is becoming increasingly complex due to technological and global impacts. It is essential, therefore, to understand why various managers approach the decision making process differently. One area that is related to how managers perceive and process the information that is associated with decision making, is that of decision style.It is not enough, however, to explore decision style in isolation, as some of the decisions that managers make often (...) entail ethical components concerning the ability to balance the interests of diverse groups. Moral reasoning is therefore important for every manager, and could impact the decision style that is employed by such managers. The relationship between managerial decision style and moral development is one that could provide unique insights into the area of decision making, yet it is an area that has remained relatively unexplored. (shrink)

In this book John Kekes examines the indispensable role enjoyment plays in a good life. The key to it is the development of a style of life that combines an attitude and a manner of living and acting that jointly express one's deepest concerns. Since such styles vary with characters and circumstances, a reasonable understanding of them requires attending to the particular and concrete details of individual lives. Reflection on works of literature is a better guide to this kind (...) of understanding than the futile search for general theories and principles that preoccupies much of contemporary moral thought. -/- Enjoyment proceeds by the detailed examination of particular cases, shows how this kind of reflection can be reasonably conducted, and how the quest for universality and impartiality is misguided in this context. Central to the argument is a practical, particular, pluralistic, and yet objective conception of reason that rejects the pervasive contemporary tendency to regard reasons as good only if they are binding on all who aspire to live reasonably and morally. Reason in morality is neither theoretical nor general. Reasons for living and acting in particular ways are individually variable and none the worse for that. -/- Kekes aims to reorient moral thought from deontological, contractarian, and consequentialist preoccupations toward a reasonable but pluralistic reflection on what individuals can do to make their lives better. (shrink)

This study investigated the impact of supervisors’ servant leadership on supervisees’ moral identity and subsequent in-role performance. Data from 226 supervisor–supervisee dyads were collected from several domestic and multinational companies operating in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to confirm the factorial validity of the measures that were employed in this study. The hypothesized moderated mediation model was tested using hierarchical multiple regression analysis. Based on social learning theory, the results showed that supervisees’ moral (...) identity served as the psychological mediating mechanism through which supervisors’ servant leadership led to supervisees’ increased in-role performance. Furthermore, the results also supported supervisees’ avoidance orientation as the dispositional boundary condition of this mediating effect. This study contributes to both the servant leadership and moral identity literatures by addressing questions with useful theoretical and managerial implications. (shrink)

many of william james's ethical writings celebrate appreciation and respect for diverse ways of life. For example, in the essay "On a Certain Blindness in Human Beings", James argues that it is a worthy endeavor to strive to overcome blindness to alien values in order to appreciate their rich diversity. In the essay "The Moral Philosopher and the Moral Life", he defends an inclusivity principle enjoining us to create a world that allows for the greatest diversity of ideals (...) and demand satisfaction. James writes: Since everything which is demanded is by that fact a good, must not the guiding principle for ethical philosophy (since all demands conjointly cannot be satisfied in... (shrink)

‘Frankfurt-style cases’ (FSCs) are widely considered as having refuted the Principle of Alternate Possibilities (PAP) by presenting cases in which an agent is morally responsible even if he could not have done otherwise. However, Neil Levy (J Philos 105:223–239, 2008) has recently argued that FSCs fail because we are not entitled to suppose that the agent is morally responsible, given that the mere presence of a counterfactual intervener is enough to make an agent lose responsibility-grounding abilities. Here, I distinguish two (...) kinds of Frankfurt counter-arguments against the PAP: the direct and the indirect counter-arguments. I then argue that Levy’s argument, if valid, can shed doubt on the indirect argument but leaves the direct argument untouched. I conclude that FSCs can still do their job, even if we grant that the mere presence of a counterfactual intervener can modify an agent’s abilities. (shrink)

