The words “for no reason” hang over Job's story like the sword of Damocles. When the sword falls, we are plunged into a world that seems to hold “no more beginnings.” Why Israel's scriptures should include such a story, and why this story seeds any new beginnings for life “east of Eden,” is Job's question ... and ours.

How did one of the greatest Jewish thinkers of the 20th century grapple with the founding of Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict—one of the most significant political conflicts of his time? Samuel Hayim Brody traces the development of Martin Buber's thinking and its implications for the Jewish religion, for the problems posed by Zionism, and for the Zionist-Arab conflict. Beginning in turbulent Weimar Germany, Brody shows how Buber's debates about Biblical meanings had concrete political consequences for anarchists, socialists, (...) Zionists, Nazis, British, and Palestinians alike. Brody further reveals how Buber's passionate commitment to the rule of God absent an intermediary came into conflict in the face of a Zionist movement in danger of repeating ancient mistakes. Brody argues that Buber's support for Israel stemmed from a radically rich and complex understanding of the nature of the Jewish mission on earth that arose from an anarchist reading of the Bible. (shrink)

This article is about nationalism from an unlikely perspective: Hannah Arendt. Though Arendt is famously no supporter of nationalism, I argue that her writing on narrative provides an illuminative way of examining the phenomenon. In the first section, I build upon Arendt’s narrative theory—and Leah Bradshaw’s analysis of it—to develop a distinction between narratively true stories and false ones, or reveries. I argue that while Arendt’s work on the matter often pertain to the tales of individuals, the thought is transferable (...) to the stories of nations. In the latter half of the paper, I turn these two questions on to instances of contemporary nationalism. Section two is on England, and section three is on Israel. I do not suggest that my conclusion about these case studies are definitive, but I do hope that their inclusion in this paper helps to demonstrate how Arendt’s philosophic analysis could be turned on the world. (shrink)

Levites and Priests in Biblical Tradition and History. Edited by Mark Leuchter and Jeremy M. Hutton. Ancient Israel and Its Literature, vol. 9. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2011. Pp. x + 257. $31.95.

"The articles in this volume are a selection of the papers presented at the Sixth Symposium Platonicum of the International Plato Society, under the auspices of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities and of the Faculty of Humanities of The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. They reflect the breadth of topics and the range of problems present in Plato's Laws : problems of editing and literary form, rhetoric and style, Homeric quotations ; the Socratic influence ; soul and motion (...) ; pleasure, virtue and happiness, ethics and education, gender ; public offices, economics, and philosophy of history ; political philosophy and religion. Addressed are also the historical and literary contexts of the Laws and its later repercussions."--taken from back cover. (shrink)

In 2019–2020, Israel went through three consecutive elections in less than a year on grounds of alleged corruption by Prime Minister Netanyahu, and his lack of ability to form a coalition. This study aims to contribute to analyses of the media mobilization/malaise effect by examining the impact of such a prolonged period of campaigning on citizens’ political behavior. Thus, we conducted six online surveys using a longitudinal sample of Israeli society before and after each election. The analysis found that, (...) despite participants’ testimonies that they were increasingly “tired of dealing with elections,” there was a significant increase in participants’ reported certainty in their vote, news consumption, participation in online political discussions, and level of political efficacy between the elections. Next, a multivariate analysis aiming to explain variations in voters’ political efficacy found that political trust, participants’ reported certainty about their vote, and political interest all explained high levels of political efficacy. The analysis provides one of the strongest reinforcements to date regarding the validity of political mobilization theory, demonstrating its relevance under challenging conditions. We discuss further implications and generalizability of our findings. (shrink)

The kingship has been integrated into the fundamental relationship between Yahweh and the people and that relationship reaffirmed. A crisis has been described and resolved in narrative and theological terms, and a new era can begin.

Contents \t\t\t\t\t \tTRANSLATOR'S INTRODUCTION \t\t1 \t \tNOTE ON THE TRANSLATION \t\t39 \t OBSERVATIONS ON THE FEELING OF THE BEAUTIFUL AND SUBLIME \t\t\t\t\t \tSECTION ONE: \t\t\t\t \t\tOf the Distinct Objects of the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime \t\t45 \tSECTION TWO: \t\t\t\t \t\tOf the Attributes of the Beautiful and Sublime.

