This research article is devoted to the research of philosophical terms of the famous Kyivan Rus’ artifact on translation of the 11th century – “Miscellany of 1073”. Scientists studied this subject in the past. However, they were focused on logical terminology, reflected in the famous fragment of “Miscellany”, which was called “philosophical treatise”. The author of this research article, unlike other scientists, has researched a part of the text “Joseph on the Maccabees”. It is no less important for clarifying the (...) peculiarities of the philosophical terms use than the already mentioned “philosophical treatise”. The chapter “Joseph on the Maccabees” in “Miscellany” is a translation of fragments of the 4 Maccabees from Greek into Old Church Slavonic, which raises the issue – how passions can be guided by reflection. This well-known apocrypha is quite saturated with receptions of classical Greek philosophy, primarily Platonism, Aristotelianism and Stoicism. It is also extremely valuable as an illustration of the complex process of the translator’s selection of ancient Slavic equivalents of Greek philosophical terms related to the philosophy of knowledge and ethics. Some of them were subsequently established in our philosophical language. In particular, the features of translation of such Greek words as “λογισμὸς”, “νοῦς”, “λόγου”, “σοφία” reflected in “Miscellany” into Old Church Slavonic have been analyzed, and the possibility of Old Church Slavonic terms translation into modern Ukrainian has also been considered. The result of the study is recognition of the need to raise the issue of modern Ukrainian philosophical terms ability to reproduce ancient Greek or even ancient Slavic terms associated with philosophy of knowledge in the process of translation. In particular, when dealing with “Miscellany”, it becomes clear that it is wrongful to reflect all cognitive processes and psychic instances with the concept “mind” in the modern terminological scheme. When dealing with old handwritten material in Old Church Slavonic, in particular “Miscellany of 1073”, it is necessary to define and distinguish the concepts of “reflection”, “mind”, “intellect”, “wisdom”, since they had specific meaning generated by attempt to translate them from Greek. (shrink)

У статті автор звертається до дослідження «Послання» Климента Смолятича. Мета публікації – з’ясувати що сáме названо «філософією» у творі на основі узагальнення традиції досліджень цього питання. Результатом роботи стало виявлення, що провідними інтерпретаціями уявлень про філософію, нібито вміщених у «Послання» є версії про те, що філософія тут розумілась як: (1) «освіта» й «освіченість», (2) язичницька мудрість, (3) християнська мудрість, (4) алегоричний метод тлумачення Біблії, або (5) було представлене плюралістичне розуміння. Автор висловлює думку, що найімовірніше у «Посланні» не висловлено якихось чітких (...) уявлень про те, що є філософією, а її образ є швидше аморфним, ніж плюралістичним, таким, що не чітко диференціює філософське і нефілософське знання. Такий образ філософії є досить типовим для тодішньої культури Візантії, під упливом якої однозначно перебували як Климент, так і його опонент – пресвітер Фома. (shrink)

The author justifies the need to return to an analysis of the meaning of such words as “philosophy” and “philosopher” in the Kyivan Rus’ written sources of the 11th–14th centuries. In the author’s view, this is explained not only by the inaccuracies the earlier research committed but also by the necessity to take contemporary achievements of Byzantine philosophical historiography into account. The author concludes that the preserved Kyivan Rus’ written sources reflect certain Byzantine interpretations of the words “philosopher” and “philosophy” (...) as understood within particular interpretive frameworks: philosophy may refer to a specifically “Christian” or “external” philosophy, presuppose rational or mystical comprehension of divine wisdom, become verbalized or not. Some sources probably espouse an understanding of philosophy as a practice of true life. The word “philosopher” had different connotations, as well. It referred to advisers or officeholders at the court of the Byzantine emperor, wise princes, church intellectuals, connoisseurs of biblical books, etc. The author invalidates the idea that in Kyivan Rus’, there existed a holistic understanding of philosophy and philosophers. Instead, one should interpret these words as having a limited plurality of meanings. (shrink)

B a c k g r o u n d. Genre-wise the article is a form of publication of analytical conclusions resulting from researching religious symbolism within the movie. The material for interpretation was derived from mass media, in particular cinematography. The article describes religious symbolism within the movie "Barbie" (2023). It is made apparent that the wide array of religious symbols in modern cinema requires a new approach. M e t h o d s. Issues with defining religious symbolism (...) in cinema have inspired a search of appropriate methods and research methodology. The article utilizes analytical approach based on religious symbolism found in the artistic source material – in this case a movie. R e s u l t s. With that considered the goal of the scientific research was to track down instances of religious symbolism in "Barbie" movie; such was confirmed to be abundant within otherwise mundane work. Barbieland symbolises paradise withiin the movie's fictional universe: it's a perfect place with no diseases or suffering, populated by perfect people ignorant of sorrow, problems, and worries. Naturally, the exile from paradise is a theme that is also predent. C o n c l u s i o n s. Brief research concludes that the "Barbie" movie features disguised religious symbolism – a common trope for many works within modern cinema. (shrink)

