Politics and Modernity provides a critical review of the key interface of contemporary political theory and social theory about the questions of modernity and postmodernity. Review essays offer a broad-ranging assessment of the issues at stake in current debates. Among the works reviewed are those of William Connolly, Anthony Giddens, J[um]urgen Habermas, Alasdair MacIntyre, Richard Rorty, Charles Taylor and Roy Bhaskar. As well as reviewing the contemporary literature, the contributors assess the historical roots of current problems in the (...) works of Nietzsche and Max Weber. (shrink)

I present the history of philosophy, and history more generally, as a context of ideas, with respect to which philosophers and historians share concerns about the meaning of the texts they both use, and where for some there is a principled contrast between seeing meaning in quasi-mathematical terms (“a philosophical stance”) or in terms of context (“a historical stance”). I introduce this imagined (but not imaginary) world of ideas as temporally extended. Returning to my early research into the (...) epistemic problems of historiography, I present my view that foundational was meaningful language in a shared world, and I display some difficulties found in handling the “wholeness” of historical accounts. I came to realise that it was epistemic opposition between historical accounts that mattered. I concluded that analytical philosophy was wrong to assume that individual sentences were free-standing meaningful units that could be juxtaposed with others at whim, and that an understanding of the rational grounds for determining relevance was needed. In order to make sense of this I used Quine’s conception of the “web of belief,” and noted that a historical account could be treated as a “unit of empirical significance” in his terms. I observe that, although the epistemic problems of history arose for me before I considered his pragmatic position, nevertheless attention to those problems required me to adopt the Quine-based form of pragmatism I describe. I came to realise that I had wrongly adopted a synchronic view of the Quinean web, thereby adopting a “philosophical stance.” Rather, the web should be conceived in diachronic terms as a rolling web, so forming history itself. It is wrong to think that language started in atomistic terms so that, following Aristotle, it first consisted of simple concepts forming sentences of brief and narrow subject-predicate form. Instead, early communications took the form of oral traditions usually in narrative form. Meaningful wholes such as historical accounts are conceptually prior to atomistic sentences and need to be seen in extended temporal terms, so that an Aristotelian subject-predicate metaphysics is implausible. Quine’s pragmatism framed and facilitated my historical stance despite the unashamed philosophical stance that he adopted. (shrink)

In the system of the philosophical and sociological ideas of the Frankfurt School the "critical theory" of society occupies the central place. In the "critical theory" are interwoven all the most significant aspects of the philosophical, economic, political, sociological, psychological, aesthetic, and ethical ideas dealt with by the representatives of this school. And therefore it is not accidental that the concept of the "critical theory" of society is employed frequently as a synonym of the social philosophy of (...) the Frankfurt School. The multi-leveled problematique of the "critical theory" of society, and the contradictoriness of the theoretical positions of its adherents, complicate critical analysis. Therefore, the explanation of its methodological orientation, which can help us to understand better the existence and actual philosophical nature of this theory, has important significance for our discussion. (shrink)

History casts a spell on our minds more powerful than science or religion. It does not root us in the past at all. It rather flatters us with the belief in our ability to recreate the world in our image. It is a form of self-assertion that brooks no opposition or dissent and shelters us from the experience of time. So argues Constantin Fasolt in The Limits of History , an ambitious and pathbreaking study that conquers history's (...) power by carrying the fight into the center of its domain. Fasolt considers the work of Hermann Conring (1606-81) and Bartolus of Sassoferrato (1313/14-57), two antipodes in early modern battles over the principles of European thought and action that ended with the triumph of historical consciousness. Proceeding according to the rules of normal historical analysis--gathering evidence, putting it in context, and analyzing its meaning--Fasolt uncovers limits that no kind of history can cross. He concludes that history is a ritual designed to maintain the modern faith in the autonomy of states and individuals. God wants it, the old crusaders would have said. The truth, Fasolt insists, only begins where that illusion ends. With its probing look at the ideological underpinnings of historical practice, The Limits of History demonstrates that history presupposes highly political assumptions about free will, responsibility, and the relationship between the past and the present. A work of both intellectual history and historiography, it will prove invaluable to students of historical method, philosophy, political theory, and early modern European culture. (shrink)

Although he developed one of the most important modern theories of time, Bergson has often been criticised for not thinking history. Drawing on his writings from Creative Evolution to The Two Sources, I show that, on the contrary, he was trying to define history in a new way, one that would not be exhausted by the traditional opposition to the natural sciences. Bergson’s new philosophy of history, free of teleology and determinism, allows us to think the specificity (...) of the human historical dimension without erasing its articulation with natural evolution. Against the critical readings Aron and Merleau-Ponty have offered, I maintain that Bergson’s philosophy does not withdraw into an individualist spiritualism but includes the collective dimension and the history of non-human, both natural and technological, reality. (shrink)

Our thinking is still the captive of the dichotomy “national/ international.” The reaction to nationalism takes the form of an abstract internationalism, and reaction to internationalism leads to the rebirth of nationalism. However, this dichotomy was only true (and that relatively) in 19th century Europe, or at the latest, at the beginning of the twentieth century, when subnational cultures seemed on the way to disappearing, and everything European was considered “universal” (two hypotheses that the facts prove to be untrue). As (...) H. Frey observes, “Today, the decline or decadence of the West is part of the contemporary view of the world, like the electron or the dinosaur.” The linear outline of progress, with Europe at the head, did not withstand the test of the First World War. The year 1918 marked the beginning of the end of Europeanism. Since then, we have begun to speak of “areas of civilization” (Splengler), “civilizations” (Toynbee), “cultural coalitions” (Lévi-Strauss). The existence of “areas of civilization” (regions) is commonly admitted today; it has entered journalistic language and even the structure of regional commissions and agencies of the United Nations (Europe, Near East, Southern Asia, South-east Asia, and the Far East). New communities have inserted themselves between nations and humanity. What do they represent? Are they something unique, or are they divided into a certain number of types in opposition to each other because of some characteristic? And in what way have they modified our view of universal history? (shrink)

Philologus, founded in 1846, is one of the oldest and most respected periodicals in the field of Classics. It publishes articles on Greek and Latin literature, historiography, philosophy, history of religion, linguistics, reception, and the history of scholarship. The journal aims to contribute to our understanding of Greco-Roman culture and its lasting influence on European civilization. The journal Philologus, conceived as a forum for discussion among different methodological approaches to the study of ancient texts and their reception, publishes (...) original scholarly contributions with a strong international focus. Publications languages are: German, English, Italian, French. As of 2014 the publication of supplementary volumes will be resumed. The series Philologus. Supplemente / Philologus. Supplementary Volumes will publish monographs and edited volumes pertaining to all aspects of the study of ancient literature and its reception, with a special focus on topics concerning literary theory, philosophy and the history of scholarship from an interdisciplinary perspective. (shrink)

The history of the opposition of the Dionysian and Apollonian principles is longer than is usually assumed. Similarly to the many of the other contrarian figures ascribed to Nietzsche, the Apollonian–Dionysian was not of his making; its history is much older and buried under a number of different layers of interpretation. In the following work I will discuss the formal aspects and content of their development, which took place under the direct authorial influence of Pseudo-Longinus, Jacob Bernays, Friedrich (...) Schiller, Fr. W. J. Schelling and Johan Jacob Bachofen. Still, although the discovery of a principle labelled das Dionysische doesn’t represent anything exceptional, the “Birth of Tragedy” treatise was a breakthrough: it began the development of a specific form of cultural critique, of which Nietzsche was the prime representative. (shrink)

ABSTRACT As has long been recognized, Arthur Schopenhauer’s intellectual encounter with the Orient represents a departure from previous Western philosophers’ approaches to it. What has been less appreciated, however, is that this encounter also marks a pivotal moment in the modern critique of systematic philosophies of history. Since Schopenhauer doubted that there was any logic in history, either in the form of a providential plan or a rationally intelligible structure, he impugned both history’s scientific status and its (...) significance for an understanding of the human condition. Rejecting both Christian eschatology and the modern theory of progress, he opted instead for a transhistorical perspective. This denigration of history, which had far-reaching repercussions in the latter half of the nineteenth century, must be understood in light of Schopenhauer’s engagement with non-Western philosophy. Schopenhauer’s devaluation of the significance of historical difference, in stark opposition to the philosophers of history who preceded him, contributed to his receptivity to non-Western thought; and his belief in the affinity between his own transhistorical perspective and the teachings of Hinduism and Buddhism informed his antagonism to contemporary historical narratives and theories. (shrink)

We are pleased to present this special issue of the journal History and Philosophy of Logic dedicated to the square of opposition.The square of opposition is a diagram and a theory of opposition re...

