In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Ethics & the Environment 7.2 (2002) 194-196 [Access article in PDF] The Body Toxic: An Environmental Memoir by Suzanne Antonetta. Washington, D.C.: Counterpoint, 2001. Pp. 242. Hardback $26; paper $15.00. ISBN 1-5824-3209-0. Memoirs rely on the power of recollection to reproduce the inward texture of experience. Autobiographies cast their authors as historians of the self, combing through documents and old letters, checking facts. In her first prose work, the (...) accomplished poet Suzanne Antonetta crosses the boundary between memoir and autobiography. Interweaving the rough textures of memory with slick surfaces of corporate data, she gives us a lyric meditation on the struggle to become undeceived. Recounting both the facts of corporate malfeasance and our fantastic capacity to filter our reality, she captures the relation between failures of understanding and failures of responsibility. She shows us how difficult it is to accept an unofficial truth. The Body Toxic is a thoughtful and obsessively readable contribution to environmental ethics.Antonetta tells us of childhood exposure to toxic wastes in a penurious and neglected corner of Barnegat Bay. She writes in retrospect, with painfully acquired knowledge of cancer clusters and disease-ridden families. [End Page 194] Her own body's malformed reproductive organs, riddled with tumors, prove spectacularly and tragically infertile when quadruplets spontaneously abort. Sharp backward glances at childhood pleasures; crabbing, berrying, and running through the sweet-smelling spray of DDT, twist us around. Children of the 1960s trail through pesticide as if the weekly truck brought some poisonous ice cream. The mosquitoes thrived: what happened to the children? We revisit these scenes obliquely. Denzer-Schaefer empties its effluent into the bay, cost-efficient Ciba-Geigy rids their chemical wastes through a pipe running straight into the woods, the local farm has become an illegal toxic dump for an unscrupulous contractor. Fire at a nearby nuclear weapons silo has hapless firemen spraying radioactive water into the air. The government responds: they build a chain link fence around the site. A nuclear power plant of the 'old-school' emanates levels of radioactivity to rival Chernobyl. The plant managers assiduously cover it up. This is not some national catalogue of Superfund sites: all take place within a dozen or so miles of a childhood summer house in New Jersey. These shards of a case study are scattered throughout Antonetta's non-linear narrative, piecing together experience, cause and effect.But this work is more ethically and artistically ambitious than the artificial clarity of case studies. Powerfully, Antonetta shows us the inner tangle of toxic mental life: the depression, listlessness, confusion, and self-medication of barely cognized symptoms. Self-clouding toxicity affects both the body and the mind. She fears that she and other family members are not right in the head. How far can she trust herself, and how far can she trace the causes? Is it heredity? Is it toxicity? Has toxic exposure potentiated some family trait? She reads out strings of hazardous chemicals like a rosary, overdetermining all of her symptoms. The distance between cause and effect shields the guilty. Strong toxicity undermines the ability of its victims to understand and act. The Body Toxic is part case study, part phenomenology of altered consciousness, and all too human. A course in environmental ethics could make imaginative use of its insights into a wide range of anthropocentric concerns. Antonetta considers questions of environmental justice, religious beliefs about the natural order, environmental responsibility and property rights, nuclear risk, and cost-benefit analysis in multi-dimensional form, an entry point for philosophical reflection. The Body Toxic is stimulating, controversial, and beautifully written.Many great works of literature signal their ethical intent by fostering a sense of identification with their subjects or protagonists. Antonetta's deft [End Page 195] blunt portraiture expands our moral sensibility by showing us how to be concerned for people with whom we are not meant to identify. The story begins before the beginning, with Antonetta's immigrant family. They are strangely familiar and not entirely sympathetic people, isolated between first generation immigrant cultures and fantasies of prosperous America, clinging to islands of... (shrink)

The ethical ideologies of psychologists and physicians were compared using the Ethics Position Questionnaire. The findings reveal that psychologists tend to be less relativistic than physicians. Further, we explored the degree to which physicians and psychologists report being influenced by a variety of factors in their ethical decision making. Psychologists were more influenced by their code of ethics and less influenced by family views, religious background, and peer attitudes than were physicians. We argue that these differences reflect the varied professional (...) cultures in which practitioners are trained and socialized. (shrink)

