The purpose of this paper is to investigate the source of Plutarch's inspiration for the impressive discourse which he presents from the lips of Ammonius in the De E apud Delphos, and in particular for the following much-quoted passage.

'Middle Platonists' is a work that focuses on the period of intellectual activity which flourished from the time of the "dogmatist" Antiochus Aschalon (ca. 80 BC) to Ammonius Saccas (ca. 220 AD), the mysterious "teacher" of the great Plotinus.

An article by John Dillon ardues that the Platonism that Plotinus inherits – setting aside Ammonius Saccas, of whom we know all too little – is by the later second century distinctly dualist in tendency, and is able, especially in the case of Plutarch, to quote Plato to its purpose. Plato himself, though, as the author maintains, is, despite appearances to the contrary, what one might term a ‘modified monist’. That is to say, he fully recognizes the degree (...) of imperfection and evil in the world, and holds it to be ineradicable, but he does not in the last resort believe in a positive countervailing force to the Good or the One. What we have is simply a negative force, whether Indefinite Dyad, disorderly World-Soul, or Receptacle, which is an inevitable condition of their being a world at all, but which, as a side-effect of introducing diversity, generates various sorts of imperfection. It is this scenario that justifies his follower Hermodorus in declaring that Plato recognizes only a single first principle, and it to this sort of monism – if anything, in a more pronounced form – that Plotinus returns. (shrink)

This volume completes, starting from chapter 6, the commentary by the young Philoponus on Aristotle's Categories, chapters 1-5 of which were previously published in this series. This ancient commentary was the first work in the Aristotelian syllabus after a general introduction to Aristotle by the same author. It is influenced by an extant short anonymous record of his teacher Ammonius' lecturees on the same work, but Philoponus' commentary is two and a half times as long as that anonymous record, (...) and includes special contributions of Philoponus' own, for example in philology, Christian theology and in disagreements with Aristotle. This English translation of Philoponus' work is the latest volume in the Ancient Commentators on Aristotle series and makes this philosophical work accessible to a modern readership. The translation is accompanied by an introduction, comprehensive commentary notes, bibliography, glossary of translated terms and a subject index. (shrink)

The paper is in three parts, prefaced by general remarks concerning Boethius' logical translations and commentaries: the text of the Peri Hermeneias as known to and commented on by Boethius (and Ammonius); the organizational principles behind Boethius' second commentary on the Peri Hermeneias ; its source(s). One of the main purposes of the last section is to demonstrate that the Peri Hermeneias commentaries of Boethius and Ammonius are, although part of a common tradition, quite independent of one another, (...) and special consideration is given to the question of how Boethius interpreted and shaped the doxographical material concerning Aspasius, Herminus, and Alexander that had been handed down to him by Porphyry. (shrink)

The notion of spirit was a central notion of two ancient traditions: the medical and the philosophical tradition of ancient Greece and the neoplatonic philosophical one. In this paper we will examine the way in which a Byzantine philosopher of the 6th century, John Philoponus, handled this notion from a neoplatonic point of view, and how he assimilated the Aristotelian, the medical and the neoplatonic “πνεῦμα” theory in a single conception. Philoponus’ career can be divided into two periods: the (...) one during which he was studying under Ammonius and the one during which he was writing in his own name, expressing his Christian convictions as a Byzantine philosopher, and criticizing neoplatonic doctrines opposed to the Christian dogma. We shall, thus, also present the refutation he gives to the neoplatonic theory of “πνεῦμα”, during the second period of his career. (shrink)