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Divine Illumination: The History and Future of Augustine’s Theory of KnowledgeSteven P. MarroneLydia Schumacher. Divine Illumination: The History and Future of Augustine’s Theory of Knowledge. Challenges in Contemporary Theology. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011. Pp. xiii + 250. Cloth, $119.95.Lydia Schumacher has written an ambitious book. Among the many things she tries to accomplish in the volume, three stand out to this reviewer. First of all, (...) she proposes to reexamine Augustine’s theory of knowledge. She argues that Augustine’s philosophy is grounded in theology. For his theory of knowledge this means, by Schumacher’s reading, that the aim of cognition is to enable the human being to regain its original status as “image of God,” which latter state is manifested in knowing God and making God known. It is the mental, and by extension ethical, process of becoming God’s image that Schumacher says we should, in the Augustinian context, take the phrase ‘divine illumination’ to signify. For Augustine, Schumacher insists, this process is an entirely internal phenomenon constituted by a self-correcting series of intellectual reflections on the part of the mind. In holding to this view, Schumacher emphatically rejects the understanding, common in scholarship, that “divine illumination” for Augustine had to do with mental reference to what she labels an “extrinsic” standard such as the eternal ideas in God’s mind. [End Page 293]Second, Schumacher argues that the Augustinian project, epitomized in his theory of knowledge, was carried out by most of the thinkers of the Latin Middle Ages, particularly by Anselm and Thomas Aquinas. These latter two individuals are therefore divine illumi-nationists of the first order. What historians often designate as an Augustinian current, evident in the high Middle Ages among scholastics from the Franciscan Order, represented instead a deviation, a turn to an entirely novel theological-philosophical project. Here, mind’s work was conceived of as “the immediate and totalized knowledge of an individual essence.” And for this, recourse to an extrinsic standard filled the bill. Consequently, high-medieval Franciscans were the actual propounders of the theory of knowledge Schumacher tells us has wrongly been associated with divine illumination. Moreover, this Franciscan current of thought, once severed from its original theological underpinnings, provided the historical inspiration for modern philosophy, thereby acting as a kind of catalyst for the modernist philosophical problems—as Schumacher receives them—of rationalism and fideism, skepticism as well.Third, Schumacher sounds the call for a contemporary return to the authentic Augustinian project. By starting philosophy, as she claims Augustine did, with theological assumptions, she wants to fashion a “faith-based concept of knowledge” and with it, most importantly, to escape the modernist dilemma of the incompatibility of faith and reason. Grounding philosophy in theology—Christian theology, she maintains—will restore a lost integrity to our procedures of thinking, ultimately redeeming philosophy itself.How much of this program has Schumacher managed to achieve? Since this reviewer is marked out as the key spokesperson for the interpretation of both divine illumination and the history of medieval thought against which Schumacher inveighs, perhaps he should not be the one to answer the question. Still, the reader forewarned, I lay out my opinion. With regard to her first goal, Schumacher makes good on her promise to render Augustine as a theologian bent on working from his assumptions to designate a process whereby philosophy and mankind can be simultaneously restored. She is not so convincing in her attempt to equate this program with divine illumination. For Schumacher, the process of divine illumination is correlative to the idea of God as source of the mind’s power to act. Yet Augustine often plainly associates what he describes as illumination with turning to God and conceding his ideas an important role in the mental processes of judgment and concept formation. It is hard to see how one can honestly exclude this extrinsic element of what Augustine intended.Regarding her second goal, Schumacher does an excellent job of reminding us how Augustinian were almost all medieval scholastics, Thomas included, and warning us not to take the high-scholastic recourse to Aristotle as a sign of opposition to Augustinian modes of thought... (shrink)

Hegel's logic provides a basis for an interpretation of his philosophy of history and political theory which avoids many of the difficulties that traditionally have been associated with his views, leaving us with a clear and useful model of modern political interaction. The unification of content and form provides for the inherently historicist features of the model, that resolve the traditional dichotomy of description and prescription by presenting the state as a historical process, developing through the opposition between (...) the normative claims of its constituents and the determinate socio-political arrangements existing at any particular stage in its history. The discussion begins with a brief examination of Hegel's doctrines of the concept and the _idea, which it subsequently applies to an interpretation of his concepts of _Sittlichkeit and the state. (shrink)

This book traces the development of the Polish theory of history, analyzing how Jerzy Topolski, Krzysztof Pomian, and Olga Tokarczuk have both built upon and transgressed the metahistorical theories of American historian Hayden White. By deconstructing and reconstructing contemporary theories of history, this research is a unique contribution to the fields of historiography and the philosophy of history.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Theory of the Apophantic Judgment According to René GirardDesiderio Parrilla Martínez (bio)introduction: criticism of judgment in rené girardIn his essay "Belief (Cultural Memory in the Present)" ("Credere di credere") Gianni Vattimo stated the conditions of possibility of a "weak and post-metaphysical Christianity" founded in René Girard´s victimary hypothesis.1 According to Vattimo, mimetic theory allows abandoning traditional metaphysics and the classical theory of truth, based on the (...) judgment. In later works, Vattimo insisted on the epistemological virtues of mimetic theory to reform the classical theory of adequacy2 and the theological implications of this reform.3 Mimetic theory definitely unmasks the violence of the "strong metaphysic," to enable the advent of a weak metaphysics and a kenotic theology based on love: "According to him, it is the survival of the victim-based mechanism, albeit in attenuated form, that explains the recurrence of violence in the history of Christianity. To complete Girard's argument, we learn from Heidegger that what Girard calls the victim-based mechanism is metaphysical objectivism."4 The Erlebnis (non-conceptualized experience) of this theological weakening [End Page 147] has occurred as an event from a previous epistemological weakening, which mimetic theory itself contributes to consolidating.5This drift toward the epistemological nihilism generated a debate between Gianni Vattimo and René Girard, who rejected this conclusion drawn from his mimetic theory.6 The transcript of this controversy first appeared in Verità o fede debole? Dialogo su cristianesimo e relativismo (2006) [Christianity, Truth, and Weakening Faith (2011)], a compilation of three dialogues on three fundamental concepts: truth, secularization, and relativism. In the first part, focused on the epistemological question of truth, Girard affirms he isn't accurately recognized in Vattimo´s thought, showing his distance and warning that, unlike the Italian thinker, his thinking is primarily realistic: "Personally, I agree with Vattimo when he says that Christianity is a revelation of love, but I do not exclude that it is also a revelation of truth. Because truth and love coincide and are one in Christianity."7 In the same chapter, Vattimo challenges René Girard for not having extracted the ultimate consequences of his mimetic theory, because he stays trapped in the realistic ontology of a pre-mimetic mentality: [Vattimo:] "In sum, the only thing I really can't go along with in Girard is his faith in the salvific power of truth, whether it be revealed or discovered by science."8However, in the controversy René Girard could not fail to recognize the central thesis of Gianni Vattimo, according to which his work involved a critique of the classical interpretation of judgment: "I think that there is some kind of incompatibility between traditional philosophy and mimetic theory. I feel, for instance, that scholars influenced by Thomism are handicapped in regard to mimetic theory, because they have to work with neatly distinguished categories. Philosophy is looking for logical foundation as well. It is difficult for philosophers to accept a mechanism that triggers opposite effects. Therefore, it always excludes the real anthropological foundation."9 René Girard acknowledges that in his eagerness to keep up the anthropo-genesis, he cannot avoid judging the theory of judgment from the mimetic theory.10 This critique appears since the beginning of his investigation in Things Hidden since the Foundation of the World, when Girard distinguishes between Heraclitus's logos and the logos of John's gospel.11 In Violence and the Sacred he proceeded to investigate the historical origins of both forms of logos and discovered that a hidden reality underlay the evidence of the canonical judicative structure, using the resources of Derridean deconstruction, of which Girard acknowledges his debt.12René Girard's relationship with philosophy is problematic. Mimetic theory criticizes all human cultural constructions, including mythology and philosophy. However, in The Scapegoat René Girard approaches the issue of "judgment" as a place of truth. His relationship with philosophy therefore needs to be [End Page 148] recognized and his contribution valued. In this work Girard exposed the evolution and transformations that have resulted in the classic judicative structure, showing the assumptions of the last supplement of logical truth.13 In Of Grammatology Derrida took up the term "suppl... (shrink)

