This essay explores the astronomical works of Pierre de Lille, a little-known French participant in the debates on calendar reform during the Fifth Lateran Council (1512–1517). It argues that astrological ideas coupled with eschatological beliefs motivated his astronomical propositions to reform the Julian calendar. De Lille conceived the calendar solar year as a unit of a great cosmic year spanning 7,153 years, the duration that he assigned to the now-obsolete theory of the motion of trepidation (...) of the eighth sphere. Although his use of this astronomical model for astrological speculations about world chronology was not new, de Lille gave an original and bold reply to Pico della Mirandola’s devastating critique of astrology. The astronomical model and its astrological implications were eventually contested at the court and in academia in France, but the alliance of chronology, astrology, and apocalypticism was to play a major role during the second half of the sixteenth century in Lutheran thought. (shrink)

We discuss the astronomical underpinning of the improved calendar of 1700. Starting from the astronomical motivation of the Gregorian calendar of 1582 and the rejection of this reform in Protestant states in Europe, we describe how the astronomical Easter reckoning based on Kepler’s Rudolphine tables led to the foundation of Berlin Observatory and enabled the founding of the Electoral Brandenburg Society of Sciences, which had to finance itself through a calendar monopoly.

Some twenty years after the Gregorian calendar reform, towards the end of his life, François Viète published his own calendar proposal. This treatise contains a sharp attack against the Jesuit scholar Clavius, the mathematical mind behind the reform. Understandably enough, Clavius prepared a negative reply. Viète heard of it and exploded in a fit of rage, ``I demonstrated that you are a false mathematician [... ], and a false theologian.'' Sadly, Clavius' rejection, added as a chapter (...) to his monumental apology of the Gregorian reform, appeared when Viète had already passed away.Viète seriously believed that the true aim of the Gregorian reform has been betrayed and he was furious about some logical inconsistencies which he claimed to have found in Clavius' calendar. Clavius apparently confused solar day and epactal day (or ``tithi''), the thirtieth part of a lunar month. This is the very core of Viète's attack against Clavius whom he accused of having introduced a false lunar period (``falsa periodus lunaris''). But his own work has some logical inconsistencies too. For instance, he reproaches Clavius for having introduced lunar months of 31 days which, indeed, are unrealistic. Grievously, his own rules can likewise give rise to lunations of unnatural lengths.In order to understand these subtle twists reader and author must work largely through both Clavius and Viète's methods of Easter reckoning. The fruit of all those efforts might be an insight into Viète's clear mathematical thinking. His calendar, however, was never considered. (shrink)

Helisaeus Roeslin’s manuscript Speculum et harmonia mundi, Das ist Wellt Spiegel Erster Theil was conceived as part of a broader project comprising a Speculum ecclesiae as well as a Speculum naturae. This project was connected with a Chronology aiming to establish the precise date of the most important events in history as well as to advance some conjectures about the approaching eschatological future. This article presents some recent discoveries that shed new light on Roeslin’s chronological work after 1579, most importantly (...) the incontrovertible attribution to Roeslin of the anonymous manuscript De potestatibus orbis Christiani, et politicis et ecclesiasticis, Discursus. Here Roeslin presented his discovery of the numerical proportions governing the numbers of spiritual and temporal potestates in the three historical periods, affirming that these numbers were now nearly fullfilled, along with their ensuing eschatological implications. We show how Roeslin published this discovery in his Kurtz Bedencken against the calendar reform and again in 1612 in a short tract on the occasion of the coronation of Emperor Matthias I. The article focuses in particular on the appended broadsheet Tabella des Welt Spiegels, which displayed the completion and culmination of history, according to the astronomical revolutions of the planets as well as the numbers of temporal and spiritual governors. (shrink)

The trigonometric table and its construction principles were introduced to China as part of calendar reform, spear-headed by Xu Guangqi in the late 1620s to early 1630s. Chinese scholars attempted and succeeded in uncovering how the construction principles were established in the seventeenth century and then in the eighteenth century expanded to include more algorithms to compute the values of trigonometric lines. Successful as they were in discoursing the construction principles, most Chinese scholars did not actually construct trigonometric (...) tables anew. In the early nineteenth century, a revolutionary approach was developed, which resembles computing a finite sum of power series to trigonometric functions of an arbitrary arc less than a one-half circle. Though hailed by many modern historians as Chinese achievements in developing “infinite series” of trigonometric functions, this approach was viewed by the actors at the time as a quick means to construct trigonometric tables. Interestingly, even with these “quick” methods, no trigonometric table was constructed. Besides the fact that constructing a trigonometric table afresh is a time-consuming business, the classification of the trigonometric table and their construction principles into different genres of knowledge by scholars offers an additional explanation of drastically uneven treatment of trigonometric tables and their construction principles. (shrink)

