Catholic healthcare institutions live amidst tension between three intersecting primary values, namely, a commitment of service to the poor and vulnerable, promoting the common good for all, and financially sustainability. Within this tension, the question sometimes arises as to whether it is ever justifiable, i.e., consistent with Catholic identity, to place limits on charity care. In this article we will argue that the health reform measures of the Affordable Care Act do not eliminate this tension but actually increase the urgency (...) of addressing it. Moreover, we will conclude that the question of limiting charity care in a manner that is consistent with the obligations of Catholic identity around serving the poor and vulnerable, promoting the common good, and remaining financially sustainable is not a question of if, but of how such limits are established. Such limits, however, cannot be established in light of one overriding moral consideration or principle, but must be established in light of a multitude of principles guiding us to a holistic understanding of the interrelatedness of the moral dimensions of Catholic identity. (shrink)

The relevance of justice for the current debate on long-term care is explored on the basis of demographic and economic data, especially in the U.S. and Germany. There is a justice question concerning the quality and availability of long-term care for different groups within society. Mapping the justice debate by discussing the two main opponents, John Rawls and Robert Nozick, the article identifies fundamental assumptions in both theories. An exploration of the biblical concept of the “option for the poor” (...) and its influence on a new “ecumenical social teaching from below” leads to the conclusion that a Christian ethical account of long-term care will argue for a system that guarantees decent care to every citizen. The German model of Soziale Pflegeversicherung is presented as one possible option for putting this ethical guideline into political practice. In a final reflection, the role of religious affiliation for long-term care is discussed by looking at empirical data and by naming seven dimensions of faith-driven long-term care. (shrink)

In autumn 1839 George Dunn found himself traveling across the rain-swept open fen land of Cambridgeshire. His journey south from Warrington had taken fifteen hours, and he was now nearing his destination, a farm on the banks of the Old Bedford River. The flat, exposed landscape must have seemed particularly desolate in such weather, and while he was no doubt glad to be reaching his destination, Dunn's thoughts turned to the Slough of Despond.1 That he should have recalled a (...) passage from Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress may have been particularly apt, not only for the dismal weather but for what lay at his journey's end. Dunn had traveled all this way to join Manea Fen, a community established along lines laid out by .. (shrink)

Glenn Wallis & John Kendall Hawkins An Interview with Glenn Wallis -/- Glenn Wallis is an independent scholar and founder of Incite Seminars in Philadelphia. He has taught at several universities, including Brown University and the University of Georgia. His most recent books include A Critique of Western Buddhism and How to Fix Education. Wallis blogs at Speculative Non-Buddhism. He holds a Ph.D. in Buddhist studies from Harvard University. He has also recently published An Anarchist’s Manifesto (Warbler, 2021). He (...) is an expert in Emma Goldman’s practical philosophy of anarchy. Here in this interview, he goes into detail about what Goldman espoused and her legacy, while also contrasting her thoughts on anarchy with his own. He addresses how notions of anarchy have changed over time and what its value is today. -/- John Kendall Hawkins is an American ex-pat freelancer based in Australia. He is a former reporter for The New Bedford Standard-Times. (shrink)

In the decades after the Civil War, Southerners wrote and published their own history textbooks for secondary schools. These “mint julep textbooks,” as the Southern all-white editions were called by the 1960s, reinforced a Lost Cause narrative of the war for Southern audiences while competing with Northern versions of events. In this study, we employ both historical narrative and content analysis of six textbooks’ portrayals of John Brown, John Wilkes Booth, and Nathan Bedford Forrest. The textbooks that (...) are compared– three Southern and three Northern – were written from the 1870s through the 1910s. While subtle but important differences emerge between the Northern and Southern depiction of these three figures, an even more important trend developed when analyzing change over time. In this article we conclude that, as time progressed, Southern versions of events increasingly impacted Northern textbooks. By the 1930s, the mint julep version of these three figures became the national consensus, as reflected in the work of historian David Saville Muzzey. This consensus around events like the raid at Harpers Ferry, the assassination of Lincoln, and the massacre at Fort Pillow lasted for much of the 20th century. By the early 20th century, Northerners appeased Southern interests in the writing of history textbooks. (shrink)

The Human Psyche is an in-depth exploration of dualist-interactionism, a concept Sir John Eccles developed with Sir Karl Popper in the context of a wide...

