Chiefly letters of the Indian philosopher.

At a time when social and ethical responsibilities of companies and CEOs are being increasingly emphasised, this paper examines conduct of social business in a different age and culture to discern features of enduring relevance for ethical business practices today.The personal correspondence of three fourth‐century saints gives insights into their relationships and decision‐making.Community expectations were those of sharing rather than of outright giving, with ‘fusion of interest’ prevailing over concerns for ‘con?ict of interest’. Selected incidents show two entrepreneurial (...) bishops, Basil and Gregory of Nyssa, struggling to balance tensions between ’liberality’ and ‘fairness’.They compromised, competed robustly for revenues and were vexed over limited budgets and resources for projects while their disapproving cousin, the academic Gregory of Nazianzus, criticised their worldliness. Their historical experiences suggest four pragmatic and possibly normative ways of blending altruism and self‐interest for the overall advancement of bene?cial change. (shrink)

At a time when social and ethical responsibilities of companies and CEOs are being increasingly emphasised, this paper examines conduct of social business in a different age and culture to discern features of enduring relevance for ethical business practices today.The personal correspondence of three fourth‐century saints gives insights into their relationships and decision‐making.Community expectations were those of sharing rather than of outright giving, with ‘fusion of interest’ prevailing over concerns for ‘con?ict of interest’. Selected incidents show two entrepreneurial (...) bishops, Basil and Gregory of Nyssa, struggling to balance tensions between ’liberality’ and ‘fairness’.They compromised, competed robustly for revenues and were vexed over limited budgets and resources for projects while their disapproving cousin, the academic Gregory of Nazianzus, criticised their worldliness. Their historical experiences suggest four pragmatic and possibly normative ways of blending altruism and self‐interest for the overall advancement of bene?cial change. (shrink)

The Analysis of Matter is perhaps best known for marking Russell's rejection of phenomenalism and his development of a variety of Lockean representationalism–-Russell's causal theory of perception. This occupies Part 2 of the work. Part 1, which is certainly less well known, contains many observations on twentieth-century physics. Unfortunately, Russell's discussion of relativity and the foundations of physical geometry is carried out in apparent ignorance of Reichenbach's and Carnap's investigations in the same period. The issue of conventionalism in its then (...) contemporary form is simply not discussed. The only writers of the period who appear to have had any influence on Russell's conception of the philosophical issues raised by relativity were Whitehead and Eddington. Even the work of A. A. Robb fails to receive any extended discussion;1 although Robb's causal theory is certainly relevant to many of Russell's concerns, especially those voiced in Part 3, regarding the construction of points and the topology of space-time. In the case of quantum mechanics, the idiosyncrasy of Russell's selection of topics is more understandable, since the Heisenberg and Schrödinger theories were only just discovered. Nevertheless, it seems bizarre to a contemporary reader that Russell should have given such emphasis2 to G. N. Lewis's suggestion that an atom emits light only when there is another atom to receive it–-a suggestion reminiscent of Leibniz, and one to which Russell frequently returns. In short, the philosophical problems of modern physics with which Russell deals seem remote from the perspective of post-positivist philosophy of physics. (shrink)

In the 1960s and 1970s, Hilary Putnam articulated a notion of relativized apriority that was motivated to address the problem of scientific change. This paper examines Putnam’s account in its historical context and in relation to contemporary views. I begin by locating Putnam’s analysis in the historical context of Quine’s rejection of apriority, presenting Putnam as a sympathetic commentator on Quine. Subsequently, I explicate Putnam’s positive account of apriority, focusing on his analysis of the history of physics and (...) geometry. In the remainder of the paper, I explore connections between Putnam’s account of relativized a priori principles and contemporary views. In particular, I situate Putnam’s account in relation to analyses advanced by Michael Friedman, David Stump, and William Wimsatt. From this comparison, I address issues concerning whether a priori scientific principles are appropriately characterized as “constitutive” or “entrenched”. I argue that these two features need to be clearly distinguished, and that only the constitutive function is essential to apriority. By way of conclusion, I explore the relationship between the constitutive function of a priori principles and entrenchment. (shrink)

In The Regulated Economy: A Historical Approach to Political Economy, Claudia Goldin and Gary D. Libecap use case studies to defend and expand upon the notion that elements of civil society—“special interests”—manage to “capture” government regulators and make the state serve their selfish ends. The evidence of the case studies themselves, however, and the occurrence of such anomalies as the deregulatory movement, suggest that government actors often enjoy considerable autonomy in regulating civil society, and that readily manipulable currents in (...) public opinion are also important. (shrink)

