Disillusionment is acknowledged to be a painful process with important personal and social consequences. However, scientific conceptualisations of the experience are inconsistent. Across four studies, we examined whether lay conceptions of disillusionment produce a consistent pattern of features. In Study 1 (N = 204), we extracted 19 features of disillusionment from open-ended participant definitions. In Study 2 (N = 131), participants rated the centrality of these features and indicated that features such as discovery, disappointment, and loss, were highly representative, while (...) features such as hopelessness, orientation, and truth, were more peripheral. In two further studies, we used experimental designs to test the diagnosticity of these features. In Study 3 (N = 155), participants rated vignettes descriptions as more disillusioning when they were based on more, rather than less, prototypical disillusionment features. Given that disappointment is a feature of disillusionment, we conducted Study 4 (N = 60) to test whether the extracted features effectively distinguish disillusionment from disappointment. Overall, we found evidence to suggest that disillusionment contains a consistent set of features, and represents a state of negative epistemic affect associated with the violation of core assumptions. These results create avenues for research on disillusionment, its antecedents and its consequences. (shrink)

Volume 19, Issue 11, November 2019, Page 78-80.

Clear guidelines addressing the ethically appropriate use of anti-infectives in the setting of hospice care do not exist. There is lack of understanding about key treatment decisions related to infection treatment for patients who are eligible for hospice care. Ethical concerns about anti-infective use at the end of life include: (1) delaying transition to hospice, (2) prolonging a dying process, (3) prescribing regimens incongruent with a short life expectancy and goals of care, (4) increasing the reservoir of potential resistant pathogens, (...) (5) placing unreasonable costs on a capitated hospice system. Although anti-infectives are thought to be relatively safe, they can place a burden on patients and be inconsistent to particular care plans. The current complex, and at times fragmented, medical care often fails to address these issues in decision-making. In many ways, the ethics governing the end of life decisions related to dialysis, hydration/nutrition, and hypercalcemia parallel those of anti-infectives. In this article we articulate important elements in ethical decision-making in the application of anti-infectives for patients who are eligible for hospice care, and we point to the need for prospective studies to help refine particular guidelines in these cases. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Clear guidelines addressing the ethically appropriate use of anti‐infectives in the setting of hospice care do not exist. There is lack of understanding about key treatment decisions related to infection treatment for patients who are eligible for hospice care. Ethical concerns about anti‐infective use at the end of life include: (1) delaying transition to hospice, (2) prolonging a dying process, (3) prescribing regimens incongruent with a short life expectancy and goals of care, (4) increasing the reservoir of potential resistant (...) pathogens, (5) placing unreasonable costs on a capitated hospice system. Although anti‐infectives are thought to be relatively safe, they can place a burden on patients and be inconsistent to particular care plans. The current complex, and at times fragmented, medical care often fails to address these issues in decision‐making. In many ways, the ethics governing the end of life decisions related to dialysis, hydration/nutrition, and hypercalcemia parallel those of anti‐infectives. In this article we articulate important elements in ethical decision‐making in the application of anti‐infectives for patients who are eligible for hospice care, and we point to the need for prospective studies to help refine particular guidelines in these cases. (shrink)

This book addresses the problem of fully explaining Socrates’ motives for philosophic interlocution in Plato’s dialogues. Why, for instance, does Socrates talk to many philosophically immature and seemingly incapable interlocutors? Are his motives in these cases moral, prudential, erotic, pedagogic, or intellectual? In any one case, can Socrates’ reasons for engaging an unlikely interlocutor be explained fully on the grounds of intellectual self-interest? Or does his activity, including his self-presentation and staging of his death, require additional motives for adequate explanation? (...) Finally, how, if at all, does our conception of Socrates’ motives help illuminate our understanding of the life of reason as Plato presents it? By inviting a multitude of authors to contribute their thoughts on these question—all of whom share a commitment to close reading, but by no means agree on the meaning of Plato’s dialogues—this book provides the reader with an excellent map of the terrain of these problems and aims to help the student of Plato clarify the tensions involved, showing especially how each major stance on Socrates entails problematic assumptions that prompt further critical reflection. (shrink)

Lukas J. Meier et al. offer the promise of a pathway for resolving clinical bioethical problems using an artificial intelligence interface. The ultimate goal, we assume, is...

