Isaiah Berlin was the greatest intellectual historian of the twentieth century. But his work also made an original and important contribution to moral and political philosophy and to liberal theory. In 1921, at the age of eleven, Isaiah Berlin arrived in England from Riga, Latvia. By the time he was thirty he was at the heart of British intellectual life. He has remained its commanding presence ever since, and few would dispute that he was one of Britain's greatest thinkers. His (...) reputation extends worldwide--as a great conversationalist, intellectual historian, and man of letters. He has been called the century's most inspired reader. Yet Berlin's contributions to thought--in particular to moral and political philosophy, and to liberal theory--are little understood, and surprisingly neglected by the academic world. In this book, they are shown to be animated by a single, powerful, subversive idea: value-pluralism which affirms the reality of a deep conflict between ultimate human values that reason cannot resolve. Though bracingly clear-headed, humane and realist, Berlin's value-pluralism runs against the dominant Western traditions, secular and religious, which avow an ultimate harmony of values. It supports a highly distinctive restatement of liberalism in Berlin's work--an agnostic liberalism, which is founded not on rational choice but on the radical choices we make when faced with intractable dilemmas. It is this new statement of liberalism, the central subject of John Gray's lively and lucid book, which gives the liberal intellectual tradition a new lease on life, a new source of life, and which comprises Berlin's central and enduring legacy. In a new introduction, Gray argues that, in a world in which human freedom has spread more slowly than democracy, Berlin's account of liberty and basic decency is more instructive and useful than ever. (shrink)

Telling stories about our experiences in dance brings to light unconscious knowledge and memories of the past and helps us understand our own decisions and practices. Reflexivity and story telling is central in the process of remembering and embodies some of the key aspects of autoethnography as a research tool. We are directed to examine and reflect on our experiences, analyzing goals and intentions, making connections between happenings and recounting each single experience. Dance has the potential for positive impact on (...) both physical and mental health among professional dancers as well as among dance students and has the power to connect them to culture and community in unique and important ways. Research has provided evidence that arts engagement provides positive forms of social inclusion, opportunities to share arts, culture, language, and values and points to the value of the arts in the prevention and amelioration of health problems. Together with those benefits of a dance experience there is clear evidence of what can be learned in, through and about dance. In this time of the Covid-19 pandemic it seemed more relevant and poignant to examine our own experiences in dance as well as those experiences of others that have influenced our lives. (shrink)

Government have in the past embarked on many infrastructural programmes such as building of roads, hospitals, health centers in the rural areas, schools, etc for its citizens. A lot of projects have been carried out in the past years, there are institutions formed to carter for the implementation of such programmes, institutions like NEMA to check disasters, repair of roads, collapse buildings etc. NDDC was formed to take care of roads in the South East but many of these programmes and (...) institutions have not fared well in recent years because of corruption. Take for instance in the channels news of Tuesdays 16/6/2020 the new NDDC Director revealed how projects awarded to contractors in the past were all not carried out, funds meant for those purposes were all embezzled into private pockets. With the coming of Covid 19, governments have now found cover to say Covid 19 has attacked all revenue sources and so cannot carry out projects in the country. This is the burden of this work. Is it true that it is Covid 19 that halted the success of programme implementation in Nigeria? This is what this paper is out to ascertain. (shrink)

Cet article a déja paru dans les Mélanges de l'École française de Rome – Italie et Méditerranée modernes et contemporaines, 125-1 | 2013 et mis en ligne ici. Résumé : La gestion de l'espace et du temps est au cœur de la pratique des marchands, ici florentins, spécialisés dans le grand commerce. Cette pratique marchande, étudiée ici pour les premières années de la compagnie Salviati de Lyon, est un élément d'une culture marchande commune aux grandes compagnies marchandes florentines de la (...) fin du Moyen Age (...) - Histoire – Nouvel article. (shrink)

Marxism, one of the few philosophies that turned into an effective movement, not so long ago was the official ideology in one form or another of much of humanity. It was promulgated, initially by the Soviet Union, then imposed on much of Central and Eastern Europe, later emerged in the People's Republic of China, and gradually spread to other parts of Asia and even bits of Africa and Latin America. Although declining in its initial popularity, it still remains strong in (...) several countries and is supported by numerous communist and other parties and countless individuals around the world. The Historical Dictionary of Marxism covers the history of Marxism and all its thinkers and schools of thought in a comprehensive manner. This is done, through a chronology, a list of acronyms and abbreviations, an introductory essay, a bibliography, and hundreds of cross-reference dictionary entries on basic terms and concepts, significant thinkers and doers, and also the parties and countries that followed it. (shrink)

This intra-view explores a number of productive junctions between contemporary Deleuzoguattarian and new materialist praxes via a series of questions and provocations. Productive tensions are explored via questions of epistemological, ontological, ethical, and political intra-sections as well as notions of difference, transversal contamination, ecosophical practices, diffraction, and, lastly, schizoanalysis. Various irruptions around biophilosophy, transduction, becomology, cartography, power relations, hyperobjects as events, individuation, as well as dyschronia and disorientation, take the discussion further into the wild pedagogical spaces that both praxes have (...) in common. -/- . (shrink)

'Ética, sustentabilidade e sociedade - desafios da nossa era' reúne estudos de diferentes áreas do conhecimento - Filosofia, Administração, Geografia - que tem em comum o foco nas questões éticas, como a corrupção no meio político e a crise ambiental planetária. Entre a violação à ética na política brasileira e o desafio de sobrevivência do planeta, variados temas são discutidos. Os pesquisadores também se defrontam com outras vertentes comportamentais, como as relacionadas ao ambiente e ao consumo sustentável.

