We are in Florence and Ferrara, between 1300 and 1600 A.D. At the beginning of this period the subjects of petty Italian potentates dream of a universal Empire and Church: a universal confined to the Latin world. Over the next three centuries this dream gradually fades; the idea of a universal Church is largely replaced by a discourse addressed to the individual conscience while in the political world sovereignty becomes synonymous with local power. The universal is progressively dissolved within a (...) multiplicity of separate regimes, each rooted in its own territory; in other words, individual societies achieve spiritual legitimation by a transfer of sovereignty. Thus linked with the absolute, territorial sovereignty, rehabilitating the idea of the local, becomes the foundation of the many-sided flowering of the Renaissance. A reading of the poets is helpful in grasping the full complexity of this historical transformation. How were Dante, Petrarch and those poets who imitated the poets of Antiquity, the so-called Petrarchists, understood? This study will focus on the way in which the texts were created. By comparing them we will try to elucidate what makes for the importance and urgency of these poems. (shrink)

Although wonder is a response to what is extraordinary or regarded as such, this covers a variety of things. Hence, wonder covers a spectrum from mere surprise or puzzlement to stronger responses like dread or amazement; moreover, it is often linked to other powerful responses like fear or admiration, and it can lead people into many pursuits and areas of reflection. I look at the variety of the objects of wonder, and of the neighbouring responses and conceptual connections found here, (...) then I discuss the response of wonder itself, and its causes and effects. Finally, I ask why the sense of wonder can atrophy, and whether it can be suppressed deliberately. (shrink)

Relativism is the view that the truth of a sentence is relative both to a context of utterance and to a context of assessment. That the truth of a sentence is relative to a context of utterance is uncontroversial in contemporary semantics. This chapter focuses on three points: whether the version of contextualism is vulnerable to the disagreement and retraction arguments, and if so, whether these problems can be avoided by a more sophisticated contextualist theory. The points include: whether relativism (...) really does avoid the four problems posed for the other theories; and whether there are other theories that also avoid the problems, without running into the problems facing relativism or problems of their own. The chapter concentrates on two families of views that have been called relativist: Relativism about propositional truth; and Relativism about utterance truth. (shrink)

"If our procedure is to work steadily in the direction of drawing as fine art, rather than beginning from examples of such art, where shall we begin? One attractive possibility is to begin at the beginning—not the beginning in prehistory, which is already wonderful art, but with our personal beginnings as children. From there it will be the ambitious project of this book to investigate 'the course of drawing,' from the first marks children make to the greatest graphic arts of (...) different cultures."—from the Introduction Patrick Maynard surveys the rich and varied practices of drawing, from the earliest markings on cave walls to the complex technical schematics that make the modern world possible, from cartoons and the first efforts of preschoolers to the works of skilled draftspeople and the greatest artists, East and West. Despite, or perhaps because of, its ubiquity, drawing as such has provoked remarkably little philosophical reflection. Nonphilosophical writing on the topic tends to be divided between specialties such as art history and mechanics. In this engagingly written and well-illustrated book, Maynard reveals the interconnections and developments that unite this fundamental autonomous human activity in all its diversity. Informed by close discussion of work in art history, art criticism, cognitive and developmental psychology, and aesthetics, Drawing Distinctions presents a theoretically sophisticated yet approachable argument that will improve comprehension and appreciation of drawing in its many forms, uses, and meanings. (shrink)

Organisationen spielen in modernen Gesellschaften eine zentrale Rolle. Der Beitrag geht davon aus, dass in den mittlerweile etablierten Formen von Ethik und Ethikberatung in Einrichtungen des Gesundheitssystems eine angemessene Reflexion des Organisationsbezugs oft ausbleibt bzw. eine besondere Herausforderung darstellt. Wir konzipieren deshalb eine „prozedurale Organisationsethik“, die sich kritisch mit der organisationalen Passung der Prozesse ethischer Reflexion auseinandersetzt. Daraus lassen sich als Anregung für Theorie und Praxis von ethischen Prozessen praktische Schlussfolgerungen ableiten. Sie betreffen die Orte der Differenzsetzung für die Frage (...) nach dem Guten; die ethischen Hintergrundtheorien und die Frage nach der organisatorischen Verknüpfung der Reflexionssettings. (shrink)

