Hume seems to have discarded with final causes and teleology. However, his invocation of a pre-established harmony between the course of nature and the succession of our ideas suggests otherwise. This paper takes Hume’s general strategy of shifting to the external perspective into account, and argues that the seemingly internal property of force and vivacity are, in fact, functional-teleological properties. Force and vivacity bears many explanatory burdens: It explains the difference between imagination and memory, between conception and belief, (...) and it establishes causal necessity. What kind of property is this supposed to be? We can answer this question by taking into account Hume’s explanation of the way in which this very property is communicated in the cases of ideas of memory and belief, and of the function it performs in these cases. It will be argued that force and vivacity is not an intrinsic, phenomenal property of ideas. It is a relational and historical property. A major objective of the paper is the application of this interpretation from the case of ideas to the case of impression. What kind of history could transfer force and vivacity to impressions? Answer: natural history. By a careful examination of passages concerning innate capacities, passions, and animal instincts, we can make sense of the tenet that impressions have force and vivacity because of our natural history. It will be suggested that Hume’s philosophy of mind is fit to integrate Darwinian Design as an explanatory corner-stone. Hume, so scheint, ist ein scharfer Kritiker von Finalursachen und Teleologie. Seine häufig als ironisch missverstandene Berufung auf eine Art „prästabilierter Harmonie“ zwischen Naturverläufen und Ideenabfolgen verweist jedoch auf eine andere Lesart. Der folgende Essay behauptet, indem er Humes explanatorische Strategie betont, etwa im Falle seiner berühmten Lösung der skeptischen Zweifele zur Kausalität zu einer externen Perspektive zu wechseln, dass es sich bei der scheinbar geistinternen Eigenschaft „Kraft und Lebendigkeit“ tatsächlich um eine teleologisch- historische Eigenschaft handelt. Kraft und Lebendigkeit leisten in Humes Philosophie des Geistes eine große Erklärungsarbeit: Sie erklären den Unterscheid zwischen Vorstellung und Erinnerung, zwischen Vorstellung und Überzeugung, und sie stellen die wesentliche Zutat der kausalen Notwendigkeit dar. Doch um welche Art Eigenschaft handelt es sich? Diese Frage kannmit Blick auf Humes Ausführung darüber beantwortet werden, wie diese Eigenschaft auf Ideen der Erinnerung und auf Überzeugungsideen übertragen wird, und v.a. mit Blick auf die Funktion, die diese Eigenschaft übernimmt. Es soll gezeigt werden, dass es sich bei Kraft und Lebendigkeit um keine intrinsische, phänomenale Eigenschaft von Ideen handelt, sondern um eine relationale, historische Eigenschaft. Ein wichtiges Ziel des Essays besteht darin, diese Deutung von Ideen auf Eindrücke zu übertragen. Inwiefern kann es sich bei der Kraft und Lebendigkeit von Eindrücken umeine relationale und historische Eigenschaft handeln? Die Antwort findet sich in der Naturgeschichte, wie mit Verweis auf Humes Ausführungen zu angeborenen Fähigkeiten, Leidenschaften und tierlichen Instinkten gezeigt werden kann. Die Stoßrichtung des Essays besagt, dass Humes Philosophie des Geistes durchaus mit einer Darwinschen Auffassung des Geistes zusammengeführt werden kann. (shrink)

"Men have died from time to time, and worms have eaten them, but not for love."Satyajit Ray Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia 2015 .

It is surely not coincidental that the term "soul" should mean not only the center of a creature's life and consciousness, but also a thing or action characterized by intense vivacity ("that bike's got soul!"). It also seems far from coincidental that the same contemporary academic discussions that have largely cast aside the language of "soul" in their quest to define the character of human mental life should themselves be so--how to say it?--bloodless, so lacking in soul. This volume (...) arises from the opposite premise, namely that the task of understanding human nature is bound up with and in important respects dependent upon the more critical task of learning to be fully human, of learning to have soul. The papers collected here are derived from a conference in Oxford sponsored by the Centre of Theology and Philosophy and together explore the often surprising landscape that emerges when human consciousness is approached from this angle. Drawing upon literary, philosophical, theological, historical, and musical modes of analysis, the essays of this volume vividly remind the reader of the power of the ancient language of soul over against contemporary impulses to reduce, fragment, and overly determine human selfhood. (shrink)

