Interpreters of the Phaedo often cite the Pythagorean context of the dialogue as a source of influence on the demanding conception of philosophy defended therein. Sandra Peterson offers a striking account of that influence: the Pythagorean sympathies of Socrates's interlocutors lead him to defend a conception of philosophy that captures their commitments, but that he himself rejects. Call this the Strong Influence Thesis. Peterson defends SIT by attempting to demonstrate a mismatch between the conception of philosophy espoused by Socrates in (...) the Apology and ‘true philosophy’ as described in the Phaedo. Assessing this defence thus requires a detailed examination of both sides of the comparison. This paper undertakes that task. I argue that when the beliefs and norms that define both philosophical lives are correctly understood, the appearance of a significant mismatch fades away. The life of true philosophy realizes the Apology ideal of caring most about wisdom, truth, and the best possible state of.. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Plato's Essentialism: Reinterpreting the Theory of Forms by Vasilis PolitisTravis ButlerPOLITIS, Vasilis. Plato's Essentialism: Reinterpreting the Theory of Forms. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2021. x + 251 pp. Cloth, $99.99The reinterpretation of the theory of forms to which Politis refers in this book's subtitle is accomplished by foregrounding the conception of forms as essences—the kinds of beings we must countenance if we pose, pursue, and believe we (...) can answer the "What is F?" question. Politis argues that some of Plato's arguments for introducing forms have been distorted by the assumption that he is primarily interested in the Aristotelian question about substance or a Parmenidean quest for stable objects of thought and knowledge. By focusing on forms as the targets of the "What is F?" [End Page 154] question, we can dispel these misconceptions and bring the Platonic theory more clearly into view.Chapter 1 includes the cornerstone of Politis' interpretation—an original reading of a brief passage in the Hippias Major. Hippias is an important interlocutor for the project because he holds that the "What is F?" question can be answered by asking instead, "Which things exemplify F?" Let's call the claim that "What is F?" can be answered by examples "The Exemplar Doctrine" (ED). Politis argues that Hippias' commitment to ED leads him to deny the existence of a single exemplar for all cases—a denial he is forced subsequently to rescind. Thus, by endorsing the search for exemplars over the search for essence, Hippias sows the seeds of his own refutation.Readers might wonder how an account of a brief passage in the Hippias Major, apparently innocent of transcendent metaphysics, could serve as the cornerstone of a reinterpretation of the theory of forms. The initial answer in chapter 2 is that the rejection of ED is taken to imply that forms are imperceptible. The implication follows because Politis takes the supposition that F is definable by example to be biconditionally related to the claim that the essence of F is perceivable by the senses. When Socrates gets Hippias to reject ED, then, he gets him (tacitly) to accept that the essence of F is not perceivable by the senses. A central tenet of Platonism, the imperceptibility of forms, thus follows from an initial point about the proper way to answer the "What is F?" question.Chapter 3 continues in a similar vein, arguing that many special features attributed to forms in the Phaedo and Republic, such as their unity, uniformity, and incompositeness, follow from facts about inquiry into essences. Politis argues that these features belong, in the first instance, to defining accounts of forms and only secondarily to the forms themselves. Skeptical readers might observe that the focus in the Phaedo is much more on the forms than on defining accounts of them. In addition, it should be noted that the list of special features on which Politis focuses is somewhat selective. Chapters 2 and 3 include no discussion of the divinity and purity of forms or their status as alone by themselves. The divinity of forms is crucial for their role in Plato's ethics, but it seems unlikely to be explained by anything related to the "What is F?" question.In chapter 4, Politis defends a novel account of the epistemology of the Phaedo. He argues that it should be viewed through the lens of the account of inquiry in that dialogue, though not the central notion of inquiring with the soul by itself. Instead, we should focus on the passage in which Socrates claims that sense perception of deficiently equal sticks puts us in mind (ennoēsai) of the equal itself (74c–75b). Politis takes this claim to imply that sense perception plays a justificatory and not merely causal role in acquiring knowledge, though the textual arguments of this chapter fall short of establishing that striking claim.Chapter 5 takes on arguments in the Phaedo and Republic that appear to distinguish forms from sensibles on the grounds that the latter but not the former suffer the compresence of opposites (for example, appearing [End Page 155] both equal and unequal). Politis argues that scholars... (shrink)