Analysis of regularity of the ideology of state-building, analysis of specificity of the manifestation of this regularity at different stages of history, in particular, in antique times, - important components of research of the problem of formation of this ideology. The purpose of the article - investigate the specificity of manifestations of the interrelation political and legal consciousness, and, at the same time, the development of the ideology of state-building as a particular species of theoretically informed practical consciousness, which was (...) used by the creators of state forms in antiquity. The study is based on the principles of materialist dialectics, historicism, formational and civilizational approaches. The obtained results of a study that summarize the scientific novelty can be formulated in the form of abstracts: a) identified two lines of ideological interaction on state building in antiquity; b) formed a theoretical model of ideological matrix of state-building of antiquity. Specificity of manifestations of the interrelation political and legal consciousness in antiquity - is the existence of two lines of ideological interaction in the field of state-building in a state-organized society: the first line - the unilateral influence of political consciousness on the legal consciousness; the second line - predominantly the asymmetric inverse influence of legal consciousness on political consciousness. These two lines of ideological interaction (the unilateral influence of political consciousness on the legal consciousness and predominantly the asymmetric inverse influence of legal consciousness on political consciousness) have created original ideological matrix of state-building. Within this ideological matrix of state-building in antiquity formed corresponding view of ideological phenomenon - the ideology of state-building of western slave state. (shrink)

Virtue ethics seems to be a promising moral theory for understanding and interpreting the development and behavior of artificial moral agents. Virtuous artificial agents would blur traditional distinctions between different sorts of moral machines and could make a claim to membership in the moral community. Accordingly, we investigate the “machine question” by studying whether virtue or vice can be attributed to artificial intelligence; that is, are people willing to judge machines as possessing moral character? An experiment describes situations where either (...) human or AI agents engage in virtuous or vicious behavior and experiment participants then judge their level of virtue or vice. The scenarios represent different virtue ethics domains of truth, justice, fear, wealth, and honor. Quantitative and qualitative analyses show that moral attributions are weakened for AIs compared to humans, and the reasoning and explanations for the attributions are varied and more complex. On “relational” views of membership in the moral community, virtuous machines would indeed be included, even if they are indeed weakened. Hence, while our moral relationships with artificial agents may be of the same types, they may yet remain substantively different than our relationships to human beings. (shrink)

The generative AI boom is unleashing its minions. Enterprise software vendors have rolled out legions of automated assistants that use large language model (LLM) technology, such as ChatGPT, to offer users helpful suggestions or to execute simple tasks. These so-called copilots and chatbots can increase productivity and automate tedious manual work. In this article, we explain how that leads to the risk that users' ethical competence may degrade over time — and what to do about it.

When experimental participants are given the chance to reflect and revise their initial judgments in a dynamic conversational context, do their responses to philosophical scenarios differ from responses to those same scenarios presented in a traditional static survey? In three experiments comparing responses given in conversational contexts with responses to traditional static surveys, we find no consistent evidence that responses differ in these different formats. This aligns with recent findings that various manipulations of reflectiveness have no effect on participants’ judgments (...) about philosophical scenarios. Although we did not find a consistent quantitative effect of format (conversation vs. static survey), conversational experiments still provide qualitative insights into debates about how participants are understanding (or misunderstanding) the scenarios they read in experimental studies, whether they are replacing difficult questions with questions that are more easily answered, and how participants are imagining the scenarios they read in ways that differ from what is explicitly stated by experimenters. We argue that conversational experiments—"Socratic questionnaires"—help show what is going on “under the hood” of traditional survey designs in the experimental investigation of philosophical questions. (shrink)

A supertask is a task that consists in infinitely many component steps, but which in some sense is completed in a finite amount of time. Supertasks were studied by the pre-Socratics and continue to be objects of interest to modern philosophers, logicians and physicists. The term “super-task” itself was coined by J.F. Thomson (1954). Here we begin with an overview of the analysis of supertasks and their mechanics. We then discuss the possibility of supertasks from the perspective of general relativity.

Linguistic category learning has been shown to be highly sensitive to linear order, and depending on the task, differentially sensitive to the information provided by preceding category markers (premarkers, e.g., gendered articles) or succeeding category markers (postmarkers, e.g., gendered suffixes). Given that numerous systems for marking grammatical categories exist in natural languages, it follows that a better understanding of these findings can shed light on the factors underlying this diversity. In two discriminative learning simulations and an artificial language learning experiment, (...) we identify two factors that modulate linear order effects in linguistic category learning: category structure and the level of abstraction in a category hierarchy. Regarding category structure, we find that postmarking brings an advantage for learning category diagnostic stimulus dimensions, an effect not present when categories are non‐confusable. Regarding levels of abstraction, we find that premarking of super‐ordinate categories (e.g., noun class) facilitates learning of subordinate categories (e.g., nouns). We present detailed simulations using a plausible candidate mechanism for the observed effects, along with a comprehensive analysis of linear order effects within an expectation‐based account of learning. Our findings indicate that linguistic category learning is differentially guided by pre‐ and postmarking, and that the influence of each is modulated by the specific characteristics of a given category system. (shrink)

Linguistic category learning has been shown to be highly sensitive to linear order, and depending on the task, differentially sensitive to the information provided by preceding category markers (premarkers, e.g., gendered articles) or succeeding category markers (postmarkers, e.g., gendered suffixes). Given that numerous systems for marking grammatical categories exist in natural languages, it follows that a better understanding of these findings can shed light on the factors underlying this diversity. In two discriminative learning simulations and an artificial language learning experiment, (...) we identify two factors that modulate linear order effects in linguistic category learning: category structure and the level of abstraction in a category hierarchy. Regarding category structure, we find that postmarking brings an advantage for learning category diagnostic stimulus dimensions, an effect not present when categories are non‐confusable. Regarding levels of abstraction, we find that premarking of super‐ordinate categories (e.g., noun class) facilitates learning of subordinate categories (e.g., nouns). We present detailed simulations using a plausible candidate mechanism for the observed effects, along with a comprehensive analysis of linear order effects within an expectation‐based account of learning. Our findings indicate that linguistic category learning is differentially guided by pre‐ and postmarking, and that the influence of each is modulated by the specific characteristics of a given category system. (shrink)