Researchers designing a clinical trial may be aware of disputed evidence of serious risks from previous studies. These researchers must decide whether and how to describe these risks in their model informed consent document. They have an ethical obligation to provide fully informed consent, but does this obligation include notice of controversial evidence? With ACCORD as an example, we describe a framework and criteria that make clear the conditions requiring inclusion of important controversial risks. The ACCORD model consent document did (...) not include notice of prior trials with excess death. We develop and explain a new standard labeled risk in equipoise. We argue that our approach provides an optimal level of integrity to protect the informational needs of the reasonable volunteers who agree to participate in clinical trials. We suggest language to be used in a model consent document and the informed consent discussion when such controversial evidence exists. (shrink)

Approaches to clinical ethics dilemmas that rely on basic principles or rules are difficult to apply because of vagueness and conflict among basic values. In response, casuistry rejects the use of basic values, and specification produces a large set of specified rules that are presumably easily applicable. Balancing is a method employed to weigh the relative importance of different and conflicting values in application. We argue against casuistry and specification, claiming that balancing is superior partly because it most clearly exhibits (...) the reasoning behind moral decision-making. Hence, balancing may be most effective in teaching bioethics to medical professionals. (shrink)

Neil Levy offers the most prominent moral principles that are specifically and exclusively designed to apply to neuroethics. His two closely related principles, labeled as versions of the ethical parity principle , are intended to resolve moral concerns about neurological modification and enhancement [1]. Though EPP is appealing and potentially illuminating, we reject the first version and substantially modify the second. Since his first principle, called EPP , is dependent on the contention that the mind literally extends into external props (...) such as paper notebooks and electronic devices, we begin with an examination of the extended mind hypothesis and its use in Levy’s EPP . We argue against reliance on EMH as support for EPP . We turn to his second principle, EPP , which is not dependent on EMH but is tied to the acceptable claim that the mind is embedded in, because dependent on, external props. As a result of our critique of EPP , we develop a modified version of EPP , which we argue is more acceptable than Levy’s principle. Finally, we evaluate the applicability of our version of EPP. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented a global threat to physical and mental health worldwide. Research has highlighted adverse impacts of COVID-19 on wellbeing but has yet to offer insights as to how wellbeing may be protected. Inspired by developments in wellbeing science and guided by our own theoretical framework, we examined the role of various potentially protective factors in a sample of 138 participants from the United Kingdom. Protective factors included physical activity, tragic optimism, gratitude, social support, and nature connectedness. (...) Initial analysis involved the application of one-sample t-tests, which confirmed that wellbeing in the current sample was significantly lower compared to previous samples. Protective factors were observed to account for up to 50% of variance in wellbeing in a hierarchical linear regression that controlled for a range of sociostructural factors including age, gender, and subjective social status, which impact on wellbeing but lie beyond individual control. Gratitude and tragic optimism emerged as significant contributors to the model. Our results identify key psychological attributes that may be harnessed through various positive psychology strategies to mitigate the adverse impacts of hardship and suffering, consistent with an existential positive psychology of suffering. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS 249 Girolamo Balduino: Ricerche sulla logica della Scuola di Padova nel Rinascimento. By Giovanni Papuli. (Bark Lacerta, Universith di Bari, Pubblicazioni dell'lstituto di filosofia, 12, 1967. Pp. 313. no price.) The philosophers at the University of Padua during the late Middle Ages and Renaissance arc attracting much renewed interest. This study makes accessible again the logical philosophy of Girolamo Balduino, professor at Padua during the second quarter (...) of the sixteenth century. Like other thinkers of his period, 13alduino follows the logic of Aristotle, and looks for progress within the ancient and mediaeval tradition, not for radically new doctrines. He continues the traditional interpretation of Aristotle by Averroes, for whom logic is only an instrumental habitus, a tool or method of demonstration. About the final contribution of the school of Padua to the improvement of Aristotelian logic was the doctrine of regressive demonstration, where demonstration terminates in or discloses the definition. Zabarella's well-known teaching on this point seems to be derived entirely from Balduino. Contrary to the interpretation of Cassirer, followed by Randall, this regressive demonstration is not a universal method of inquiry and is not at all like, and not the historical source of, the new method of Galileo. Papuli's book is solidly based on the original Latin texts, in notes, which are of great value in view of the fact that Balduino's works have been out of print since 1573. Not all of Papuli's interpretations are beyond criticism (e.g., p. 296), but he has done a service in enabling us to reestablish contact with one of the last significant commentators on Aristotle's logic. PAUL J. W. MILLER University of Colorado Documents sur la vie de Jules-Cdsar Vanini de Taurisano. By Emile Namer. (Bari: Adriatica Editrice, n.d.