Proponents of modern Frankfurt-Style Counterexamples generally accept that we cannot construct successful FSCs in which there are no alternative possibilities present. But they maintain that we can construct successful FSCs in which there are no morally significant alternatives present and that such examples succeed in breaking any conceptual link between alternative possibilities and free will. I argue that it is not possible to construct an FSC that succeeds even in this weaker sense. In cases where any alternatives are clearly insignificant, (...) it does not appear at all obvious that the agent can be held responsible. Present popular FSCs include alternatives that are ambiguous in their significance, and when the examples are sharpened to remove this ambiguity, they lose their force. Moreover, the proponent of such examples faces a problem: We can easily construct scenarios in which any alternatives are obviously insignificant, and in such scenarios, we are not intuitively inclined to suppose the agent is responsible. The proponent of new FSCs must therefore distinguish any alternatives she includes from the sorts included in these scenarios. The difference must now be such that this helps to make it seem intuitively likely that the agent is responsible where the agent otherwise would not appear responsible, and these alternatives are irrelevant to any judgment about whether the agent is responsible. I maintain that it is impossible to achieve both of these goals at once. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The Frankfurt-style Counterexamples to the Principle of Alternative Possibilities have been controversial. I sketch some of the major moves in the debates surrounding the FSCs, and I seek to provide an answer to a big challenge: the indeterministic horn of the ‘dilemma defense’. Given indeterminism, it is unclear how Black can know with certainty what Jones will choose and do in the future; this leaves at least some open alternatives for Jones. I adopt the strategy of positing God in (...) Black’s place. The challenge now is to explain how God can have knowledge with certainty of future free human behavior in an indeterministic context, insofar as there is no entailing evidence in available in advance in such a situation. I present the Bootstrapping View of God’s knowledge to solve this problem. If we replace Black with God, we have an indeterministic case in which an agent acts freely, and yet cannot do otherwise. My account of God’s knowledge provides an interpretation of Luis de Molina’s notoriously obscure notion of Supercomprehension. (shrink)

The principle of alternative possibilities tells us that an agent is morally responsible for an action only if he could have done otherwise. Frankfurt-style cases provide an extremely influential challenge to the PAP . And Frankfurt-style compatibilists are motivated to accept compatibilism about responsibility and determinism in part due to FSCs. But there is a significant tension between our judgments about responsibility in FSCs and our judgments about responsibility in certain omissions cases. This tension has thus far largely been treated (...) as an internal puzzle for defenders of FSCs to solve. My goal here is to regiment this tension into a clear argument which undermines the FSC based critique of PAP. I will also argue that there is an in principle reason to doubt that Frankfurt-Style Compatibilists will be able to successfully respond to my argument. (shrink)

Frankfurt style examples (FSEs) have played an important role in the development of metaphysical accounts of moral agency. The legitimacy of this approach often requires that FSEs be metaphysically possible. I argue that, given our current knowledge of the nature of decision-making, we have no grounds to accept the metaphysical possibility of many standard FSEs involving a device that can be triggered to bring about a predetermined decision.

This paper employs (and defends where needed) a familiar four-part methodology for assessing moral theories. This methodology makes the most popular kind of moral pluralism--here called Ross-style pluralism--look extremely attractive. The paper contends, however, that, if rule-consequentialism's implications match our considered moral convictions as well as Ross-style pluralism's implications do, the methodology makes rule-consequentialism look even more attractive than Ross-style pluralism. The paper then attacks two arguments recently put forward in defence of Ross-style pluralism. One of these (...) arguments is that no moral theory containing some single normative principle to justify general pro tanto duties can do justice to the ineliminable role of judgment in moral thinking. The other argument is that no such theory is plausible in light of the fact that our moral ideas come from disparate historical sources. (shrink)

