Until recently, more scholarly careers were being devoted to the study of the teaching of St Thomas Aquinas than to any other philosophical or theological doctrine, with the possible exception of Marxism. Roman Catholic scholars have tended, however, to isolate his philosophical theology from its neo-Platonism, while others have treated the various parts of his Summa Theologiae without regard to their historical context. Dr Hankey's main contention is that Aquinas was less of an Aristotelian than is commonly supposed, and (...) that a proper appreciation of his work requires us to take fuller notice of his reliance on neo-Platonism. In setting out his case, Dr Hankey pays special attention to the influence of Proclus, whose work receives a critical exposition. The author supports his position by making a careful analysis of the first 45 questions of the Summa Theologiae. (shrink)

Something is wrong with current discussions about theory reduction. The question of whether higher level theories are reducible to lower level theories cannot be posed in a sensible way if methodological principles that are needed to evaluate scientific theories are disregarded. If this is recognized, the problem looses much of its alleged importance.

The overt oviposition rhythm ofLymnaea stagnalis should be regarded as an endogenous one. Despite considerable deviations of its period from 24 hrs, entrainment by 24 hr. external periodicities is possible. Possibly, entrainment is effectuated via a second — covert — internal rhythm. The fact that similar rhythms have not been established before, is probably connected with the nature of the phenomena to which previous studies have generally been limited.

(1996). Geography, science and national identity in early modern Britain: The case of Scotland and the work of Sir Robert Sibbald (1641–1722) Annals of Science: Vol. 53, No. 1, pp. 29-73.

W. J. Mander presents the first ever synoptic history of British Idealism, the school of thought which dominated English-language philosophy from the 1860s to the early 20th century. He restores to its proper place this neglected period of philosophy, introducing the exponents of Idealism and explaining its distinctive concepts and doctrines.

J. Wackernagel and E. Löfstedt have both drawn attention to Pindar's ‘Neigung, das Futurum zu setzen bei Verben, die eine jetzt vorhandene, aber auf zukünftiges Tun abzielende Willensrichtung ausdrücken’. But they regarded this as a purely grammatical phenomenon, and did not note that the Pindaric use is practically limited to statements of the type, ‘I shall sing, glorify, testify, etc.’. It was E. Bundy who first drew attention to the conventional nature of these futures and so ended years of misunderstanding. (...) So, for example, Wilamowitz considered that P. 1.75 represented an optative with while Slotty, following Breyer, thought that N. 9. 10 was an aorist subjunctive ‘auf Grund des pindarischen Sprachgebrauches’! Postgate, following Gildersleeve, thought that 0. 8. 57 represented though the contrary would appear to be more true, cf. 0. 13. 11: and also Hoekstra sees in the future ‘den Nebenbegriff des Konnens’. (shrink)

F. H. Bradley did not write extensively or systematically on the philosophy of religion, and much of what he did write has the character of either tentative speculation or the pre-emptive rebuttal of potential misinterpretations that might threaten his general philosophical position. ‘I admit that on this subject I never had much to say’ he warns. But such a remark should not discourage us from considering his views on this topic, since the disclaimer is typically Bradleian, and more reflective of (...) his high standards for what is required in order to claim to have something to say about some matter than of any genuine lack of opinion. On closer inspection we find that he has, scattered throughout his work, a great many important things to say about this subject. (shrink)

What precisely, W. J. T. Mitchell asks, are pictures (and theories of pictures) doing now, in the late twentieth century, when the power of the visual is said to be greater than ever before, and the "pictorial turn" supplants the "linguistic turn" in the study of culture? This book by one of America's leading theorists of visual representation offers a rich account of the interplay between the visible and the readable across culture, from literature to visual art to the mass (...) media. (shrink)

In Search of a Political Philosophy is an analysis of the three democratic `isms'--conservatism, liberalism, and socialism--and of the distinct nature of the all-consuming ideology of Marxist communism. W. J. Stankiewicz is concerned with the conscious and unconscious assumptions of the proponents and followers of each ideology, and those of their theoreticians and critics. Stankiewicz examines the norms by which political ideologies are characterized, and discusses which of these are given precedence. He provides an analysis of how each ideology views (...) such issues as freedom and restraint, responsibility, equality, justice, power, authority, property, human nature and happiness. He also examines the areas of ideological contiguity and mutual influences, the sources of ideological incomprehension in our society, and the forces that split Western societies. In Search of a Political Philosophy takes issue with the positions of some of our leading political theorists and represents an original contribution to political philosophy in its own right. It makes a stimulating and challenging contribution to the areas of politics, political philosophy, ethics, political and social theory, the history of political thought, and the history of ideas. (shrink)

W. J. Mander provides a brief introduction to and critical assessment of the thought of the greatest of the British Idealist philosophers, F. H. Bradley (1846-1924), whose work has been largely neglected in this century. After a general introduction to Bradley's metaphysics and its logical foundations, Mander shows that much of Bradley's philosophy has been seriously misunderstood. Mander argues that any adequate treatment of Bradley's thought must take full account of his unique dual inheritance from the traditions of British empiricism (...) and Hegelian rationalism. The scholarship of recent years is assessed, and new interpretations are offered of Bradley's views about truth, predication, and relations, and of his arguments for idealism. (shrink)

Through clear explanation of its characteristic concepts and doctrines, and paying close attention to the published works of its philosophers, the volume ...

