In this stunning act of synthesis, Abraham Edel captures the entire range of Aristotle's thought in a manner that will prove attractive and convincing to a contemporary audience. Many philosophers approach Aristotle with their own, rather than his, questions. Some cast him as a partisan of a contemporary school. Even the neutral approach of classical scholarship often takes for granted questions that reflect our modern ways of dissecting the world. Aristotle and His Philosophy shows him at work in asking (...) and answering questions. Abraham Edel fashions a sound comparative way of using current analysis to deepen our understanding of Aristotle rather than argue with or simply appropriate him. Edel examines how Aristotle's basic ideas operated in his scientific and humanistic works, what they enabled him to do, what they kept him from doing, and what in turn we can learn from his philosophical experimentation. The purpose of this volume is twofold: to provide a comprehensive introduction to Aristotle's thought, and to throw fresh light on its patterned and systematic character. First, tracing the pattern in Aristotle's metaphysical and physical writings, he then explores the psychology, epistemology, ethics and politics, rhetoric and poetics. In the process, Edel discusses the way interpretations of Aristotle are built up and how different philosophical outlooks¿Catholic, Hegelian, Marxian, linguistic, naturalistic, and pragmatic¿have affected the reading of Aristotelian texts and ideas. The new introduction probes the general problem of interpreting a philosophy, and suggests how working through the different interpretations can contribute to a fuller understanding. This methodological self-consciousness makes Aristotle and His Philosophy markedly different from other studies of Aristotle. Martha C. Nussbaum of Brown University has described Edel as having "philosophical sensitivity and good sense throughout. His scholarship is comprehensive, but handled with grace and clarity.". (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Buddhist-Christian Studies 22 (2002) 31-46 [Access article in PDF] Remedying Globalization and Consumerism: Joining the Inner and Outer Journeys in "Perfect Balance" Judith Simmer-Brown Naropa University One hundred forty years ago, Abraham Lincoln wrote in a prophetic voice: I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country.... Corporations have been enthroned and an (...) era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed. 1As the global economy has grown and the economic gap between the poor nations and the rich nations has become enormous, we are realizing Lincoln's nightmare.Globalization has effects more devastating than Lincoln could have imagined. What do we mean by globalization? The president of Nabisco once defined it as "a world of homogeneous consumption." 2 It is a world in which everyone, no matter what latitude or longitude, eats the same food, wears the same clothing, and derives pleasure from the same entertainment. It is the world of McDonald's, Holiday Inn, James Bond movies, Nike shoes, and Coca-Cola. Noam Chomsky, in a lecture at Boston College, described globalization as the "new face of capitalism." 3 It is a network of power centered in corporate interests and financial institutions that controls the flow of capital in order to promote the financial interests of those in power to the detriment of all others. The strategies of globalization have to do with centralizing all power in financial interest, reducing all value to money, and subsuming governments to the interests of the corporations. According to Chomsky, the strategies employed by the transnational network are designed to consolidate this control:Buy the executive branch of the states involved;Own the legislative branch through lobbyists, campaign contributions, and term extensions, or whatever else may work; [End Page 31]Set the conditions in which policy is determined, asserting the power of global capital;Control the doctrine and information systems, especially to invent new needs in order to bolster a culture of fashionable consumption. 4The players in this transnational network reside in the wealthy countries of the world, especially the governments of the G8, and most especially the United States. The global dominance of the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization is funded by U.S. dollars funneled to them by the network. Yet this capital is not really exchange of cash; instead, it is speculation. Chomsky commented: In the last twenty-five years, there has been a huge explosion of financial institutions and financial capital, most of it speculative, with little actual capital in the economy. The flow of capital is $1.5 trillion per day, very little of it productive. Ninety-five percent of it is destructive and speculative. The return time on investments is very rapid; eighty percent has a return time of a week, and often it is less than a day. This daily flow of capital in international markets is twice the total foreign exchange of all states together. This concentrated power is interlinked, determining states' decisions. 5States are no longer autonomous agents; transnational economic interests have taken precedence over national sovereignty, regional power, and military concerns.The impact on developing countries and rural economies is devastating. The global monoculture is eradicating cultural diversity, replacing locally adapted forms of production with industrial systems divorced from natural cycles. Agriculture has become centrally managed and chemically dependent, delivering a narrower range of transportable foods to the international market. This, of course, robs the vitality of local communities and moves a greater proportion of villagers into urban life, creating megalopolises. Because everyone becomes dependent upon the same resources, "globalization creates efficiency for corporations, but it also creates artificial scarcity for consumers, thus heightening competitive pressures.... Globalization means the undermining of the livelihoods and cultural identities of the majority of the world's peoples." 6... (shrink)

The aim of this article is to contrast Hegelian insights about the secret with Derrida’s literary account of the secret in the story of Abraham. Derrida outlines two kinds of secret in “Literature in Secret,” one revealable and the other apophatic. I propose that the first kind of secret is Hegelian in nature because a productive concept of contradiction underlies it. On the other hand, the second kind of secret is Derridean because it withdraws from all revelation. Through an (...) analysis of the role of contradiction in Hegel’s Logic and Derrida’s distinction between revealable and unrevealable secrets, I aim to explore the logical and structural components of the concept of the secret. (shrink)