=Univcrsith degli Studi di Bari, Pubblicazioni delFIstituto di Filosofia, II serie, Testi e Documenti, I. Pp. 196+22 facsimile illustrations) Giulio Cesare Vanini (1585-1619) ranks with Giordano Bruno as a modern hero of freedom of philosophical expression. He was tortured and then burned at the stake in Toulouse at the age of thirty-four, because of the unorthodoxy of his views. For this reason, he has drawn more attention than is perhaps deserved on the basis of his rather mediocre writings, which are little more than a tissue of plagiarisms culled from Pomponazzi, Cardano, J. C. Scaliger, and others. In this volume, Emile Namer has collected the scattered documents dealing with Vanini's life and activities. This is a valuable service, for it should enable scholars to disentangle fact from fiction and reality from myth. There has been so much heated discussion regarding Vanini that it is now time that someone should attempt to establish the precise facts and to reevaluate Vanini's place in intellectual history. In the past, writings about him have been governed more often by emotion than by reason. Namer prints documents from Naples, London, Paris, Simancas, and Toulouse. Some of these have been printed before in various journal articles, but it is valuable to have them all together in a single volume. In addition, he prints relevant excerpts concerning--as one of them put it--le douzi~me apostre de Satan, including material from Mersenne, Garasse, and others. He also includes a series of facsimiles of sample pages from the documents which he prints. All in all Namer's work is competently 250 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY done, though perhaps a bit more annotation to put the documents in historical perspective would have been desirable. In any case this little volume must be one of the bases for any future serious biographical or interpretative studies dealing with Vanini. Moreover, it shouM also be useful for scholars dealing with more general questions of seventeenth-century intellectual, religious, and social history. Unfortunately, there is no index, nor bibliography of earlier literature on Vanini, and the Introduction is perhaps too brief to orient the reader who has little previous knowledge of Vanini. CHARLES B. SCHMITT University oJ Leeds Tommaso Campanella: Renaissance Pioneer o[ Modern Thought. By Bernardino M. Bonansea. (Washington: Catholic University of America Press, 1969. Pp. xi 421. $14.50) This excellent critical study of the life and... (shrink)

Clinical ethics consultants should show bold moral courage in discharging their duties to patients, families, and healthcare providers. Given the corrosive impact on trust, and on the appropriate d...

Examining the implications of a localist model for linguistic performance, I show the strengths of the P-graph, a network of elementary units of meaning where utterance results from relaxation through the operation of a dynamics of affect values. A unit of meaning is stored in a synaptic connection that brings together two words. Such a model, consistent with the anatomy and physiology of the neural tissue, eschews a number of traditional pitfalls of “semantic networks”: (1) ambiguity ceases to be an (...) issue, as similar uses of a word are automatically clustered together; (2) faster retrieval of words acquired early is explained by the larger number of their instances. In addition the P-graph takes advantage of a plausible form of information storage: the local topology of the neural tissue. (shrink)

Gilbert and colleagues point out the discrepancy between the limited empirical data illustrating changes in personality following implantation of deep brain stimulating electrodes and the vast number of conceptual neuroethics papers implying that these changes are widespread, deleterious, and clinically significant. Their findings are reminiscent of C. P. Snow’s essay on the divide between the two cultures of the humanities and the sciences. This division in the literature raises significant ethical concerns surrounding unjustified fear of personality changes in the context (...) of DBS and negative perceptions of clinician-scientists engaged in DBS. These concerns have real world implications for funding future innovative, DBS trials aimed to reduce suffering as well as hampering true interdisciplinary scholarship. We argue that the philosophical tradition of pragmatism and the value it places on empirical inquiry, experiential knowledge, and inter-disciplinary scholarship – reflecting diverse ways of knowing – provides a framework to start to address the important questions Gilbert and colleagues raise. In particular, we highlight the importance of expert clinician knowledge in contributing to the neuroethical questions raised by Gilbert and colleagues. Finally, we provide illustrative examples of some of our interdisciplinary empirical research that demonstrate the iterative cycle of inquiry characteristic of pragmatism in which conceptual neuroethics questions have led to empirical studies whose results then raise additional conceptual questions that give rise to new empirical studies in a way that highlights the contributions of the humanities and the sciences. (shrink)