In the Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, Philo and Cleanthes make use of irregular arguments—arguments whose veracity is founded on the force and vivacity with which they strike the mind. This paper provides an analysis of the irregular arguments by the two characters in the Dialogues and by Hume in the Treatise of Human Nature. Since both characters accept the veracity of irregular arguments, it seems that they are in agreement at the end of the Dialogues. The similarity between (...) their arguments and those Hume presents in the Treatise seem suggests that both characters represent Hume’s actual position. (shrink)

Trust is a topic of longstanding philosophical interest. It is indispensable to every kind of coordinated human activity, from sport to scientific research. Even more, trust is necessary for the successful dissemination of knowledge, and by extension, for nearly any form of practical deliberation and planning. Without trust, we could achieve few of our goals and would know very little. Despite trust’s fundamental importance in human life, there is substantial philosophical disagreement about what trust is, and further, how trusting is (...) normatively constrained and best theorized about in relation to other things we value. This entry is divided into three sections, which explore key (and sometimes interconnected) ethical and epistemological themes in the philosophy of trust: (1) The Nature of Trust; (2) The Normativity of Trust, and (3) The Value of Trust. (shrink)

Duality in Logic and Language [draft--do not cite this article] Duality phenomena occur in nearly all mathematically formalized disciplines, such as algebra, geometry, logic and natural language semantics. However, many of these disciplines use the term ‘duality’ in vastly different senses, and while some of these senses are intimately connected to each other, others seem to be entirely … Continue reading Duality in Logic and Language →.

Certainty The following article provides an overview of the philosophical debate surrounding certainty. It does so in light of distinctions that can be drawn between objective, psychological, and epistemic certainty. Certainty consists of a valuable cognitive standing, which is often seen as an ideal. It is indeed natural to evaluate lesser cognitive standings, in particular … Continue reading Certainty →.

Consider a recent expression of such traditionalism.

KANT ARGUES AT GREAT LENGTH in the Critique of Pure Reason that the existence of God cannot be demonstrated by means of theoretical reason. For after dividing all traditional theistic proofs into three different kinds—the ontological, the cosmological, and the physico-theological—Kant argues first that the cosmological and physico-theological implicitly assume the ontological argument and then that the ontological argument is necessarily fallacious. By restricting knowledge in this manner Kant notoriously makes room for faith, that is, in this case, for a (...) practical proof of the existence of God, which he develops in the Critique of Practical Reason. Kant’s reasons for rejecting theoretical proofs of the existence of God have received considerable attention. In particular, Kant’s objection to the ontological argument, namely that existence is not a real predicate, still seems relevant in contemporary philosophy of religion. What has not received much attention, however, is the relationship between Kant’s rejection of theistic proofs in his critical period and his views on the matter in his pre-critical period. For throughout his pre-critical period, but especially in his The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God, Kant believes that there is a theoretical proof of the existence of God. One would naturally expect Kant’s criticisms of theistic proofs as developed in the “ideal of pure reason” to apply in straightforward ways to his earlier attempts at a theistic proof. However, Kant rejects the three traditional arguments in The Only Possible Argument just as he does in the first Critique. Further, his reason for rejecting the ontological argument in particular is identical to the one presented in the first Critique: “Existence is not a predicate or a determination of a thing.” Accordingly, Kant understood himself to be developing a theistic proof in The Only Possible Argument that is distinct from the three traditional arguments and is also not subject to the objections he raises against them. Given that Kant rejects all theoretical proofs of God’s existence in his critical period and given that he did not take his critical objections to the traditional proofs to apply to the theistic proof developed in The Only Possible Argument, what is his justification for rejecting his pre-critical argument for God’s existence? (shrink)

Existence Since Thales fell into the well while gazing at the stars, philosophers have invested considerable effort in trying to understand what, how and why things exist. Even though much ink has been spilled about those questions, this article focuses on the following three questions: What is the nature of existence? Are there … Continue reading Existence →.

The main theme that pervades this Festschrift, written by fellow-scholars and students of Bodde for his seventy-fifth birthday, is that of the proper ordering of the universe as it obtains in the Chinese tradition.

Hume introduced important innovations concerning the theory of ideas. The two most important are the distinction between impressions and ideas, and the use he made of the principles of association in explaining mental phenomena. Hume divided the perceptions of the mind into two classes. The members of one class, impressions, he held to have a greater degree of force and vivacity than the members of the other class, ideas. He also supposed that ideas are causally dependent copies of impressions. (...) And, unlike Locke and others, Hume makes positive use of the principle of association, both of the association of ideas, and, in a more limited way, of the association of impressions. Such associations are central to his explanations of causal reasoning, belief, the indirect passions (pride and humility, love and hatred), and sympathy. These views about impressions and ideas and the principles of association form the core of Hume’s science of human nature. Relying on them, he attempts a rigorously empirical investigation of human nature. The resulting system is a remarkable but complex achievement. (shrink)

Human Dignity The mercurial concept of human dignity features in ethical, legal, and political discourse as a foundational commitment to human value or human status. The source of that value, or the nature of that status, are contested. The normative implications of the concept are also contested, and there are two partially, or even wholly, … Continue reading Human Dignity →.

