Encounters with Alphonso Lingis is the first extensive study of this American philosopher who is gaining an international reputation to augment his national one. The distinguished contributors to this volume address most of the central themes found in Lingis's writings—including singularity and otherness, death and eroticism, emotions and rationality, embodiment and the face, excess and the sacred. The book closes with a new essay by Lingis himself.

Encounters with Alphonso Lingis is the first extensive study of this American philosopher who is gaining an international reputation to augment his national one. The distinguished contributors to this volume address most of the central themes found in Lingis's writings—including singularity and otherness, death and eroticism, emotions and rationality, embodiment and the face, excess and the sacred. The book closes with a new essay by Lingis himself.

In a city high school recently a male student completed a one day suspension for fighting with a female student. It was the only day of school he missed and the only time he got into trouble. When he returned to sit in his usual place, which was next to the female student, the teacher soon noticed and suggested the male student move to another seat. The student said this was his usual seat, he was comfortable there, and wanted to (...) know why he had to move. The teacher insisted, the student resisted, until the teacher called in the principal and security guard. After trying to persuade the student, they said, “We'll have to arrest you”; and he replied, “So?” The student was arrested. The teacher did not attempt to discuss the suggestions with the student nor ask other faculty for assistance. By being arrested and too poor to post bond, the student had to spend two nights in the city jail. Unsurprisingly, this notorious building induced greater fear in the student, whose cellmate was a convicted murderer, than any nagging public school teacher could; still, the student forced himself to stay awake for two consecutive nights. Sending a student to jail for not switching seats strikes one as insane. Even though this incident may not be typical, one should be cautioned about drawing the conclusion that it was only a freak occurrence. The insanity followed a rational routine: Teacher makes request to student; student says no, hence disobeys; teacher gives warning, calls in authorities; authorities give warning, arrest student; student goes to jail. Indeed, the final action follows a sequence in which no outlandish violation of the rules appeared. A combination of regulations, circumstances, and individuals invested with power make this insanity readily possible. And yet, as one observer put it, it could have been avoided, “All they had to do was treat him as a human being.”1. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Diacritics 31.4 (2001) 11-21 [Access article in PDF] Alphonso Lingis's We—A Collage, not a Collective Alexander E. Hooke Alphonso Lingis. Abuses. Berkeley: U of California P, 1994. [AB]________. The Community of Those Who Have Nothing in Common. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1994. [COMM]________. Dangerous Emotions. Berkeley: U of California P, 2000. [DE]________. Foreign Bodies.New York: Routledge, 1994. [FB]________. The Imperative Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1998. [IMP] For Walt Fuchs 1 (...) Alphonso Lingis is unabashed in his uses of we. He does not speak about a privileged we, an exemplary or hegemonic we, or "we." According to this American philosopher, the various ways critics qualify their references to first person plural (we, us, our) are unnecessary, if not unjustifiable. Their caution and skepticism about any direct use of we invariably lead one to focus on this important pronoun as if it were a rhetorical sleight of hand, an ironic twist, a sign of embarrassment or elitism. Worse, their gradual cynicism diminishes or derides the reality of those whose contact with others can only be articulated in terms of we or our. Thus readers, and students subject to these theoretical reservations, are tempted to circumvent any substantive meaning to first-person plural in their own reflections and research. Given the persuasive charms of these reservations, to admit a genuine or lived we involves the risk of being charged with superficiality, a lack of sophistication, nostalgia, or political naiveté. 1In the face of this risk, Lingis writes in first-person plural without apology. Seemingly oblivious to the ongoing controversies over any legitimate use of we—as if it connoted self-indulgence or self-delusion, Lingis depicts experiences and contacts that embody a substance to first-person plural. These contacts are presented directly and with little hesitation, as they often move one to awaken to daring, brazen, or unfamiliar individuals in their contexts and surroundings. To present them requires an air of innocence to the extent that the contacts appear as new to the writer as they are to the reader. [End Page 11]They encompass more than surprise and spectacle. They also initiate beliefs and emotions that embrace other truths: unfamiliar expressions of gods, strange forms of human commitments, eccentric relations humans have with the past and future, but also with animals, trees, and unseen spirits. These truths evoke the kinds of genuine goods and values that are better conceived not as potential instantiations or counterexamples to our generalizations and conventions, but rather as compelling additions to our own senses of reality and truth.In writing about we or us, however, Lingis also raises some critical stakes. While conversant with most of the influential figures and themes discussed under the postmodern rubric, Lingis extends their central ideas to new levels and fields of inquiry. Instead of scrutinizing the uses of first-person plural or maintaining a respectable distance from them, his philosophical endeavors are distinct insofar as they address: How do we, he and his audience, respond to the many kinds of contact that are readily dismissed insofar as they overlooked in our scholarly and philosophical endeavors? What might these other uses and realities of the first-person plural say that affirm, question, or contest us? Can his own work, lucidly presented in five recent books, contribute to contemporary discussions about the possibilities and pitfalls of human relations, cultural and political entities, social and biological communities, and the theoretical or critical reflections on them? 2 Lingis's answers are guided by looking at we more as a collage and less as a collective. A collage, unlike a collection, emphasizes or highlights the unpredictable ways that humans and other life forms come together. The use of we as a collective—whether the result of unconscious drives, chosen ideologies, an intersubjective ethic, or rational communication acts—emphasizes certain values, particularly those that help us to distinguish whether the experiences of we can be understood or appreciated in terms of true or false, good or bad, genuine or superficial, beautiful or ugly, familiar and significant terms for making judgments about moral, social, and... (shrink)

