Thora Ilin Bayer - G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the History of Philosophy, 1825-26. Volume II: Greek Philosophy - Journal of the History of Philosophy 45:4 Journal of the History of Philosophy 45.4 664-665 Muse Search Journals This Journal Contents Reviewed by Thora Ilin Bayer Xavier University of Louisiana Robert F. Brown, editor and translator. G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the History of Philosophy, 1825–26. Volume II: Greek Philosophy. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2006. Pp. xiv + 375. (...) Cloth, $160.00. Hegel delivered his lectures on the history of philosophy nine times during his career, giving them for the first time in Winter 1805–06 in Jena prior to his publication of the Phenomenology of Spirit in 1807. He began to give them for a tenth time before his death in Berlin in 1831. Hegel.. (shrink)

ABSTRACT As bioethics emerged in the 1960s and 1970s and began to have enormous impacts on the practice of medicine and research – fuelled, by broad socio‐political changes that gave rise to the struggle of women, African Americans, gay men and lesbians, and the antiauthoritarian impulse that characterised the New Left in democratic capitalist societies – little attention was given to the question of the ethics of public health. This was all the more striking since the core values and practices (...) of public health, often entailing the subordination of the individual for the common good, seemed opposed to the ideological impulses of bioethics. Of what relevance is autonomy‐focused bioethics for public health, with its mix of justifications including those that are either implicitly or explicitly paternalistic or that seek to impose strictures on individuals and communities in the name of collective welfare? To examine the deep divide between the central commitments of bioethics and the values that animate the practice of public health, we focus on a series of controversies implicating the concepts of privacy, liberty, and paternalism. Recognising the role of moral values in decision‐making was a signal contribution of bioethics in its formative period. Over the past three decades a broad array of perspectives emerged under the rubric of bioethics but individualism remains central. As we commence the process of shaping an ethics of public health, it is clear that bioethics is the wrong place to start when thinking about the balances required in defence of the public's health. (shrink)

The current use of citation-based metrics to evaluate the research output of individual researchers is highly discriminatory because they are uniformly applied to authors of single-author articles as well as contributors of multi-author papers. In the latter case, these quantitative measures are counted, as if each contributor were the single author of the full article. In this way, each and every contributor is assigned the full impact-factor score and all the citations that the article has received. This has a multiplication (...) effect on each contributor's citation-based evaluative metrics of multi-author articles, because the more contributors an article has, the more undeserved credit is assigned to each of them. In this paper, I argue that this unfair system could be made fairer by requesting the contributors of multi-author articles to describe the nature of their contribution, and to assign a numerical value to their degree of relative contribution. In this way, we could create a contribution-specific index of each contributor for each citation metric. This would be a strong disincentive against honorary authorship and publication cartels, because it would transform the current win-win strategy of accepting honorary authors in the byline into a zero-sum game for each contributor. (shrink)

This paper invokes the conceptual framework of Bourdieu to analyse the mechanisms, which help to maintain inappropriate authorship practices and the functions these practices may serve. Bourdieu’s social theory with its emphasis on mechanisms of domination can be applied to the academic field, too, where competition is omnipresent, control mechanisms of authorship are loose, and the result of performance assessment can be a matter of symbolic life and death for the researchers. This results in a problem of game-theoretic nature, where (...) researchers’ behaviour will be determined more by the logic of competition, than by individual character or motives. From this follows that changing this practice requires institutionalized mechanisms, and change cannot be expected from simply appealing to researchers’ individual conscience. The article aims at showing that academic capital is translated into honorary authorship. With little control, undetected honorary authorship gives the appearance of possessing intellectual capital. In this way a dominant position is made to be seen as natural result of intellectual ability or scientific merit, which makes it more acceptable to those in dominated positions. The final conclusion of this paper is that undemocratic authorship decisions and authorship based performance assessment together are a form of symbolic violence. (shrink)

Moral Philosophy and Moral Education considers the interconnections of ethics, education, and the philosophy of culture as related to the human concern with self-knowledge. The individual self finds its inner life writ large in the forms of culture such as religion, art, and history. Such forms of cultural life represent and embody normative ideals that can provide the necessary content to shape the character and the conduct of civic life. Thora Ilin Bayer draws upon the ancient Greek view of (...) education as paideia and the conception of Bildung of the German idealist philosophers. These two ideas of education aim at the development of the whole person as distinct from training in a particular skill, subject matter, technique, or occupation. The education of the whole person aims at the production in the individual of a broad mental outlook harmoniously joined with a knowledge of the great perspectives and principles of human culture as it takes its various shapes within the history of humanity. Moral philosophy requires both culture and the individual as its terms of inquiry, and moral education requires a vision of how to have these two terms interact to form a whole. (shrink)

