Domestic abuse is a common occurrence for women in the Christian Church. Underlying this dark reality is a long history of patriarchal theological interpretations that have depicted God as a dominant male figure that subjects women to male hierarchy as a subordinate. Often based on an understanding of Jesus as subordinate to God the Father in the Trinity, the correlated praxis of the Church has commonly been to subject women to suffering at the hands of men – even at the (...) cost of their lives – thus mimicking the death of Christ. This deeply flawed androcentric theology and subsequent praxis of women’s subordination has been severely challenged by liberal feminists, and rightly so for the sake of women’s survival and flourishing. This article utilizes the Social Trinity to provide a Christian feminist critique of patriarchal atonement models and theology towards the feminist goal of liberating women from male-perpetrated violence. Ultimately a reframing of God will be presented that includes women as full persons and calls them to resist the suffering of domestic abuse and to reclaim their full personhood as the imago Dei. (shrink)

An argument that Pamela Sue Anderson’s critique of Irigaray commits her to a version of the Ideal Observer Theory, a theory Anderson rejects. This paper was delivered in the APA Pacific 2007 Mini-Conference on Models of God.

This chapter contains sections titled: The “Generic Male” and the Problem of Evil The Concept of God and Feminist Critique Feminism and Religious Epistemology Works cited.

This article aims to justify the positive role in the empirical investigation of nature that Kant attributes to the idea of God in the Critique of Pure Reason. In particular, I propose to read the Transcendental Ideal section and the Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic together to see whether they can reciprocally illuminate each other. I argue that it is only by looking at the transcendental deduction of the ideas of reason and the resulting analogical conception of God that (...) a fully legitimate positive use of the idea of God can be vindicated. (shrink)

This paper presents a feminist intervention into debates concerning the relation between human subjects and a divine ideal. I turn to what Irigarayan feminists challenge as a masculine conception of ‘the God’s eye view’ of reality. This ideal functions not only in philosophy of religion, but in ethics, politics, epistemology and philosophy of science: it is given various names from ‘the competent judge’ to the ‘the ideal observer’ (IO) whose view is either from nowhere or everywhere. The question is (...) whether, as Taliaferro contends, my own philosophical argument inevitably appeals to the impartiality and omni-attributes of the IO. This paper was delivered during the APA Pacific 2007 Mini-Conference on Models of God. (shrink)

Thinking about God is historical thinking and that in two senses : the idea of God has a history, and those who think about God think through an historically formed mind. The task of the theologian, is not the attempt to move outside his historicity - such an attempt constitutes a fallacy and not a virtue - but to accept its implications and limitations. Methodologically this means that the theologian must point to the historical perspectives that underlie the idea of (...) God in its development and, in his own constructive thought, must work self-consciously with an historical perspective informed by the psychological and cosmological understanding of his own time. This book centers on that idea which traditionally has been associated with the very godness of God - the idea of divine abso luteness - and puts certain historical, logical, religious and, finally, cosmological questions to it. The roots of that idea lie in Greek thought, which entered Christian theology via the early church fathers; even so, there is much indication, particularly in Patristic trinitarian thought, that the Biblical heritage is pushing theological thinking towards a social or relative concept of divine being (ch. 1). (shrink)

The relationship between community and individual is the key issue in contemporary political philosophy and ethics. The concept of self seems very important for individualism, communitarianism and feminism when they respond to relationships, particularly when we have to situate selfhood in the conditions of modernity. Consequently, this paper can be divided into seven parts. First it introduces the debate about the concept of the self between individualism and communitarianism. Second, it discusses the feminist critique of this (...) issue and analyses the feminist concept of self, and then addresses modernity as the condition of women. Next it attempts to analyze how women situate themselves in the conditions of modernity. Then it discusses how Chinese women are reshaping their selfhood under the conditions of modernity, and finally draws some brief conclusions claiming that neither communitarian nor individualist self is adequate in contemporary society. Chinese women, it is argued, are expected to reshape their own selfhood resting on the positive side of Confucian ethics and a feminist concept of self. (shrink)

This paper employs tools and critiques from analytic feminist scholarship in order to show how particular values commonly on display in analytic theology have served both to marginalize certain voices from the realm of analytic theological debate and to reinforce a particular conception of the divine—one which, despite its historical roots, is not inevitable. I claim that a particular conception of what constitutes a “rational, objective, analytic thinker” often displays certain affinities with those infinite or maximal properties that analytic (...) theologians have taken to be most relevant or essential to their theological conceptions of the divine, and I explore what thinking differently about the former might mean for how we think about the latter and vice versa. (shrink)