Aristotle’s solution to Zeno’s arrow paradox differs markedly from the so called at-at solution championed by Russell, which has become the orthodox view in contemporary philosophy. The latter supposes that motion consists in simply being at different places at different times. It can boast parsimony because it eliminates velocity from the ontology. Aristotle, by contrast, solves the paradox by denying that the flight of the arrow is composed of instants; rather, on my reading, he holds that the flight is a (...) unity which is ontologically prior to the temporal parts that may be abstracted from it. I label this position temporal holism; and an entity that is ontological prior to its temporal parts lasting. Lasting, I argue, is the key to Aristotle’s solution to the arrow paradox, but it has received insufficient attention in the relevant literature. I therefore set out here to investigate lasting and highlight its major role in Aristotle’s metaphysics more broadly, and in his solution to other problems of change. I show, too, how lasting within a contemporary context underwrites a parsimonious and intuitive solution to the arrow paradox that retains instantaneous velocity, and hence solves a problem for those who think velocity is required within the ontology to underwrite certain causal roles. (shrink)

Nuffield Council on Bioethics, London * Corresponding author: Nuffield Council on Bioethics, 28 Bedford Square, London WC1B 3JS, UK. Email: hschmidt{at}nuffieldbioethics.org ' + u + '@' + d + ' '//--> Abstract In November 2007, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics published the report Public Health: Ethical Issues . While the report has been welcomed by a wide range of stakeholders, there has also been some criticism. First, it has been suggested that it is not clear why, in developing its (...) ‘stewardship model’, the Council felt the need to go beyond the liberal position developed by John Stuart Mill—what is it that the stewardship model adds? Second, it is suggested that the Report is confused about the concept of paternalism. Third, it is argued that the discussion of the concept of stewardship is lacking in detail and substance. We clarify the Working Party's thinking regarding these three areas, which demonstrates the robustness of the framework set out in the report. CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)

Genetic testing has historically been performed in the context of chronic disease and cancer diagnostics. The timelines for these tests are typically measured in days or weeks, rather than in minutes. As such, the concept that genetic information might be generated and then used to alter management in the acute setting has, thus far, not been feasible. However, recent advances in genetic technologies have the potential to allow genetic information to be generated significantly quicker. The m.1555A>G genetic variant is present (...) in one in 500 individuals and predisposes to profound hearing loss following the administration of aminoglycoside antibiotics. These antibiotics are used frequently in cases of neonatal sepsis and it is estimated that approximately 180 neonates in the UK are at risk of antibiotic induced hearing loss each year because of this genetic change. Knowledge of this variant in the acute setting would allow clinicians to prescribe alternative antibiotics. The Pharmacogenetics to Avoid Loss of Hearing study will implement a genetic point of care test (POCT) for the m.1555A>G variant within two major UK based neonatal intensive care units. This represents the first trial of a genetic POCT aimed at altering management in the acute setting. This round table discussion outlines the novel ethical issues faced in the development of this trial and the legal barriers to implementation. We ask five stakeholders to provide their opinions on this trial and their perspectives on the concept of genetic testing in the acute setting.Trial registration numberISRCTN-13704894. (shrink)

Rylands Latin MS 164 is one of over forty manuscript books of hours in the John Rylands Library. It was made in France in the middle of the fifteenth century and its extensive, high quality illumination associates its production with the worshop of the so-called Bedford Master. However, it has not been the subject of any sustained published research and consequently the significance of variations in the mise-en-page of the books pages has not been scrutinised. This article focuses (...) on the variations in two replacement pages, one within the calendar and one beginning the Penitential Psalms, and in the case of the page beginning the Penitential Psalms considers whether the replacement could have been made by Sir Gregory Osborne Page-Turner, the owner of Rylands Latin MS 164 in the early nineteenth century. (shrink)

