The three texts addressed in this review essay challenge us to question and creatively re-imagine the representation of material spaces at the centre of the colonial project: oceans, islands, ships and archives. Elizabeth McMahon deconstructs the island and its metaphorics, charting the relationship of geography, politics and literature through the changing status of islands, as imagined by colonists, beginning in the Caribbean and ending in Australia. Renisa Mawani destabilises colonial geography by re-animating the ocean and presents, amongst others, the (...) ship and the ocean, as both method and juridical form. Writing against the ‘free sea’, Mawani addresses the imperial reliance on control of the ocean and the intensive juridification of the sea. Stewart Motha re-imagines law’s aggressive acts of adjudication, and challenges its originary fictions by exploring the logic, aesthetics and violence of legal processes that preserve and disavow the past at the same time. Each monograph considers the imaginaries, fictions and material geographies of colonialism, alongside how these imaginaries have been used as sites of counter-claim and resistance by those subjected to their technologies. (shrink)

The ability to quantify the relationship between the ocean and the atmosphere is an enduring challenge for global-scale science. This paper analyzes the World Ocean Circulation Experiment, an international oceanographic program that aimed to provide data for decadal-scale climate modeling and for the first time produce a “snapshot” of ocean circulation against which future change could be measured. WOCE was an ambitious project that drew on extensive international collaboration and emerging technologies that continue to play a significant role in how (...) the global environment is known and governed. However, a main outcome of WOCE was an encounter with ocean variability: the notion that the ocean is governed not by the circular currents shown in the popular “conveyor-belt” diagram but by eddies, filaments, jets, and other nonlinear forces. This paper suggests the concept of “productive limits” as an analytic for understanding how ocean variability both prompted new forms of knowledge and the development of a global knowledge infrastructure that is contingent, uneven, and fully entwined with geopolitical dynamics. (shrink)

The most current text available on the international and U.S. law of the sea, this much-needed reference is built around the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and other relevant maritime materials. While it addresses all aspects of ocean usage, much emphasis has been placed on issues of contemporary importance such as international fisheries, maritime boundaries, and deep seabed mining. The first part introduces traditional zones of jurisdiction and doctrine such as inland waters, territorial seas, (...) or high seas, as well as some new concepts related to navigation: the regimes of international straits and archipelagic waters and exclusive economic zones. The latter part analyzes functional issues such as fishing, oil and gas exploitation, mining, scientific research, and maritime pollution, referring on each subject to the U.S. law for comparison. (shrink)

Transformation of the sparrow and the butterfly -- Meeting the gods of poverty in a dream -- The greatest joys of the cicada and its cast-off shell -- The owl's understanding -- The centipede questions the snake -- The toad's way of the gods -- The mysterious technique of the cat -- Afterword by William Scott Wilson.

The three texts addressed in this review essay challenge us to question and creatively re-imagine the representation of material spaces at the centre of the colonial project: oceans, islands, ships and archives. Elizabeth McMahon deconstructs the island and its metaphorics, charting the relationship of geography, politics and literature through the changing status of islands, as imagined by colonists, beginning in the Caribbean and ending in Australia. Renisa Mawani destabilises colonial geography by re-animating the ocean and presents, amongst others, the (...) ship and the ocean, as both method and juridical form. Writing against the ‘free sea’, Mawani addresses the imperial reliance on control of the ocean and the intensive juridification of the sea. Stewart Motha re-imagines law’s aggressive acts of adjudication, and challenges its originary fictions by exploring the logic, aesthetics and violence of legal processes that preserve and disavow the past at the same time. Each monograph considers the imaginaries, fictions and material geographies of colonialism, alongside how these imaginaries have been used as sites of counter-claim and resistance by those subjected to their technologies. (shrink)

A graphic novel version of the classic book that first introduced Westerners to the samurai ethos. This graphic novel version of the cult classic Bushido brings the timeless secrets of the samurai to life. Originally published in 1905, Bushido was the first book to introduce Westerners to the samurai ethos. Written by Inazo Nitobe, one of the foremost Japanese authors and educators of the time, it describes the characteristics and virtues that are associated with bushido—honor, courage, justice, loyalty, self-control—and explains (...) the philosophy behind how samurai were educated and trained; the connection between the sword and the samurai; seppuku; and the position of women in samurai culture; among other themes. To this day,Bushido is considered a must-read for anyone who wants to understanding the soul of Japan and navigate their world with integrity and honor. (shrink)