Katelis Viglas’ book: Jeremiah II Tranos. Archbishop of Constantinople, New Rome and Ecumenical Patriarch (1536-1595) is a historical-theological description and analysis of the most important data and facts concerning the life and works of Jeremiah II Tranos, Patriarch of Constantinople in the 16th century. The book consists of a Prologue, which refers to the aim of the treatise and the method followed. In the Introduction there is a general outline of the era of Jeremiah II and its origins, as well (...) as a brief presentation of his contribution to the Greek Genus. The First Chapter is divided into three subchapters. The first subchapter provides a brief overview of the history of the birthplace of Jeremiah II, Anchialos, a city on the shores of the Black Sea, and describes patriarch’s character and education, along with an extensive reference to his teachers. In this subchapter information is included relative to Jeremiah’s life until his ordination as Metropolitan of Larissa. The second subchapter briefly narrates the glorious ordination of Jeremiah II to Patriarch of Constantinople. In the third subchapter of the First Chapter, the three breaks during Jeremiah II’ patriarchate –caused by the selfish ambitions of his competitors, who coveted the patriarchal throne– are recounted. The Second Chapter consists of four subchapters. In the first subchapter there are a brief reference to the life and religious beliefs of the founder of the Reformation, Martin Luther, and the interest and curiosity of the Lutherans in the situation of the Eastern Orthodox Church. The second subchapter of the Second Chapter contains biographical details of the Protestant scholar and philhellene Philip Melanchthon, and a reference to the first contact attempt of Lutherans with the Patriarchate of Constantinople. The third subchapter of the Second Chapter is divided into six other subsections. The first section of the third subchapter describes the way the relationships of the Lutheran theologians of Tubingen with Patriarch Jeremiah II developed and to the starting point of their correspondence. Yet, the Philhellenism of the German Hellenist Martin Crusius and the role he played in the correspondence are highlighted. The second section outlines Jeremiah II’ responses to each article of the Augsburg Confession send to him by the Tubingen theologians. The third section highlights the key points of the reply of the Tubingen theologians to the First Answer from Jeremiah II. The third section refers to the Second Answer from Jeremiah II. In the short fifth section there is a reference to the reply of the Tubingen theologians to the Second and the Third Answer from Jeremiah II. The sixth section provides information related to the publication of that correspondence. In the fourth subchapter of the Second Chapter there are general and evaluative judgments on the correspondence between Jeremiah II and the Tubingen theologians. The Third Chapter is divided into five subchapters. The first subchapter explains the ancient Roman calendars of Numa and Julius Caesar and their shortcomings. The second subchapter presents the findings of these imperfections by various scholars. The third subchapter describes the Gregorian Reform of the calendar. The fourth subchapter analyses the social situation within the Orthodox Church during the Gregorian Reform. The fifth subchapter aims to show the orthodox reaction of Jeremiah II to the Gregorian calendar and its causes. The Fourth Chapter is divided into two subchapters, of which the first is related to Jeremiah’s travels in Poland and the regulation by him of Church life in this country, while the second gives an overview of the circumstances, under which the foundation of the Russian Patriarchate took place. The Fifth Chapter is divided into three subchapters. The first subchapter examines Jeremiah II’s concern on various issues. The second subchapter deals with Jeremiah II’ concern on the education of the Greek Genus. The third subchapter explains the attitude of Jeremiah II towards the Pontifical Greek College in Rome. At the end of the treatise there is an Epilogue, with concluding remarks on the evaluation of the historical figure of Jeremiah II, his spiritual identity and the status of the Orthodox East under his leadership. An extensive Bibliography, a Chronology, an Index of Names, 21 Illustrations and 2 Maps, complete the book. (shrink)

