Philosophy's traditional "man of reason"—independent, neutral, unemotional—is an illusion. That's because the "man of reason" ignores one very important thing—the woman. Representing Reason: Feminist Theory and Formal Logic collects new and old essays that shed light on the underexplored intersection of logic and feminism.

From 1908 to 1916, articles supporting the axiom of choice were scant. The situation changed in 1916, when Wacław Sierpiński published a series of articles reviving the debate. The posterity of the axiom of choice as we know it would be unimaginable without Sierpiński’s efforts.

This volume contains thirteen papers that were presented at the 2017 Annual Meeting of the Canadian Society for History and Philosophy of Mathematics/Société canadienne d’histoire et de philosophie des mathématiques, which was held at Ryerson University in Toronto. It showcases rigorously reviewed modern scholarship on an interesting variety of topics in the history and philosophy of mathematics from Ancient Greece to the twentieth century. A series of chapters all set in the eighteenth century consider topics such as John Marsh’s techniques (...) for the computation of decimal fractions, Euler’s efforts to compute the surface area of scalene cones, a little-known work by John Playfair on the practical aspects of mathematics, and Monge’s use of descriptive geometry. After a brief stop in the nineteenth century to consider the culture of research mathematics in 1860s Prussia, the book moves into the twentieth century with an examination of the historical context within which the Axiom of Choice was developed and a paper discussing Anatoly Vlasov’s adaptation of the Boltzmann equation to ionized gases. The remaining chapters deal with the philosophy of twentieth-century mathematics through topics such as an historically informed discussion of finitism and its limits; a reexamination of Mary Leng’s defenses of mathematical fictionalism through an alternative, anti-realist approach to mathematics; and a look at the reasons that mathematicians select specific problems to pursue. Written by leading scholars in the field, these papers are accessible to not only mathematicians and students of the history and philosophy of mathematics, but also anyone with a general interest in mathematics. (shrink)

In the following essay, I argue for an alternative anthropocentrism that, eschewing failed appeals to traditional moral principle, takes (a) as its point of departure the cognitive, perceptual, emotive, somatic, and epistemic conditions of our existence as members of Homo sapiens, and (b) one feature of our experience of/under these conditions particularly seriously as an avenue toward articulating this alternative, the capacity for aesthetic appreciation. To this end, I will explore, but ultimately reject philosopher Allen Carlson's ecological aesthetics, and I (...) will adopt with modification aspects of the work of Ronnie Hawkins, Val Plumwood, and Donna Haraway. My central claim is that, equipped with a better understanding of our interdependent relationship to/within human and nonhuman nature, an understanding made especially available to those who occupy situations imbued by subjugation, we can come to understand our human-centeredness not as a justification of entitlement, but as an opportunity for critical self-reflection upon those actions which endanger the ecological conditions of human and nonhuman being. I suggest, then, that developing criteria for an aesthetic appreciation ground in such a centeredness can make a vital contribution to a more ecologically defensible moral and political activism. (shrink)

In the following essay, I argue for an alternative anthropocentrism that, eschewing failed appeals to traditional moral principle, takes (a) as its point of departure the cognitive, perceptual, emotive, somatic, and epistemic conditions of our existence as members of Homo sapiens, and (b) one feature of our experience of/under these conditions particularly seriously as an avenue toward articulating this alternative, the capacity for aesthetic appreciation. To this end, I will explore, but ultimately reject philosopher Allen Carlson's ecological aesthetics, and I (...) will adopt with modification aspects of the work of Ronnie Hawkins, Val Plumwood, and Donna Haraway. My central claim is that, equipped with a better understanding of our interdependent relationship to/within human and nonhuman nature, an understanding made especially available to those who occupy situations imbued by subjugation, we can come to understand our human-centeredness not as a justification of entitlement, but as an opportunity for critical self-reflection upon those actions which endanger the ecological conditions of human and nonhuman being. I suggest, then, that developing criteria for an aesthetic appreciation ground in such a centeredness can make a vital contribution to a more ecologically defensible moral and political activism. (shrink)

J. S. Mill's role in the Indian education controversy is well known, but scarcely well understood. That he drafted, in 1836, a despatch sharply critical of Macaulay's infamous Minute on Indian Education, is general knowledge now. That in drafting the despatch Mill drew upon the ideas of H. H. Wilson, a noted Orientalist and sharp critic of Macaulay and the Anglicists, has been adequately demonstrated. That the despatch was never sent to India, because of the objections of the President of (...) the Board of Trade, John Hobhouse, a Whig with some utilitarian connections, has been common knowledge for several decades. (shrink)