Environmental violence takes form of both ‘spectacular’ events, like ecological disasters usually recognised by the general public, and ‘slow violence’, a type of violence that occurs gradually, out of sight and on a long-term scale. Planetary seas and oceans, loaded with cultural meanings of that which ‘hides’ and ‘allows to forget’, are the spaces where such attritional violence unfolds unseen and ‘out of mind’. Simultaneously, conventional concepts of nature and culture, as dichotomous entities, become obsolete. We all inhabit (...) and embody the world differently, as variously situated people, divided by national, sexual, bodily and economic status, and as very variously situated nonhumans in an increasingly anthropogenic world. This chapter focuses on subtle ‘slow violence’ unfolding through the instances of submerged chemical weapons, so-called dead zones, invasive species and high- and low-trophic mariculture in the Baltic and North Sea regions. It zooms in on the select cases of such ‘environed bodies’, their stories of excruciating slow violence and yet also on unexpected encounters with care and hospitality. The aim is to unfold a low-trophic theory for the naturecultural research on violence and care within environmental humanities, and to engage a coexistential ethics of environmental adaptability informed by feminist posthumanities. (shrink)

Unholy human beings and holy humanity in Kant's critical and practical philosophy -- Independence from nature : preparing the ground for perpetual peace in the third critique -- The problem of international politics : human beings within the mechanism of nature -- The instruction of suffering : Kant's theological anthropology for a prodigal species -- An "all-unifying church triumphant!" -- Conclusion : believing in the possibility of salvation -- Epilogue : Kant and contemporary cosmopolitanism.

In this study international legal experts explore legal concepts and contexts from diverse national and disciplinary perspectives. Themes range from legal and normative pluralism to the development of state law and legal systems, and from law's rhetoric and the potential utility of alternative vocabularies to the polyjurality of the present. The study combines theoretical analyses and case studies to create a rich picture of present scholarship on laws and norms and the state of contemporary legal complexity, each crossing traditional boundaries.

As the Panama Canal approached its fiftieth anniversary in the mid-1960s, U.S. officials concerned about the costs of modernization welcomed the technology of peaceful nuclear excavation to create a new waterway at sea level. Biologists seeking a share of the funds slated for radiological-safety studies called attention to another potential effect which they deemed of far greater ecological and evolutionary magnitude – marine species exchange, an obscure environmental issue that required the expertise of underresourced life scientists. An enterprising endeavor to (...) support Smithsonian naturalists, especially marine biologists at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, wound up sparking heated debates – between biologists and engineers about the oceans’ biological integrity and among scientists about whether the megaproject represented a research opportunity or environmental threat. A National Academy of Sciences panel chaired by Ernst Mayr failed to attract congressional funding for its 10-year baseline research program, but did create a stir in the scientific and mainstream press about the ecological threats that the sea-level canal might unleash upon the Atlantic and Pacific. This paper examines how the proposed megaproject sparked a scientific and political conversation about the risks of mixing the oceans at a time when many members of the scientific and engineering communities still viewed the seas as impervious to human-facilitated change. (shrink)

In this article we investigate how Latino immigrant farmers in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States navigate United States Department of Agriculture programs, which necessitate standardizing farming practices and an acceptance of bureaucracy for participation. We show how Latino immigrant farmers’ agrarian norms and practices are at odds with the state’s requirement for agrarian standardization. This interview-based study builds on existing historical analyses of farmers of color in the United States, and the ways in which their farming practices and (...) racialized identities are often unseen by and illegible to the state. This disjuncture leads to the increased racial exclusion of immigrant farmers from USDA opportunities. Such exclusions impede the transition to a “new era of civil rights,” as has been proclaimed by USDA leadership. Although efforts to address institutionalized racism on a national level may be genuine, they have failed to acknowledge this schism between rural Latino immigrants and the state, thereby inhibiting a meaningful transition in the fields, and continuing a legacy of unequal access to agrarian opportunities for non-white immigrant farmers. (shrink)

Collection of papers delivered at a symposium held in Lausanne, 10-11 September 2009.".

In this clear, accessible guide, Sean Hand sets Levinas's work in its intellectual and social contexts and examines: the influence of phenomenology and Judaism ...

