In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Hume Studies Volume XXII, Number 1, April 1996, pp. 193-202 Why Hume Wasn't an Atheist: A Reply to Andre BERYL LOGAN In a recent issue of Hume Studies,1 Shane Andre argues that, as Hume's position on theism can be read primarily from Philo's position in the Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, and since Philo's position in the Dialogues is one of "limited theism," Hume was also a "limited theist" (...) and therefore not an atheist. According to Andre, a "limited theist" is one like Epicurus, "who denied, not that the Gods exist, but that they intervene in human affairs" and, he continues, "...at least in philosophical circles, the term 'atheist' is generally restricted to people who disbelieve any form of theism, and this is the sense in which I propose to enquire whether Hume was an atheist" (142). Andre's claim then is that Hume is not an atheist in this latter sense, but is a limited theist in the former sense. This is shown in "three major objections to standard theism" in the Dialogues: those addressing the Argument from Design and the problem of evil, as well as the lack of debate on whether or not God exists. Philo's criticisms of the Argument from Design amount to the claim that, "not that there is no God, but that, if there is a God," empirical evidence cannot show that God has any of the traditional characteristics of wisdom, power or goodness. The "proper conclusion" of Philo's argument from evil does not concern God's existence, but establishes that God is "limited in some important respect." Philo's "limited theism" is expressed in his ambivalent attitude toward Cleanthes' Argument from Design in Part 12 ("that the cause or causes of order in the universe probably bear some remote analogy to human Beryl Logan is at the Department of Philosophy, Scarborough College, University of Toronto, 1265 Military Trail, Scarborough, Ontario MlC 1A4, Canada, email: logan@lake.'scar.utoronto.ca 194 Beryl Logan intelligence"). In sum, Philo and Cleanthes never debate God's existence, and they accept a limited Deity, therefore they hold positions of limited theism, therefore Philo is not an atheist. While I agree with Andre's conclusion that Hume is not an atheist, I will show in this paper first, that the interpretation which provides his means for arriving at this conclusion is not consistent with the text and faces a number of difficulties, and second, that the sense in which Hume is a limited theist has to do with the limitations of human reason and experience, and not with God's limited nature. My criticisms of Andre's position will be directed at three points in his argument: (1) his claim for Philo's theism based on Philo's lack of scepticism about God's existence; (2) what he regards to be the "proper conclusion" (153) to the problem of evil, as this directly influences his view of Philo's scepticism and the nature of the Deity; and (3) his view that Philo's theism is to be found in his acceptance of the Argument from Design (Philo's limited theism). My arguments will centre upon the "suspense of judgement," and where and how this.mental stance is used by Hume in the arguments of the Dialogues.2 Scepticism about God's Existence Andre claims that the arguments in the Dialogues are directed only to God's nature and do not address God's existence in spite of the fact that Cleanthes concludes his Argument from Design by claiming that the data in the world provide conclusive analogical support for the existence and (human-like) intelligence of the (traditional) Deity.3 Cleanthes' anthropomorphic Argument from Design purports to "prove" that the world has an intelligent divine designer just like machines have intelligent human designers and the only difference between the causes based on the effects is one of degree and not one of kind: the designer of the world is far grander than the designer of a computer because the world is more complex than a computer. I would urge, though, that Philo's scepticism is directed at both aspects of the Argument... (shrink)

Within capitalist modernity, `children' and `culture' were ideologically positioned as `sacred' in opposition to the `profane' sphere of commerce and industry. In the last quarter of the 20th century, this romantic construction of childhood as a time of enchantment was appropriated by the `children's culture industry' and re-inscribed as a marketing strategy. Capitalist childhood was reconstituted as a time of consumption. In invoking the myth of the `sacred child', however, capital also elicits ambivalence about the `profanity' of commercial intrusion into (...) the domain of childhood. Similarly, the narratives of `good' versus `evil' through which children's culture is organized can be deployed in opposition to the conditions under which global capital produces children's consumer goods. While the cultural tension surrounding the commercialization of childhood has diminished as money itself takes on the aura of the `sacred', the residual power of romantic mythology creates potential for critical engagement on the terrain of capitalist childhood. (shrink)

Alexander’s call for a cultural sociology that goes beyond hermeneutic reading to an understanding of how cultural texts are instantiated in action is considered in relation to earlier attempts to establish a tradition of symbolic analysis in American sociology. The sociological provenance of the dramaturgical model that Alexander appropriates from performance studies serves to underline the precariousness of cultural sociology as a project within the American academy. Alexander’s thesis on the critical importance of ‘refusion’ to the life of societies is (...) endorsed, as is his argument that the specificity of ‘post-traditional’ societies cannot be elided by drawing directly on conceptual tools developed in analysis of ritual in ‘traditional’ societies. His argument for sociological agnosticism in relation to the moral qualities of symbolic action, on the other hand, is called into question. (shrink)

Writing Gender History. By Laura Lee Downs.