Silence and madness can be likened to irritating cousins. Both introduce questionable or negative elements to the ideals of dialogue and rational communication. Silence can disturb and disrupt the rational pursuit of truth, while madness can noisily provoke a mockery of any meaningful or reciprocal exchange of ideas and thoughts. In the work and life of philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, silence and madness highlight more positive features.To study and articulate these features, this paper relies on the central themes of two prominent (...) thinkers, the archaeological and genealogical studies from the late Michel Foucault and the revived forces of phenomenology from American philosopher Alphonso Lingis, to present the case that Nietzsche embraced a late 19th century disorder called the fugue. This disorder, what Ian Hacking calls a transient mental illness, involves nomadic life. Nietzsche exemplified such a life. His writings and experiences comprise a mixture of travels, arts of the self, willful forgetfulness, and a philosophical play with madness. From conventional perspectives, this play is viewed as irrelevant or detrimental to Nietzsche's philosophical importance. From Nietzsche's own perspective, however, this play might be appreciated as a gift from the insights of madness and the enriching contacts with silence. (shrink)

The first book-length study of the work of Alphonso Lingis' philosophical works.

This chapter focuses on one of the common fallacies in Western philosophy, 'the line‐drawing fallacy'. Many logic or critical thinking textbooks treat the line‐drawing fallacy as a footnote to or subcategory of another fallacy. They view it as a variation of vagueness, false dilemma, slippery slope, or the perfectionist fallacy. Depending on how one interprets a key premise or central term of the argument, detecting a line‐drawing fallacy can take several forms. The chapter discusses these forms. To correct or to (...) prevent the absurd conclusions, logicians try to identify and/or explain the nature of the line‐drawing fallacy. Several line‐drawing‐related fallacies immediately arise, from false dilemma to straw man. Yet this exercise is too obvious to help a student discern the underlying difficulty in recognizing the line‐drawing fallacy or avoiding the paradox it raises. (shrink)

Twilight Zone and Philosophy attempts to bring the insights and paradoxes of Rod Serling's project to contemporary audiences through a variety of philosophical perspectives"--Publisher.

With the earliest known reference to angling with a fly dating from the Chou Dynasty, more than 2,300 years ago, it should come as no surprise that when asked to justify their passionate devotion to fly fishing, many anglers will refer to the rich and venerable literature the sport has generated. Ranging from Plutarch's references to Nile fishing in the Life of Antonius, to Pliny the Elder's Historia Naturalis, to the fifteenth century classic, Dame Julian Berner's The Treatyse of Fysshynge (...) wyth an Angle, to the sport's bible, the 17th century The Compleat Angler by Izaak Walton, to literary treatments in the work of authors such as John Donne, Gerard Manley Hopkins, William Butler Yeats, Ezra Pound and Ernest Hemingway, the wealth of literature devoted to fly fishing appears to be out of proportion to what is, ultimately, just a way of seducing an animal with a brain the size of a pea into inhaling a hook upon which some feathers, furs and tinsels have been lashed. What then, one may legitimately ask, is it about this sport that creates fanatical devotion on the part of its practitioners, who tend to regard it with such zeal and passion as is commonly reserved for art and religion? (shrink)