North Korea references gender equality in its socialist constitution, but the de facto social and legal circumstances that women face in the country are far below the de jure status they are purported to enjoy. North Korean women endure extremely low public health standards and pervasive harassment. Yet their growing market power and social influence are underestimated. Women account for the majority of North Korean border crossers, and their informal economic activities are supporting families while modernizing the economy. This essay (...) examines the dangers of exploitation that North Korean women face and highlights the ethical and legal imperatives of supporting their roles in marketizing the economy and liberalizing the society in one of the worst human rights–violating states. Women are North Korea's most deserving recipients of international assistance and the country's most promising partners to the world. (shrink)

It might seem strange to connect the word hope with the world's oceans. No honest person can deny that the oceans face multiple crises: overfishing, dying coral reefs, acidification, industrial and agricultural pollution, vast rafts of garbage. The oceans bear witness to humanity's worst tendencies. It is therefore a bold effort that seeks to find hope in this litany of despair.In Hope at Sea Teresa Shewry seeks signs of hope in various literary works from around the Pacific (...) region. This book has many attractions. For the nonspecialist Shewry provides a useful introduction to the environmental/cultural discourse of a region that is often forgotten. She provides a good overview of recent literature dealing with the... (shrink)

Outlines the ethical code of the samurai in a time when the martial skills of the warrior became redundant and his role was subsumed into governmental service, in graphic novel form.

By its nature, comparative education values diversity. Respectfully studying how different groups pursue education provides opportunities to learn about the variety of human experience, expand the boundaries of the field, and ultimately re-understand ourselves. At its core, the field leverages the dynamic space between life as culturally located and being human. This chapter contributes value to comparative education from an Oceanic viewpoint. Oceania is the world region with more water and languages than any other. Because of its diversity and colonial (...) histories, Oceania is a site of creative tension between regionalism and self-determination. Unsurprisingly, conflict exists in the region. However, a key need in our ‘sea of islands’ for sustainability is to live well together. Faced with the uncertainties of the future such as climate change, mutual understanding and support is at a premium. The collaboration of writers; Solomon Islander, Tongan, and Anglo-Welsh, embodies this, as does the chapter’s woven mat-based structure. The thrust of this chapter is that through walking backwards into the future and embracing solidarity through diversity, we can promote a sustainable educational journey that offers the hope of continuity in the face of the challenges ahead. (shrink)

The ocean is central to our lives, but many of our impacts on the ocean are highly unsustainable, and patterns of resource exploitation at sea are deeply inequitable. This article assesses whether the objectives encapsulated in the UN's Sustainable Development Goal for the ocean are well equipped to respond to these challenges. It will argue that the approach underpinned by the SDG 14 is largely compatible, unfortunately, with ‘business as usual’. SDG 14 is undoubtedly intended as a starting point rather (...) than a final destination; but it is nevertheless important to be clear about how far we still need to travel on the road to oceanic justice. Most significantly, SDG 14 leaves several key challenges inadequately addressed or simply unaddressed. It fails to specify adequate principles for the fair sharing of benefits and burdens flowing from the ocean, including the burdens of tackling pressing environmental problems. Neither does it address the underlying causes of inequality in the ocean economy. It neglects to properly address, furthermore, the fragmented institutional context which significantly impedes effective action to advance the goals of justice and sustainability at sea. Finally, whereas SDG 14 correctly identifies a series of necessary reforms to the ocean economy, it fails to engage with important issues of transitional justice which will arise if these policies are implemented. Vital first step though it is, promoting a just and sustainable ocean will require us to set our sights considerably higher than the targets endorsed as part of SDG 14. (shrink)

The ocean is central to our lives, but many of our impacts on the ocean are highly unsustainable, and patterns of resource exploitation at sea are deeply inequitable. This article assesses whether the objectives encapsulated in the UN's Sustainable Development Goal for the ocean are well equipped to respond to these challenges. It will argue that the approach underpinned by the SDG 14 is largely compatible, unfortunately, with ‘business as usual’. SDG 14 is undoubtedly intended as a starting point rather (...) than a final destination; but it is nevertheless important to be clear about how far we still need to travel on the road to oceanic justice. Most significantly, SDG 14 leaves several key challenges inadequately addressed or simply unaddressed. It fails to specify adequate principles for the fair sharing of benefits and burdens flowing from the ocean, including the burdens of tackling pressing environmental problems. Neither does it address the underlying causes of inequality in the ocean economy. It neglects to properly address, furthermore, the fragmented institutional context which significantly impedes effective action to advance the goals of justice and sustainability at sea. Finally, whereas SDG 14 correctly identifies a series of necessary reforms to the ocean economy, it fails to engage with important issues of transitional justice which will arise if these policies are implemented. Vital first step though it is, promoting a just and sustainable ocean will require us to set our sights considerably higher than the targets endorsed as part of SDG 14. (shrink)

