Throughout his literary career Walker Percy read and studied the philosophical thought of Charles Sanders Peirce in an attempt to re-present in language the world as Percy knew it. Beginning in 1984 and ending in 1990, the year of his death, Percy corresponded with Kenneth Laine Ketner about the "semiotic" of Peirce. Their letters - honest, instructive, and often filled with down-home humor - record an epistolary friendship of two men both passionately interested in Peirce's theory of (...) signs. This volume of letters provides a rich philosophical perspective for better understanding the fiction and nonfiction of Walker Percy. (shrink)

What is the real significance of covariance anyway, and why should it be regarded as so fundamental ? What we mean by a covariant expression is one whose ...

Women philosophers have not received their due in the discipline's reference works. Kersey's international biographical dictionary of women philosophers from ancient times up until the present redresses that situation.... This very capably fills a very evident gap in the philosophy reference corpus. Wilson Library Bulletin This work developed from Kersey's discovery that there existed no biographical dictionaries of women philosophers, and few references to women in textbooks on the history of philosophy. Intended to fill that void, this source book covers (...) more than 170 women born before 1920 who wrote about or pondered questions of Western intellectual life. Using broad criteria, Kersey has included any woman who conducted serious work in the traditional fields of philosophy, including metaphysics, ethics, aesthetics, or logic. Although acknowledging that the field has been dominated by men, the author excluded feminist scholars on the grounds that they have been given serious attention elsewhere, and also omitted women theologians or devotional writers. The volume includes extensive bibliographies of both primary and secondary works about each philosopher. An in-depth introduction establishes the context for the reference, and an appendix provides charts showing women philosophers by century, nationality, and discipline. An index of names completes the source book. This reference will be an important addition to university and public libraries, and a valuable reference for courses in philosophy and women's studies. (shrink)

In this new five-minute collection, kids will read twelve heart-warming true stories about animals that have been rescued from tough situations. The stories range from handicapped pets given a loving home to exotic wild animals rescued by caring humans with some help from special wildlife sanctuaries. Perfect as an introduction to nonfiction, young readers will learn simple facts about animals and their behaviors.

The exploration of personal identity and theories of narrative in Narrative Identity and Personal Responsibility is extraordinarily suggestive, resulting in implications for theories of action as well as ethics and psychology. Taking seriously the thought that we mediate our relations with the world by means of self-defining narratives grounded in the natural phenomenon of desire provides new answers to old puzzles of what it means to be human.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain (...) in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

As Raymond Martin noted, historians can make objective judgments about relative causal importance. He constructs a philosophical statement showing that counterfactuals enable us to assess relative causal importance. To justify the counterfactual statement itself, historians usually intuitively try to find for a comparison some other real situation which is in some important respect similar to the possible situation reflected in the counterfactual claim. The question then becomes, "How do we know that the actual historical situation, the counterfactual situations, and the (...) real comparison situations are similar in relevant aspects?" As Martin did, we must look at real cases of historical thinking to make a philosophical statement, which in turn leads to a new set of questions and so on. At some stage a statement that gives substantial support to the Marxist claim that history is a scientifically analyzable, law-governed process will be reached. (shrink)

Cyril Scott once described Percy Grainger as a `lovable eccentric'. The Australian-American pianist, composer, ethnologist, and aspiring `all-round man' was, however, more eccentric to his own age than to ours. His views on the environment, food, the body, participatory democracy, and sex all anticipated by several decades views more typical of the mid-late twentieth century. Prolific as a composer, performer, and recording artist, Grainger was an indefatigable writer. This selection of forty-six essays about the production, promotion, and propagation of (...) music is drawn from his over 150 public writings. Written between the turn of the century and the early 1950s, these essays reveal Grainger's youthful compositional plans, his ideas about piano technique, and his enduring high regard for the music of Edvard Grieg, Frederick Delius, and `Frankfurt Group' colleagues Cyril Scott, Roger Quilter, and Henry Balfour Gardiner. Grainger on Music also pursues his evolving thoughts about Nordic music, `Free Music', instrumental usage, and his occasional suggestions for musical development in Australia and the United States. (shrink)

