Kritische bijdragen over ideologisch gekleurde vormen van westerse culturele antropologie.

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Cet ouvrage se veut une réhabilitation du "langage ordinaire" cherchant à dévoiler ses "virtualités" et à "jeter un pont entre ce langage et celui de la philosophie" pour leur mutuelle sauvegarde. Il s'agit d'une entreprise phénoménologique qui, malheureusement, repose sur des soi-disant "évidences", sur une sorte de terrorisme argumentait opposant le bien (ce qui est vivant, spontané, dynamique, etc.) au mal (ce qui est inerte, mort, pétrifié, etc.), et sur la simple affirmation de ce que les "gens ordinaires" sont censés (...) éprouver. La quête du "langage ordinaire" devient ainsi quelque chose d'assez extraordinaire! (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 61.4 (2000) 561-575 [Access article in PDF] Claude de Seyssel's Translations of Ancient Historians Rebecca Boone Through his seven translations of ancient history Claude de Seyssel played a major role in transmitting knowledge about antiquity to the French. Despite this fact he has received little attention from scholars of the French Renaissance. Perhaps the problem is that Seyssel does not seem to fit (...) neatly into any category. He was neither French nor Italian but a Savoyard, not truly noble but the illegitimate son of a noble family, not truly a historian but a writer of history-based propaganda and a translator of histories. He began his career as a jurist, became a royal councillor, then a bishop, and in the end died as the Archbishop of Turin. Before his death Seyssel left numerous works, his most famous being a political treatise entitled La Monarchie de France, a work contemporaneous with The Prince by Machiavelli, with whom he shared a similar view of the political world. 1Much like Seyssel himself the genre of history translation has been rather neglected by scholars. A notable exception is a recent article by A.C. Dionisotti, which also examines the translations of Seyssel. The article's intention is to continue a project proposed by Arnaldo Momigliano, to collect evidence that "would help us to understand where and on what occasions and by what people books of history were written and read." 2 This essay attempts to continue this project by asking the following questions: Why did Seyssel undertake the translations? For whom were they intended? How did Seyssel conceive his task as translator? Finally, what can be inferred from his technique of translation? [End Page 561]First, the translations must be put in the context of Seyssel's life. The translations were a sideline in his busy career as royal councillor. One of many itinerant scholar-diplomats hired by the states of Europe at that time, Seyssel had been teaching law at the University of Turin when he was called into the service of France by the newly crowned Louis XII in 1498. Seyssel was of value to the court because of his reputation as a jurist as well as his connections with the court of Savoy, the state which held the mountain passes leading to Italy. This was especially important because the conquest of Milan was the main goal of Louis XII throughout his reign. Seyssel played an active role in the French occupational government in several Italian cities. Although Seyssel spent much of his time in Italy, he often followed the king around France or was in transit on diplomatic missions to England, to Flanders, and to the Swiss cantons.It is amazing that Seyssel even found the time to write, but by the end of his life, he had left an astounding variety of written works: legal commentaries, translations, works of propaganda for the French monarchy, a political treatise, and at the end of his life several religious tracts. Despite the copiousness of his written works, however, Seyssel remained outside the circle of writers at the French court. He had no connections either with Budé or with the Grands Rhetoriqueurs, such as Jean Lemaire de Belges, nor did he leave any friendly and eloquent correspondence to other humanists. If Seyssel lived during the budding years of the French renaissance, he showed few signs of appreciating it. As a Savoyard educated in Italy he probably thought of the French in the same way as did many Italians of his age: they were militarily powerful but culturally backward. 3Undoubtedly, Seyssel believed the translations would serve his own interests at court. They were a way to cultivate patronage and to enhance his prestige by building up a reputation as an important scholar. But evidence suggests that their main purpose was to prove to the king, to whom all but one of his translations were dedicated, his utility as a councillor. This was the argument of Paul [End Page 562] Chavy in his study of Seyssel's... (shrink)