By focusing upon three figures: a trade unionist, who can no longer understand or reconcile himself with his past misogynist behaviour; Spinoza’s Spanish poet, who loses his memory and can no longer write poetry or even recognise his earlier work; and Spinoza’s lost friend, Burgh, who became a devout Catholic, I draw out Spinoza’s description of radical change in beliefs. I explore how, for Spinoza, radical changes that involve an increase in our powers of acting are conceived differently from those (...) changes that reduce our power. These transitions—which can be viewed as both personal and political—are not symmetrical because of the way in which they can be understood in relation to selfhood. To highlight the originality of Spinoza’s argument on personal change, I then compare it with that of his contemporary John Locke, who in Chapter 27 of the Essay Concerning Human Understanding famously theorises the maintenance of personal identity. I draw out one common aspect of the work of Étienne Balibar and of Janet Coleman to compare the ways in which Spinoza and Locke produce different answers to the same questions: how do we conceptualise our encounters with bodies and with ideas? How do these encounters affect our identity over time? In the final section, I switch from analysing personal (but also political) change to consider political change itself, by juxtaposing Warren Montag’s Spinozist analysis of the will, with Carole Pateman’s feminist critique of contract and consent. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that Augustine's conception of God as substance (substantia) has misleadingly been evoked by Martin Heidegger's deconstruction of onto-theological and substantialist variants of metaphysics as they mistook entities (Seienden, entia, beings) f r their very Being (Sein, ens, esse) which cannot be conceptualized or objectified by human thinking, but makes both their thought and reality possible. Even though Augustine sought somehow to reconcile a Neoplatonic, essentialist cosmology with a Judeo-Christian worldview of historical redemption, Heidegger not only (...) failed to properly recognize his indebtedness to Augustinian existential anthropology, but also the latter's contention that the actuality of beings and contingent history ultimately determines ontological concepts in their basic difference from their ontical counterparts, compromising thus Heidegger's intuitive criticisms against the confusion between God and Being (Sein). (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Girardian Theory and Feminism: Critique and Appropriation Susan Nowak Syracuse University The construction of theories of relationality, society, and religion supportive of women and women's experience is one of the major concerns of feminist scholarship today.1 This study examines the arguments put forth by feminist scholars who contend that the Girardian theory offers important contributions to their work.2 These scholars use the insights of the (...) Girardian theory into the intrinsic connection between ritual and violence, religion and modes ofrelationality, myth and societal formation, and victimage and social cohesion to critique the androcentric-patriarchal worldview that has shaped western civilization.3 Part One of this study will identify the elements of the 1 It is important to state the well known fact that there is no such thing as the feminist position, theory, or scholarship. It is of the very nature of feminist projects to be diverse, to acknowledge and honor the existence of difference and particularity. In the realms of religion and literature, projects by white Christian and Neo-pagan feminists have been criticized by both womanist and Jewish feminist scholars for their failure to uphold, in practice, this commitment to difference and particularity. 2 1 confine my attention to the ways in which the Girardian understanding of religion, societal formation, and modes of relationality informs the relation of violence and victimage to women. In order to explore the basic issues involved, I examine various writings of Martha Reineke, Luce Irigaray, Sarah Halford, Rebecca Adams, Carole Deering Paul, Cynthia Chase, Ann Demaitre, and Linda Alcoff. 3 It is important to clarify for this study the terms "androcentrism" and "patriarchy." "Androcentrism" refers to patterns of thinking that posit the humanity of dominant male human beings as normative for all human beings; all non-normative human beings are viewed, accordingly, as derivative of, and dependent upon, the normative male. "Patriarchy" is the structural expression of an androcentric worldview. "Patriarchy" as one identified reality does not exist; rather it is a diversified reality whose expressions are influenced by the sociopolitical, historico-religious context. Its structure is so shaped that the multiple forms ofpower within a society are possessed by the dominant males. Women and non-normative men do not 20Susan Nowak Girardian theory that feminist scholars judge to be most useful to their projects, elements that serve as vital theoretical underpinnings for feminist critiques of conceptual frameworks, modes of relationality, and social structures which perpetuate the victimage of women. Part Two examines elements within the Girardian theory which feminist scholars judge to be informed by an androcentric-patriarchal worldview. According to feminist theoreticians, those elements reinforce the oppressive dimensions of human relationships, of social institutions, and of religion. Because of this influence it is claimed that aspects of the Girardian theory cannot promote an authentic sense of selfhood and agency for women. It is, however, also the position of feminist scholars that a revisionary process could strip the theory of its androcentric elements and retool it in a manner supportive of women and women's experiences.4 In this section I will highlight their recommendations for such a revision. Part Three is my critique of the feminist critique. I will indicate what I find to be the major weakness in feminist projects to-date and discuss the ways in which the Girardian concept of difference may offer a possible corrective. Part One Methodologically, a hermeneutic of suspicion is central to feminist projects. Its usage supports two main tasks of feminist scholarship: the retrieval of women's experiences and history from the oppression of silence, as Martha Reineke observes ("Body" 246), and the exposure of androcentric thought frames and patriarchal structures which have relegated women's history and experiences to the crippling domain of silence. René Girard's employment of a hermeneutic of suspicion for the analysis of the myths and have access to power by their own right. Women have access to power only through the men to whom they belong. The "androcentric-patriarchal worldview" can be summarized, then, in terms of an ethos which functions to exclude, to marginalize, and to render invisible in language and public life all who are defined as non-normative human beings. The... (shrink)