The tendency is strong to take the notion of “conflict of interests” for granted as if it had an invariant meaning and an ethical content independent of the historical context. It is doubtful however, from an historical and sociological point of view, that many of the cases now considered as instances of “conflicts of interests” would also have been conceived and perceived as such in, say, the 1930s. The idea of a “conflict of interests” presupposes that there are (...) indeed interests in conflict. Conversely, as long as there is a consensus among the different groups involved, they will not conceive and even less denounce a given practice as being an instance of a “conflict of interests”. In this article we will show that the content of the discussions over conflicts of interests has changed over time in close relation with the transformations of the research system. In other words: there are social conditions for the emergence of “conflicts of interests”. The changing meaning of the notion is assessed by analyzing the presence of the expression “conflicts of interests” in the magazine Science over the past century. Three different meanings emerge and their content has evolved in close link with the changing structure of the relations between the scientific community first with the State and then with industry. It moved from a situation external to the scientific community to a debate going on inside the scientific community generated by the growing relations between university and industries. (shrink)

Why are we interested in history at all? Why do we feel the need to distinguish between past and present? In this book, the author argues that the past originates from an experience of rupture separating past and present. Think of the radical rupture with Europe's past that was effected by the French and the Industrial Revolutions. Sublime Historical Experience investigates how the notion of sublime historical experience complicates and challenges existing conceptions of language, truth, and knowledge. These (...) experiences of rupture are paradoxical since they involve both the separation of past and present and, at the same time, the effort to overcome this separation in terms of historical knowledge. The experience unites feelings of loss/pain with those of love/satisfaction, and thus is in agreement with how sublime experience is ordinarily defined. The experience is also precognitive since it precedes historical knowledge. As such it is a challenge to traditional conceptions of the relationship between experience and truth or language. It compels us to disconnect the notions of experience and truth. (shrink)

It is commonly argued that cultural objects ought to be returned to their place of origin in order to remedy injustices committed in the past. In this paper, it is shown that significant challenges attach to this way of arguing. Although there is considerable intuitive appeal in the idea that if somebody wrongs another person then she ought to compensate for that injustice, the principle is difficult to apply to wrongdoings committed many decades or centuries ago. It is not clear (...) that historic injustices can meaningfully be corrected, or compensated for, and there are several arguments why, even in cases where there is a prima facie moral case for compensation, repatriation might not be a legitimate means of remedy. In order to bring analytical clarity to the issue, this paper discusses the various steps of the argument that must be addressed in order to ground a valid repatriation claim based on historic injustices. (shrink)

Pierre de Fermat is known as the inventor of modern number theory. He invented–improved many methods useful in this discipline. Fermat often claimed to have proved his most difficult theorems thanks to a method of his own invention: the infinite descent. He wrote of numerous applications of this procedure. Unfortunately, he left only one almost complete demonstration and an outline of another demonstration. The outline concerns the theorem that every prime number of the form 4n + 1 is the sum (...) of two squares. In this paper, we analyse a recent proof of this theorem. It is interesting because: it follows all the elements of which Fermat wrote in his outline; it represents a good introduction to all logical nuances and mathematical variants concerning this method of which Fermat spoke. The assertions by Fermat will also be framed inside their historical context. Therefore, the aims of this paper are related to the history of mathematics and to the logic of proof-methods. (shrink)

This article traces the historical co-evolution of microbiology, bacteriology, and virology, framed within industrial and agricultural contexts, as well as their role in colonial and national history between the end of the 19th century and the first decades of the 20th century. The epistemology of germ theory, coupled with the economic interests of European colonies, has shaped the understanding of human-microbial relationships in a reductionist way. We explore a brief history of the medical and biological sciences, focusing on microbes (...) and the difficulty of implementing germ theory outside of biology laboratories. Furthermore, we highlight the work of Lynn Margulis, who conceptualized microbes within their ecological contexts. Such research shows the active role microbes play in handling life-sustaining biological and biochemical processes. We outline how the industrial and technological advancements of the last two centuries not only impacted almost all human societies, but also changed the world on microbial, biological, and geological levels. The narration of these histories is a complex task, and depends on how national, international, and intergovernmental institutions (such as the World Health Organization) conceive of the selective environmental pressures exerted by industry and biotechnological companies. (shrink)