This paper presents arguments against two crucial elements of recent versions of the Two‐Worlds interpretation of Plato. I argue first that in addition to knowledge of the forms, Plato allows beliefs about them as well. Then I argue that Plato sees knowledge as a state in which the subject is conscious of information about the forms. Thus, the infallibility of knowledge must be understood in a way that is consistent with its being informational. Finally, I argue that my conclusions about (...) knowledge do not preclude the possibility that cognition of forms has a direct, nonrepresentational aspect. (shrink)

Richard Kraut argues that Neo-Aristotelian ethics should include a com­mitment to “diluted hedonism,” according to which the exercise of a developed life-capacity is good for S only if and partly because S enjoys it. I argue that the Neo-Aristotelian should reject diluted hedonism for two reasons: first, it compro­mises the generality and elegance of the initial developmentalist account; second, it leads to mistaken evaluations of some of the most important and ennobling capacities and activities in human life. Finally, I argue (...) that a more plausible ac­count of the place of pleasure in the good life derives from Aristotle’s discussion in book X of the Nicomachean Ethics: pleasure is a supervenient good that signifies the value of the underlying capacity and activity, but it is not a necessary condition for their goodness. (shrink)

Aristotle famously claims that Plato, unlike Socrates, separated the forms. Some argue that Plato's dialogues provide a record of this disagreement, with the Socratic and Platonic theories presente...

Refined intellectualism holds that although an agent’s actions always follow his rationally-produced choices of what is best, those choices can be influenced by non-rational motivational states. Through a contrast with the Protagoras, I argue that RI is not only clearly endorsed in the Phaedo but also central to the philosophical ethic defended in that dialogue. This result raises problems for prevailing developmentalist interpretations of Plato’s moral psychology.

An abiding puzzle in the Phaedo is the transition in the text from initial pessimism about the possibility of wisdom during human life to a more optimistic view. Prominent interpretations posit different kinds or degrees of wisdom at issue in the two sets of passages. By contrast, I argue that the pessimistic view rests on the implicit premise that the soul cannot be completely purified during human life—a premise which arises from an initial conception of impurity and its cause. In (...) developing his eschatology, Socrates refines this conception and rejects the implicit premise. Because the embodied soul can be completely purified, it can achieve philosophical wisdom as well. (shrink)

The ethics and moral psychology of the Phaedo crucially depend on claims made uniquely about bodily desire. This paper offers an analysis and defense of the account of bodily desire in the dialogue, arguing that bodily desires – desires with their source in processes or conditions of the body – are characterized by three features: motivational pull, assertoric force, and intensity. Desires with these features target the soul’s rational functions with distinctive forms of imprisonment. They target the soul’s capacity to (...) rule with servility; and they target the soul’s capacity for knowledge with confinement in the visible world. (shrink)

In so many of his epistemological writings, Aristotle defends a sensible flavor of gradualism about our cognitive capacities: we start with the partial grasps afforded by what is better known to us, and if things go well, we end up with understandings of those objects better known by nature. The picture is of a step-wise process, rather than a transforming moment of illumination.

In his tripartite theory of corporate responsibility, Kenneth Goodpaster argues for the inclusion of “Comprehensive Moral Thinking (CMT)” as the third part alongside shareholder and stakeholder thinking. CMT requires managers sometimes to act for reasons of dignity or a just community, against what shareholder and stakeholder thinking recommend. To address concerns about the demandingness of CMT, Goodpaster argues that the responsibilities it imposes are significant but qualified or conditional: they require only that managers make efforts to address problems of dignity (...) and justice, especially in cooperation with other willing firms. If extreme efforts are required or if other firms are unwilling to cooperate, managers can be justified in deciding in favor of shareholder or stakeholder values, even when dignity or justice is at stake. I raise two problems for the appeal to qualified responsibility—an extensional problem about the inability of the account to yield the correct judgment in important cases and an internal problem about the coherence of the account when qualified responsibility is included. I conclude by considering the prospects of a theory that includes CMT but rejects qualified responsibility. (shrink)

In Explaining an Eclipse, Owen Goldin provides a book-length treatment of the first ten chapters of book 2 of the Posterior Analytics. Goldin’s aim is to answer one question: how can an Aristotelian demonstration show anything of scientific interest if all the premises are definitions? To this question Goldin gives his undivided attention.