The most favourable explanation pertaining to the Yoruba origin is that of the Oduduwa tradition according to which he is the original ancestor of the Yoruba people. Although the Yorubas have reached a settlement on Oduduwa as their ancestor, they disagree on the origin of Oduduwa. Whilst some associated his origin with Mecca or Arabia, others say Egypt or Israel. Samuel Johnson, the most prominent writer of the Yoruba history, discussed various theories that pertained to the origin of (...) Oduduwa. He argued that Oduduwa or the original ancestors of the Yoruba people were Coptic Christians. Writers of Yoruba history from the 20th and 21st centuries had continued to build upon Johnson’s view of the Yoruba origin in connection with Oduduwa. This research is a study of the Yoruba and Johnson’s perspectives of Oduduwa in connection with the Yoruba origins. The research elucidates the circumstances of Johnson’s Christianisation of the Egyptian origin of the Yoruba.Contribution: This article shall contribute to a distinct understanding of the origin of the Yoruba in connection with the identity and the personality of Oduduwa. Students of history and cultural studies will find this research of utmost benefit because it explains the origin of the Yoruba from the perspective of Samuel Johnson, the first Yoruba man to document extensively on the Yoruba history, language, its culture and its people in a single document or collection. (shrink)

Liao and Carbonell discuss the role of (supposed) racial differences and racism in two medical devices: pulse oximeters and spirometers. They show that what might seem like cases of mere bias, are...

In the wake of the Scientific Revolution, the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries saw the complete demolition of traditional structures of authority, scientific thought, and belief by the new philosophy and the philosophes, including Voltaire, Diderot, and Rousseau. The Radical Enlightenment played a part in this revolutionary process, which effectively overthrew all justification for monarchy, aristocracy, and ecclesiastical power, as well as man's dominance over woman, theological dominance of education, and slavery. Despite the present day interest in the revolutions of (...) the eighteenth century, the origins and rise of the Radical Enlightenment have received limited scholarly attention. The greatest obstacle to the movement finding its proper place in modern historical writing is its international scope: the Racial Enlightenment was not French, British, German, Italian, Jewish or Dutch, but all of these at the same time. In this wide-ranging volume, Jonathan Israel offers a novel interpretation of the Radical Enlightenment down to La Mettie and Diderot, two of its key exponents. Particular emphasis is placed on the pivotal role of Spinoza and the widespread underground international philosophical movement known before 1750 as Spinozism. (shrink)

In this paper, I will argue that there is a version of possibilism—inspired by the modal analogue of Kit Fine’s fragmentalism—that can be combined with a weakening of actualism. The reasons for analysing this view, which I call Modal Fragmentalism, are twofold. Firstly, it can enrich our understanding of the actualism/possibilism divide, by showing that, at least in principle, the adoption of possibilia does not correspond to an outright rejection of the actualist intuitions. Secondly, and more specifically, it can enrich (...) our understanding of concretism, by proving that, at least in principle, the idea that objects have properties in an absolute manner is compatible with transworld identity. (shrink)

Belief -- Trust -- Loyalty -- World-view -- Concluding thoughts.

Kaplan says that monsters violate Principle 2 of his theory. Principle 2 is that indexicals, pure and demonstrative alike, are directly referential. In providing this explanation of there being no monsters, Kaplan feels his theory has an advantage over double-indexing theories like Kamp’s or Segerberg’s (or Stalnaker’s), which either embrace monsters or avoid them only by ad hoc stipulation, in the sharp conceptual distinction it draws between circumstances of evaluation and contexts of utterance. We shall argue that Kaplan’s prohibition is (...) also essentially stipulative, and that it is too general. The main difference between ourselves and Kaplan is that the basic carriers of a truth-value is a sentence-in-a-context; our account is utterance-based. (shrink)

Mind wandering is typically operationalized as task-unrelated thought. Some argue for the need to distinguish between unintentional and intentional mind wandering, where an agent voluntarily shifts attention from task-related to task-unrelated thoughts. We reveal an inconsistency between the standard, task-unrelated thought definition of mind wandering and the occurrence of intentional mind wandering (together with plausible assumptions about tasks and intentions). This suggests that either the standard definition of mind wandering should be rejected or that intentional mind wandering is an incoherent (...) category. Solving this puzzle is critical for advancing theoretical frameworks of mind wandering. (shrink)

We sometimes fail unwittingly to do things that we ought to do. And we are, from time to time, culpable for these unwitting omissions. We provide an outline of a theory of responsibility for unwitting omissions. We emphasize two distinctive ideas: (i) many unwitting omissions can be understood as failures of appropriate vigilance, and; (ii) the sort of self-control implicated in these failures of appropriate vigilance is valuable. We argue that the norms that govern vigilance and the value of self-control (...) explain culpability for unwitting omissions. (shrink)

