In their interesting and informative paper ‘From Szasz to Foucault: On the Role of Critical Psychiatry,’ Pat Bracken and Phil Thomas contrast, in a clear and helpful way, some central themes in the works of Thomas Szasz and Michel Foucault. They go on to endorse a form of critical psychiatry inspired by the latter. Szasz’s critique of psychiatry, they explain, is premised on binary oppositions, principally that between ‘mental’ and ‘bodily.’ Szasz begins by assuming the legitimacy of the (...) distinction and proceeds to argue that the term ‘illness’ can only be legitimately applied to what is ‘bodily.’ According to Szasz, there are medical pathologies, which are to be understood in naturalistic, biological terms, and .. (shrink)

Pylyshyn makes a convincing case that early visual processing is cognitively impenetrable, and although I question the utility of binary oppositions such as penetrable/impenetrable, for the most part I am in agreement. The author does not provide explicit designations or denotations for the terms penetrable and impenetrable, which appear quite arbitrary. Furthermore, the use of focal attention smacks of an homunculus, and the account appears to slip too easily between the perceptual, the cognitive, and the neurophysiological.

The article considers regional issues of the Kazakh transtoposystem. There are a number of problematic issues related to cross-border Kazakh toponymy. The article analyzes only one aspect – the status of binary names in the cross-border toposystem. The goal is to study how obvious the binary opposition is there, considering the etymology of toponyms based on semantic opposition. The toposystem of the Northern and Western regions bordering Russia was used as the empirical material for the study. According to (...) the border administrative-regional division, a number of districts of such regions of the country as North Kazakhstan, Pavlodar, Kostanay, Western Kazakhstan, Aktobe, and Atyrau border with Russia. In the article, a series of binary names along the toponyms of this cross-border zone is formed. In particular, Úlken-Kіshі (Big-Small), Aq-Qara (Black-White), Qara-Sary (Black-Yellow), Jaqsy-Jaman (Good-Bad), Jyly-Sýyq (Warm-Cold), and Ashy-Tushy (Bitter-Fresh) are analyzed. The difference between toponymic binary names and lexical antonyms is considered. We discuss the fact that the contradiction in lexical antonyms is clearly expressed, but in binary opposition along toponyms, the contradiction may not be complete. It is reported that the contradiction of toponyms is recognized only in the toponymic context, and sometimes it is even possible to form a related pair, rather than a semantic contradiction. (shrink)

The remarks which follow arise from the daily and simultaneous consulting of two literatures and, in a larger sense, of two cultures, Portuguese and Brazilian, both expressed in the same language, Portuguese. They also arise from an attempt to describe and define by categories which are “internal” to literature the differences which exist between the two bodies of writing under discussion. But they are equally inspired by a desire to isolate in the corpus of the texts which conventionally constitute a (...) national literature those thematic and stylistic recurrences which may serve as starting points for an attempt at formalization. (shrink)

Abstract In this article we develop a relational understanding of sociality, that is, an account of social life that takes relation as primary. This stands in contrast to the common assumption that relations arise when subjects interact, an account that gives logical priority to separation. We will develop this relational understanding through a reading of the work of Martin Buber, a social philosopher primarily interested in dialogue, meeting, relationship, and the irreducibility and incomparability of reality. In particular, the article contrasts (...) Buber’s work with that of poststructuralist theorists who take as their starting point the deconstruction of the Hegelian logic of binary oppositions. Deconstruction understands difference as the excess that undoes the binary, but Buber, we argue, shows how difference derives from the primacy and ontological undefinability of relation. Relational logic does not exclude the logic of separations and oppositions: relation is the primal ground that makes separations possible. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-13 DOI 10.1007/s11841-011-0278-9 Authors Andrew Metcalfe, School of Social Sciences and International Studies, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia Ann Game, School of Social Sciences and International Studies, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia Journal Sophia Online ISSN 1873-930X Print ISSN 0038-1527. (shrink)

Chinese translation courtesy of Zhuanxu Xu. We want to know what gender is. But metaphysical approaches to this question solely have focused on the binary gender kinds men and women. By overlooking those who identify outside of the binary–the group I call ‘genderqueer’–we are left without tools for understanding these new and quickly growing gender identifications. This metaphysical gap in turn creates a conceptual lacuna that contributes to systematic misunderstanding of genderqueer persons. In this paper, I argue that (...) to better understand genderqueer identities, we must recognize a new type of gender kind: critical gender kinds, or kinds whose members collectively resist dominant gender ideology. After developing a model of critical gender kinds, I suggest that genderqueer is best modeled as a critical gender kind that stands in opposition to `the binary assumption', or the prevalent assumption that the only possible genders are the binary, discrete, exclusive, and exhaustive kinds men and women. (shrink)

A formal theory of oppositions and opposites is proposed on the basis of a non- Fregean semantics, where opposites are negation-forming operators that shed some new light on the connection between opposition and negation. The paper proceeds as follows. After recalling the historical background, oppositions and opposites are compared from a mathematical perspective: the first occurs as a relation, the second as a function. Then the main point of the paper appears with a calculus of oppositions, by (...) means of a non-Fregean semantics that redefines the logical values of various sorts of sentences. A num- ber of topics are then addressed in the light of this algebraic semantics, namely: how to construct value-functional operators for any logical opposition, beyond the classical case of contradiction; Blanché's "closure problem", i.e., how to find a complete structure connecting the sixteen binary sentences with one another. All of this is meant to devise an abstract theory of opposition: it encompasses the relation of consequence as subalternation, while relying upon the use of a primary "proto- negation" that turns any relatum into an opposite. This results in sentential negations that proceed as intensional operators, while negation is broadly viewed as a difference-forming operator without special constraints on it. (shrink)