This contribution continues the comparison between ancient and modern beliefs on scientific cosmology which began in a previous article in this Journal. I begin with a brief survey of contemporary theories on Big Bang cosmology, followed by a study of the cosmological theories of the Presocratic thinker Pherecydes of Syros. The second part of my paper studies the ramifications of the basic Platonic principle that bonum est diffusivum sui. I begin by studying the vicissitudes of this theory in the Patristic (...) thought of Origen, the Arians, and Athanasius. Following Willy Theiler, I suggest that similarities between the views of Origen and the Neoplatonist philosopher Porphyry of Tyre may be traceable to Plotinus' teacher Ammonius Saccas. Finally, following Endress, I study the way the Arabic translation of some propositions from Proclus' Elements of Theology were accompanied by interpolated glosses derived from the Christian Neoplatonist John Philoponus, which were designed to make Proclus' thought more acceptable to a creationist, Monotheistic belief system such as Islam. Philoponus' theories of instantaneous creation were taken up, thanks to al-Kindi, by the Neoplatonica Arabica, whence they exerted an important influence on the development of Islamic thought. An Appendix of texts with translation and bibliography completes the article. (shrink)

Several psychological experiments have suggested that concepts can influence perceived color (e.g., Delk and Fillenbaum in Am J Psychol 78(2):290–293, 1965, Hansen et al. in Nat Neurosci 9(11):1367–1368, 2006, Olkkonen et al. in J Vis 8(5):1–16, 2008). Observers tend to assign typical colors to objects even when the objects do not have those colors. Recently, these findings were used to argue that perceptual experience is cognitively penetrable (Macpherson 2012). This interpretation of the experiments has far-reaching consequences: it implies that the (...) way we think of objects determines how we see them, thus threatening the role of perception in justifying beliefs. In this paper, I show that the psychological findings can be accounted for without admitting cognitive penetrability. An underestimated but key feature of the experiments is that observers had to judge colors in borderline cases, in conditions of reduced acuity, or on the basis of color-concepts instead of matching. Such judgments are sensitive to the form of bias that Tversky and Kahneman (Science 185:1124–1131, 1974) have termed ‘anchoring’. Adopting a suggestion from Raffman (Philos Rev 103(1):41–74, 1994), I argue that the way subjects in the experiments think of the objects could affect their color judgments without altering their color experiences. (shrink)

The danger of human operators devolving responsibility to machines and failing to detect cases where they fail has been recognised for many years by industrial psychologists and engineers studying the human operators of complex machines. We call it “the control problem”, understood as the tendency of the human within a human–machine control loop to become complacent, over-reliant or unduly diffident when faced with the outputs of a reliable autonomous system. While the control problem has been investigated for some time, up (...) to this point its manifestation in machine learning contexts has not received serious attention. This paper aims to fill that gap. We argue that, except in certain special circumstances, algorithmic decision tools should not be used in high-stakes or safety-critical decisions unless the systems concerned are significantly “better than human” in the relevant domain or subdomain of decision-making. More concretely, we recommend three strategies to address the control problem, the most promising of which involves a complementary coupling between highly proficient algorithmic tools and human agents working alongside one another. We also identify six key principles which all such human–machine systems should reflect in their design. These can serve as a framework both for assessing the viability of any such human–machine system as well as guiding the design and implementation of such systems generally. (shrink)

No mathematical background is necessary to appreciate this classic of probability theory, which remains unsurpassed in its clarity, readability, and sheer charm. Its author, British logician John Venn (1834-1923), popularized the famous Venn Diagrams that are commonly used in teaching elementary mathematics.

This book is an extensive review & analysis of Aristotelian thought as received & adapted by such medieval commentators as Ammonius, Philoponus, Boethius, al-Farabi, Yahya ibn 'Adi, Avicenna, Albertus Magnus, Thomas Aquinas, Martin of Dacia, Simon of Faversham, John Duns Scotus, Peter of Spain, Robert Kilwardby, William of Ockham, & Giles of Rome. The discussions range from metaphysics to logic, linguistics, & epistemology, encompassing such topics as being, god, causation, actuality, potentiality, universals, individuation, signification, cognition, certainty, infallibility, error, (...) ignorance, analogy, grammar, interpretation, foundationalism, & the eucharist & transubstantiation. (shrink)