Volume 11 brings together all of Dewey's writings for 1918 and 1919. A Modern Language Association Committee on Scholarly Editions textual edition. Dewey's dominant theme in these pages is war and its after-math. In the Introduction, Oscar and Lilian Handlin discuss his philosophy within the historical context: The First World War slowly ground to its costly conclusion; and the immensely more difficult task of making peace got painfully under way. The armi-stice that some expected would permit a return to normalcy (...) opened instead upon a period of turbulence that agitated fur-ther a society already unsettled by preparations for battle and by debilitating conflict overseas. After spending the first half of 1918-19 on sabbatical from Columbia at the University of California, Dewey traveled to Japan and China, where he lectured, toured, and assessed in his essays the relationship between the two nations. From Peking he reported the student revolt known as the May Fourth Move-ment. The forty items in this volume also include an analysis of Thomas Hobbe's philosophy; an affectionate commemorative tribute to Theodore Roosevelt, our Teddy; the syllabus for Dewey's lectures at the Imperial University in Tokyo, which were later revised and published as Reconstruction in Philosophy; an exchange with former disciple Randolph Bourne about F. Mat-thias Alexander's Man's Supreme Inheritance; and, central to Dew-ey's creed, Philosophy and Democracy. His involvement in a study of the Polish-American community in Philadelphia--resulting in an article, two memoranda, and a lengthy report--is discussed in detail in the Introduction and in the Note on the Confidential Report ofConditions among the Poles in the United States. (shrink)

Introduction A Brief Conceptual Framework for Biology PART ONE: UNDERSTANDING NATURE 1. The Antecedents of Scientific Thought Animism, Totemism, and Shamanism The Paleolithic View Mesopotamia Egypt 2. Aristotle and the Greek View of Nature The Science of Animal Biology The Parts of Animals The Classification of Animals The Aristotelian System Basic Questions 3. Those Rational Greeks? Theophrastus and the Science of Botany The Roman Pliny Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine Erasistratus Galen of Pergamum The Greek Miracle 4. The Judeo-Christian Worldview (...) The Bishop of Hippo Scholastic Thought Islamic Science Books on Beasts Antecedents of a Revolution 5. The Revival of Science Andreas Vesalius and the Study of Structure William Harvey and the Study of Function Sir Francis Bacon’s Great Instauration Induction, Hypothesis, Deduction The Very Small--Animalcules Robert Hooke and the Discovery of Cells 6. Figur’d Stones and Plastick Virtue Marine Life on Mountain Tops? Figured Stones of Unknown Creatures Baron Cuvier Quarries of the Paris Basin Catastrophism and Uniformitarianism William Smith and the Geological Column Understanding Nature in 1850 PART TWO: THE GROWTH OF EVOLUTIONARY THOUGHT 7. The Paradigm of Evolution First Questions The Paradigm of Natural Theology First Answers 8. Testing Darwins Hypotheses Have Life Forms Changed over Time? Do Species Evolve into Different Species over Time? Has There Been Time Enough for Evolution? Is Natural Selection the Mechanism of Change? The Genetic Basis of Natural Selection Accounting for the Diversity of Life 9. In the Light of Evolution Comparative Anatomy Embryonic Development Classification Microstructure Molecular Processes 10. Life over Time The Origin of Life The Rise of Multicelled Organisms What Is a Phylum? Burgess Shale Metazoans Early Evolution of the Vertebrates The Age of Dinosaurs Birds, Mammals, and Flowering Plants The Rancho La Brea Tar Pits Human Evolution The Role of Extinction in Evolution PART THREE: CLASSICAL GENETICS 11. Pangenesis What Is the Question? Hippocrates and Aristotle The Darwinian Answer Assembling the Data Formulating the Hypothesis by Induction Galton’s Rabbits 12. The Cell Theory The Discovery of Cells: Robert Hooke Schwann and Cells in Animals Gametes as Cells Omnis cellula e cellula? The Technology of Cell Research 13. The Hypothesis of Chromosomal Continuity The Ephemeral Nucleus Schneider, Flemming, and Cell Division The Chromosomes and inheritance Gamete Formation Fertilization 14. Mendel and the Birth of Genetics Model for Monohybrid Crosses Model for Dihybrid Crosses Mendel’s Laws Initial Opposition to Mendelism 15. Genetics + Cytology: 1900-1910 Sutton’s Model The Cytological Basis of Mendel’s Laws Boveri and Abnormal Chromosome Sets Variations in Mendelian Ratios The Discovery of Sex Chromosomes 16. The Genetics of the Fruit Fly Morgan’s First Hypothesis Morgan’s Second Hypothesis The Fly Room Linkage and Crossing-Over The Cytological Proof of Crossing-Over Mapping the Chromosomes The Final Proof The Determinants of Sex The Conceptual Foundations of Classical Genetics 17. The Structure and Function of Genes One Gene, One Enzyme The Substance of Inheritance The Watson-Crick Model of DNA Genes and the Synthesis of Proteins The Genetic Code PART FOUR: THE ENIGMA OF DEVELOPMENT 18. First Principles The Peripatetic Stagirite The Death and Rebirth of Scientific Thought Harvey and Malpighi A Two-Millennial Summing Up Preformation versus Epigenesis 19. The Century of Discovery Von Baer’s Discovery of the Mammalian Ovum Darwin’s Contribution to Embryology Haeckel and Recapitulation 20. Descriptive Embryology Germ Layers The External Development of the Amphibian Embryo The Internal Development of the Amphibian Embryo 21. The Dawn of Analytical Embryology His, Roux, and Mosaic Development Driesch and Regulative Development Novelty in Development Cell Lineage Nucleus or Cytoplasm? Fin de Siècle 22. Interactions during Development Amphibian Organizers Secondary Organizers The Reacting Tissue The Chemical Nature of the Organizer Putting It All Together Conclusion Further Reading References Illustration Credits Index. (shrink)