The present study aims to assess the restriction of private ownership on the cultural-historical property based on the public interest and evaluate how this restriction is explained and what restrictions the cultural heritage rules and regulations impose on the private ownership. The present descriptive and analytical study seeks to examine the above-mentioned questions using the library method. Based on the results, statute law has defined a large number of restrictions for the owner including the owner restriction in the (...) obligation to declare, implement protection plans, as well as sale and transfer of the cultural-historical property. Theories such as public interest are considered as the basis for the restriction of ownership on historical-cultural property. (shrink)

Using the concept of social denial, this article puts the American Psychological Association's (APA’s) pattern of willful blindness, identified by independent reviewer David Hoffman, in historical context by examining the contributions of Cold War social scientists to the CIA's KUBARK torture manual, and discusses the implications of this history for the reform of the APA's ethics policies. David Hoffman found that the leadership of the APA colluded with Department of Defense (DoD) to ensure that the APA's ethical policies were (...) no stronger than those issued by the DoD. While the independent reviewer did not find evidence of collaboration between the CIA and the APA, this was not due to a lack of effort on the part of the APA, which was anxious to establish good relations and so promote the use of psychology in the national security arena. While Hoffman did not find that the APA knew that its collaborations would facilitate the development of abusive interrogation techniques, it showed a marked, motivated lack of interest in whether or not the DoD or CIA was abusing prisoners. The APA maintained its strategic ignorance even while engaging in a public relations campaign designed to give the impression that it was deeply concerned about multiple reports of psychologist involvement in a system of torture. This willful ignorance was not unprecedented and follows a predictable pattern of knowing and not-knowing to which all psychologists should attend. (shrink)

Richard Popkin’s meticulous translation--the most complete since the eighteenth century--contains selections from thirty-nine articles, as well as from Bayle’s four Clarifications. The bulk of the major articles of philosophical and theological interest--those that influenced Leibniz, Berkeley, Hume, and Voltaire and formed the basis for so many eighteenth-century discussions--are present, including David, Manicheans, Paulicians, Pyrrho, Rorarius, Simonides, Spinoza, and Zeno of Elea.

This paper focuses on the discipline of history, its methods, subject, and output. A brief overview of contemporary analytic philosophy of history is provided, followed by critical discussion of historical realism. It is argued that the insistence on the idea that historians inquire into the real past and that they refer to the actual past entities, events, or agents is widely open to sceptical objections. The concept of an abstract historical chronicle of past events which are explained or (...) retold by historians is identified as misleading. The idea of historical antirealism is then introduced. It is argued that in the centre of historian’s attention are present phenomena that are identified as historical evidence and require historical explanation. Historical explanation consists of constituting an historical past—a fictional model that accounts for present data. The identification process of historical evidence and the discursive nature of historical enterprise are analysed and accompanied by several concrete examples. According to historical antirealism, historians are not interested in the real past, but in the present empirical data. In their pursuit of historical knowledge, they produce fictional models—an historical past. Lastly, several common caveats against historical antirealism are addressed. The historical antirealism is presented as a viable fictionalist account of the historical inquiry that is capable of avoiding sceptical attacks on historical method and it is argued that antirealism allows history to retain its worth as a distinctive kind of scientific discipline. (shrink)

In this paper I focus on the emergence of the concept of the “historical a priori” at the origin of Foucault’s archeology. I emphasize the methodological function of this concept within Foucault’s archaeology, and I maintain that despite the different thesis it entails as compared to its philosophical sources, it pertains to one of the main issues of phenomenology, that is, the problematization of the relation between reality as it appears in its historicity, and transcendentality. I start from the (...) interest of the young Foucault in existential psychiatry, and I focus on the French philosophical context in which Foucault’s Introduction to Ludwig Binswanger’s “Dream and Existence” (1954) was conceived. My aim is to show that the first “phenomenological” phase of Foucault’s work is coherent, from a methodological point of view, with the development of archaeology intended as “historical epistemology.” I conclude by arguing that Foucault’s archaeology is methodologically linked to Canguilhem’s epistemology, in that the latter presents itself as an important attempt at linking together historicity and transcendentality. (shrink)

Why should past occurrences matter to us as such? Are they in fact meaningful in a specifically historical way, or do they only become meaningful in being connected to other sorts of meaning—political or speculative, for example—as many notable theorists imply? Ranke and Oakeshott affirmed a purely historical meaningfulness but left its nature unclear. The purpose of this essay is to confirm historical meaningfulness by arguing that our commanding practical interest in how we share action with (...) other actors is distinctively engaged by presumed information about past occurrences. We recognize that past occurrences have determined the conditions of action sharing, constraining our practice with regard to which actors we share practical reality with and which compounding actions we may or must join in progress. (shrink)

