My strategy is to examine a recent trend in philosophical discussions of responsibility, a trend that tries, but I think ultimately fails, to give an acceptable analysis of the conditions of responsibility. It fails due to what at first appear to be deep and irresolvable metaphysical problems. It is here that I suggest that the condition of sanity comes to the rescue. What at first appears to be an impossible requirement for responsibility---the requirement that the responsible agent have created (...) her- or himself---turns out to be the vastly more mundane and non controversial requirement that the responsible agent must, in a fairly standard sense, be sane. (shrink)

I propose the notion of ‘epistemic sanity’, a property of parsimony between the holding of true but not false beliefs and the consideration of our cognitive limitations. Where ‘alethic value’ is the epistemic value of holding true but not false beliefs, the ‘alethic potential’ of an agent is the amount of extra alethic value that she is expected to achieve, given her current environment, beliefs, and reasoning skills. Epistemic sanity would be related to the holding of (true or (...) false) beliefs that increase the agent's alethic potential (relevant beliefs) but not of beliefs that decrease it (this is related to cognitive parsimony). Suspension of judgment, forgetting, and clutter avoidance are the main contributors to an agent's epistemic sanity, where this paper focuses on suspension. I argue that rational suspension favors the holding of true and relevant beliefs, which is not the case for the extremes of opinionation (no suspension) and skepticism (general suspension). In the absence of evidence, opinionated agents are often forced to rely on principles such as the principle of indifference, but suspension dominates indifference in terms of alethic value in some conditions. A rational agent would only find it beneficial to adopt skepticism if she considers herself to be an anti-expert about her entire agenda, but then ‘flipping’ beliefs maximizes expected alethic value in relation to skepticism. The study of epistemic sanity results in an ‘impure’ veritism, which can deal with some limitations of veritism (e.g., explaining the existence of false but relevant beliefs). (shrink)

Celebrates a half century of television history, from "The Howdy Doody Show" and "I Love Lucy" to "The Simpsons" and "The Sopranos," and the personalities, shows, and landmark events that changed entertainment history.

The concept of autonomy plays atleast two roles in moral theory. First, itprovides a source of constraints upon action:because I am autonomous you may not interferewith me, even for my own good. Second, itprovides a foundation for moral theory: humanautonomy has been thought by some to producemoral principles of a more general kind.This paper seeks to understand what autonomyis, and whether the autonomy of which we arecapable is able to serve these roles. We wouldnaturally hope for a concept of autonomy (...) thatis value-neutral rather than value-laden. Thatis to say, we would want the judgement that Iam autonomous to depend wholly on, say,structural features of my psychology, and in noway to require us to make ethical judgements, orother value judgements. Being value-neutral isperhaps desirable in a concept of autonomyserving the first role, and plausiblyindispensible in one playing the second. Ishall argue, however, that value-neutral conceptionsof autonomy are impoverished and out of linewith our intuitions; set out and defendan explicitly value-laden conception ofautonomy; and explore the implications of such a view for theability of autonomy to play the rolesmentioned above. (shrink)

Three questions govern this ``phenomenological'' inquiry: (1) how are sanity and madness spatialized? (2) how do myths shape lived space? (3) how can we moderns use primitive myth-systems to restructure lived space? i contrast newtonian and einsteinian spaces with the original space of our living. i show that this 'normal' space, and the spaces of science, are structured by the egological subject and therefore reflect ego-pathology. can we use myths to schematize a more satisfying space?

Taking up the idea that sanity is a necessary condition for responsibility, Susan Wolf sets forth two criteria for determining whether an actor is sane. I argue that the second criterion is inappropriate for this determination since it invokes some hidden axiological standard. I reexamine a case study that Wolf describes and arrive at a different judgment about the responsibility of the actor. I argue that the foremost criterion for determining whether an actor is sane is functional rather than (...) axiological. The theory of responsibility, rather than the notion of sanity, must do the work of appraising the value of an actors’ behavior, and that must be done in light of the fact that responsible moral agents enjoy varying degrees of sanity. (shrink)

Chapter discussing the relationship between rationality and sanity.

This paper looks at the question of sustainability through the prism of a collective action problem fundamentally driven by human desires and needs. It ftrst characterizes the problem of non-sustainability by combining environmental ethics with the philosophy of technology. The paper then considers four basic strategies for resolving the collective action problem: virtue, regulation, price, and innovation. Each solution has its own set of weaknesses and strengths, meaning that achieving sustainability will remain a difficult balancing act.

Science and Sanity has by now spawned a whole library of works by other time- binders. Some of them have been listed in previous editions. ...