Animalism is the view that human persons are human animals – biological organisms that belong to the species Homo sapiens. This paper concerns a family of modal objections to animalism based on the essentiality of personhood (persons and animals differ in their persistence conditions; psychological considerations are relevant for the persistence of persons, but not animals; persons, but not animals, are essentially psychological beings). Such arguments are typically used to support constitutionalism, animalism’s main neo-Lockean rival. The problem with such arguments (...) is that they wrongly assume that animalism is incompatible with our essentially being psychological beings. In this paper, I discuss a formulation of animalism, what I call psychologically-serious animalism, according to which human persons are essentially human animals and essentially persons. I show how the availability of this neglected formulation of animalism undermines objections based on the essentiality of personhood. (shrink)

This article challenges John M. Cooper’s reading of ancient Stoicism as a way of life, one which sets its back against Pierre Hadot’s notion that Stoicism could have philosophically advocated regimens of non-cognitive practices of the kind documented by Hadot. Part 1 examines Arrian’s Discourses, following A. A. Long in seeing in this text Arrian’s portrait of Epictetus as a philosophical persona: one bringing together the different virtues of Socrates, Diogenes, and Zeno. Part 2 then examines Epictetus’s Handbook , seeing (...) in this text—in contrast to Hadot and Sellars—a distinct set of prescriptions for the kinds of existential practices the Roman Stoics advocated, not in place of philosophical argumentation, but as a means to habituate aspirants’ conduct to ways of thinking, desiring and acting harmonious with their philosophical conclusions. (shrink)

This article challenges the recurrent critique that Pierre Hadot’s identification of ancient philosophy with the practice of spiritual exercises introduces a non- or irrational dimension into metaphilosophy. The occasion to do this is provided by Kerem Eksen’s recent reading of Descartes’s Meditations as consisting of solely intellectual, rather than spiritual, exercises—since the latter, Eksen claims, involve extrarational means and ends. Part 2 presents an alternative account of the role of cognition in the ancient meditatio at issue in understanding Descartes’s antecedents. (...) This account is indebted to Michel Foucault’s characterization of ancient meditation as involving two cognitive mechanisms: an appropriation of thought, and an experiment in identification. Part 3 argues that attempts such as Eksen’s to depict spiritual exercises as wholly noncognitive themselves are the product of an “unexamined Cartesianism” that is fundamentally at odds with the monistic psychology of ancient Stoics like Marcus Aurelius as discussed in Hadot’s studies. (shrink)

Research suggests that Canadian police officers are exposed to trauma at a greater frequency than the general population. This, combined with other operational stressors, such as risk of physical injury, high consequence of error, and strained resources, can leave officers less resilient to organizational stressors. In my experience, a significant and impactful organizational stressor is ineffective leadership, which include leaders who are non-supportive, inconsistent, egocentric, and morally ambiguous. Ineffective leadership in the context of paramilitary police culture has been recognized as (...) psychologically distressing. Further, moral injury may result when leadership fails to meet officers’ needs, expectations, and values. Ineffective leadership and resulting moral injuries are an understudied area in the literature. This review will help provide a comprehensive context of policing and the impact of ineffective leadership on police mental health. (shrink)

IntroductionResearch indicates that body image disturbance is associated with poorer psychosocial outcomes for individuals with physical health conditions, with poorest body image reported for individuals with visible bodily changes. Using White’s theoretical model of body image the present paper aimed to examine the nature of these relationships in two distinct groups: individuals with an amputation and individuals with diabetes. It was hypothesized that body image disturbance would be associated with psychosocial outcomes and would mediate the relationships between self-ideal discrepancy and (...) personal investment in psychosocial outcomes.MethodsIndividuals with diabetes and individuals with an amputation provided details regarding their medical condition, and completed measures assessing body image, investment, self-ideal discrepancy, depression, anxiety, and quality of life. Structural equation and invariance modeling were used to test the model paths and the invariance of the model.ResultsAs hypothesized, body image disturbance was found to mediate the relationships between personal investment and psychosocial outcome, and between self-ideal discrepancy and psychosocial outcome. The predicted paths were invariant across groups, although the model accounted for more variance in people with an amputation than people with diabetes.ConclusionBody image disturbance, personal investment, and self-ideal discrepancy are important factors contributing to psychosocial outcome for individuals with diabetes and individuals with an amputation. These findings not only confirm the validity of the model in these two groups, but they emphasize the importance of targeting body image in future psychological interventions for individuals with a health condition. (shrink)