The relationship between philosophy and aesthetic criticism has occupied Robert Pippin throughout his illustrious career. Whether discussing film, literature, or modern and contemporary art, Pippin's claim is that we cannot understand aesthetic objects unless we reckon with the fact that some distinct philosophical issue is integral to their meaning. In his latest offering, Philosophy by Other Means, we are treated to a collection of essays that builds on this larger project, offering profound ruminations on philosophical issues in aesthetics along with (...) revelatory readings of Henry James, Marcel Proust, and J. M. Coetzee. (shrink)

Gender issues are well-researched in the general management literature, particular in studies on new ventures. Unfortunately, gender issues have been largely ignored in the dynamic capabilities literature. We address this gap by analyzing the effects of gender diversity on dynamic capabilities among micro firms. We consider the gender of managers and personnel in 124 Ukrainian tourism micro firms. We examine how a manager’s gender affects the firm’s sensing capacities and investigate how it moderates team gender diversity’s impact on sensing capacities. (...) We also investigate how personnel composition impacts seizing and reconfiguration capacities. We find that female managers have several shortcomings concerning a firm’s sensing capacity but that personnel gender diversity increases this capacity. Team gender diversity has positive effects on a firm’s seizing and reconfiguration abilities. Our study advances research on gender diversity and its impact on firm capabilities and illustrates its relevance for staffing practices in micro firms. (shrink)

Two main methods for analysing de re readings of definite descriptions in intensional contexts coexist: that of evaluating the description in the actual world, whether by means of scope, actuality operators, or non-local world binding, and that of substituting another description, usually one expressing a salient or ‘vivid’ acquaintance relation to an attitude holder, prior to evaluation. Recent work on so-called descriptive indexicals suggests that contrary to common assumptions, both methods are needed, for different ends. This paper aims to show (...) that there is indeed a division of labour between the two methods of analysis and to identify criteria for choosing among alternative ways to model the second, substitutional method. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence (AI), large language models (LLMs), such as Open AI’s ChatGPT, have a remarkable ability to process and generate human language but have also raised complex and novel ethica...

Platonism has played a central role in Christianity and is essential to a deep understanding of the Christian theological tradition. At times, Platonism has constituted an essential philosophical and theological resource, furnishing Christianity with an intellectual framework that has played a key role in its early development, and in subsequent periods of renewal. Alternatively, it has been considered a compromising influence, conflicting with the faith's revelatory foundations and distorting its inherent message. In both cases the fundamental importance of Platonism, as (...) a force which Christianity defined itself by and against, is clear. Written by an international team of scholars, this landmark volume examines the history of Christian Platonism from antiquity to the present day, covers key concepts, and engages issues such as the environment, natural science and materialism. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Review Essay:Aquinas, Modern Theology, and the TrinityGuy Mansini O.S.B.As one would expect from his Incarnate Lord, Thomas Joseph White's Trinity is no exercise in historical theology, although of course it calls on history, but aims to give us St. Thomas's theology as an enduring and so contemporary theology that both respects the creedal commitments of the Catholic Church and offers a more satisfying understanding of the Trinity than anything (...) proposed by the great theologians, Catholic and Protestant, of the past hundred years.1 The Trinity, however, gives a more complete and satisfying view of its subject than does The Incarnate Lord.Can St. Thomas really be fruitfully located within the dialectic of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Trinitarian speculation? Yes, and it is one of White's principal contributions to show how St. Thomas's medieval contemporaries, the early Franciscans on the one hand and William of Ockham on the other, remotely but really adumbrate nineteenth- and twentieth-century theological positions, once due attention is paid to the key issues of the analogical naming of God and his knowability. The reader is thus assured that Aquinas's original project was composed with some awareness of temptations and alternatives repeated (though not exactly, of course) in modern thought. It should be added that St. Thomas is by no means treated as the only systematic theological authority for Trinitarian theology, but White recognizes his paradigmatic place in the Catholic theological tradition. [End Page 1415]The most important issue for assessing the enduring value of Thomas's Trinitarian theology, then, whether in the thirteenth century or twentieth century, turns out to be the applicability and centrality of the psychological analogy for an understanding of the immanent intelligibility of the Trinity, an analogy suggested by Scripture, and developed by the Cappadocians, St. Augustine, St. Thomas, and other medieval writers, not to mention John Henry Newman and Matthias J. Scheeben.What is the status of this analogy? Olivier-Thomas Venard laconically describes it as "revealed"—too hot. Michael Maria Waldstein has recently argued vigorously and at length that it is not revealed at all—too cold. White does not discuss this in detail but is satisfied with saying that it is "derived" from Scripture—just right. However one thinks this question is to be resolved, White robustly defends the psychological analogy as a proper analogy and as the only systematic theological instrument ever offered by the theological tradition that succeeds in providing real understanding of the immanent life of the Trinity, one that preserves the transcendence of God and honors the dogmatic tradition of the Church bearing on the nature of God and the Trinity of persons—Nicaea, Lateran IV, and Vatican I, especially. This is how he does it in chapter 22.1. We know the mystery of interior Trinitarian life based on God's manifestation of it to us in the economy of salvation via the missions of Word and Spirit, which disclose to us distinct personal processions.2. Such processions are either immanent or transitive.3. But transitive processions terminate in some substance distinct from whence they emanate.4. God, however, is one in nature (essence, substance) both specifically and numerically.5. Therefore, the processions are immanent to the godhead.6. However, there are only two immanent immaterial activities known to us, that of knowing and that of loving.7. Therefore, we cannot have some understanding of the mystery of interior Trinitarian life except by analogy with these two [End Page 1416] activities. That is to say, we know the mystery of the Trinitarian life according to the "psychological model" or not at all.This argument can be re-phrased with more pointed reference to modern theologies of the Trinity.1. If we wish to understand the mystery of the immanent Trinitarian life of distinct persons, but not by way of immanent activities and processions, then we must appeal to transitive activity to account for the distinction of persons.2. Transitive divine activity can be conceived of (1) as creative, (2) as within creation relative to its history (the continental way), or (3) as taking place between three already constituted divine individuals, relating transitively to one... (shrink)