Three of the most venerable objections to anthropomorphic conceptions of the divine are traceable to Xenophanes and his critique of the early Greek gods. Though suitably revised, these ancient criticisms have persisted over the centuries, plaguing various religious communities, particularly those of classical Christian commitment. Xenophanes complained that anthropomorphism leads to unseemly characterizations, noting that both over the ages, the list of unseemly characteristics has expanded somewhat.

Until recently, feminist theory and citizenship theory have seemed two distinct areas, with writers in both camps seldom discussing the other's work.

In this article I concentrate on three issues. First, Graham Oppy’s treatment of the relationship between the concept of infinity and Zeno’s paradoxes lay bare several porblems that must be dealt with if the concept of infinity is to do any intellectual work in philosophy of religion. Here I will expand on some insightful remarks by Oppy in an effort ot adequately respond to these problems. Second, I will do the same regarding Oppy’s treatment of Kant’s first antinomy (...) in the first critique, which deals in part with the question of whether the world had a beginning in time or if time extends infinitely into the past. And third, my examination of these two issues will inform what I have to say regarding a key topic in philosophy of religion: the question regarding the proper relationship between the infinite and the finite in the concept of God. (shrink)

In the ‘Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic’ of the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant contends that the idea of God has a positive regulative role in the systematization of empirical knowledge. But why is this regulative role assigned to this specific idea? Kant’s account is rather opaque and this question has also not received much attention in the literature. In this paper I argue that an adequate understanding of the regulative role of the idea of God depends on the (...) specific metaphysical content Kant attributes to it in the Critique and other writings. I show that neither a heuristic principle of conceptual systematicity, nor conceiving God as a hypothesis of an intelligent designer, can satisfy the demands of reason to make the unity and necessity of the laws of nature intelligible. Regarding the positive account about the metaphysical content of the idea of God, I support my argument by referring to Kant’s pre-critical discussion of the usefulness of the conception of God for the project of science, and by expounding Kant’s critical account of the necessity of the laws of nature. Thus my account sheds light on the continuity of Kant’s conception of God and his appropriation of his own rationalistic metaphysics. (shrink)

This book analyses the concepts of God in Vaisnavism, which is commonly referred to as one of the great Hindu monotheistic traditions. Addressing the question of what attributes God possesses according to particular textual sources and traditions in Vaisnavism, the book analyses Vaisnava traditions and texts in order to locate them within a global philosophical framework. The book is divided into two sections. The first one, God in Vaisnava Texts, deals with concepts of God found in the canonical Vaisnava texts: (...) the Bhavagad Gita, the Bhagavata Purana, the Pancaratras, and the Mahabharata. The second section, God in Vaisnava Traditions, addresses concepts of God found in several Vaisnava traditions and their respective key theologians. As well as the Alvars, five traditional Vaisnava schools- the Sri Vaisnava tradition, the Madhva tradition, the Nimbarka tradition, the Pustimarga tradition, and the Caitanya Vaisnava tradition- and two contemporary ones Ramakrishna's and Swami Bhaktivedanta's are considered. The book combines normative, critical and descriptive elements. Some chapters are philosophical in nature, others are more descriptive, unpacking a specific Vaiṣṇava concept of God for future philosophical analysis and critique. Written by experts who break new ground in presenting and representing a diversity of Vaiṣṇava texts and tradition, the book presents approaches that reflect the amount of philosophical and historical deliberation on the specific issues and divine attributes considered. This book will be of interest to researchers in the fields of philosophy of religion and Indian philosophy, cross-cultural and comparative philosophy, analytic philosophy of religion, Hindu studies, theology and religious studies. (shrink)

This paper offers a critical investigation of the theological assumptions that lie within three forms of modern feminist ethics, with a view to challenging feminist ethics to enter the new theological possibilities opened up in postmodernity for the conceiving of god. The first part of the paper considers the conceiving of god in modern feminisms, in which theology becomes ethics. The consequences of this development are considered. The second part of the paper investigates the turn into postmodernity which (...) hears the saying of the death of god and the critique of onto-theology. This disturbance to the foundations of feminist ethics is understood as part of a wider critique of humanism manifest particularly in gender theory. That the end of the modern human subject might allow a conceiving of god through an understanding of the performative is the restored orthodoxy to which the paper points. (shrink)