Each volume of this series of companions to major philosophers contains specially commissioned essays by an international team of scholars and will serve as a reference work for students and nonspecialists. John Rawls is the most significant and influential philosopher and moral philosopher of the twentieth century. His work has profoundly shaped contemporary discussions of social, political and economic justice in philosophy, law, political science, economics and other social disciplines. In this exciting collection of new essays, many of the world's (...) leading political and moral theorists discuss the full range of Rawls's contribution to the concepts of political and economic justice, democracy, liberalism, constitutionalism, and international justice. There are also assessments of Rawls's controversial relationships with feminism, utilitarianism and communitarianism. New readers will find this the most accessible guide to Rawls currently available. Advanced students and specialists will find a conspectus of recent developments in the interpretation of Rawls. (shrink)

In this anthology, distinguished scholars--Thomas Nagel, T.M. Scanlon, John Rawls, Robert Nozick, Samuela Scheffler, Conrad D. Johnson, Bernard Williams, Peter Railton, Amartya Sen, Philippa Foot, and Derek Parfit-- debate arguments for and against the moral doctrine of consequentialism to present a complete view of this important topic in moral philosophy.

Introduction: Not many writers have made suggestions about Saul’s mental state as reported in the Judaic-Christian bible. He became king under the tutelage of Samuel, a highly-respected prophet of the Israelite God, Yahweh. At some points during his reign, the biblical narrative depicted him as, at least, mentally unstable, if not decidedly insane. Modern-day writers, in some cases have provided lists of conditions, which purport to represent Saul’s psychological malady. None, however proves adequate or appropriate to encompass the complexity (...) of his behavior. The Safety-Oriented Personality Style (SOPS) or Phobicentric Psychopathology (PCP) appears to offer the best explanation of Saul’s psychological condition. Purpose: The main purpose of this paper is to offer a modern-day analysis/explanation of Saul’s apparently disturbed behavior. Evidence for the facts about Saul’s fascinating presentation is adduced both from the biblical passages and from present-day psychological theory. The previous explanations of the psychological disorder that plagued Saul, the first king of Israel, have focused on depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, hysteria, and bipolar disorder. The associated symptoms, however, have been vague and, in some cases, apparently unrepresentative of psychological nosology or, in general, they fail to conform to the prevailing nomenclature. Method: The present study introduces the Safety-Oriented Personality Style (SOPS) or Phobicentric Psychopathology (PCP), a relatively newly-unveiled chronic, anxiety-based disorder, to provide the “best” explanation of the ancient king’s perplexing conduct. Biblical passages pertaining to the topic provide the historical context of the events, which depict Saul’s provable psychopathology. Result: The evidence seems to clearly indicate that the explanation that Saul’s actions were mainly controlled by SOPS/PCP, a chronic anxiety disorder, is valid, applying most aptly to his reaction to David’s military and religious successes, and even to the recorded circumstances of his death. Conclusion: The historical account of Saul’s life and death, recorded primarily in the Christian bible, has remained intriguing, though somewhat esoteric. Probably as a result, its portrayal in the psychological literature has been scant. While the SOPS/PCP construct has apparently helped to provide grounds for diagnostic consensus that Saul’s problem was chronic anxiety, the newness of SOPS/PCP would tend to limit its purview. On a different but relevant level, the study also demonstrates the feasibility of common endeavors between the scientific and theological communities. (shrink)

Gils-Schmidt and Salloch recognise that human and climate health are inextricably linked, and that mitigating healthcare-associated climate harms is essential for protecting human health.1 They argue that physicians have a duty to consider how their own practices contribute to climate change, including during their interactions with patients. Acknowledging the potential for conflicts between this duty and the provision of individual patient care, they propose the application of Korsgaard’s neo-Kantian account of practical identities to help navigate such scenarios. In this commentary, (...) we argue that by focusing attention on this physician–patient level, the authors overlook the complexity of climate change, both within the healthcare sector and beyond. We recognise the importance of individual agency in tackling this issue, and we also recognise that the authors do briefly acknowledge the importance of considering these broader complexities; however, we emphasise the need for climate and health discussions/action to be situated in a wider framework of systemic change. Our concern is that overemphasis on patient-level interactions risks normalising the prioritisation of individual-level approaches to addressing climate change, detracting from such a broader approach. Physician training emphasises the need for trust, confidentiality and shared decision-making in the doctor–patient relationship. …. (shrink)