The 1924 Church reform, through which the Romanian Orthodox Church decided to adopt the Revised Julian Calendar, led to dissent movements, mostly comprised of peasants, especially in the villages of Moldavia and Bessarabia. Considering the calendar change a heresy, these groups soon developed into religious communities that came to be known as Old Calendarists, or “stylists,” followers of “the old-style calendar.” Led by defrocked priests and monks who rejected the reform, the groups very quickly became (...) the target of the secret police and the Gendarmerie. What also drew the attention of the authorities and the Orthodox Church was that women, especially the younger ones, seemed to play important roles within the communities, not only in terms of membership, but also in preserving and spreading the Old Calendarists’ beliefs and religious ideas. As many members of the communities were being arrested, and their churches were destroyed, these women also suffered imprisonment, monastic incarceration, or were forced to hide from the authorities in caves or huts that they built in the woods. Though subjected to various forms of persecution, which continued through the communist period, the majority of them held strong to their beliefs and contributed to the forging of a religious identity. Using archival documents, in the forms of letters, postcards, photos, and declarations as primary sources, and drawing on interviews conducted with contemporary nuns and members of the Old Calendarist communities, the present article explores the personal stories of young Old Calendarist women. Building upon the work of Anca Șincan, this article challenges the notion that transmission of religion was the exclusive prerogative of older women. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Thinking with Heidegger:Rethinking Environmental Theory and PracticeKevin Michael DeLuca (bio)Environmentalism is tired. It is a movement both institutionalized and insipid. The vast majority of Americans claim to be environmentalists while buying ever more SUVs, leaf-blowers, and uncountable plastic consumer goods. Indeed, environmentalism itself has become just another practice of consumerism, a matter of buying Audubon memberships, Ansel Adams calendars, and 'biodegradable' plastic bags with one's Sierra Club credit card. (...) As a practice of everyday life, environmentalism has devolved into another lifestyle choice.On the political front, carbon-copy blow-dried presidential candidates proclaim their allegiance to the environment, an allegiance that is more a sign of fealty to opinion polls than a concern with environmental issues. In the world of real-politic, environmental regulations are gutted as corporations write legislation for the politicians they have bought. Outspent and outmaneuvered, mainstream environmental groups preach at the altar of broken promises about the potential of lobbying and insider access while awaiting the blandishments of the next candidate. As [End Page 67] a political practice, mainstream environmentalism has degenerated into a marginal special-interest group.On the intellectual front, a confusing array of reform environmentalists, deep ecologists, social ecologists, ecofeminists, wilderness advocates, social justice activists, social constructionists, and Christian ecologists offer a cacophony of competing paradigms and programs while exchanging charges and countercharges of wrong-headedness and infidelity. If on the level of practice an exhausted environmentalism has achieved both institutionalism and irrelevance, intellectually environmentalism has reached several stasis points. This is crucial, for at a level that is unusual for social movements, environmentalism has always highlighted the importance of how we think about the environment, that ideas of nature are powerful because practices follow from ideas. In other words, how we think about nature guides how we act toward nature. In the midst of this melee I want to suggest we reconsider the work of Martin Heidegger.I want to think Heidegger in distress: in the distress of machination; in the distress of the technological enframing of the earth; in the distress of the environmental crisis. In rejecting a Heideggerian hermeneutics, a piety to textual exegesis, I hope to stress Heidegger in order to stress environmental theory. With few exceptions,1 two insufficient responses typify the reception of Heidegger in environmental thinking. One is to champion Heidegger as some proto-environmentalist. Certainly, quotes from such works as Being and Time, Contributions to Philosophy: From Enowning, "The Question Concerning Technology," "Building Dwelling Thinking," and "The Age of the World Picture" inspire such a reading. Such readings, however, present a simplified Heidegger. For example, a poor reading of an essay such as "The Question Concerning Technology" produces the conclusion that Heidegger was anti-technology.2 These misreadings are not merely accidental but a result of the goal of the citation. The challenge of Heidegger is not engaged to develop environmental theory; rather, Heidegger is cited to lend some borrowed legitimacy to the fledgling enterprise. The most prominent example of this move occurs in Devall and Sessions' Deep Ecology, wherein Heidegger joins a potpourri of thinkers, including Dogen, Job, St. Francis of Assisi, Giordano Bruno, Spinoza, Thoreau, Chief Seattle, Herman Melville, John Muir, Aldous Huxley, Gandhi, Rainer Maria Rilke, Aldo Leopold, Robinson Jeffers, Mary Austin, Rachel Carson, Barry Commoner, Stanley Diamond, and [End Page 68] David Brower from a host of traditions, including Taoism, Hinduism, Zen