This is review of the book: M. Dafermos. Rethinking Cultural-Historical Theory. A Dialectical Perspective to Vygotsky. (Springer: Singapore, 2018. IX, 309 P. ISBN 978‒981‒13‒0190‒2. Doi: 10.1007/978‒981‒13‒0191‒9). The book is devoted to the making of the cultural-historical approach in psychology in the works of Vygotsky. The author claim that Vygotsky, relying on the ideas of Spinoza, Hegel, Feuerbach and Marx, developed this approach by mastering the dialectical method in his Hegel-Marxist version. The atmosphere of the storm and the onslaught (...) in the social and cultural life of the 1920s – early 1930s contributed to the formation of Vygotsky as a thinker with broad interests and deep philosophical background, who experienced several crises in his intellectual development. These crises forced him to qualitatively revise his ideas and, thus, substantially deepen and improve them. The author shows that Vygotsky’s literary origins allow his life compare with a drama, which accompanied by drama and the proliferation of ideas. This, in particular, expressed in his criticism of Gestalt psychology, theory of J. Piaget, ultimately a divergence of views with a number of his students who created Kharkov psychological school. Vygotsky left a great scientific legacy, which includes an analysis from the standpoint of the cultural-historical approach of the nature of consciousness, the relationship between thinking and language, the evolution of personality, a multitude of other psychological problems and art. (shrink)

In the field of history education, researchers and practitioners frequently demonstrate a keen interest in historical empathy. However, very little consensus exists concerning the meaning of the term. In an effort to make sense of the continuing debate, this article explores the competing conceptualizations of historical empathy found in the history education literature of the past decade. Discussion of recent theoretical work is coupled with a review of the numerous empirical studies, which have sought to shed light (...) on the various factors that impact students' development of historical empathy. This article examines the answers that have been posited to the following questions and, in so doing, reveals where further research is needed: What capacity do K-12 students possess for historical empathy? What obstacles hinder them from demonstrating empathic regard? What pedagogical practices promote the development of empathy? How do teachers navigate the decisions they face as they seek to cultivate empathy in their classrooms? (shrink)

What is it to do justice to the absent victims of past injustice, given the distance that separates us from them? Grounded in political theory and guided by the literature on historical justice, W. James Booth restores the dead to their central place at the heart of our understanding of why and how to deal with past injustice. Testimonies and accounts from the race war in the United States, the Holocaust, post-apartheid South Africa, Argentina's Dirty War and the conflict (...) in Northern Ireland help advance and defend Booth's claim that caring for the dead is a central part of addressing past injustice. Memory, Historic Injustice, and Responsibility is an insightful and original book on the relationship of past and present in thinking about what it means to do justice. A valuable addition to the currently available literature on historical justice, the volume will be of great interest to students and scholars of political science, philosophy, history, and law. (shrink)

This article aims to serve as an introductory discussion of the European Continental tradition of pedagogics, specifically from a North American perspective. It begins with an overview of the Continental tradition and its main figures. Here, we find a philosophical and, thus, language-sensitive attitude toward the human, the child; and a specific pedagogical terminology, i.e., descriptions and interpretations about the reality of education, such as educational practices, goals, norms, and organizational forms of educational institutions. John Dewey's educational theories exemplify the (...) North American perspective on Continental pedagogics and its study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence. Dewey's writings diverge notably from this tradition, as he integrated into his work American pragmatism and an interest in the scientific method, an interest that plays a role in today's policy trends in the United States and elsewhere. Then again, Dewey took a critical stand toward instrumentalizing pedagogics for political aims. On this point, the German-born political philosopher Hannah Arendt agreed with him. As Arendt can be seen as an example of a Continental perspective on philosophy that includes a strong warning to separate politics and education, she relates to Dewey's argument against instrumentalization. Thus, this article also features some of her work. The overall intention is to contribute to a renewal of a language for pedagogics by delineating a historical-philosophical perspective on this specific field of professional practice. (shrink)