Joanna Crosby and Dianna Taylor: The theme of this special section of Foucault Studies, “Foucauldian Spaces,” emerged out of the 2016 meeting of the Foucault Circle, where the four of you were participants. Each of the three individual papers contained in the special section critically deploys and/or reconceptualizes an aspect of Foucault’s work that engages and offers particular insight into the construction, experience, and utilization of space. We’d like to ask the four of you to reflect on what makes a (...) space Foucauldian, and whether or not you’d consider the space created by the convergence of and intellectual exchanges among an international group of Foucault scholars at the University of New South Wales in the summer of 2016 to be Foucauldian. (shrink)

Comment la conception religieuse et mythique de la nature qu'avaient traditionnellement les Romains a-t-elle survécu à l'irruption de la philosophie?? Que savaient-ils de la réflexion grecque sur la physique?? Comment ont-ils adapté cette information à leurs propres préoccupations?? Telles sont quelques-unes des questions explorées dans cet ouvrage.

Rational expectations models have become a staple of economic theory and the basis for a Nobel Prize. This article argues that rational expectations analysis suffers from potentially fatal flaws that seriously undermine its value in understanding many market phenomena. Using the example of financial markets, the article illustrates how the rational expectations approach has worked to obscure, rather than to illuminate, our understanding of speculation and speculative markets. This misguidance raises problems for law and policy.

In this article I bring together Jacques Derrida and Luce Irigaray's engagements with Sigmund Freud's vexed attempt to step beyond the pleasure principle. Derrida's speculations on the name, the house and the practice of Freud find him inadvertently rewriting the conditions of the autobiographical as that which erases as much as inscribes, while Irigaray requires a sexually different modelling of what we call language if the experience of the girl is to be addressed. Yet Irigaray uncannily repeats the teleological gesture (...) of laying claim to a legacy, diagnosed in Freud by Derrida, even as this legacy is newly imagined as that of the feminine to which Freud remained blind. I then interweave these revised stakes of the fort-da game as they are expressed in two experimental films; Lynn Hershman Leeson's feature Conceiving Ada (USA, 1997) and Hussein Chalayan's short Absent Presence (UK/Turkey, 2005). One self-consciously concerns the recovery of ‘lost’ women from history (da!), the other investigates the treatment of the foreigner staged with an all-female cast (in which the instability of foreign objects can secure no fortification for the scientific subject). The films differently engage fantasies concerning genetics, and differently engage the projection of a legacy as teleological ambition. Privileging Derrida's transformation of the pleasure into the postal principle as that which invokes ‘Tele–without telos’, I ask after the transmissibility of this ambition. (shrink)

On 29 February 2008, Val Plumwood died of stroke at the age of 68. She was not only a seminal environmental thinker, whose book Feminism and the Mastery of Nature has become a classic of environmental philosophy; she was also a woman who fearlessly lived life on her own deeply considered terms, often in opposition to prevailing norms. In this obituary Freya Mathews discusses Val's life and her contributions to environmental philosophy.

Two of the most important political movements of the late twentieth century are those of environmentalism and feminism. In this book, Val Plumwood argues that feminist theory has an important opportunity to make a major contribution to the debates in political ecology and environmental philosophy. _Feminism and the Mastery of Nature_ explains the relation between ecofeminism, or ecological feminism, and other feminist theories including radical green theories such as deep ecology. Val Plumwood provides a philosophically informed account of the relation (...) of women and nature, and shows how relating male domination to the domination of nature is important and yet remains a dilemma for women. (shrink)

Val Plumwood has asserted that the appropriate stance toward the more-than-human world is not one of identification or unity, but of solidarity "in the political sense." But can the language of solidarity be extended or revised to articulate a particular kind of ethico-political relationship between humans and the more-than-human world? Can the term "political solidarity" be accurately and productively used to describe a relationship between humans and the more-than-human world in which humans and non-humans struggle together to alter ecosocially-oppressive states (...) of affairs? What else is at stake in this question? The work of Plumwood prompts ecofeminism to attend to these inquiries. In this essay, the work of Plumwood is brought together with that of feminist political philosopher Sally Scholz, who offers a non-environmental account of political solidarity. This essay shows how both theorists, despite disagreement over whether non-humans can be "in" solidarity with the more-than-human world, intend that the concept of solidarity do the same sort of ethico-political work in achieving mutuality without hegemonic over-identification with the oppressed by the privileged. Then, to examine how solidarity between humans and the more-than-human world works "in action," the essay ends with a brief consideration of the shared political life of human and non-human actors in the direct-action forest defense movement of the Pacific Northwest. (shrink)