Is the history of life a series of accidents or a drama scripted by selfish genes? Is there an “essential” human nature, determined at birth or in a distant evolutionary past? What should we conserve—species, ecosystems, or something else? -/- Informed answers to questions like these, critical to our understanding of ourselves and the world around us, require both a knowledge of biology and a philosophical framework within which to make sense of its findings. In this accessible introduction to philosophy (...) of biology, Kim Sterelny and Paul E. Griffiths present both the science and the philosophical context necessary for a critical understanding of the most exciting debates shaping biology today. The authors, both of whom have published extensively in this field, describe the range of competing views—including their own—on these fascinating topics. -/- With its clear explanations of both biological and philosophical concepts, Sex and Death will appeal not only to undergraduates, but also to the many general readers eager to think critically about the science of life. (shrink)

Samuelson's text was first published in 1948, and it immediately became the authority for the principles of economics courses. The book continues to be the standard-bearer for principles courses, and this revision continues to be a clear, accurate, and interesting introduction to modern economics principles. Bill Nordhaus is now the primary author of this text, and he has revised the book to be as current and relevant as ever.

In a town near mine, a small business owner used their changeable-letter sign to wage a public protest against a variety of restrictions implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic. Unlike a great man...

Paul M. Pietroski presents an ambitious new account of human languages as generative procedures that respect substantive constraints. He argues that meanings are neither concepts nor extensions, and sentences do not have truth conditions; meanings are composable instructions for how to access and assemble concepts of a special sort.

Despite clinical evidence of drug superiority, therapeutic modalities, like combination immunotherapy, are mostly considered cost-ineffective due to their high costs per life year(s) gained. This paper, taking an ethical stand, reevaluates the standard cost-effectiveness analysis with that of the more recent justice-enhanced methods and concludes by pointing out the shortcomings of the current methodologies.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Cross and Creation: A Theological Introduction to Origen of Alexandria by Mark E. TherrienJean-Paul JugeCross and Creation: A Theological Introduction to Origen of Alexandria by Mark E. Therrien (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2022), xxii + 303 pp.Although Origen of Alexandria has been misrepresented and maligned since his own lifetime, allies have always arisen to defend him in his stead. Especially after the French Catholic (...) reappraisal of Origen's theology in the twentieth century, the once-dominant interpretation of Origen as a Platonist dressed in Christian garb no longer holds sway among most scholars. As Mark Therrien notes, however, traces of a "metaphysical reductionist" interpretation of Origen, propounded most notably by Adolf [End Page 295] von Harnack, still influences Origenian scholarship (89). Therrien's book vigorously opposes this line of interpretation and provides a rereading of crucial passages in Origen's On First Principles (Peri archōn) and his Commentary on John. In addition to presenting a fresh interpretation of these texts, Therrien also offers an introduction for those who are encountering Origen's theology for the first time. Rather than prefacing with biographical remarks, this book dives straight into Origen's major theological texts, allowing the reader, as Henri de Lubac put it, "to see Origen at work."Therrien operates under the principle that Origen is above all a biblical theologian whose speculation is driven primarily by his commitment to exegesis rather than Platonic presuppositions. Thus, his reading of various controversial excerpts of Origen, particularly from the Peri archōn, pays close attention to the biblical verses that Origen cites, which operate not as mere ornamentation but as the indispensable mechanics of his theology.This book is divided into eight chapters, each of which presents a "fundamental pillar" of Origen's thought: God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, eschatology the soul, the world, the Cross, and deification. Drawing attention to the first two cycles that comprise Origen's Peri archōn, Therrien treats the first cycle as authoritative to Origen's system, since it is here that Origen presents the Church's teaching in a more dogmatic form prior to the zetetic approach of the second cycle. Chapter 1 highlights the anti-Valentinian polemic that contextualizes Origen's account of divine incorporeality and the possibility of genuine knowledge of God. Following the insights of Cyril O'Regan, Therrien notes that an extreme apophaticism led the Valentinian Gnostics to "assimilat[e] God to creaturely categories," as seen in their account of various deities emanating from God as if by a material transfer of substance (36). For Origen, only the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are absolutely incorporeal, and it is their absolute incorporeality that separates the Trinity from all creatures. Despite this fundamental distinction between the Trinity and creation, Origen affirms that a limited knowledge of God is possible for rational creatures with the caveat that, whenever God is likened analogically to a created reality, the dissimilarity is always greater (38). Therrien contends that, unlike the Gnostics, Origen envisions the material world as the positive and even necessary means for creatures to derive knowledge of God.Chapter 2 focuses on Origen's Christology, especially the primacy of Christ's title "Wisdom," which the author accounts for by explaining the logic behind Origen's exegesis of John's Prologue and Prov 8:22. Long before the Arian controversy of the fourth century, Origen insisted that God is eternally Father and thus generates the Son from all eternity. Origen has often been characterized, however, as arguing that God's eternal status as Creator [End Page 296] necessarily entails the existence of creation ab aeterno. Therrien points out that such a reading conflates Origen's two distinct notions of creation: the foreknown existence of creatures as "sketched and prefigured" in Wisdom from all eternity and the concrete, substantial existence of creatures that begins in time (60). The investigation of Origen's pneumatology in chapter 3 shows how Ps 103 (in the Septuagint) informs Origen's notion of the Holy Spirit as Creator. For Origen, creation is not simply a past event, but is instead a dynamic process: "Created beings must, so to... (shrink)