The Tobacco Control Legal Consortium is a national “network” designed to tap expertise about tobacco control legislation and to leverage existing resources. Based at the William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul, Minnesota, the Consortium supports local counsel with research, strategic advice, sample materials and pleadings, and amicus briefs. The Consortium’s priorities are to support capacity nationally, to offer education, and to perform outreach activities to a variety of audiences.The Consortium seeks to advance policy change by making legal expertise (...) more readily available to the tobacco control community. Legal issues are inevitably involved in policy change. The Consortium does not provide legal representation, but conducts analysis and research. They publish on important and emerging legal issues as well as on specific cases, assist in the development of legislation, and train public health practitioners and policy makers on recurring legal issues. (shrink)

[opening paragraph]: Nicholas Humphrey is interested in illustrating how it is that the mind is the brain. We can think of him as taking up David Chalmers’ and Joe Levine's challenge to solve the so-called hard problem, to bridge the so-called explanatory gap. For after being convinced, as we surely are, that minds are housed in brains via the activity of neurons, we still need to explain why that should be the case. Why is it that our lumpy grey matter (...) should contain consciousness? Even if we agree that it does, we still need to arrange the facts so that having minded brains is a patently obvious truth. (shrink)

While there may be interesting theoretical differences between cortical and subcortical malfunctions, it is not a difference that is going to separate the psychological from the biological. For, the distinctions we draw between the “psychological” and “biological” turn on our assessments of others' conscious experiences, and not on anything deeper or more profound.

Editorial for ‘One Christ—Many Witnesses: Marking the Completion of the Regnum Edinburgh Centenary Series’, a special issue to celebrate the Regnum Edinburgh Centenary Issue.

In this paper, we pay attention to the impact on staff of what was a new place, Ko Awatea, within a large New Zealand hospital. The place became a space from within which a particular mood arose. This paper seeks to capture that mood and its impact. Using a Heideggerian hermeneutic approach, the study reported on drew on data from interviews with 20 staff. Philosophical notions about the nature and mood of place/space are explored. As staff claimed this space, the (...) mood that emerged was of liveliness, buzz and comfort. It became a space where people wanted to be, where they met others, where conversations unfolded, where thinking happened in new ways. Staff places tend to be sacrificed or poorly resourced in resource-tight environments. We argue that creating a space that feels home-like, where staff come, linger and engage in community is a priority for generating the mood and thinking of an organization. Such spaces do not happen by chance; it takes forethought and intentionality. The gift of such space is the thinking that is sparked and grown. (shrink)

The recent discovery and translation of Herman Bavinck’s (1854–1921) Reformed Ethics and the ongoing work on the sources and contours of his organic ontology create the impetus to relate these two trajectories together. The twin questions this article will be asking, precisely, are these: what is the logical relationship between Bavinck’s organic whole federalism, where ethical ties are ontologically constitutive, with his claim in the Reformed Ethics that sin’s organizing principle is the prioritization of the ego above all else? Further, (...) how does that organic whole anthropology inform his vision of renewal and the subsequent ethical imperative that flow from the Spirit’s regenerative work? This article traces Bavinck’s logic through the Ethics on these twin questions, while being cognizant of the rest of his oeuvre. With this exposition in hand, this article then relates Bavinck’s outlook to current discussions in Protestant theological ethics. (shrink)

June grass at sunset, Indian grass at sunrise, hawk moths and monarch butterflies nectaring on purple fringed orchids and rough blazing star, little bluestem and saw-tooth sunflowers and butterfly milkweed in hill prairies and sand prairies, and blue skies and one bright rainbow arching over them all. Bill Witt has been photographing Iowa’s wild places for more than thirty years, and the result is this collection of splendid images that reveal the glorious beauty and diversity of the state’s prairie remnants. (...) Witt gives us close-ups of pasque flower shoots covered with ice in spring, coneflowers dancing in a summer breeze, and prairie dropseed in its autumn colors as well as such prairie companions as sandhill cranes, northern harriers, and bison. His panoramic visions of prairie landscapes in all seasons focus on the personal pleasure and spiritual sustenance that connecting with prairies, even small and neglected ones, can bring us. Osha Davidson’s essay compares today’s prairie remnants with yesterday’s expanses and calls for us to restore balance to this damaged landscape. Altogether, Enchanted by Prairie celebrates today’s prairie landscape and encourages us, in Davidson’s words, to restore its “beauty and scents and textures and sounds.”. (shrink)