The volume starts with the paper of Lynn Maurice Ferguson Arnold, former Premier of South Australia and former Minister of Education of Australia, concerning the Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne (International Exposition of Art and Technology in Modern Life) that was held from 25 May to 25 November 1937 in Paris, France. The organization of the world exhibition had placed the Nazi German and the Soviet pavilions directly across from each other. Many papers are devoted (...) to the interpretation of this opposition. Arnold’s paper considers the differences in the two totalitarian states’ architectural and design discourse styles. Although each of them communicated a totalitarian language of purposes, permissions, and boundaries, they essentially differed in the styles of discourse represented by the architecture and design of their respective pavilions. They were opposites of each other and the liberal ideals they contested. The internationalist viewpoint reflecting the multi-ethnic mix of the USSR is contrasted to the ein Volk homogeneity represented in the German pavilion. The Soviet pavilion opted for a utopian future to be arrived at by “benign” leadership, whereas the German pavilion anchored itself in the myth of Teutonic history with the nostalgic pride protected by the swastika-bearing eagle. Jean-Yves Béziau is best known as a logician and founder of Universal Logic. However, in this paper, he poses a new philosophical question: why philosophical discourse does not use images? The paper begins with a general analysis of different types of philosophical discourses. Then, he focuses on why images have been and are still rejected in philosophical discourse. He explains various ways to use images in a fruitful way to develop philosophical thinking and discourse and illustrates his view by providing several examples. He concludes with a promising programmatic declaration about founding a new journal entitled World Journal of Pictorial Philosophy to stimulate the usage of images for developing philosophical thinking. Although complaints about the obscurity of many philosophers’ discourse are widespread, Tatiana Denisova, ex-professor of the Surgut University and a research associate of the University of the Aegean undertakes a positive attitude to this problem. She explains that the reasons for the obscurity of philosophical texts, the subsequent complexity in communicating philosophers’ meanings and their eventual incomplete understanding is not a sign of their inferiority. On the contrary, it is a sign of the fruitfulness of philosophical discourse, which can generate new meanings. Thus, the darkness of philosophical discourse is like the life-giving chaos, and the obscurity that it inevitably contains can be the keeper of implicit meanings and even their generator. Katarzyna Gan-Krzywoszyńska and Piotr Leśniewski, authors of a monograph on Polish philosopher Kazimierz Ajdukiewicz (1890 – 1963), make a comparative analysis of his educational style with that of Paulo Reglus Neves Freire (1921 – 1997). The authors highlight that these scholars have distinctly different backgrounds. The former was an educator, philosopher and a leading advocate of critical pedagogy connected with the dialogical Latin-American tradition. The latter was a philosopher and logician, a notable representative of the Lwów–Warsaw school of logic with significant contributions to semantics, model theory and the philosophy of science. Despite their apparent difference, the authors identify some striking similarities regarding their attitudes towards education; notably, their approaches are essentially dialogical. Gilah Yelin Hirsch is a multidisciplinary artist who works as a painter, writer, curator, educator, and filmmaker. In her experiential paper, he explains how and why she uses four channels of communication in her creative expression: writing, painting, filmmaking, and teaching, as dialogic inquiry. She considers that these channels compose a continuum of discourse styles, each reaching a different facet of kaleidoscopic consciousness. She claims that her choice of medium is prompted by a need to communicate her insights profoundly. Thus, for instance, she created painted allegories to express narratives based on dreams and visions emerging from her subconscious. Art and healing is another Tibetan-rooted type of discourse practised by the author. Creating and observing a healing image produces a positive psychophysiological change in both the artist and the viewer. The discourse here is tripartite between creator, image, and