The article explores the landscape in higher education in which old binary divisions are officially denied yet have been reinvigorated through a mix of conservative and neo-liberal policies. Efforts to resist such pressures can happen at different levels, including, in this case, module design and classroom practice. The rationale for such resistance is considered in relationship to the authors’ political and moral standpoints. Debates within higher education policy circles are invariably reduced to a series of oppositions: theory and (...) practice; training and education; research and teaching. The article seeks to break down such polarities through an exploration of classroom practice. In fact, we argue that such distinctions help to legitimize the existing inequalities in higher education and group-based harms, which characterize the sector. Instead, a case is made for a pedagogy that enables students, particularly those from diverse and disadvantaged backgrounds, to use their experiences, values, etc. to exchange and develop ideas in a group context, thereby providing an important means of collective empowerment (intellectual and practical, both at work and in their private lives). In this process students are encouraged to use ethical theories as tools to explain and underpin their understanding of work-based scenarios. The role of the academic is to facilitate such exchanges and foster new ethical approaches and a public awareness and engagement that goes beyond the classroom. The pedagogic approach, drawing on notions of relational autonomy and narrative methods as well as providing spaces for the co-production of new knowledge, confirms the indivisibility of research and teaching. (shrink)

In the following lines the symbolic oppression founded on binary hierarchies that exist inside the framework of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Basic Freedoms will be presented. In those binary oppositions opposed terms are not equally valued. One of these terms is dominant, while the other is subordinated and mostly defined only as the first term’s other. This symbolic oppression creates various forms of discrimination. This paper argues that this problem can be (...) resolved by deliberative democracy. Effective deliberation leads to more informed public sphere which is capable to embrace otherness and diversity. (shrink)

ABSTRACT It is fruitless to interpret Constant's modern liberty from the binary perspective of either the negative/positive freedom opposition or the liberal/republican freedom opposition. Both oppositional perspectives reduce the relationally complex nature of modern liberty to one or another component of the relation. Such reduction inevitably results in an incomplete and, therefore, inadequate interpretation of Constant's modern liberty. Consequently, either of these binary frames of interpretation obscures rather than illuminates the full nature of Constant's modern liberty. Boxed into (...) their irreconcilably opposed alternatives, both binary perspectives fail to appreciate that Constant's conception of modern liberty is a complex achievement irreducible without loss to either liberal negative liberty as non-interference or republican freedom as non-domination. Nor does combining liberal negative freedom and positive freedom (in the sense of ancient liberty), as Holmes well establishes, adequately tells the whole story of Constant's modern liberty. As a complex achievement, Constant's conception of modern liberty, I shall argue, blends negative freedom as associated with neo-Roman republican freedom as non-subjection to arbitrary power, negative freedom as non-interference, associated with the liberal tradition, positive freedom in the sense of inner self-development, and positive freedom as collective self-government or civic republican freedom. (shrink)

The feature selection (FS) process has an essential effect in solving many problems such as prediction, regression, and classification to get the optimal solution. For solving classification problems, selecting the most relevant features of a dataset leads to better classification accuracy with low training time. In this work, a hybrid binary crow search algorithm (BCSA) based quasi-oppositional (QO) method is proposed as an FS method based on wrapper mode to solve a classification problem. The QO method was employed in (...) tuning the value of flight length in the BCSA which is controlling the ability of the crows to find the optimal solution. To evaluate the performance of the proposed method, four benchmark datasets have been used which are human intestinal absorption, HDAC8 inhibitory activity (IC50), P-glycoproteins, and antimicrobial. Accordingly, the experimental results are discussed and compared against other standard algorithms based on the accuracy rate, the average number of selected features, and running time. The results have proven the robustness of the proposed method relied on the high obtained value of accuracy (84.93–95.92%), G-mean (0.853–0.971%), and average selected features (4.36–11.8) with a relatively low computational time. Moreover, to investigate the effectiveness of the proposed method, Friedman test was used which declared that the performance supremacy of the proposed BCSA-QO with four datasets was very evident against BCSA and CSA by selecting the minimum relevant features and producing the highest accuracy classification rate. The obtained results verify the usefulness of the proposed method (BCSA-QO) in the FS with classification in terms of high classification accuracy, a small number of selected features, and low computational time. (shrink)

Hypatia and Synesius lived in a highly divisive time with religious extremism on the rise and the meaning and role of Classical cultural fixtures like paideia, philosophia and manteia being questioned and redefined. I examine Synesius’ Letters, Dion, and De Insomniis to tease out the universalizing and harmonizing tendencies between pagan and Christian, theoria and paideia, philosophia and manteia that Synesius’ writings, life and career embody. I look at Synesius’ synthesis of Iamblichean and Plotinian tendencies, a binary found in (...) modern scholarship, to show that theurgy was likely part of Hypatia’s teaching within a well-rounded curriculum that included classical paideia and philosophical theoria. Synesius advocates for the importance of paideia, including rhetoric and philosophia as aids in the step-by-step approach to the spiritual ascent, while also acknowledging the value and universal accessibility of theoria reached by desert monks and the dream-divination (oneiromanteia) that everyone can experience in sleep. Paideia makes the fall from the heights of theoria more pleasant, while philosophia (which in Synesius’ mind included theurgy) is essential for purifying the pneuma and making it receptive to divinely inspired dreams. I propose that it was in Hypatia’s school that Synesius internalized a quote (from a lost work of Aristotle) that reconciles the two approaches (curated and amateur) to the ascent. While society at large was obsessed with ever widening opposites and binaries, Hypatia’s Synesius both overtly and covertly emphasized harmonization and unity that are at the heart of philosophia. (shrink)