Fresnel's theory of light was (a) impressively predictively successful yet (b) was based on an "entity" (the elastic-solid ether) that we now "know" does not exist. Does this case "confute" scientific realism as Laudan suggested? Previous attempts (by Hardin and Rosenberg and by Kitcher) to defuse the episode's anti-realist impact. The strongest form of realism compatible with this case of theory-rejection is in fact structural realism. This view was developed by Poincare who also provided reasons to think that it is (...) the only realist view of theories that really makes sense. (shrink)

En este artículo se analizan las relaciones del conocimiento científico con las sociedades en las que se produce. Tras repasar sus diversas funciones en tipos distintos de sociedades, la discusión se centra en los fines de la ciencia en las sociedades democráticas pluralistas. Frente al cada vez mayor rol instrumental de la ciencia, por el que ha recibido los nombres de «ciencia postacadémica» o «tecnociencia», se defienden los roles no instrumentales tradicionales de la investigación académica clásica. Se argumenta que sólo (...) si la ciencia académica mantiene su autonomía y su integridad frente a intereses políticos o empresariales podrá ser de utilidad al público al ofrecerle conocimiento imparcial y fidedigno frente a los sesgos producidos por la naturaleza propia de la ciencia postacadémica. (shrink)

This book is an extensive review & analysis of Aristotelian thought as received & adapted by such medieval commentators as Ammonius, Philoponus, Boethius, al-Farabi, Yahya ibn 'Adi, Avicenna, Albertus Magnus, Thomas Aquinas, Martin of Dacia, Simon of Faversham, John Duns Scotus, Peter of Spain, Robert Kilwardby, William of Ockham, & Giles of Rome. The discussions range from metaphysics to logic, linguistics, & epistemology, encompassing such topics as being, god, causation, actuality, potentiality, universals, individuation, signification, cognition, certainty, infallibility, error, (...) ignorance, analogy, grammar, interpretation, foundationalism, & the eucharist & transubstantiation. (shrink)