In feminist theory, intersectionality has become the predominant way of conceptualizing the relation between systems of oppression which construct our multiple identities and our social locations in hierarchies of power and privilege. The aim of this essay is to clarify the origins of intersectionality as a metaphor, and its theorization as a provisional concept in Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw’s work, followed by its uptake and mainstreaming as a paradigm by feminist theorists in a period marked by its widespread (...) and rather unquestioned--if, at times, superficial and inattentive--usage. I adduce four analytic benefits of intersectionality as a research paradigm: simultaneity, complexity, irreducibility and inclusivity. Then, I gesture at, and respond to some critiques of intersectionality advanced in the last few years, during which the concept has increasingly come under scrutiny. (shrink)

In this essay I distinguish four different modes of feminist critique of reason. Discussing the work of authors such as Keller, Irigaray, and Butler, I point out that the issue of masculine connotations has been addressed with regard to different concepts-or at least different aspects-of reason. In view of a tendency to overdraw the objections, I suggest to reformulate the feminist critique of reason. I also argue that a rediscovery of those philosophical concepts of reason that (...) do not restrict this term to instrumental rationality might be useful for this purpose. (shrink)

Cooper’s book criticizes the traditional "absolutist" Christian doctrine of God, as exemplified in Aquinas, and concludes with a constructive chapter on "Redemption and Process Theism." His critique is chiefly Hartshornean, not Whiteheadian in character. Cooper, adding nothing of substance to Hartshorne’s extant critique, instead scrutinizes the Thomistic texts to show just how and where the difficulties noted by Hartshorne arise. The final chapter, which leans heavily on Whitehead is chiefly a summary of the usual charges against process theism, (...) together with most of the standard process replies. The deepest difficulty, as the author sees it, lies in showing that Whitehead’s God can guarantee ultimate security or redemption in the face of ineradicable pain and evil; to show this requires reconceiving nature and redemption as well as God. Here Cooper is perhaps open to charges of occasional misinterpretation: For example, is it true that for Whitehead the fact of divine existence is "an ultimate irrationality,... an everlasting given"? And can actuality be separated from concreteness? (shrink)

This essay aims to show how feminist theoretical and practical perspectives have enriched and deepened debate about moral and social issues generated by the proliferation and commodification of new reproductive techniques. It evaluates alternative feminist appraisals beginning with the first group to organize a collective response to the medicalization of infertility and explores several weaknesses working within their assessment: objectification of infertile women, naturalizing constructions of motherhood, hostility to technology, and an overly simplistic conception of power relations. Next, (...) it shows how subsequent feminists have reframed the issues to overcome these weaknesses, drawing on themes prominent in recent theoretical debates: the need to reclaim women's agency, to revalue mothering, and to reappraise power relations. Lastly, it weighs the prospects for a collaborative politics that is sensitive to the social marginalization of vulnerable women and suggests practical strategies for responding to mounting pressures to procreate at any price. (shrink)

Contemporary feminist theory is at an impasse: the project of reformulating concepts of self and social identity is thwarted by an association between identity and oppression and victimhood. In Sacrificial Logics, Allison Weir proposes a way out of this impasse through a concept of identity which depends on accepting difference. Weir argues that the equation of identity with repression and domination links "relational" feminists like Nancy Chodorow, who equate self-identity with the repression of connection to others, and poststructuralist (...) feminists like Judith Butler, who view any identity as a repression of nonidentity and difference. Through readings of Chodorow, Butler, Jessica Benjamin, Luce Irigaray, Jacqueline Rose and Julia Kristeva, Weir analyzes the relation of theories of self-identity to theories of women's identity, social identity, the identity of meaning in language and feminist solidarity. Drawing particularly on the work of Julia Kristeva, she argues for a reformulation of self-identity as a capacity to participate in a social world, and sketches a model of a self-identity which depends on a capacity to accept nonidentity, difference and connections to others. (shrink)

We re-examine Mersenne's critique of Giordano Bruno concerning the question of the extension of the universe and the plurality of worlds as well as that of universal animation. For this, it is necessary to distinguish, especially in the examination of the first question, the strictly cosmological problem from its metaphysical and theological foundation in which the relation between God and the universe is resolved. Mersenne's critique fundamentally concerns this second side of our problem, according to his conviction that (...) Bruno repeats the age-old errors of philosophical paganism and reaffirms an 'impiety' completely incompatible with Christian doctrine.------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------. (shrink)