As technologies of ocean exploitation emerged during the late 1960s, science policy and diplomacy were formed in response to anticipated capabilities that did not match the realities of extracting deep-sea minerals and of resource exploitation in the deep ocean at the time. Promoters of ocean exploitation in the late 1960s envisaged wonders such as rare mineral extraction and the stationing of divers in underwater habitats from which they would operate seabed machinery not connected to the turbulent surface waters. Their promises (...) coincided with others' fears that nuclear weaponry would be placed on the seabed. Those who lacked the technological capability to extract minerals from the seabed also had concerns that other nations would exploit their resources. Scientific imaginaries caused uncertainty in the international community—especially in the “Global South.” The UN called the “Law of the Sea” conferences to mediate emerging geopolitical tensions caused by these imaginaries of exploitation of ocean resources. These conferences became a site where lawmakers projected futures rather than merely responding to past or present dilemmas. Diplomats' negotiations, with their basis in anticipation of the future uses of science and technology, reveal the role of scientific imaginaries within complex negotiations. Here, we see the impact of the distinction (or blurring) of the real and the imagined on the balance of relations between Global North and South increasing global imbalances of resources and power. This article's analysis of such scientific diplomacy provides a valuable example of the power of scientific imaginaries to have a global impact. (shrink)

The Sea as Mirror traces the pressing and repressed material and symbolic presence of the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean from Plato to Heidegger. To do so, Wu Yi employs the maritime as a lens to understand the drive of philosophy as both a response to and moment within the impetus of Western colonization. Yi examines how philosophy has again and again constructed itself as a genre in opposition to the movement of deterritorialization and fluidity of mimesis. She does (...) so via the method (meta, “after” + hodos, “way, journey”) of a series of essayings (in the original sense of trial, measure, attempt) across a geopolitical topography of discourses. These include philosophical texts drawn from a constellation of historical topoi at the critical moments of their encounter with the maritime: Plato and Euripedes’s work from fifth-century Athens; Augustus and Plautus’s writings from republican and early imperial Rome; Shakespeare’s creations from Elizabethan England; Kant and Rousseau’s texts from enlightenment continental Europe; and the thinking of Husserl and Heidegger from interwar Germany of the twentieth century. For each historical topos, Yi juxtaposes different representations of and responses to the maritime through the reading of a philosophical text vis-à-vis the reading of a literary text. In so doing, she lays bare the deep political and moral ambiguity attributed to the ocean in Western philosophical and literary imaginaries. (shrink)

This essay considers the challenges that the gendered and raced transnational subaltern refugee subject poses to the order of ‘the liberal state’ and ‘the liberal subject’, and argues that the latter are bound up in complex ways with entrenched understandings of the ocean as elementally distinct from land. This distinction, constituted by the freedom of the sea-going individualist liberal subject, invariably raced as white and gendered as male, to range across the waves in search of new worlds to conquer, is (...) one that is continually reproduced both in popular culture's contemporary sea romances, and in the spatial and legal demarcations of the nation and its limits. In the diverse forms of traffic flowing from south to north, the historical oceanic mobility of this unfettered liberal subject (always shadowed and weighted down by its invisible freight of non-white bodies) now meets the transversal movements of the contemporary transnational subaltern as complex subject. Through the narratives of two refugees to Australia, the article traces the possibilities of an embodied refugee poetics for inscribing new geographies across the global borderlands. (shrink)

A close reading of the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea (1st century CE), an anonymous captain's manual written in everyday Greek, provides ways of thinking about broader questions concerning the connectedness of the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean. It is located primarily in the Red Sea, an interstitial zone between the two large seas, and concerns long-distance networks of exchange between South Asia, the Arabian peninsula, the Horn of Africa, Alexandria, and beyond that the Mediterranean. Among the issues to (...) emerge are the linear nature of spatial experience and the means by which commodities are mapped. A goal of the article is to identify ways in which to link the practice and representations of travel. (shrink)

The present expression of radiation of an accelerated point charge is only approximately valid. The exact expression of radiation of an accelerated point charge is derived based on special relativity, and using the Larmor formulation for the radiation of an charged particle being accelerated, but instantaneously at rest. The totaled radiation power obtained by the exact expression is the same as Liénard’s generalization of the Larmor formula.