The fundamental, irreplaceable exposition of general semantics. In this work Korzybski developed important lines of formulating neglected by subsequent authors. A must-have for the student of general semantics interested in the original formulations of Alfred Korzybski. The sixth edition of Science and Sanity: An Introduction to Non-Aristotelian Systems and General Semantics includes a new preface by Lance Strate, President of the Institute of General Semantics.

Political humor and satire are, perhaps, as old as comedy itself, and they are crucial to our society and collective sense of self. In a poignant, pithy, but not a ponderous manner, Al Gini and Abraham Singer delve into satire’s history to rejoice in its triumphs and watch its development from ancient graffiti to the latest late night TV talk show.

Political humor and satire are, perhaps, as old as comedy itself, and they are crucial to our society and collective sense of self. In a poignant, pithy, but not a ponderous manner, Al Gini and Abraham Singer delve into satire’s history to rejoice in its triumphs and watch its development from ancient graffiti to the latest late night TV talk show.

This paper provides a brief visual history of the ways women patients, and specifically women patients whose marital status is identified in conjunction with their illness, have been constructed as abnormal in the images of advertisements designed to promote psychotropic medications to an audience of psychiatrists. The advertisements I discuss come from the two largest circulation American psychiatric journals, The American Journal of Psychiatry and Archives of General Psychiatry, between the years 1964 and 2001. I use the ads to focus (...) on two concomitant narratives. On one hand, I show how the advertisements situate the rise of wonder drugs in the context of an era described as the golden age of psychopharmacology, during which time drug treatments helped revolutionize the diagnosis and treatment of anxiety, depression, and other outpatient mental illnesses in the United States. On the other hand, the advertisements also illustrate the ways in which these new scientific treatments could not function free of the culture in which they were given meaning. In the space between drug and wonder drug, or between medication and metaphor, the images thus hint at the ways psychotropic treatments became imbricated with the same gendered assumptions at play in an American popular culture intimately concerned with connecting normal and heteronormal when it came to defining the role of women in civilization. (shrink)

The New York Times-bestselling author offers a stirring defense of liberalism against the dogmatisms of our time Not since the early twentieth century has liberalism, and liberals, been under such relentless attack, from both right and left. The crisis of democracy in our era has produced a crisis of faith in liberal institutions and, even worse, in liberal thought. A Thousand Small Sanities is a manifesto rooted in the lives of people who invented and extended the liberal tradition. Taking us (...) from Montaigne to Mill, and from Middlemarch to the civil rights movement, Adam Gopnik argues that liberalism is not a form of centrism, nor simply another word for free markets, nor merely a term denoting a set of rights. It is something far more ambitious: the search for radical change by humane measures. Gopnik shows us why liberalism is one of the great moral adventures in human history--and why, in an age of autocracy, our lives may depend on its continuation. (shrink)

Lately, a clamor can be heard, announcing that disinterested inquiry is neither possible nor desirable, that so-called “knowledge” is nothing but an expression of power, and that the concepts of evidence, objectivity, truth, are mere “ideological humbug” (p. 93). Thus, according to Richard Rorty, the champion of relativism, to call a statement true “is just to give it a rhetorical pat on the back” (p. 7), and “there are no constraints on inquiry save conversational ones” (p. 44). Similarly, for Sandra (...) Harding, a leading feminist, scientific work is best begun by “thinking from women's lives” (p. 116) and “the model…. (shrink)

Healthy life is both balanced and creativity of the physical and mental state, in which, as I desire meaning of power can fully realize their potential, build a meaningful life. This paper argues that language acquisition and talking the whole way interaction for the complex of fundamental importance. Return healthy life-style is necessary to recognize the Other, and adjust the I and he who [includes others and nature] of the relationship, until the Self and with other things integrated in the (...) Road, which transcends all sense-making and integration in the road. This sound and the construction of a meaningful life, consists of three levels: first level is the language of representation and meaning construction , which is the body's movement from the I and the body is reflected in the rise of the desire among , then to achieve a variety of appearance and language, including language access is essential. The second level is to build a sense of community , through communication, we work with others, especially with significant others , talk to each other and together build a meaningful life. Third, the ontology level, a sound to be on the end of life "is itself" open to be able to make sense of life in the introduction of free dimension, which also contains the meaning of the previous construction to deconstruction , this deconstruction of the action of the openness of human existence and its ultimate realization is necessary. Therapy is considered here as a process of restoring the way to sanity. But it is important to know what a sane life is. For the author it is a balanced yet creative state of body-mind in which our desire could conduce itself, at least hopefully, to the ultimate degree of the construction of a meaningful life or of the realization of its potentiality. The process of language appropriation and dialogical interaction are considered as essential here. For me this construction of a meaningful life, and therefore a life of sanity , consists of three levels: First, the representational and linguistic construction of meaning, as casting up from the movement of our body and the desire residing therein; second, the social co-construction of meaningfulness, in which we dialogue with significant others in order to construct together a meaningful world; third, the ontological level, which implies also an act of deconstruction necessary for the openness and the ultimate fulfillment of human existence in the Reality Itself. (shrink)

PARTICULAR point is given Mr. Ryan's study of the in philosophy of sanity by reason of the recent forward strides medical science has made in cures forsanity, Hygeia for September reports cures in "nervous" hospitals running as high as 40%. The disease is no longer a mysterious "divine visitation." The Editor.