Buddhism, Christianity, Native American thought, Romanticism, and ecological science (1985, 79–108). The result is confusion, at best.On the other hand, in a second response Heidegger serves as a kind of bogeyman, a Nazi used to tar the more radical environmental groups. The syllogism is simple and simplistic: Deep Ecologists are bio/ecocentric; Deep Ecologists quote Heidegger; Heidegger was a Nazi; Therefore, Deep Ecologists are Nazis/fascists. (To push this thinking to its logical extreme, then, all nonanthropocentric thinking is fascist.) Both responses may be useful for polemics but serve to prevent a possibly productive exploration of Heidegger for the engagement of the difficult problems that have stumped environmentalism on multiple levels.Violating HeideggerAs a prefatory word, even a cursory glance at Heidegger's work reveals him to be a thinker who... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Thinking with Heidegger:Rethinking Environmental Theory and PracticeKevin Michael DeLuca (bio)Environmentalism is tired. It is a movement both institutionalized and insipid. The vast majority of Americans claim to be environmentalists while buying ever more SUVs, leaf-blowers, and uncountable plastic consumer goods. Indeed, environmentalism itself has become just another practice of consumerism, a matter of buying Audubon memberships, Ansel Adams calendars, and 'biodegradable' plastic bags with one's Sierra Club credit card. (...) As a practice of everyday life, environmentalism has devolved into another lifestyle choice.On the political front, carbon-copy blow-dried presidential candidates proclaim their allegiance to the environment, an allegiance that is more a sign of fealty to opinion polls than a concern with environmental issues. In the world of real-politic, environmental regulations are gutted as corporations write legislation for the politicians they have bought. Outspent and outmaneuvered, mainstream environmental groups preach at the altar of broken promises about the potential of lobbying and insider access while awaiting the blandishments of the next candidate. As [End Page 67] a political practice, mainstream environmentalism has degenerated into a marginal special-interest group.On the intellectual front, a confusing array of reform environmentalists, deep ecologists, social ecologists, ecofeminists, wilderness advocates, social justice activists, social constructionists, and Christian ecologists offer a cacophony of competing paradigms and programs while exchanging charges and countercharges of wrong-headedness and infidelity. If on the level of practice an exhausted environmentalism has achieved both institutionalism and irrelevance, intellectually environmentalism has reached several stasis points. This is crucial, for at a level that is unusual for social movements, environmentalism has always highlighted the importance of how we think about the environment, that ideas of nature are powerful because practices follow from ideas. In other words, how we think about nature guides how we act toward nature. In the midst of this melee I want to suggest we reconsider the work of Martin Heidegger.I want to think Heidegger in distress: in the distress of machination; in the distress of the technological enframing of the earth; in the distress of the environmental crisis. In rejecting a Heideggerian hermeneutics, a piety to textual exegesis, I hope to stress Heidegger in order to stress environmental theory. With few exceptions,1 two insufficient responses typify the reception of Heidegger in environmental thinking. One is to champion Heidegger as some proto-environmentalist. Certainly, quotes from such works as Being and Time, Contributions to Philosophy: From Enowning, "The Question Concerning Technology," "Building Dwelling Thinking," and "The Age of the World Picture" inspire such a reading. Such readings, however, present a simplified Heidegger. For example, a poor reading of an essay such as "The Question Concerning Technology" produces the conclusion that Heidegger was anti-technology.2 These misreadings are not merely accidental but a result of the goal of the citation. The challenge of Heidegger is not engaged to develop environmental theory; rather, Heidegger is cited to lend some borrowed legitimacy to the fledgling enterprise. The most prominent example of this move occurs in Devall and Sessions' Deep Ecology, wherein Heidegger joins a potpourri of thinkers, including Dogen, Job, St. Francis of Assisi, Giordano Bruno, Spinoza, Thoreau, Chief Seattle, Herman Melville, John Muir, Aldous Huxley, Gandhi, Rainer Maria Rilke, Aldo Leopold, Robinson Jeffers, Mary Austin, Rachel Carson, Barry Commoner, Stanley Diamond, and [End Page 68] David Brower from a host of traditions, including Taoism, Hinduism, Zen Buddhism, Christianity, Native American thought, Romanticism, and ecological science (1985, 79–108). The result is confusion, at best.On the other hand, in a second response Heidegger serves as a kind of bogeyman, a Nazi used to tar the more radical environmental groups. The syllogism is simple and simplistic: Deep Ecologists are bio/ecocentric; Deep Ecologists quote Heidegger; Heidegger was a Nazi; Therefore, Deep Ecologists are Nazis/fascists. (To push this thinking to its logical extreme, then, all nonanthropocentric thinking is fascist.) Both responses may be useful for polemics but serve to prevent a possibly productive exploration of Heidegger for the engagement of the difficult problems that have stumped environmentalism on multiple levels.Violating HeideggerAs a prefatory word, even a cursory glance at Heidegger's work reveals him to be a thinker who... (shrink)