The interpretation given by Craik and Lockhart of the findings by Hyde and Jenkins involving supposed depth of incidental-task processing on subsequent word recall is brought into question by the tenets of logical learning theory. It is shown that Craik and Lockhart overlooked the possible role of oppositionality in this research. An alternative explanation relying on an oppositional context and predication is offered. Two experiments present evidence supporting the hypothesis that oppositionality in an incidental task facilitates subsequent word recall . (...) In both experiments, the importance of taking a subject's meaningful understanding of the task instruction into consideration is highlighted. The discussion contrasts Boolean "binary" disjunction with the logic of oppositionality. It is shown how oppositionality allows us to conceptualize a testable theory of human agency. (shrink)

Nursing and nursing practice both construct and are in turn constructed by the context in which they operate. Texts play a central part in that construction. As such, nursing and nursing practice can be considered to represent a reality that is textually mediated. This paper explores the notion of nursing as a textually mediated reality and offers the reader the possibility of engaging in reflection on what implications this has for nursing and their own nursing practice. The analyses provided draw (...) on aspects of die work of both Foucault and Derrida. Foucault's notion of discourse provides a vehicle for die exploration of nursing as textually mediated, as does Derrida's concept of binary oppositions. The paper thus illustrates some of die possibilities afforded nursing by poststructural analyses. In particular it does this by exploring one of the central textual constructions, impacting on die way that nursing and nursing practice are conceptualized, the mind/body binary opposition. (shrink)

The analysis of armed opposition groups is heavily tainted by gross categorizations and labeling. Using vague terms that reduce the objectives of such groups to a uniform binary of secessionist or reformist defies their ideational complexity, undermining the effort to gain a nuanced and in-depth understanding of their actual motives. A closer look into the Ogaden National Liberation Front in Ethiopia reveals the type of complexity we might expect to find in armed opposition groups’ objectives, and thus the problem (...) with superficially labeling them to make for easy comparative analyses. (shrink)

When people understand a counterfactual such as “if the flowers had been roses, the trees would have been orange trees,” they think about the conjecture, “there were roses and orange trees,” and they also think about its opposite, the presupposed facts. We test whether people think about the opposite by representing alternates, for example, “poppies and apple trees,” or whether models can contain symbols, for example, “no roses and no orange trees.” We report the discovery of an inference‐to‐alternates effect—a tendency (...) to make an affirmative inference that refers to an alternate even from a negative minor premise, for example, “there were no orange trees, therefore there were poppies.” Nine experiments show the inference‐to‐alternates effect occurs in a binary context, but not a multiple context, and for direct and indirect reference; it can be induced and reduced by prior experience with similar inferences, and it also occurs for indicative conditionals. The results have implications for theories of counterfactual conditionals, and of negation. (shrink)

Michel Foucault's theory of moral subjectivity, as a trained relation of the subject to itself, contains a latent semiotic theory of self-knowledge. The formation of the moral subject is seen by Foucault as a sign system, given the name of technology, and placed in a broader context of semiotic and non-semiotic paths to knowledge. In such a framework, signification as a technology, the self as a binary opposition, and the in-between space of binaries emerge as important methodological elements in (...) self-knowledge. Furthermore, a semiotic argument comes forth about the epistemological role of culture in the modeling of knowledge at large. (shrink)

This paper reflects on the postmodern shift in childhood studies and its impact on education. As scholars interrogate the modern notion of childhood, the discourse of postmodernism has entered the realm of childhood studies, yielding various new perspectives on childhood. The key characteristics of the postmodern shift in childhood studies include: 1) the rejection of essentialism regarding childhood and the recognition of the diversity inherent in it; 2) the deconstruction of binary oppositions and the advocacy for the heterogeneous (...) nature of childhood and the concept of "becoming-child"; 3) the dissolution of the modern subject associated with childhood and the reconstruction of the postmodern subject. Postmodern childhood studies will bring some positive impacts to the field of education, such as focusing on the differences among children rather than abstracting them into a unified map, removing adultism from education, and emphasizing the construction of new forms of child subjectivity in education. However, at the same time, it will also bring many challenges to education, such as questioning the essence of childhood and good education, shaking the foundation of educational existence brought by the dissolution of childhood, and the loss of educational significance due to the fluid and changing construction of child subjectivity. This underscores the importance of acknowledging that as education embraces the discourse of postmodern childhood, both its promises and perils will permeate the educational domain. (shrink)

Veronica Mars offers something typically lacking in mainstream television. It confronts race, whereas similar shows have actively avoided the topic. The constant friction between classes and racial groups provides both the compelling drama and a narrative that the author, an African American, is familiar with. Veronica's description of Neptune's economic class structure introduces us to the binary or dual nature of its society. The traditional three economic classes—upper, middle, and lower—have been replaced by the “haves” and “have‐nots.” Binary (...) opposition is a common way of creating social categories or labels. All too often, however, one of the opposites is assigned a higher value and is regarded as the default, dominant, or privileged category, superior to its opposite. Neptune's racial binary is similar to that of the United States in general, but there the site of the conflict is typically white versus Hispanic rather than white versus black. (shrink)