Internalism about a person's good is roughly the view that in order for something to intrinsically enhance a person's well-being, that person must be capable of caring about that thing. I argue in this paper that internalism about a person's good should not be believed. Though many philosophers accept the view, Connie Rosati provides the most comprehensive case in favor of it. Her defense of the view consists mainly in offering five independent arguments to think that at least some form (...) of internalism about one's good is true. But I argue that, on closer inspection, not one of these arguments succeeds. The problems don't end there, however. While Rosati offers good reasons to think that what she calls 'two-tier internalism' would be the best way to formulate the intuition behind internalism about one's good, I argue that two-tier internalism is actually false. In particular, the problem is that no substantive theory of well-being is consistent with two-tier internalism. Accordingly, there is reason to think that even the best version of internalism about one's good is in fact false. Thus, I conclude, the prospects for internalism about a person's good do not look promising. (shrink)

This Is A New Release Of The Original 1868 Edition.

“Opt-out” organ procurement policies based on presumed consent are typically advertised as being superior to “opt-in” policies based on explicit consent at securing organs for transplantation. However, Michael Gill has argued that presumed consent policies are also better than opt-in policies at respecting patient autonomy. According to Gill’s Fewer Mistakes Argument, we ought to implement the procurement policy that results in the fewest frustrated wishes regarding organ donation. Given that the majority of Americans wish to donate their organs, it is (...) plausible that a presumed consent policy would result in fewer frustrated wishes compared to the current opt-in policy. It follows that we ought to implement a policy of presumed consent. In this paper, I first consider and find wanting an objection to the Fewer Mistakes Argument developed recently by Douglas MacKay. I also consider an objection put forth by James Taylor but argue that there is a methodological reason to prefer my own argument to Taylor’s. Finally, I argue for two theses: first, that Gill’s major argument in favor of the crucial premise of the Fewer Mistakes Argument is flawed, and second, that the major premise of the Fewer Mistakes Argument is false. (shrink)