Gilbert and colleagues point out the discrepancy between the limited empirical data illustrating changes in personality following implantation of deep brain stimulating electrodes and the vast number of conceptual neuroethics papers implying that these changes are widespread, deleterious, and clinically significant. Their findings are reminiscent of C. P. Snow’s essay on the divide between the two cultures of the humanities and the sciences. This division in the literature raises significant ethical concerns surrounding unjustified fear of personality changes in the context (...) of DBS and negative perceptions of clinician-scientists engaged in DBS. These concerns have real world implications for funding future innovative, DBS trials aimed to reduce suffering as well as hampering true interdisciplinary scholarship. We argue that the philosophical tradition of pragmatism and the value it places on empirical inquiry, experiential knowledge, and inter-disciplinary scholarship – reflecting diverse ways of knowing – provides a framework to start to address the important questions Gilbert and colleagues raise. In particular, we highlight the importance of expert clinician knowledge in contributing to the neuroethical questions raised by Gilbert and colleagues. Finally, we provide illustrative examples of some of our interdisciplinary empirical research that demonstrate the iterative cycle of inquiry characteristic of pragmatism in which conceptual neuroethics questions have led to empirical studies whose results then raise additional conceptual questions that give rise to new empirical studies in a way that highlights the contributions of the humanities and the sciences. (shrink)

Gilbert and colleagues point out the discrepancy between the limited empirical data illustrating changes in personality following implantation of deep brain stimulating electrodes and the vast number of conceptual neuroethics papers implying that these changes are widespread, deleterious, and clinically significant. Their findings are reminiscent of C. P. Snow’s essay on the divide between the two cultures of the humanities and the sciences. This division in the literature raises significant ethical concerns surrounding unjustified fear of personality changes in the context (...) of DBS and negative perceptions of clinician-scientists engaged in DBS. These concerns have real world implications for funding future innovative, DBS trials aimed to reduce suffering as well as hampering true interdisciplinary scholarship. We argue that the philosophical tradition of pragmatism and the value it places on empirical inquiry, experiential knowledge, and inter-disciplinary scholarship – reflecting diverse ways of knowing – provides a framework to start to address the important questions Gilbert and colleagues raise. In particular, we highlight the importance of expert clinician knowledge in contributing to the neuroethical questions raised by Gilbert and colleagues. Finally, we provide illustrative examples of some of our interdisciplinary empirical research that demonstrate the iterative cycle of inquiry characteristic of pragmatism in which conceptual neuroethics questions have led to empirical studies whose results then raise additional conceptual questions that give rise to new empirical studies in a way that highlights the contributions of the humanities and the sciences. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Some Suggestions about the Moral Philosophy of George Berkeley* PAUL J. OLSCAMP WHILE TRAVELLINGIN ITALYin 1716, Berkeley lost the second part of his Principles of Human Knowledge. Much later he wrote to Dr. Johnson in America, saying that he did not have the energy to do something so disagreeable as writing the same thing twice? This manuscript contained Berkeley's ethics and metaphysics, but in spite of its loss, (...) there is much to be learned about Berkeley's moral philosophy from his extant writings. Surprisingly, very little has been written about Berkeley's ethics, and what has been written usually concentrates on Passive Obedience and virtually ignores the rest of his worksY Most of the terminology now used to classify and criticize ethical theories was, of course, unknown to Berkeley. In spite of this, much of what he says may be fruitfully compared with some of the claims of modern ethicists. I shall try to show that many of his claims might have been strikingly modern, a In this paper however, I can only deal with what would now be called the normative part of Berkeley's theory, so, perhaps, it would be of some use to give a general *All references to Berkeley's writings are to the Jessop and Luee edition, The Works o] George Berkeley, Bishop o] Cloyne (9 vols.; London: Nelson and Sons Ltd., 1948). I shall abbreviate the titles of the works in this collection as follows: A/c. for A/~phron, or the Minute Ptdlosopher; DraJt for The First Dra]~ o] the Introduction to the Priuciple8 o] Human Knowledge; Principles for The Principles o] Human Knowledge; P.O. for Passive Obedience; Disc. for A Discourse to the Macistrates; T.V. for An Essay Towards a New Theory o] Vision; T.V~E. for The Theory o] Vision Vindicated and Explained; P.C. for philosophical Commentaries; Corr ]or Philosophical Correspondence; DHP for Three Dialooucs Between Hylas and Philonous. I am deeply indebted to Professor Richard T. Garner for his help in the preparation of thispaper. 1Corr., II, 282. 