According to transhumanists who urge the radical enhancement of human beings, humanity’s top priority should be engineering “posthumans,” whose features would include agelessness. Increasingly, transhumanism is critiqued on foundational grounds rather than based largely on anticipated results of its implementation, such as rising social inequality. This expansion is crucial but insufficient because, despite its radical aim, transhumanism reflects beliefs and attitudes that are evident in the broader culture. With a focus on the yearning to eliminate aging, I consider four of (...) these: a disproportionate reliance on science and technology to address major human challenges; the conceptualization of human beings in terms of binaries like “young-old”; a repudiation of vulnerability; and intensifying perfectionism. Illuminating these interlocked commitments both deepens an existing critique of transhumanism and draws our attention to deleterious cultural views that must be vigorously contested if our commitment to human flourishing is to be deep and unwavering. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Democracy, Spirit, and RevitalizationWalter B. Gulick (bio)The assumptions of democracy as an associational ethos of vulnerable life are, first, that we don't already know how best to order our common life and, second, that we don't know what the abstract ideals of empathy, emancipation, and equity entail in the concrete.—Michael Hogue1In American Immanence: Democracy for an Uncertain World, Michael S. Hogue grounds his proposal for a political theology in (...) a critique of American exceptionalism and its supportive "redeemer symbolic."2 In the Anthropocene era, Hogue states, American exceptionalism "legitimates the extraction of diverse forms of value and justifies the externalization of diverse costs" (29) with unconscionable costs to the natural environment and international justice. As indicated in the passage quoted above, Hogue's reaction to the rigid assumptions supportive of American exceptionalism is to offer a humble acknowledgement of political fallibility coupled with what he terms "a theopolitics of resilient democracy" (184; see also 3–6).My concern in this essay is largely practical. I will focus on discerning what intellectual, emotional, and communal resources might be drawn upon to further develop and actually effect the needed changes that Hogue so ably points out. Relatedly, I will inquire into who the most likely candidates are to devote energy to the reconstruction of social structures and practices so that they express values that Americans at their best uphold. Finally, I will reflect upon the role that spiritual ideals and communal practices might play in energizing effective democratic action. [End Page 5]I. Hogue's Critical and Constructive TasksHogue's overriding interest is to outline an epistemic/axiological/environmental/political stance that does not give rise to the various sorts of injustices and dysfunctions that mark the Anthropocene era, especially our allegiance to policies that eventuate in what he calls "climate wickedness." The alternative vision he embraces develops pragmatic naturalism as a method of inquiry and exposition. His reflections are especially indebted to the thought of Dewey, James, and Whitehead (78–82). During a time when e-words are normally associated with forms of electronic communication, Hogue offers instead two trios of e-words with another sort of significance—one that signifies a stance he wishes to overcome and one that communicates what he hopes to achieve. Our current era is unfortunately in thrall, he says, to extraction, externalization, and exception, whereas what we should strive for is a society marked by empathy, emancipation, and equitability. Well put. He presupposes that democratic governance, deeply embedded in American history, ought to serve as the vehicle for achieving what the positive set of e-words promotes. To this end, Hogue quotes appreciatively from Dewey's article, "Democracy is Radical": Democracy "is radical because it requires great change in existing social institutions, economic, legal and cultural" (170). This understanding of democracy slumbers now; what might it take to reawaken it? And if reawakened, what changes might be made to establish the more nearly equitable political influence that is basic to the promise of democracy?Hogue, recognizing in good pragmatic fashion the importance of consequential change, states, "In contrast to foundationalist commitments to antecedents and precedents, pragmatic naturalism commits to a prospective concern with consequents" (80). Foundational commitments to antecedents may certainly impede needed change, but surely attention to the historical events and practices that gave rise to current problems is needed to avoid repeating previous errors. Hogue refers to Whitehead's vision of social symbolism, suggesting that "social change can be catalyzed by the improvised revision of existing symbolic repertoires or the innovative formation or subversive interjection of new symbols" (99). I'm not fully convinced by Whitehead's claim. I suspect that many of our social problems are rooted below the linguistic level in an array of affective issues that elude symbolic adjustment. New strategies are needed to counter the prevalence of fear and resentment in society as promoted for political and commercial reasons and tied to Hogue's strongly voiced recognition that we live in an uncertain world.Here is my understanding of how Hogue both frames our current social and cultural situation and what he says might begin to remediate these circumstances. [End Page... (shrink)