"An eloquent work. Somer Brodribb not only gives us a feminist critique of postmodernism with its masculinist predeterminants in existentialism, its Freudian footholdings and its Sadean values, but in the very form and texture of the critique, she literally creates new discourse in feminist theory. Brodribb has transcended not only postmodernism but its requirement that we speak in its voice even when criticizing it. She creates a language that is at once poetic and powerfully analytical. Her (...) insistent and compelling radical critique refuses essentialism-from both masculinist thinkers and their women followers. She demystifies postmodernism to reveal that it and its antecedents represent yet another mundane version of patriarchal politics. Ultimately Brodribb returns us to feminist theory with the message that we must refuse to be derivative and continue to originate theory and politics from the condition of women under male domination." -Kathleen Barry, author of Female Sexual Slavery An iconoclastic work brilliantly undertaken . . . Nothing Mat(T)ers magnificently shows that postmodernism is the cultural capital of late patriarchy. It is the art of self- display, the conceit of masculine self and the science of reproductive and genetic engineering in an ecstatic Nietzschean cycle of statis." -Andre Michel Nothing Mat(T)ers encapsulates in its title the valuelessness of the current academic fad of postmodernism. Somer Brodribb has written a brave and witty book demolishing the gods and goddesses of postmodernism by deconstructing their method and de-centering their subjects and, in the process, has deconstructed deconstructionism and decentered decentering! This is a long-awaited and much-needed book from a tough- minded, embodied, and unflinching scholar." -Janice Raymond. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In recent years, the medical establishment has been speaking in favor of women's autonomy in childbirth by advocating cesarean delivery on maternal request (CDMR). This paper offers to look at the ethical dimension of CDMR through a feminist critique of the medicalization of childbirth and its influence on present‐day medical ethics. I claim that the medicalization of childbirth reflects a sexist bias with regard to conceptions of the body and needs to be used with caution when applied (...) to women's reproductive health. I then use this perspective to critically analyze the position of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) on the ethics of decision‐making in patient‐choice surgery. I claim that informed consent cannot be meaningfully exercised unless women are made aware of the sexist underpinnings of the medical model of childbirth and its influence on the ethical reasoning of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. I also express concern about the effects of normalizing patient‐choice cesarean sections on the choices available to pregnant women using as examples the institutional rules on mandatory cesarean sections for women with a previous cesarean delivery or breech presentation. I conclude with a call for more research into the real cost of convenience in CDMR, particularly as our increasingly strained publicly funded healthcare system would greatly benefit from the de‐medicalization of normal body functions rather than an increased dependence on costly surgical technology. (shrink)

This article critiques Jack Halberstam's concept of queer failure through a feminist cripistemological lens. Challenging Halberstam's interpretation of Erika Kohut in The Piano Teacher as a symbol of postcolonial angst rather than a figure of psychosocial disability, the article establishes a critical coalition between crip feminist theory and queer-of-color theory to promote a materialist politics and literal-minded reading practice designed to recognize minority subjectivities rather than exploiting them for their metaphorical resonance. In asserting that Erika Kohut is (...) better understood as a woman with borderline personality disorder , and in proposing borderline personality disorder as a critical optic through which to read both The Piano Teacher and The Queer Art of Failure , the article challenges the usual cultural undermining of epistemic authority that comes with the BPD diagnosis. It asserts instead that BPD might be a location of more, rather than less, critical acumen about the negative affects that accompany queer failures, and reflect on what we might call a borderline turn in queer theory. On a broader level, the article joins an emergent conversation in crip theory about the reluctance of queer theory to address disability in meaningful and substantive ways. (shrink)

This paper explores the ways in which women’s nature has been defined as different from men’s in Mormonism. Unlike many mainstream Christian traditions, Mormons have a positive view of the Fall and of Eve, do not embrace the doctrine of original sin, and reject dualities which assign women to lower bodily categories in opposition to men’s higher rational ones. However, women in Mormonism are subordinated to men. This subordination is due, not to a sense that men are superior to women, (...) but to a sense that man’s distinct role is to be leader in church and family. This sense of the propriety of role differentiation coexists with romantic notions of women’s greater natural spirituality and altruism. In the last section of the paper, I discuss the ways in which feminist Mormons have critiqued the notions of gender role differentiation and women’s greater spiritual capacities. (shrink)

The concept of self - respect is often invoked in feminist theorizing. But both women's too-common experiences of struggling to have self - respect and the results of feminist critiques of related moral concepts suggest the need for feminist critique and reconceptualization of self - respect. I argue that a familiar conception of self - respect is masculinist, thus less accessible to women and less than conducive to liberation. Emancipatory theory and practice require a suitably (...) feminist conception of self - respect ; I propose one such conception. (shrink)

The arguments against the existence of Īśvara that are advanced by Śālikanātha’s Prakaraṇapañcikā are quite peculiar and cryptic, due to both the idiosyncratic nature and opaque style of Śālikanātha’s writing. This has contributed to the difficulty in identifying the actual nature of the views that Śālikanātha opposes. This article analyses the framework by which Śālikanātha interrogates the concept of Īśvara and discusses the possible sources of his arguments. It shows, contrary to the conclusions of past scholarship, that considerations of (...) both Nyāya and Vaiśeṣika sources are certainly apparent in Śālikanātha’s formulation of his critique of Īśvara. This paper also discusses the possible sources from which Śālikanātha derives the notion of Īśvara as the creator of the Vedas. It concludes that rather than any Nyāya or Vaiśeṣika sources, it is most likely that Śālikanātha derives this notion of Īśvara from Kumārila, who potentially has Yoga opponent in mind. (shrink)

