In the growing philosophical literature on the family and its value, the parents' fiduciary role often serves to explain why the family is valuable from a child-centred perspective. Recently it has been further argued that this fiduciary role also explains the distinctive value the family has for parents. By offering a critique of that argument, the paper advances an alternative parent-centred account of the value of the family. It points out the process in families whereby parents reproduce some of their (...) characteristics in their children and thereby establish a powerful sense of interconnectedness and continuity between their own identity and the child's. The fact that the family provides quite a unique platform for developing this type of interpersonal bond may account for the striking importance ascribed to families. Liberal theory should accommodate this fact when offering an account of legitimate parental authority. (shrink)

Hegel's Science of Logic has received less attention than his Phenomenology of Spirit, but Hegel himself took it to be his highest philosophical achievement and the backbone of his system. The present book focuses on this most difficult of Hegel’s published works. Béatrice Longuenesse offers a close analysis of core issues, including discussions of what Hegel means by ‘dialectical logic’, the role and meaning of ‘contradiction’ in Hegel’s philosophy, and Hegel’s justification for the provocative statement that ‘what is actual (...) is rational, what is rational is actual’. She examines both Hegel's debt and his polemical reaction to Kant, and shows in great detail how his project of a ‘dialectical’ logic can be understood only in light of its relation to Kant’s ‘transcendental’ logic. This book will appeal to anyone interested in Hegel's philosophy and its influence on contemporary philosophical discussion. (shrink)

"Kant and the Capacity to Judge" will prove to be an important and influential event in Kant studies and in philosophy.

In response to Henry Allison's and Sally Sedwick's comments on my recent book, Kant and the Capacity to Judge, I explain Kant's description of the understanding as being essentially a "capacity to judge", and his view of the relationship between the categories and the logical functions of judgment. I defend my interpretation of Kant's argument in the Transcendental Deduction of the Categories in the B edition. I conclude that, in my interpretation, Kant's notions of the "a priori" and the "given" (...) are more complex and flexible than is generally perceived. Nevertheless, Kant maintains a strict distinction between receptivity and spontaneity, the "passive" and the "active" aspects of our representational capacities. This separates him from his German idealist successors, most notably Fichte and Hegel. Contrary to Sedgwick's and Allison's suggestions, I do not think that my interpretation tends to blur this distinction. (shrink)

This article presents the main results of a statistical survey carried out among disability advisors in the civil service in 2019. Through the many tasks they carry out, alone or in cooperation, disability advisors appear to be key players in the implementation of a policy of inclusion of people with disabilities in employment, which aims to go beyond the simple respect of quotas. However, these professionals express the need for better recognition of their function, in particular in terms of allocated (...) working time and access to training leading to a diploma. The survey shows that only one in four disability advisors is employed full-time in this function. Furthermore, although in nine out of ten cases, these professionals were already professionally integrated before taking on the role of disability adviser, three-quarters had never worked in the field of disability and only a minority had taken disability-related training. It is through practice, and in connection with networks, that the skills and the definition of the missions of a function called for to become more professional are built. (shrink)

I defend the view that aspect-perception – seeing as a duck, or a face as courageous – typically involves concept-application. Seemingly obvious, this is contested by Avner Baz: ‘aspects may not aptly be identified with, or in terms of, empirical concepts […]’ – In opposition, I claim that they may. Indeed, in many cases there is no other way to identify aspects.I review the development in Baz’s view, from his early criticism of Stephen Mulhall, to his recent recruitment of the (...) discussion about aspects to criticize John McDowell’s conceptualism, and his claim: ‘the dawning of Wittgensteinian aspects reveals our power to perceive unity and sense that are not aptly thought of as conceptual’.I accept many of Baz’s claims against Mulhall and McDowell. However, his arguments go too far. Aspect-perception, I argue, typically involves a special kind of application of concepts. Denying that is denying much of what is important and of interest in the phenomena of aspect. The world revealed in aspect-perception is not the conceptualized world of science; but it is also not the pre-conceptualized ‘phenomenal’ world which, according to Baz, we normally have in perception, and which he wants to bring into view. (shrink)