Definition of the problem Organisations play a vital role in modern societies. This article presumes a lack of sufficient organisational reflection of well-established forms of ethics and ethics counselling in institutions belonging to the health sector or sees particular challenges where it is implemented. Arguments We have therefore conceived a procedural type of organisational ethics which critically examines the organisational fit of processes in terms of ethical reflection, leading to practicable suggestions. Conclusions On the one hand they relate to where (...) differences are established when asking for the good; on the other hand they are concerned with background theories and the organisational fit of the reflection settings. (shrink)

C. A. W. Manning was an important figure in the early days of what became known as the English School, and was one of the most philosophically explicit articulators of the interpretivist approach t...

Retributivism is often explicitly or implicitly assumed to be compatible with the harm principle, since the harm principle (in some guises) concerns the content of the criminal law, while retributivism concerns the punishment of those that break the law. In this essay I show that retributivism should not be endorsed alongside any version of the harm principle. In fact, retributivists should reject all attempts to see the criminal law only through (other) person-affecting concepts or “grievance” morality, since they should endorse (...) the criminalization of conduct that is either purely self-harming or good for somebody and bad for nobody (i.e., Pareto improvements). (shrink)

Many philosophers assume that philosophical theories about the psychological nature of moral judgment can be confirmed or disconfirmed by the kind of evidence gathered by natural and social scientists (especially experimental psychologists and neuroscientists). I argue that this assumption is mistaken. For the most part, empirical evidence can do no work in these philosophical debates, as the metaphorical heavy-lifting is done by the pre-experimental assumptions that make it possible to apply empirical data to these philosophical debates. For the purpose of (...) this paper, I emphasize two putatively empirically-supported theories about the psychological nature of moral judgment. The first is the Sentimental Rules Account, which is defended by Shaun Nichols. The second is defended by Jesse Prinz, and is a form of sentimentalist moral relativism. I show that both of the arguments in favour of these theories rely on assumptions which would be rejected by their philosophical opponents. Further, these assumptions carry substantive moral commitments and thus cannot be confirmed by further empirical investigation. Because of this shared methodological assumption, I argue that a certain form of empirical moral psychology rests on a mistake. (shrink)

In this paper, missing attribute values in incomplete data sets have three possible interpretations: lost values, attribute-concept values and ‘do not care’ conditions. For rule induction, we use characteristic sets and generalized maximal consistent blocks. Therefore, we apply six different approaches for data mining. As follows from our previous experiments, where we used an error rate evaluated by ten-fold cross validation as the main criterion of quality, no approach is universally the best. Thus, we decided to compare our six approaches (...) using complexity of rule sets induced from incomplete data sets. We show that the smallest rule sets are induced from incomplete data sets with attribute-concept values, while the most complicated rule sets are induced from data sets with lost values. The choice between interpretations of missing attribute values is more important than the choice between characteristic sets and generalized maximal consistent blocks. (shrink)

This paper analyzes the metaphysical system developed in Cheyne’s Philosophical Principles of Religion. Cheyne was an early proponent of Newtonianism and tackled several philosophical questions raised by Newton’s work. The most pressing of these concerned the causal origin of gravitational attraction. Cheyne rejected the occasionalist explanations offered by several of his contemporaries in favor of a model on which God delegated special causal powers to bodies. Additionally, he developed an innovative approach to divine conservation. This allowed him to argue that (...) Newton’s findings provided evidence for God’s existence and providence without the need for continuous divine intervention in the universe. (shrink)