Anyone who goes beyond procedural questions of a discourse theory of morality and ethics and, in a normative attitude … embarks on a theory of the well-ordered, or even emancipated, society will very quickly run up against the limits of his own historical situation.For some time now, a certain strand of contemporary critical theory has understood its task not as providing a substantive critique of power relations, let alone an alternative normative conception of what social relations might be, but (...) as how to justify critique as such: how to justify those elements which critique owes to its philosophical origins, albeit in a nonfoundationalist manner.1 This focus on—if not obsession with—the theoretical problem of... (shrink)

Contrary to the classical denial of bodily attributes or human emotions to God, both Samson Raphael Hirsch and Franz Rosenzweig embrace biblical anthropomorphisms. Their views on anthropomorphisms are part of their critiques of philosophy, especially of the basic preconceptions of the philosophical approach to the concept of God. This article analyses their positions by examining Hirsch’s commentaries on scripture (especially Gen 6:6), and Rosenzweig’s “A Note on Anthropomorphisms in Response to the Encyclopedia Judaica’s Article.” Through a close reading and (...) interpretation of Rabad of Posquiére’s famous animadversion against Maimonides’s rule concerning heretics, this paper retraces the rabbinical roots of Hirsch’s and Rosenzweig’s approach to anthropomorphisms. (shrink)

In recent developments in Artificial Intelligence and especially in robotics we can observe a tendency towards building intelligent artefacts that are meant to be social, to have ‘human social’ characteristics like emotions, the ability to conduct dialogue, to learn, to develop personality, character traits, and social competencies. Care, entertainment, pet and educational robots are conceptualised as friendly, understanding partners and credible assistants which communicate ‘naturally’ with users, show emotions and support them in everyday life. Social robots are often designed to (...) interact physically, affectively and socially with humans in order to learn from them. To achieve this goal, roboticists often model the human‐robot interaction on early caregiver‐infant interactions. In this paper I want to analyse prominent visions of these ‘socio‐emotional’ machines as well as early prototypes and commercial products with regard to the human‐machine interface. By means of this I will ask how feminist critiques of technology could be applied to the field of social robotics in which concepts like sociality or emotion are crucial elements while, at the same time, these concepts play an important role in feminist critiques of technology. (shrink)

Helen Longino's account of objectivity has been highly regarded by both feminist and mainstream philosophers of science. However, I have encountered three feminist philosophers who have all offered one especially compelling feminist critique of Longino's view: far from vindicating or privileging the work of feminist scientists, Longino's account actually requires the active cultivation of anti-feminist and misogynist scientists to balance out the possibility of feminist bias. I call this objection the Nazi problem, for (...) the particular version that claims that her view requires even the active cultivation of Nazi scientists in objective inquiry. In this paper I consider one response to the Nazi problem, which I call the good faith argument. I show that the good faith argument itself is just as objectionable, on feminist grounds, as the Nazi problem it is meant to address. (shrink)

The scholarship on Mary Wollstonecraft is divided concerning her views on women's role in public life, property rights, and distribution of wealth. Her critique of inequality of wealth is undisputed, but is it a complaint only of inequality or does it strike more forcefully at the institution of property? The argument in this article is that Wollstonecraft's feminism is partly defined by a radical critique of property, intertwined with her conception of rights. Dissociating herself from the conceptualization of (...) rights in terms of self-ownership, she casts economic independence—a necessary political criterion for personal freedom—in terms of fair reward for work, not ownership. Her critique of property moves beyond issues of redistribution to a feminist appraisal of a property structure that turns people into either owners or owned, rights-holders or things acquired. The main characters in Wollstonecraft's last novel—Maria, who is rich but has nothing, and Jemima, who steals as a matter of principle—illustrate the commodification of women in a society where even rights are regarded as possessions. (shrink)