We may now ask the question: In what historical perspective should we place the work of Richard Goldschmidt? There is no doubt that in the period 1910–1950 Goldschmidt was an important and prolific figure in the history of biology in general, and of genetics in particular. His textbook on physiological genetics, published in 1938, was an amazing compendium of ideas put forward in the previous half-century about how genes influence physiology and development. His earlier studies on the genetic and (...) geographic distribution of the various species and races of Lymantria contributed soundly to an understanding of the inheritance and development of sex, as well as the genetics of speciation. He was a curious mixture of the experimentalist, empiricist, and theorizer, who could grasp both the large and the small at once and wrap them into the same integrated and coherent package.In insisting on trying to relate genetics to development, Goldschmidt was continually forced to speculate and to forsake experimental fact for generalized theory. In refusing to reconcile a physiological and developmental conception with a corpuscular theory of the gene, he forced himself to substitute for a large body of experimentally verified evidence, vague and general speculations which did not lead in any precise direction. L. C. Dunn summarizes succinctly the effect of Goldschmidt's thinking on the development of genetic theory: Although Goldschmidt's ideas had a considerable influence in directing attention to the developmental processes intervening between genes and characters, they did not lead to the establishment of a general theory of development in genetical terms. In fact, at the end of the period, as signalized by Goldschmidt's book of 1938 [Physiological Gentics] doubt remained whether there was a field with a defined problem which could be identified as developmental genetics.Yet the frequency with which Goldschmidt is cited by later writers suggests that there is a more positive side to his contribution than this. The early Mendelians had recognized the genic constitution of organisms and the Drosophila workers had uncovered in detail the chromosomal mechanism of heredity. These great discoveries were of classical character, solidly based on a multitude of well established facts. By themselves, however, they would not have been sufficient to place genetics in the central position within biology which it was to assume. Beyond the “static” analysis of gene transmission an insight was needed into the dynamic role of genes in cellular physiology, biochemistry, and development. Goldschmidt recognized this aspect and outlined in brilliant generalizations a physiological theory of genetics. Necessarily the prophetic nature of this achievement — romantic in the sense of Ostwald's classification of great scientists and their discoveries — transcended its factual basis. It was the audacity of the theoretician unimpeded by the still scanty data which gave a new focus to biological thought.Some have called Goldschmidt an “obstructionist” in the history of genetics—one whose efforts were largely directed toward useless and continual criticism — challenge for the sake of challenge. As this line of argument goes, time wasted answering Goldschmidt's poorly conceived criticisms could have been better used to pursue new lines of thought within the classical gene theory. Sometimes historians are upbraided for studying the work of such “obstructionists,” or even the work of those whose ideas have later proved to be inadequate. This argument misses the point of history and the lessons which it can teach. Perhaps Goldschmidt did take the time of a number of the classical geneticists who tried to answer his objections to the gene theory; and perhaps many of his own ideas about genes were, by today's view, “wrong.” These are always easier judgments to make by hindsight than at the moment. But that is not the point. Goldschmidt had a considerable influence on his contemporaries, and to dismiss him as an obstructionist because his opponents later proved to be more nearly right, distorts history and obscures significant questions which we might well be asking. It might be valuable to know why Goldschmidt felt compelled to be an iconoclast —and how that impulse, psychological in orgin, led him to overlook critical items of evidence which his opponents considered more carefully. It might also be valuable to try and understand how a contemporary of Goldschmidt or. Morgan really viewed the gene theory — what were its strong and weak point? Such questions are not readily answered by studying the work of only those men who were correct by later standards.Answers to some of the above questions can be gleaned from this study of Goldschmidt — though the first, and most psychologically oriented, question is largely untouched here.On the one hand, Goldschmidt forced classical geneticists to reexamine the foundation of their ideas about the nature, inviolability, and even physical dimensions of genes. He also kept alive the very real problems of gene physiology and its relations to development — a relationship that was given less attention by the Drosophila school in their pursuit of the transmission process. On a broader level he emphasized to the biological community a principle that was in danger of being lost in the enthusiasm surrounding the expansion of the Mendelian-chromosome theory. The point was that all theories in science are transient, logical constructs which should not be held as sacred. Time and again, as the history of science has shown, theories become rigid structures which retard new modes of thought. From Goldschmidt's perspective, the gene theory was in danger of performing just that function, for it was preventing workers from viewing the gene in a functional as well as a structural light.On the other hand, examining the work of critics (or even of outright “obstructionists”) gives the historian an opportunity to observe how the more established community of scholars at some point in time reacts to challenges of its cherished ideas. The fact that many workers in his own day (such as Beadle, Luria, Delbruck, Sturtevant, Bridges, and others), as well as most geneticists today, saw Goldschmidt as having been largely “obstructionist” is useful historical (and/or sociological) data. Clearly, as this paper has tried to show, Goldschmidt's ideas were not all obstructionist, and his viewpoint that genes must be considered functionally was one which was clearly valid, premature as it may have been from an experimental and technique point of view. Perhaps Goldschmidt's major fault was that he developed alternative theories which were not easily testable. Nonetheless, his challenge to a fundamental and established idea brought forth a reaction from many members of the genetic community which indicates how unwilling they were to reconsider the formalized theory on which their work was based. While many of Goldschmidt's criticisms — and particularly his way of making them — arose out of his own idiosyncrasies, they were also a product of his times. His view of the nature of theory-construction, and his rejection of old-style reductionism and mechanism, were part of a growing awareness within the world scientific community that explanations based on reducing complex phenomena to ultimate particles or units were clearly inadequate. The success of the Mendelian-chromosome theory had obscured that fact for many geneticists, but to Goldschmidt it was a point that could not be allowed to pass unnoticed. (shrink)

How does Sylvia Wynter’s theory of the human depart from Western bio-centric and teleological accounts of the human? To grapple with this question I clarify five key concepts in her theory: the Third Emergence, auto- and socio-poiesis, the autopoietic overturn, the human as hybrid, and sociogenesis. I draw on parts of Wynter’s oeuvre, texts she works with and my conversations with Anthony Bogues. Wynter invents a Third Emergence of the world to mark the advent of the human as (...) a hybrid being. She challenges Western conceptions that reduce the human to biological properties. In opposition to Western teleology, her counter-cartography of a history of human life offers a relational conception of human existence which pivots around Frantz Fanon’s theory of sociogeny. She draws on Aimé Césaire’s call for a conception of the human made to the measure of the world, not to the measure of ‘Man’. This makes Wynter’s theory counter-, not post-humanist. (shrink)

