Catholic University Of America, Philosophical Studies, V99.

The author describes how he uses Shakespeare's play about Henry V in his courses on ethics and warfare to illustrate several principles in the just-war tradition.

Who bears responsibility for the actions of a city or state? Is it the entity that we sometimes call a nation? Or the individual members of the nation? Shakespeare’s Henry V includes a brief interchange the night before the battle at Agincourt that addresses this question. A disguised king and the common soldiers of his army debate who is responsible for the deaths that will occur during the forthcoming battle if the war they are fighting is unjust: the (...) king or his soldiers? Who will be punished on Judgment Day? The interchange opens up reflections on the challenge of deciding who acts when a state acts. Henry V is a play that emphasizes the role of the imagination as central to both stagecraft and the politics of creating a nation. Engaging with the medieval theory of the “king’s two bodies,” the Henry of Shakespeare’s play is caught between the desire to be the embodiment of the imagined nation and yet be his own “natural person” when questions of responsibility for the actions of the nation emerge. Dependent on the imagination to build a unified nation of diverse peoples, Henry desires to escape responsibility for the potentially unjust actions of the nation by focusing on the private actions of his individual subjects. The play thereby brings questions of responsibility for the actions of collective bodies founded by the imagination to the fore and forces us to explore who is responsible when states or nations act. (shrink)

J. L. Schellenberg’s Divine Hiddenness and Human Reason claims that the existence of reflective persons who long to solve the problem of God’s existencebut cannot do so constitutes an evil rendering God’s existence improbable. In this essay, I present Schellenberg’s argument and argue that the kind of reasonable nonbelief Schellenberg needs for his argument to succeed is unlikely to exist. Since Schellenberg’s argument is an inductive-style version of the problem of evil, the empirical improbability of the premise I challenge renders (...) the conclusions derived from it empirically improbable as well. (shrink)

In Divine Hiddenness and Human Reason, J. L. Schellenberg argues that the phenomenon of “reasonable nonbelief” constitutes sufficient reason to doubtthe existence of God. In this essay I assert the reasonableness of entertaining doubts about the kind of reasonable nonbelief that Schellenberg needs for a cogent argument. Treating his latest set of arguments in this journal, I dispute his claims about the scope and status of “unreflective nonbelief,” his assertion that God would prevent reasonable nonbelief “of any kind and duration,” (...) and his confidence that we can know that some doubters are not self-deceived. (shrink)

Plato provocatively characterizes truth $$ in terms of harmony $$ at various points throughout his dialogues. While limited attention has been directed toward the role of musical concepts in Plato's general cosmology, not any attention has been directed toward how musical concepts function in relation to Plato's characterization of truth. In fact, this issue has had little occasion for consideration. Almost every contemporary translator empties terms such as $\grave\alpha\rho\mu o\nu\acute\iota\alpha,$ when co-incidental with $\acute\alpha\lambda\acute\eta\theta\varepsilon\iota\alpha,$ of their musical content. As a consequence, (...) I argue, Plato's characterization of truth is made readily amenable to contemporary conceptions of truth-not necessarily a good thing since it robs us of the original richness of Plato's thought. The dissertation explores how retaining the aural meaning latent within $\grave\alpha\rho\mu o\nu\acute\iota\alpha$ and other terms of musical import serves to elucidate the rich complexion of Plato's notion of $\acute\alpha\lambda\acute\eta\theta\varepsilon\iota\alpha.$ Ultimately, I show how Plato's use of musical terminology to characterize truth informs other features of his philosophical outlook, illustrate the cohesiveness and consistency of key texts believed problematic by other commentators, and underscore significant differences between Plato's $\acute\alpha\lambda\acute\eta\theta\varepsilon\iota\alpha$ and ideas of truth prevalent today. ;For Plato, I argue $\acute\alpha\lambda\acute\eta\theta\varepsilon\iota\alpha$ bears a meaning different from its primitive sense of oracular unconcealment and its later sense of correctness $,$ and a meaning also different from other terminological alternatives $.$ Truth, accordingly, turns out for Plato to be neither mysterious and groundless nor a matter of simple correspondence to an objective reality. The value of Plato's conception of truth as harmony consists in its ability to avoid the polarity of contemporary conceptions of truth as either objectively determinate or subjectively determinate . Truth is neither arbitrarily imposed upon the world by us, nor artificially imposed upon us by an antecedently structured and independent reality. The dissertation concludes by articulating reasons for favoring Plato's theory of truth, while noting a few underlying assumptions likely problematic for some contemporary philosophers. (shrink)