In a fair, infinite lottery, it is possible to conclude that drawing a number divisible by four is strictly less likely than drawing an even number; and, with apparently equal cogency, that drawing a number divisible by four is equally as likely as drawing an even number.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Contemporary IlluminationsReading Donne's "A Nocturnall upon S. Lucies Day through Three Twenty-First-Century PoemsTheresa M. DipasqualeIn his contribution to the 2017 volume John Donne and Contemporary Poetry, edited by Judith Scherer Herz, Jonathan F. S. Post explores "a nearly endless landscape of comparisons and contrasts" that unfolds between Stephen Edgar's 2008 poem "Nocturnal" and Donne's "A nocturnall upon S. Lucies day, Being the shortest day."1 Post's essay illuminates what (...) Calvin Bedient, in the same volume, calls the "great glacier-gloom" of Donne's "Nocturnall," its devastated "solemnity."2 In doing so, Post renders largely moot many questions that have preoccupied critics of Donne's poem: whether or how this poem reflects Donne's experience; whether the woman lamented by the speaker is a fiction or a historical person lamented by the poet; and if the latter, whether the poem mourns the 1617 death of John Donne's wife, Anne More Donne; the 1627 death of Donne's patroness Lucy, Countess of Bedford; or the Countess' near-fatal illness in 1612–13.3 These biographical and historical questions are not without value, but they draw the critic's attention away from more compelling questions regarding the "I" of the poem—a persona who claims not to be a person at all, but an inscription, a grave, "A quintessence" derived or "expresse[d]/... even from nothingnesse."4In this article, I widen and intensify the pool of light cast on Donne's "Nocturnall" by Post's presentist and intertextual analysis of Edgar's poem, examining three of the many other twenty-first-century poems that tap into Donne's poem, allude to it, quote it, adopt its structure, or respond to the anguish it expresses.5 Each of the three I discuss is [End Page 1] luminous in its own right but also a potent critical response to Donne's five-stanza poem. Each teaches something different about Donne's lyric. The poets whose work I consider—Liz Lochhead, Jay Wright, and Meena Alexander—all address twenty-first-century concerns; they grapple with questions and sorrows beyond the scope of Donne's conscious imagining yet latent in his poem. Each picks up where critics leave off when they "assume," as Alison R. Rieke notes, "that the speaker... is a husband or lover, possibly Donne, who experiences grief upon his wife's or mistress' death."6 Each takes up the challenge that Donne's persona issues when it denies that it is either "a man" (30) or any other living thing.In the first stanza of "A Nocturnall upon S. Lucies Day," this anti-persona observes that "all" other things around it are "Dead and enterr'd" and "yet" that "all these seeme to laugh, / Compar'd with mee, who am their Epitaph" (8–9). If it is an incised text rather than a human being, the poem's "mee" can no more speak than laugh; it is as silent as the grave it marks or as the dead flesh interred there. Indeed, it goes on to claim that it is "every dead thing" and that love's alchemical "art" has "expresse[d] / A quintessence even from" this mass of nonliving objects, this "nothingnesse" (12, 14–15). Struggling to define its anti-essential essence, it declares itself a mass burial site: "I, by loves limbecke, am the grave / Of all, that's nothing" (21–22). An epitaph, dead things, nothingness, a grave: all these are silent. And yet, in Donne's poem, they strenuously assert their nonbeing; they pulse with a paradoxically audible sense of self. After "Compar'd with mee" in the final line of the opening stanza, the reader encounters sixteen additional instances of the first-person singular in the poem's forty-five lines: "my" appears once, "mee" five times, and "I" eleven times. And the "I" issues a directive to readers: commanding, in the opening line of stanza 2, "Study me then, you who shall lovers bee" (10). But those who obey this order, making themselves students of the poem's inscribed nothingness, find themselves dismissed in the poem's final stanza. Having insisted that its "Sunne" will never "renew... (shrink)

Christian miller invites further clarification about the relationship between accountability and autonomy. Whereas embracing accountability to others for one’s responsibilities in those relationships emphasizes relationality, autonomy accents the individual’s own capacities to exhibit agency in enacting one’s decisions. Accordingly, we theorize that relational capacities for empathic concern and perspective-taking are especially important in the virtue of accountability. The capacity for self-regulation may serve both one’s autonomous pursuits and accountability for carrying out one’s responsibilities...

In this article I explore Serres’ idea of science and how it impacted his overall work. This approach to understanding Serres’ idea of science is much like working with Nietzsche. I look at the areas Serres viewed as the dangers of science including what he referred to as a tsunami of data and the primary focus on methods. I end with Serres third way of inventive science.