The foundations of law. The digest title, De diversis regulis iuris antiqui, and the general principles of law, by P. Stein. Equity in Chinese customary law, by W. Y. Tsao. Prolegomena to the theory and history of Jewish law, by H. Cohn. Juridical evolution and equity, by J.P. Brutau. Reflections on the sources of the law, by P. Lepaulle. The true nature and province of jurisprudence from the viewpoint of Indian philosophy, by M.J. Sethna. On the functions and aims of (...) the state, by G. Del Veccchio.--Concepts of jurisprudence. Legal language and reality, by K. Olivecrona. The logic of the reasonable as differentiated from the logic of the rational (human reason in the making and the interpretation of the law) by L. Recaséns-Siches. Some refections on status and freedom, by W.G. Friedmann. Law and power and their correlation, by M. Reale. The notion of canonical auctoritas with respect to statute, custom and usage, by B.F. Brown. Two theories of "the institution," by J. Stone. (shrink)

Contemporary scholars of Chinese philosophy often presuppose that early China possessed a naturalistic worldview, devoid of any non-natural concepts, such as transcendence. Challenging this presupposition head-on, Joshua R. Brown and Alexus McLeod argue that non-naturalism and transcendence have a robust and significant place in early Chinese thought. -/- This book reveals that non-naturalist positions can be found in early Chinese texts, in topics including conceptions of the divine, cosmogony, and apophatic philosophy. Moreover, by closely examining a range of early (...) Chinese texts, and providing comparative readings of a number of Western texts and thinkers, the book offers a way of reading early Chinese Philosophy as consistent with the religious philosophy of the East and West, including the Abrahamic and the Brahmanistic religions. -/- Co-written by a philosopher and theologian, this book draws out unique insights into early Chinese thought, highlighting in particular new ways to consider a range of Chinese concepts, including tian, dao, li, and you/wu. (shrink)

We perceive the objective world through a subjective perceptual veil. Various perceived properties, particularly “secondary qualities” like colours and tastes, are mind-dependent. Although mind-dependent, our knowledge of many facts about the perceptual veil is immediate and secure. These are well-known facets of sense-datum theory. My aim is to carve out a conception of sense-datum theory that does not require the immediate and secure knowledge of a wealth of facts about experienced sense-data (§1). Such a theory is of value on its (...) own, given well-known challenges to epistemic foundationalism. Beyond this such a theory helps demonstrate how sense-datum theory can accommodate challenging perceptual phenomena like shape and size constancies (§3). These ideas are bridged by the roots of perceptual ambiguity (§2). In brief, tapering acquaintance knowledge creates space for perceptual representation to resolve the ambiguities in presented objects seemingly inherent in scenarios involving perceptual constancies. Thus, I offer a two-factor (acquaintance-representation) sense-datum theory to meet the challenge posed by constancies. Following Smith (2002), from whom this challenge is drawn, my focus is on shape and size constancies. Other constancies, notably colour constancy, are treated elsewhere (Brown 2014). (shrink)

In contemporary histories of psychology, William Moulton Marston is remembered for helping develop the lie detector test. He is better remembered in the history of popular culture for creating the comic book superhero Wonder Woman. In his time, however, he contributed to psychological research in deception, basic emotions, abnormal psychology, sexuality, and consciousness. He was also a radical feminist with connections to women's rights movements. Marston's work is an instructive case for philosophers of science on the relation between science and (...) values. Although Marston's case provides further evidence of the role that feminist values can play in scientific work, it also poses challenges to philosophical accounts of value-laden science. Marston's work exemplifies standard views about feminist value-laden research in that his feminist values help him both to criticize the research of others and create novel psychological concepts and research techniques. His scientific work includes an account of the nature of psycho-emotional health that leads to normative conclusions for individual values and conduct and for society and culture, a direction of influence that is relatively under-theorized in the literature. To understand and evaluate Marston's work requires an approach that treats science and values as mutually influencing; it also requires that we understand the relationship between science advising and political advocacy in value-laden science. (shrink)