An account of successive legal theories in England and America against a background of the varieties of natural law in the ancient, medieval and modern worlds. The outcome in Legal Realism provides insight into contemporary issues in law and the judicial process and their relation to moral philosophy. As Levy shows, legal theory has always been inspired by forces outside the law in philosophy and politics. In England the philosophy of Utilitarianism as expounded by Bentham and Austin brought legal positivism (...) into prominence as an alternative to natural law. In the United States the philosophy of pragmatism spearheaded by James and Dewey and shared by Justice Holmes gave the functional turn resulting in the movement of Legal Realism. After sketching the background of varieties of natural law in the ancient, medieval, and modern worlds, Levy presents leading figures and trends in England and the United States. The book is written so as to be intelligible to lawyers, philosophers, and students of cultural history and social science. (shrink)

The Collected Papers of Bertrand Russell, Volume 15 assembles Russell's writings on his experiences of visiting and reflecting on Russia and China. Having emerged from the Great War determined to prevent another armed conflict, Russell became a champion of international socialism as the antidote to the destructive forces of nationalism and capitalism. His quest for international reconstruction led to two enduring experiences, his trip first to Bolshevik Russia in 1920 and then to divided China in 1920-21. These letters describe those (...) experiences which confirmed his emergence as a popular commentator on contemporary political issues. The volume includes two unpublished papers on Russell's trip to Russia. (shrink)

In this paper, I will focus on two sections of otherwise extensively studied Humean texts that have received little or no attention in the scholarly literature. A substantial part of Part 12 of the Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion and Section XI of An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding—also written in dialogue form—are concerned with similar doctrines: that the prospect of a future state, or afterlife, acts as the motivating influence on our earthly moral behaviour.

This collection of seminal essays on the _Prolegomena_ provides the student of philosophy with an invaluable overview of the issues and problems raised by Kant. Starting with the Carus translation of Kant's work, the edition offers a substantive new introduction, six papers never before published together and a comprehensive bibliography. Special attention is paid to the relationship between Kant and David Hume, whose philosophical investigations, according to Kant's famous quote, first interrupted Kant's 'dogmatic slumber'.

Very little scholarly attention has been devoted to Part 1 of Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion. This lack has been addressed recently by Tweyman, who argues for the importance of this part in understanding the positions defended by the characters in the remainder of the dialogue, in accordance with the types that Hume discusses in part 12 of the Enquiry concerning Human Understanding—Cleanthes is a philosophical dogmatist who requires the application of excessive skepticism by Philo to turn to the approved (...) position of mitigated skepticism, while Demea is and remains a religious dogmatist. In the present paper I will address the question of why the Dialogues continues beyond Part 1 in the face of the statement by Philo, who is generally considered to be Hume's spokesperson in the dialogue, that the inquiry being undertaken—the investigation into the nature of the Deity—is beyond human reason. (shrink)

A choice set for a computable linear ordering is a set which contains one element from each maximal block of the ordering. We obtain a partial characterization of the computable linear order-types for which each computable model has a computable choice set, and a full characterization in the relativized case; Every model of the linear order-type α of degree ≤ d has a choice set of degree ≤ d iff α can written as a finite sum of order-types, each of (...) which either has finitely many blocks, or has order-type n · η for some integer n. (shrink)

The complexity of aII 4 set of natural numbers is encoded into a linear order to show that the finite condensation of a recursive linear order can beII 2–II 1. A priority argument establishes the same result, and is extended to a complete classification of finite condensations iterated finitely many times.

During the First World War, Bertrand Russell was political commentator for _The Tribunal_, the official weekly publication of the No-Conscription Fellowship, of which Russell was Action Chairman. This volume contains many short papers from that period, which reflect Russell's immediate reponses to developments in the conflict. These documents bear witness to Russell's growing commitment to pacifism, and reveal the development of the patterns of political argument, rhetoric and activism which were to characterise his work throughout his life.