viewer. Filmmaking is another type of discourse she practices between the filmmaker/artist as shaman or healer and the viewer as respondent or participant. These films are meant to be experienced frame by frame, physically and emotionally in both the body and mind. Jocelyn Ireson-Paine is a cartoonist and programmer. His paper offers an original attempt to use category theory in cartooning. Category theory is a branch of mathematics that provides concepts and methods to describe general abstract structures in terms of a labelled directed graph called category, whose nodes are called objects, and whose labelled directed edges are called arrows (or morphisms or transformations or mappings). The author explores different ways to define “style” in art using category theory and a relational view of art. Moreover, he examines how “translation” (transformation) between styles could be defined and reveals the difficulties of how it could be implemented in a computer using special software. Jens Lemanski is a philosopher who has revived research in Arthur Schopenhauer’s legacy by exploring his work on mathematical evidence, logic diagrams, and problems of semantics. In this paper, he advances a new approach to eristic as an art of protecting oneself from the one who deliberately violates norms of discourse ethics to win an argument. The author attributes the origins of this view to Schopenhauer, suggesting a new reading of his work. According to the author, eristic is a prohibitive technique that takes effect when the norms of discourse ethics are transgressed and violated. Thus, eristic is viewed as a discipline of Enlightenment philosophy and a correlate of discourse ethics. Roshdi Rashed is an authority on the history of Arabic mathematical sciences. Proceeding from Gilles-Gaston Granger’s definition of mathematical style, he studies the question of whether a mathematical work can be characterized by a single style or by a multitude of styles. This question is explored within the style of a single work, namely Menelaus’s Sphaerica, and through the study of the development of a single problem over time, namely the isoperimetric problem. He indicates Menelaus’s divergence from the Euclidean style of (plane and stereometric) geometry caused by the drop of the Parallel Postulate, which associated it with hyperbolic geometry. Hence, the author concludes that Menelaus’s Sphaerica incorporates the well-known Euclidean style with a variation of the non-Euclidean one. On the other hand, examining the isoperimetric problem reveals another interesting historical picture. A succession of different styles (cosmological, geometric, infinitesimalistic, style of the calculus of variations, of synthetic geometry) can be observed due to the transformation of the research object over time. Boris Shalyutin, a Russian social philosopher, and Ombudsman for Human Rights in the Kurgan Region, explores the origins of discourse in combination with the birth of society and law. He claims that legal discourse marks the historical emergence of discourse in general. Homo Juridicus generated Homo Sapiens, which have created new spheres of discourse, notably moral discourse and further philosophical, political, and scientific discourse. Petros Stefaneas, a logician, computer scientist and novelist, suggests an alternative to the traditional narratology approach for studying (interactive) social media discourse. He claims that style describes how the parts of a narrative are blended into a whole. The author relies upon Goguen’s and Harrel’s concept of style as a choice of blending principles and transfers to the study of the social media narratives elements from the methodology of studying Web-based collaborative search for mathematical proofs like those implemented within the Polymath project. The last paper belongs to Ghil‘ad Zuckermann, a linguist, language revivalist, and proponent of a model of the emergence of Israeli Hebrew, according to which Hebrew and Yiddish were the primary sources of Modern Hebrew. This paper explores the fascinating and multifaceted Yiddish language and its survival in Israeli. Yiddish is characterized by a unique style that embeds psycho-ostensive expressions throughout its discourse. The author highlights the cross-fertilization between Hebrew and Yiddish as it manifests itself in any aspect of the Israeli language. He claims that Yiddish survives beneath Israeli phonetics, phonology, discourse, syntax, semantics, lexis, and even morphology, although traditional and institutional linguists have been most reluctant to admit it. (shrink)