In the study of the history of philosophy, there is a long-standing question as to whether works produced between the mid-fourteenth century and the end of the sixteenth century, the Renaissance, can be rightly understood as philosophy or as primarily literary and rhetorical in character. The latter view is prominently held by Paul Oskar Kristeller but has precedent in Hegel’s treatment of this period in his History of Philosophy. That the works of major figures of this period are essentially philosophical (...) is a view held, in quite different ways, by Ernst Cassirer and Ernesto Grassi. This essay examines the origin and nature of these views and advances a general perspective through which they may be brought together. (shrink)

We relax the assumption that priors are common knowledge, in the standard model of games of incomplete information. We make the realistic assumption that the players are boundedly rational: they base their actions on finite-order belief hierarchies. When the different layers of beliefs are independent of each other, we can retain Harsányi's type-space, and we can define straightforward generalizations of Bayesian Nash Equilibrium and Rationalizability in our context. Since neither of these concepts is quite satisfactory, we propose a hybrid concept, (...) Mirage Equilibrium, providing us with a practical tool to work with inconsistent belief hierarchies. When the different layers of beliefs are correlated, we must enlarge the type-space to include the parametric beliefs. This presents us with the difficulty of the inherent openness of finite belief subspaces. Appealing to bounded rationality once more, we posit that the players believe that their opponent holds a belief hierarchy one layer shorter than they do and we provide alternative generalizations of BNE and Rationalizability. Finally, we show that, when beliefs are degenerate point beliefs, the definition of Mirage Equilibrium coincides with that of the generalized BNE. (shrink)

Chapter 1 Introduction How are participants associated with the eventualities they participate in? Are there events? Thematic roles? ...

Interpretations of Anselm's Proslogion range between the extremes of 'rationalism' and 'fideism' because of the challenge of unifying its philosophical and devotional aspects. In this book, Bayer argues that a 'monastic interpretation' - or an interpretation that takes seriously the intellectual significance of our existential commitments - offers a powerful compromise. Through an extensive study of Anselm's spiritualty, especially as it is manifested in his letters and homiletic works, coupled with a profound study of Anselm's philosophy of language in (...) the De grammatico and Monologion, Bayer aims to reveal the Anselmian unity of life and thought, and thereby also the harmony between faith and reason. In this way, he defends the Proslogion as a unified and probative argument. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Classification and Explanation in Aristotle’s Theory of DefinitionGreg Bayer1. introductiona problem lies at the heart of Aristotle’s theory of definition. On the one hand, Aristotle says in Topics VI.4 that “the one who defines well must define by means of genus1 and differentia” (141b25–7); indeed his view of definition most often seems to be confined to its role of picking out the definiendum by indicating the class it belongs (...) to—what can be called its “class definition.”2 But on the other hand, in Posterior Analytics II.2 he makes the pronouncement that “knowing what something is ” is the same as knowing why it is ” (90a31–2), and then goes on in II.2 and 8 to argue that definition is an, “explanation” or “explanatory principle.” How can these two notions of definition be reconciled?Short of giving the full Aristotelian solution to this problem, I hope here to suggest one way in which Aristotle’s notion of class definition—especially the reformed version presented in De Partibus Animalium I.2–4—can be shown to relate to his notion of explanatory definition in APo II. The link is his notion of scientific, “problems,” as discussed in APo II. 14 and elsewhere.3 It will turn out that a class definition in effect presents a scientific problem to the scientist which can best be solved by an explanation—ultimately by an “explanatory definition”—accounting for the attributes that form the basis of [End Page 487] class membership. Or more succinctly: the class definition presents a problem that the explanatory definition solves. Further, although the discussion in PA I is meant to be a reform of the simpler but unworkable method of arriving at the genus-differentia formula based upon, “division,” I intend to argue that an important ancillary benefit of the reformed method is that it is capable of articulating scientific problems in a much clearer way than division can. In fact, it seems very well suited to the task of presenting problems and hence to the task of searching for explanatory definitions.2. scientific problemsIn APo II. 14, Aristotle begins to outline the proper procedure for formulating scientific problems. We are told that “in order to obtain problems, we must pick out the sections 4 and divisions” of the subject we are investigating, about which we are formulating a problem (98a1–3). That is, we must learn to pick out each genus in the hierarchy of genera the subject belongs to by learning to identify the attributes associated with each of these genera. This will enable us to account for each attribute we find in the subject under investigation in terms of the genus the attribute is primarily associated with. As Aristotle explains: “Let A stand for animal, B for [an attribute] of every animal, and C, D, and E some particular animal [species]; it is clear why B belongs to D—because of A” (98a9–11).This, in a sense, shows one way a scientific problem—Why does attribute B belong to D?—can be “solved”: by finding the right “division” of D that accounts for its having B. But what is important to note here is that, in fact, our investigation only begins with this process of finding the right genus. This is simply how we “obtain” the problem, strictly speaking, not the means for ultimately solving it. Indeed the problem of accounting for why an attribute belongs to a given subject is not even completely formulated until we are able to determine the proper “division,” or genus, the attribute universally belongs to. Then we can ask the more fundamental question of why the attribute belongs to this genus, i.e., why B belongs to genus A. Now this question can be analyzed further, in terms of the other attributes of the genus. Any genus (or infima species) is, in effect, designated by a regular concomitance of the many attributes that identify it—i.e., attributes that universally co-occur in it. So the scientific problem we are formulating, regarding why a certain attribute belongs to a certain subject, ultimately should be reformulated in this way: Why does... (shrink)