History casts a spell on our minds more powerful than science or religion. It does not root us in the past at all. It rather flatters us with the belief in our ability to recreate the world in our image. It is a form of self-assertion that brooks no opposition or dissent and shelters us from the experience of time. So argues Constantin Fasolt in _The Limits of History_, an ambitious and pathbreaking study that conquers history's power by (...) carrying the fight into the center of its domain. Fasolt considers the work of Hermann Conring and Bartolus of Sassoferrato, two antipodes in early modern battles over the principles of European thought and action that ended with the triumph of historical consciousness. Proceeding according to the rules of normal historical analysis—gathering evidence, putting it in context, and analyzing its meaning—Fasolt uncovers limits that no kind of history can cross. He concludes that history is a ritual designed to maintain the modern faith in the autonomy of states and individuals. God wants it, the old crusaders would have said. The truth, Fasolt insists, only begins where that illusion ends. With its probing look at the ideological underpinnings of historical practice, _The Limits of History_ demonstrates that history presupposes highly political assumptions about free will, responsibility, and the relationship between the past and the present. A work of both intellectual history and historiography, it will prove invaluable to students of historical method, philosophy, political theory, and early modern European culture. (shrink)

Herder, the German humanist from the end of the 18th century, a representative of Weimar classicism and of the Sturm und Drang movement, man of letters, philosopher of history, defender of popular cultures, advocate of the uniqueness and importance of every civilization. The ways in which one may summarize his legacy extend even further. The present paper will focus on the philosophy of history. We will prove that his writings reveal a complex and solid theory of barbarianism, (...) topical for 21st century Europe. First of all, we aim to clarify the multiple meanings of this concept, identifying both the historical data and the theoretical principles behind it. In this way, the grounds on which Herder executed a radical overthrow of the Enlightenment conception upon the barbarian will be revealed. Subsequently should derive the relativity of the “civilization–barbarism” opposition, as well as the anticipation of Hegel’s idea that history necessarily continues through the barbarian. Finally, we aim to provide reasonably founded answers to the questions generated by this thesis: 1. What are the qualities that confer on the barbarian the possibility of creating history? – in other words, what turns him from supporting actor into a collective agent able to change the course of history? 2. Is there a law of history that decides whether some barbarians are doomed to perish, while others build empires? (shrink)

Twenty-first-century philosophy has been drawn into a false opposition between speculation and critique. Nathan Brown shows that the key to overcoming this antinomy is a re-engagement with the relation between rationalism and empiricism. If Kant’s transcendental philosophy attempted to displace the opposing priorities of those orientations, any speculative critique of Kant will have to re-open and consider anew the conflict and complementarity of reason and experience. Rationalist Empiricism shows that the capacity of reason and experience to extend and yet delimit (...) each other has always been at the core of philosophy and science. Coordinating their discrepant powers, Brown argues, is what enables speculation to move forward in concert with critique. Sweeping across ancient, modern, and contemporary philosophy, as well as political theory, science, and art, Brown engages with such major thinkers as Plato, Descartes, Hume, Hegel, Marx, Heidegger, Bachelard, Althusser, Badiou, and Meillassoux. He also shows how the concepts he develops illuminate recent projects in the science of measurement and experimental digital photography. With conceptual originality and argumentative precision, Rationalist Empiricism reconfigures the history and the future of philosophy, politics, and aesthetics. (shrink)