A Schrödinger-like formalism of relativistic quantum theory is presented based on an alternative Lagrangian formalism of relativistic mechanics with the proper time as the evolution parameter. The Schrödinger-like formalism resolves the great difficulties of negative probability density, Klein paradox, and Zitterbewegung. Ehrenfest's theorem is preserved in the Schrödinger-like formalism.

This feels like a time of environmental and moral crisis without parallel.... Not only do human beings seem not to believe in anything but, despite exponential advances in information production, we do not appear to know much either. This book is a guide for everyone who feels understandably perplexed. The book considers issues as diverse as: the lure of alternative religions and belief systems; the use of the rhetoric of economics to justify amoral decisionmaking; green politics and genetically-modified crops; new (...) technology's power to preserve the status quo; and the true impetus behind the Human Genome Project. Presenting an explanation of recent findings in science and their relationship with society and politics, the book seeks to give guidance towards responsible political action. Starting from themes developed in the companion volume The Search for Mind, the author attempts to provide intellectual roots for the 'anti-capitalist' or 'anti-globalization' movement and, in particular, treats social protest as a form of knowledge-seeking. The author brings to very topical and controversial concerns some much-needed clarity. Complete with reader-friendly summaries of current thought in the biological, physical, and social sciences, this book is designed primarily for the popular market but will also appeal to those working or studying in these fields. (shrink)

Machine generated contents note: Part 1 - The Constituent Disciplines of Cognitive Science -- Philosophical Epistemology -- Glossary -- 1.0 What is Philosophical Epistemology? -- 1.1 The reduced history of Philosophy Part I - The Classical Age -- 1.2 Mind and World - The problem of objectivity -- 1.3 The reduced history of Philosophy Part II - The twentieth century -- 1.4 The philosophy of Cognitive Science -- 1.5 Mind in Philosophy: summary -- 1.6 The Nolanian Framework (so far) -- (...) Psychology -- 2.0 Why is Psychology so difficult? -- 2.1 A brief history of Experimental Psychology -- 2.2 Methodologies in Psychology -- 2.3 Perception -- 2.4 Memory -- 2.5 Mind in Psychology -- Linguistics -- 3.0 Introduction -- 3.1 Why Linguistics? -- 3.2 Computation and Linguistics -- 3.3 The main grammatical theories -- 3.4 Language development and linguistics -- 3.5 Toward a definition of context -- 3.6 The multifarious uses of Language -- 3.7 Linguistics and Computational Linguistics -- 3.8 Language and other symbol systems -- 3.9 On the notion of context -- 3.10 Mind in Linguistics: summary -- Neuroscience -- 4.0 The constituent disciplines of Neuroscience -- 4.1 The methodology of Neuroscience -- 4.2 Gross Neuroanatomy -- 4.3 Some relevant findings -- 4.4 Connectionism (PDP) -- 4.5 The victory of Neuroscience? -- 4.6 Mind in Neuroscience: summary -- Artificial Intelligence -- 5.0 Introduction -- 5.1 Al and Cognitive Science -- 5.2 Skeptics and their techniques -- 5.3 Al as Computer Science -- 5.4 Al as software -- 5.5 The current methodological debate -- 5.6 Context, syntax and semantics -- 5.7 Mind in Al -- 5.8 Texts on Al -- Etholoqy and Ethnoscience -- 6.1 Etology -- 6.2 Ethnoscience -- 6.3 Mind in Ethology arid Ethnoscience -- Part II - A New Foundation for Cognitive Science -- - Symbol Systems -- 7.1 Characteristics of symbol systems -- 7.2 Context and the layers of symbol systems -- 7.3 Mind and symbol systems -- Consciousness and Selfhood -- 8.0 Introduction -- 8.1 Cognitive views -- 8.2 What is at stake? -- 8.3 Consciousness as treated in Philosophy -- 8.4 The Development of Selfhood -- 8.5 The minimal requirements for this theory -- 8.6 Self as a filter -- 8.7 Self and motivation -- 8.8 Conclusions -- 8.9 Recent developments -- Cognitive Science and the Search for Mind -- 9.1 Introduction -- 9.2 Review -- 9.3 A Theory of Mind anyone? -- 9.4 Foundational considerations -- 9.5 Coda: the Nolanian Framework. (shrink)