John Woods' The Logic of Fiction, now thirty-five years old, is a ground-breaking event in the establishment of the semantics of fiction as a stand-alone research programme in the philosophies of language and logic. There is now a large literature about these matters, but Woods' book retains a striking freshness, and still serves as a convincing template of the treatment options for the field's key problems. The book now appears in a second edition with a new Foreword by Nicholas (...) Griffin and an extended bibliography covering the period 1969-2009. As Griffin notes in his Foreword, it is "surprising on looking back to discover how little was written on the semantics of fiction before John Woods' The Logic of Fiction was published in 1974. The surprise is the greater because Woods' book appeared after almost a quarter century of fierce philosophical debate about reference Fictional discourse, one would have thought, would be an important testing ground for philosophical theories of referential expressions and one, moreover, in which the standard theories would likely be tested to destruction. " " One of the great merits of Woods' book is that it takes seriously the wide-ranging demands that fiction imposes on logic and semantics, and does not try to force fiction into some pre-conceived logical mould. but thanks to Woods' pioneering efforts, we are much closer to one now than we were when he set out to write his book. His book was not the last word on the logic of fiction; it was much more important: it was nearly the first." NICHOLAS GRIFFIN is Canada Research Chair in Philosophy at McMaster University. Recent publications include Russell vs Meinong: The Legacy of "On Denoting," edited with Dale Jacquette. JOHN WOODS is Director of the Abductive Systems Group at the University of British Columbia and Charles S. Peirce Visiting Professor of Logic in the Group on Logic and Computational Science, King's College London. He has two forthcoming books on fiction - an edited volume, Fictions and Models: New Essays, and a research monograph, Sherlock's Member: New Perspectives on the Semantics of Fiction, both to appear in 2010. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Hume Studies Volume 29, Number 1, April 2003, pp. 125-141 Dr. George Cheyne, Chevalier Ramsay, and Hume's Letter to a Physician JOHN P. WRIGHT The publication of a new intellectual biography of George Cheyne1 provides a "propitious" occasion for "a thoroughly skeptical review"2 of the question which has long exercised Hume scholars, whether Cheyne was the intended recipient of David Hume's fascinating pie-Treatise Letter to a Physician,3 the (...) letter which describes his own hypochondriacal physical and mental symptoms and gives an account of his early philosophical development.4 Hume's nineteenth-century biographer, John Hill Burton, argued that Hume was probably writing to Cheyne,5 while Ernest Mossner claimed to definitively refute that hypothesis in an article entitled "Hume's Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot," published in 1944.6 Anita Guerrini's intellectual biography does not discuss Cheyne as a possible recipient of Hume's letter, but she does present a well-rounded picture of this interesting eighteenth-century physician from which we can judge his appropriateness as its addressee. In the following discussion I will make use of the biographical material found in this new biography of Cheyne, as well as other sources, to show that Mossner's arguments are less than definitive, and that it would be wrong to dismiss the possibility that the letter was sent to George Cheyne.7 This is a possibility that, for reasons that I will make clear, makes good biographical and philosophical sense. At the same time, it is important to keep a proper suspense of judgment as Burton did, for the evidence that the letter was either intended for or actually sent to Cheyne is not definitive. John P. Wright is Professor of Philosophy, Central Michigan University, Mt. Pleasant, MI 48859, USA. e-mail: [email protected] 126 John P. Wright Burton, who first published the autobiographical letter of the 22-yearold Hume in 1846, narrowed down the possible addressees of Hume's letter to either Cheyne or John Arbuthnot. He also pointed out that it is possible that the letter was never sent, and that the ten and a half page manuscript is only a neatly written draft, rather than a fair copy of an actual letter. Nevertheless, Burton thought he could identify the unnamed addressee on the basis of the internal evidence of the manuscript and the records of Scottish physicians practicing in England at the time. In the letter, Hume refers to the intended recipient as his "Countryman, a Scotchman [,]... a skilful Physician, a man of Letters, of Wit, of Good Sense, & of great Humanity."8 Further he writes that he is consulting him because he is a person "of great Learning beyond [his]... own Profession" who is acquainted with the "Motions of the Mind" he has described in his letter, and that "Fame pointed [him]... out as the properest person to resolve my Doubts..." about the cure of his disorder.9 Burton tells us that "the first name that suggested itself... was Arbuthnot, whose fine genius was just then flickering in the socket."10 (John Arbuthnot had been ill for some time, and died a year later.) But he then added that "a more full consideration showed to my satisfaction that it must have been destined for Dr. George Cheyne." His main reason for settling on Cheyne was that Cheyne's immensely popular The English Malady (1733) had recently been published, and that "there is a certain unison of tone between Hume's letter and this book." Burton quotes a portion of Cheyne's own long autobiographical account of his own disease in The English Malady. Cheyne's autobiography begins with the claim that "I passed my Youth in close study, and almost constant Application to the abstracted Sciences, (wherein my chief pleasure consisted) and consequently in great Temperance and a Sedentary Life"; it is followed by the reflection that any overindulgence in food or drink led to physical and psychological problems.11 He goes on to describe these in great detail for 39 pages, along with a history of his life. Burton also quotes a section of the book in which Cheyne describes how a studious and sedentary life causes the symptoms... (shrink)

This book provides an intellectual biography of Max Horkheimer during the early and middle phases of his life and analyzes his model of early Critical Theory.