In this article it is argued that the relation between the socalled Gutenberg galaxis of print culture and the Turing galaxis of digital media is not one of opposition and substitution, but rather one of co-evolution and integration. Or more precisely: that the Gutenberg galaxis on the one hand can be inscribed into the Turing galaxis, which on the other hand is textual in character since it is based on linear and serially processed representations manifested in a binary alphabet. (...) In continuation of this text and hypertext is described as notions of related but different sorts of complex systems and it is argued that both texts and hypertexts are best thought of as sequentially organised. The first part of the paper contains a description of the basic properties of computers and digital representation answering the question: what are the properties common to all kinds of use of computers – whether used for one purpose or another? The second part is concerned with the relationship between printed and electronic text. The third part addresses the idea of hypertext as systems which exploits modal shifts between node-mode and link-mode as a significant part of the semantics of the system. (shrink)

This paper presents a theoretical study of the binary oppositions underlying the mechanisms of natural computation understood as dynamical processes on natural information morphologies. Of special interest are the oppositions of discrete vs. continuous, structure vs. process, and differentiation vs. integration. The framework used is that of computing nature, where all natural processes at different levels of organisation are computations over informational structures. The interactions at different levels of granularity/organisation in nature, and the character of the phenomena (...) that unfold through those interactions, are modeled from the perspective of an observing agent. This brings us to the movement from binary oppositions to dynamic networks built upon mutually related binary oppositions, where each node has several properties. (shrink)

During the last decades, the psychology of reasoning has identified experimentally many fallacies committed by spontaneous reasoners. Given these experimental results, some theories have been developed about this phenomenon, mainly algorithmic theories. This paper develops instead a computational modelling of these current fallacies which appear as simplifications in the treatment of information that do not respect the formal rules of classical propositional logic. These fallacies are explained as crushes in the Klein group structure and so, in squares of opposition. These (...) crushes are an effect of not to take into account the dual of the binary operator at work in the major premise of the inference. This analysis allows predictions on fallacies not identified before, which are fallacies produced when reasoning with incompatibilities. The paper concludes with consequences of the analysis on pedagogical strategies for the teaching of logic. (shrink)

Modern capitalist societies are plagued by a series of oppositions, such as the subject/object, theory/practice, and the mind/body opposition. The problem with these oppositions is that they appear in an absolute opposition and hierarchical relation, making the negative pole (the object, practice, and the body) appear inferior to the positive pole (the subject, theory, and the mind). Furthermore, the “inferior” pole is often unconsciously linked to women, racial minorities, and working-class people, reinforcing injustices towards them. In this chapter, (...) I read Theodor W. Adorno with Jacques Lacan to explain how these oppositions are connected and different from one another, and what we can do to challenge them, and the injustices they engender. (shrink)

The article deals with linguistic relativism in the decisions of the Austrian Verfassungsgerichtshof and the Czech Constitutional Court. It focuses on the Courts argumentation in which the state of language and its limiting perception of the word gender about non-binary and intersex people were used. The article conducts an in-depth analysis of two judgments. The first is the ruling of the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic Case No. Pl. ÚS 2/20, in which the Court argued the absence of (...) gender-neutral names in Czech as one of the reasons for rejecting the constitutional complaint. The second is the judgment of the Austrian Verfassungsgerichtshof Case No. G 77/2018-9, in which the Court concluded as part of the constitutional review that the language can be adapted to the societal situation. The paper analyses selected parts of both decisions, interpreted using fundamental theses of linguistic relativism (and determinism). I argue that the Czech Constitutional Court has adopted a conservative approach without considering the current societal situation. This opened space for the unequal status of people with an alternative gender identity in society based on ignoring inclusive language, which is the exact opposite of the position of the Austrian Verfassungsgerichtshof. (shrink)

A monosexual configuration of sexuality assumes that sexual desire is directed at either men or women. Bisexuality resists a choice between oppositional categories and is often theorised as having a transgressive potential to destabilise binary logic, not only in relation to sexuality but also to gender. There is, however, a lack of empirical work exploring how this potential might be realised in the accounts of bisexual individuals. Drawing on interviews with South African bisexual women, we use a narrative-discursive lens (...) to examine the discursive resources employed by participants to trouble or resist hetero-gendered norms. Our findings demonstrate how resistance to the gender binary hinges on citational politics that are fundamentally gendered and linked to sexuality. Instead of entirely destabilising hetero-gendered norms, participants draw on gendered scripts that simultaneously expand norms to accommodate their sexual difference and, through processes of othering, function to reiterate hetero-gendered norms. While complete subversion of gender binaries is not possible in participants’ discursive contexts, what does occur is a ‘slow bending’ of norms. Theorising bisexuality as transgressing oppositional categories closes off opportunities to interrogate the pervasive influence of gender binaries in contexts that remain marked by pervasive heteronormativity and heterosexism. Significantly, it also obscures more modest improvisations of gender scripts that hold potential for destabilising gender binaries. (shrink)