Surveys were conducted at two metta meditation retreats in order to examine the psychological effects of metta meditation. Participants were invited to complete the survey at the beginning of the retreat, at the end of the retreat, and two weeks after the end of the retreat. Participants completed the same scales at each time phase, which included measures of happiness, compassionate love, revenge and avoidance motivation, gratitude, and a depression, anxiety and stress scale. Significant increases were found in happiness and (...) compassionate love, reductions in avoidance and revenge, and reductions on the depression, anxiety and stress subscales. (shrink)

L’hypothèse développée dans cet article repose sur l’idée que les échanges électroniques sont davantage propices à la tension verbale en raison du contexte lui-même (interaction verbale asynchrone), dans la mesure où certains éléments (linguistiques et discursifs) se trouvent exacerbés du fait de l’absence d’autres éléments (prosodiques et mimogestuels) que permettent les communications en face à face. Nous étudions à partir de ce postulat en quoi et comment les échanges de courriels destinés à plusieurs personnes en contexte institutionnel favorisent la cristallisation (...) de la tension verbale et quels peuvent être ses impacts sur le devenir de l’interaction verbale asynchrone. Ce travail fait suite à un précédent (Fracchiolla et Romain, à paraître) portant sur le même corpus et à partir duquel nous avons développé l’idée d’un continuum allant de la politesse à l’impolitesse linguistique, en examinant spécifiquement les différentes formes observées. Le présent travail vise à rendre compte plus spécifiquement de la plus ou moins grande corrélation entre principe de (non) coopération et (non) cristallisation de la tension verbale. Notre corpus est constitué de courriels de type CC échangés entre universitaires. Il est étudié sous l’angle de l’analyse linguistique de la violence verbale (Auger et al., 2008 ; Fracchiolla et al. 2013), en tant que montée en tension contextualisée, advenant à travers différentes étapes. (shrink)

Heideggers Topologie des Seins kann als eine Chaos- und Emergenztheorie des Seins gelesen werden. Die einzelnen Topoi sind emergente Selbstkonstituierungen des ur-sprünglich fraktgenen Seinsgeschehens, der Physis, des Naturprozesses. Unsere Selbstgegebenheit, unsere Wirklichkeit und unsere Freiheit sind solche Konstituierungen und stehen nicht im Widerspruch zum Naturprozess, sondern werden von ihm getragen und ausgetragen. Das Seinsgeschehen ist zwar schon im Anfang fatal fraktal, aber kein blindes Geschick, kein blindes Fatum. Zum Fatum gehört die Autonomie als ein Aus-sich-selbst-für-sich-selbst-sein. Freiheit ist schon im Ur-Sprung (...) unser Verhängnis. Naturgesetz und Freiheit stehen sich nicht unversöhnlich gegenüber, doch das Fatum unserer Freiheit wurde uns wiederholt zum Verhängnis. Als Teil des ganzen großen Wirkgefüges können wir die Hoffnung hegen, auf Grund unseres immanenten Logos, der nur eine Selbstkonstituierung des >großen Logos. (shrink)

Le terme « totalitaire » est issu d’un réseau discursif indissociable d’actes meurtriers. D’où le sens donné à l’expression de « langage totalitaire » : un langage de coercition, lié à la violence, au meurtre et à la terreur. Les communications présentées à Cerisy-la-Salle tentent de caractériser un tel langage. Chercheurs en communication, en sciences du langage, en sociologie ou en littérature, philosophes et psychanalystes s’interrogent sur la tyrannie logique du discours de la terreur et les manipulations mortifères mises en (...) œuvre d’hier à aujourd’hui. Les analyses de Victor Klemperer sur le discours nazi et ses observations scrupuleuses sur les signes de ce régime sont une référence primordiale. Les diverses études montrent comment se met en place une logique d’assujettissement à partir du matériau signifiant et de sa mise en scène. L’interrogation porte enfin sur les formes de résistance à opposer à ce langage.The term « totalitarian » is a product of a discursive system that is inseparable from acts of murder, hence the meaning given to the expression « totalitarian language » as a language of coercion linked to violence, murder and terror. The papers given in Cerisy-la-Salle attempt to characterise this language, through the reflections of researchers in communication, language sciences, sociology and literature on the logical tyranny of the discourse of terror and its murderous manipulations, both past and present. Victor Klemperer’s analyses of Nazi discourse and his scrupulous observations on signifiers in the Nazi regime are references of paramount importance. The different studies show how the logic of subjection takes hold as it spreads from a body of signifying material and the representations given to it. Finally, the question is raised of forms of resistance to language of this kind. (shrink)