The “Slicing Problem” is a thought experiment that raises questions for substrate-neutral computational theories of consciousness, including those that specify a certain causal structure for the computation like Integrated Information Theory. The thought experiment uses water-based logic gates to construct a computer in a way that permits cleanly slicing each gate and connection in half, creating two identical computers each instantiating the same computation. The slicing can be reversed and repeated via an on/off switch, without changing the amount of matter (...) in the system. The question is what do different computational theories of consciousness believe is happening to the number and nature of individual conscious units as this switch is toggled. Under a token interpretation, there are now two discrete conscious entities; under a type interpretation, there may remain only one. Both interpretations lead to different implications depending on the adopted theoretical stance. Any route taken either allows mechanisms for “consciousness-multiplying exploits” or requires ambiguous boundaries between conscious entities, raising philosophical and ethical questions for theorists to consider. We discuss resolutions under different theories of consciousness for those unwilling to accept consciousness-multiplying exploits. In particular, we specify three features that may help promising physicalist theories to navigate such thought experiments. (shrink)

O objetivo do artigo é examinar o argumento cartesiano em favor da distinção corpo/alma à luz da tese, também cartesiana, da união corpo/alma no homem. A hipótese a ser defendida é a de que a prova da distinção real entre corpo e alma envolve um conceito de substância segundo o qual um atributo principal não pode coexistir com outro numa mesma substância. Mais ainda, será sustentado que interpretando assim o argumento em favor da distinção é possível admitir que Descartes ao (...) provar a união entre essas duas substâncias distintas não abandona nem enfraquece sua tese dualista. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in (...) the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain (...) in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article: Philosophy in Medicine: Conceptual and Ethical Problems in Medicine and Psychiatry. By Charles M. Culver and Bernard Gert. Psychiatric Ethics. Edited by Sidney Block and Paul Chodoff. Man, Mind, and Morality: The Ethics of Behavior Control. By Ruth Macklin.

O objetivo desse artigo é examinar o conceito de falsidade material das idéias introduzido por Descartes na Terceira Meditação das Meditações Metafísicas. A hipótese a ser defendida é a de que o que determina a falsidade material das idéias é o fato destas envolverem uma contradição em seu conteúdo representativo. Isto é, no lugar da interpretação tradicional segundo a qual o que caracteriza as idéias materialmente falsas é o fato destas envolvem um erro categorial ao exibirem modos da alma como (...) se fossem modos da extensão , será argumentado que o que caracteriza certas idéias como materialmente falsas é o fato delas pretenderem exibir algo que ao mesmo tempo é um modo da alma e um modo da extensão , isto é, algo que é modo de duas substâncias distintas que, por conseguinte, se excluem, engendrando assim uma contradição. (shrink)

Gender scholars argued that gendered organizations theory needs updating as organizational logic has shifted amid neoliberal workplace transformations. This qualitative case study of a high-tech firm reveals how features of the traditional work logic remain resilient. I analyze the gendered implications of a high-tech startup restructuring and going public, finding the flexible organization to bureaucratize, implementing specialized jobs and a hierarchy with standardized career ladders. Going public creates conflicting gendered logics that place women at a structural disadvantage, relegating them to (...) low-status, narrow jobs while simultaneously demanding masculine ideal worker norms of visibility and self-promotion. Despite networking, women experience job insecurity and a glass ceiling, while men are assumed ideal workers and advance. By tracing one high-tech firm’s restructuring from a startup to public company, I demonstrate how the collision of new and traditional workplace logics perpetuates gender inequalities. (shrink)

The aim of this study was to explore experiences of participation in treatment planning decisions from the perspective of patients recently treated for colorectal cancer. Ten patients were purposively selected and interviewed. Constant comparative analysis, the core concept of grounded theory, was used. The dimensions were developed and organized into the main theme of ‘compliant participation in serious decisions’, which was composed of the two variations: complying with participation; and complying without participation. Complying with participation was characterized by feelings of (...) self-confidence and self-competence and by open dialogue between the participants, significant others and the physician. Complying without participation was characterized by participants’ feelings of uncertainty and distress, and of being rushed into submitting to decisions without having time to reflect on the information provided or the opportunity to influence the treatment and care process. To participate (or choosing not to participate) builds on open and affirming dialogue, information and knowledge about the illness. Patient participation in treatment and care decision making is interpreted as a health promoting way of coping with illness. (shrink)