The theory that photographs are images made by belief‐independent feature‐tracking is not a philosopher's invention. It gives concise, precise, and unifying expression to an assemblage of ideas about photography with a long and influential history. Traditional theory ironically flubs the line between photography and drawing precisely because it attempts to put them in opposition to each other. Photographs made by drawing can have a special significance because they originate in richly embodied action with a distinctive expressive character. (...) Making marks by printing has different expressive resources. Photography avails itself of the expressive power of printing and drawing too. The new theory of photography prevails over the traditional theory if it helps to make sense of how the authors use photographs in art and communication. The traditional theory was developed partly in order to explain photographs’ special epistemic power. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 61.1 (2000) 115-132 [Access article in PDF] Schiller's Theory of Landscape Depiction Jason Gaiger This paper offers a critical discussion of the theory of landscape depiction which Friedrich Schiller developed in an important but neglected article on the work of Friedrich Matthisson, published in 1794. 1 The question of the value and status of landscape painting and poetry was far (...) from settled at the end of the eighteenth century, and Schiller's essay should be seen as making an important contribution to an ongoing debate. 2 The second half of the eighteenth century is marked by a profound ambivalence towards the natural world. On the one hand there is a remarkable "rediscovery" of nature, evidenced in such diverse but related phenomena as the vogue for English gardens and the appreciation of wild and "untamed places," such as the Alps and the Herz mountains. It is also the age of "sentiment," embracing a heightened sensitivity to all aspects of the physical world. And yet when we turn to the visual arts, we find landscape painting ranked far below history painting and portraiture. Precedence is given to the representation of human actions and emotions, and the depiction of the human figure remains the highest goal of ambitious art.The modern hierarchy of the genres was first established on a firm theoretical and practical basis with the founding of the French Royal Academy in the seventeenth century. The painter of living animals is ranked higher than the [End Page 115] painter of inanimate nature who depicts "choses mortes et sans mouvement." 3 The painter of human subjects, who imitates "the most perfect work of God," stands higher still. The highest achievement to which the artist can aspire, however, is history painting, the depiction of groups of figures in themes derived from biblical and mythical sources. To achieve this, the artist cannot depict what he sees but must employ both knowledge and imagination. The fundamental opposition here is between painting as a merely imitative or mechanical art, which is addressed to the eye alone, and painting as a work of "invention" or "imagination," which is addressed to the mind. Only the latter constitutes a properly liberal art, entitling the painter to stand alongside the poet as "un auteur ingénieux et savant" over and above the mere artisan or skilled laborer.The great popularity enjoyed by landscape painting in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was not met by any comparable elevation in its status as a fine art. Addressing students of the Royal Academy in London in 1770, Joshua Reynolds could continue to dismiss landscape and still-life as the "meaner walks of painting" which require only "mechanical" expertise. 4 For Reynolds the status of painting as a fine art is established through its treatment of the great subjects of history painting, that is, the depiction of human passions and the intellect. Only in tackling such themes does the artist succeed in addressing the imagination, which Reynolds describes as the "great end of art." 5 Although of comparatively recent origin, the genre of "landscape poetry" remained equally problematic and could not easily be reconciled with classicist ideals. New categories seemed to be required to comprehend the work of poets such as Albrecht von Haller and James Thomson, in which the varied and ever-changing aspects of the natural landscape were made the central protagonists of the poetic drama. While traditional forms such as the bucolic, the Arcadian, and the pastoral allowed the depiction of rural existence, the new "descriptive poetry" sought to celebrate the life of nature independently of man's intervening presence: it is nature itself rather than man's relation to nature which is made the poet's primary concern.Schiller's review of the third, expanded edition of Matthisson's poetry appeared in two parts in the Jenaer Allgemeine Literatur-Zeitung, 11-12 September 1794. While the second half of the review is given over to a detailed discussion of Matthisson's poetry, the first part is reserved for an extended theoretical discussion in which Schiller... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 63.1 (2002) 83-104 [Access article in PDF] Reluctant Modernism: Moses Mendelssohn's Philosophy of History Matt Erlin In a well-known passage from the second section of Jerusalem (1784) Moses Mendelssohn takes his old friend Lessing to task for his recent treatise on The Education of the Human Race (1780). His respect for the author notwithstanding, Mendelssohn has little sympathy for Lessing's view (...) of human progress. Opposing the attempt to force the entire species into a single framework of linear development, Mendelssohn claims that, as a species, humankind has always oscillated between cultivation and barbarism. Borrowing the "ages of man" metaphor that Lessing employed in his own discussion, he writes that at almost any point in human history, man is "child, adult, and old man at the same time, though in different places and regions of the world." 1 Against Lessing's concept of global progress Mendelssohn proposes a model in which each individual follows his own trajectory of self-cultivation, a trajectory that begins before birth, intersects more or less briefly with the plane of historical time, and then continues after death into eternity.Mendelssohn's resistance to the Geschichtsphilosophie articulated here by Lessing and later appropriated by Kant, Schiller, and Hegel has been subject to a variety of interpretations. Not surprisingly, more recent commentators have stressed the philosopher's defense of particularity, his opposition to a totalizing theory of history that threatens to grant the individual nothing more than a bit part in the realization of some future state of human perfection. Norbert Hinske, for example, has argued that Mendelssohn's late writings engage in a conscious confrontation with Kant's understanding of historical progress. 2 [End Page 83]According to Hinske, especially Mendelssohn's short text On the Ideal Constitution indicates that the author "must have recognized spontaneously that Kant's proposed solution, whether intentionally or unintentionally, degraded the individual to a mere means of social progress...." 3Mendelssohn's concern for the individual is certainly central to his rejection of a species-based historical teleology, but one should also keep in mind the ethnic and cultural implications of such a model. As both Kant's and Hegel's later writings reveal, any attempt to understand human history in terms of a coherent, linear narrative, especially one that culminates in the rise of Christian Europe, is necessarily troubled by the continued existence of Judaism. In other words it is not just the individual who suffers an implicit reduction in status in late eighteenth-century theories of progress; entire cultures become vestigial once their historical function has been fulfilled. 4 Although the texts containing the most striking hostility toward Judaism were published after the appearance of Jerusalem, a somewhat surprising anti-Jewish bias is already evident in Lessing's explorations of the topic. Lessing does after all refer to the Jews in the period of Egyptian exile as "the most rude and the most ferocious" people imaginable. 5 Moreover, although he grants them a crucial role as educators of humanity, this role lasts only until the appearance of Jesus Christ, an event that simultaneously marks the end of the childhood of humankind. As Hans Liebeschütz has remarked, Lessing's adoption of this position must have been quite a blow to Mendelssohn. 6Each of these reasons for Mendelssohn's skepticism is significant in its own right; taken together, they also raise fundamental questions regarding his relationship to modernity and modern historical consciousness more generally. In one respect, of course, the topic of Mendelssohn's modernity has been much debated. Ever since Alexander Altmann's 1973 biography addressed the philosopher's complex relation to the "two disparate worlds of Judaism and modern Enlightenment," scholars have sought to untangle the strands of tradition and innovation in his work. 7 Most recently, Allan Arkush has depicted Mendelssohn as a radical deist whose observance of Jewish law was largely [End Page 84] strategic, while David Sorkin has emphasized the more conservative aims of his long neglected Hebrew works. 8In light of this interest... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Martin Heidegger and OntologyEmmanuel Levinas (bio)The prestige of Martin Heidegger 1 and the influence of his thought on German philosophy marks both a new phase and one of the high points of the phenomenological movement. Caught unawares, the traditional establishment is obliged to clarify its position on this new teaching which casts a spell over youth and which, overstepping the bounds of permissibility, is already in vogue. For once, (...) Fame has picked one who deserves it and, for that matter, one who is still living. Anyone who has studied philosophy cannot, when confronted by Heidegger’s work, fail to recognize how the originality and force of his achievements, stemming from genius, are combined with an attentive, painstaking, and close working-out of the argument—with that craftsmanship of the patient artisan in which phenomenologists take such pride. In this study, it is important for us to understand, above all, the true intentions of our author, to illuminate what he thinks really needs to be said, and to surmise what is most critical for him.To get to the heart of Heidegger’s system, it seems fitting to begin with a problem that is generally familiar. We choose the problem of knowledge, a deeper understanding of which takes us to the very threshold of Heidegger’s thought. For this problem, central to modern philosophy, is one of the main obstacles of modern philosophy that Heidegger wishes to surmount. Neo-Kantianism, which takes knowledge as the philosophical problem of the first rank, is the movement against which Heidegger rebels with all his strength. We have, thus, every chance of gaining access to his thought by the main door, so to speak. Once inside the system we will try to trace its outlines, 2 reserving, for a second part of our work, the determination of Heidegger’s place in the history of ideas, especially in the phenomenological movement, as well as of his relations with the philosopher to whom he owes so much—Edmund Husserl. 31In its most general form, the problem of the theory of knowledge has a critical significance. It consists in delineating a domain where knowledge can be certain and in determining the criteria for the legitimate scope of knowledge. But this problem, as normal and as simple as it may appear, has deeper roots. That knowledge should need a criterion at all presupposes that truth is not identical to all that is known and that the course [End Page 11] of things can fail to correspond with the course of thought. “How does knowledge correspond to being?” is a more profound formulation of the problem of knowledge.But we are not going to touch anymore on the primordial phenomenon that generates the problem. The problem of correspondence between thing and thought presupposes a free activity of thought and its isolation in relation to the object. It is precisely this presupposition which renders their harmony and even their contact problematic. “How does the subject take leave of itself to attain the object?” is what the problem of knowledge, in the last analysis, boils down to. Its true source is thus the concept of “subject” as elaborated by modern philosophy. The cogito presided over the subject’s birth. The cogito was the affirmation of the privileged nature of the subject’s immanent sphere, of its unique place in existence; hence, the cogito was the specificity of the subject’s connection to the rest of reality, the sui generis nature which opens up the passage from immanence to transcendence, the passage from ideas contained in the thinking substance to 4 their “formal existence.”The concept of the subject, understood as a substance having a specific position in the entire domain of being, presents us with difficulties of two kinds. First, how do we understand this leave-taking from the self which the thinking substance brings about and which displays an entirely original aspect? Indeed, we could say that thought, in reaching out toward objects, does not actually take leave of itself, since its objects—considered as ideas and contents of thought—are, in a certain sense, already within it. In order to make sense of this paradox, Descartes... (shrink)

This radical analysis of the role and importance of historiography interprets the philosophy and theory of history on the basis of historicity as a human condition. The book examins the norms and methods of historiography from a philosophical point of view, but rejects generalisations tht the philosophy of history can provide all the answers to contemporary problems. Instead it outlines a feasible theory of history which is still radical enough to apply to all social structures.

The centrally recognized theoretical achievement that enabled the Higgs boson discovery in 2012 was the hypothesis of its existence, made by Peter Higgs in 1964. Nevertheless, there is a significant body of comparably important theoretical work prior to and after the Higgs boson hypothesis. In this article we present an additional perspective of how crucial theory work was to the genesis of the Higgs boson hypothesis, especially emphasizing its roots in Landau's theory of phase transitions and subsequent theoretical (...) work on superconductivity. A detailed description is then given of the opposition to the Higgs boson hypothesis by many researchers, giving evidence to its speculative nature. And finally, it is discussed the importance of theory work in the decades after the hypothesis in order to make possible the experimental discovery of the Higgs boson. (shrink)

Cultures are constituted by binary oppositions: the absolute and the relative; the perfect and the imperfect; the stable and the unstable. Many of the world’s cultures have looked to revealed religion to discover the absolute: that which transcends the human, the intellect, and space and time. By positing a God who is omniscient and omnipotent, they conceive of an eternal and absolute that continues to exist in an immutable state.In such cultures new perspectives for reinterpreting the past are continually propounded. (...) This allows history to be rewritten and re-rewritten. History simply becomes a method for becoming conscious of the past.By contrast, many East Asian cultures have not developed such a concept of revealed religion. For them, history itself constitutes an absolute, something on which one can rely. History in East Asia is endowed with a normative function, a source of authority that does not permit easy rewriting. (shrink)

While some process philosophers have denigrated the emergent theory of mind, what they have denigrated has been ‘materialist’ theories of emergence. My contention is that one of the most important reasons for embracing process philosophy is that it is required to make intelligible the emergence of consciousness. There is evidence that this was a central concern of Whitehead. However, Whitehead acknowledged that his metaphysics was deficient in this regard. In this paper I will argue that to fully understand the (...) emergent theory of mind and its relation to process philosophy it is necessary to recast the whole history of modern philosophy in terms of efforts by philosophers grappling with the relationship between mind and body, or more broadly, consciousness and nature. This will involve granting a central place to Schelling’s philosophy, the ideas that influenced it and how Schelling’s insights were developed by subsequent philosophers. Process philosophy will then be seen as the tradition generated by efforts to transcend the opposition between idealism and materialism, and its promise in this regard, apart from anything else, is what makes it the most promising philosophy for the future. (shrink)

Recognizing that probability (the Greek doxa) was understood in pre-modern theories as the polar opposite of certainty (episteme), the author of this study elaborates the forms which these polar opposites have taken in some twentieth century writers and then, in greater detail, in the writings of Thomas Aquinas. Profiting from subsequent more sophisticated theories of probability, he examines how Aquinas’s judgments about everything from God to gossip depend on schematizations of the polarity between the systematic and the non-systematic: revelation/reason, science/opinion, (...) saints/philosophers, Aristotle/others. Post-medieval developments have provided the means to discern within Thomas’s thought both a logical theory and a kind of relative frequency theory of probability. The former depends on Aristotle’s theory of demonstration, the latter on his theory of an orderly cosmos; but each as used by Thomas lead to convictions that are sometimes naive, sometimes amusing or even terrifying. (shrink)

Scholasticism : the last shall be first -- Romance and epic : honor abandoned because of love -- Conversion : a poor man from a rich man -- Conflict resolution : he humbly delivered himself to justice -- Gender : male and female created he them.