In this essay I shall begin by sketching a "Frankfurt-type example." I shall then lay out a disturbing challenge to the claim I have made above that these examples help us to make significant progress in the debates about the relationship between moral responsibility and causal determinism. I then will provide a reply to this challenge, and the reply will point toward a more refined formulation of the important contribution I believe Frankfurt has made to defending a certain sort (...) of compatibilism. (shrink)

: We may better understand the development of the Neo-Confucian religiousethical tradition in East Asia if we can discern the different ways that the scholars of Japan and Korea reacted to and adjusted the discourse of the tradition. Focusing on the optimistic concept of human nature and an ethic of situation developed by the Kogakuha scholars in Japan, we will contrast them with the more rigoristic philosophy of kyŏng (reverential seriousness) and an ethic of principle emphasized by the Korean Neo-Confucian (...) thinkers Yi T'oegye and Yi Yulgok. By doing so, we attempt to delineate the salient characteristics of the Japanese and Korean traditions of moral culture. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Literature and the Moral Life David Lurie Moses Herzog The Category of Orientation.

The ArgumentThe paper argues for the restricted viability of the concept of style in the history of science. Since historians of science borrow this term from art history or the sociology of knowledge, the paper outlines its emergence and function in these disciplines, in order to show that the need for ever subtler stylistic distinctions in historical description inevitably leads to the dissolution of the concept of style itself.“Style” will be defined in predominantly cognitive or technical terms when imputed to (...) an individual; in social or moral terms when thought to be carried by some collective entity. Both descriptions are given normative interpretations. A good individual style, then, is regarded as the pledge for valid knowledge or insights of a “higher order,” while a collective style, understood as the vehicle of successful intra group communication, involves the acceptance of certain rhetorical norms and/or socially shared values that are supposed to structure that style. “National styles” belong to the latter category; the emergence of this dubious notion can best be explained in sociological terms.If historians of science insist on adopting the concept of style, they will have to agree on its meaning. The paper concludes, therefore, with a rough typology of its most frequent meanings and uses. (shrink)

Almost thirty years ago, in an attempt to undermine what he termed "the principle of alternate possibilities" (the thesis that people are morally responsible for what they have done only if they could have done otherwise), Harry Frankfurt offered an ingenious thought-experiment that has played a major role in subsequent work on moral responsibility and free will. Several philosophers, including David Widerker and Robert Kane, argued recently that this thought-experiment and others like it are fundamentally flawed. This paper develops (...) a new Frankfurt-style example that is immune to their objections. [Reprinted in Laura Waddell Ekstrom, ed., Agency and Responsibility: Essays on the Metaphysics of Freedom (Westview Press, 2001), pp. 241-54; and in John Martin Fischer, ed., Free Will, Vol. III (Routledge, 2005), pp. 330-42.]. (shrink)

Frankfurt-style cases (FSCs) have famously served as counterexamples to the Principle of Alternative Possibilities (PAP). The fine-grained version of the flicker defense has become one of the most popular responses to FSCs. Proponents of this defense argue that there is an alternative available to all agents in FSCs such that the cases do not show that PAP is false. Specifically, the agents could have done otherwise than decide on their own, and this available alternative is robust enough to ground (...) class='Hi'>moral responsibility. In this paper, I argue that, when relying on definitions of ‘on one’s own’ within the literature on FSCs, a case can be constructed in which the agent could not have done otherwise than make a decision on his own. Insofar as this new case is successful, it will be able to avoid arguments about robustness while showing that moral responsibility does not require alternative possibilities of the type argued for by proponents of the fine-grained version of the flicker defense. (shrink)

According to the Dilemma Defense, it is question-begging against the incompatibilist defender of the principle of alternative possibilities (PAP) to assume that the agent in a deterministic Frankfurt-style case (FSC) cannot do otherwise in light of causal determinism, but is nevertheless morally responsible. As a result, Fischer (Philos Rev 119:315–336, 2010; Analysis 73:489–496, 2013) attempts to undermine PAP in a different manner via a deterministic FSC. More specifically, Fischer attempts to show that if causal determinism rules out an agent’s (...) class='Hi'>moral responsibility, it is not in virtue of its eliminating the agent’s alternative possibilities. I contend that, once we focus upon the distinction between entailment and explanation, the incompatibilist defender of PAP can successfully rebut Fischer’s argument. I argue for this claim while granting Fischer a number of assumptions that only render a defense of PAP more difficult. Additionally, I cast doubt upon Palmer’s (Synthese 191:3847–3864, 2014) critique of Fischer’s argument, which in turn renders my defense of PAP all the more critical. (shrink)