P. Kyle Stanford defends the problem of unconceived alternatives, which maintains that scientists are unlikely to conceive of all the scientifically plausible alternatives to the theories they accept. Stanford’s argument has been criticized on the grounds that the failure of individual scientists to conceive of relevant alternatives does not entail the failure of science as a corporate body to do so. I consider two replies to this criticism and find both lacking. In the process, I argue that Stanford does not (...) provide evidence that there are likely scientifically plausible unconceived alternatives to scientific theories accepted now and in the future. (shrink)

This dissertation is an experiment: what happens if we treat proper names as anaphoric expressions on a par with pronouns? The first thing to notice is that a name's 'antecedent' can occur in a discourse prior to the one containing the name. An individual may be introduced and tagged with a name in one context, and then retrieved using the name in a later context. To allow for discourse crossing anaphora, in addition to the usual cross-sentential anaphora, a revision of (...) discourse semantics is in order. Essentially, we must countenance discourse referents that span contexts, and think of contexts, not as islands, but as nodes connected to each other by the discourse referents they share. Discourse semantics gives rise to a new notion of content determined by discourse reference rather than pure reference. In a space of contexts structured by shared discourse referents, discourse content becomes transmissable. For a piece of content may be sent from one context to another whenever the discourse referents bundled up in the content are held in common by the two contexts. The final step is to treat the cognitive state of an agent as just another kind of context, and so a potential recipient of discourse content. Discourse content is more fine-grained than traditional 'singular' content, and so is a better fit for our pretheoretic intuitions about communication and attitude reporting. This is illustrated by applying the theory to Frege's puzzle, a puzzle of Loar's about communication, Kripke's puzzle about belief, Geach's intentional identity and new breed of 'mixed' de re-de dicto sentence. (shrink)

One popular theory of moral responsibility locates responsible agency in exercises of control. These control-based theories often appeal to tracing to explain responsibility in cases where some agent is intuitively responsible for bringing about some outcome despite lacking direct control over that outcome’s obtaining. Some question whether control-based theories are committed to utilizing tracing to explain responsibility in certain cases. I argue that reflecting on certain kinds of negligence shows that tracing plays an ineliminable role in any adequate control-based theory (...) of responsibility. (shrink)

Examining a broad range of issues - from computers in school to math education, from metaphor to morality - these essays are unified by Scheffler's conviction ...

This article challenges the association between realist methodology and ideals of legitimacy. Many who seek a more “realistic” or “political” approach to political theory replace the familiar orientation towards a state of justice with a structurally similar orientation towards a state of legitimacy. As a result, they fail to provide more reliable practical guidance, and wrongly displace radical demands. Rather than orienting action towards any state of affairs, I suggest that a more practically useful approach to political theory would directly (...) address judgments, by comparing the concrete possibilities for action faced by real political actors. (shrink)

Confabulation is typically understood to be dysfunctional. But this understanding neglects the phenomenon’s potential benefits. In fact, we think that the benefits of non-clinical confabulation provide a better foundation for a general account of confabulation. In this paper, we start from these benefits to develop a social teleological account of confabulation. Central to our account is the idea that confabulation manifests a kind of willful ignorance. By understanding confabulation in this way, we can provide principled explanations for the difference between (...) clinical and non-clinical cases of confabulation and the extent to which confabulation is rational. (shrink)

The controversy over the equivalence of continuous sedation until death (CSD) and physician-assisted suicide/euthanasia (PAS/E) provides an opportunity to focus on a significant extended use of CSD. This extension, suggested by the equivalence of PAS/E and CSD, is designed to promote additional patient autonomy at the end-of-life. Samuel LiPuma, in his article, “Continuous Sedation Until Death as Physician-Assisted Suicide/Euthanasia: A Conceptual Analysis” claims equivalence between CSD and death; his paper is seminal in the equivalency debate. Critics contend that sedation (...) follows proportionality protocols for which LiPuma’s thesis does not adequately account. Furthermore, sedation may not eliminate consciousness, and as such LiPuma’s contention that CSD is equivalent to neocortical death is suspect. We not only defend the equivalence thesis, but also expand it to include additional moral considerations. First, we explain the equivalence thesis. This is followed by a defense of the thesis against five criticisms. The third section critiques the current use of CSD. Finally, we offer two proposals that, if adopted, would broaden the use of PAS/E and CSD and thereby expand options at the end-of-life. (shrink)