The article analyzes the features of understanding of the history of philosophical process by the leading representative of French Neo-Kantianism. The binary scheme, thoroughly substantiated by Renоuvier in the “Sketch of the Systematic Classification of Philosophical Doctrines”, was a certain result of his previous creative way. In the “Textbook of Philosophy of the New Age”, he, highlighting the pantheism–idealism dilemma, expresses his sympathies for eclecticism. In the “Textbook of Ancient Philosophy”, he advocates giving philosophy a scientific character by combining (...) the laws of reason and history. In “Experiences of General Criticism” he builds a system of neo-criticism, identifying phenomena with reality. Finally, the “Sketch” presents an attempt at an objective consideration of the history of philosophy. Renоuvier identifies six oppositions passing through the entire history of thought (thing–consciousness, infinite–finite, evolution–creation, necessity–freedom, happiness–duty, evidence–belief). The strength of his method is the desire to make a choice between opposing trends, taking into account intellectual motives, passions, practical inducements of varying degrees of community. But both elements of reductionism and unfounded optimism about the lack of influence of all kinds of systems on his own constructions are present in his approach. (shrink)

Who can say "I am Jewish?" What does "Jew" mean? What especially does it mean for Jacques Derrida, founder of deconstruction, scoffer at boundaries and fixed identities, explorer of the indeterminate and undecidable? In _Portrait of Jacques Derrida as a Young Jewish Saint_, French feminist philosopher Hélène Cixous follows the intertwined threads of Jewishness and non-Jewishness that play through the life and works of one of the greatest living philosophers. Cixous is a lifelong friend of Derrida. They both grew up (...) as French Jews in Algeria and share a "belonging constituted of exclusion and nonbelonging"--not Algerian, rejected by France, their Jewishness concealed or acculturated. In Derrida's family "one never said 'circumcision'but 'baptism,'not 'Bar Mitzvah'but 'communion.'" Judaism cloaked in Catholicism is one example of the undecidability of identity that influenced the thinker whom Cixous calls a "Jewish Saint." An intellectual contemporary of Derrida, Cixous's ideas on writing have an affinity with his philosophy of deconstruction, which sought to overturn binary oppositions--such as man/woman, or Jew/non-Jew--and blur boundaries of exclusion inherent in Western thought. In portraying Derrida, Cixous uses metonymy, alliteration, rhyme, neologisms, and puns to keep the text in constant motion, freeing language from any rigidity of meaning. In this way she writes a portrait of "Derrida in flight," slipping from one appearance to the next, unable to be fixed in one spot, yet encompassing each point he passes. From the circumcision act to family relationships, through Derrida's works to those of Celan, Rousseau, and Beaumarchais, Cixous effortlessly merges biography and textual commentary in this playful portrait of the man, his works, and being (or not being) Jewish. (shrink)

This collection of five essays by Germany’s most prominent and influential social thinker both links Luhmann’s social theory to the question “What is modern about modernity?” and shows the origins and context of his theory. In the introductory essay, “Modernity in Contemporary Society,” Luhmann develops the thesis that the modern epistemological situation can be seen as the consequence of a radical change in social macrostructures that he calls “social differentiation,” thereby designating the juxtaposition of and interaction between a growing number (...) of social subsystems without any hierarchical structure. “European Rationality” defines rationality as the capacity to see the difference between systems and their environment as a unity. Luhmann argues that, in a world characterized by contingency, rationality tends to become coextensive with imagination, a view that challenges their classical binary opposition and opens up the possibility of seeing modern rationality as a paradox. In the third essay, “Contingency as Modern Society’s Defining Attribute,” Luhmann develops a further and probably even more important paradox: that the generalization of contingency or cognitive uncertainty is precisely what provides stability within modern societies. In the process, he argues that medieval and early modern theology can be seen as a “preadaptive advance” through which Western thinking prepared itself for the modern epistemological situation. In “Describing the Future,” Luhmann claims that neither the traditional hope of learning from history nor the complementary hope of cognitively anticipating the future can be maintained, and that the classical concept of the future should be replaced by the notion of risk, defined as juxtaposing the expectation of realizing certain projects and the awareness that such projects might fail. The book concludes with “The Ecology of Ignorance,” in which Luhmann outlines prospective research areas “for sponsors who have yet to be identified.”. (shrink)

Melancholia is a commonly experienced feeling, and one with a long and fascinating medical history which can be charted back to antiquity. Avoiding the simplistic binary opposition of constructivism and hard realism, this book argues that melancholia was a culture-bound syndrome which thrived in the West because of the structure of Western medicine since the Ancient Greeks, and because of the West's fascination with self-consciousness. While melancholia cannot be equated with modern depression, Matthew Bell argues that concepts from recent (...) depression research can shed light on melancholia. Within a broad historical panorama, Bell focuses on ancient medical writing, especially the little-known but pivotal Rufus of Ephesus, and on the medicine and culture of early modern Europe. Separate chapters are dedicated to issues of gender and cultural difference, and the final chapter offers a survey of melancholia in the arts, explaining the prominence of melancholia - especially in literature. (shrink)

This paper emphasizes the crucial role that language use plays in climate change communication. In particular, this paper examines UN public discourse and narratives about climate change. It will be shown that the climate change is often described as a "threat to human wellbeing" and as an external enemy—the Other. On the other hand, humanity is often portrayed as a victim of climate change. The consequence of this rhetoric and logic of apocalypse is insufficient action in relation to climate change. (...) The narrative construction of the Other that is described as a threat is founded on binary oppositions: we/they, self/other, culture/nature, human/non-human and so forth. As long as climate change is described as an external enemy and "independent matter" and climate policy is based on binary oppositions, action to combat climate change will remain insufficient. (shrink)

