The author analyses the problem of the communication from the epistemological point of view, noting that the interest to the theme is obviously determined by the enormous ambiguity and by the disciplinary vagueness of the communication's notion itself. It is argued that it is the philosophical conceptualization of the communication that allows in a certain sense to «save» philosophy itself. The author notes that the philosophical studies of communication as if return the relevance to the classical philosophical problems: to the (...) (communicative) sphere, (communicative) time, (social) causality, (collective) subject and object, filling them with the meaningful characteristics and testing their concepts by the experience of the functioning of real society and communication. He concludes that the epistemological content of the concept of communication is comes together with several aspects of human cognition. The first aspect has to do with the dimensions for defining the adequacy for determination of the statement made by the Other (i.e. the other participant), given that the content of the Other's consciousness is unavailable. The second aspect is related to the principle of a double purpose of any communication: on the one hand, integration and mutual understanding and, on the other, informational description of the subject of the message. The third aspect is that communication is based on the most important epistemological distinction between knowledge and ignorance, i.e. on the predominance of any information to one participant of the communication and of its uncertainty to the other participant, and that such a situation actually conditions the formation of communication systems, as well as of a wide variety of forms of sociality. The author also addresses the problem of whether contemporary media make communication at all possible since they decrease the impact that the secrecy of the Other's consciousness has on communication by triggering a communicative act. (shrink)

My goal is to define intending. I defend the view that believing and desiring something are necessary for intending it. They are not sufficient, however, for some things we both expect and want (e.g., the sun to rise tomorrow) are unintendable. Restricting the objects of intention to our own future actions is unwarranted and unhelpful. Rather, the belief involved in intending must be based on the desire in a certain way. En route, I argue that expected but unwanted consequences are (...) not intended, examine the two senses of "desire," distinguish intending from being willing, and relate intending to a variety of other propositional at? titudes. (shrink)

Moral education through service learning at post-secondary level is an important but under-researched field. Most existing studies center on its learning outcomes like academic progress, personal development, communication, and leadership skills, with only a few evaluating the moral development of college students participating in service-learning projects. The lack of study on moral development in service learning indicates a need for clarification of the theoretical underpinnings of service learning, John Dewey's ideas on moral growth, in particular his model of moral imagination (...) and the implications thereof, for current service-learning research and practice. We argue that Dewey's work here can help strengthen .. (shrink)

What can--and what can't--philosophy do? What are its ethical risks--and its possible rewards? How does it differ from science? In Philosophy as a Humanistic Discipline, Bernard Williams addresses these questions and presents a striking vision of philosophy as fundamentally different from science in its aims and methods even though there is still in philosophy "something that counts as getting it right." Written with his distinctive combination of rigor, imagination, depth, and humanism, the book amply demonstrates why Williams was one of (...) the greatest philosophers of the twentieth century. Spanning his career from his first publication to one of his last lectures, the book's previously unpublished or uncollected essays address metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics, as well as the scope and limits of philosophy itself. The essays are unified by Williams's constant concern that philosophy maintain contact with the human problems that animate it in the first place. As the book's editor, A. W. Moore, writes in his introduction, the title essay is "a kind of manifesto for Williams's conception of his own life's work." It is where he most directly asks "what philosophy can and cannot contribute to the project of making sense of things"--answering that what philosophy can best help make sense of is "being human." Philosophy as a Humanistic Discipline is one of three posthumous books by Williams to be published by Princeton University Press. In the Beginning Was the Deed: Realism and Moralism in Political Argument was published in the fall of 2005. The Sense of the Past: Essays in the History of Philosophy is being published shortly after the present volume. (shrink)

Appearing in the “Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam” as an undefined referent for the limits on freedom of expression in Islam, Shariah is still to be chased as an indefinable referent which restricts freedom of the expression in the Islamic Republic of Iran. Iran’s Press Law as well as Constitution unveil Shariah’s referent to be a person: the Jurist-Ruler around whom a cult of personality is legalized in terms of “Imamate” and around whom all the limits on freedom (...) of expression revolve. Interpretation of Shariah is not a solution but part of the problem in Iran. Such problem can be dealt in terms of three modes of self-expression which were invented by the Iranian Reformists to avoid self-censorship. The notion of master-signifier can be the key to unraveling the problem of self-referentiality in freedom of expression and its Reformist solution in Iran’s legal system. (shrink)

Women; ethics; religious aspects; ethics.