There is a form of intellectual controversy, exhibited throughout the nineteenth century and into our own, which is less accessible because of a radically different order than certain controversies it appears to resemble, namely those which sprang up dramatically between science and religion in this era. Those latter controversies developed chiefly because it was at first supposed that religion was in possession of factual truths which entailed answers incompatible with those offered by science, to just the same factual questions: the (...) age of the universe, the mutability of species, the community of men and beasts or, for the matter, the historicity of sacred writ itself. On the basis of criteria supposed appropriate to the resolution of scientific controversies as such, the factual claims of religion were one by one infirmed, and it seemed then a reasonable projection that more or less the same would happen in any future such collisions. This left certain options open for religionists. They could, like adherents of any infirmed theory, simply give them up like good scientists are supposed to do. Or they could attempt to shun refutation by regarding religious statements as mere mythic paraphrases of recoverable literal scientific statements which were in fact true. Or religion could constitute itself a specialized science, concerned with an area of reality the "other" sciences did not touch upon, purging itself of any statements which then could conflict with those of the "other" sciences. Or finally, it could radically redefine its own scope and office by foreswearing any claim at all to factuality, so that questions of truth or falsity simply no longer would apply, and controversies between it and any discipline to which such questions did apply would be as inconceivable as a truth-contest between chemistry and opera. The Wittgensteinian suggestion that it is not the purpose of religious language to state facts may be seen as a late response to a dilemma which is then resolved by assigning religious utterance to one language game and physics to another. Were this a suitable disposition of the matter, religionists might be grateful for the suffering undergone, for though in the light of it the dilemma need never have arisen, still, had it not done so, religion might never have arrived at a proper consciousness of its own deep character. So the recent history of religion recapitulates its own favorite episodes of trial and purified renascence. (shrink)

"This volume brings together a collection of recent essays on the philosophy and theory of history. Phenomenology is about experience. In our language, "history" usually means either 1) what happened, i.e. past events, or 2) our knowledge of what happened. We can't experience past events, and whatever knowledge we have of them must come from other sources-memory, testimony, physical traces. Through these essays, the author explains how we can experience historical events. Sitting at the intersection of philosophy and history, (...) this is the ideal volume for those interested in experience from a philosophical and historical perspective"--. (shrink)

A challenging question regarding compensation for historic injustices like slavery or colonialism is whether there is anyone to whom it would be just to ascribe duties of compensation given that allegedly all the perpetrators--the guilty parties--are dead. Some answer this question negatively, arguing it is wrong to ascribe to anyone compensatory duties for injustices committed by others who died multiple generations ago. This objection to compensation for historic injustice, which I call the Historical Responsibility Objection (HRO), takes as its (...) core premises (1) that one must be guilty of wrongdoing with respect to a given historic injustice in order to bear a duty to compensate for the injustice, and (2) that no one alive today can be considered so guilty because no one alive today was alive when the historic injustice occurred. The result is that we cannot ascribe compensatory duties to anyone for any historic injustic. While all arguments I am aware of that refute HRO reject premise (1), this paper sketches a novel refutation of HRO by exploring the implications of rejecting premise (2). Doing so would invoke the state as a collective agent, distinct from its constitutive individual agents, liable to acquire compensatory duties for wrongs it commits that none of its constitutive individuals bear. To the extent that states that are collective agents committed historic injustices, such states have duties to compensate for historic injustice. (shrink)

This book proposes a new theoretical framework to move beyond the traditional tenets of modern international relations theory to investigate European integration and shed light on current events. -/- Based on contemporary analyses, Hegel’s political philosophy, and the fundamental role of historical interpretation, this book addresses the institutional dynamics as well as the discursive practices behind both the Eastern enlargement and the current critical situation. Looking back in particular at European integration in one of its most significant events, namely (...) the enlargement of the European Union to include former Socialist countries, it offers a unique conceptualisation of the nature and limits of European integration and for understanding the current crisis between Brussels and the Visegrád countries, 30 years since the revolutions of 1989. -/- This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of European integration, European politics and history, and political theory and philosophy. (shrink)