In this thesis I examine a number of topics that bear on explanation and understanding in molecular and cell biology, in order to shed new light on explanatory practice in those areas and to find novel angles from which to approach relevant philosophical debates. The topics I look at include mechanism, emergence, cellular complexity, and the informational role of the genome. I develop a perspective that stresses the intimacy of the relations between ontology and epistemology. Whether a phenomenon looks mechanistic, (...) or complex, or indeed emergent, is largely an epistemic matter, yet has an objective basis in features of the world. After reviewing several concepts of mechanism I consider the influential recent account of Machamer, Darden and Craver (MDC). That account makes interesting proposals concerning the relationship between mechanistic explanation and intelligibility, which are consistent with the results of the investigation I undertake into the science surrounding protein folding. In relation to a number of other issues pertaining to biological systems I conclude that the MDC account is insufficiently nuanced, however, leading me to outline an alternative approach to mechanism. This emphasizes the importance of structure—function relations and addresses issues raised by reflection on the nature of cellular complexity. These include the distinction between structure and process and the different possible bases on which system organization may be maintained. The account I give of emergence construes the phenomenon in terms of psychological deficit: phenomena are emergent when we lack the capacity to trace through and model their causal structures using our cognitive schemas. I conclude by developing these ideas into a preliminary and partial account of explanation and understanding. This aspires to cover the significant fraction of work in molecular and cell biology that correlates biological structures, processes and functions by visualizing phenomena and making them imaginable. (shrink)

The A-theory of time says that it is an objective, non-perspectival fact about the world that some events are present, while others were present or will be present. I shall argue that the A-theory has some implausible consequences for inductive reasoning. In particular, the presentist version of the A-theory, which holds that the difference between the present and the non-present consists in the present events being the only ones that exist, is very much in trouble.

Book Review: P.P. Tolochko. Ukraine between Russia and the West: Historical and Nonfiction Essays. Saint Petersburg: Saint Petersburg University of Humanities and Social Sciences, 2018. - 592 pp. ISBN 978-5-7621-0973-4This author discusses the problem of scientific objectivity and reviews a book written by the medievalist-historian P.P. Tolochko, full member of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, honorable director of the NASU Institute of Archaeology. The book was published by the Saint Petersburg University of Humanities and Social Sciences in the (...) autumn of 2018. The book presents a collection of articles and reports devoted to processes in Ukraine and, first of all, in Ukrainian historical science, which, at the moment, is experiencing an era of serious reformation of its interpretative models. The author of the book shows that these models are being reformed to suit the requirements of the new ideology, with an obvious disregard for the conduct of objective scientific research. In this regard, the problem of objectivity of scientific research becomes the subject of this review because the requirement of objectivity can be viewed not only as a methodological requirement but also as a moral and political position, opposing the rigor of scientific research to the impact of ideological, political and moral systems and judgments. It is concluded that in this sense the position of P.P. Tolochko can be considered as the act of profound ethical choice. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:HUME'S IDEAS In the eighteenth century, there was widespread acceptance of a physiological basis for cognition. Some writers even argued for a rather detailed correlation between awareness and physiological changes, suggesting that (a) the former could be adequately explained in terms of the latter or, in some few instances, (b) that the former are the latter. David Hartley may come to mind as fitting one or the other of (...) these alternatives, but Robert Hooke had earlier argued for ideas as brain impressions, as of course did Descartes in his early scientific treatises. There was also one medical doctor in the eighteenth century, Dr. Astruc, who seems (on the basis of what Chambers reports) to have attempted a very specific correlation between specific forms of awareness and specific states and changes in physiology. There were also writers in this century who warned against the dangers of using physical-object vocabulary when talking about the mind and acts of awareness. Berkeley is one such writer,- Thomas Reid at the end of the century traced, to the use of this vocabulary, what he took to be the indirect realism of the way of ideas. Hume is writing in both these traditions: the tradition of using physical language for characterizing mental operations and the tradition of physiological explanations and correlations. The phrase used by Alexander Pope and Hume, 'the anatomy of the mind', seems to be a mixed metaphor, but it is a phrase which I take as an indication that Hume is doing what we would call 'cognitive psychology'. Another phrase used by Hume (this time in the Enquiry), 'mental geography', may capture his enterprise better: 'geography' still sounds physical, but it is modified by 'mental'. Hume is engaged in mental mapping. I want to take a look at the use of the term 'idea' in Hume's writing (mainly in the Treatise) in order to see 2. whether Hume's text enables us to say anything about the nature of his ideas, to discover what role they play in his mental geography. As far as I can determine, there are three possible candidates for the nature of ideas in Hume: images, brain impressions, and cognitive contents. The first of these is, I think, the standard reading of Hume's ideas. Professor Anderson has presented strong argument and evidence to support the second. I will be suggesting that the third is the best candidate, given the full range of the text of the Treatise. Of course, the correct answer 4 may be all three of these. The Treatise opens by dividing all perceptions of the human mind into two kinds. Impressions and ideas differ in the degree of force and liveliness with which they strike upon the mind. Even though the language of 'force' and 'liveliness' may be borrowed from physical talk, it is the mind, not the brain, on which perceptions strike. The examples of impressions are sensations, passions, and emotions. Ideas are said to be the faint images of these impressions in thinking and reasoning. The term 'image' throughout the eighteenth century never receives any clear explication. Its inheritance from optical treatises always hangs about it. We should look to the examples cited by Hume, in order to see whether we can construct a meaning for that term when used in these psychological contexts. Let us look first at his very first example of 'ideas': all the perceptions excited by the present discourse. (Tl) He explicitly excludes from these perceptions those which arise from the sight and touch, as well as the immediate pleasure or uneasiness his discourse may excite in us. The perceptions which are thus excluded are sensations and emotions, the impressions he has just distinguished. The only candidate left for ideas would seem to be what this discourse says, our thoughts about it, my understanding of what it says. The distinction is not one Hume thinks is difficult to follow: Every one of himself will readily perceive the difference betwixt feeling and thinking. (Tl-2) Last week I was sad, today I recall that feeling of sadness/ the difference between being sad and remembering that I was sad. Hume gives a different example: the perceptions formed when... (shrink)

Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We have not used OCR(Optical Character Recognition), as this leads to bad quality books with introduced typos. (2) In books where there are images such as portraits, maps, sketches etc We have endeavoured to keep the quality of these images, so they represent accurately the original artefact. Although occasionally there may be certain imperfections with these old texts, we feel they deserve to be made available for future generations to enjoy.

This paper shows that the history of clinical medicine in the eighteenth century supports Paul Hoyningen-Huene’s thesis that there is a correlation between science and systematicity. For example, James Jurin’s assessment of the safety of variolation as a protection against smallpox adopted a systematic approach to the assessment of interventions in order to eliminate sources of cognitive bias that would compromise inquiry. Clinical medicine thereby became a science. I use this confirming instance to motivate a broader hypothesis, that systematicity is (...) a distinctive feature of science because systematicity is required by processes of knowledge generation that go beyond our everyday cognitive capacities, and these processes are required to produce knowledge of the kinds that science aims at. (shrink)

The percentage of female entrepreneurs is far below the level of males, although it has increased over the past several years. Based on the theory of planned behavior, the purpose of this article is to specify a model in which the relationship among entrepreneurial potential, gender and entrepreneurial intention are explored, by analyzing how perceived behavioral control (PBC) and perceived entrepreneurial skills, as exogenous variables, affect expression of intention for business, and how these are mediated by their entrepreneurial motivations and (...) risk taking propensity. Control variables where also included in this model, such as necessity-driven motives for business, in order to observe whether these are an influential factor. An implementation of Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was used to analyze data collected from 677 students. Variables within the model were compared by gender using t-Test, and all multivariate analysis were done by each one separately as well in order to better gauge their perceptions. Results showed that mean differences between males and females are not abundant, and come only from intentions, PBC and subjective norm, which are higher in males; and motives for business higher in females. Multivariate analysis shows gender differences at the mediation level and that necessity-driven motives are an influencing factor, more so in males, and it hampers the significance of subjective norm. Finally, the theoretical and practical implications of the results within the framework of entrepreneurship in Spain and future alternatives to improve the entrepreneurial potential are discussed. (shrink)

Peter Lipton argues that inference to the best explanation involves the selection of a hypothesis on the basis of its loveliness. I argue that in optimal cases of IBE we may be able to eliminate all but one of the hypotheses. In such cases we have a form of eliminative induction takes place, which I call ‘Holmesian inference’. I argue that Lipton’s example in which Ignaz Semmelweis identified a cause of puerperal fever better illustrates Holmesian inference than Liptonian IBE. I (...) consider in detail the conditions under which Holmesian inference is possible and conclude by considering the epistemological relations between Holmesian inference and Liptonian IBE.Keywords: Inference to the best explanation; Peter Lipton; Abduction; Holmesian inference; Eliminative induction. (shrink)

A collection of essays by Alexander Rosenberg, the distinguished philosopher of science. The essays cover three broad areas related to Darwinian thought and naturalism: the first deals with the solution of philosophical problems such as reductionism, the second with the development of social theories, and the third with the intersection of evolutionary biology with economics, political philosophy, and public policy. Specific papers deal with naturalistic epistemology, the limits of reductionism, the biological justification of ethics, the so-called 'trolley problem' in (...) moral philosophy, the political philosophy of biological endowments, and the Human Genome Project and its implications for policy. Rosenberg's important writings on a variety of issues are here organized into a coherent philosophical framework which promises to be a significant and controversial contribution to scholarship in many areas. (shrink)