The square of opposition is a diagram related to a theory of oppositions that goes back to Aristotle. Both the diagram and the theory have been discussed throughout the history of logic. Initially, the diagram was employed to present the Aristotelian theory of quantification, but extensions and criticisms of this theory have resulted in various other diagrams. The strength of the theory is that it is at the same time fairly simple and quite rich. (...) The theory of oppositions has recently become a topic of intense interest due to the development of a general geometry of opposition (polygons and polyhedra) with many applications. A congress on the square with an interdisciplinary character has been organized on a regular basis (Montreux 2007, Corsica 2010, Beirut 2012, Vatican 2014, Rapa Nui 2016). The volume at hand is a sequel to two successful books: The Square of Opposition - A General Framework of Cognition, ed. by J.-Y. Béziau & G. Payette, as well as Around and beyond the Square of Opposition, ed. by J.-Y. Béziau & D. Jacquette, and, like those, a collection of selected peer-reviewed papers. The idea of this new volume is to maintain a good equilibrium between history, technical developments and applications. The volume is likely to attract a wide spectrum of readers, mathematicians, philosophers, linguists, psychologists and computer scientists, who may range from undergraduate students to advanced researchers. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Did Hobbes Have a Semantic Theory of Truth? WILLEM R. DEJONG 1. INTRODUCTION THE qUESTIONRAISEDin the title of this article may strike the reader as a bit anachronistic. A phrase like 'semantic theory of truth' evokes associations with rather recent developments in logic, especially the work of Alfred Tarski. Nevertheless, it is generally agreed that Hobbes made important observations of a semantical nature. Moreover, in an interesting (...) article still frequently referred to, R. M. Martin has argued that Hobbes "has in mind a clear-cut semantical concept of truth."' Examining Hobbes's semantical ideas somewhat more closely than Martin did, T6rnebohm has given a more precise characterization of Hobbes's view on truth and falsity; he speaks of Hobbes's comprehension theory of truth. ~One of the main purposes of this article is to investigate whether such a theory is correctly attributed to Hobbes. For Tarski 'true' and 'false' are predicates of (declarative) sentences) But this is not enough to speak of a semantic theory of truth: The leading idea behind Tarski's fundamental work in the field of semantics is (a restricted version of) the principle of compositionality. This principle, also known as Frege's principle, says that the semantic value of a (complex) expression is a function of the semantic values of the syntactic (and categorematic) parts it is ' R. M. Martin, "On the Semantics of Hobbes," Philosophyand PhenomenologicalResearch 14 095314): 2o5-11, esp. ~o7, 211. Cf. I. C. Hungerland and G. R. Vick, "Hobbes's Theory of Language, Speech and Reasoning," in ThomasHobbes:Computatwsire Logica--Logic, translated and commentary by A. Martinich, ed. and introduced by I. C. Hungerland and G. R. Vick (New York: 1981), 15--167, esp. 17, 121-22. 9 H. T6rnebohm, "A Study in Hobbes' Theory of Denotation and Truth," Theor~a26 (196o): 53-7o; see p. 66. 3 A. Tarski, "The Semantic Conception of Truth and the Foundations of Semantics," Philosophy and PhenomenologicalResearch4 (1944): 341-375; see p. 342. [63] 64 JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 28:1 JANUARY 199o composed of. Moreover, in the case of linguistic expressions which are (deciarative ) sentences this semantic value should be its truth-value. 4 As we shall see, Hobbes's theory of propositions is basically a theory of subject-predicate propositions. It is therefore reasonable to qualify his theory of truth as a semantic one only if it satisfies Frege's principle to a certain extent. Ideally, this means that the truth-value of subject-predicate propositions should be conceived as a function of the semantic interpretations of its subject and predicate. In the next three sections I will concentrate principally on the logicosyntactical aspects of language. I will then discuss successively the general structure of propositions, the various sorts of names, and the syntax of Hobbes's theory of propositions. Section 5 is devoted to Hobbes's theory of truth as interpreted by Martin and T0rnebohm. The outcome of this examination makes it necessary to break away from Martin's restricted conception of semantics. Martin, like Tarski, takes semantics as "semantics in the narrower sense," i.e., as the discipline Quine refers to as the theory of reference. 5 However, sometimes this term is used in a broader sense; the field of semantics is taken then to include the theory of meaning too. Although the wording differs frequently, the distinction between meaning and reference is almost a constant in the history of thinking about language. On the side of meaning one finds terms like connotation, intension, conception, signification and analyticity, while terms like naming, denoting, extension (and sometimes again signification) are ]inked to the notion of reference. In the Computatio sive Logica, the first part of De Corpore, containing Hobbes's most mature work on the philosophy of language, this opposition is displayed by way of a distinction between, on the one side, nominare, denotare and appellare and, on the other side, significare. Hobbes's view of the significative, as opposed to the denotative, role of linguistic expressions is treated in sections 6, 7, and 8. There it will be shown that Hobbes's radical nominalism is decisive for his doctrine of signification; moreover, this nominalism raises serious problems for the relation... (shrink)

The Russian philosopher and cultural theorist Mikhail Bakhtin has traditionally been seen as the leading figure in the group of intellectuals known as the Bakhtin Circle. The writings of other members of the Circle are considered much less important than his work, while Bakhtin's achievement has been exaggerated in proportion to the downgrading of the thinkers with whom he associated in the 1920s. This volume, which includes new translations and studies of the work of the most important members of the (...) Circle, sets out to correct the distortions in the established representations of its activity. The original contributions to literary and linguistic theory made by Valentin Voloshinov and Pavel Medvedev (but frequently credited to Bakhtin) are assessed, and the distinctiveness of their approaches is highlighted. (shrink)

Responding to the long-standing debate concerning whether Michel Foucault is a philosopher or a historian, Amy Allen questions the incompatibility that this opposition suggests. Foucault can be considered neither a historian nor a philosopher in isolation. Rather, given his own account of history and critique in his early text, The Order of Things, we should understand Foucault as a philosopher whose critical interventions are historically contingent. This commentary asks about the role of linguistics in critical theory, as it (...) is the third counterscience listed alongside ethnology and psychoanalysis. Does a Foucault-inspired critical theory privilege the linguistic turn, even above and beyond the critical potential of either psychoanalysis or ethnology? Secondly, this commentary questions the truly critical power of Foucauldian critique in light of a defanged postcolonial theory, which is partially rooted in Foucauldian thought. Specifically, this commentary asks whether Edward Said, a postcolonial theorist explicitly influenced by Foucault, should be considered emblematic of this Foucauldian critique despite Said's complete assimilation into the status quo. (shrink)