This book is relevant for anyone involved in the practice of psychology and the social sciences more broadly: researchers, teachers, students, and practitioners. It challenges the status quo with regards to the way that psychology is done, and it offers a unified solution that encompasses both theory and methodology.

This article is a contribution to interdisciplinary scholarship addressing the presumption of innocence, especially interdisciplinary conversations between philosophers and jurists. Terminological confusion and methodological traps and errors notoriously beset academic literature addressing the presumption of innocence and related concepts, such as evidentiary presumptions, and the burden and standard of proof in criminal trials. This article is diagnostic, in the sense that its primary objective is to highlight the assumptions—in particular, the disciplinary assumptions—implicit in influential contributions to debates on the presumption (...) of innocence. It advocates a methodologically pluralistic approach, according to which definitions of the presumption of innocence are necessarily sensitive to purpose and method. These relationships and their implications are not always appreciated, and are seldom explicitly elucidated. Notably, philosophers routinely treat the presumption of innocence as epistemic, evidentiary or otherwise featuring directly in practical reasoning. This article identifies jurisprudential and practical reasons why legal scholars and practitioners concerned with criminal procedure and evidence should reject evidentiary interpretations of the presumption of innocence. By encouraging finer-grained engagement with the history and institutional details of common law procedural traditions, the article aims to show why legal scholars might think that philosophical approaches to the presumption of innocence are already methodologically-loaded and, for our purposes, address the wrong questions with deficient concepts. (shrink)

Die Frage nach den grundsätzlichen Erkenntnisgrenzen der Physik wird hier verstanden als die Frage danach, welchen Status die Aussagen der Physik über unbeobachtbare Gegenstände haben, z.B. über den Urknall, über Quarks oder über dunkle Materie. Sind die diesbezüglichen Aussagen der besten physikalischen Theorien einfach wahr oder wenigstens annähernd wahr (realistische Interpretation)? Oder wenigstens wahrscheinlich? Oder handelt es sich um bloße Modellvorstellungen, die für Vorhersagen und ggf. technische Anwendungen praktisch sind, aber keinen Wahrheitsgehalt aufweisen (instrumentalistische Interpretation)? In diesem Aufsatz werden verschiedene (...) solcher Möglichkeiten genauer vorgestellt und die wichtigsten einschlägigen Argumente für und gegen solche Positionen diskutiert. (shrink)

Investigations of data-centered efforts in advocacy and activism are often cast in terms of a narrative of opposition between grassroots activists working through and with data, and corporations or institutions whose actions data might expose. The boundaries are, however, not so distinct in practice. Indeed, one outcome of successful advocacy efforts for opening big data to the public is that the activists may find themselves drawn into the institutions they critique or view as impediments in order to actualize those efforts (...) from the inside. Drawing on an ongoing ethnographic investigation of urban data initiatives inside city government, we explore the productive ambivalences of activism and advocacy that arise when those with data activist ideals find themselves operating within the government structure. (shrink)