We offer an analysis of future morphemes as epistemic operators. The main empirical motivation comes from the fact that future morphemes have systematic purely epistemic readings—not only in Greek and Italian, but also in Dutch, German, and English will. The existence of epistemic readings suggests that the future expressions quantify over epistemic, not metaphysical alternatives. We provide a unified analysis for epistemic and predictive readings as epistemic necessity, and the shift between the two is determined compositionally by the lower tense. (...) Our account thus acknowledges a systematic interaction between modality and tense—but the future itself is a pure modal, not a mixed temporal/modal operator. We show that the modal base of the future is nonveridical, i.e. it includes p and ¬p worlds, parallel to epistemic modals such as must, and present arguments that future morphemes are a category that stands in between epistemic modals and predicates of personal taste. We identify, finally, a subclass of epistemic futures which are ratificational, and argue that will is a member of this class. (shrink)

Free swimming cells of the ciliated protozoan Tetrahymena are attracted to certain chemicals by chemokinesis. However, a special type of chemotaxis in response to a chemical gradient is found in cells gliding very slowly in semisolid media. In contrast to classical chemotaxis by leukocytes, which is solely positive towards chemo‐attractants, the oriented chemokinesis by gliding Tetrahymena involves both positive and negative elements. The major chemo‐attractants are peptides and/or proteins, and they may be compounds which signal the presence of food in (...) the natural environment of this freshwater phagotroph. (shrink)

Volumes 1 and 2 of Hume’s Treatise of Human Nature, first published in January 1739, were soon after publication the subject of five notices and four reviews. Volume 3, published at the end of October 1740, received no notices and was reviewed only in the Bibliothèque raisonnée. This anonymous review of vol. 3 is of interest not only for David Norton is Professor of Philosophy Emeritus, McGill University, and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy, University of Victoria. His address is 8-4305 Maltwood (...) Lane, Victoria, BC, Canada V8X 5G9. what it says about Hume’s views as set out in the third book of the Treatise, but also because of questions that have arisen about the authorship of this and an earlier review of vol. 1 of the Treatise published in the same journal. In Part I of this paper we begin by reviewing the grounds for attributing to Pierre Des Maizeaux the notice of vols. 1 and 2 of the Treatise published by the Bibliothèque raisonnée in its April–June, 1739 issue. We then focus principally on the question of the authorship of the review of vol. 3 of the Treatise published by the Bibliothèque raisonnée in its April–June, 1741 issue, but we also consider in passing the grounds that have been offered for attributing to Francis Hutcheson the critical components of the Bibliothèque raisonnée review of vol. 1 of the Treatise. In Part II of the paper we present a transcription of the French text, never before reprinted, of this review. Part III is a new English translation of this text. In an effort to show the differences between the sense of the Treatise presented by translated quotations of it and Hume’s original texts, Part IV offers some three-column comparisons of three relatively lengthy French “quotations” of Treatise 3 found in the review, our back-translations of these texts, and the versions of these texts found in the Treatise. It then offers in a similar format, comparisons of the present and earlier translations of passages of the review of vol. 3. (shrink)

Human beings are in the midst of very powerful shifts in our understanding of what it means to be a human. There is a non-trivial chance that sometime in the future humanity will transform itself, leading to an emergence of posthumans with God-like qualities – Homo Deificatio. Such a transformation has great potential for both good and bad. Posthumanism seeks to improve human nature, increase the human life- and health-span, extend its cognitive and physical capacities, and broaden its mastery over (...) the environment. As such, the notion of posthumanism implies a radical breaking off from, and reconceptualisation of, the state of being human. As neuroscientists, we aim to bring a neuroscientific perspective to this debate. Current scientific and technologic developments (related to brain and its augmentation) clearly demonstrate that what was formerly considered to be science fiction is slowly but firmly becoming a scientific reality. (shrink)