'The other references are: C. D. Broad, "Berkeley's Theory of Morals," Revue Internationale de Philosophie (1953); Graham P. Conroy, "Berkeley on Moral Demonstration, Journal o] the HisLory o] Ideas, XXII (1961), and Conroy's doctoral dissertation, Language and Morals in Berkeley's Philosophy (Berkeley, 1957); H. D. Aiken, "The Fate of Philosophy in the Twentieth Century," The Kenyon Review (Spring, 1962); kvrum Stroll, The Emotive Theory o] Ethics (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1954); Ernest Albee, A History o] English Utilitarianism (London: Alien & Unwin, 1901), chap. xv; I. A. Richards and C. K. Ogden, The Meaning o] Meaning (New York: Harcourt Brace and Co., 1923), p. 42; P. J. Olscamp, A Berlceleyan Analysis o] the Uses o] Language in Ethics, (doctoral dissertation, University of Rochester, 1962); W. V. Denard, "Berkeley's Theological Utilitarianism," Acres de XI" eongr~s internationale de philosophic, XIII (1953), 87-93; G. A. Johnston, "The Development of Berkeley's Ethical Theory," Philosophical Review, XXIV, 419-430; H. W. Orange, "Berkeley as a Moral Philosopher," Mind, XV (old series), 514-523. =The definitions of any technical terms I may use will be found in William K. Frankena, Ethies, (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Foundations of Philosophy Series, 1963). [147] 148 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY outline of the main features of what I think his entire system would have been, before examining part of it in more detail. Berkeley was first and last a Christian clergyman, and he therefore believed in the existence of a personal, wise, and benevolent God whose being was relevant to our daily lives. He was convinced that the natural world provides evidence for this belief, evidence as sound as that which we have for the existence of other minds. Given that the esse of objects consists in their being perceived, that only minds are active, and that no human perceiver perceives all things at all times, it follows that a cosmic mind maintains the universe it created. Moreover, the system of nature is not random, but regular; it is, in fact, a divine language in which God makes his intentions known to us, and demonstrates his wisdom... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS 477 (p. 32), although some might consider him to have been an important historian of logic. I am not certain that citing Carnap and Heideggar (p. 75) can do much to clarify Vires. When one reads 'Henrique Estienne' and "Hipotiposes pirronicas" (p. 266) in an Italian book he is a bit taken aback and wonders whether the author has done his homework. The writer missed a golden (...) opportunity to connect Galileo to the tradition, for his still unpublished Quaestiones on logic and the De motu (both written before 1600) have many interesting comments which tie in directly with the material developed in this volume. This could have provided an excellent bridge to the next'century, when the analytic method began to take a more central role in scientific and methodological discussions. There is still room for a number of studies on the evolution of the analytic method during the Renaissance. Unfortunately Crescini's study barely scratches the surface of this immense subject. Let us hope that his book will at least have the effect of encouraging others to treat the matter with more care, in greater depth, and more exhaustively. The volume is provided with a preface by Giorgio Radetti, who claims more for it than it actually provides, as well as noting that it is the first part of a more comprehensive study by the same author on the formation of the analytic method in Cartesian philosophy (p. 5). The book has a useful index, but unfortunately no bibliography. CHARLESB. ScxiMrrr The University of Leeds Le thomisme et la pens#e italienne de la Renaissance. By Paul Oskar Kristeller. Conference Albert-le-Grand 1965. (Montr6ah Institut d'~tudes m~di~vales, and Paris: Vrin, 1967. Pp. 287. $6) Surprisingly little is known about the later history of Thomism. This brief but very rich lecture by Professor Kristeller, renowned historian of Italian Renaissance philosophy, examines one period in the later career of St. Thomas' thought. This study, based chiefly on unpublished source material, shows that Thomas was very much present to both the humanists and to the academic philosophers during the Renaissance. Such leading humanists as Lorenzo Valla, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, and Marsilio Ficino, quote St. Thomas frequently and with approval. Even the unfavorable attitudes of Ermolao Barbaro or Baptista Mantuanus show that Thomas was already the most celebrated of mediaeval philosophers. The professors of philosophy at Italian universities, such as Pierre Pomponazzi, speak of Thomas with great respect and regard his theology as in conformity with the truths of faith, even when they reject his philosophy as being in disaccord with the authentic teaching of Aristotle. St. Thomas made a continuous contribution to the development of Renaissance theology and philosophy. Yet the principal Italian thinkers did not follow him strictly nor fall under his exclusive influence. Thomas is merely one of the most important sources, not the prevailing influence, in Renaissance thought. Ficino, for example, is,178 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY in accord with Thomas on certain important points, but his own theology is more in the spirit of Plato and Augustine. Professor Kristeller's vast learning is at the service of admirably balanced conclusions. Not everyone will agree with all his interpretations; Ficino perhaps did not imagine himself to be "constructing a system of philosophy" (p. 96) since the very title of his work, Theologia platonica, suggests that he continues, with new materials, the labor of mediaeval theolo#ans. And Ficino's doctrine of the continuity of the supernatural life of the soul in this world and the next (p. 120) seems to be completely in accord with Thomas. But the author's very careful scholarly method and sound general conclusions are beyond criticism. Two hitherto unpublished Latin texts are printed in critical edition at the end of the French lecture, the Opus aureum in Thomistas by Baptists Mantuanus, which is anti-Thomas, and the Opusculum ad Laurentium Medicem on beatitude, by Vincentius Bandellus, which is pro-Thomas. Like Professor Kristeller's fine lecture, these new texts are a permanent contribution to scholarship. PAUL J. W. MILLER University of Colorado The Anatomy of Leviathan. By F. S. McNeilly. (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1968. Pp... (shrink)