In this book Paul Dragos Aligica revisits the theory of political self-governance in the context of recent developments in behavioral economics and political philosophy that have challenged the foundations of this theory. Building on the work of the 'Bloomington School' created by Nobel Laureate Elinor Ostrom and Public Choice political economy co-founder Vincent Ostrom, Aligica presents a fresh conceptualization of the key processes at the core of democratic-liberal governance systems involving civic competence and public entrepreneurship. The result is not (...) only a re-assessment and re-articulation of the theories constructed by the Bloomington School of Public Choice, but also a new approach to several cutting-edge discussions relevant to governance studies and applied institutional theory, such as the debates generated by the recent waves of populism, paternalism and authoritarianism. (shrink)

Like Plato, Protagoras held that young children learn virtue from fine examples in poetry. Unlike Plato, Protagoras taught adults by correcting the diction of poets. In this paper I ask what his standard of correctness might be, and what benefit he intended his students to take from exercises in correction. If his standard of correctness is truth, then he may intend his students to learn by questioning the content of poems; that would be suggestive of Plato’s program in Republic III. (...) But his standard is more likely to be the accurate use of language; in that case he would intend his students to learn to express their thoughts clearly enough that their audience would understand what they were saying. That standard would be independent of the truth of what they are saying; and that would be a precursor to modern techniques by which we try to teach speaking and writing. Truth is not so easy to escape, however, and we shall see that Protagoras’ exercise must assume that the poet is trying to tell the truth. (shrink)

In Principles of Non-Philosophy, Laruelle develops the concepts and method of a more democratic form of thought where neither science nor philosophy is subjected to one another, but brought together in a more productive theoretical and practical relationship. While the potential importance of this project is clear, Laruelle remains famously difficult. Anthony Paul Smith provides an introduction and guide to the text that situates you amongst the figures and concepts Laruelle engaged with, provides a foothold for your own understanding (...) and, more importantly, potential use of the project of non-philosophy. (shrink)

Paul M. Pietroski, University of Maryland I had heard it said that Chomsky’s conception of language is at odds with the truth-conditional program in semantics. Some of my friends said it so often that the point—or at least a point—finally sunk in.

In diesem Band wird eine kritische Edition der ersten Vorlesungen vorgelegt, die der Privatdozent Paul Tillich an der Berliner Theologischen Fakultät gehalten hat. Es handelt sich dabei um folgende Vorlesungen: 1. Das Christentum und die Gesellschaftsprobleme der Gegenwart, 2. Enzyklopädie der Theologie und Religionswissenschaft, 3. Religion und Kultur, 4. Religionsphilosophie. Hinzu kommt eine Hörernachschrift der Vorlesung "Religionsphilosophie". Die bisher unveröffentlichten Manuskripte aus dem in der Harvard University befindlichen Nachlaß Paul Tillichs geben uns ein differenziertes Bild des kulturtheologischen und (...) religionsphilosophischen Denkens Paul Tillichs in den ersten Jahren der Weimarer Republik. Der Band enthält einen editorischen Bericht, eine historische Einleitung sowie ein Personen- und Sachregister. Anmerkungen geben textkritische und inhaltliche Informationen zum Text. (shrink)

Der Band enthält die bisher unveröffentlichten Manuskripte der Vorlesungen, die der Privatdozent Paul Tillich vom Wintersemester 1920/21 bis zum Wintersemester 1923/24 an der Theologischen Fakultät der Berliner Universität gehalten hat. Ihr Thema ist die Geschichte des philosophischen Denkens von den Vorsokratikern bis zur Aufklärung unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der altchristlichen und mittelalterlichen Philosophie. Tillich behandelt den traditionellen Stoff der Philosophiegeschichte nach der von ihm in seiner Idee der Geisteswissenschaft begründeten metalogischen Methode, einer theonomen Erkenntnistheorie. Die Vorlesungen zeigen Sinn und Reichweite (...) dieser Methode und stellen Konkretionen seines Programms einer Theologie der Kultur dar. (shrink)