Although most studies on the Fair Trade initiative are, to some extent, cognizant of its contribution to environmental sustainability, what the environmental aspect means to Fair Trade has not yet been explored fully. A review of environmental issues in the Fair Trade literature suggests that Fair Trade might influence participant producers’ farming practices even if it does not directly impact natural resources. This paper attempts to interpret Fair Trade certification as an intermediary institution that links two significant objectives of rural (...) development in the global South—environmental conservation and poverty reduction. This theoretical concept is examined in different real settings by observing four cases of Southern small farmer groups involved in the Fair Trade initiative. Findings from these case studies imply that if Fair Trade certification ensures tangible benefits for small farmers, it can not only help such disadvantaged farmers but also work as an approach for natural resource management. (shrink)

Research involving minors has been the subject of much ethical debate. The growing number of longitudinal, pediatric studies that involve genetic research present even more complex challenges to ensure appropriate protection of children and families as research participants. Long-term studies with a genetic component involve collection, retention and use of biological samples and personal information over many years. Cohort studies may be established to study specific conditions (e.g. autism, asthma) or may have a broad aim to research a range of (...) factors that influence the health and development of children. Studies are increasingly intended to serve as research platforms by providing access to data and biological samples to researchers over many years. (shrink)

Yule, Val A series of before-and-after pictures shows the cost to a city that is bombed. A recent example is the UNESCO-listed sites in the Syrian city of Aleppo - one example is given above. After bombing these sites were all rubble.

In this much-needed account of what has gone wrong in our thinking about the environment, Val Plumwood digs at the roots of environmental degradation. She argues that we need to see nature as an end itself, rather than an instrument to get what we want. Using a range of examples, Plumwood presents a radically new picture of how our culture must change to accommodate nature.

This article explores mechanisms for making poor rural women’s work visible by drawing on Amartya Sen’s intra-family “cooperative conflict” theory to explain the workings of two Bangladesh non-governmental organization’s income-generating programs (rearing poultry and rearing silkworms). On the assumption that cooperation surpasses conflict in the intra-family relations when women’s work is visible, the article identifies factors that influence intra-family conflict and cooperation. At entry, cooperation in a family depends on how successfully the family can make women’s income-generating activities compatible with (...) their existing household responsibilities and with continuation of the male breadwinner’s income source. In women’s continuing work, the level of cooperation depends greatly on the amount and frequency of women’s income and the family’s level of indebtedness. Families with a male breadwinner having a regular income source tended to offer a more cooperative environment to women’s work than those with a breadwinner involved in casual labor. Women’s work as a second regular income source can make their work more visible and contribute to their families’ upward mobility. (shrink)

Val Plumwood (nee Morrell) is best known in the logic community for her work on relevant logics published jointly with Richard Sylvan. Together, as `"Val and Richard Routley", they worked at the center of the Canberra Logic Group from 1971 to 1981 before they divorced and changed names, whereupon Val shifted her focus to issues in environmental philosophy. Her writing in that latter field drew so much attention, in fact, that most people familiar with her philosophical work know her solely (...) for contributions there and are quite often surprised to hear of her work in non-classical logic. While her ``fame as an environmental philosopher overshadowed her work in logic, this work included significant contributions to the emerging study of non-classical logics and relevant logics in particular. Like Sylvan, she later turned to applications of this non-classical thinking in other areas, eventually in areas traditionally deemed beyond the reach of logical innovation. (shrink)

Den här uppsatsen handlar om fritt val (FV) tillåtelser (FVT). Jag går igenom den s.k. fritt val tillåtelser paradoxen och nämner några möjliga lösningar på denna. Därefter presenterar jag mitt eget förslag på hur man bör förstå tillåtelser av detta slag och hur man kan lösa (FVT) paradoxen. Jag tar upp några potentiella invändningar mot denna analys och visar hur dessa kan bemötas. Ibland har (FVT) paradoxen använts som ett argument emot s.k. standard deontisk logik (SDL). Jag argumenterar för att (...) man kan acceptera förekomsten av (FV) tillåtelser utan att behöva förkasta (SDL). Däremot pekar diskussionen på behovet av en kvantifierad deontisk logik. (shrink)