The quest -- Data -- Magic -- The sea as beloved -- Childhood -- Infinity -- Beaches -- The history of sea love -- The sea as koan -- Orenda -- The joy of ignorance -- Water -- Seeing the sea with the third eye -- The sea as miracle -- Music -- Water in love -- Aliveness -- The dark side -- The sea as toy -- The sea as healer -- Time and power.

At once feared and revered, sharks have captivated people since our earliest human encounters. Children and adults alike stand awed before aquarium shark tanks, fascinated by the giant teeth and unnerving eyes. And no swim in the ocean is undertaken without a slight shiver of anxiety about the very real—and very cinematic—dangers of shark bites. But our interactions with sharks are not entirely one-sided: the threats we pose to sharks through fisheries, organized hunts, and gill nets on coastlines are more (...) deadly and far-reaching than any bite. In Sharks and People acclaimed wildlife photographer Thomas Peschak presents stunning photographs that capture the relationship between people and sharks around the globe. A contributing photographer to National Geographic, Peschak is best known for his unusual photographs of sharks—his iconic image of a great white shark following a researcher in a small yellow kayak is one of the most recognizable shark photographs in the world. The other images gathered here are no less riveting, bringing us as close as possible to sharks in the wild. Alongside the photographs, Sharks and People tells the compelling story of the natural history of sharks. Sharks have roamed the oceans for more than four hundred million years, and in this time they have never stopped adapting to the ever-changing world—their unique cartilage skeletons and array of super-senses mark them as one of the most evolved groups of animals. Scientists have recently discovered that sharks play an important role in balancing the ocean, including maintaining the health of coral reefs. Yet, tens of millions of sharks are killed every year just to fill the demand for shark fin soup alone. Today more than sixty species of sharks, including hammerhead, mako, and oceanic white-tip sharks, are listed as vulnerable or in danger of extinction. The need to understand the significant part sharks play in the oceanic ecosystem has never been so urgent, and Peschak’s photographs bear witness to the thrilling strength and unique attraction of sharks. They are certain to enthrall and inspire. (shrink)

Carl Mika claims in the symposium’s lead essay that we need more myth today. In fact, an “unscientific” attitude can potentially reorient the alienation from the world. For Mika, a philosophical mātauranga Māori incorporates such a way of being in the world. Through it, an unmediated and co-existent relationship with the world can be built up. Some of Mika’s co-symposiasts invite Mika to substantiate aspects about this bold claim. Carwyn Jones nudges Mika to discuss the parallels between tikanga Māori—a system (...) that seeks to incorporate Māori law—and the common-law tradition that is adopted in New Zealand today. W. Julian Korab-Karpowicz agrees with Mika that to understand the world through an indifferent “scientific” investigation is to understand the world only partially, while the Māori scientist Ocean Ripeka Mercier illustrates how she seeks to develop a third space in her work that reconciles the fear of the unknown with the propensity to control the world through knowing. Helen Verran invites Mika to think about whether, and how, his understanding of a philosophical mātauranga Māori can help to facilitate the cultivation of a naturalism that is able to generate a cosmopolitics in New Zealand. (shrink)

According to the ancient commentaries, Iliad 21.195 was omitted by some sources, thereby making Acheloios, instead of Ocean, the origin of all waters, including the sea: the reasons for and the date of such a version of the text have been debated. In this paper 1 argue that the version without line 195 actually represents the earlier textual stage. This role of Acheloios is paralleled in the poem interpreted in the Derveni papyrus, and some features of Acheloios' cosmological function, as (...) well as his iconography, find interesting parallels in the Near East. As a 'cosmic' figure, Acheloios was in competition with Ocean, and is only rarely so represented in later preserved texts. His function as the origin of all fresh water and the source of all springs was more persistent, probably due also to his cultic role in Dodona: this, too, is probably reflected in another ancient variant for the text of Il. 16.234. (shrink)