El objetivo de este artículo es abordar el reciente problema del nexo entre realismo y fenomenología hermenéutica desde un enfoque específico: el diálogo entre el nuevo realismo de Markus Gabriel y algunas propuestas hermenéutico-fenomenológicas alemanas que se autocomprenden en términos realistas. Afirmo la hipótesis de que es posible un diálogo productivo entre estas propuestas, basado en una comprensión mínima del realismo como fundamentación ontológica viable. Para esto, en primer lugar mostraré el sentido del actual resurgimiento del realismo en el contexto (...) de la ontología continental contemporánea, situando su recepción, crítica e integración a propósito del ámbito de la fenomenología y hermenéutica recientes. En segundo lugar, analizaré la propuesta de nuevo realismo, que está implicada en la ontología de campos de sentido de M. Gabriel. Y, en tercer lugar, reseñaré las propuestas de Günter Figal, Anton Friedrich Koch y Tobias Keiling en su fundamento realista. Mediante este trabajo comparativo, concluiré afirmando que el diálogo entre ambas corrientes comparte una comprensión realista no reductiva a la cuestión del mundo exterior, que le permite entenderlo como búsqueda de cierto criterio de objetividad para lo que aparece sensiblemente con sentido, con el propósito de esclarecer por qué las cosas reales son dependientes de la interpretación (interpretables en general), pero independientes de interpretaciones individuales. (shrink)

The authors rightly critique existing social sciences approaches. However, they are too quick to dismiss the criticism that their proposed paradigm is atheoretical. Social and cognitive theories are indeed incommensurate, often due to the lack of a unifying framework. Without proper integration with theoretical frameworks, their proposal may merely produce a resource-intensive veneer of thoroughness without substantive improvements to understanding.

Volume 2, Issue 4, December 2018, Page 355-364.

The Southern Journal of Philosophy, Volume 60, Issue 2, Page 277-303, June 2022.

Résumé L’envoûtement médiatique est un travail de l’imagination, effectué par le consommateur, qui occupe désormais la totalité, toujours croissante, de son temps de connexion. Cet hypertravail est au fondement de la nouvelle économie capitaliste, la chronophagie, en raison de sa rentabilité sans précédent, car le consommateur produit lui-même, par son imagination, un surcroît de valeur de la marchandise, qui lui fait accepter de la payer plus cher. L’hypertravail est le premier travail payant.