Critique of Violence is a highly original and lucid investigation of the heated controversy between poststructuralism and critical theory. Leading theorist Beatrice Hanssen uses Walter Benjamin's essay 'Critique of Violence' as a guide to analyse the contentious debate, shifting the emphasis from struggle to dialogue between the two parties. Regarding the questions of critique and violence as the major meeting points between both traditions, Hanssen positions herself between the two in an effort to investigate what critical theory and poststructuralism have (...) to offer each other. In the course of doing so, she assembles imaginative new readings of Benjamin, Arendt, Fanon and Foucault, and incisively explores the politics of recognition, the violence of language, and the future of feminist theory. This groundbreaking book will be essential reading for all students of continental philosophy, political theory, social studies and comparative literature. Also available in this series: Essays on Otherness Hb: 0-415-13107-3: £50.00 Pb: 0-415-13108-1: £15.99 Hegel After Derrida Hb: 0-415-17104-4: £50.00 Pb: 0-415-17105-9: £15.99 The Hypocritical Imagination Hb: 0-415-21361-4: £47.50 Pb: 0-415-21362-2: £15.99 Philosophy and Tragedy Hb: 0-415-19141-6: £45.00 Pb: 0-415-19142-4: £14.99 Textures of Light Hb: 0-415-14273-3: £42.50 Pb: 0-415-14274-1: £13.99 Very Little ... Almost Nothing Pb: 0-415-12821-8: £47.50 Pb: 0-415-12822-6: £15.99. (shrink)

Aspect-seeing, I claim, involves reflection on concepts. It involves letting oneself feel how it would be like to conceptualize something with a certain concept, without committing oneself to this conceptualization. I distinguish between two kinds of aspect-perception: -/- 1. Preparatory: allows us to develop, criticize, and shape concepts. It involves bringing a concept to an object for the purpose of examining what would be the best way to conceptualize it. -/- 2. Non-Preparatory: allows us to express the ingraspability of certain (...) experiences. It involves bringing a concept to an object for the purpose of showing—per impossible—what it would take to properly capture one’s experience. -/- I demonstrate the usefulness of the two kinds of aspect perception in making conceptual judgments, and in making moral and aesthetic judgments. (shrink)

This article characterizes aspect-perception as a distinct form of judgment in Kant's sense: a distinct way in which the mind contacts world and applies concepts. First, aspect-perception involves a mode of thinking about things apart from any established routine of conceptualizing them. It is thus a form of concept application that is essentially reflection about language. Second, this mode of reflection has an experiential, sometimes perceptual, element: in aspect-perception, that is, we experience meanings—bodies of norms. Third, aspect-perception can be “preparatory”: (...) it may help us to decide what linguistic norms to develop and how to conceptualize—make the world thinkable. Fourth, the article discusses the forms of justification for which aspect-perception allows—the necessity and normativity involved in employing this form of judgment. (shrink)