Aristotle is sometimes committed to a pattern of inference that moves from complexity offunctioning to complexity in the entity's metaphysical structure. This article argues that Aristotle rejects this inference in the case of the basic essence, the ultimate differentia that determines the kind to which the entity belongs. Specifically, the functional difference between active and passive reasoning in humans is not matched in the structure of the basic human essence. The basic essence is an immediate unity in the strong sense (...) that it is wholly without structural parts. Complex rational functioning emerges from a metaphysically simple basic essence. (shrink)

The focus of this paper is Butler's recent work on Antigone, kinship and the state. Like many advocates of radical democracy, Butler is suspicious of attempts to enlist state support for political demands, preferring politics at the level of civil society. Butler turns to the narrative of Antigone, in part, to explore just such a version of (feminist?) resistance to the state but also, crucially, to contemplate the constitutive role that Antigone (and her contemporary counterparts) represents in (...) respect of the formation of the state and politics. While sympathetic to Butler's thesis in general, in this paper, I raise three sets of questions concerning her reading of the state. First, I explore the ambiguity surrounding her conceptualization of the state. Next, I turn to the tension between the state's purported efficacy in achieving its aims and the theory of resignification that Butler deploys widely throughout her work. Finally, I look at the understated role of Creon whose failure to compel obedience from Antigone is largely occluded in Butler's re-reading of Antigone. (shrink)

Bringing together a group of internationally renowned theorists, these 9 essays asks whether there has been an 'ethical turn' in Butler's work, exploring how ethics relate to politics and how they connect to her increasing concern with violence, war and conflict.

The focus of this paper is Butler's recent work on Antigone, kinship and the state. Like many advocates of radical democracy, Butler is suspicious of attempts to enlist state support for political demands, preferring politics at the level of civil society. Butler turns to the narrative of Antigone, in part, to explore just such a version of (feminist?) resistance to the state but also, crucially, to contemplate the constitutive role that Antigone (and her contemporary counterparts) represents in (...) respect of the formation of the state and politics. While sympathetic to Butler's thesis in general, in this paper, I raise three sets of questions concerning her reading of the state. First, I explore the ambiguity surrounding her conceptualization of the state. Next, I turn to the tension between the state's purported efficacy in achieving its aims and the theory of resignification that Butler deploys widely throughout her work. Finally, I look at the understated role of Creon whose failure to compel obedience from Antigone is largely occluded in Butler's re-reading of Antigone. (shrink)

One of Chicago's great cultural achievements, the Institute of Design was among the most important schools of photography in twentieth-century America. It began as an outpost of experimental Bauhaus education and was home to an astonishing group of influential teachers and students, including Lázló Moholy-Nagy, Harry Callahan, and Aaron Siskind. To date, however, the ID's enormous contributions to the art and practice of photography have gone largely unexplored. Taken by Design is the first publication to examine thoroughly this remarkable institution (...) and its lasting impact. With nearly 300 illustrations, including many never-before published photographs, Taken by Design examines the changing nature of photography over this critical period in America's midcentury. It starts by documenting the experimental nature of Moholy's Bauhaus approach and photography's new and enhanced role in training the "complete designer." Next it traces the formal and abstract camera experiments under Harry Callahan and Aaron Siskind, which aimed at achieving a new kind of photographic subjectivity. Finally, it highlights the ID's focus on conscious references to the processes of the photographic medium itself. In addition to photographs by Moholy, Callahan, and Siskind, the book showcases works by Barbara Crane, Yasuhiro Ishimoto, Joseph Jachna, Kenneth Josephson, Gyorgy Kepes, Nathan Lerner, Ray K. Metzker, Richard Nickel, Arthur Siegel, Art Sinsabaugh, and many others. Major essays from experts in the field, biographies, a chronology, and reprints of critical essays are also included, making Taken by Design an essential work for anyone interested in the history of American photography. Contributors include: Keith Davis, Lloyd Engelbrecht, John Grimes, Nathan Lyons, Hattula Moholy-Nagy, Elizabeth Siegel, David Travis, Larry Viskochil, James N. Wood. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to examine both the work of Judith Butler on gender performativity and examples of how Butler's writings have been appropriated by certain other writers. I explore three areas in particular: the relation between performance and performativity in the work of Butler and her `adherents'; the developmental changes in Butler's argument between Gender Trouble and Bodies That Matter; and the question of the effectiveness of the politics of parody. I argue that (...) it is the ambiguities in Butler's own several accounts of the distinction between performance and performativity that fuel the readings of the politics of performance as the province of the autonomous subject - a perspective at variance with Butler's own. In addition, I explore the deficiencies in Butler's account of politics, especially her denial of the significance of the context on the efficacy of political interventions. (shrink)