Peter Abelard (1079–1142 ce) was the most wide‐ranging philosopher of the twelfth century. He quickly established himself as a leading teacher of logic in and near Paris shortly after 1100. After his affair with Heloise, and his subsequent castration, Abelard became a monk, but he returned to teaching in the Paris schools until 1140, when his work was condemned by a Church Council at Sens. His logical writings were based around discussion of the “Old Logic”: Porphyry's Isagoge, aristotle'S Categories and (...) On Interpretation and boethius'S textbook on topical inference. They comprise a freestanding Dialectica (“Logic”; probably c.1116), a set of commentaries (known as the Logica [Ingredientibus], c. 1119) and a later (c. 1125) commentary on the Isagoge (Logica Nostrorum Petititoni Sociorum or Glossulae). In a work Abelard called his Theologia, issued in three main versions (between 1120 and c.1134), he attempted a logical analysis of trinitarian relations and explored the philosophical problems surrounding God's claims to omnipotence and omniscience. The Collationes (“Debates,” also known as “Dialogue between a Christian, a Philosopher and a Jew”; probably c.1130) present a rational investigation into the nature of the highest good, in which the Christian and the Philosopher (who seems to be modeled on a philosopher of pagan antiquity) are remarkably in agreement. The unfinished Scito teipsum (“Know thyself,” also known as the “Ethics”; c.1138) analyses moral action. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Zhuangzi:Personal Freedom and/or Incongruity of Names?Paul J. D'Ambrosio (bio)Tao Jiang's Origins of Moral-Political Philosophy in Early China: Contestation of Humaneness, Justice, and Personal Freedom (hereafter Origins) has sparked much scholarly debate. Already numerous presentations, various types of discussions, and reviews have appeared based on Origins. The present review focuses specifically on the Zhuangzi chapter. The entire project actually began, Jiang writes, fifteen years ago as a book (...) on the Zhuangzi. Through his research Jiang realized he needed to learn more about the objects of philosophical ridicule and critique in the Zhuangzi. Origins is the result of this decade-and-a-half study.Origins provides a somewhat novel framework for reading Warring States period philosophy. Summarizing the basic structure of his project Jiang writes: "I make the case that the philosophical dialectics between the partialist humaneness and imperialist justice formed the fundamental dynamics underlying the mainstream moral-political project during the classic period, with the musing on personal freedom as the outlier" (p. 35). As Karyn Lai puts it, Origins revolves around a "predictable set of inherited pre-Qin texts associated with key figures, traditionally called the "Masters" (zi 子) text" (Lai 2022, p. 181). Some models inherited by the "masters," such as yinyang 陰陽 thinking or ming 名 (names) and shi 實 (actualities), are nearly absent in Origins and would cast new light on the project as well [End Page 458] as the tradition. In this review I will first outline Jiang's reading of the Zhuangzi before considering how a richer appreciation of the Chinese tradition, especially its own methodological tools, frameworks, and concepts, could bolster the exciting contributions Origins stands to make. We will start with Jiang's big picture view of the Zhuangzi.In Origins the Zhuangzi is taken to be a completely unique text. It does not engage in the moral and political discourse the other "masters" texts are subsumed by, and instead of supporting either partialist humaneness or impartialist justice it "muses" on personal freedom. Jiang defines: "Personal freedom is understood as the appreciation and cultivation of personal space wherein one can be left alone and enjoy the company of like-minded friends without being entangled in the sociopolitical world" (p. 36). There are two significant points to note about Jiang's understanding of freedom. First, it is almost a word-for-character definition of how the "Seven Worthies of the Bamboo Grove" have been described by many. Research on these philosophical works could significantly enrich Jiang's reading, albeit from a different angle. Second, Guo Xiang's 郭象 (d. 312) emphasis on, and philosophical explorations of, du 獨 (an interconnected type of "lone") would further fill out how freedom and relationality—which are both attributed to the Zhuangzi by Jiang—are connected.In addition to a "fierce advocacy for personal freedom" Jiang classifies the Zhuangzi as a "singular outlier" for ridiculing the "misguided character of [the contestations between humaneness and justice] and warn[ing] against their potential for inhumanity and injustice" (p. 49). Indeed, the Zhuangzi does demonstrate that these discussions can elicit "the very opposite of what was intended by the participants of the mainstream discourse" (p. 49). Its criticisms are even more penetrating when we appreciate its deeper point about "names being the guests of actualities" (Zhuangzi 1:4). From this perspective the Zhuangzi is not against systems of humaneness or justice as such. It rather points out that humaneness does not have a single referent, nor could that referent be reliably distinguished. The name "humane" does not guarantee humane action, or really anything in particular. The same is true for "justice." We will return to these points below.Jiang's chapter on the Zhuangzi begins by defending moral and political readings of the text. It is an outlier from the perspective of the "humanity-justice" framework, but this only means that the moral-political discourse Zhuangists were engaged in was different. The result was that already by the early Han and by the time of Sima Qian 司馬遷 (d. 86 b.c.e.) "Zhuangzi's teachings were … of little use to contemporary political discourse" (p. 288). Jiang should be delighted to know that the Wei-Jin period, which had inestimable... (shrink)