Public deliberation, highly valued by many African societies, becomes the cornerstone of a new system of African political philosophy in this brilliant, highly original study. In Deliberative Agency, philosopher Uchenna Okeja offers a way to construct a new political center by building it around the ubiquitous African practice of public deliberation, a widely accepted means to resolve legal matters, reconcile feuding groups, and reestablish harmony. In cities, hometown associations and voluntary organizations carry out the task of fostering deliberation among African (...) groups for different reasons. In some instances, the deliberation aims to settle disputes. In others, the aim is to decide the best action to take to address unfortunate incidents such as death. Through a measured, comparative analysis, Deliberative Agency argues that the best way to reimagine and harness the idea of public deliberation, based on current experiences in Africa, is to see it as performance of agency. Building a new political center around the practice places agency at the core of a new political life in Africa. (shrink)

Positivism has had a tremendous impact on the development of the social sciences over the past two centuries. It has deeply influenced method and theory, and has seeped deeply into our broader understandings of the nature of the social sciences. Postmodernism has attempted to loosen the grip of positivism on our thinking, and while it has not been without its successes, postmodernism has worked more to deconstruct positivism than to construct something new in its place. Psychologists today perennially wrestle to (...) find and retain their intellectual balance within the methodological, theoretical, and epistemological struggles between positivism and postmodernism. In the process, pre-postmodern criticisms of positivism have been largely forgotten. Although they remain deeply buried at the core of psychology, these early alternatives to positivism are rarely given explicit hearing today. The current piece explores some of the early critiques of positivism, particularly of its scientism, as well as early suggestions to tip the scales in favor ofsapientia. This third option, largely overlooked within mainstream psychology, is of tremendous value today as it is both deconstructive and constructive relative to the shortcomings of positivism. It avoids the overly reductionistic “trivial order” of positivism, as well as the deeply unsatisfying and disorienting “barbaric vagueness” of postmodernism, while simultaneously embracing important core elements of both currents of thought. (shrink)

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Volume 103, Issue 3, Page 728-733, November 2021.

Originally published in 1957, The Uniqueness of the Individual is a collection of 9 essays published from the ten years preceding publication. The essays deal with some of the central problems of biology. These are among the questions put and answered from the standpoint of modern experimental biology. What is ageing and how is it measured? What theories have been held to account for it, and with what success? Did ageing evolve, and if so how? Is Lamarckism and adequate explanation (...) of evolutionary process? Does evolution sometimes go wrong? Do human beings evolve in a way peculiar to themselves? Other essays touch upon the problems of scientific method and of growth and transformation. This book will be of interest to natural historians, evolutionists and anthropologists. (shrink)

How questions are understudied in philosophy and linguistics. They can be answered in very different ways, some of which are poorly understood. Jaworski identifies several types: ‘manner’, ‘method, means or mechanism’, ‘cognitive resolution’, and develops a logic designed to enable us to distinguish among them. Some key questions remain open, however, in particular, whether these distinctions derive from an ambiguity in how, from differences in the logical structure of the question or from contextual underspecification. Arguing from two classes of responses, (...) adverbs and by gerunds, I give the answer that the logical structure of the question is indeed relevant: loosely, manners are adjuncts but methods are arguments. (shrink)

Conviction Narrative Theory (CNT) is a theory of choice underradical uncertainty– situations where outcomes cannot be enumerated and probabilities cannot be assigned. Whereas most theories of choice assume that people rely on (potentially biased) probabilistic judgments, such theories cannot account for adaptive decision-making when probabilities cannot be assigned. CNT proposes that people usenarratives– structured representations of causal, temporal, analogical, and valence relationships – rather than probabilities, as the currency of thought that unifies our sense-making and decision-making faculties. According to CNT, (...) narratives arise from the interplay between individual cognition and the social environment, with reasoners adopting a narrative that feels “right” to explain the available data; using that narrative to imagine plausible futures; and affectively evaluating those imagined futures to make a choice. Evidence from many areas of the cognitive, behavioral, and social sciences supports this basic model, including lab experiments, interview studies, and econometric analyses. We identify 12 propositions to explain how the mental representations (narratives) interact with four inter-related processes (explanation, simulation, affective evaluation, and communication), examining the theoretical and empirical basis for each. We conclude by discussing how CNT can provide a common vocabulary for researchers studying everyday choices across areas of the decision sciences. (shrink)