Manuel Vargas advocates a revised understanding of the terms “free will” and “moral responsibility” that eliminates the problematic libertarian commitments inherent to the commonsense understanding of these terms. I argue that in order to make a plausible case for why philosophers ought to adopt his recommendations, Vargas must explain why we ought to retain the retributivist elements that figure prominently in both commonsense views about morality and philosophical discussions concerning free will and moral responsibility. Furthermore, I argue that (...) his revisionist account lacks the resources necessary to accommodate retributivist attitudes and practices. (shrink)

The moral enhancement (or bioenhancement) debate seems stuck in a dilemma. On the one hand, the more radical proposals, while certainly novel and interesting, seem unlikely to be feasible in practice, or if technically feasible then most likely imprudent. But on the other hand, the more sensible proposals – sensible in the sense of being both practically achievable and more plausibly ethically justifiable – can be rather hard to distinguish from both traditional forms of moral enhancement, such as (...) non-drug-mediated social or moral education, and non-moral forms of bioenhancement, such as smart-drug style cognitive enhancement. In this essay, I argue that bioethicists have paid insufficient attention to an alternative form of moral bioenhancement – or at least a likely candidate – that falls somewhere between these two extremes, namely the (appropriately qualified) use of certain psychedelic drugs. (shrink)

The paper attempts to explicate and justify the position I call `Agency Incompatibilism'- that is to say, the view that agency itself is incompatible with determinism. The most important part of this task is the characterisation of the conception of agency on which the position depends; for unless this is understood, the rationale for the position is likely to be missed. The paper accordingly proceeds by setting out the orthodox philosophical position concerning what it takes for agency to exist, before (...) going on to explain why and how that orthodoxy should be challenged. The relations between my own views and those of others writing on the issues of free will and moral responsibility, in three crucial and inter-connected areas are then explored. These are (1) the question how animals should figure in the philosophy of action; (2) the question what the lesson is of `Frankfurt-style' examples; and (3) the distinction between so-called `leeway' incompatibilism and `source' incompatibilism. The paper moves on to consider and respond to various objections to Agency Incompatibilism, including the claim that to embrace the conception of agency that makes incompatibilism plausible is to beg the question against the compatibilist, and also the worry that determinism is an empirical thesis which ought not to be straightforwardly falsifiable by such a priori reasoning as Agency Incompatibilism appears to involve. I also try to rebut the worry that Agency Incompatibilism is committed to the existence of an unintelligible and/or naturalistically impossible variety of irreducible agent causation. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy and Rhetoric 35.3 (2002) 223-243 [Access article in PDF] Style, Rhetoric, and Postmodern Culture Bradford Vivian Modern rhetoricians habitually avoid the canon of style. The reasons for this avoidance should be familiar to those versed in the disciplinary lore of rhetoric. Since the fifth and fourth centuries B. C. E., when oratorical virtuosos like Gorgias proclaimed that "Speech is a powerful lord, which by means of the finest (...) and most invisible body effects the divinest works" (41), the suspicion that rhetorical style amounts to irrational verbal excess has dogged those who would argue for the moral integrity of the art. Most recently, twentieth-century rhetoricians, Toulmin (1958) and Perelman (1969, 1979, 1982) in particular, realigned rhetoric with the study of argumentation after its apparent reduction, during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, to innocuous matters of form and taste by the elocutionist and belletristic movements. Consequently, the aesthetic capacities of rhetoric have received scant attention from modern rhetoricians, who resign considerations of style largely to supposedly regrettable episodes in the history of the discipline. For better or worse, then, modern rhetorical theory lacks a contemporary rationale and methodology for the study of style. 1Beyond unfortunate equations of rhetoric with grandiloquence, this scarcity in recent rhetorical scholarship corresponds to general humanistic and social scientific prejudices against the topic of style. Robert Hariman posits, "Established academic conceptions of style hardly prepare one to take seriously the aesthetic dimension of political experience" (7). As evidence for this claim, he cites Stuart Ewen's reflections on the "frustration" peculiar to research on style: "It seemed to be a universal category," Ewen writes, "transcending topical boundaries, an accolade applied to people, places, attitudes and things... a subject that was, at best, amorphous" (quoted in Hariman, 7-8). Yet the social ubiquity of style—"[o]n news magazines, sports magazines, music-oriented magazines, magazines about [End Page 223] fashion, architecture and interior design, automobiles, and sex"—indicates that it offers "a key to understanding the contours of contemporary culture" (qtd. in Hariman, 7-8). Hence, the paradox of style as a scholarly topic: that which exhibits its cultural importance makes it seem intellectually vacuous.Hariman's treatise on political style offers the most noteworthy attempt in rhetorical studies to remedy these trends; brief consideration of his insights will suggest further objectives for the study of rhetoric and style. 2 In Hariman's estimation, "style ultimately is a significant dimension of every human experience" because "relations of control and autonomy are negotiated through the artful composition of speech, gesture, ornament, decor, and any other means for modulating perception and shaping response. In a word, our political experience is styled" (3, 2). The distinctive contribution of rhetorical inquiry into political style involves "understanding the dynamics of our social experience or the relationship between rhetorical appeals and political decisions" rather than merely "cataloging discursive forms in the artistic text alone" (Hariman, 8).Accordingly, Hariman acknowledges that one must recognize the substantive social and political influences of style apart from its traditional connotations of individual artistic performance. "In this context," he explains, "although style still highlights aesthetic reactions it no longer enforces artistic autonomy. Style becomes an analytic category for understanding a social reality; in order to understand the social reality of politics, we can consider how political action involves acting according to a particular political style" (9). Thus, for Hariman, rhetorical choices in political style need not amount to a valorization of "artistic autonomy": "each political style draws on universal elements of the human condition and symbolic repertoire but organizes them into a limited, customary set of communicative designs... Each is thoroughly conventional, yet the means for personal improvisation and intelligent, innovate responses to unique problems" (11-12). His treatise therefore appears to dissociate style from its outmoded definitions while recommending the utility of rhetorical principles to the study of political culture.What Hariman calls the "cautious postmodernism" (6) of his project, however, hinders its innovative aspirations. The postmodern portion of his work endorses the study of style according to the aesthetic dimensions of social relations rather than "artistic autonomy" alone; but its... (shrink)