The contribution of Jesuits to the different fields of knowledge, including philosophy, is historically well known. In fact, since the foundation of the Society of Jesus, in the 16th century, Jesuits from different generations and cultures have taken part in the philosophical debates of their time and their different contexts. Since the foundation of the Society of Jesus, in 1540, the Jesuits, individually and as a body, have engaged in a fruitful dialogue between the Christian tradition and different dimensions of (...) human culture. During almost five centuries, numerous Jesuits taught philosophy in academic institutions all over the world. Some of them have their names recorded in the history of philosophy. Of course, the majority of them is not anymore remembered, despite their valuable contribution to the development of the Jesuit intellectual tradition up to our times. In fact, as an heir of the Roman College, the first academic institution founded by the Society of Jesus, in 1551, the Pontifical Gregorian University, in Rome, is a witness to this tradition, which has been kept alive thanks to the discrete work of both Jesuits and lay intellectuals. Known as the University of the Nations, this institution corroborates not only the capacity of the Jesuit tradition to put faith in dialogue with reason, but also the option to take the concrete reality of each human culture and its historical context as its point of departure. The Jesuits’ willingness to engage in dialogue with different intellectual perspectives is underpinned by one of the most defining traits of the Jesuit charism, namely, the conviction that God can be found and served in all things. Accordingly, Jesuits have adopted, from the beginning, an amenable stance towards the world with its different cultures and intellectual trends. As such, Jesuits have, since the beginning, inhabited the frontiers of human thought. According to the contemporary philosopher Paul Gilbert, SJ, within the institutions under the leadership of the Society of Jesus, it was always possible to maintain an equilibrium between two principles: “intellectual unity” and “openness to the world.” Without detriment to the Jesuit identity, the companions of Ignatius have been willing to dwell in the various dimensions of human reality, in their multiplicity and plurality. Either in the renewal of Aristotle’s and Aquinas’ metaphysics, or in the dialogue with modern philosophers such as Descartes, Kant, or Hegel, and even in the inculturation in non-European contexts, the Jesuits have been able to preserve the Christian tradition through an original development of human culture in all its richness and diversity. With respect to the last century, it has to be acknowledged that a significant number of Jesuits made significant contributions, with recognized competence, to philosophy. Certainly, the 20th century was particularly complex in many respects. It would be enough to recall that this period, which brought with it unprecedented social, scientific, and technological developments, was also the stage for the two World Wars. With the emergence or consolidation of philosophical currents such as Marxism, Phenomenology, Existentialism, Structuralism, and Post-Modernism, the past century was, without any doubt, fascinating from the intellectual point of view. Jesuits such as Karl Rahner, Frederick Copleston, Bernard Lonergan, William Norris Clarke, John F. Kavanaugh, Teilhard de Chardin, Gaston Fessard, Jean Daniélou, Henri de Lubac, Michel de Certeau, Xavier Tilliette, Paul Valadier, Paweł Siwek, Ignacio Ellacuría, Francisco Taborda, Henrique de Lima Vaz and, in the Portuguese context, Diamantino Martins or Júlio Fragata, among many others, were able to engage different philosophical currents, problems and controversies of their times. Faithful to their long tradition of being present in the frontiers of thought, those Jesuits have engaged in a fruitful dialogue with these intellectual trends, offering relevant contributions to different ongoing debates. Within this context, the present volume recalls and discusses the philosophical contribution of some of the most prominent Jesuit protagonists of the intellectual interchange that took place in the 20th century. This volume also intends to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia, which happens just before the inauguration of the Ignatian Year. Decreed by Father Arturo Sosa, the Superior General of the Society of Jesus, this celebratory Year will start on May 20, 2021, precisely 500 years after Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit Order, was wounded at the battle of Pamplona. We are happy that this volume could bring together outstanding specialists in the thought of some of the most prominent Jesuits philosophers of the last century, namely Paul Valadier, Paul Gilbert, Józef Bremer, Jacek Poznański, Alexander Maar, Patrick H. Byrne, M. Ross Romero, Carlos Alvarez, Hélio Pereira Lima, José Gama, Domingos Terra, Gabriel Flynn, Marie-Gabrielle Lemaire, José Sols Lucia, Lorena Zuchel Lovera, Pedro Pablo Achondo Moya, Enzo Solari, Massimo Borghesi, Mendo Castro Henriques, João Barbosa, and Dominique Lambert. In addition, in the celebration of the 100th anniversary of Júlio Fragata’s birth, Maria Teresa Fragata presents a memory of his life and thought. We hope that this volume may be useful to all those interested in the Jesuit philosophical tradition. Hopefully, it will stimulate scholars to pursue a fruitful and creative dialogue with contemporary philosophy, in the footsteps of the Jesuit philosophers featured here. We would like to thank all the authors and all those who, in different ways, made this volume possible. (shrink)

This paper challenges “traditional measurement-accuracy realism”, according to which there are in nature quantities of which concrete systems have definite values. An accurate measurement outcome is one that is close to the value for the quantity measured. For a measurement of the temperature of some water to be accurate in this sense requires that there be this temperature. But there isn’t. Not because there are no quantities “out there in nature” but because the term ‘the temperature of this water’ fails (...) to refer owing to idealization and failure of specificity in picking out concrete cases. The problems can be seen as an artifact of vagueness, and so doing facilitates applying Eran Tal’s robustness account of measurement accuracy to suggest an attractive way of understanding vagueness in terms of the function of idealization, a way that sidesteps the problems of higher order vagueness and that shows how idealization provides a natural generalization of what it is to be vague. (shrink)

Catholic hospitals and health systems have proliferated and succeeded in American healthcare; they now operate four of the largest health systems and serve nearly one in six hospital patients. Like other religious entities that Wuest and Last write about in this issue, in their article Church Against State, they have benefited by and supported the long reach of conservative efforts to undermine the administrative state.