After the Human explores how the strategies and methods of scientific as well as humanistic inquiry are converging to construct a relational view of the world. It evaluates Einstein's theory of relativity, quantum theory, information theory, cognitive neuropsychology, and evolution alongside the history of modern western philosophy, arguing that presumptions such as human exceptionalism and individualism are not only out of sync with scientific knowledge but also root causes of the critical issues facing the world--climate change, machine intelligence, ideological political (...) oppositions. How to think beyond anthropocentrism and binary oppositions--human/animal, sacred/profane--and acknowledge ourselves as entangled parts of larger ecologies is the aim of the book. The distinctive character of the book is its wealth of scientific insight; the opening chapter reveals the complex worlds of dirt, water, air, and fire and how humans have deformed them beyond recognition. Extraordinary advances in technology, with their promise of furthering a global village, have been derailed by economic individualism and hierarchy, prefigured in the atomism of Descartes and Newton. Not until Einstein, Bohr, and Heisenberg introduced relativity and quantum mechanics--less than a century after Hegel first proposed his dialogical worldview--did a relational account of reality begin to develop. The study of the natural world revealed a micro-universe of relations in which organisms and environments constantly adapt to one another; as Lynn Margulis puts it, "life is a verb," webs and networks of intelligences and emotions communicating within and across species and nonbiological life forms including AI. We have only to change not the world but how we see ourselves in it. (shrink)

In What is Philosophy? Deleuze and Guattari muse on that time of life when a philosopher feels compelled to reflect upon the question of the nature of her or his practice. The desire for such reflection, they argue, comes with age. It involves self-reflection, something that concerns one's disposition, and one's place in the world. As such it is properly an ethical process. The idea of reflection, however, is also fundamental to both thought itself and to artistic practice, or the (...) practice of creation. In considering the nature of philosophy, then, Deleuze and Guattari turn, through logical necessity, to the nature of thought and the thought of nature: that is, they also consider science, and art. This chapter argues that this interrelation is at the heart of their understanding of natural being, and links up with the minor traditions of thinking that they trace and extend in their own work. Yet the connection between art and how we should live also occurs in the dominant tradition of thought: rather than ethics, however, this tradition links artistic practice to morals, and the ‘moral’. There are a number of distinctions, then, which involve not so much binary oppositions as differences of perspective, and these are crucial to an understanding of the interrelations Deleuze and Deleuze and Guattari develop between art, ethics, and ethology. These distinctions assert an ethics over a morality; thought over consciousness; creation over mimesis. (shrink)

This thesis provides a comparative analysis of the different ways Hegel and Sartre understand that consciousness can be alienated. Because understanding the various ways Hegel and Sartre hold that consciousness can be alienated is not possible without first understanding what each thinker understands by consciousness, I first identify and outline the different ways Hegel and Sartre conceptualise consciousness’s ontological structure before identifying the various ways each thinker understands that consciousness can be alienated. The general argument developed shows that while Hegel (...) and Sartre agree that alienation is a constitutive aspect of consciousness’s existence and are, therefore, allies in the battle against it, Sartre’s analysis of consciousness’s ontological structure is unable to provide the same depth of analysis as Hegel’s. Put differently, I believe it is Hegel’s analysis of consciousness’s ontological structure that provides an analysis of alienation that is more nuanced, subtle, complex, and multi-dimensional than the account Sartre’s provides. To support my argument, I first explore Sartre’s understanding of consciousness’s ontological structure. This discloses that, because Sartre defines consciousness as ontologically nothing, he holds that consciousness is defined in strict ontological opposition to objectivity. Consciousness’s ontological nothingness leads Sartre to hold that consciousness is free to choose its mode of being. This leads me to identify what Sartre holds to be constitutive of authentic and inauthentic modes of being. But while Sartre distinguishes between the ontological structure of consciousness and its experiences, I argue that Hegel: 1) does not introduce a distinction between consciousness’s ontological structure and its mode of being, but holds that consciousness’s self-understanding and ontological structure develop through its experiences; and 2) holds that consciousness is not ontologically opposed to objectivity, but is a spiritual synthesis of subjectivity and objectivity. I show that because Hegel holds that consciousness’s intentional object is an aspect of its ontological structure, rather than something simply opposed to itself, and because he recognises that consciousness must learn what it is ontologically by experiencing numerous different relations with its object, he is able to show that while the subject/object binary opposition of Sartre’s analysis of consciousness’s ontological structure describes one potential ontological relation consciousness can have to its object, it is not the only one. Indeed, Hegel’s analysis of consciousness’s ontological structure insists that consciousness will only truly understand its ontological structure if it learns to not think of itself in terms of the subject/object dichotomy and, instead, realises that it is a spiritual synthesis of subjectivity and objectivity. To show how this fundamental difference manifests itself throughout their thought, I identify and compare what each thinker’s understanding of consciousness’s ontological structure means in terms of consciousness’s relation to the world, alienation, authenticity, ethics, self-transformation, and social relations. (shrink)

This chapter explores the ways in which Jacques Lacan and Cornelius Castoriadis understand the role(s) that violence plays in the formation of the individual. While the majority of the literature tends to focus on their accounts of the symbolic and imaginary to highlight the differences between them, this chapter claims that a different and more harmonious relationship appears once we focus on their respective claims regarding the roles that violence plays in relation to the formation of the individual. For Lacan, (...) violence appears via the process through which the child enters the symbolic realm by learning to talk and use language. Far from being a negative occurrence, however, such violent imposition serves to create a fully functioning (adult) individual. Castoriadis comes to a similar conclusion, albeit from a different ontological background. Whereas Lacan affirms the primary importance of symbolic differential relations, Castoriadis claims that the psyche is structured from and around a monadic core. Lacan and Castoriadis agree therefore that violence is fundamental to the formation of the individual, but they seem to disagree on whether it entails a symbolic or social form of violence. By way of conclusion, however, I undermine this apparent binary opposition by showing that, for Lacan, the symbolic is inherently social and, for Castoriadis, the social is linked to symbolic relations. As a consequence, both agree that violence is key to the formation of the individual and is socio-symbolic in nature. (shrink)