At the end of the 19th century, most professional historians – wherever they existed – deemed history to be a form of knowledge ruled by a method that bears no resemblance with those most commonly traceable in the natural sciences. The bulk of the historian’s task was then frequently regarded as being the application of procedures frequently referred to as ‘historical method’. In the context of such an emerging interest on historical methods and methodology, at least three (...) textbooks stand out: Johann Gustav Droysen’s Grundriss der Historik (Outline of the Theory of History), Ernst Bernheim’s Lehrbuch der historischen Methode (Handbook of Historical Method), and Charles Langlois and Charles Seignobos’s Introduction aux études historiques (Introduction to the Study of History). These books were quite influential in Germany, France, and elsewhere, and they very much helped promote a general idea of historical method that would become relatively consensual among historians of many nationalities by the early 20th century. Such a relative agreement on historical method sponsored both the communication and the development of a sense of disciplinary identity among historians trained within different and sometimes conflicting national traditions. It was then partially extended, partially challenged, and surely made more complex when, from the 1920s on, social and economic historians became a good part of the historiographical establishment in many countries. -/- The three books by Droysen, Bernheim, and Langlois and Seignobos were already pieced together by Rolf Torstendahl, who studied them as a group of texts that, despite their differences, contributed to shape the developments outlined above. However, Torstendahl’s primary aim was to show how Droysen, Bernheim, and Seignobos all resorted to ‘method’ as a way to circumvent skepticism against the possibility of historical knowledge, rather than investigate the internal interrelationships between the three texts. In this chapter I follow precisely this latter, not yet taken, road, focusing on crucial cross-references between the Grundriss, the Lehrbuch, and the Introduction. I intend to show that, at a general level, the schemes of historical method found in these texts are largely convergent, and that this convergence is due to Bernheim’s reading of Droysen and to Langlois and Seignobos’s reading of Bernheim. I will attempt to do it through a regressive approach that starts with an analysis of the Introduction. Aspects of the editorial history and circulation of the three texts will also be briefly addressed, as a way to illustrate their special importance within the framework of early 20th century historical theory. Because my argument calls for a focus on the most general lines of Droysen’s, Bernheim’s, and Langlois and Seignobos’s schemes of historical method, I will, for the sake of consistency, refrain from analysing in-depth the complex epistemological and ontological arguments in which those schemes are nested. (shrink)

This intriguing volume provides a thorough examination of the historical roots of global climate change as a field of inquiry, from the Enlightenment to the late twentieth century. Based on primary and archival sources, the book is filled with interesting perspectives on what people have understood, experienced, and feared about the climate and its changes in the past. Chapters explore climate and culture in Enlightenment thought; climate debates in early America; the development of international networks of observation; the scientific (...) transformation of climate discourse; and early contributions to understanding terrestrial temperature changes, infrared radiation, and the carbon dioxide theory of climate. But perhaps most important, this book shows what a study of the past has to offer the interdisciplinary investigation of current environmental problems. (shrink)

David Lewis defends the thesis of the asymmetry of overdetermination: later affairs are seldom overdetermined by earlier affairs, but earlier affairs are usually overdetermined by later affairs. Recently, Carol Cleland has argued that since the distinctive methodologies of historical science and experimental science exploit different aspects of this asymmetry, the methodology of historical science is just as good, epistemically speaking, as that of experimental science. This paper shows, first, that Cleland's epistemological conclusion does not follow from the thesis (...) of the asymmetry of overdetermination, because overdetermination is compatible with epistemic underdetermination. The paper also shows, contra Cleland, that there is at least one interesting sense in which historical science is epistemically inferior to experimental science, after all, because local underdetermination problems are more widespread in historical than in experimental science. (shrink)

This essay aims to sharpen debates on the pros and cons of historical epistemology, which is now understood as a novel approach to the study of knowledge, by comparing it with the history of epistemology as traditionally pursued by philosophers. The many versions of both approaches are not always easily discernable. Yet, a reasoned comparison of certain versions can and should be made. In the first section of this article, I argue that the most interesting difference involves neither the (...) subject matter nor goal, but the methods used by the two approaches. In the second section, I ask which of the two approaches or methods is more promising given that both historical epistemologists and historians of epistemology claim to contribute to epistemology simpliciter . Using traditional problems concerning the epistemic role of perception, I argue that the historical epistemologies of Wartofsky and Daston and Galison fail to show that studying practices of perception is philosophically significant. Standard methods from the history of epistemology are more promising, as I show by means of reconstructing arguments in a debate about the relation between perception and judgment in psychological research on the famous moon illusion. (shrink)