In 1277, Stephen Tempier, bishop of Paris, drafted the famous Condemnation of 219 articles in theology and natural philosophy. This Condemnation was a reaction against a group of theologians, led by Siger of Brabant, who were accused of holding that truths of reason could contradict those of revelation. Writing before the Condemnation, which impugned reason's autonomy, Thomas Aquinas critiqued Siger and his followers, and argued that reason could never generate truths that contradict revelation. As a consequence, Aquinas sometimes dwells on (...) reason's limits, terming our knowledge of God 'equivocal' or 'analogical'. Sitting on the other side of the Condemnation, around the turn of the fourteenth century, John Duns Scotus was concerned to secure for reason a portion of its lost dignity. Accordingly, he explores what we can know of God, and lays claim to 'univocal' knowledge of him. Some scholars hold that Scotus's claim to univocal knowledge of God puts him at odds with Aquinas. In this dissertation, I argue that this is not the case, that this apparent discord is largely the result of their different enterprises rather than their basic beliefs about our natural knowledge of God, that Scotus's discussion of univocity is targeted not at Aquinas, but rather at Henry of Ghent---the leading light of the University of Paris at the time that Scotus studied there---and that Scotus does not believe that our knowledge of God is univocal in a strong sense, such that he would claim that it is wholly accurate. Rather, Scotus believes that, in this life, our knowledge of God must comprise abstract concepts that can never do justice to their source. This being the case, he has more in common with Aquinas than some would allow. (shrink)

There is a variety of concepts of the divine in the eastern and western theological and philosophical traditions. There is, however, not enough reflection on the logic behind concepts of God and their justification. I clarify some necessary and sufficient conditions any attempt to explicate a concept of God has to take into account. I argue that each concept of God is a cypher for a particular worldview and distinguishes three types of justification frequently used to bestow content (...) on particular concepts of God: philosophical, theological, and scientific. I turn to four fundamental models of the God–world relation and argue that the most promising concept of God is panentheistic, on which the universe is essentially divine but is not exhaustive of the divine being. (shrink)

This wide-ranging anthology of philosophical writings on the concept of God presents a systematic overview of the chief conceptions of deity as well as skeptical and atheistic critiques of theological ideas. The selections cover key philosophic developments in this subject area from ancient to modern times in both the East and West.

This article deals with Ibn Sīnā’s criticisms of Aristotle regarding what the place of God should be in the science of metaphysics. From Aristotle’s point of view, the existence of God is proved by the proof of motion in physics and is held as a subject matter in a science that comes after physics, which is metaphysics. According to him, metaphysics is the most sublime science because God is its subject matter. The most striking criticism against Aristotle’s conception of metaphysics (...) was put forward by Ibn Sīnā. From Ibn Sīnā’s point of view, the most important problem encountered in Aristotle’s understanding of metaphysics is that ontology and theology are intertwined. According to him, God cannot be a subject matter in metaphysics, rather, proving the existence of God is the aim of metaphysics. The subject matter of metaphysics is being qua being, and its aim is to prove the Necessary Existent that is the principle of existence. Accordingly, for Ibn Sīnā, metaphysics is an ontological science in terms of its subject and a theological science in terms of its aim. This new conception of metaphysics, developed by Ibn Sīnā, had a profound effect not only on Islamic thought but also on Western philosophy. In a way, the ontotheological notes of Islamic and Western thought from the Middle Ages to the present have progressed through the metaphysical symphony composed by Ibn Sīnā. (shrink)

There is a well known debate between those who defend a traditional (or classical) concept of God and those who defend a process (or neoclassical) concept of God. Not as well known are the implications of these two rival concepts of God in the effort to understand religious experience. With the aid of the great pragmatist philosopher John Smith, I defend the process (or neoclassical) concept of God in its ability to better illuminate and render as intelligible (...) as possible mystical experience. (shrink)

Beginning with a critique of Max Weber’s famous, but misleading distinction between an ‘ethics of intention’ and an ‘ethics of responsibility’, the article brings attention to the elucidating analysis of the concept of responsibility by the German philosopher Georg Picht. Originally a juristic term, responsibility was applied to eschatology and so became a fundamental ethical concept. By separating the concept from its theological background it remains a necessary idea for modern societies but increasingly loses its definition. (...) The concept suffers from overemphasising the autonomous subject, which is overburdened by the universality of responsibility. Therefore a ‘polis ethic’ is needed: not the isolated subject, but subjects in community are its authors. For Christians all human responsibility is preceded by God’s actions and held by God’s grace. (shrink)

Abstract:AbstractThis article examines how representations of women of color in the 1970s shaped and were shaped by US feminist print cultures. Critiques of the US women's liberation movement importantly focus on its whiteness and US-centrism, deployment of concepts such as sisterhood, and practices such as tokenization. I propose a shift the terms of this conversation through a semiotic and affective analysis of representations of women of color across a range of US feminist periodicals published during the 1970s. Specifically, (...) I identify patterns in the representation of figures of Indochinese and other revolutionary women, attending to what is consistent and what varies in their representation. I argue that the revolutionary, antiracist, antisexist, and anti-imperialist struggles of women of color lent US feminism a weight that countered the ways movement outsiders—particularly mainstream media and the New Left—trivialized and devalued feminist activism. This paper thus seeks to demonstrate that portrayals of women of color countered not only sexism but also the implicit racism in dominant narratives characterizing the women's liberation movement. (shrink)