How to theorise religion in International Relations (IR)? Does the concept of post-secularity advance the debate on religion beyond the ‘return of religion’ and the crisis of secular reason? This article argues that the post-secular remains trapped in the logic of secularism. First, a new account is provided of the ‘secularist bias’ that characterises mainstream IR theory: (a) defining religion in either essentialist or epiphenomenal terms; (b) positing a series of ‘antagonistic binary opposites’ such as the secular versus the (...) religious; (c) de-sacralising and re-sacralising the public square. The article then analyses post-secularity, showing that it subordinates faith under secular reason and sacralises the ‘other’ by elevating difference into the sole transcendental term. Theorists of the post-secular such as Jürgen Habermas or William Connolly also equate secular modernity with metaphysical universalism, which they seek to replace with post-metaphysical pluralism. In contrast, the alternative that this article outlines is an international theory that develops the Christian realism of the English School in the direction of a metaphysical-political realism. Such a realism binds together reason with faith and envisions a ‘corporate’ association of peoples and nations beyond the secularist settlement of Westphalia that is centred on national states and transnational markets. By linking immanent values to transcendent principles, this approach can rethink religion in international affairs and help revive grand theory in IR. (shrink)

In this paper, comparative philosophy from the point of view, accusing both the freedom of human existence is related to: human freedom is the freedom in the relationship, human relationship is the relationship in freedom. Today, however, are in a rapidly changing technology and globalization are shaping the technology products and among the diverse network of his freedom and development of their relationship. For me, if not free then there is no leisure at all, even the Bliss half a day, (...) lazy nothing, if not the hearts of freedom, can not be relaxed. This paper attempts to analyze the relationship between work and leisure, beyond the ancient Greek society and the modern discipline of social work and leisure are assumed binary opposition, and inquire for a more balanced point of view, to redefine humanity. I will be free, easy to create with pleasure and delight as the four leisure in the state of existence. Accordingly, we will discuss today are due to inhibition of the free course of commercialization and mechanization brought leisure life crisis. This will re-interpretation of Taoism into the spirit of art and technology in the Road and Freedom, by Taoist philosophy, some ideas to inspire today's humans, how the dynamic relationship among the ontology freedom to think and inquire, and practice the art of life through to achieve free life. From my philosophy of contrast, I understand human being today as both free and related, in the networks of multiple others and technical objects developed by science / technology and the process of globalization. For me, without freedom there is no leisure. By the mediation of technical objects today, human desire tends to develop in various networks of multiple others in order to gain its own freedom. This paper will analyse the relation between work and leisure, attempting to go beyond the presupposed dichotomy of work / leisure in both modern " disciplined society "and ancient Greek society, and to look for a more balanced view of their relation in redefining the nature of human being. This understanding will allow us to proceed to characterize the state of being in leisure as freedom, being-at-ease , creativity and joyfulness. An attempt will be made ​​to characterize the crisis of today's leisure life in reference to its commercialization and mechanicalization. Also, we will try to obtain some inspirations from Daoist philosophy as to the idea of freedom in the dynamic ontology of relationship with the Daoist art of life-praxis. (shrink)

A new view of the extended mind thesis argues that a stark binary opposition between really extending and seeming to extend oversimplifies the issue.

This paper examines Nietzsche’s conception of what persists, or occurs, as becoming in relation to Ramose’s reconceptualization of what persists, or occurs, as be-ing becoming with a view to showing how divergence and convergence of thought in the western and African contexts can inform cross-cultural philosophizing. Nietzsche radically subverts the traditional notion of an eternal immutable being that constitutes the ground of change and replaces it with the notion of becoming. Ramose’s notion of being, which is grounded in ubuntu philosophy, (...) integrates a dynamic perspective into a process view of reality. While Nietzsche seeks to abandon the categories of being, unity, and purpose altogether, Ramose ambiguously retains them and, in fact, endorses the category of unity. I highlight the dynamics of Nietzsche’s notion of becoming and articulate the basic principles of Ramose’s idea of being as be-ing becoming and argue that both thinkers’ struggle to subvert substance-based understanding of being invites us to question the intelligibility of the binary opposition of being with becoming and to regard both concepts as indicating different ways of understanding reality. (shrink)

In Telling Flesh: the Substance 0f the C0rporeul, Vicki Kirby suggests, among other things, that it is not in the interests of feminism to propound what she describes as an ‘inessentialist’ position in regards to embodiment. While she objects to undifferentiating biological givens that might, for example, attempt to construe women as confined to a nurturing role, she also does not want to simplistically insist that embodiment has nothing to do with subjectivity. To pose the problem in terms more closely (...) aligned with her own, Kirby is wary of the tendency to simply reverse binary oppositions, to swap nature for culture, reality for representation, and originary cause for interpretive effect. According to her, themes like ‘textuality’, and linguistic ideality have all but replaced the notion of ‘reality’. As arguably the pre-eminent ‘continental’ philosopher of our generation, the work of Derrida is invariably associated with this reversal of binary oppositions that seem to prohibit recourse to questions concerning embodiment. Several critics have even suggested that deconstruction is nothing but semiological reductionism in disguise. However, Kirby’s thesis, via an extended meditation upon Derrida’s claim that "there is nothing outside of the text," constitutes an important attempt to redeem him from such criticism. Rather than eschewing any and every reference to the body, she wants to insist that deconstruction cannot be contained within such a framework, and that it makes sense, within the logic of Of Grummutology (and she also pays cursory attention to Derrida’s ""Eating Well," or the Calculation of the Subject"), to conceive of embodiment in deconstructive terms. Examining the coherence of this claim will be the main focus of this paper, though in order to facilitate this task, this paper will also compare the notion of embodiment that Kirby espouses, to a curiously similar conception of the body that Merleau-Ponty theorizes in his unfinished text The Wsible und the Invisible.. (shrink)