Although features of the dentition figure prominently in discussions of early hominid phylogeny, remarkably little is known of the developmental basis of the variations in occlusal morphology and dental proportions that are observed among taxa. Recent experiments on tooth development in mice have identified some of the genes involved in dental patterning and the control of tooth specification. These findings provide valuable new insight into dental evolution and underscore the strong developmental links that exist among the teeth and the jaws (...) and cranium. The latter has important implications for cladistic studies that traditionally consider features of the skull independently from the dentition. BioEssays 23:481–493, 2001. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

The recent success of the Mars 2020 project and the high quality images relayed back to Earth have provided further impetus and expectations for human missions to Mars. To support space agency and private enterprise plans to establish a sustainable colony on Mars in the 2030s, synthetic biology may play a vital role to enable astronaut self-sufficiency. In this review, we describe some aspects of where synthetic biology may inform and guide in situ resource utilisation strategies. We address the nature (...) of Martian regolith and describe methods by which it may be rendered fit for purpose to support growth and yield of bioengineered crops. Lastly, we illustrate some examples of innate human adaptation which may confer characteristics desirable in the selection of colonists and with a future looking lens, offer potential targets for human enhancement. (shrink)

This paper wants to draw out a common argument in three great philosophers and littérateurs in modern French thought: Michel de Montaigne, Voltaire, and Albert Camus. The argument makes metaphysical and theological scepticism the first premise for a universalistic political ethics, as per Voltaire's: “it is clearer still that we ought to be tolerant of one another, because we are all weak, inconsistent, liable to fickleness and error.” The argument, it seems to me, presents an interestingly overlooked, deeply important and (...) powerful contribution to the philosophical discourse of modernity. On one hand, theological and post-structuralist critics of “humanism” usually take the latter to depend either on an essentialist philosophical anthropology, or a progressive philosophy of history. The former, it is argued, is philosophically contestable and ethically contentious. The latter, for better or worse, is a continuation of theological eschatology by another name. So both, if not “modernity” per se, should somehow be rejected. But an ethical universalism – like that we find in Montaigne, Bayle, Voltaire, or Camus – which does not claim familiarity with metaphysical or eschatological truths, but humbly confesses our epistemic finitude, seeing in this the basis for ethical solidarity, eludes these charges. On the other hand, philosophical scepticism plays a large role in the post-structuralist criticisms of modern institutions and ideas in ways which have been widely taken to license forms of ethics which problematically identify responsibility, with taking a stand unjustifiable by recourse to universalizable reasons. But, in Montaigne, Voltaire and Camus, our ignorance concerning the highest or final truths does not close off, but rather opens up, a new descriptive sensitivity to the foibles and complexities of human experience: a sensitivity reflected amply, and often hilariously, in their literary productions. As such, a critical agnosticism concerning claims about things “in the heavens and beneath the earth” does not, for such a “sceptical humanism,” necessitate decisionism or nihilism. Instead, it demands a redoubled ethical sensitivity to the complexities and plurality of political life which sees the dignity of “really-existing” others, whatever their metaphysical creeds, as an inalienable first datum of ethical conduct and reflection. After tracking these arguments in Montaigne, Voltaire, and Camus, the essay closes by reflecting on, and contesting, one more powerful theological argument against modern agnosticism's allegedly deleterious effects on ethical culture: that acknowledging ignorance concerning the highest things robs us of the basis for awe or wonder, the wellspring of human beings’ highest ethical, aesthetic, and spiritual achievements. (shrink)

David Bohm is a physicist with a broad range of other interests including religion, philosophy, education, art, and linguistics. This book surveys Bohm's physical theories including the quantum potential theory and the implicate order or holomovement theory.