In this study, W. J. Waluchow argues that debates between defenders and critics of constitutional bills of rights presuppose that constitutions are more or less rigid entities. Within such a conception, constitutions aspire to establish stable, fixed points of agreement and pre-commitment, which defenders consider to be possible and desirable, while critics deem impossible and undesirable. Drawing on reflections about the nature of law, constitutions, the common law, and what it is to be a democratic representative, Waluchow urges a different (...) theory of bills of rights that is flexible and adaptable. Adopting such a theory enables one not only to answer to critics' most serious challenges, but also to appreciate the role that a bill of rights, interpreted and enforced by unelected judges, can sensibly play in a constitutional democracy. (shrink)

Burgess, J.P. and Rosen, G. Subject with No ObjectElliott, R.Faking Nature.

W. J. Mander examines the nature of idealist ethics, that is to say, the form and content of ethical belief most typically adopted by philosophical idealists. His inquiry has two aims. The first is historical: from the record of past philosophy, Mander demonstrates that there exists a discernible idealist approach to moral philosophy; a tradition of 'idealist ethics', and examines its characteristic marks and varieties. The second aim is apologetic. He argues that such idealist ethics offers an attractive way of (...) looking at moral questions and that it has much to contribute to contemporary discussion. In particular he argues that Idealist ethics have the power to cut through the sterile opposition between moral realism and moral anti-realism. To be an idealist is precisely to hold that the universe is so constituted that things are real if and only if they are ideal; to hold that uncovering in something the work of mind makes it more not less significant. (shrink)

Most of what has been written about Buber and education tend to be studies of two kinds: theoretical studies of his philosophical views on education, and specific case studies that aim at putting theory into practice. The perspective taken has always been to hold a dialogue with Buber's works in order to identify and analyse critically Buber's views and, in some cases, to put them into practice; that is, commentators dialogue with the text. In this article our aims are of (...) a different kind. First and fundamentally, we demonstrate the political and social ontological basis of Buber's thought; that is, we show that Buber, the philosopher of dialogue, held an authentic dialogue with his time, and demonstrate that Buber's work, in this case I and Thou, holds a dialogue with its Zeitgeist; that is the text dialogues with its Zeitgeist. This approach leads us to our second aim, which is to demonstrate that Buber's thought remains relevant to our times, particularly when it serves as a dialogical educational tool with which to resolve conflict of all types and to aid dialogue towards peace in inter‐community relations. (shrink)

There exist important deductive systems, such as the non-normal modal logics, that are not proper subjects of classical algebraic logic in the sense that their metatheory cannot be reduced to the equational metatheory of any particular class of algebras. Nevertheless, most of these systems are amenable to the methods of universal algebra when applied to the matrix models of the system. In the present paper we consider a wide class of deductive systems of this kind called protoalgebraic logics. These include (...) almost all (non-pathological) systems of prepositional logic that have occurred in the literature. The relationship between the metatheory of a protoalgebraic logic and its matrix models is studied. The following results are obtained for any finite matrix model U of a filter-distributive protoalgebraic logic : (I) The extension U of is finitely axiomatized (provided has only finitely many inference rules); (II) U has only finitely many extensions. (shrink)

Klaus Alpers has recently recovered from the obscurity of Byzantine lexica the fragments of what appears to be a novel dating from c. A.D. 100, and notable to us, as it was for the Byzantine excerptor, for the elegant verbal borrowings from ancient comedy, always a favourite source of good Attic Greek for the atticists of imperial times. One of these glosses gives occasion to look again at fishing metaphors for erotic business, a subject discussed often enough by scholars, but (...) still perhaps capable of revealing new nuances. These hunting and fishing metaphors are used as one would expect in many non-amatory contexts, but in both love poetry and its allied genres they occur throughout antiquity in such quantity that the metaphorical complexity reaches into very allusive language. Long ago Preston had already pointed out that ‘Figures from hunting, fowling and fishing as parallel to the arts of the meretrix, are very frequent, and are developed at unusual length.’ There was undoubtedly a realistic side to all of this metaphorical hunting. ‘The lover is a fish to be baked, as long he has juice in him’, says the bawd at Plautus, Asinaria 177, and one needs little imagination to realize what plays can be made on such a theme, and indeed were made at all levels throughout antiquity. (shrink)