Countersexual society -- Countersexual reversal practices -- Theories -- Countersexual reading exercise -- On philosophy as a better way of taking it in the ass: deleuze and "molecular homosexuality.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:A Response to Charles AltieriRobert B. PippinIam very grateful to Charles Altieri for his attentive reading of and thoughtful critique of Philosophy by Other Means: The Arts in Philosophy and Philosophy in the Arts.1 Let me proceed immediately to his main and quite important criticism of the approach defended there. It is this: "My one huge problem with Pippin's perspective is that I cannot accept his insistence that the (...) distinctive form of thinking elicited by works of art is best treated as a mode of knowledge." And he offers a contrasting perspective: "Instead I propose that art should matter to society primarily as the achievement of constructed, specific, individual experiences that embody resonance and authority. Then we can claim that their capacities to engage audiences in particular imaginative situations dramatically stage responses to the historical conditions on which Pippin dwells." This is a densely stated alternative, and I am not sure I fully understand it or why stating it this way thereby shows why art "should matter to society" (art may do this, but why is that important?), but I have much to say by way of clarification before getting to the alternative.First, I meant the title to be as dialectical and so as paradoxical as it sounds. If the means are "other," then we have left philosophy altogether; if the other means are still philosophical, then they can't count as "other." By dialectical I mean simply the avoidance of such dualisms, while not collapsing distinctions through some sort of resolutive reductionism. The idea is to avoid two terrible examples of philosophical approaches to the arts that putatively avoid such dualisms: either provocative or illustrative. The former sees literature especially as embodying issues like moral dilemmas that can be understood to pose, to provoke, philosophical [End Page 249] questions that traditional philosophy should then take up and discuss on its own. (Examples are the way Samuel Beckett's plays, or Albert Camus's The Stranger, are sometimes taught.) The latter, the illustrative, sees literature, again paradigmatically, as providing something like the flesh and blood of abstract philosophical issues, instantiating and illustrating a particular philosophical approach, like moral sentimentalism. (Charles Dickens is often cited.)These are surely examples of what Altieri cites as, and quite rightly rejects, as "appropriating those [aesthetic] experiences for philosophical explanation." I want to reject such "appropriationism" too. In my first chapter, on philosophical criticism of the arts, the idea I defended was that attention to the philosophical value of literature (I will stay with this art form for a while) is attention to literature as a form of reflective thinking itself, in no need of appropriation by philosophy—even though, I claim, there can be a form of philosophical criticism. The point of such criticism is to illuminate that dimension of the work itself, something philosophically significant that the work can do but traditional philosophy cannot.This is couched within several qualifications. Such attentiveness can be valuable, but not for just any work of great literature. Some literature is great without being concerned with any aesthetic modality of "thinking." One can surely admire Samuel Richardson or Anthony Trollope or William Makepeace Thackeray and admit that their value stems from other qualities in the prose, plotting, and psychologically astute portrayal of characters. And for many other reasons, any of the arts can be said to be valuable even if a case can also be made for their bearing on philosophy.And finally, the concept of "philosophical knowledge" is quite complicated. Surely some philosophers, like G. W. F. Hegel, believe in such a thing, but I don't. As Altieri rightly points out, no Absolute exists. What interests me is the relevance of Hegel's claim that a sensible and affective modality of collective self-knowledge can be embodied in many great works. But the collective self-knowledge embodied in fiction is not like discursive or analytic or even speculative knowledge. I see no strict distinction between the object of interrogation and the interrogation itself. That is, the "self" in question (e.g., who have we become?) is what it is by virtue of its own self-interpretation. Self-knowledge in... (shrink)

John Burdon Sanderson Haldane was a giant among men. He made major contributions to genetics, population biology, and evolutionary theory. He was at once comfortable in mathematics, chemistry, microbiology and animal physiology. But it was his belief in education that led to his preparing his popular essays for publication. In his own words: "Many scientific workers believe that they should confine their publications to learned journals. I think that the public has a right to know what is going on inside (...) the laboratories, for some of which it pays." So begins Haldane's collection of essays, perhaps the most public intellectual communicating science before the writings of Stephen Jay Gould. The first part of the volume emphasizes the important developments in biology and natural science in the first quarter of the century. As such, it provides a benchmark for studies of the next three quarters of the century. In an unusual introduction, Price takes the readers through their paces, discussing the situation then and now in vitamins, oxygen want, disease controls, and the rewards of science as such. This is followed by Haldane's views on society, art, religion and economy as seen through the eyes of a politically alert major scientist. The editor provides readers unfamiliar with Haldane with a carefully rendered chronology of a life that began in 1892 and that spanned much of the present century. Despite ideas on race, class and politics that have seen better times, Haldane was truly exceptional in translating the science of his time into ideas that "everyman" could readily grasp. His predictions on what science would achieve were on target far more often than not. But even his failed predictions are perhaps the most interesting of all. They throw into sharp relief the truly novel and revolutionary developments in science over the past 75 years. J.B.S. Haldane held many positions and received many honors during his lifetime. But for most of the period covered in this volume, he was the William Dunn Reader in Biochemistry at Cambridge University. He simultaneously served as Fellow of New College, in Oxford University's Horticultural Institute. Carl A. Price served until 1999 as professor IIof plant molecular biology in the Waksman Institute of Microbiology at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey. He also served as the editor of Plant Molecular Biology Reporter from 1983 until 1997. This is the first volume in a new series on the history and theory of science. (shrink)

Kwasi Wiredu defines conceptual decolonisation as an activity in which Africans divest themselves of undue colonial influences, but his descriptions of this process are either unrelated to divesting or work quite generally, and not in favour of an African point of view. Wiredu's approach to decolonisation appears to be largely indistinguishable from the business of philosophy.

Background Respect is essential to providing high quality healthcare, particularly for groups that are historically marginalized and stigmatized. While ethical principles taught to health professionals focus on patient autonomy as the object of respect for persons, limited studies explore patients’ views of respect. The purpose of this study was to explore the perspectives of a multiculturally diverse group of low-income women living with HIV (WLH) regarding their experience of respect from their medical physicians. Methods We analyzed 57 semi-structured interviews conducted (...) at HIV case management sites in South Florida as part of a larger qualitative study that explored practices facilitating retention and adherence in care. Women were eligible to participate if they identified as African American (n = 28), Hispanic/Latina (n = 22), or Haitian (n = 7). They were asked to describe instances when they were treated with respect by their medical physicians. Interviews were conducted by a fluent research interviewer in either English, Spanish, or Haitian Creole, depending on participant’s language preference. Transcripts were translated, back-translated and reviewed in entirety for any statements or comments about “respect.” After independent coding by 3 investigators, we used a consensual thematic analysis approach to determine themes. Results Results from this study grouped into two overarching classifications: respect manifested in physicians’ orientation towards the patient (i.e., interpersonal behaviors in interactions) and respect in medical professionalism (i.e., clinic procedures and practices). Four main themes emerged regarding respect in provider’s orientation towards the patient: being treated as a person, treated as an equal, treated without blame or prejudice, and treated with concern/emotional support. Two main themes emerged regarding respect as evidenced in medical professionalism: physician availability and considerations of privacy. Conclusions Findings suggest a more robust conception of what ‘respect for persons’ entails in medical ethics for a diverse group of low-income women living with HIV. Findings have implications for broadening areas of focus of future bioethics education, training, and research to include components of interpersonal relationship development, communication, and clinic procedures. We suggest these areas of training may increase respectful medical care experiences and potentially serve to influence persistent and known social and structural determinants of health through provider interactions and health care delivery. (shrink)

The target articles in this issue advance our understanding of bioethical considerations in pragmatic trials (Garland, Morain, and Sugarman 2023; Morain and Largent 2023). Both articles appreciate...