Contrasting the work of Genevieve Lloyd, Elizabeth Grosz, and Moira Gatens with the poststrueturalist philosophy of Judith Butler, this paper identifies a distinctive “Australian” feminism. It argues that while Butler remains trapped by the matter/representation binary, the Spinozist turn in Lloyd and Gatens, and Grosz's work on Bergson and Deleuze, are attempts to think corporeality.

: Contrasting the work of Genevieve Lloyd, Elizabeth Grosz, and Moira Gatens with the poststructuralist philosophy of Judith Butler, this paper identifies a distinctive "Australian" feminism. It argues that while Butler remains trapped by the matter/representation binary, the Spinozist turn in Lloyd and Gatens, and Grosz's work on Bergson and Deleuze, are attempts to think corporeality.

En el presente artículo nos proponemos abordar la dimensión crecientemente política en los más de treinta años de producción teórica de Judith Butler, entendiendo a Butler como unx teóricx políticx por derecho propio (Chambers y Carver, 2008) que desarrolla su propia concepción de política radical (Moya Lloyd, 2009). Aunque el foco suele estar puesto en el “giro ético” de Butler a partir de sus desarrollos sobre precariedad, sostendremos que hay un giro previo en la obra butleriana (...) a partir de su concepto de universalidad-por-venir: un “giro político” o “giro hacia lo político” a través del cual cierta diferencia ontológica entre lo político y la política ingresa en las tesis butlerianas. ¿En qué medida se puede afirmar que Judith Butler es unx políticx radical? Consideramos que sus críticas a la universalidad como trascendentalización de contenidos históricos y contingentes llevan a la teoría butleriana a un impasse en el que rechaza lo que su política requiere y que solo logra superar a su pesar: introduciendo la precari/e/dad, aquella condición socio-ontológica de apertura constitutiva, como su propio cuasi trascendental. (shrink)

Recent work on Mary Shepherd has largely focused on her metaphysics, especially as a response to Berkeley and Hume. However, relatively little attention has thus far been paid to the epistemological aspects of Shepherd’s program. What little attention Shepherd’s epistemology has received has tended to cast her as providing an unsatisfactory response to the skeptical challenge issued by Hume. For example, Walter Ott and Jeremy Fantl have each suggested that Shepherd cannot avoid Hume’s inductive skepticism even if she is granted (...) her metaphysics. In this paper, I examine Shepherd’s epistemology and argue that her response to Hume is more successful than the current literature suggests. In particular, I argue that, if Shepherd is granted her metaphysics, she can answer Hume’s demand for a rational justification of ordinary inductive inferences via a deductively justified uniformity principle and an appeal to parsimony. (shrink)

Lloyd E. Sandelands unites the metaphysics of Aristotle and Aquinas and the social teachings of the Catholic Church to describe how business leaders can help people in their organizations become more truly and fully human. Being at Work is a much-needed marriage of metaphysical philosophy and managerial common sense.

With the same intellectual courage with which she addressed issues of gender, Judith Butler turns her attention to speech and conduct in contemporary political life, looking at several efforts to target speech as conduct that has become subject to political debate and regulation. Reviewing hate speech regulations, anti-pornography arguments, and recent controversies about gay self-declaration in the military, Judith Butler asks whether and how language acts in each of these cultural sites.