This volume closes yet another gap in the available English translations of Hegel’s early work. Still unavailable even here is the third part of the “Jena System,” the philosophy of nature, which the translators - a committee of thirteen! - refrained from undertaking. What the volume does include is unavoidably incomplete, for approximately five large sheets of Hegel’s original manuscript are presumably lost.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Hume Studies Volume XXV, Numbers 1 and 2, April/November 1999, pp. 83-99 Force and Vivacity in the Treatise and the Enquiry FRANCIS W. DAUER Hume's appeal to "force and vivacity" presents a challenge to those of us who try to render his views as plausible as possible. Of course, if we reject "folk psychology " or an appeal to our consciousness, the challenge becomes insurmountable. Fortunately, in (...) today's philosophical climate such appeals are no longer universally rejected, and at least in some quarters there may be interest in discerning what such appeals may reveal. But even granting such an appeal, is there anything given to our consciousness that will do the kind of work Hume intends for force and vivacity? I shall attempt to make an affirmative answer as plausible as I can. Recall that Hume appeals to force and vivacity to distinguish (1) impressions from ideas, (2) memory from other ideas, and (3) beliefs from fictions of the fancy. In my defense of Hume, I shall urge that, taken separately, each of these appeals has some plausibility and to this extent provides some tentative suggestions on what it is like to perceive, remember, and believe. Before proceeding to this defense, several preliminaries are called for. Hume's view on force and vivacity underwent changes in his writings, and no one view can be said to be his account of force and vivacity. His initial view occurs in Book I of the Treatise (which was published along with Book II). By the time the Appendix of the Treatise was published with Book III, we see Hume shifting away from his initial view. Further changes, as well as a full appreciation of the shift, can be found in the Enquiry. For most of this paper I shall primarily be concerned with his later views, though earlier views will Francis W. Dauer is a professor at the Department of Philosophy, South Hall, University of California at Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93105, USA. e-mail: [email protected] 84 Francis W. Dauer occasionally be mentioned for contrast. In the final section, I shall address the more exegetical issues concerning Hume's change of mind over the years. While space constraints prevent a discussion that will do justice to the views of other commentators, a few words may be in order to indicate what I think is needed to render Hume's views plausible. Leaving aside commentators finding fatal defects with his account, those trying to salvage a tolerable reading of Hume more or less identify force and vivacity with belief (which Hume on one occasion says is the true and proper name for the feeling). One group focuses on Hume's use of 'force' and proposes a functionalist account of force and vivacity whereby it is a causal property of "perceptions" (in the wide sense) to produce such states as passions and actions which are functionally related to beliefs.1 At least on the face of it, this is at odds with force and vivacity being available to consciousness, and I shall take it that Hume took force and vivacity to be so available. Beyond this, while I shall take it that Hume appealed to force and vivacity to distinguish impressions from ideas, a functionalist account has difficulties in preventing impressions from degenerating into mere beliefs (unless something quite foreign to the Humean framework is appealed to).2 A second line of thought is due to Wayne Waxman, who identifies force and vivacity with something like a felt sense of reality or truth, with impressions having this quality in the highest degree.3 While this avoids the first defect of the functionalist account, I believe it fails to avoid a variant of the second problem: without appealing to something quite un-Humean, some impressions can become mere beliefs, and vice versa.41 shall assume that force and vivacity must be consciously available, and that appealing to them, at least in one guise, must allow impressions and ideas to be distinguished. Impressions Hume introduces the distinction between impressions and ideas in the Treatise by saying: The difference betwixt these consists in the degrees of force and liveliness with which... (shrink)

We discuss the intertwined topics of Fulling non-uniqueness and the Unruh effect. The Fulling quantization, which is in some sense the natural one for an observer uniformly accelerated through Minkowski spacetime to adopt, is often heralded as a quantization of the Klein-Gordon field which is both physically relevant and unitarily inequivalent to the standard Minkowski quantization. We argue that the Fulling and Minkowski quantizations do not constitute a satisfactory example of physically relevant, unitarily inequivalent quantizations, and indicate what it (...) would take to settle the open question of whether a satisfactory example exists. A popular gloss on the Unruh effect has it that an observer uniformly accelerated through the Minkowski vacuum experiences a thermal flux of Rindler quanta. Taking the Unruh effect, so glossed, to establish that the notion of particle must be relativized to a reference frame, some would use it to demote the particle concept from fundamental status. We explain why technical results do not support the popular gloss and why the attempted demotion of the particle concept is both unsuccessful and unnecessary. Fulling non-uniqueness and the Unruh effect merit attention despite these negative verdicts because they provide excellent vehicles for illustrating key concepts of quantum field theory and for probing foundational issues of considerable philosophical interest. (shrink)