We introduce an abstract framework for general rough set theory from a mereological perspective and consider possible concepts of ’a priori’ granules and granulation in the same. The framework is ideal for relaxing many of the relatively superfluous set-theoretic axioms and for improving the semantics of many relation based, cover-based and dialectical rough set theories. This is a relatively simplified presentation of a section in three different recent research papers by the present author.

Open theism argues that traditional responses to the problem of evil fail to provide comfort amidst suffering because of their notion of metaphysical determinism and over-dependence on Greek philosophy. Open theists argue that the best solution to the problem of evil lies in our understanding of the nature of God’s power, which has been relinquished due to his love, the open nature of creation, and the creatures’ inherent powers. This study argues that the open-theistic notion of divine power is reductionistic (...) because it does not consider coercive power as part of divine power. Further, the open theistic logic-of-love defence propagates a loveless God who respects his covenant with the beloved more than the beloved. Finally, the study argues that the open theists’ notions of divine omniscience and divine power are not viable; they raised many questions and objections and, therefore, created room for despair rather than comfort in adversity. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: The Start Line Lap One, Where Cycling Practice Meets Feminist Ethics Lap Two, Words from Our Teammates or The Dirt Documentaries Lap Three, Different Lines, Same Course Last Lap, How Women Cyclists Transform Cycling.

Critical and comparative analysis on the philosophical thoughts of ʻAlī Sharīʻatī and Sir Muhammad Iqbal, 19th and 20th centuries Muslim philosophers.

The essays look at the role of the military in the Cold War and after, and review the prospects for war and peace in the next century."--BOOK JACKET.

In this paper I challenge the notion that a healthy and resilient coral is (in all cases) a fast‐growing coral, and by inference, that a reef characterised by a fast trajectory toward high coral cover is necessarily a healthy and resilient reef. Instead, I explain how emerging evidence links fast skeletal extension rates with elevated coral‐algae (symbiotic) respiration rates, most‐often mediated by nutrient‐enlarged symbiont populations and/or rising sea temperatures. Elevated respiration rates can act to reduce the autotrophic capacity (photosynthesis:respiration ratio) (...) of the symbiosis. This restricts the capacity of the coral host to build and maintain sufficient energy reserves (e.g. lipids) needed to sustain essential homeostatic functions, including sexual reproduction and biophysical stress resistance. Moreover, it explains the somewhat paradoxical scenario, whereby at the ecological instant before the reef‐building capacity of the symbiosis is lost, a reef can look visually at its best and be accreting CaCO3 at its maximum. (shrink)

Книга представляет собой собрание избранных докладов, прочитанных на семинаре в 2004-2009 гг.

Erratum to: Synthese DOI 10.1007/s11229-015-0705-5In line 3 of footnote 8 on page 4, ‘allow’ should be ‘disallow’.In line 8 of page 5, \ should be \ and \ should be \. Similarly for lines 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 13 and 14 of page 6.The entry in row 20 column 6 of the table on page 5 should be 1 rather than 0.The entry \ in row 30 column 5 of the table on page 5 should be \.In line 27 (...) of page 13, ‘it’ should be ‘them’.Four lines from the end of section 12.3 on page 20, ‘premisses’ should be ‘premiss sets’, and .. (shrink)

Some authors have advanced a contractual model to protect patient autonomy within the therapeutic relationship. Such a conception of the physician–patient relationship is intended to serve both parties by respecting patients' choices and preserving physician integrity. I critique this contractual view and offer an alternative, feminist contextualized approach to autonomy within the therapeutic relationship. This approach places the physician-patient relationship within a larger social context, and indicates the many social inequalities that render insupportable the notion of physicians and patients as (...) contracting equals. (shrink)