To answer whether moral responsibility is compatible with determinism, two different methods for justifying compatibilist conditions of responsibility have emerged in recent literature. First-person approaches, such as Hilary Bok's, appeal to the first-person experience of human agency to justify our practices of holding agents responsible. In contrast, T. M. Scanlon and Jay Wallace, following P. F. Strawson, begin with an account of the interpersonal significance of holding each other responsible in order to discern the conditions under which it is appropriate (...) to assign that significance to an agent's actions. In this dissertation, I evaluate these different methodologies, and I examine the details of each view in order to find a proper understanding of the conditions of responsibility and of the significance of responsibility judgments within our interpersonal lives. ;I argue that the backward-looking significance we attach to responsibility judgments, including those of blame and praise, can be captured only by an interpersonal approach. Specifically, I argue that the significance of responsibility is not found in the negative consequences or emotions that we associate with holding agents responsible. Rather, ascribing to an agent the status of being responsible is a form a deep respect, which has practical implications. I argue that our intuitions concerning victims of severely deprived childhoods are best accounted for if we recognize that ascription as a form of respect and we separate the question of whether an agent is responsible from considerations of appropriate punishments. ;With regard to the conditions of responsibility, I argue that practical reasoners should be considered responsible not only for their choices, but also for negligent omissions, moral beliefs, and certain emotional reactions, even if such phenomena are not based on their choices. In addition, I argue that compatibilists do not need to add the capacity to grasp distinctly moral reasons to the requirements of responsible agency because that capacity is entailed by the basic capacity to reason practically. I examine the psychological literature on psychopaths---agents who supposedly are practical reasoners without moral understanding---to counter an objection to my view. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS 477 (p. 32), although some might consider him to have been an important historian of logic. I am not certain that citing Carnap and Heideggar (p. 75) can do much to clarify Vires. When one reads 'Henrique Estienne' and "Hipotiposes pirronicas" (p. 266) in an Italian book he is a bit taken aback and wonders whether the author has done his homework. The writer missed a golden (...) opportunity to connect Galileo to the tradition, for his still unpublished Quaestiones on logic and the De motu (both written before 1600) have many interesting comments which tie in directly with the material developed in this volume. This could have provided an excellent bridge to the next'century, when the analytic method began to take a more central role in scientific and methodological discussions. There is still room for a number of studies on the evolution of the analytic method during the Renaissance. Unfortunately Crescini's study barely scratches the surface of this immense subject. Let us hope that his book will at least have the effect of encouraging others to treat the matter with more care, in greater depth, and more exhaustively. The volume is provided with a preface by Giorgio Radetti, who claims more for it than it actually provides, as well as noting that it is the first part of a more comprehensive study by the same author on the formation of the analytic method in Cartesian philosophy (p. 5). The book has a useful index, but unfortunately no bibliography. CHARLESB. ScxiMrrr The University of Leeds Le thomisme et la pens#e italienne de la Renaissance. By Paul Oskar Kristeller. Conference Albert-le-Grand 1965. (Montr6ah Institut d'~tudes m~di~vales, and Paris: Vrin, 1967. Pp. 287. $6) Surprisingly little is known about the later history of Thomism. This brief but very rich lecture by Professor Kristeller, renowned historian of Italian Renaissance philosophy, examines one period in the later career of St. Thomas' thought. This study, based chiefly on unpublished source material, shows that Thomas was very much present to both the humanists and to the academic philosophers during the Renaissance. Such leading humanists as Lorenzo Valla, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, and Marsilio Ficino, quote St. Thomas frequently and with approval. Even the unfavorable attitudes of Ermolao Barbaro or Baptista Mantuanus show that Thomas was already the most celebrated of mediaeval philosophers. The professors of philosophy at Italian universities, such as Pierre Pomponazzi, speak of Thomas with great respect and regard his theology as in conformity with the truths of faith, even when they reject his philosophy as being in disaccord with the authentic teaching of Aristotle. St. Thomas made a continuous contribution to the development of Renaissance theology and philosophy. Yet the principal Italian thinkers did not follow him strictly nor fall under his exclusive influence. Thomas is merely one of the most important sources, not the prevailing influence, in Renaissance thought. Ficino, for example, is,178 