The future of the United States rests in many ways on how the ongoing challenge of racial injustice in the country is addressed. Yet, humanists remain divided over what if any agenda should guide humanist thought and action toward questions of race. In this volume, Anthony B. Pinn makes a clear case for why humanism should embrace racial justice as part of its commitment to the well-being of life in general and human flourishing in particular. As a first step, humanists (...) should stop asking why so many racial minorities remain committed to religious traditions that have destroyed lives, perverted justice, and justified racial discrimination. Rather, Pinn argues, humanists must first confront a more pertinent and pressing question: why has humanism failed to provide a more compelling alternative to theism for so many minority groups? For only with a bit of humility and perspective-and a recognition of the various ways in which we each contribute to racial injustice-can we truly fight for justice. (shrink)

Heidegger claimed that Western philosophy ended, failed even, in the German Idealist tradition. In The Culmination, Robert B. Pippin explores the ramifications of this charge through a masterful survey of Western philosophy, especially Heidegger's critiques of Hegel and Kant. Pippin argues that Heidegger's basic concern was to determine sources of meaning for human life, particularly those that had been obscured by Western philosophy's attention to reason. The Culmination offers a new interpretation of Heidegger, German Idealism, and the fate of Western (...) rationalism. (shrink)

Descartes, padre de la filosofía moderna, por E.B. Pita.--El problema critico fundamental, por J.I. Cifuentes.

B F Scarlett; Formal and Teleological Elements in Hirst’s Argument for a Liberal Curriculum, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 18, Issue 2, 30 May 2006.

In this article, we present results from a literature review of intrinsic, instrumental, and relational values of nature conducted for the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, as part of the Methodological Assessment of the Diverse Values and Valuations of Nature. We identify the most frequently recurring meanings in the heterogeneous use of different value types and their association with worldviews and other key concepts. From frequent uses, we determine a core meaning for each value type, which is (...) sufficiently inclusive to serve as an umbrella over different understandings in the literature and specific enough to help highlight its difference from the other types of values. Finally, we discuss convergences, overlapping areas, and fuzzy boundaries between different value types to facilitate dialogue, reduce misunderstandings, and improve the methods for valuation of nature's contributions to people, including ecosystem services, to inform policy and direct future research. © 2023 The Author(s). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Institute of Biological Sciences. (shrink)

One of the vexed questions in the philosophy of wonder and indeed education is how to ensure that the next generation harbours a sense of wonder. Wonder is important, we think, because it encour- ages inquiry and keeps us as Albert Einstein would argue from ‘being as good as dead’ or ‘snuffed-out candles’ (Einstein 1949, 5). But how is an educator to install, bring to life, or otherwise encourage a sense of wonder in his or her stu- dents? Biologist Rachel (...) Carson suggests that exploring nature and specifically undertaking walks along the rocky coast of Maine would keep alive a person’s inborn sense of wonder (Carson 1984). Philosopher Jesse Prinz thinks that exposure to art will encourage wonderment because artworks, as he puts it, are “inventions for feeding the appetite that wonder excites in us” (Prinz 2013). Weird fiction (a subgenre of speculative fiction) – and in particular the work of one of its greatest exponents, the early-20th-century American author How- ard Phillips Lovecraft – is likewise a catalyst for wonder. The reason behind this is that Lovecraft’s ‘wonder-stories’ are densely packed with wonder per design; and in support of this claim I shall in what is to come 1) provide a brief introduction to Lovecraft and weird fiction; 2) present a working definition of wonder; and 3) clarify what is meant by something being ‘densely packed with wonder’ via bringing to the fore evidence of Lovecraft’s literary wonder- mongery. The paper ends with some reflections on the notion of ‘dark wonder’, why this peculiar label might be suitable for the kind of wonder we find in Lovecraft’s work, and why exposure to ‘dark wonder’ can be edifying, and in that sense educational. (shrink)

This paper reports our analysis of the ELSI Virtual Forum: 30 Years of the Genome: Integrating and Applying ELSI Research, an online meeting of scholars focused on the ethical, legal, and social implications (ELSI) of genetics and genomics.

