Charles Mills makes visible in the world of mainstream philosophy some of the crucial issues of the black experience.

Foundations of the theory of signs.--Signs, language, and behavior.--Five semiotical studies.

In few cases among modern religious ethicists are the contemporary issues concerning the problem of norms and of criteria more intriguingly brought to the fore than in the ethics of Martin Buber.

The study of the relationship between culture and mind is cognitive anthropology. Its primary objects of study are knowledge and thinking, mostly as these appear in naturally occurring settings. Cognitive anthropology's main contribution has been to show that there are important cultural differences in perception, memory, and inference. Recently, the field has begun to consider emotions and their power to motivate cognition, historically among the most neglected subjects in cognitive science. This is leading to an interesting rapprochement with psychoanalysis and (...) to the partial eclipse of information processing models and their computer analogs. (shrink)

Kegley argues that the greatest obstacle to the creation of a mechanism for multilateral peacekeeping is an absence of a moral consensus in a world where the nature of rapidly changing threats to global peace make it difficult to share a common vision.

This previously-unpublished essay by the late Charles W. Mills (1951–2021) seeks to demonstrate the racially-structured character of the universe created by J. R. R. Tolkien in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Written long before the popular film series, the essay critically examines Tolkien's novels and comments on the nature of fictional creation. Mills argues that Tolkien designs a racial hierarchy in the novels that recapitulates the central racist myth of European thought.

“Paradise Well Lost” offers a description and criticism of communitarian claims that in contemporary liberal society the self is in sad shape, that liberal society is out of harmony with the needs of the self, and that such a society makes the good life nearly impossible to achieve. It is argued that communitarian thought is driven by a false and deluded nostalgia for a self-world unity that never was andnever can be, that human consciousness prohibits the neatly unified communialization of (...) self and world that seems desired by much communitarian thinking. A final argument claims that there are nontrivial connections between the communitarian desire for self-world unity, and the twentieth-century emergence of totalitarian society--connections about which it is wise to be worried. (shrink)

The ongoing pursuit of tacit knowledge Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-5 DOI 10.1007/s11016-010-9500-6 Authors Charles W. Smith, Department of Sociology, Queens College, CUNY, 65-30 Kissena Boulevard, Flushing, NY 11367, USA Journal Metascience Online ISSN 1467-9981 Print ISSN 0815-0796.

For several decades, Dr. Morris has worked primarily with twoproblems: the development of a general theory of signs, and thedevelopment of a general theory of value. He approached both problemsin terms of George Mead's theory of action or behavior. This bookbrings together these two lines of development. For several decades, Dr. Morris has worked primarily with two problems: the development of a general theory of signs, and the development of a general theory of value. He approached both problems in terms (...) of George Mead's theory of action or behavior. This book brings together these two lines of development. In many languages there is a term like the English "meaning" which has two poles: that which something signifies and the value or significance of what is signified. The nature of signification and significance, as well as their relations within human behavior, is the subject matter of this book. This book is addressed to philosophers and to students of the behavioral sciences, but it will also appeal to anyone seriously interested in the study of human communication. (shrink)

There is little evidence to support any estimate of the sizes and number of the phratries in Classical Attica. According to the author of the Aristotelian Athenaion Politeia, there were four tribes, 12 phratries and 360 gene, corresponding respectively to the seasons, months and days of the year. Most older discussions of the tribal organization of Attica were based on this passage. More recently, however, scholars have come to agree that this information is too schematic to be historical, and in (...) any event was not intended to describe the constitution of Attica in the Classical period. Currently, in spite of this passage, many contend that there were probably numerous phratries in Classical Attica , which varied greatly in size. (shrink)

The assessment of student learning is widely regarded with suspicion. Philosophers in particular have been reluctant to take this practice seriously. The essay reviews an ongoing effort to assess the development of philosophical dispositions among undergraduate students at a religiously affiliated liberal arts college. The procedure used in this effort as well as the results obtained so far strongly suggest that the deep learning valued most highly by philosophy teachers can be measured without harm to the teaching enterprise. The essay (...) argues that in light of a current cultural climate that fails to recognize the value of our enterprise, philosophers would be well advised to clearly define our particular learning goals, develop our own instruments, and to exercise more initiative in assessing our students learning. (shrink)

This essay tries to develop a “black radical Kantianism”—that is, a Kantianism informed by the black experience in modernity. After looking briefly at socialist and feminist appropriations of Kant, I argue that an analogous black radical appropriation should draw on the distinctive social ontology and view of the state associated with the black radical tradition. In ethics, this would mean working with a (color-conscious rather than colorblind) social ontology of white persons and black sub-persons and then asking what respect for (...) oneself and others would require under those circumstances. In political philosophy, it would mean framing the state as a Rassenstaat (a racial state) and then asking what measures of corrective justice would be necessary to bring about the ideal Rechtsstaat. (shrink)

Evolutionary biologists have suggested that human moral judgment is best understood as an emotionally mediated phenomenon. With few exceptions, philosophers have scorned these proposals. Recent research in moral psychology and social neuroscience indicates, though, that moral judgment is produced by the coordinated activity of multiple regions of the brain, and consists of both cognitive and affective processes. Evidence also suggests that different dimensions of moral judgment – the affective and cognitive processes, for instance – possess distinct evolutionary histories. Moral philosophers (...) will need to reconsider longstanding debates – such as those between Humeans and anti-Humeans, and between motivation internalists and externalists – in light of this evidence. Otherwise we run the risk of disciplinary irrelevance. (shrink)

Using Biblical quotes and his own personal beliefs, the author presents analysis and a critique on some of the contemporary viewpoints presented to the public by the popular media, educational leaders, scientists, and politicians.