Urban infrastructures serve as the backbone of modern economies, mediating global exchanges and responding to urban demands. Yet, our comprehension of these complex structures, particularly within diverse socio-political terrain, remains fragmented. In bridging this knowledge gap, this study delves into “boundary objects”—entities enabling diverse stakeholders to collaborate without a comprehensive consensus. Central to our investigation is the hypothesis that oceanic infrastructural developments are instrumental in molding the interface of urban, industrial, and energy sectors within marine contexts. Our lens is directed (...) at the Gulf of Mexico, which is distinguished by its industrial depth and expansive marine grid. We highlight the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway’s (GIWW) paramount role in regional movement and the ecological facets of practices such as dredging, which is vital for transport and coastal conservation. A striking revelation of our study is the transformation of offshore structures in the Gulf into vibrant marine habitats. Emphasizing the intertwined nature of marine infrastructures, we denote oceans as pivotal platforms for impending urban expansion, especially as land resources wane. Our research aspires to validate the role played by oceans as a nexus in the urban–industrial–energy fusion. (shrink)

This book examines John Locke’s political thought and activity surrounding oceans with a focus on law and freedom at sea. By examining Locke’s Two Treatises of Government alongside his work on England’s Board of Trade, this book shows how his theoretical ideas were translated into laws and policies about issues such as piracy and slavery.

From immemorial time, many Tyrrhenian places of ancient Sicily and Italy were identified with the main stages of the return of Ulysses. Some Hellenistic critics assumed that it was from the various ancient and pre-Homeric myths that Homer drew inspiration, in the same way that he did with the myth of the Trojan War, which certainly occurred before him. Thus, the voyage of Ulysses, after his losing the course because of the storm at Cape Malea, had to be located in (...) those sites. But how can one explain the fact that Homer places the voyage from Circe to the Hades over the Ocean? Is it only a pseudogeographic poetic touch, aimed to magnify the exploit? Crates of Mallus did not think so: in his opinion, only some of the numerous adventures had taken place in the Tyrrhenian Sea, whereas Homer had purposefully placed some other exactly on the Atlantic Ocean, beyond the Pillars of Hercules. Whichever of the two models one chooses, the route of Ulysses seems to be completely unlikely, both from the point of view of objective reality and from the point of view of poetic imagination. It appears to be a senseless coming and going that takes the shape of some sort of a labyrinth. Furthermore, the navigation times suggested by the text do not accord at all with the distances among the real sites. For this reason, Eratosthenes held that, from Cape Malea onwards, Ulysses switched from the real world to that of fantasy, or better still to the world of some narrative fable that does not heed geography at all. The modern critics are inclined to agree with him and this thesis is nowadays the most popular one. Yet, a very serious objection can be raised here: the myth and the epos, are strictly linked to the geography and the topography as well – they are radically refractory to a narrative fable that totally contradicts the then realities of time and space. Why should Ulysses plunge from Cape Malea onwards straight into the Neverland kingdom? If we combine Odyssey’s data with those we can reconstruct for the earliest form of the Argonautic saga, then we get the solution that neither the ancient nor the modern critics have guessed correctly: up to around the middle of the 8th century B.C., the Greeks thought the Ocean to flow just after the Sicily Channel, essentially coinciding with the so-called Tyrrhenian Sea, still completely unknown at that time. This new perspective can well justify the objective disorder of Ulysses’ route. Above all, it also bears a deeper poetic sense: the Hero had the chance to know and to experience not only some far and exotic countries in general terms, but he also met the very boundaries of the surfacing lands and the rushing waters which encircle the terrestrial disc, bordering the external cosmic abyss. Ulysses came back home alive. He was able to tell the stories about the lands where no human being could ever sail. This borderline that geographically is clearly located marks at the same time the insurmountable chasm between the physical and the meta-physical world. (shrink)

Recent times have seen an emergence of cold-water sea swimming as a popular pasttime for increased numbers of people in coastal regions. Within this paper, we seek to outline the philosophical relationship between water and society, right back to Thales. From this we continue through anthropological sources to highlight the relationship between culture and the sea throughout much of human history. Sociology offers only piecemeal theoretical bases for this relationship. Here, the concept of liminality is deployed as a mechanism through (...) which we can interpret human-water relations. On from this, the concept of the ‘oceanic feeling’, coined by French intellectual Romain Rolland, is discussed to situate how the experience of swimming might offer one among many means through which we can return to the world as it is given to us, in a Nietzschean sense, and in doing so return at once to an experience of the eternal borne from presence. (shrink)