Abraham Fraunce’s The Shepherds’ Logic (c. 1585) is one of the first English adaptations of Petrus Ramus’s Dialecticae libri duo (1556). Preserved in a manuscript also containing two shorter essays on Ramist dialectic, the work was later modified and enlarged for publication as The Lawyers’ Logic (1588). But Fraunce’s substantial and almost exclusive use of Edmund Spenser’s The Shepherds’ Calendar (1579) as the source for practical examples makes the manuscript treatise a unique document revealing the influence of the Ramist (...) reform of the arts of discourse on the new literary elite led by Philip Sidney and Gabriel Harvey. This is the first published critical edition of Fraunce’s early treatise and the two companion essays. It presents the texts in modernized spelling, traces their sources and contexts, and draws out their literary and philosophical implications. It also includes relevant excerpts from The Lawyers’ Logic, such as Fraunce’s quantitative-verse translation of Virgil’s Second Eclogue and its Ramist analysis, and a full catalogue of the quotations from Spenser’s Calendar. As a whole, this edition sees Fraunce’s pastoral logic as a first-hand testimony showing how scholarly training in the Renaissance arts of discourse enlightened the composition and interpretation of poetic texts. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Dr. Ambedkar and Untouchability: Fighting the Indian Caste SystemChristopher S. QueenDr. Ambedkar and Untouchability: Fighting the Indian Caste System. By Christophe Jaffrelot. New York: Columbia University Press, 2005. xiii + 205 pp.Outside of India, Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar remains virtually unknown. Everyone knows that Mahatma Gandhi led the fight for Indian independence and that his nonviolent marches inspired Dr. King and the American civil rights movement. Most educated men (...) and women have heard of Nehru and some of the political and literary figures that India has produced in modern times. But few know of the first Untouchable to attend college, who went on to earn advanced degrees in the social sciences and law at Columbia University, the London School of Economics, and Grays Inn, who returned to India in the 1920s to launch a civil rights movement for Untouchables, [End Page 168] who drafted the constitution for the Republic of India as its first law minister, and who led a mass conversion to Buddhism weeks before this death.Dr. B. R. Ambedkar (1891–1956) is venerated by millions of Buddhist and low-caste followers in India today, and at the same time feared by politicians determined to preserve the Hindu caste system he vowed to destroy. Admirers call him Babasaheb Ambedkar or simply Baba, using a traditional term of respect for a guiding elder, and many use the greeting Jai Bhim (“Victory to Bhimrao”) within the Untouchable communities. Ambedkar is portrayed on ubiquitous wall calendars, public statues, and home altars alongside that of the Buddha, wearing a Western suit and tie, with the horn-rimmed glasses and pocket pens of a scholar and diplomat. Although widely regarded as a bodhisattva or Buddhist saint, he is never pictured in the robes of a holy man or entreated in prayer by his devotees. And while most of his campaigns for Untouchable human rights were driven back by the Hindu nationalists, many of the provisions of his path-breaking legislation were eventually adopted after his death. In the intervening decades, amid deepening polarization over his legacy, the state government of Maharashtra has published eighteen volumes of Ambedkar’s collected works and the government of India has bestowed on him its highest civilian honor, the Bharat Ratna.Given the dearth of Western scholarship on Ambedkar’s place in the history of modern India and the emergence of socially engaged Buddhism, I welcome Chris-tophe Jaffrelot’s Dr. Ambedkar and Untouchability: Fighting the Indian Caste System. As a social scientist and director of the Centre d’Études et de Recherches Internatio-nales (CERI) who has published more than a dozen books on South Asian politics, Jaffrelot is well qualified to assess Ambedkar’s life and thought. Drawing on a wide range of materials on the social reform movements of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and Ambedkar’s contributions to sociology and politics, the author aims to redress Ambedkar’s neglect by Indian scholars before the 1990s, when the low-caste movement began finally to gain traction. However, he does not address the anomaly of Ambedkar’s neglect by all but a small circle of Western authors.1The strength of Dr. Ambedkar and Untouchability is its concise analysis of the geographical, political, and social context of Ambedkar’s career. Jaffrelot shows how British recruitment of the Mahars, members of Ambedkar’s lowly but numerous caste, for service in the colonial army resulted in disproportionate levels of literacy. Ambedkar was the fourteenth child in such a military family, whose father held the rank of major and served as a school master for the barracks. Both parents and all of Bhimrao’s uncles could read and write, compared to less than one percent of Mahars in village life. Moreover, in spite of his brilliance and determination, Ambedkar could not have continued his education without the financial support of Maratha maharajahs who opposed the Brahmins’ monopoly in education. “Ambedkar was the heir to a regional tradition; his struggle harked back to the anti-Brahmin movements which emerged in western Maharashtra from the mid-nineteenth century onward, a precocity that only the Dravidian South—the other key area of anti-Brahmin mobilization—could match.”Jaffrelot presents... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Montaigne on Witches and the Authority of Religion in the Public SphereBrian RibeiroThe pleasure in reading Michel de Montaigne, the French Counter-Reformer and fideistic skeptic, is due in no small part to the ways in which he so frequently defeats our expectations. The surprises occur at several levels, beginning with the very titles of his essays, which frequently have little to do with the topics he actually discusses. Who, (...) for example, would expect an essay titled "Of Three Good Women" (II.35) to praise the three women for their variously successful attempts at committing suicide—and little else? Or who would expect an essay with the innocent title "On Some Verses of Virgil" (II.5) to be richly confessional, as well as very explicitly sexual? Or, as one final example, who would expect an essay "Of Cripples" (II.11) to either (a) discuss the witch trials or (b) discuss cripples principally in terms of whether the lame make better sexual partners?The surprises are not confined to the formal features of Montaigne's text, but also appear in the views he articulates. We would not expect an early modern Frenchman to write so sympathetically and even admiringly about the cannibals of the New World (I.31). Nor would we expect an early modern French Catholic to write in opposition to the witch trials. Montaigne does both—with incredible finesse. But despite the attractively progressive attitude seemingly manifested in these two stances, Montaigne's overall view is in fact far more conservative and quietistic than we might expect, were we judging based only on these few cases. And so he surprises us yet again: We are surprised to find him opposing the witch trials, and we are surprised a second time to find that his opposition does not signal any deeper tendency toward progressive or politically liberal views. In short, there is good reason [End Page 235] to see Montaigne's general stance as firmly traditional. While he sometimes expresses apparently progressive views, he does so in a way that has no stable basis in his overall conceptual scheme, as I will argue. Of course, merely observing this tension in Montaigne's work is nothing new. Hugo Friedrich, writing in 1949, and discussing II.11, claimed that "Montaigne bravely takes a position against the delusion of the masses and against clerical fanaticism."1 But in the same passage (and elsewhere) Friedrich shows himself to be well-aware that this apparent radicalism is balanced by Montaigne's conservatism.2 That tension—in a nutshell—encapsulates the debate.3 However, "Of Cripples" presents this tension in its most perplexing form, making a detailed analysis of II.11 our best hope of making progress on the debate.4To support these claims I propose to offer a careful textual analysis of Montaigne's discussion of the witch trials in "Of Cripples."5 After considering several philosophical interpretations of his key Augustinian principle, I will argue that Montaigne's critique of the witch trials is primarily driven by problems internal to the religious perspective, and so does not represent an attempt to circumscribe the authority of religion in the public sphere more generally.6 Such a position, then, is both traditional and quietistic—another of Montaigne's surprises for his readers. If this is correct, then one of the principal texts used for promoting a "liberal" Montaigne—namely, II.11—can be be reappropriated by the defenders of a "quietistic" Montaigne. Nonetheless, even on my reading, there remain some incompletely resolved tensions. That, perhaps, is no less than we should expect from history's only self-proclaimed "accidental philosopher."7IMontaigne opens "Of Cripples" by discussing the Gregorian reform of the calendar, which had been adopted in France in 1582. Yet as odd as this opening is, it serves to quickly introduce a familiar theme in the Essays: Even so basic a matter as the calendar is subject to "[s] o much uncertainty"—just like everything else—that "we are every day in doubt" about how to "keep a record of past events" (F, pp. 784–85). These thoughts are then quickly transformed into a skeptical reflection on human reason itself... (shrink)