I want to discuss a doctrine and a concept in theory of knowledge which has various manifestations from at least the seventeenth to the early twentieth century. The concept is that of direct or immediate cognition, the doctrine says that only what is like mind can be directly or immediately present to mind. This doctrine raises the question of how we can know things other than ourselves and our experiences: the concept of direct presence most usually had the consequence of (...) making our knowledge of the world indirect, uncertain, or impossible. The directly present must in some way inform us about the indirectly present. (shrink)

Philosophy as a separate discipline is a rather new phenomenon. This presents problems for our understanding of what constitutes the history of philosophy. Past writers often approached their concerns from a multi-disciplinary perspective; thus to understand them we have to do more than answer a contemporary set of issues. To that end, I suggest we attend to Locke's advice on how to read a text. Following this advice may permit us to avoid several puzzles which result from misreading a text.

This paper represents the first installment of alarger project devoted to the relevance of pragmatism forbioethics. One self-consciously pragmatist move would be toreturn to the classical pragmatist canon of Peirce, James andDewey in search of substantive doctrines or methodologicalapproaches that might be applied to current bioethicalcontroversies. Another pragmatist (or neopragmatist) move wouldbe to subject the regnant principlist paradigm to Richard Rorty'ssubversive assaults on foundationalism in epistemology andethics. A third pragmatist method, dubbed ``freestandingpragmatism'' by its proponents, embraces a ``pragmatist'' approachto practical (...) reasoning without discernable moorings either to theclassical canon or to Rorty's neopragmatism. This thirdpragmatist approach to method in practical ethics is the subjectof this article. I begin with an examination of freestandingpragmatism in the theory of judicial decision making. I arguethat this version of legal pragmatism – so described on account ofits commitments to contextualism, instrumentalism, eclecticism,and freedom from grand theory – bears a striking resemblance tomuch self-described pragmatist work in bioethics today. Ifurther argue that if this is what we mean by ``pragmatism,'' thenin a certain sense ``we are all pragmatists now.''. (shrink)

David Hume's A Treatise of Human Nature presents the most important account of skepticism in the history of modern philosophy. In this lucid and thorough introduction to the work, John P. Wright examines the development of Hume's ideas in the Treatise, their relation to eighteenth-century theories of the imagination and passions, and the reception they received when Hume published the Treatise. He explains Hume's arguments concerning the inability of reason to establish the basic beliefs which underlie science and morals, (...) as well as his arguments showing why we are nevertheless psychologically compelled to accept such beliefs. The book will be a valuable guide for those seeking to understand the nature of modern skepticism and its connection with the founding of the human sciences during the Enlightenment. (shrink)

Studies in Empirical Philosophy was published in 1962 shortly after Anderson's death and had been prepared by him to include most of his published articles from the Australasian Journal of Philosophy and Psychology. It also includes a couple of articles written especially for the book. It remains the main published source of material on Anderson's systematic philosophy. John Passmore has kindly granted permission for his introduction to be included in this new release. John Anderson (1893-1962) was Challis Professor (...) of Philosophy at the University of Sydney from 1927 until 1958. He is generally regarded as the most important philosopher to have worked in Australia. His students included not only academic philosophers but also important figures in politics, law and journalism. His impact upon Sydney's social and cultural life was enormous. (shrink)

What’s so bad about the placebo effect? John Worrall discusses the recent Nurofen labelling “scandal”.

Gerald Sykes -- Aldous Huxley -- Gerald Heard -- Christopher Isherwood -- John van Druten -- Marianna Masin -- J. Crawford Lewis -- Dorothy F. Mercer -- Kurt Friedrichs -- Swami Atulananda -- Jane Molard -- The Countess of Sandwich -- John Yale -- Joan Rayne -- Durgacharan -- Pravrajika Saradaprana.

Since its modern inception in the early 1970s, informal logic has placed a special emphasis on the analysis of fallacies and argumentative dialogue schemes. Concurrent developments in speech communication circles exhibit a like concentration on the dialectical character of argument.