This paper argues that individuals in many high-income countries typically have moral reasons to limit their beef consumption and consume plant-based protein instead, given the negative effects of beef production and consumption. Beef production is a significant source of agricultural greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental impacts, high levels of beef consumption are associated with health risks, and some cattle production systems raise animal welfare concerns. These negative effects matter, from a variety of moral perspectives, and give us collective moral (...) reasons to reduce beef production and consumption. But, as some ethicists have argued, we cannot draw a straight line from the ethics of production to the ethics of consumption: even if a production system is morally impermissible, this does not mean that any given individual has moral reasons to stop consuming the products of that system, given how miniscule one individual’s contributions are. This paper considers how to connect those dots. We consider three distinct lines of argument in support of the conclusion that individuals have moral reasons to limit their beef consumption and shift to plant-based protein, and we consider objections to each argument. This argument applies to individuals in high beef-consuming and high greenhouse gas-emitting high-income countries, though we make this argument with a specific focus on the United States. (shrink)

Dispossession describes the condition of those who have lost land, citizenship, property, and a broader belonging to the world. This thought-provoking book seeks to elaborate our understanding of dispossession outside of the conventional logic of possession, a hallmark of capitalism, liberalism, and humanism. Can dispossession simultaneously characterize political responses and opposition to the disenfranchisement associated with unjust dispossession of land, economic and political power, and basic conditions for living? In the context of neoliberal expropriation of labor and livelihood, dispossession opens (...) up a performative condition of being both affected by injustice and prompted to act. From the uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa to the anti-neoliberal gatherings at Puerta del Sol, Syntagma and Zucchotti Park, an alternative political and affective economy of bodies in public is being formed. Bodies on the street are precarious - exposed to police force, they are also standing for, and opposing, their dispossession. These bodies insist upon their collective standing, organize themselves without and against hierarchy, and refuse to become disposable: they demand regard. This book interrogates the agonistic and open-ended corporeality and conviviality of the crowd as it assembles in cities to protest political and economic dispossession through a performative dispossession of the sovereign subject and its propriety. (shrink)

I ask why an increasing number of business scholars today are drawn to an idea of “positive business” that they cannot account for scientifically. I answer that it is because they are attracted to the real mystery of positive business which is its incomprehensible and unspeakable divinity. I begin by asking why the research literature has yet to speak of positive business plainly and with one voice. I find that it lacks for the right words because it comes to human (...) being in business as a science attuned to its objects rather than as a religion attuned to its spirit. Next, I say what I can about the real mystery of business, keeping in mind that we can say about it only what we can say about God. This brings me at last to the Christian insight that human being, in business and everywhere else, is the mystery of Jesus Christ in whom we are reconciled to God. Business is positively human as it invites us to be as Christ, to be a fully human person in joyful communion with others in God. This, in sum, is how to speak plainly and with one voice of the positive business that our hearts desire but our science cannot say. (shrink)

Inattentional blindness is described as the failure to perceive a supra-threshold stimulus when attention is directed away from that stimulus. Based on performance on an explicit recognition memory test and concurrent functional imaging data Rees, Russell, Frith, and Driver [Rees, G., Russell, C., Frith, C. D., & Driver, J. . Inattentional blindness versus inattentional amnesia for fixated but ignored words. Science, 286, 2504–2507] reported inattentional blindness for word stimuli that were fixated but ignored. The present study examined both explicit and (...) implicit memory for fixated but ignored words using a selective-attention task in which overlapping picture/word stimuli were presented at fixation. No explicit awareness of the unattended words was apparent on a recognition memory test. Analysis of an implicit memory task, however, indicated that unattended words were perceived at a perceptual level. Thus, the selective-attention task did not result in perfect filtering as suggested by Rees et al. While there was no evidence of conscious perception, subjects were not blind to the implicit perceptual properties of fixated but ignored words. (shrink)

This book is available either individually, or as part of the specially-priced Arguments of the Philosphers Collection.

Considered together, Butler and Whitehead draw from a wide palette of disciplines to develop distinctive theories of becoming, of syntactical violence, and creative opportunities of limitation. The contributors of this volume offer a unique contribution to and for the humanities in the struggles of politics, economy, ecology, and the arts.