Nietzsche talks about style [Stil and cognates] in all of his published and authorized works, from The Birth of Tragedy to Ecce Homo. He refers to style in over one hundred passages. Yet the scholarly literature on Nietzsche and style includes only a handful of publications, among them Derrida’s notorious Spurs: Nietzsche’s Styles (1978), which barely even engages with Nietzsche’s writings (see also Magnus 1991 and Babich 2011, 2012). Much of the rest of the literature is about Nietzsche’s style, (...) rather than about what he has to say about style. And none of it is comprehensive. In this paper, I aim to fill the gap in the secondary literature by using digital humanities methods to systematically investigate the functions of style in Nietzsche’s writings. I argue that, for Nietzsche style emerges in the context of a tradition in a community. It can then become personalized and individualized, though there are dangers with such innovations. One’s personal style is expressive of one’s psychology and physiology, and can go wrong by mis-expressing. Correlative with style, in Nietzsche’s conception, is the taste of the audience. Only those who share important psychological characteristics with the stylist will be able to fully comprehend their expressions. Finally, moving beyond aesthetics, Nietzsche connects style with moral and intellectual character, contending that the good stylist seeks recognition as such from those with good taste. (shrink)

Marrying lyrical close reading with critical awareness, Novel Style argues for the ethical value of elaborate styles of writing and demonstrates that artistic excessiveness can provide dynamic responses to the moral complexities of our times.