Le présent essai tente de tirer au clair les différentes significations des termes « conscient » et « conscience » dans la philosophie critique de Kant et en particulier dans la Critique de la raison pure. On considère d’abord les divers types de représentations et ce que veut dire Kant lorsqu’il les dit « avec » ou « sans » conscience. On considère ensuite le concept de conscience tel qu’il apparaît dans la Déduction transcendantale des catégories, où il ne réfère (...) pas à une qualité de représentations particulières, mais à une attitude active de l’esprit. Considérée dans son ensemble, la conception kantienne de la « conscience » mêle inséparablement un aspect que nous appelons, après T. Nagel, « conscience phénoménale », et un aspect proche de la « conscience d’accès » selon N. Block, dans lequel cependant la conscience de soi, exprimable par la proposition « Je pense », joue un rôle central. Cette combinaison fait de Kant un interlocuteur unique dans les débats contemporains sur la conscience et son rôle dans notre vie mentale, ainsi que sur l’IA et sa signification pour l’avenir de l’humanité. (shrink)

In France, the Kouchner law of 2002 has allowed for a rethinking of patients’ rights; as well, it introduced the notion of health democracy. For example, in oncology, advocacy groups for patients and ex-patients now provide support and information to patients, representation of patients in health care institutions and state agencies, education to caregivers, and opportunities for participation in research. In fact, such advocacy groups have been so impactful that some patients have gone on to work in the health care (...) system itself; it is this rise in professionalism that is of interest in this article, where we will discuss the first results of two ongoing research projects on the subject. (shrink)

Aesthetic investigations of computation are stuck in an impasse, caused by the difficulty of accounting for the ontological discrepancy between the continuity of sensation and the discreteness of digital technology. This article proposes a theoretical position intended to overcome that deadlock. It highlights how an ontological focus on continuity has entered media studies via readings of Deleuze, which attempt to build a ‘digital aisthesis’ (that is, a theory of digital sensation) by ascribing a ‘virtuality’ to computation. This underpins, in part, (...) the affective turn in digital theory. In contrast to such positions, this article argues for a reconceptualization of formal abstraction in computation, in order to find, within the discreteness of computational formalisms (and not via the coupling of the latter with virtual sensation), an indeterminacy that would make computing aesthetic qua inherently generative. This indeterminacy, it is argued here, can be found by reconsidering, philosophically, Turing’s notion of ‘incomputability’. (shrink)

This interview with M. Beatrice Fazi explores in detail her work on computation. Focusing in particular upon her recent publications, it covers the themes of contingency and indeterminacy. The questions explore Fazi’s perspectives on computational aesthetics, abstraction and experience. Through an interrogation of the conceptual insights that Fazi’s recent work offers, the interview outlines an agenda for future work in the philosophy of computation and sets forward a series of conceptual policies for seeing the digital, software and data in a (...) fresh light. (shrink)

Aristotle explicitly speaks of intelligible matter in three passages only, all from theMetaphysics, in the context of the analysis of definition as the formula that expresses the essence:Metaph.Z10, 1036 a8-11;Metaph.Z11, 1037 a5;Metaph.H6, 1045 a34-36 and 45 b1. In the case of the occurrences of Z10 and Z11, there is almost unanimous consensus that Aristotle uses the expression in a technical way, to indicate the matter of that particular type of objects that are intelligible compounds, of which mathematical objects are paradigmatic (...) instances. By contrast, there is no agreement on how to understand the expression in the case of H6. Here, ‘intelligible matter’ would denote, as stated by some interpreters, the generic element of the definition. The aim of this paper is to show that ὕλη νοητή has the same technical meaning in all the three explicit occurrences in theMetaphisics. Contrary to the interpretation that there is a shift in meaning from Z10-11 to H6, my goal is to illustrate that in both contexts, Aristotle uses the expression ‘intelligible matter’ to designate the matter of mathematical objects insofar as they are paradigmatic intelligible compounds. (shrink)

Analytic Philosophy, Volume 62, Issue 1, Page 70-83, March 2021.

Dans la philosophie antique, la φαντασία constitue une notion clé au croisement de la psychologie, de l’éthique et de l’esthétique. Deux diffi­cultés cependant surgissent pour qui veut étudier ce terme. C’est d’abord que, assez fréquent dans les textes grecs en tant que marqueur de chacun des systèmes philosophiques qui se sont succédé, il ne relève pas tou­jours de la puissance cognitive de l’âme ; c’est ensuite que le terme pose de redoutables problèmes de transferts, liés aussi bien à la s...