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY in accord with Thomas on certain important points, but his own theology is more in the spirit of Plato and Augustine. Professor Kristeller's vast learning is at the service of admirably balanced conclusions. Not everyone will agree with all his interpretations; Ficino perhaps did not imagine himself to be "constructing a system of philosophy" (p. 96) since the very title of his work, Theologia platonica, suggests that he continues, with new materials, the labor of mediaeval theolo#ans. And Ficino's doctrine of the continuity of the supernatural life of the soul in this world and the next (p. 120) seems to be completely in accord with Thomas. But the author's very careful scholarly method and sound general conclusions are beyond criticism. Two hitherto unpublished Latin texts are printed in critical edition at the end of the French lecture, the Opus aureum in Thomistas by Baptists Mantuanus, which is anti-Thomas, and the Opusculum ad Laurentium Medicem on beatitude, by Vincentius Bandellus, which is pro-Thomas. Like Professor Kristeller's fine lecture, these new texts are a permanent contribution to scholarship. PAUL J. W. MILLER University of Colorado The Anatomy of Leviathan. By F. S. McNeilly. (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1968. Pp... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Eighteenth-Century Hermeneutics: Philosophy of Interpretation in England from Locke to BurkePaul J. KorshinEighteenth-Century Hermeneutics: Philosophy of Interpretation in England from Locke to Burke, by Joel Weinsheimer; xiii & 275 pp. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993, $30.00.Hermeneutics has until the present study had little application to eighteenth-century England. The omission is curious for, although there were few advances in biblical scholarship during the Restoration and eighteenth century, modern (...) literary criticism begins in this century with Dryden and Johnson, modern aesthetics with Shaftesbury and the Scottish school of taste, and modern theories of art with Reynolds and writers on the picturesque. Joel Weinsheimer’s treatment of this topic, then, instantly possesses originality, not only from a lack of serious competition but because of its approach to [End Page 365] hermeneutics. He “does not offer a historical narrative” of what happened in hermeneutics in eighteenth-century England (p. xi). Rather, Weinsheimer prefers to see hermeneutics as a series of snapshots of how various writers, of whom only a few are conventional exegetes, deal with matters of interpreting texts. In all, the book treats eight major figures (Swift, Locke, Toland, Bolingbroke, Hume, Reid, Blackstone, and Burke), devoting a chapter to each.The method in each one is approximately the same: Weinsheimer produces a reading not of a single work alone but of all, or almost all that an author writes about interpretation. In the case of Swift, for instance, his principal contribution on exegesis, A Tale of a Tub, is a satire on styles of exegesis Swift considered ridiculous. This chapter adds little to what we know of Swift but, in relation to Weinsheimer’s analysis of Sir William Blackstone, we can see that there is a legal background to parts of the debate among the three brothers on the meaning of Scripture. Locke (pp. 23–45) also dealt with the Bible extensively, but his tendency to prefer the doctrine of “sola scriptura” limits what an author can say about his hermeneutics. John Toland (pp. 46–71), in his Christianity Not Mysterious, proposes radical notions of biblical exegesis, and Weinsheimer gives us a lucid reading of the first English skeptical exegete. All the other figures he studies, however, had little interest in traditional literary exegesis. Weinsheimer sees Bolingbroke (pp. 72–102) as a philosopher of history who tried to generate a theory of decoding the past, but he does not clearly distinguish Bolingbroke’s rules for writing history. Hume (pp. 103–34) wrote extensively on exegetical topics without actually being an exegete; although this is one of Weinsheimer’s more opaque chapters, it does succeed in showing the diversity of Hume and his inability to reason conclusively on matters of interpretation. Hume basically did not think that there is any problem in understanding others, so his theories of exegesis are not coherent. So, too, Thomas Reid (pp. 135–65) considered language, properly used, as lacking in opacity; hence elaborate theories of interpretation have little use for him.However, with Blackstone and Edmund Burke, Weinsheimer contributes his two most interesting chapters. The law, as Blackstone conceived of it, is extremely difficult to understand, so his Commentaries on the Laws of England is an attempt to read legal texts “in the context of general literacy” (p. 168); Bentham would later imitate him. Burke, Weinsheimer argues, started as an aesthetician and ended applying principles of good and bad taste to political behavior, always one of the weaknesses of reactionary politics.In a brief epilogue (pp. 226–33), Weinsheimer speculates on the effort of eighteenth-century hermeneutics to understand historical reason, but he does not comment on the failure of the period to produce a single important hermeneuticist. His own choice to avoid major exegetes such as Samuel Johnson and Joshua Reynolds abridges his results dramatically, but a study based on scholarly snapshots always courts this risk. Hermeneutics is a [End Page 366] recondite concept, yet Weinsheimer renders his topic more difficult than it need be by frequent shifts in its definition and a complex, often unclear, style. Eighteenth-Century Hermeneutics provides a start, if not a definitive treatment, for later students of exegesis in the English Enlightenment.Paul... (shrink)