In 1971, John Rawls published A Theory of Justice, the burden of which was strongly egalitarian. But Rawls eventually came to the conclusion that the project of working out a stable, well‐ordered society as argued in A Theory of Justice had failed. In 1993, in Political Liberalism, Rawls sought to establish a sounder theoretical foundation for a stable, well‐ordered society. Rawls was widely viewed, however, as having given up egalitarianism in Political Liberalism ‐ the commitment to a fair distribution, or (...) ‘justice as fairness’, along lines originally developed in A Theory of Justice. I argue, by contrast, that Political Liberalism does not in fact repudiate the egalitarianism of A Theory of Justice. Political liberalism has many variants, including variant conceptions of justice. In the first part of what follows, the question is raised whether political liberalism can defend a conception of justice that is as egalitarian as ‘justice as fairness’. Such a conception would guarantee the fair value of political liberties and would also contain the so‐called ‘difference principal’, which states that social and economic inequalities are to be adjusted so that they are to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged. Although it seems possible to defend such an egalitarian conception of justice, it does not seem necessary, all the same, that all variants of political liberalism should be as egalitarian as justice as fairness. Thus, in the second part of my argument, I seek to overturn, or at least substantially to qualify, the idea that there is no need for political liberalism to be strongly egalitarian. I conclude that the egalitarian credentials of political liberalism have to be bolstered, even more so than Rawls himself seems to think. (shrink)

Présentation:L’année 2015 marque le dixième anniversaire de la mort de Raymond Klibansky, philosophe et historien des idées canadien. La revueDialoguelui rend hommage en publiant le texte qui suit de Mme Ethel Groffier, veuve de Raymond Klibansky et chercheure émérite au Centre de recherche Paul-André Crépeau en droit privé et comparé de l’Université McGill. Dans cette intervention, Mme Groffier rappelle l’importance de l’engagement dans la vie et l’œuvre de ce remarquable philosophe.Né en France au mois d’octobre 1905 dans une famille (...) allemande, éduqué en Allemagne à partir de la Première guerre, exilé en Angleterre en 1933, Raymond Klibansky s’installa à Montréal dès 1946, à l’invitation de l’Université McGill. Sa carrière académique au Canada et à l’étranger fut admirable et reconnue par de nombreux hommages. Il laisse derrière lui une œuvre imposante, tant en philosophie qu’en histoire des idées modernes; parmi ces idées, il s’attacha particulièrement à la tolérance et à la liberté, qui inspirèrent toute sa vie.Luc LangloisPresentation:The year 2015 marked the 10thanniversary of Raymond Klibansky’s death. As a tribute to this prominent Canadian philosopher and historian of ideas,Dialogueis proud to publish the following intervention by Ethel Groffier, Raymond Klibansky’s widow and Emeritus scholar at McGill University’s Paul-André Crépeau Centre for Private and Comparative Law. Groffier reminds us of the importance of engagement—understood in the strong, philosophical sense—in this philosopher’s life and works.Born in France in October 1905 to a German family, raised in Germany from World War I to 1933, and then forced to move to the United Kingdom, Klibansky settled in Montreal in 1946 following an invitation from McGill University. His academic career in Canada and abroad is admirable and has been acclaimed on numerous occasions. He left behind an impressive body of work in philosophy and in the history of modern ideas; among these ideas, freedom and tolerance inspired his entire life.Luc Langlois. (shrink)

The stream of human consciousness appears to be interruptible, in that we can experience a sensation of ‘returning to ourselves after an absence of content’ (e.g. sleep, anaesthesia, full-absorption meditation). Prima facie, such evidence poses a challenge to simple applications of theories of consciousness based on electromagnetic or neural activity in the brain, because some of this activity persists during periods of interruption. This paper elaborates one of several possible responses to the challenge. We build on a previous theory in (...) which EM field topology delineates complex macrophenomenal experience. We first apply an analytic lens to identify different ways in which field topologies might generate sensations of ‘absence of content’. We then test the feasibility of a particular phenomenological approach for assessing those field topologies, powered by the unusual lucidity about cessation pathways induced via certain meditation practices and psychedelic dosages. We build computational simulations of these cessation pathways and test them on eight interviewees with various levels of experience in cessation states. We conclude that this approach can generate usable insight, but requires further formalisation to fulfil its potential. The findings tentatively support our claims but the theory remains speculative at this stage. We set out empirical tests with 11 specific predictions, both for further phenomenological research and for brain manipulation research. Although they align neatly, our ontological and cessation theories can also be separated. The paper describes how our theories can be consistent with other perspectives on consciousness, such as variants of predictive processing or global network theory. (shrink)