Humans have always sought to change their environment—building houses, monuments, temples, and roads. In the process, they have remade the fabric of the world into newly functional objects that are also works of art to be admired. In this second edition of his popular Existential Pleasures of Engineering, Samuel Florman explores how engineers think and feel about their profession. A deeply insightful and refreshingly unique text, this book corrects the myth that engineering is cold and passionless. Indeed, Florman celebrates (...) engineering not only crucial and fundamental but also vital and alive he views it as a response to some of our deepest impulses, an endeavor rich in spiritual and sensual rewards. Opposing the "anti-technology" stance, Florman gives readers a practical, creative, and even amusing philosophy of engineering that boasts of pride in his craft. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS 173 ducente un monde interamente unificato dall'azione divina. Ma, come egli stesso ritiene di avere mostrato nell'altro sue libro, Le probl~raede l'ttre chezAristote, questo fu soltanto l'ideale di Aristotele, mentre la sua filosofia effettiva ne rimase infinitamente Iontana. L'etica di Aristotele si pu6 definire allora un umanesimo tragieo: umanesimo, in quanto presuppons la fiducia nell'uomo, nella sua ricerca e nella sua azione; tragieo, in quanto si costituisce (...) proprio nella distanza che separa l'uomo da Die: Aristotele invita l'uomo a volere tutto il possibile, ma solo il possibile, e a lasciare il resto agli dei (pp. 174-177). Nell'appendice, dedicata al tema dell'amieizia in Aristotele, I'A. mostra come anche questa virtfl, analogamente alla prudenza, sia espressione dell'imperfezione dell'uomo, il quale, non potendo trovare la propria felicit~ nella contemplazione e nelI'amore dise stesso, come Die, la cerca nel riconoscimento e nell'amore degli altri (pp. 179-183). Nel complesso si deve ammettere che lo studio dell'A. ~ il tentative pifl interessante e pih moderno che sia state fatto per collegare logicamente l'etica di Aristotele con la sua metafisica, e si deve riconoscere che tale tentative, nonostante qualche affermazione discutibile, ~ perfettamente riuseito. Esso infatti conserva all'etica aristotelica quel carattere di problematicit~ e di asistematicit~ che ne costituisce la pifi genuina natura e che altri tentativi analoghi finiscone invece inevitabilmente col sopprimere. Ci6 che rende possibile la sua riuscita b la nuova interpretazione della metafisica aristotelica, che I'A. ha sviluppato nella sua opera precedente ed in base alla quale anche la metafisica, come l'etica, lungi dal presentarsi come una costruzione sistematica e rigidamente dimostrativa, rivela una natura essenzialmente problematica. L'unica riserva di fondo che ritengo di dover muovere a tale interpretazione, ~ quella a cui he avuto occasione di accennare recensendo Le probl~me de l'$tre chez Aristote (cf. "Giornale di Metafisica", XVIII, 1963, 266-271), e cio~ che la problematicit~ della metafisica aristoteliea non significa rinunzia ad affermare con certezza razionale la trascendenza di Die, ma anzi si risolve proprio in questa affermazione, la quale, lungi dall'essere uno scacco o un insuccesso, 6, al contrario, la pifi esaltante delle certezze. Analogamente la problematicit~ dell'etica arlstotelica non significa rinunzia all'affermazione di un valore supreme, ma riconoscimento della sua necessitY, anche se l'uomo non giunger~, mai ad attuarlo. Come nella metafisica il sapere dell'uomo si risolve in definitiva nslla continua ricerca del sapere, cio~ nella consapevolezza dell'esistenza di un sapere superiore a quello puramente umano, cosi nell'etica la perfezione dell'uomo si risolve nella stessa aspirazione alla perfezione, cio~ nell'ineessante sforzo di autoperfezionarsi. Tale precisazione, a mio avviso, ~ necessaria, per evitare chela metafisica di Aristotele venga interpretata come una forma di scetticismo e la sua etica come una forma di relativismo. ENRICO BERTI Perugia, Italy Consolation ]or the Tribulations o] Israel (Consola~am as Tribula~oens de Israel). By Samuel Usque. Translated from the Portuguese by Martin A. Cohen. (Philadelphia: Jewish Publications Society of America, 1965. Pp. xiii + 354. $6.00.) This work, the first in a new scholarly series of translations of texts, is a fascinating document. It was probably written in Italy around 1550 and was first published in Portuguese in Ferrara in 1553. Although it was not widely read at the time, it was republished around the end of the sixteenth century in the Netherlands. By now it is a Portuguese classic, and a unique document in Jewish intellectual history. Usque, whose biography is almost unknown except for clues found in the Consola~am, was apparently a Portuguese New Christian (a forced convert) who fled during the persecutions of Judaizers by the Inquisition in the 1530's. He wandered in Europe and the Levant, visited Palestine, and settled down in Italy, probably in the entourage of Samuel Abravanel (the brother of Leon Ebreo), Dona Gracia Nasi (the aunt and mother-in-law of the Duke of Naxos), and Hercules of Este, the Duke of Ferrara. His book, addressed "to the gentlemen of the Diapora of Portugal" is a pastoral and a dialogue, dealing with Israel's fate. Writing just 174 HISTORY OF... (shrink)