Das Wort »Metakritik«, heute eine gängige philosophische Vokabel, (er-)findet der Königsberger Publizist und Schriftsteller Johann Georg Hamann (1730–1788) im Zuge seiner intensiven Auseinandersetzung mit Kants ›Kritik der reinen Vernunft‹. – Das vorliegende Buch bietet erstmals eine durchgängige, eingehende und umfassende Kommentierung der ›Metakritik über den Purismum der Vernunft‹ (1784) und ihrer Begleittexte. In seinem Sprachdenken ist Hamann ein entscheidender Vermittler zwischen dem angelsächsischen Empirismus und dem Frühidealismus in Deutschland. Über ihre spezifische Kantkritik hinaus ist Hamanns ›Metakritik‹ philosophiegeschichtlich und systematisch von (...) Interesse vor allem für die Sprach- und Religionsphilosophie. (shrink)

In our article, we argue, following Nelson Goodman and Arthur Danto, that in contrast to the essentialist conception of authenticity, it is more fertile to consider authentic patterns not as the inner core of the person, but as a case of metaphorical exemplification. According to our approach, if we accept that authentic style is a metaphorical exemplification, then, based on Richard Rorty’s concepts of language and metaphor, style can be seen as an exaptation or reuse of symbols previously adapted through (...) cultural selection to other specific functions. To support this approach, we proceed as follows. First, using Goodman’s and Danto’s model, we argue that authentic style can best be grasped through metaphorical exemplification. We then show that the metaphorical use of linguistic, pictorial, and other symbols is the result of exaptation. According to our results, the authentic style is the exaptation of symbols previously adapted to culturally selected functions. We then separate authenticity from creativity through the concepts of style and manner—borrowed from Danto—and we point out that whether a particular symbol is authentic or not is not affected by whether creative or mechanical mental processes are responsible for its creation. Finally, we examine the relationship between authenticity and autonomy, and we show that in an environment that promotes autonomous decisions and authentic style, agents that originally generated inauthentic symbols may be able to produce authentic ones. (shrink)

In this commentary I discuss the role of types of knowledge and conceptual structures in lexical representation, revealing the explanatory potential of frame-based knowledge. Although frame-based lexical semantics is not alien to the theoretical model outlined in Jackendoff's conceptual semantics, testing its relevance to the analysis of the lexical evidence presented in his book has been left out of consideration.

L’héritage paulinien fut transmis à Luther surtout par la tradition de l’Ordre des Ermites de St Augustin, auquel il appartenait, c’est-à-dire pour l’essentiel par l’interprétation de Paul proposée par Augustin. La propre relecture de sa vie par Luther dit déjà l’importance de cet héritage, et dans le tournant réformateur de sa théologie comme d’une ouverture vers la juste distinction entre la Loi et l’Evangile, point culminant du rapport exégétique intense de Luther à Paul. Sa réception de Paul fait particulièrement ressortir (...) l’Epître aux Romains qui, comme point de référence principal représente la figure matérielle, la concrétisation le plus importante du principe herméneutique permanent du réformateur, constitué par la règle « sacra scriptura sui ipsius interpres ». Par ailleurs, le double front du combat paulinien contre l’ « enthousiasme » et contre le légalisme fut appliqué par Luther d’un côté à la papauté, de l’autre aux spiritualistes et « illuminés ».The Pauline legacy was transmitted to Luther especially by the tradition of the Order of Hermits of St. Augustine, to which he belonged, that is to say for the essential, by the interpretation of Paul proposed by Augustine. Luther’s own rereading of his life already speaks of the importance of this legacy, and in the reforming bent of his theology as an opening towards the legitimate distinction between the Law and the Gospel, a culminating point of the intense exegetic rapport of Luther to Paul. His reception of Paul particularly highlights the Epistle to the Romans which, as a principle point of reference represents the material figure, the most important solidification of the permanent hermeneutical principle of the reformer, constituted by the rule “sacra scriptura sui ipsius interpres.” Furthermore, the double front of the Pauline combat against “enthusiasm” and against legalism was applied by Luther on the one hand to the papacy, and on the other to the spiritualists and “illuminated ones.”. (shrink)