The lives of few mathematicians offer the drama that is presented by the life of L. E. J. Brouwer, correctly identified on the cover of this book as a topologist, intuitionist, and philosopher, and before we go any further, it will be worth indicating why.It is not just that Brouwer would rank high among mathematicians for his work in topology alone: he set standards for rigour and created a theory of dimension for topological spaces, and his fixed-point theorem is of (...) great importance. Nor is it just that his philosophy of intuitionism created a new and vibrant branch of logic, that is, arguably, the only viable alternative to naïve, classical logic outside the enclave of professional logicians. Rather, it is that there is a tension, popularly taken to amount to a contradiction, in the fundamental ideas behind his topology and his intuitionism. Added to that, he took a highly principled stand on mathematical issues that led him into confrontations with major figures and a certain degre .. (shrink)

Bonaventure’s third distinction in the first book of his ’Commentary on the Sentences’ is the focus of argument, after situating the question within contemporary Bonaventure interpretation and current Trinity philosophy. It is argued that Bonaventure had sufficient philosophical grounds to conclude to the existence of Trinity from its image in memory, intelligence and will. Suggestions are made for why he did not do so.

As well as data indicating relationships (emphasised in the target article) (1) between dopaminergic transmission in the nucleus accumbens and positive incentive motivation, and (2) between dopaminergic transmission and extraversion, other data (not accounted for by the hypotheses developed in the target article) indicate relationships (3) between accumbens dopaminergic transmission and cognitive, especially perceptual, processes that are disrupted in schizophrenia, and (4) between dopaminergic transmission and psychoticism. The tension between relationships 1 + 2 and 3 + 4 is discussed and (...) a tentative resolution proposed. (shrink)

_Teleparody: Predicting/Preventing the TV Discourse of Tomorrow_ Edited by Angela Hague and David Lavery London: Wallflower Press, 2002 ISBN 1-903364-39-6 198 pp.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Herodotus' Literary and Historical Method:Arion's Story (1.23-24)Vivienne GrayHerodotus' story of how the talented and original musical performer and conductor Arion of Methymna was rescued from the sea and carried to dry land by a dolphin is of great interest because of the literary and historical methods he uses.1 The story arises out of the siege of Miletus and is connected with it through Periander (1.20, 1.24.1, 7), but different (...) readings have been presented in order to make a better connection with the immediate or wider context.2 Questions have also been raised about the authenticity of Herodotus' inquiry and his own belief in the miracle.3 His normal inquiry (historia) involves akoe (what he heard), opsis (what he saw), and gnome (his judgment).4 He tells Arion's story mainly on the authority of the traditions of the Corinthians and Lesbians, whose agreement on it frames the story.5 He supplements this akoe with [End Page 11] apparent opsis, in the form of a "material proof": the dedication "of Arion" on a statue of a man on a dolphin, at Taenarum, to which his sources said the dolphin carried him. The genitive case of the dedication suggests that Arion dedicated it and inscribed it with his name.6 And Herodotus' description of the statue as "bronze, not big" suggests that he saw it. But he does not add his own gnome of belief, or disbelief, in the miracle.I would like to offer a new reading of Arion's story that combines insights into Herodotus' presentation of it and its context with some comments on Herodotus' own beliefs and his use of the oral traditions available to him.The StoryThe story goes that Arion had been spending most of his time at the court of Periander. Periander plays an important role in the story: his experience of Arion's miracle is the focus from beginning to end. The traditions that Herodotus cites present the story as a "very great wonder" () that "occurred to Periander in his lifetime" (1.23.1). They give an account of how it happened, and say that Arion gave an account to Periander, presumably in the same form (1.24.6). Periander experiences "disbelief" as a result of the "wonder" but conducts an "inquiry" that shows it to be true.7Arion decides to go west to acquire his fortune. He hires a Corinthian ship to take him back to Corinth, but the crew plots to rob him and make him kill himself, giving him a choice that seems to be no choice (): to kill himself on board and be buried, or to jump overboard (and not be buried). Arion promises to kill himself, but first secures the crew's permission to give a last performance, which he does in full dress, of "the shrill/rising tune" ().8 He then makes what appears to be the worse choice and jumps overboard, whereupon a dolphin rescues him and carries him safely to Taenarum. [End Page 12]Herodotus does not explain Arion's choice or directly connect his performance with his rescue, but Arion's religious dedication () at Taenarum implies that Arion, at least, believed that the dolphin came as a divine agent (1.24.8). Poseidon had a very famous shrine at Taenarum and was thought to save men from disaster at sea by sending his dolphin to assist them.9 Similar patterns of action in other stories strengthen the hypothesis that Arion has appealed to some divine force to rescue him.10 Croesus, for example, secures his divine salvation by shouting out to the god Apollo, appealing to him to stand by and deliver him from death if ever he has given him any gift that pleased him (1.87.1). Arion sings () instead of shouting, but a song from the world's best kitharode (1.23) is bound very much to please the god to whom it is addressed.11 The Magi sacrifice and sing () to the god of the wind and sacrifice to Thetis and the Nereids of the sea in order to quell a storm that is threatening them and prevent further... (shrink)