In the newly discovered letter Hume answers Reid's charge that he held a theory of ideas derived from his predecessors and criticizes Reid's own theory of innate ideas. He defends his own theory that ideas are derived from impressions. I discuss Reid's own puzzlement that in the first _Enquiry_ Hume ascribes a natural belief in necessary connections to the vulgar without an idea--and its influence on subsequent readings of Hume as a 'regularity theorist.' I argue that it was the 'Common (...) Sense' school of philosophers following Reid, rather than Hume, who insisted that beliefs must be based on legitimate ideas. (shrink)

The conflict between Kant and the medical faculty was far more complex and substantial than is indicated in the section of his famous Conflict of the Faculties addressing this matter. In this essay I will consider not only what Kant, as a philoso­pher, thought of medicine as a faculty, but what medicine as a faculty thought of Kant as a philosopher.

It has often been remarked that bioethics is a quintessentially American phenomenon. Broadly speaking, bioethics as a field has tended to enshrine the value of autonomy, it places individual rights above communal well-being, and it has adopted a largely permissive and optimistic view of emerging biotechnologies. In contrast to much European thinking at the intersection of ethics and medicine, American-style bioethics has been resolutely middlebrow, eschewing grand philosophical schemes in favor of pragmatic policy-making and democratic consensus. It was, then, perhaps (...) only a matter of time before various theorists began proposing a marriage between bioethics and pragmatism, which is the homegrown American philosophy. (shrink)

Participants in AIDS research may justify noncompliance with protocols by a “coercion defense.” While this defense may not be philosophically successful, a prudent social policy can enhance compliance by encouraging community participation and providing greater access to non‐validated therapies.

Our likes and dislikes--our senses and sensibilities--did not fall ready-made from the sky, argues internationally acclaimed author John D. Barrow. We know we enjoy a beautiful painting or a passionate symphony, but what we don't necessarily understand is that these experiences conjure up latent instincts laid down and perpetuated over millions of years. Now, in The Artful Universe, Barrow explores the close ties between our aesthetic appreciation and the basic nature of the Universe, challenging the commonly held view that (...) our sense of beauty is entirely free and unfettered. Barrow argues that the laws of the Universe, its environments and its astronomical appearance, have imprinted themselves upon our thoughts and actions in subtle and unexpected ways. Why do we like certain types of art or music? What games and puzzles do we find challenging? Why do so many myths and legends have common elements? Who created the cornucopia of constellations in the night sky? And why? In this eclectic and entertaining survey, Barrow answers these questions and more as he explains how the landscape of the Universe has influenced the development of philosophy and mythology, and how millions of years of evolutionary history have fashioned our attraction to certain patterns of sound and color. Barrow casts the story of human creativity and thought in a fascinating light, considering such diverse topics as our instinct for language, the origins and uses of color in Nature, why we divide time into intervals as we do, the sources of our appreciation of landscape painting, and whether computer-generated fractal art is really art. Barrow reconsiders the question of whether intelligent extraterrestrial life exists, showing that the benefits (and even the likelihood) that might follow from the discovery of life on other worlds could be very different from what we might have been led to expect. Remarkably, we find that some of the properties of the Universe that are essential for the existence of any form of life play a key role in determining psychological and religious responses to the Cosmos. Drawing on a wide variety of examples, from the theological questions raised by St. Augustine and C.S. Lewis to the relationship between the pure math of Pythagoras and the music of the Beatles, The Artful Universe covers new ground and enters a wide-ranging debate about the meaning and significance of the links between art and science. It will change our view of the creation of art and the way we see the world in which we live. (shrink)

For scientific essentialists, the only logical possibilities of existence are the real (or metaphysical) ones, and such possibilities, they say, are relative to worlds. They are not a priori, and they cannot just be invented. Rather, they are discoverable only by the a posteriori methods of science. There are, however, many philosophers who think that real possibilities are knowable a priori, or that they can just be invented. Marc Lange [Lange 2004] thinks that they can be invented, and tries to (...) use his inventions to argue that the essentialist theory of counterfactual conditionals developed in Scientific Essentialism [Ellis 2001, hereafter SE ] is flawed. (shrink)