The aim of this essay is to extend and refine the concept of ‘haptic visuality’ which has taken decisive shape in film studies so that it can be used to describe narrative form. In recent theory, the haptic has on the whole been set in opposition to narrative. Should narrative cinema then be understood in and through its neglect or disavowal of haptic visuality? Or might certain feature films in fact incorporate haptic imagery, without thereby ceasing to narrate? These (...) are questions urgently provoked by Lynne Ramsay's brilliant first feature film, Ratcatcher. The answer proposed here takes its bearings from the history of literary and filmic Naturalism, and from the understanding of narrative process Siegfried Kracauer develops in his Theory of Film. (shrink)

The most general theory of life history evolution, that of r versus K selection, implies that innovation in the form of plasticity is more likely to be adaptive under poor rather than good resource conditions, the opposite of how Baumard has it. However, this does focus on benefits rather than costs, and including both allows for greater diversity of outcomes.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Interpretation of Plato's Parmenides: Zeno s Paradox and the Theory of Forms R. E. ALLEN PLATO'S Parmenides is divided into three main parts, of uneven length, and distinguished from each other both by their subject matter and their speakers. In the first and briefest part (127d-130a), Socrates offers the Theory of Forms in solution of a problem raised by Zeno. In the second (130a-135d), Parmenides levels (...) a series of objections against Socrates' theory, objections putatively meant as refutation. Then, after an interlude to explain an unfamiliar method of dialectic (135d-137c), that method is applied in the third part by Parmenides, with the help of the young Aristoteles (137c-166c). This final part forms more than two-thirds of the whole. I propose here to examine the first part of the dialogue, the interchange between Zeno and Socrates, and to examine it with special attention to the bearing which questions of dialectical structure and dramatic characterization may have upon its interpretation. It is perhaps here proper to indicate the general view of the dialogue which this discussion will help serve to recommend. Briefly, it is this. The Parmenides is a sustained examination of Plato's Theory of Forms, and the manner of examination is Socratic: the student is presented, not with a body of conclusions, but with a series of arguments whose implications he is left to think through for himself. When he has done so, he will realize that the Theory of Forms is proof against the objections here brought against it: the Parmenides provides no direct support for the thesis, currently popular, that Plato in later life ceased to believe that Forms exist. But though sound as far as it goes, the Theory of Forms does not go far enough: the Parmenides demonstrates that there is a range of problems, bound up with the application of unrestricted predicates, which Forms do not solve but are prey to. A broader theory is required, though a theory which may well contain the Theory of Forms as a part. The Parmenides, whose purpose is critical, leaves unanswered the question of what that theory may be. Zeno's Paradox and the Theoryof Forms (127d-130a) It is Zeno who begins the dialectic of the Parmenides,and fittingly, he begins it with a paradox. If there are many things, the same things must be both [143] 144 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY like and unlike. But this is impossible: unlike things cannot be like, nor like things unlike. Therefore, there cannot be many things (127e). Socrates' reply begins with a solution, and ends with a challenge. There exists, alone by itself, a Form of Likeness, and also a Form of its opposite, Unlikeness. The things we call 'many' are both like and unlike; but in this they differ from the Forms in which they partake. For things which are just alike (abr& r& 6uoLa)1 cannot be unlike, nor things just unlike alike. But it is no more surprising that the same things should partake both in Likeness and Unlikeness than it is that a thing should be both one and many by partaking in both Unity and Plurality. Still, Unity itself is not many, nor Plurality one. And so with other Forms: Socrates would be filled with wonder if someone could show that Likeness and Unlikeness, Unity and Plurality, Rest and Motion, and the other Forms, can be combined with (~v'rK~p&vvwOaO and separated from (SLaKotp~0a,) each other. Forms cannot be qualified by their opposite. 2 Socrates' denial is a conjunction. Several translators, including Cornford and Taylor, have rendered ~v3,~p&vvvaOa~ ~as &aKps as though it were a disjunction, 'combined or separated'. The reason for this was no doubt stylistic; but the Greek means, not 'or' but 'and', and logically, the difference is important. Zeno and Parmenides are challenged to prove, not one of two alternatives, but both together. This conclusion rests on more than a Kas In the Sophist, knowing how to separate (&a~ps 253e 3) according to kinds is equivalent to distinguishing (&a~m~a0a~ 253d 1) according to kinds, and both are equivalent to not believing that the same Form is different or a different Form the same (253d 1... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Interpretation of Plato's Parmenides: Zeno s Paradox and the Theory of Forms R. E. ALLEN PLATO'S Parmenides is divided into three main parts, of uneven length, and distinguished from each other both by their subject matter and their speakers. In the first and briefest part (127d-130a), Socrates offers the Theory of Forms in solution of a problem raised by Zeno. In the second (130a-135d), Parmenides levels (...) a series of objections against Socrates' theory, objections putatively meant as refutation. Then, after an interlude to explain an unfamiliar method of dialectic (135d-137c), that method is applied in the third part by Parmenides, with the help of the young Aristoteles (137c-166c). This final part forms more than two-thirds of the whole. I propose here to examine the first part of the dialogue, the interchange between Zeno and Socrates, and to examine it with special attention to the bearing which questions of dialectical structure and dramatic characterization may have upon its interpretation. It is perhaps here proper to indicate the general view of the dialogue which this discussion will help serve to recommend. Briefly, it is this. The Parmenides is a sustained examination of Plato's Theory of Forms, and the manner of examination is Socratic: the student is presented, not with a body of conclusions, but with a series of arguments whose implications he is left to think through for himself. When he has done so, he will realize that the Theory of Forms is proof against the objections here brought against it: the Parmenides provides no direct support for the thesis, currently popular, that Plato in later life ceased to believe that Forms exist. But though sound as far as it goes, the Theory of Forms does not go far enough: the Parmenides demonstrates that there is a range of problems, bound up with the application of unrestricted predicates, which Forms do not solve but are prey to. A broader theory is required, though a theory which may well contain the Theory of Forms as a part. The Parmenides, whose purpose is critical, leaves unanswered the question of what that theory may be. Zeno's Paradox and the Theoryof Forms (127d-130a) It is Zeno who begins the dialectic of the Parmenides,and fittingly, he begins it with a paradox. If there are many things, the same things must be both [143] 144 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY like and unlike. But this is impossible: unlike things cannot be like, nor like things unlike. Therefore, there cannot be many things (127e). Socrates' reply begins with a solution, and ends with a challenge. There exists, alone by itself, a Form of Likeness, and also a Form of its opposite, Unlikeness. The things we call 'many' are both like and unlike; but in this they differ from the Forms in which they partake. For things which are just alike (abr& r& 6uoLa)1 cannot be unlike, nor things just unlike alike. But it is no more surprising that the same things should partake both in Likeness and Unlikeness than it is that a thing should be both one and many by partaking in both Unity and Plurality. Still, Unity itself is not many, nor Plurality one. And so with other Forms: Socrates would be filled with wonder if someone could show that Likeness and Unlikeness, Unity and Plurality, Rest and Motion, and the other Forms, can be combined with (~v'rK~p&vvwOaO and separated from (SLaKotp~0a,) each other. Forms cannot be qualified by their opposite. 2 Socrates' denial is a conjunction. Several translators, including Cornford and Taylor, have rendered ~v3,~p&vvvaOa~ ~as &aKps as though it were a disjunction, 'combined or separated'. The reason for this was no doubt stylistic; but the Greek means, not 'or' but 'and', and logically, the difference is important. Zeno and Parmenides are challenged to prove, not one of two alternatives, but both together. This conclusion rests on more than a Kas In the Sophist, knowing how to separate (&a~ps 253e 3) according to kinds is equivalent to distinguishing (&a~m~a0a~ 253d 1) according to kinds, and both are equivalent to not believing that the same Form is different or a different Form the same (253d 1... (shrink)