In this paper, we are concerned with the development of a general set theory using the single axiom version of Leśniewski’s mereology. The specification of mereology, and further of Tarski’s geometry of solids will rely on the Calculus of Inductive Constructions (CIC). In the first part, we provide a specification of Leśniewski’s mereology as a model for an atomless Boolean algebra using Clay’s ideas. In the second part, we interpret Leśniewski’s mereology in monadic second-order logic using names and develop a (...) full version of mereology referred to as CIC-based Monadic Mereology (λ-MM) allowing an expressive theory while involving only two axioms. In the third part, we propose a modeling of Tarski’s solid geometry relying on λ-MM. It is intended to serve as a basis for spatial reasoning. All parts have been proved using a translation in type theory. (shrink)

Companions in guilt arguments are widespread in defenses of moral realism and criticisms of error theory. Recently, a number of philosophers have argued that the companions in guilt argument fails because it makes untenable assumptions about the existence of categorical epistemic reasons. In this article, I develop an alternative version of the companions in guilt argument that does not succumb to this criticism, as it begins with the claim that there is a presumptive case in favor of attributing a belief (...) in categorical norms of philosophical argumentation to proponents of the error theory. I then point to an instability in the error-theoretic position and explore the extent to which this instability poses a serious philosophical problem. While this argument has a narrower scope than the traditional companions in guilt arguments, I conclude that it nonetheless poses a significant challenge to any philosophical attempt to deny the categoricity of moral reasons. (shrink)

This book defends the conjugal view of marriage. Patrick Lee and Robert P. George argue that marriage is a distinctive type of community: the union of a man and a woman who have committed to sharing their lives on every level of their beings (bodily, emotionally, and spiritually) in the kind of union that would be fulfilled by conceiving and rearing children together. The comprehensive nature of this union, and its intrinsic orientation to procreation as its natural fulfillment, distinguishes (...) marriage from other types of community and provides the basis for the norms of marital exclusivity and permanence. Lee and George detail how the basic moral norms regarding sexual acts follow from the ethical requirement to respect the good of marriage and explain how the law should treat marriage, given its conjugal nature, examining both the same-sex-marriage issue and civil divorce. (shrink)

Despite its philosophical interest, Susanna Newcome’s Enquiry Into the Evidence of the Christian Religion (1728, revised 1732) has received little attention from commentators. This paper seeks to redress this oversight by offering a reconstruction of Newcome’s innovative argument for God’s existence. Newcome employs a cosmological argument that differs from Thomist and kalām version of the argument. Specifically, Newcome challenges that idea that the causal chains observed in nature can exist independently. She does this through an appeal to findings from Newtonian (...) natural philosophy that suggest that the universe has entropic tendencies. This suggests that the continued operations of nature are dependent on a cause external to the universe. Newcome identifies this external cause with God. Various strengths and weaknesses of Newcome’s argument are discussed and an attempt is made to situate the argument within her broader epistemic framework and the larger context of Newtonian physico-theology. The paper also explores what is known of Newcome’s biography and intellectual milieu. (shrink)

The central claim of this book is that the dichotomy between economic dependence and economic independence is completely inadequate for describing the political challenges faced by contemporary capitalist welfare states. The simplistic contrast between markets and states as sources of income renders invisible the relations of dependence established in our basic economic institutions such as the family, property, and money. This book is a work of political theory that attacks narrow conceptions of dependence and identifies distinct senses of dependence that (...) might allow political communities to make clearer decisions about the justice of our economic institutions and practices. Inheritance, for example, is as much a form of dependence as support by a welfare state, but these are never compared in debates about economic justice. This book begins the work of comparing forms of economic dependence, and argues that economic dependence is always an issue of both vulnerability and parasitism. It builds bridges between political theory and social science, and is of relevance to those concerned with social and economic justice in and beyond contemporary capitalist welfare states. (shrink)