The hour-galss.--Anomalies of the seasons and days.--The reform of the calendar.--The stars and the daughters of the sun.--The masters of time at work.--Einstein or Bergson?--Strange consequences of the relativity of time.

Summary Syriac translations and Syriac scholars played an important role in the transmission of the sciences, including the mathematical sciences, from the Greek to the Arabic world. Relatively little, unfortunately, remains of the translations and original mathematical works of earlier Syriac scholars, but some materials have survived, and further glimpses of what once existed may be gained from works of later authors. The paper will provide an overview of the earlier materials that have survived or are known to have existed. (...) This will be followed by an account of some of the later materials, which will include an example illustrating how further earlier materials can be recovered from the writings of later authors, and a mention, by way of an epilogue, of an instance where a Syriac scholar was involved in a major historical and scientific event in the West, namely the reform of the calendar by Gregory XIII. (shrink)

This paper takes as its focus efforts to address particular aspects of sexist oppression and its intersections, in a particular field: it discusses reform efforts in philosophy. In recent years, there has been a growing international movement to change the way that our profession functions and is structured, in order to make it more welcoming for members of marginalized groups. One especially prominent and successful form of justification for these reform efforts has drawn on empirical data regarding implicit (...) biases and their effects. Here, we address two concerns about these empirical data. First, critics have for some time argued that the studies drawn upon cannot give us an accurate picture of the workings of prejudice, because they ignore the intersectional nature of these phenomena. More recently, concerns have been raised about the empirical data supporting the nature and existence of implicit bias. Each of these concerns, but perhaps more commonly the latter, are thought by some to undermine reform efforts in philosophy. In this paper, we take a three- pronged approach to these claims. First, we show that the reforms can be motivated quite independently of the implicit bias data, and that many of these reforms are in fact very well suited to dealing with intersectional worries. Next, we show that in fact the empirical concerns about the implicit bias data are not nearly as problematic as some have thought. Finally, we argue that while the intersectional concerns are an immensely valuable criticism of early work on implicit bias, more recent work is starting to address these worries. (shrink)