Sometimes we say that pleasure is distinct form joy, happiness, or good mood. Some other times we say the joy, happiness or good mood are types of pleasure. This suggests the existence of two concepts of pleasure: one specific, the other generic. According to the specific concept, pleasure is one type of positive affects among others. Pleasure is to be distinguished from joy, gladness, contentment, merriment, glee, ecstasy, euphoria, exhilaration, elation, jubilation; happiness, felicity, bliss, well-being; enjoyment, amusement, fun, rejoicing, delectation, (...) enchantment, delight, rapture, relish, thrill; satisfaction, gratification, pride, triumph; good mood, jollity, gaiety, cheerfulness; relief (or at least from some of these concepts). According to the generic concept of pleasure, a pleasure is any of these positive affects. Joy, gladness, contentment, merriment, glee, ecstasy, euphoria, exhilaration, elation, jubilation, happiness, felicity, bliss, well-being, enjoyment, amusement, fun, rejoicing, delectation, enchantment, delight, rapture, relish, thrill, satisfaction, gratification, pride, triumph, good mood, jollity, gaiety, cheerfulness, relief and pleasure in the specific sense are all species of pleasures. In this thesis, I shall focus on the generic concept of pleasure, in order to address the question “what is the property of pleasantness common to all positive affects?” In order to address this question nevertheless, one need to have at least rough grip on pleasure in the specific sense and on what distinguishes it from other positive affects. I shall therefore start by hinting at the problem of the definition of the specific concept of pleasure. (shrink)

Our interpretations of experience determine the limits of what we can do with the world.Jorge Luis Borges's short stories act as narrative experiments with the potential to alter the reader's experience. They provide momentary glimpses into a remixed reality that, through their vivacity, allow us to wonder at the immanent possibilities that emerge when we acknowledge the irreality of language. This function of Borges's writing follows from his understanding of fictions as imaginative verbal constructions that are effective due to (...) their aesthetic quality, the capacity to evoke emotional responses through play with narrative form. Borges does not write to produce truths. He is doubtful of the ability of any given... (shrink)

PHILOSOPHY BEGINS IN WONDER--so says Socrates in the Theaetetus-- but where does it end? The Theaetetus itself ends in such a puzzling way as to be the cause of apparently interminable dispute. Although its theme is the nature of knowledge, neither Socrates nor his interlocutors ever present a definition that gains unanimous approval. The definitions of knowledge as perception, as true opinion and as true opinion with an account are all rejected. This fact has understandably inclined most interpreters to maintain (...) that the dialogue fails to reach its explicit goal. Nevertheless, Socrates' attitude about the apparent failure of his conversation with Theaetetus is markedly distinct from his express attitude in those early dialogues with which the Theaetetus is often compared. Whereas early dialogues conclude with self-deprecation and exhortation to continue the quest, the Theaetetus concludes in satisfaction, indifferent to the possibility of further study. As midwife Socrates has successfully delivered Theaetetus of his phantom offspring; beyond that he can do no more. Thus the apparently negative conclusions of the dialogue are at least not negatively intoned, and readers can barely avoid the suspicion of having missed something. One response is to argue that an authorized definition of knowledge can be found by a careful reexamination of the very arguments Socrates rejects. But the fact that our suspicion is aroused by a dramatic consideration commends a search for resolution through the drama, however that might happen to bear on the problem of knowledge. (shrink)

WHO IN TODAY'S WORLD OF PHILOSOPHY has not been made acutely aware of a singular and even felicitous phenomenon that has arisen in recent moral philosophy from within the natural law tradition? This is the phenomenon of three philosophers of whom it might be said that not only do they have "hearts that beat as one," but even their minds would appear to think as one as well: Germain Grisez, John Finnis, and Joseph Boyle. What could be more appropriate (...) for economy of reference in our critical study than if we simply refer to them henceforth as "the Grifinnboyle"? (shrink)

There are few living thinkers who have enjoyed the eminence and reown of Jürgen Hamermas. His work has been highly influential not only in philosopy, but also in the fields of politics, sociology and law. This is the first collection dedicated to exploring the connections between his body of work ahd America's most significant philosophical movement, pragmatism. Habermas and Pragmatism considers the influence of pragmatism on Habermas's thought and the tensions between Habermasian social theory and pragmatism. Essays by distinguished pragmatists, (...) legal and critical theorists, and Habermas cover a range of subjects including the philosophy of language, the nature of rationality, democracy, objectivity, transcendentalism, aesthetics, and law. The collection also addresses the relationship to Habermas of Kant, Peirce, Mead, Dewey, Piaget, Apel, Brandom and Rorty. (shrink)