This book extends philosophy's engagement with the double beyond hierarchized binary oppositions. Brian Seitz explores the double as a necessary ontological condition or figure that gets represented, enacted, and performed repeatedly and in a myriad of configurations. Seitz suggests that the double in all of its forms is simultaneously philosophy's shadow, its nemesis, and the condition of its possibility. This book expands definitions and investigations of the double beyond the confines of philosophy, suggesting that the concept is at (...) work in many other fields including politics, cultural narratives, literature, mythology, and psychology. Seitz approaches the double by means of a series of case studies and by engaging loosely in eidetic variation, a methodological maneuver borrowed from phenomenology. The book explores the ways in which wide-ranging instances of the double are connected by the dynamics of intersubjectivity. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that Marx's central concern, consistent throughout his works, is to challenge and overcome hierarchical oppositions, which he considers as the core of modern, capitalist societies and the cause of alienation. The young Marx critiques the hierarchical idealism/materialism opposition. In this opposition, idealism abstracts from and reduces all material elements to the mind (or spirit), and materialism abstracts from and reduces all mental abstractions to the body (or matter). The mature Marx sophisticates this critique with (...) his theory of the commodity fetish. The commodity fetish abstracts the exchange-value (the mind) from the commodity's use-value (the body). Although Marx aims to challenge capitalism by abolishing the hierarchical relation among binary oppositions, I show that in his early and later writings on the working-class woman, he reinforces hierarchical binaries, pointing at the gendered unconscious structure of capitalism. (shrink)

Desire, political consciousness and formative subjectivity -- Lévi-Strauss and the methodological value of concepts of binary oppositions -- The pedagogy of the politics of difference -- The performance of Différance and deconstruction -- Temporality, modernity, and Différance -- Transformation, politics, and difference.

The article is devoted to the problem of the demarcation of social sciences from social philosophy. The author proposes to model the relations between these two disciplines as a continuum instead of binary opposition - a continuum in which certain authors and concepts are located depending on the nature of their statements and the amount of empirical data involved. To illustrate a number of this continuum’s positions and features, the concept of the sacred is brought: emerging in Modern history (...) as a cultural idea, in the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries in the works of French sociologists it becomes an empirical model that describes both the effect of social solidarity and the particular forms of religious existence. However, later, in the College of Sociology and in the works of such thinkers as G. Bataille, R. Caillois, etc., the concept acquires value meanings and becomes socio-philosophical. The absence of a clear boundary between the two statement formats, it makes possible both the “drifting” from one to another over time and the ambiguity of any critics of social science from social philosophy’s position and vice versa. At the same time, the historical “load” of the concept could be discarded in order to use it within the framework of “pure” social science or philosophy. (shrink)

Borders are essentially imaginary structures, but their effects are very real. This volume explores both geopolitical and conceptual borders through an interdisciplinary lens, bridging the disciplines of philosophy and literature. With contributions from scholars around the world, this collection closely examines the concepts of race, nationality, gender, and sexuality in order to reveal the paradoxical ambiguities inherent in these seemingly solid binary oppositions, while critiquing structures of power that produce and police these borders. As a political paradigm, liminality (...) may be embraced by marginal subjects and communities, further blurring the boundaries between oppressive distinctions and categories. (shrink)

This article considers the state of human beings in a post-postmodern conditions and focuses on obversion as one version of posthuman reality in polyversion, which is lusciousness. Obversion is regarded as a logical and at the same time dynamic figure of dis-identity and non-presence. Trying to find out if a real human being is written leads one to consider the relationship of real and written reality and the possibility of posthuman writing. Posthuman writing becomes apparent in tracks, traces, scars and (...) vestiges such an @ as a signifier of becoming t@iled. The vestiges of a human being are being investigated through the appeal to an actual post-postmodern conceptions such as speculative realism, speculative posthumanism, dark ecology, etc. In the post-postmodern context concepts such as trut/h, faith and kindness as a counterweight to the excessive postmodern quotation and theorization are being examined. Thus, a human being as a post-postscript is becoming a preface at the same time. This article explores such crucial postmodern issues as iterability, signature and others in a contingent context, in which an immanence of living itself becomes a writing in the postdigitality, post-Internet and post-media extent in relation to the realization of the disaster of technical or even mechanical as human. This research realizes on a showcase of post-postmodern architecture as an immanent spatiotemporal contingency, en-vironment of a human being. It shows how a minimalistic style in post-postmodern ethics and aesthetics correlates with obversive rocking in contrast to binary opposition logic. Thus, it realizes a movement from human to posthuman as scriptor, writing a postscript, and beyond to post-posthuman as postscriptor, writing a post-postscript as a human being, writing itself in its contingent immanence. (shrink)