Twenty years ago our great teacher and leader Chairman Mao published "On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People," an epoch-making piece of Marxist literature. In this brilliant piece, Chairman Mao applied the fundamental law of the universe, the law of the unity of opposites, to sum up comprehensively the historical experience of China's socialist revolution and construction and the international Communist movement and to analyze profoundly the nature, peculiarities and laws of socialist society. He was the first in (...) the history of the development of Marxism to point out clearly that the fundamental contradictions of socialist society are still the contradiction between the productive forces and production relations and the contradiction between the superstructure and the economic base. He was the first to demonstrate clearly that even after the system of ownership of the means of production has been transformed into that of a socialist country there still exist classes, class struggle, and the danger of capitalist restoration. He was the first to indicate clearly that there exist two different kinds of contradictions in socialist society which must be rigorously distinguished and correctly handled, for which he established the great theory of continuing revolution under the dictatorship of the proletariat. On the basis of the unity of theory and practice, he resolved the issue of preventing and combating revisionism, consolidated the dictatorship of the proletariat, and stymied the threat of capitalist restoration. It was an important essay for our time concerning carrying the cause of socialist revolution through to the end, a great enrichment and development of Marxism-Leninism. To study this brilliant essay by Chairman Mao is of the greatest significance for China's current investigation and criticism of the Wang-Chang-Chiang-Yao "gang of four" anti-Party clique. (shrink)

Several attempts have been made recently to apply Darwinian evolutionary theory to the study of culture change and social history. The essential elements in such a theory are that variations occur in population, and that a process of selective retention operates during their replication and transmission. Location of such variable units in the semantic structure of cognition provides the individual psychological basis for an evolutionary theory of history. Selection operates on both the level of cognition (...) and on its phenotypic expression in action in relation to individual preferred sources of psychological satisfaction. Social power comprises the principal selective forces within the unintended consequences of action and through the struggle of individuals and groups in pursuit of opposing interests. The implication for historiography are methodological in that evolutionary theory of history sharpens the focus of explanatory situational analysis, and interpretive in that it provides a paradigmatic metanarrative for the understanding of historical change. (shrink)

According to Ockham and Chatton, every cognitive process through which one genuinely cognizes a mental state involves a reflexive act of the will. They think that such an act is necessary to explain why we do not genuinely cognize every present mental act. With respect to a present extra-mental thing, an act of the will can only be elicited once such thing has been intuitively apprehended, because according to both authors one cannot voluntarily desire something whose existence one does not (...) know. However, with respect to mental acts, Ockham and Chatton maintain the opposite: an act of the will precedes the simple apprehension of a straight or direct act. As a consequence, in both theories of consciousness the same problem arises: how can the will want something that it does not know? This article presents Chatton’s and Ockham’s responses to this question. (shrink)

Several attempts have been made recently to apply Darwinian evolutionary theory to the study of culture change and social history. The essential elements in such a theory are that variations occur in a population, and that a process of selective retention operates during their replication and transmission. Location of such variable “units” in the semantic structure of cognition provides the individual psychological basis for an evolutionary theory of history. Selection operates on both the level of (...) cognition and on its “phenotypic” expression in action in relation to individual preferred sources of psychological satisfaction. Social power comprises the principal selective forces within the sociocultural environment. Sociocultural evolution takes place both as a result of the unintended consequences of action and through the struggle of individuals and groups in pursuit of opposing interests. The implications for historiography are methodological in that evolutionary theory of history sharpens the focus of explanatory situational analysis, and interpretive in that it provides a paradigmatic metanarrative for the understanding of historical change. (shrink)

Alongside the 'critical theory' of the Frankfurt School, West Germany was also home to another influential Marxist current known as the Marburg School. In this volume, Marburg disciple Lothar Peter traces the school's history and situates it in the political discourse and developments of its time. The renowned political scientist Wolfgang Abendroth plays a large role, but unlike most histories of the Marburg School Peter also takes the sociologists Werner Hofmann and Heinz Maus into account as well as (...) their many students and successors. They were united by the conviction that teaching and scholarship must necessarily be tied to the practical goal of transforming society - an approach that met with considerable opposition in the harshly anti-Communist atmosphere of the period. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Conflict and Reconciliation in Hegel’s Theory of the TragicJ. G. FinlaysonἊϱης Ἂϱει ξυμβαλεῖ, Δίϰᾳ Διϰα. (Κοεφοϱοι 461)this article has two related aims: to expound and defend Hegel’s theory of the tragic; and to clarify Hegel’s concept of reconciliation. These two aims are related in that a widespread, but misleading, conception of the tragic and a common, but mistaken, understanding of Hegel’s concept of reconciliation can seem to (...) offer mutual support. According to the misleading conception, the tragic consists in the defeat of human lives and projects that arises from irresolvable conflict. Goethe is the most notable exponent of this view. In 1824 Goethe writes that “everything tragic rests on irresolvable opposition. As soon as resolution enters or becomes possible the tragic vanishes.”1 The mistaken understanding of Hegel’s concept of reconciliation is that it consists in a triumphal and wholly affirmative resolution of contradiction through the attainment of harmony. It is easy to see how the two views support one another. For Hegel presents the tragic as a dialectic of conflict and reconciliation in human action, a dialectic in which the moment of reconciliation is ineliminable. So, if one conceives reconciliation as an harmonious resolution of conflict and one also subscribes to Goethe’s view that the tragic rests on irreconcilable opposition, one is not likely to take Hegel’s theory of the tragic very seriously. If, however, we keep in mind what Hegel means by ‘reconciliation, ’ then we can begin both to understand and to defend his theory of the tragic. [End Page 493]1. TRAGEDY AND THE TRAGICLet us begin with a preliminary delineation and defense of the concept of the tragic. Hegel does not have a theory of tragedy, he has a theory of the tragic. A theory of tragedy would be genre-specific, a theory about tragedies, the works of theater and not the pitiable and terrifying events they represent.2 Aristotle’s Poetics is a theory of tragedy. It is a theory about the composition of tragic poems, about their parts and their function. One can call a theory of tragedy loosely an ‘aesthetic’ theory, to the extent that it is a theory of the experience of a work of tragedy, indeed for the ancient Greeks, an experience not just of beholding but of participating in the performance of a tragedy. By contrast, a theory of the tragic is not a theory about tragedies. It is not genre specific, for not only tragedies are tragic. And neither is it an ‘aesthetic’ theory about the experience of a work of tragedy. Rather, it is a theory about what makes a work of theater into a tragedy, about what it is to be a tragedy. True, the essence of tragedy has to do with experience, but it has to do primarily with the experience of the tragic hero, not the experience of the actor or the spectator.Furthermore, whereas a theory of tragedy tells us something about tragedies, a theory of the tragic tells us something about human experience, human actions and the ethical-life of a community in which the actions are played out.3 The tragic arises from the way in which institutions, customs, and practices within which we become what we are, shape our actions on the one hand, and take shape through our actions on the other. Hence the question of the tragic enjoys a certain priority over the question of tragedy. The works of theater we call tragedies exist because of the tragic, not vice versa.There is another reason why we should grant that the question of the tragic as such is interesting and relevant. Tragedy is not a vague term; historically at least the matter of classification has been settled. It is not as if, in significant instances, it is impossible to decide whether a work of ancient drama is or is not a tragedy. Lebeck may argue, rather unconvincingly that the trial scene in the Eumenides is a parody of Athenian litigation; but she does not dispute that it is a tragedy.4 Steiner may claim that “tragedies end badly,” in flagrant disregard of the evidence, (the Eumenides of Aeschylus, and Sophocles’ Philoctetes and Oedipus at... (shrink)

This paper investigates Wittgenstein's "notorious" criticism of Russell's theory of judgment. Instead of advancing a further new interpretation of it, though, I analyze and discuss some of the most promising readings of the Russell/Wittgenstein dispute put forward in the secondary literature; I aim to show that, despite their alleged reciprocal opposition, they cohere with each other because they are, at bottom, different ways of highlighting the same question. I then connect Wittgenstein's criticism of Russell to the account of the (...) nature of the proposition presented in the Tractatus, arguing that the latter can be seen as a natural development of the former. Finally, I make a quick connection between Wittgenstein's criticism of Russell and the conception of the world as the totality of facts, as presented in the Tractatus. (shrink)