This paper takes as its focus efforts to address particular aspects of sexist oppression and its intersections, in a particular field: it discusses reform efforts in philosophy. In recent years, there has been a growing international movement to change the way that our profession functions and is structured, in order to make it more welcoming for members of marginalized groups. One especially prominent and successful form of justification for these reform efforts has drawn on empirical data regarding implicit (...) biases and their effects. Here, we address two concerns about these empirical data. First, critics have for some time argued that the studies drawn upon cannot give us an accurate picture of the workings of prejudice, because they ignore the intersectional nature of these phenomena. More recently, concerns have been raised about the empirical data supporting the nature and existence of implicit bias. Each of these concerns, but perhaps more commonly the latter, are thought by some to undermine reform efforts in philosophy. In this paper, we take a three-pronged approach to these claims. First, we show that the reforms can be motivated quite independently of the implicit bias data, and that many of these reforms are in fact very well suited to dealing with intersectional worries. Next, we show that in fact the empirical concerns about the implicit bias data are not nearly as problematic as some have thought. Finally, we argue that while the intersectional concerns are an immensely valuable criticism of early work on implicit bias, more recent work is starting to address these worries. (shrink)

Health care reform that includes universal coverage could lower a major barrier to care for people of color and ethnic minorities—the inability to pay for care. But universal coverage alone, even with comparable fee-for-service payment or appropriately risk-adjusted capitated reimbursement, will not eradicate the racial and ethnic inequities in health care delivery. Restrictive admissions practices, geographic inaccessibility, culture, racial stereotypes, and the failure to employ minority health care professionals will still create barriers to minority health care. In addition to (...) universal financing, health care reform should include new civil rights legislation to address and reduce these noneconomic barriers to minority health care. (shrink)

Debates over health care have focused for so long on economics that the proper goals for medicine seem to be taken for granted; yet problems in health care stem as much from a lack of agreement about the goals and priorities of medicine as from the way systems function. This book asks basic questions about the purposes and ends of medicine and shows that the answers have practical implications for future health care delivery, medical research, and the education of medical (...) students. The Hastings Center coordinated teams of physicians, nurses, public health experts, philosophers, theologians, politicians, health care administrators, social workers, and lawyers in fourteen countries to explore these issues. In this volume, they articulate four basic goals of medicine — prevention of disease, relief of suffering, care of the ill, and avoidance of premature death — and examine them in light of the cultural, political, and economic pressures under which medicine functions. In reporting these findings, the contributors touch on a wide range of diverse issues such as genetic technology, Chinese medicine, care of the elderly, and prevention and public health. The Goals of Medicine clearly demonstrates the importance of clarifying the purposes of medicine before attempting to change the economic and organizational systems. It warns that without such examination, any reform efforts may be fruitless. (shrink)

Health care reform that includes universal coverage could lower a major barrier to care for people of color and ethnic minorities—the inability to pay for care. But universal coverage alone, even with comparable fee-for-service payment or appropriately risk-adjusted capitated reimbursement, will not eradicate the racial and ethnic inequities in health care delivery. Restrictive admissions practices, geographic inaccessibility, culture, racial stereotypes, and the failure to employ minority health care professionals will still create barriers to minority health care. In addition to (...) universal financing, health care reform should include new civil rights legislation to address and reduce these noneconomic barriers to minority health care. (shrink)

"The picture of Hume clinging timidly to a raft of custom and artifice, because, poor skeptic, he has no alternative, is wrong," writes John Stewart. "Hume was confident that by experience and reflection philosophers can achieve true principles." In this revisionary work Stewart surveys all of David Hume's major writings to reveal him as a liberal moral and political philosopher. Against the background of seventeenth-and eighteenth-century history and thought, Hume emerges as a proponent not of conservatism but of reform. (...) Stewart first presents the dilemma over morals in the modern natural-law school, then examines the new approach to moral and political philosophy adopted by Hume's precursors Shaftesbury, Mandeville, Hutcheson, and Butler. Illuminating Hume's explanation of the standards and rules that should govern private and public life, the author challenges interpretations of Hume's philosophy as conservative by demonstrating that he did not dismiss reason as a key factor determining right and wrong in moral and political contexts. Stewart goes on to show that Hume viewed private property, the market, contracts, and the rule of law as essential to genuine civilized society, and explores Hume's criticism of contemporary British beliefs concerning government, religion, commerce, international relations, and social structure. Originally published in 1992. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)

Many argue that an important goal of campaign finance reform should be to ensure that competing candidates have roughly equal financial resources with which to contest campaigns. Although there are...