In contemporary philosophy, substantive moral theories are typically classified as either consequentialist or deontological. Standard consequentialist theories insist, roughly, that agents must always act so as to produce the best available outcomes overall. Standard deontological theories, by contrast, maintain that there are some circumstances where one is permitted but not required to produce the best overall results, and still other circumstances in which one is positively forbidden to to do. Classical utilitarianism is the most familiar consequentialist view, but it is (...) widely regarded as an inadequate account of morality. Although Professor Scheffler agrees with this assessment, he also believes that consequentialism seems initially plausible, and that there is a persistent air of paradox surrounding typical deontological views. In this book, therefore, he undertakes to reconsider the rejection of consequentialism. He argues that it is possible to provide a rationale for the view that agents need not always produce the best possible overall outcomes, and this motivates one departure from consequentialism; but he shows that it is surprisingly difficult to provide a satisfactory rationale for the view that there are times when agents must not produce the best possible overall outcomes. He goes on to argue for a hitherto neglected type of moral conception, according to which agents are always permitted, but not always required, to produce the best outcomes. (shrink)

Draft Chapter for Chinese Philosophy and Its Thinkers: From Ancient Times to the Present Day .

This article is divided into three sections. In the first and second, I examine Sartorio’s account of the causal structure of the famous Thirsty Traveler thought experiment. I argue that this account does not withstand critical scrutiny. In the third, I turn to a novel kind of moral luck that Sartorio uses the Thirsty Traveler to expose. I expand the scope of my argument to look also at other recently proposed categories of moral luck. I argue that these proposals are (...) overhasty. (shrink)

According to Aristotle, the medical art aims at health, which is a virtue of the body, and does so in an unlimited way. Consequently, medicine does not determine the extent to which health should be pursued, and “mental health” falls under medicine only via pros hen predication. Because medicine is inherently oriented to its end, it produces health in accordance with its nature and disease contrary to its nature—even when disease is good for the patient. Aristotle’s politician understands that this (...) inherent orientation can be systematically distorted, and so would see the need for something like the Hippocratic Oath. (shrink)

Sprat situated his analysis of the Royal Society within an emerging Anglican Royalist narrative of the longue durée of post-Reformation England. A closer examination of Sprat's own religious views reveals that his principal interest in the History of the Royal Society, as in the closely related reply to Samuel de Sorbière, the Observations, was to appropriate the advantages and benefits of the Royal Society as support for a re-established, anti-Calvinist Church of England. Sprat connected the two through a reformulation (...) of the powerful conventions of ‘Reformation’ and ‘Israel’, both of which still resonated strongly in the religious politics of the 1660s. Applying his voluntarist theology, Sprat changed especially the representation of the chosen nation from a tale of divine castigation and punishment to a rational and probabilistic covenant based on material success as the indicator of God's pleasure. Sprat proposed that the knowledge and application of nature, through the experimental labours of the Royal Society, could build an increasingly wealthy nation and so a permanent home for the reconfigured Israel. Attaching this to a renewed monarchical and Anglican state also meant security for the traditional forms of rule. (shrink)

Some people believe that the demands of morality coincide with the requirements of an enlightened self-interest. Others believe that morality is diametrically opposed to considerations of self-interest. This book argues that there is another position, intermediate between these extremes, which makes better sense of the totality of our moral thought and practice. Scheffler elaborates this position via an examination of morality's content, scope, authority, and deliberative role. Although conflicts between morality and self-interest do arise, according to this position, nevertheless morality (...) is fundamentally a reasonable and humane phenomenon. Moreover, the psychological bases of effective moral motivation have sources deep within the self, and morally motivated individuals try to shape their own interests so as to avoid conflict with morality. Since human practices and institutions help to determine the prevalence of these motives, and since in this and other ways they influence the degree to which conflicts between morality and self-interest actually occur, the extent of such conflict is not fixed or immutable, and is in part a social and political issue. (shrink)