Companions in guilt arguments respond to moral error theory by pointing out that its philosophical rationale mandates the rejection of all categorical normative reasons, including epistemic reasons. A number of philosophers have recently been engaging in a dialogue about the strength of this argumentative strategy and the significance of the criticisms that has been raised against it. In this paper, I identify a specific argument, which I dub the ‘bullet-biting response’ as a crucial element in some recent attacks on the (...) CGA. I assess five objections to the bullet-biting response and conclude that only the fifth poses a significant problem. Specifically, I argue that the proponent of the bullet-biting response is at a dialectical disadvantage in this particular debate. While this disadvantage is not decisive, it has two implications that raise serious concerns for the bullet-biting response. (shrink)

This study examines how people engage with the dynamic environment of the dog park in the face of unclear or ambiguous rules and emergent norms. Using participant observation, the analysis shows how, in the formal dog park, caretakers become “control managers” who must negotiate problems related to a variety of dog behaviors, especially mounting, aggression, and waste management. In this process, caretakers use various strategies to manage their own and others’ possible perceptions and understandings of appropriate behavior for dogs in (...) public places. (shrink)

Preface -- Identity and the subjunctive -- Representing the seducer -- Interrupting philosophy: -- The complaint about knowledge -- Transcendence and negativity -- The moodiness of the subjunctive -- The accusation of ethics -- Working through love -- The subjunctive hopes all things -- Freedom -- Suffering, faith, and forgiveness -- Concluding with the unscientific.

The publication of two new books by Professor D.Z. Phillips provides a suitable opportunity to consider some recent attempts to apply Wittgenstein's philosophy to religious issues. I shall concentrate mainly on Phillips' work, with particular reference to his treatment of the question of religious truth, but I shall also discuss some other writers and topics.

To accept ‘pragmatic encroachment’ is to take the view that whether you are in a position to know is in part a function of practical stakes. This position strikes many as not just unorthodox but extremely implausible. According to Jeremy Fantl and Matthew McGrath (F&M), however, the best account of the prima facie oddity of certain utterances incorporates just such a pragmatist maneuver. In reaching this conclusion, F&M begin with Trent Dougherty and Patrick Rysiew’s (D&R’s) theory as the best (...) on offer (2009a: 63/2009b: 20), but go on to raise objections to D&R’s recent account of the relevant oddity in purely pragmatic (i.e., extra-semantic) terms and to develop it in directions quite inimical to the general outlook established in D&R 2009 and D&R forthcoming. In this brief note, we reply to F&M’s objections and show that their development in the direction of interest-relativism is ill-founded: the relevant phenomena provide no grounds for budging on the issue of pragmatic encroachment. In addition, in the course of meeting F&M’s objections, an original account of certain Moore-paradoxical sentences is given, and the issue of how probable a proposition needs to be to be known is addressed. The result is a quite general defense of a commonsense, evidence-based approach to the relevant phenomena (quite apart from a defense of D&R). (shrink)

Patrick Turmel,François Boucher,Marie-Noëlle Carré.

Explanatory accounts of emotion require, among other things, theoretically tractable representations of emotional experience. Common methods for producing such representations have well-known drawbacks, such as observer interference or lack of ecological validity. Literature offers a valuable supplement. It provides detailed instructions for simulating emotions; when successful, it induces empathic emotions. It too involves distortions, through emotion-intensifying idealization and ideological biases. But these also relate to emotion study. There are three levels at which literature bears on emotion research: (1) the individual (...) work; (2) generic and related patterns; and (3) properties found widely across individual works and genres. Even at the third, most general level, literature suggests potentially important hypotheses about our pleasure in emotional simulation and our need to share emotional experiences. (shrink)