In Part 1, we situate Dugin’s interpretation of Heidegger in relation to the better known, broadly left-liberal approaches to interpreting Heidegger’s thought, stressing Dugin’s unusual focus on the German thinker’s “middle” or Nazi-era texts, and showing how this periodizing optic affects Dugin’s culminating reading of Sein und Zeit and its key axiological notion of authenticity (Part 1). Part 2 examines Dugin’s appropriation of Heidegger’s radically pessimistic, trans-epochal critique of Western thought, centring around his striking reading of the esoteric notion of (...) the “fourfold” or Gewiert. In this account, the essence of reality itself, the “crosshairs” of the fourfold, is provocatively depicted by Dugin as war, Polemos, Kampf, or Krieg, following the Heidegger of 1933–1936. In a move which echoes Heidegger’s own post-1938 relativizations of all distinctions between Nazism, liberalism and socialism – as well as the Shoah and mechanized agriculture – the Russian thinker hence ends by obviating any distinctions between liberal or democratic and totalitarian regimes, war and peace, and genocide and consumerism. All must be overcome in the “another beginning” destined for the new Russia, if it has the ears to hear. (shrink)

Research Ethics Boards (REBs) at universities are chaired and staffed by researchers who serve to enforce codes of ethics by scrutinizing research proposals. Yet there is widespread dissatisfaction with the REB approval process. This article examines the sources of that dissatisfaction, the place for codes of ethics in the conducting of research, the evidence for risk to research participants as the basis for those codes, and the effectiveness of REBs in protecting research participants. We offer suggestions for how REB chairs, (...) members, and researchers can improve the REB approval process so that it is fair and responsive. (shrink)

This detailed 1990 book describes the light and dark adaptation of receptoral and post-receptoral mechanisms from a number of perspectives. The authors emphasise the importance of the study of achromatopsia, a rare congenital condition in which the visual mechanisms that mediate day vision are absent whilst those that mediate night vision remain intact.

Background: Fear of cancer recurrence or progression is a common challenge experienced by people living with and beyond cancer and is frequently endorsed as the highest unmet psychosocial need amongst survivors. This has prompted many cancer organizations to develop self-help resources for survivors to better manage these fears through psychoeducation, but little is known about whether they help reduce FCR/P.Method: We recruited 62 women with ovarian cancer. Women reported on their medical history and demographic characteristics and completed the Fear of (...) Progression Questionnaire-Short Form. They then read a booklet on FCR specifically created for Ovarian Cancer Australia by two of the authors. One week after reading the booklet, 50/62 women completed the FoP-Q-SF and answered questions about their satisfaction with the booklet.Results: More than half of the women scored in the clinical range for FCR/P at baseline. Of the completers, 93% said that they would recommend the booklet to other women. Satisfaction with the booklet was relatively high and more than two-thirds of women rated it as moderately helpful or better. However, FCR/P did not change significantly over the week following reading the booklet [t = 1.71, p = 0.09]. There was also no difference in change in FCR/P between women in the clinical vs. non-clinical range on the FoP-Q. Women high in FCR/P rated the booklet as less helpful in managing FCR/P, but overall satisfaction with the booklet was not associated with degree of FCR/P.Conclusions: These results suggest that a simple online FCR booklet is acceptable to women with ovarian cancer and they are satisfied with the booklet, but, it was insufficient to change in FCR/P levels. These results suggest that such resources are valued by women with ovarian cancer, but more potent interventions are necessary to reduce FCR in this population. (shrink)

This article presents a critical examination of Igor Soikhedbrod’s Revisiting Marx’s Critique of Liberalism: Rethinking Justice, Legality, and Rights. We argue that the book presents an important criticism of antinomian forms of critical theory, which underplay the extent to which Marx engaged in an imminent critique of liberal societies, including the rule of law, and upheld that progressive advances enshrined in this rule should be carried over or sublated in a communist dispensation.

ABSTRACTThis paper is a critical response to Amy Allen’s The End of Progress: Decolonising the Normative Foundations of Critical Theory. We take up her book’s call for a “problematizing” history which challenges “taken-for-granted” preconceptions in order to contest Allen’s own representation of the thought of the enlightenment. Allen accepts that all the enlighteners agreed upon a stadial, progressive account of history, which she critiques epistemically and normatively. But we show in Part 2, drawing on the work of Henri Vyverberg and (...) other historians of eighteenth century ideas, that a cyclical, rise and fall account of historical succession was more prominent than the progressive narrative in leading enlighteners such as Montesquieu, Voltaire, Diderot, D’Alembert, Condillac, Jancourt, Grimm, and Raynal, all of whom Allen does not mention. In Part 3, we show that not all thinkers of the enlightenment were pro-colonial or pro-imperialist, as Allen also presupposes in The End of Progress. By examining Abbé Raynal’s History of The Two Indies in Part 3, and notably its Diderotian interpolations, we show that many enlighteners propounded fierce criticisms of European colonialism and the slave trade, even calling directly for armed resistance against European infractions. In critical theorists’ search for chastened normative foundations, our concluding remarks contend, there is a need to develop more accurate, balanced, post-postmodern reckonings of the enlightenment. (shrink)