Ideal for undergraduate students in philosophy and science studies, Philosophy of Technology offers an engaging and comprehensive overview of a subject vital to our time. An up-to-date, accessible overview of the philosophy of technology, defining technology and its characteristics. Explores the issues that arise as technology becomes an integral part of our society. In addition to traditional topics in science and technology studies, the volume offers discussion of technocracy, the romantic rebellion against technology. Complements The Philosophy of Technology : The (...) Technological Condition: An Anthology, edited by Robert C. Scharff and Val Dusek. (shrink)

This paper examines the use and meaning of the body-part terms or quasi-body part terms associated with Japanese emotions. The terms analyzed are kokoro, mune, hara, ki, and mushi. In Japanese kokoro is regarded as the seat of emotions. Mune (roughly, ‘chest’) is the place where Japanese believe kokoro is located. Hara (roughly, ‘belly’) can be used to refer to the seat of ‘thinking’, for example in expression of anger-like feelings which entail a prior cognitive appraisal. The term ki (roughly, (...) ‘breath’) is also used for expressions dealing with emotions, temperament, and behaviour; among these, ki is mostly frequently used for referring to mental activity. Mushi — literally, a ‘worm’ which exists in the hara ‘belly’ — is also used for referring to specific emotion expressions. The tool for semantic analysis employed in this paper is the “Natural Semantic Metalanguage” method developed by Anna Wierzbicka and colleagues. This metalanguage enables us to explicate concepts by means of simple words and grammar (easily translated across languages), and clarifies the similarities and dissimilarities between the components involved in semantically similar terms. The data used for analysis are from various sources; published literature both in Japanese and English, newspaper/magazine articles, film scripts, comic books, advertisements, dictionaries, and popular songs. (shrink)

Situationists (e.g., Doris in Lack of character: personality and moral behavior, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2002; Harman in Proc Aristot Soc 99:315–331, 1999. 10.2307/4545312), with reference to empirical work in psychology, have called into question the predictive and explanatory power of character traits and on this basis have criticized the empirical adequacy of moral virtue. More recently, Alfano (Philos Q 62(247):223–249, 2012; Character as moral fiction, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2013) has extended the situationist critique from virtue ethics to virtue (...) epistemology. On the line he advances, virtue responsibilism—the view that intellectual character traits play an important part in traditional and untraditional epistemological inquiries—is criticized as empirically inadequate in light of the extent to which individuals are shown to be susceptible to seemingly trivial and epistemically irrelevant situational influences. Alfano’s attempted redeployment of the situationist challenge to virtue responsibilism is on closer inspection not as straightforward as he claims. It is granted that the empirical adequacy of virtue responsibilism will be eventually threatened if it can be shown that virtuous motivation is, in light of situational factors, causally ineffective. As it turns out, various psychological studies which situationists have overlooked, suggest that virtuous motivation is causally efficacious in a way that favours the position of the virtue responsibilist over the situationist. In the first part of this paper, I outline the hard core of virtue theory: both a rich motivation requirement, and a commitment to the inherent relation between virtue and a good life; then I assess whether these are undermined by situationist criticism. I address the confusion of the existing debate, and the conclusion drawn is that virtue theory ultimately remains unscathed. In the second part of my paper I defend the empirical adequacy of virtue theory based on self-determination theory. When we afford closer attention to studies on the orientation of our motivation, it becomes clear how the dynamics of our motivation have a tremendous influence on desirable behavioural outcomes: a good life. (shrink)

This paper offers an account of collective epistemic vices, which we call the “group identification account”. The group identification account attributes collective epistemic vices to the groups that are constituted by “group identification”, which is a primitive and non-doxastic self-understanding as a group member (Turner, 1982; Brewer, 1991; Brewer & Gardner, 1996; Pacherie, 2013; Salice & Miyazono, 2020). The distinctive feature of the group identification account is that it enables us to attribute epistemic vices not just to established social groups (...) (e.g. committees, research teams, juries) but also to loose social groups (e.g. loosely connected people in an echo chamber) when they are constituted by group identification. The group identification account is contrasted with Fricker’s (2010, 2020) influential account, the “joint commitment account”, which focuses on established social groups, and has difficulty in making sense of collective epistemic vices of loose social groups. The group identification account is motivated by the fact that collective epistemic vices can be useful to diagnose not only the epistemic performance of established groups but also that of loose groups in real-life cases, such as echo chamber (Nguyen, 2020), implicit bias (Holroyd, 2020), group polarization (Broncano-Berrocal & Carter, 2021), etc. (shrink)