This book examines the theory and practice of argument in primary, secondary and tertiary education. Several of its chapters offer theoretical discussion of the forms and functions of argument within social, philosophical, historical and rhetorical contexts.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:EXISTENTIAL PROPOSITIONS IN THE THOUGHT OF ST. THOMAS AQUINAS A REVALENT VIEW of St. Thomas Aquinas's position on the logic of propositions has been that according to him propositions of the :form, x is, hold a privileged place, that they are in a special sense " existential," and that such propositions straight.forwardly attribute the act of exi,stence to an individual or to a class of individuals.1 Some texts seem (...) to support such an interpretation. For example, in his commentary on Aristotle's Perihermeneias, Aquinas says: " To clarify this we must note that the verb 'is ' itself is sometimes predicated in an enunciation, as in ' Socrates is.' By this we intend to signify that Socrates really is." 2 This passage seems to treat the predicate " exists " or " is " as unproblematical, as though it had a straightforward meaning needing little clarification, at least in the context of a logical treatise. On the basis of such a text, one may be tempted to infer that for Aquinas " Socrates exists " has the same logical form as " Socrates sits," and that " Men exist " is of the same form as " Men are mortal.'' Peter Geach has shown, however, that Aquinas's doctrine here is not as simple as it may first appear. For Aquin,as some of the propositions which have the grammatical form of x is have 'a different logical form.3 Geach points out that for Aquinas the sentence, "Blindness exists," for example, actual1 E.g., Etienne Gilson, Being and Some Philosophers, 2nd ed. (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1952), 190-215. 2 Super Peri, Bk. II, lect. 2, # 212. Cf. Summa Contra Gentiles, Bk. II, ch. 37 at "FJ11J hoc..•." a Peter Geach, in P. T. Geach and G. E. M. Anscombe, Three Philosophers (New York: Cornell University, 1961), 88 ff; Peter Geach, "Form and Existence," in Aquinas: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. A. Kenny (New York: Notre Dame U., 1969), pp. 41-47. 605 606 PATRICK LEE ly means, Something or other is blind. That is, blind is the real predicate rather than exists. Mo11eover, Geach argues, the logical peculiarity of this sentence is equally found in any sentence of the form, "an F exists." Such a proposition, " does not,attribute actuality (existence) to an F, but F-ness to something or other..." 4 And yet Geach will not apply rthis interpretation to all sentences of the form, " x is." He al'lgues that sentences in which " is " or " exists " is. joined to a logically pl'oper name are in a different category. Unlike in general propositions such as "an F exists," in such singular propositions, those using logically proper names, Geach,argues, actual existence is attributed to or predicated of an individual. "We have here a sense of 'is ' or 'exists ' that seems to me to be certainly a genuine predicate of individuals: the sense of ' exists ' in which one says that an individual came to exist, still exists, no longer exists, etc...."5 I believe that, while Geach's position is more accurate than the first interpretation, mentioned above, it is nevertheless still inaccurate on certain key points. While it is misleading to say that for Aquinas exists is never a genuine predicate; nevertheless, I will argue that it is his position that exists or existence is not a genuine predicate in any proposition which does not refer back to a previous proposition (or to what is known in or by previous propositional knowledge). Let us crull a proposition which refers to something known in a previous proposition a " second-order p11oposition," and one that does not thus refer a " first-order proposition." Then, I shall argue that for Aquinas exists is not a genuine predicate in any first-order proposition. Moreover, I believe that these points are crucial to understanding Aquinas's position on existence as well as his position on how knowledge is related,to reality, i.e., his realism. In this article I would like to examine Aquinas's thought on the logic of existential propositions and discuss its significance for epistemology. 4 Geach, " Form and Existence," Zoo. int., p. 45. 5 Ibid., p. 46. EXISTENTIAL PROPOSITIONS IN AQUINAS 607 In sections... (shrink)

A number of commentators have recently suggested that there is a puzzle surrounding Locke’s acceptance of Newton’s Principia. On their view, Locke understood natural history as the primary methodology for natural philosophy and this commitment was at odds with an embrace of mathematical physics. This article considers various attempts to address this puzzle and finds them wanting. It then proposes a more synoptic view of Locke’s attitude towards natural philosophy. Features of Locke’s biography show that he was deeply interested in (...) mathematical physics long before the publication of the Principia. This interest was in line with important developments in the Royal Society. It is argued that Locke endorsed a two-stage approach to natural philosophy which was consistent with an embrace of both natural history and mathematical physics. The Principia can be understood as consistent with this approach. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Semiotica Jahrgang: 2014 Heft: 202 Seiten: 571-588.