Carol Gilligan has identified two orientations to moral understanding; the dominant justice orientation and the under-valued care orientation. Based on her discernment of a voice of care, Gilligan challenges the adequacy of a deontological liberal framework for moral development and moral theory. This paper examines how the orientations of justice and care are played out in medical ethical theory. Specifically, I question whether the medical moral domain is adequately described by the norms of impartiality, universality, and equality that characterize the (...) liberal ideal. My analysis of justice -oriented medical ethics, focuses on the libertarian theory of H.T. Engelhardt and the contractarian theory of R.M. Veatch. I suggest that in the work of E.D. Pellegrino and D.C. Thomasma we find not only a more authentic representation of medical morality but also a project that is compatible with the care orientation's emphasis on human need and responsiveness to particular others. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis paper looks at the state of the literature surrounding Heidegger and Nazism today. Part 1 focusses on Hassan Givsan’s remarkable work, Une histoire consternante: pourquoi les philosophes se laissent corrompre par le “cas Heidegger”, which looks at the different, mutually inconsistent forms of “apologetics” denying that Heidegger had been a Nazi, or that this commitment could have been shaped by his philosophy. Part 2 looks at five themes that emerge from the 2014 French-language collection Heidegger, le sol, la communauté, (...) la race, edited by Emmanuel Faye: Heidegger’s anti-semitism, before and in the Black Notebooks; Sein und Zeit and “the political”; Heidegger and his estate’s post-war “rewriting” of his Nazi-era texts; Heidegger’s esotericism; and his intellectual proximities to other Nazi thinkers. Closing reflections touch on the state of the debate, calling for increased scholarly awareness of the evidence, and debate of its significance. (shrink)

This paper starts from the contention that Pierre Hadot’s unusually divided reception reflects the different dimensions of Hadot’s own scholarly profile. Hadot’s largely favourable reception amongst historians of ideas responds to the philological dimension of his work, but misses the implicit normativity involved in his recovery of the sense of ancient philosophy as a way of life. Analytic critics have registered but contested this normativity in ways that arguably also misrepresent his work. This paper contends that both receptions of Hadot (...) have missed what can be called Hadot’s unique philosophical problematic: uncovering through the ancient sources a kind of phenomenology of how a person would perceive and evaluate the world who had, counter-factually, attained a wholly enlightened, wholly “sage” mode of living. This phenomenology of sagesse, which is predicated on a metaphysical agnosticism, proves closer to the last Foucault than Hadot sometimes suggested: albeit embodying an aesthetics of “the whole,” over against Foucault’s aesthetics of existence. (shrink)

This paper reassesses the Cooper-Hadot debate surrounding how students are converted to philosophy as a way of life (section 1) through engagement with philosophical protreptics. In section 2, the paper identifies the core “argument from finality” in philosophical protreptics seeking to convert non-philosophers to philosophy, starting from the universal human interest in securing eudaimonia. In line with Cooper, this argument seeks to persuade prospective students on rational grounds, so that their choice to philosophise would be rationally motivated. In section 3.1, (...) the paper illustrates how in Plato's Euthydemus (a) the choice to undertake philosophy is rationally justified by Socrates, using the eudaimonistic argument from finality. In section 3.2, by recourse to Aristotle's Protrepticus, the paper shows how the protreptic texts also compared philosophy to other intellectual pursuits, notably rhetoric, so as to recommend philosophy specifically for delivering a directive wisdom concerning how to live. (shrink)