Here I set the stage for developing a Kantian account of punishment attuned to social and economic injustice and to the need for prison reform. I argue that we cannot appreciate Kant's own discussion of punishment unless we read it in light of the theory of justice of which it is a part and the fundamental commitments of that theory to freedom, autonomy and equality. As important, we cannot properly evaluate Kant's advocacy of the law of retribution unless we (...) recognize his theory of justice as an ideal theory. Once we understand both Kant's larger account of justice and its relationship to his less basic commitments, we discover grounds to accept that larger theory, but reject components like the law of retribution with their basis in empirical conclusions we may not share with Kant. We also open the way to develop an account of punishment responsive to social circumstances. (shrink)

At the heart of Kant’s legal-political philosophy lies a liberal, republican ideal of justice understood in terms of private independence (non-domination) and subjection to public laws securing freedom for all citizens as equals. Given this basic commitment of Kant’s, it is puzzling to many that he does not consider democracy a minimal condition on a legitimate state. In addition, many find Kant ideas of reform or improvement of the historical states we have inherited vague and confusing. The aim of (...) this paper is to untangle both puzzles by exploring Kant’s idea of self-governance. I argue that Kant’s idea of self-governance gives us a very good starting point for thinking about how to leave room for a variety of political systems—different ideals—that have grown out of and responding to different contingent historical and cultural circumstances. It also helps us identify those areas where we want to take extra care to build in safeguards to secure stability and to take sufficiently seriously humankind’s truly nasty sides. (shrink)

We stand on the edge of change. The Republican coalition is frayed, and its trusty issues — slash taxes, cut programs, deregulate industry, preach morals — have worn thin. Will the Democrats seize the opportunity and capture the political system? Or will Republicans refresh themselves and win a new lease on power? The contest will center on clashing visions and competing programs; since national health insurance is perhaps the Democrats’ signature program, health reform will be, once again, at the (...) eye of the political storm. (shrink)

The object of this article is to examine, with the work of Jeremy Bentham as the principal example, one strand in the complex pattern of European social theory during the second half of the eighteenth century. This was of course the period not only of the American and French revolutions, but of the culmination of the movements of thought constituting what we know as the Enlightenment. Like all great historical episodes, the Enlightenment was both the fulfilment of long-established processes and (...) the inauguration of new processes of which the fulfilment lay in the future. Thus the seminal ideas of seventeenth-century rationalism realized and perhaps exhausted their potentialities in the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. The ideas with which this article is concerned, however—conveniently grouped and labelled as the ideas of utilitarianism—only began to achieve systematic development in these later decades of the eighteenth century. Within that period—during the first half and more of Bentham's long life—attempts to apply those ideas to the solution of social problems met largely with failure and frustration. Yet unrealized potentialities remained, the realization of which was reserved for a time when the world of the philosophes no longer existed. The movements for social and political reform which have played so large a part in modern history since the French Revolution may be judged in widely differing ways; but whatever the verdict, these movements surely cannot be understood without due consideration of that part of their origins which lies in eighteenth-century utilitarianism. (shrink)

This paper argues that corporate governance reformers in Anglo-American jurisdictions should consider a different approach in their quest for better corporate governance. Traditionally, corporate governance reform has taken a structural approach, tightening the rules around the number of independent directors required on boards and committees and fine-tuning the definition of independence. However, such an approach has failed to achieve effective corporate governance. Moreover, this approach is informed by the arguably discredited assumption that individuals are rational self-interest utility maximizers. This (...) conceptual paper questions why corporate governance scholars and regulators remain uncritical of this assumption and suggests an approach to reform inspired by a different view of human nature. Indeed, incorporating an actor-based approach to reform into existing structures may better achieve effective corporate governance while addressing an unjustified adherence to this flawed assumption. (shrink)

In all probability, future generations will outnumber us by thousands or millions to one. In the aggregate, their interests therefore matter enormously, and anything we can do to steer the future of civilization onto a better trajectory is of tremendous moral importance. This is the guiding thought that defines the philosophy of longtermism. Political science tells us that the practices of most governments are at stark odds with longtermism. But the problems of political short-termism are neither necessary nor inevitable. In (...) principle, the state could serve as a powerful tool for positively shaping the long-term future. In this chapter, we make some suggestions about how to align government incentives with the interests of future generations. First, in Section II, we explain the root causes of political short-termism. Then, in Section III, we propose and defend four institutional reforms that we think would be promising ways to increase the time horizons of governments: 1) government research institutions and archivists; 2) posterity impact assessments; 3) futures assemblies; and 4) legislative houses for future generations. Section IV concludes with five additional reforms that are promising but require further research: to fully resolve the problem of political short-termism we must develop a comprehensive research program on effective longtermist political institutions. (shrink)

Throughout his writings, and particularly in Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason, Kant alludes to the idea that evil is connected to self-deceit, and while numerous commentators regard this as a highly attractive thesis, none have seriously explored it. Kant on Evil, Self-Deception, and Moral Reform addresses this crucial element of Kant's ethical theory. -/- Working with both Kant's core texts on ethics and materials less often cited within scholarship on Kant's practical philosophy (such as Kant's logic lectures), (...) Papish explores the cognitive dimensions of Kant's accounts of evil and moral reform while engaging the most influential -- and often scathing -- of Kant's critics. Her book asks what self-deception is for Kant, why and how it is connected to evil, and how we achieve the self-knowledge that should take the place of self-deceit. (shrink)