This interview with Paul Gilroy and Arjun Appaddurai was conducted in the belief that these two thinkers, who stem from different disciplines but whose work meets at certain crucial junctures, would be able to present a discussion to a wider audience about the themes and issues that were currently motivating them in their work. Paul Gilroy's work is well known as a central reference point within the contemporary analysis of `race' and racism. At its most broad, he has a reputation (...) for thinking throughout his writings about the historical constitution of race and the mobility of forms of racism over time and space. Arjun Appadurai's work emanates from the discipline of anthropology, and he has a specific and on-going interest in South East Asai Studies. He has been influential in the exploration of new modes of conceptualizing the remit and processes of forming anthropological knowledge. While both authors share certain key concerns, their interconnections are not explicit in their writings. This interview, conducted in London during Arjun Appadurai's visit in 1997, was an opportunity to bring these two authors together to discuss the themes and connections which they are both exploring in different ways, but in ways that have similar theoretical and political impulses. In particular, they address the themes that animate the critical edge of cultural studies: the politics of memory, the theorization of movement and new conceptualizations of spatiality, the critique of authenticity and modes of theorizing embodiment, and concurrent directions in their present work, especially around the notions of extreme actions, of war and violence. (shrink)

An introduction to the philosophical implications of the recent surge of political and ethical interest in historical redress.

The article attempts refute recent arguments that the historical context in which an artwork is produced is relevant to its aesthetic value. These arguments claim that forgeries are intrinsically less aesthetically valuable than originals because forgeries lack the appropriate relation to the past. These arguments fail because demanding an "appropriate" historical context of a work for it to be aesthetically respectable confuses aesthetic merit with artistic merit, A work's significance within its culture and the history of art.

Despite their shared interests, historians and philosophers of science collaborate poorly and generally lack firsthand experience in laboratories. This volume invents ways to develop their understanding of each other's goals and their common subject matter. Internatinally respected historians and philosophers of science clarify the distinct perspectives of each discipline and explore the types of interaction possible between them. By focusing on specific scientific problems, their papers make an excellent introduction to both historical and philosophical theories.

In common with history, all the social sciences crucially rely on descriptions of the past for their evidence. But when, if ever, is it reasonable to regard such descriptions as true? This book attempts to establish the conditions that warrant belief in historical descriptions. It does so in a non-technical way, analysing numerous illustrations of the different kinds of argument about the past employed by historians and others. The author concludes that no historical description can be finally proved, (...) and that we are only ever justified in believing them for certain practical purposes. This central question has not been addressed in such a thorough and systematic manner before. It draws on recent philosophy of history and will interest philosophers. But the wealth of material and accessibility of the presentation will also make it very valuable for historians and other social scientists concerned with the logic of their disciplines. (shrink)

My interest in gathering together a collection of this sort was generated by a fortuitous combination of historical studies under Professor Keith Lehrer and studies in cognitive science under Professor R. Michael Harnish at the University of Arizona. Work on the volume began there while I was an instructor in the Department of Linguistics and was greatly encouraged by participants in the Faculty Seminar on Cognitive Science chaired by Professor Lance J. Rips. I wish to express my appreciation (...) to all of these and to many other individuals with whom I discussed the possibility of contribution to this work. I am especially grateful to the authors of the essays included here, as they showed more patience than I could have hoped for in seeing me through a number of uncertain stages in development of the project. My thanks are also due to my colleague Charles Reid for assistance in reviewing submissions, to Tim McFadden for computer resources, and again, to Keith Lehrer for continuing advice in arrangements for publication. Financial support for manuscript preparation was provided in part under University Research Grant No. 617 from the University Research Council, Youngstown State University. (shrink)

This volume brings together an international array of scholars to reconsider the meaning and place of poststructuralism historically and demonstrate some of the ways in which it continues to be relevant, especially for debates in aesthetics, ethics, and politics. The book's chapters focus on the works of Butler, Deleuze, Derrida, Foucault, Irigaray, Kristeva, Lacan, and Lyotard-in combination with those of Agamben, Luhman, Nancy, and Nietzsche-and examine issues including biopolitics, culture, embodiment, epistemology, history, music, temporality, political resistance, psychoanalysis, revolt, and the (...) visual arts. The contributors use poststructuralism as a hermeneutical strategy that rejects the traditional affirmation of unity, totality, transparency, and representation to instead focus on the foundational importance of open-ended becoming, difference, the unknowable, and expression. This approach allows for a more expansive definition of poststructuralism and helps demonstrate how it has contributed to debates across philosophy and other disciplines. Historical Traces and Future Pathways of Poststructuralism will be of particular interest to researchers in philosophy, politics, political theory, critical theory, aesthetics, feminist theory, cultural studies, intellectual history, psychoanalysis, and sociology. (shrink)

My book is about the human creativity being a source of progress, and cycling of evolution caused by platitude and triviality of once high-reaching idealism. In essence the book presents an original perception of human history, based on Christian values as vital coordinates system. I hope this book will revive the interest to the Russian school of thoughts and to humanism in general.