What follows is a work of critical reconstruction of Camus' thought. It aims to answer to the wish Camus expressed in his later notebooks, that he at least be read closely. Specifically, I hope to do three things. In Part I, we will show how Camus' famous philosophy of the absurd represents a systematic scepticism whose closest philosophical predecessor is Descartes' method of doubt, and whose consequence, as in Descartes, is the discovery of a single, orienting certainty, on the basis (...) of which Camus would proceed to pass beyond the 'nihilism' that conservative critics continued to level against him (MS 34). Part II will unfold the central tenets of Camus' mature thought of rebellion, and show how Camus' central political claims follow from his para-Cartesian claim to have found an irreducible or 'invincible' basis for a post-metaphysical ethics, consistent with the most thoroughgoing epistemic scepticism. Part III then undertakes to show that the neoclassical rhetoric and positioning Camus claimed for his postwar thought—as a thought of moderation or mesure, and a renewed Greek or Mediterranean naturalism—is more than a stylistic pretension. It represents, so I argue, a singular amalgam of modern and philosophical classical motifs which makes Camus' voice nearly unique in twentieth century ideas, and all the more worth reconsidering today. So let us proceed. (shrink)

This article will provide a critique of tworecent English marriage law decisions, thefirst concerning a (female to male) transgenderman and the second a (male to female)intersexed woman. It will do so throughconsideration of the dialogue between each andthe landmark transgender case of Corbett v. Corbett. It will highlight howboth decisions, in seeking to minimise the factof `departure' from Corbett, serve toreproduce key elements of that decision whichserve to undermine the future prospects fortransgender law reform in the English context.In particular, both (...) decisions, in differentways, or with different emphases, ensure that`legal sex' continues to be determined by(bio)logical and temporal factors. Crucially,however, as in Corbett, it is legalanxiety over the boundaries of the `natural',and the homophobia of law, that underscoresthis anxiety, that account for these particularconstructions of `legal sex'. (shrink)

In this paper, I explore the complex ethical dynamics of violence and nonviolence in Mahāyāna Buddhism by considering some of the historical precedents and scriptural prescriptions that inform modern and contemporary Buddhist acts of self-immolation. Through considering these scripturally sanctioned Mahāyāna ‘case studies,’ the paper traces the tension that exists in Buddhist thought between violence and nonviolence, outlines the interplay of key Mahāyāna ideas of transcendence and altruism, and comments on the mimetic status and influence of spiritually charged texts. It (...) is the contention of this paper that violent scriptural metaphors can create paradigms of enactment that are paradoxically illustrative of the core ‘non-violent’ Mahāyāna virtues of compassion, giving, patience, and vigor. The discussion will show that these virtues are underpinned by the Mahāyāna philosophical mainstays of non-duality, bodhisattvic transcendent altruism, skillful means, and dependent co-origination. (shrink)

This paper explores the role of ethics and responsibility as drivers of a transition to a more sustainable agri-food system, by drawing on an investigation of the governance of social sustainability in the UK’s conventional food supply. The paper investigates how and why various non-state actors in the conventional food supply construe certain social obligations as being part of the remit of the food supply; whether ethics plays a motivating role; and the extent to which their activities are linked to (...) sustainability. The paper uses data collected via two surveys of diverse entities in the conventional food supply, the first a survey of public-facing websites, the second a series of in-depth interviews. The entities ranged from primary producers, manufacturers and food service operators to consultancies, standard-setting organisations and advocacy groups. The study finds that actors view a variety of socially focused or socially beneficial activities as legitimate governance concerns for the conventional food supply, and that ethics plays a role in motivating or justifying these activities. However, the activities are inconsistently associated with sustainability, a finding that may undermine the use of sustainability programmes as tools for driving ethical agendas. Moreover, the dominant business framing of the conventional food supply means that ethical considerations are often expressed in terms of more instrumental priorities. Social sustainability or responsibility actions can be justified on moral grounds as ‘the right thing to do’ but usually have to be backed up in more pragmatic terms as a way of ‘doing well by doing good’. (shrink)

"In this book (originally delivered as the John Albert Hall Lectures in Victoria, British Columbia) Terence Penelhum identifies what distinguishes the ethics of the Christian from the ethics of a secular world that commonly sees itself as having adopted Christian principles. He also tries to locate the understanding of human nature and its defects which is implied by Christian ethics. In both cases he maintains that there are continuities as well as sharp differences between the moral attitudes and the (...) experiences of secular people and those of Christians." "However, the author's remit extends beyond that of just clarification. In comparing one set of beliefs with others, and in assessing their truth, he tries to see how the Christian view of human nature should respond to the claims of other religions. This leads to a discussion of how the Christian perspective on our nature ought to be affected by the recognition that human nature is part of Nature as a whole. It is suggested that the continuities which exist between the religions and secular moral consciousness can help us to address some of the perplexities that our own place in Nature gives rise to in the Christian mind. The book contributes to a number of significant debates, in moral theology, philosophy, and interfaith dialogue."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved. (shrink)