This article takes as its basis the claim that the root cause of the ecological crisis is based on theological reasons, especially the monotheistic conception of God in traditional Christianity. The article aims to evaluate the claim that the monotheist understanding of the God-universe relationship is the main cause of the ecological crisis, in the context of ecofeminism, which is one of the leading representatives of this claim. In the literature, which includes examining the ecological crisis with its theological dimensions, (...) many studies evaluate the relationship between human beings and nature. In addition, some studies deal with the subject within the framework of the relationship between God and the universe, albeit relatively few. An important part of them consists of the studies done by ecofeminist theologians. The most distinctive feature of these studies is the critical attitude of ecofeminist theologians against traditional monotheism concerning the ecological crisis. At the center of the criticism is the emphasis on power and absolute transcendence among the attributes of God in the monotheist conception of God. According to ecofeminist theologians, the monotheist conception, which is claimed to represent the dominant understanding of God, especially in Western Christianity, supports a hierarchical God and universe relationship as a result of the application of the dualist perspective in explaining reality. In this hierarchical structure, God is portrayed as a being outside and beyond this world, who legitimizes power relations and enables the weak to be oppressed, therefore, the monotheistic God concept is strongly criticized by ecofeminist theologians. On the other hand, ecofeminist theologians propose pantheist and panentheist God conceptions, which are defended by two pioneer ecofeminist theologians Rosemary R. Ruether and Sally McFague, respectively, as an alternative to the traditional monotheist conception of God. In this study, in line with the mentioned purpose of the study, pantheist and panentheist interpretations proposed by ecofeminist theology and prominent among the God and universe relationship approaches in contemporary Christian philosophical theology are discussed in the context of ecological crisis. In this framework, this study evaluates some of the problems that arise in the application of ecofeminist discourse to the field of theology in terms of alternative God conceptions put forward by ecofeminist theologians. Based on this background, the study includes four chapters. First, the dimensions of the relationship between ecofeminism and theology have been revealed. Then, the main arguments of ecofeminist theology in its critique of the monotheist conception of God are evaluated. Then, pantheist and panentheist conceptions, the alternative God conceptions offered by ecofeminist theology against monotheism, are discussed. Finally, within the framework of the arguments it has put forward, an evaluation of ecofeminist theology and conceptions of God has been made in terms of contextual and methodological aspects. (shrink)

What should philosophical theology look like after the critique of Onto-theology, after Phenomenology, and in the age of Speculative Realism? What does Kabbalah have to say to Philosophy? Since Kant and especially since Husserl, philosophy has only permitted itself to speak about how one relates to God in terms of the intentionality of consciousness and not of how God is in himself. This meant that one could only ever speak to God as an addressed and yearned-for holy Thou, but (...) not to God as infinite creator of all. In this book-length essay, the author argues that reality itself is made up of the Holy Name of God. Drawing upon the set-theoretical ontology of Alain Badiou, the computational theory of Stephen Wolfram, the physics of Frank Tipler, the psychoanalytical theory of Jacques Lacan, and the genius of Georg Cantor, the author works to demonstrate that the universe is a computer processing the divine Name and that all existence is made of information (the bit). As a result of this ontic pan-computationalism, it is shown that the future resurrection of the dead can take place and how it may in fact occur. Along the way, the book also offers compelling critiques of several significant theories of reality, including the phenomenological theologies of Emmanuel Levinas and Jean-Luc Marion, Process Theology, and Object-Oriented Ontology. Reality in the Name of God explores how the concepts of Jewish mysticism can be articulated and deployed as philosophical theses within current metaphysical debates. It provides a new and dynamic Structural Realist ontology of information. Ultimately, the book aims to deal a death blow to the restriction of philosophy and theology in relation to elaborations of a how a believer relates to a God outside the mind and to return thought to a direct encounter with the divine nature of reality itself and its creator"--Website of the publisher, October 19, 2020. (shrink)

Previous research has shown that the more individuals view observable entities as animate, the more those entities are associated with having psychological and physiological experiences. This study examined the relationship between children's animistic and anthropomorphic reasoning for concepts of unobservable scientific (i.e., germ) and religious (i.e., God) entities. This study further explored how children's conceptions vary according to the social learning opportunities (i.e., discourse, rituals) parents reportedly create. Parent–child dyads with young children from diverse ethnic and religious backgrounds participated. Three (...) central findings emerged. First, children readily associated God with psychobiological characteristics but did not do so to the same extent for germs. Second, children applied more psychobiological properties to both entity types when they believed that the entity was animate. Third, engaging in rituals and discourse with parents was indirectly related to children's concepts of God but not related to their concepts of germs. Overall, this study presented support for a connection between children's animistic and anthropomorphic reasoning for unobservable entities, and an indirect effect of cultural input on this reasoning. The implications of these findings will be discussed. (shrink)