A short, provocative book about why "useless" science often leads to humanity's greatest technological breakthroughs A forty-year tightening of funding for scientific research has meant that resources are increasingly directed toward applied or practical outcomes, with the intent of creating products of immediate value. In such a scenario, it makes sense to focus on the most identifiable and urgent problems, right? Actually, it doesn't. In his classic essay "The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge," Abraham Flexner, the founding director of the (...) Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and the man who helped bring Albert Einstein to the United States, describes a great paradox of scientific research. The search for answers to deep questions, motivated solely by curiosity and without concern for applications, often leads not only to the greatest scientific discoveries but also to the most revolutionary technological breakthroughs. In short, no quantum mechanics, no computer chips. This brief book includes Flexner's timeless 1939 essay alongside a new companion essay by Robbert Dijkgraaf, the Institute's current director, in which he shows that Flexner's defense of the value of "the unobstructed pursuit of useless knowledge" may be even more relevant today than it was in the early twentieth century. Dijkgraaf describes how basic research has led to major transformations in the past century and explains why it is an essential precondition of innovation and the first step in social and cultural change. He makes the case that society can achieve deeper understanding and practical progress today and tomorrow only by truly valuing and substantially funding the curiosity-driven "pursuit of useless knowledge" in both the sciences and the humanities. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the `Lorentzian Pedagogy' defended by J.S. Bell in his essay ``How to teach special relativity'', and to explore its consistency with Einstein's thinking from 1905 to 1952. Some remarks are also made in this context on Weyl's philosophy of relativity and his 1918 gauge theory. Finally, it is argued that the Lorentzian pedagogy---which stresses the important connection between kinematics and dynamics---clarifies the role of rods and clocks in general relativity.

A higher order potential analysis of moral status clarifies the issues that divide Human Being Theorists who oppose embryo research from Person Theorists who favor embryo research. Higher order potential personhood is transitive if it is active, identity preserving and morally relevant. If the transition from the Second Order Potential of the embryo to the First Order Potential of an infant is transitive, opponents of embryo research make a powerful case for the moral status of the embryo. If it is (...) intransitive, then the Person Theorist can draw lines between levels of moral status that permit embryo research to proceed. (shrink)

It is claimed by the future like ours anti-abortion argument that since killing adult humans is wrong because it deprives them of a future of value and the fetus has a future of value, killing fetuses is wrong in the same way that killing adult human beings is wrong. In The morality of abortion and the deprivation of futures (this journal, April 2000) I argued that the persuasive power of this argument rests upon an equivocation on the term “future of (...) value”. If the expression means “a potential future of value” then the moral claim is implausible because people do not in general have rights to what they need to fulfill their potential; if the expression means “self-represented future of value” then the argument fails because the fetus does not represent its future. Under no interpretation is the argument sound. In Deprivations, futures and the wrongness of killing (this journal, December 2001) Donald Marquis, author of the future like ours argument, responds at length to this objection. In the present essay the focus of the debate shifts to the proper interpretation of the right not to be killed. Donald Marquis argues that this liberty right entails the welfare right to the means necessary to sustain life; I argue that the right not to be killed does not entail unlimited welfare rights. On Marquis's view, the right not to be killed confers upon the fetus the right to whatever it takes to sustain life; on the view I defend, the right not to be killed does not confer upon the fetus or anyone else the right to another person's body. On Marquis's view, abortion is almost never permissible; on my view abortion is almost always permissible. (shrink)

Narrow mental content is a kind of mental content that does not depend on an individual's environment. Narrow content contrasts with “broad” or “wide” content, which depends on features of the individual's environment as well as on features of the individual. It is controversial whether there is any such thing as narrow content. Assuming that there is, it is also controversial what sort of content it is, what its relation to ordinary or “broad” content is, and how it is determined (...) by the individual's intrinsic properties. (shrink)

This book outlines the broad spectrum of answers to important questions presented in Jewish literature, covering theological issues bearing on the meaning of the Torah and of revelation, as well as hermeneutical questions regarding understanding of the halakhic text.

In Israel, whistleblowing in the nursing profession has been largely ignored. This topic is neither part of the professional—ethical discourse nor a subject for research. Focusing on the divide between internal and external whistleblowing, this article presents a study that explores nurses’ willingness to disclose an act that could jeopardize the rights or safety of patients. Internal disclosure entails reporting wrongdoing to an authority within the organization. External disclosure involves reporting the offense to an outside agency, such as a professional (...) organization or the press. The study’s findings indicate that the nurse respondents viewed both the harmful misconduct of a colleague and that of a manager as being very serious. In such dilemmas the nurses reported a desire to correct the wrongdoing and a concomitant willingness to act. They were, however, much more likely to whistleblow internally rather than externally. This study revealed a pattern of nurses’ progressive retraction as the circle of disclosure widened. (shrink)

Die Entwicklung eines philosophischen Systems ist für den Autor Folge der persönlichen Auseinandersetzung mit der Frage nach dem Lebenssinn und der Stellung des Menschen in der Welt. Die Frage nach dem Sinn des menschlichen Lebens ist die zentrale Frage des Menschen. Die zentrale Stellung bekommt diese Frage dadurch, dass der Mensch selbst - mehr unbewusst als bewusst - sie in seinem Verhalten, seinen Absichten und in seiner Lebensweise, in dem, was er vom Leben im Allgemeinen und von seinem persönlichen Leben (...) im Besonderen fordert und in ihm erreichen will, beantwortet. Diese Frage wird durch die Möglichkeit eines konkret bestimmten individuellen Lebensvollzugs gestellt und durch den Vollzug dieses individuellen, persönlichen Lebens beantwortet. Das eigentliche Problem eines jeden einzelnen Menschen ist seine Orientierung in der Welt. Den «Kompass» für die Orientierung in der Welt kann er nur in der Erkenntnis der Wirklichkeit finden. (shrink)