This paper presents core features of the virtue ethics of American philosopher Ella Lyman Cabot. It offers an articulation of her position in Everyday Ethics (1906), and argues that Cabot's account has the resources to respond to a critique leveled against her mentor, Josiah Royce—namely, that a virtue ethics organized around loyalty is too easily corrupted by loyalty to bad causes. In addition to its importance to a full picture of the pragmatist tradition in moral philosophy, engagement with Cabot's work (...) is critical to an accurate grasp of the virtue ethics revival of the 20th century. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Patterns of Penance and the Sin of Cain:Approaching a Sacramental Biblical TheologyJames B. ProthroMy essay focuses particularly on the sacrament of reconciliation. I am currently composing a monograph on this sacrament for a series in biblical theology, surveying the Scriptures to see how, within them, the Church's sacraments are prefigured, revealed, and commanded, and to illustrate Scripture's witness in a way that will "strengthen" and "rejuvenate" our theology and (...) practice, following Dei Verbum (DV) §24. My contribution here focuses especially on how to approach writing a biblical theology of penance. Biblical treatments and defenses of the sacrament are often brief, contenting themselves with proving a few conceptual points or doubling down on Jesus's giving his apostles the power and duty of absolution in John 20:19–23. Robert Fastiggi's discussion of the biblical "foundations" of reconciliation, for instance, spans less than thirty pages for both testaments combined, and concludes with a kind of anti-climactic apology: "While it's clear that the Sacrament of Penance has been instituted by Christ, the actual form of the administration of the sacrament will need to develop within the Church's tradition."1 This is a roundabout way of saying that although Scripture clearly attests to the sacrament's theological foundations, it leaves us only with foundations. If this is true, how far can a biblical theology of the sacrament go, and how should one go about it?Approaching a biblical theology of penance, I think, requires us to pause and consider two aspects of the task. First, we should give an account [End Page 1371] of "biblical theology" and our aims in writing one. Secondly, we should consider how to write a theology of this sacrament in particular. What should we be looking for? Such questions will help us gain a clearer vision of what illumination we should expect from Scripture about penance and how we will go about finding it. With our approach and aims discussed, this essay can then conclude with an attempt to follow them in practice by offering a theological, penance-focused exegesis of the sin of Cain (Gen 4:1–16).A Biblical Theology of the SacramentWriting a biblical theology of the sacrament of reconciliation requires us to attend to the notion of "biblical theology." Unfortunately, there continues to be little agreement on exactly what biblical theology is. The phrase is "a wax nose" molded always to the interpreter practicing it.2 Thankfully, however, this lack of consensus allows us to offer our own proposal and tailor it to the task at hand. Rather than offering a requisite Forschungsbericht or haggling with other proposals in detail as though my goal were to dismantle or replace them globally, I can in this brief essay tell you how I think one should go about this task and why.Our task is writing a biblical theology of penance, and we may begin by noting already two small words in that phrase that tell us much. The first is the indefinite article, "a." We are writing a biblical theology. That designates our goal already as an academic product that fits a particular genre, not simply a lens with which I read. Depending on which term one emphasizes—biblical or theology—and depending on what one means the phrase to rule out, the phrase "biblical theology" can be used to indicate exegesis that is "theologically interested"3 (as opposed to exegesis that spurns dogmatic theology) or to indicate theology that is "biblically faithful"4 (i.e., explicitly biblically sourced as opposed to theologies that operate from first principles other than revelation). Both of these uses of the term, I think, have valid interests but cede too much definitional ground: exegesis that is opposed to or not aimed at the theological truth is incomplete, from a Catholic perspective, and theology that is not constantly informed and reformed by God's [End Page 1372] word can only be ancillary to theology.5 To do exegesis that is theological or theology that is exegetical is simply to do exegesis or to do theology; we do not need an added composite term. Writing a biblical theology indicates not merely... (shrink)

Mit dem vorliegenden Werk schliesst Lorenz B. Puntel seine Seinstrilogie ab; die beiden vorherigen Bande sind unter dem Titel Struktur und Sein (2006) und Sein und Gott (2010) erschienen. Der neue Band fuhrt das in den anderen Banden nur inchoativ formulierte gesamtsystematische philosophische Programm aus. Lorenz B. Puntel betrachtet das Thema Sein und Nichts als das ursprungliche Thema der Philosophie und stellt daruber eine umfassende Theorie auf. Diese Theorie nennt er Seinstheorie; sie besteht aus den beiden Subtheorien: Ontologie als Theorie (...) (des Seins) der Seienden und Einailogie als Theorie des Seins selbst oder als solchen. Ausgangspunkt ist die von Heidegger eingefuhrte ontologische Differenz, die Unterscheidung von Sein und Seienden. In eingehenden, auf den einschlagigen Originaltexten der wichtigsten Philosophen basierenden Ausfuhrungen wird der Nachweis gefuhrt, dass der in der Philosophiegeschichte feststellbare Grundmangel in der haufigen totalen und in sehr wenigen Fallen partiellen Ignorierung der grossen Seinsfrage besteht; nirgends wird diese in adaquater Weise thematisiert. In Teil II arbeitet der Autor die Grundzuge sowohl der allgemeinen Ontologie als auch der Einailogie heraus. Zwei grundlegende Thesen werden bewiesen: die Moglichkeit des relativen Nichts, d. h. des Verschwindens aller Seienden auf der Basis ihrer Kontingenz, und die Unmoglichkeit des absoluten Nichts, d. h. des Verschwindens des Seins selbst auf der Basis seines notwendigen Status. Gezeigt wird schliesslich, dass dem Sein selbst eine geistige Verfasstheit innewohnt, die aus Intelligenz/Denken, Wille und Freiheit besteht, womit die Moglichkeit eroffnet wird, dass das notwendige geistig verfasste und damit freie Sein sich weiter offenbaren kann. Dem nachzugehen, setzt aber eine grundlegende methodische und thematische Zasur voraus. (shrink)

Wael Hallaq explores the history, development, and contemporary trends in Muslim political thought using the work of Morocco-based philosopher Taha Abdurrahman. A sweeping intellectual history and philosophical examination, this book examines the trajectory of how we understand the central questions plaguing modernity in both the West and Muslim lands.