This paper draws a correlation between the experience of consumerism portrayed in the critique of Alexander and Baudrillard and in the theory of plenitude derived from Renaissance literature. It draws parallels between features of the modern and antique sensibilities. It suggests that the e-commerce practitioner manipulates a modern economy informed by a cosmology which depicts imagery capable of interpretation in terms of conceptions derived from archaic themes. These are drawn from the High Renaissance and relate to Neoplatonism which is (...) in turn linked to Renaissance occult philosophy. Ecommerce metaphors display these aspects; and thereby both hook into, and valorise — rendering liminal — the experiential dimension of the consumer, and its incipient tensions between desire anticipated and that achieved. The article suggests how the populist magic of consumerism is not only facilitated by e-commerce but how that magic arose at a pre-modern, intellectualist level. From a philosophical perspective, readers will note the inter-relationship of earlier bodies of thought to contemporary management theories of e-commerce. Academics or practitioners interested in e-commerce or e-business are offered a fresh and radical interpretative perspective on these areas, which expresses a novel role for metaphor in terms of linking features of pre-modern and modern conceptions of reality, aslant the subjective absorption of figurative images of a textual derivation. (shrink)

In this volume his object is to fully examine his friend's writings and characters and draws upon his own personal recollections to do so.

There is a growing body of literature on whether or not online hate speech, or cyberhate, might be special compared to offline hate speech. This article aims to both critique and augment that literature by emphasising a distinctive feature of the Internet and of cyberhate that, unlike other features, such as ease of access, size of audience, and anonymity, is often overlooked: namely, instantaneousness. This article also asks whether there is anything special about online (as compared to offline) hate speech (...) that might warrant governments and intergovernmental organisations contracting out, so to speak, the responsibility for tackling online hate speech to the very Internet companies which provide the websites and services that hate speakers utilise. (shrink)

This essay aims to articulate why the Orthodox have historically, and to the present, opposed cremation. Its primary line of argument is that inhumation is a site of “theophanic encounter”: a manifestation of the Glory of God. This theophanic quality is borne out in the scriptures and the Church’s liturgical experience. In particular, the connections between the funeral service and the entombed Christ on Holy Friday and Saturday properly situate the meaning of the post-mortem body. This intimate connection between the (...) deceased and their body is clear in Orthodoxy’s “hylomorphism,” the soul-body unity, which champions the eschatology of resurrection. Finally, all of the above is concretely experienced in the cult of the saints and their relics, which become vehicles for the divine energies: a theophany of Christ’s ongoing conquest of sin and death. Thus, cremation can only be viewed as a tragic misunderstanding of the dual meaning of “doxa” in Orthodoxy: right-belief and right-glory. (shrink)

In this paper I outline my conception of the epistemology of science, by reference to my published papers, showing how the ideas presented there fit together. In particular I discuss the aim of science, scientific progress, the nature of scientific evidence, the failings of empiricism, inference to the best (or only) explanation, and Kuhnian psychology of discovery. Throughout, I emphasize the significance of the concept of scientific knowledge.

Let us call a property that is essentially dispositional a potency.1 David Armstrong thinks that potencies do not exist. All sparse properties are essentially categorical, where sparse properties are the explanatory properties of the type science seeks to discover. An alternative view, but not the only one, is that all sparse properties are potencies or supervene upon them. In this paper I shall consider the differences between these views, in particular the objections Armstrong raises against potencies.

Ame, vie, souffle, qui saurait bien les distinguer exactement?1like heartburn, a pronounced discomfort with the very idea of consciousness followed the early days of experimental psychology. Received wisdom has it that psychologists came to mistrust consciousness for largely behaviorist reasons—they are supposed to have worried about the alleged impossibility of performing quantifiable, repeatable measurements on an essentially private phenomenon.2 But this is a historical distortion, one that obscures some interesting and earlier philosophical concerns about the scientific study of consciousness.Behaviorists rejected (...) the scientific respectability of consciousness, to be sure. But by the... (shrink)

Volume 20, Issue 6, June 2020, Page 30-32.