This paper examines the use and meaning of the body-part terms or quasi-body part terms associated with Japanese emotions. The terms analyzed are kokoro, mune, hara, ki, and mushi. In Japanese kokoro is regarded as the seat of emotions. Mune (roughly, ¿chest¿) is the place where Japanese believe kokoro is located. Hara (roughly, ¿belly¿) can be used to refer to the seat of ¿thinking¿, for example in expression of anger-like feelings which entail a prior cognitive appraisal. The term ki (roughly, (...) ¿breath¿) is also used for expressions dealing with emotions, temperament, and behaviour; among these, ki is mostly frequently used for referring to mental activity. Mushi ¿ literally, a ¿worm¿ which exists in the hara ¿belly¿ ¿ is also used for referring to specific emotion expressions. The tool for semantic analysis employed in this paper is the ¿Natural Semantic Metalanguage¿ method developed by Anna Wierzbicka and colleagues. This metalanguage enables us to explicate concepts by means of simple words and grammar (easily translated across languages), and clarifies the similarities and dissimilarities between the components involved in semantically similar terms. The data used for analysis are from various sources; published literature both in Japanese and English, newspaper/magazine articles, film scripts, comic books, advertisements, dictionaries, and popular songs. (shrink)

Little attention has been paid to the role which impression management (IM) of genuine and substantial talents and commitment plays in the careers of female and male managers seeking promotion. IM studies have largely investigated the supervisor/subordinate relationship, often with samples of business students in laboratory settings. In the Cranfield Centre for Developing Women Business Leaders, we have focused on the use of IM by practising managers. In this paper, we examine previous literature for indications that gender may be important (...) in explaining differences in IM behaviours. We then report findings from a survey and a qualitative study, showing that gender, especially combined with age and job level, is a differentiating factor in managers' inclinations to use particular IM behaviours. Many women (and some men too) seem uncomfortable with using IM. Women do not always want to play "the organizational game" by the male-constructed unwritten rules, but prefer to trust good management and systems fairness for just rewards. Younger and junior level women managers often recognize that IM may be a useful tool but reject its use for themselves. Women seem to prefer to rely on extra high performance and commitment for visibility to their seniors rather than the networking, ingratiation and self-promotion strategies used more by males. An important consequence is that as ambitious young males use job-focused IM in addition to self and manager-focused strategies, this is likely to leave young women at a considerable disadvantage for promotion, if the strategies are successful. (shrink)

Women, Humanity and Nature Val Plum wood There is now a growing awareness that the Western philosophical tradition which has identified, on the one hand, maleness with the sphere of rationality, and on the other hand, femaleness with the sphere...

Quelle idée libre la terre peut-elle encore porter en un temps d'exécration, de désertification et d'universalisation hâtive? Cette question attend une réponse qui dépasse les oppositions simples entre mythologie et philosophie. En rupture avec les allégations de Heidegger, Bruno Pinchard cherche à définir la place d'un humanisme latin dans un monde désormais accaparé par les forces exclusives de la technologie et de la religion. Ce parcours, qui s'inscrit dans le sillage de Virgile, Dante, Vico, Chateaubriand, cherche à deviner les destins (...) de l'Occident à travers le passage irréversible qui, de l'installation bornée dans les terres, conduit les peuples à l'exil universel de la mer. Ce chemin a un nom : Hespérie. (shrink)

The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights has recently handed down its judgement in the case of three women contesting the abortion law in the Republic of Ireland, which has one of the most restrictive abortion laws in the world. Although the Court ruled that Ireland had to clarify the current law following the success of one of the three claims, the failure of the other two claims allows Ireland to continue to enforce its law, which has (...) an adverse effect on women's health. This paper, therefore, proposes an amendment to abortion legislation in the Republic of Ireland that would be compatible with safeguarding women's health, highlighting several circumstances in which the continuation of a pregnancy may have a detrimental impact on a woman's physical and/or mental health. (shrink)