Historically the primary role of the Institutional Review Board (IRB) has been "to assure, both in advance and by periodic review, that appropriate steps are taken to protect the rights and welfare of humans participating as subjects in research" (U.S. FDA, 1996). However, there is much to suggest that IRBs have been unable to fulfil this mandate, particularly in regard to the matter of informed consent. Part of the problem in this regard is that the competing interests of other stakeholders (...) often undermine the IRB's capacity to serve the best interests of research subjects. This paper proposes an alternative view of the role of the IRB. It begins by treating the interests of other stakeholders as legitimate matters of concern for IRBs. Hence the process established to review and monitor human research should be treated as an exercise in social justice in which the interests of all legitimate stakeholders must be represented and considered. A variation of Rawls' (1971) heuristic "the veil of ignorance" is employed to explore the dynamic relationship between knowledge and interests that ensues when the role of the IRB is characterized in this manner. Inadequacies in the informed consent process are taken as illustrative of the inability of IRBs as they are presently construed to attend to the interests of research subjects. The major normative implication of the analysis offered here is that the role of the IRB must be expanded to include the granting of a provisional proxy consent on behalf of prospective research subjects. This provision is necessary, it is argued, if the interests of research subjects are to be fairly assessed by IRBs as a matter of social justice. It is necessary as well to ensure that an adequate standard of informed consent is attained. Somewhat paradoxically it is argued competing sets of interests the IRB must serve, rather than as the primary concern of the IRB. (shrink)

We consider a version of so called T x W logic for historical necessity in the sense of R.H. Thomason (1984), which is somewhat special in three respects: (i) it is explicitly based on two-dimensional modal logic in the sense of Segerberg (1973); (ii) for reasons of applicability to interesting fields of philosophical logic, it conceives of time as being discrete and finite in the sense of having a beginning and an end; and (iii) it utilizes the technique of (...) systematic frame constants in order to handle the problem of irreflexivity in tense logics, well known since Gabbay (1981). Axiomatizations are given for two infinite hierarchies of two-dimensional modal tense logics, one without and one with the characteristic operators for historical necessity and possibility. Strong and weak completeness results are obtained for both hierarchies as well as a result to the effect that two approaches to their semantics are equivalent, much in the spirit of Di Maio and Zanardo (1996) and von Kutschera (1997). (shrink)

This paper attempts to reassess the standard sociological canon and sketch the outlines of a new approach by bringing together a series of thinkers whose works so far have remained disconnected. Introducing a distinction between classics and background figures who were crucial sources of inspiration, it shifts emphasis to the late, reflexive works of Durkheim and Weber. These are sources for two types of reflexive sociology: historical and anthropological. The main background figures of reflexive historical sociology are Marx, (...) Kierkegaard, Nietzsche and Freud, while its protagonists include Foucault, Elias, Voegelin, Borkenau, Mumford, Ariès and Koselleck. A short introduction will be given to the four main fields of interest within the approach: the reconstructive histories of subjectivity, of forms of thought, of forms of knowledge, and of closed space and regulated time. (shrink)

The "non-identity argument" has been applied to reject the validity of claims for historic justice, often generating highly unintuitive conclusions. George Sher has suggested a solution to this problem, explaining the harm to descendants of historically wronged peoples as deriving not from the historic wrongs but from the failure to provide rectification to the previous generation for harm they suffered. That generation was likewise owed rectification for harm they suffered from failure to provide rectification to the generation preceding them. In (...) this chain of injustices each failure to provide rectification to one is the source of wrongful harm to the next. Such chains form a "bridge" between the historic wrong and the harm suffered by living individuals. I call this approach the subsequent-wrong solution (SWS). I argue that bypassing the non-identity argument in this way is problematic. First, SWS cannot justify rectification in seemingly legitimate historic-justice claims, such as historic wrongs generating delayed harms that skip generations. Second, SWS justifies rectification for the wrong reasons, denying the essence of historic-justice claims: that past wrongs, for which original wrongdoers are responsible, harm descendants of original victims. Finally, SWS does not fully account for group membership's role in historic injustice, unable to distinguish between claims of descendants of historic victims and claims made by others with unrelated interests in the rectification of the previous generation. A supplementary solution is needed, focusing on the role of group harm and group membership. The plausibility of this approach, tying individual harm to group harm, derives from these three limitations of the subsequent-harm solution. I give a rudimentary account of what such a solution would look like. (shrink)