PARTICULAR point is given Mr. Ryan's study of the in philosophy of sanity by reason of the recent forward strides medical science has made in cures forsanity, Hygeia for September reports cures in "nervous" hospitals running as high as 40%. The disease is no longer a mysterious "divine visitation." The Editor.

This is the editorial to the special edition of Cosmos and History on 'Regaining Sanity'.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Commentary on “Sanity and Irresponsibility”Lloyd Fields (bio)AbstractI make two criticisms of Wilson’s proposal to dispense with a loaded axiological criterion of sanity. First, Edwards’s axiological criterion of sanity, which Wilson accepts, involves the requirement of impartiality, which at least excludes some standards of right and wrong. Second, value pluralism applies only to morally acceptable forms of life and thus presupposes a standard of right and wrong. (...) I conclude by noting that mental illnesses are not sufficiently characterised by extreme and persistent deviance from practical rationality, as conceived by Edwards and Wilson.KeywordsSanity, responsibility, mental illness, value pluralismWilson’s paper is set in an important tradition of which Susan Wolf is a notable exemplar. He tackles the crucially important issue of how practical rationality is related to mental health and of how certain forms of irrationality are connected with mental illness. This issue must be taken into account in order to avoid infecting the criteria of sanity with “idiosyncratic or culturally biased norms.” Like Wolf (1989, 137–151), Wilson holds that sanity is a necessary condition of responsibility. But Wilson rejects the second of Wolf’s two criteria of sanity on the grounds that it invokes a definite normative theory of right and wrong. He proposes instead that whether an agent is sane should be decided on the basis of whether s/he displays practical rationality, as defined by Edwards’s list of seven items. Following Edwards, Wilson implicitly equates “sanity” with “mental health” and “insanity” with “mental illness.” By rejecting an axiological criterion of sanity that depends on a normative theory of right and wrong, Wilson is able to ensure that individuals like JoJo are not judged to be insane and hence not morally responsible for their actions. Wilson is right to stress the importance of our not applying notions such as “mental illness” or “insanity” too widely, especially in such a way as to allow blameworthy persons to escape blame and punishment.But are Wilson’s own criteria of sanity free from dependence on a normative theory, or a normative standard, of right and wrong? First, let us note that Wilson states Edwards’s seventh condition of practical rationality as follows: “holding values that are or would be adopted under the conditions of (negative) freedom.” Edwards’s own formulation of this condition is the following: “having values which have been (or would be) adopted under conditions of freedom, enlightenment and impartiality” (1982, 315). Wilson explains “freedom” as the absence of coercion. It is uncertain what “enlightenment” means in this context. Impartiality would seem to include being impartial between oneself and others and between one’s own tribe, nation or race and that of others. Although this requirement is perhaps too general to be regarded as a sufficient standard [End Page 303] of right and wrong, it is at least part of such normative theories as utilitarianism and Kant’s moral theory, while it is inconsistent with ethical egoism, i.e., the view that an action is right or wrong depending on whether it serves or frustrates the agent’s overall best interests. One could dispute Wilson’s claim, therefore, that Edwards’s seventh item is not a “loaded” axiological criterion.Second, Wilson maintains that we can avoid assuming a loaded axiological criterion for sanity by adopting the position of value pluralism. Wolf’s axiological criterion for sanity is that the agent should be capable of knowing the difference between right and wrong. Wilson holds that this criterion, as presented, invokes a normative theory of right and wrong. The criterion would not do so if it were applied in accordance with value pluralism, which, Wilson says, “rejects the notion that there is one monolithic theory of right and wrong without denying that an actor may behave virtuously or viciously.” Wilson appears to assume that an “unloaded” version of Wolf’s axiological criterion would be more or less equivalent to Edwards’s seventh condition of practical rationality.Value pluralism maintains that there are incompatible forms of life that display distinct virtues. “Whichever form of life one is pursuing there are virtues which elude one because they are available only to people pursuing alternative and... (shrink)

According to the author, human society and everyone in it is insane with fear. The root of our trouble is our ability to think. Since to eliminate thought is to eliminate fear, our cure "is the blind surrender to an indescribable influence," which Woodworth calls "the self."--R. D. G.