The holomovement metaphysics of David Bohm emphasizes connections and continuous change. Two general movements through space‐time extend Bohm's ideas. One is that the universe was nonlocal when it started but increases in locality. (With nonlocality, two simultaneous but distant events affect each other.) The other is the opposite movement or evolution toward increasingly complex systems exhibiting internal connections and a type of nonlocality. This metaphysics produces a theology when the holomovement is a model for God. Several topics follow, including global (...) nonlocality, God as creator, God's transcendence and immanence, and God as personal. This theology shows promise but needs further development. (shrink)

This essay, which will be divided between two SOPHIA editions, proposes to test the consensus in Maimonidean scholarship on the alleged intellectualism of Leo Strauss’ Maimonides by making a close interpretive study of Strauss’ 1963 essay ‘How to Begin to Study the Guide for the Perplexed’. While the importance of this essay, which is Strauss’ last extended piece on the Guide, is established in Maimonidean scholarship, its recognised esotericism has been matched by a dearth of detailed studies of the piece. (...) We aim in this essay to try to rectify this situation, by reading ‘How to Begin to Study’ as Strauss directs us to read esoteric texts in Persecution and the Art of Writing. As one control on our exegetical claims, we will close by situating our reading of ‘How to Begin to Study’ and Strauss’ positions there on philosophy, prophecy and the Torah alongside the claims of his earlier, much less esoteric, but also rarely studied: ‘Some Remarks on the Political Science of Maimonides and Farabi’. Because of the now widely recognised foundational importance of Maimonides in understanding Leo Strauss’ own lasting positions, this work will have wider importance in Strauss scholarship, and hopefully make a contribution to the continuing task of trying to understand Strauss’ important thoughts on Athens and Jerusalem, reason and revelation, the city and man. (shrink)

In the second half of this essay, we continue our reading of Leo Strauss’ important later essay on Maimonides, ‘How to Begin to Study the Guide of the Perplexed’. Our method is to try, as best as we are able, to read this essay as Strauss directs us to read esoteric texts in Persecution and the Art of Writing. As a means of testing and attempting to confirm our reading of this difficult later essay on Maimonides, we will close by (...) situating our reading of ‘How to Begin to Study’ and Strauss’ partly concealed positions there on philosophy, prophecy and the Torah alongside the claims of his earlier, much less esoteric, but also rarely studied 1930s essay: ‘Some Remarks on the Political Science of Maimonides and Farabi’. Because of the widely recognised foundational importance of Maimonides in understanding Leo Strauss’ own lasting positions, this work aims at making a contribution to the continuing, and presently highly contentious, task of trying to understand Strauss’ thoughts on Athens and Jerusalem, reason and revelation, the city and man. (shrink)

Este artigo apresenta um exame da crítica proposta por Morton White em seu artigo “Valor e obrigação em Dewey e Lewis”, em particular, a aquela voltada para o conceito de normatividade e valoração de C.I. Lewis. A crítica afirma que Lewis, ao oferecer um caráter normativo dos juízos éticos, malogra ao articular consistentemente a sua concepção ética com a sua teoria do conhecimento. Isso leva White a concluir que o pragmatista não possui uma solução para o problema fundamental da ética. (...) Argumentarei que tal conclusão é equivocada. O núcleo da minha argumentação repousa na tese de que a crítica de White se origina de uma interpretação incorreta do pragmatismo conceitualista de Lewis, falhando em reconhecer que o apriorismo pragmático é a chave para o entendimento adequado de teoria do conhecimento e para uma explicação da conexão e articulação entre valoração e normatividade no interior da abordagem de Lewis. Nesta linha, mostrarei que, muito pelo contrário, a epistemologia de Lewis destaca os desenvolvimentos éticos e normativos, revelando uma teoria naturalística de valoração que é a base na qual a normatividade emerge pragmaticamente. Sustentarei, também, que essa perspectiva oferece uma concepção profícua de valores e normas que não têm sido suficientemente exploradas; algo que confronta o ceticismo ético, podendo levar em conta o status cognitivo de valores e normas, e que recupera o caráter racional da valoração não apenas para a ética, mas, também, para o conhecimento e a ciência. (shrink)