In a wide-ranging, provocative anatomy of modern society and its origins, novelist and historian John Ralston Saul explores the reason for our deepening sense of crisis and confusion. Throughout the Western world we talk endlessly of individual freedom, yet Saul shows that there has never before been such pressure for conformity. Our business leaders describe themselves as capitalists, yet most are corporate employees and financial speculators. We are obsessed with competition, yet the single largest item of international trade is (...) a subsidized market in armaments. We call our governments democracies, yet few of us participate in politics. We complain about "invasive government," yet our legal, educational, financial, social, cultural and legislative systems are breaking down. While most observers view these problems separately, Saul demonstrates that they are largely manifestations of our blind faith in the value of reason. Over the last 400 years, our "rational elites" have gradually instituted reforms in every phase of social life. But Saul shows that they have also been responsible for most of the difficulties and violence of the same period. This paradox arises from a simple truth which our elites deny: far from being a moral force, reason is no more than an administrative method. Their denial has helped to turn the modern West into a vast, incomprehensible, directionless machine, run by process-minded experts - "Voltaire's bastards"--Whose cult of scientific management is bereft of both sense and morality. Whether in politics, art, business, the military, entertainment, science, finance, academia or journalism, these experts share the same outlook and methods. The result, Saul maintains, is a civilization of immense technological power whose peoples increasingly dwell in a world of illusion. Already known to millions of readers as the author of novels which portray the overwhelming effects of this power on the modern individual by weaving together international finance, the oil and arms business, guerrilla warfare, drug traffic, and the world of art, here Saul lays aside the mask of fiction to speak in his own voice. Only by withdrawing from our addiction to "solutions," he argues, reclaiming the citizens' right to question and participate in public life, and recovering a common sense capacity for intelligent panic, can we find a way out of our permanent crisis. (shrink)

A formal semantic analysis of the _tough_-construction is provided building on the well-known observation that _events_ play a central role. A close look at the semantic characteristics of the class of _tough_-predicates and the syntactic and semantic properties of nonfinite clauses reveals the link between these pieces, expanding on recent advances in the semantics of clauses (Moulton in Natural selection and the syntax of clausal complementation, PhD thesis, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, 2009 ). Building on Salzmann (Reconstruction and resumption (...) in indirect A′-dependencies: On the syntax of prolepsis and relativization in (Swiss) German and beyond, de Gruyter, Berlin 2017b ), a formal semantic and syntactic analysis of prolepsis is provided to explain the antecedent gap chain in the _tough_-construction. In total, this paper offers a description and explanation of (i) the class of _tough_-predicates; (ii) the properties of the nonfinite clause that appears in the _tough_-construction; (iii) why no other predicates or clauses are permitted in the construction; (iv) the many properties of the antecedent gap chain in the _tough_-construction, primarily the fact that the chain is “weakly” unbounded; and (v) the semantic contribution of prolepsis as it applies in the _tough_-construction. (shrink)

I evaluate Patrick Todd's critique of the idea accepted by many, including (in contemporary philosophy) Nelson Pike and John Martin Fischer, that there can be non‐causal constraints on human actions (including basic actions). I suggest that Todd's critical reflections, although illuminating, are not persuasive. I defend non‐causal constraints in part by putting forward an interpretation of the intuitive idea of the fixity of the past following Carl Ginet: our freedom is the power to add to the given past.

This paper draws on the work of Alain Badiou and Martin Heidegger to construct a postructural theory of the firm. The ideal firm is conceived as a technology that facilitates a technology-free void/site of potential. For actors within this firm to be ethical requires their achievement of human subjecthood through aesthetic fidelity to the site-induced events. Heidegger’s concerns regarding the enframing effects of technology and his recognition of the truth-revealing qualities of art, are incorporated here into a theory of the (...) firm as an idealized, technology facilitated, aesthetic void-of-potential revealing. Authentic human being thus implies that firms-as-technology ‘get out of the way’. This theory of the firm is further revealed through Badiou’s concept of event-driven human flourishing. We embrace Badiou’s ‘ethics-of-truths’ in which fidelity to the trace of an event creates human subjecthood. We consider implications of our theory-of-the-firm for social media firms such as Alphabet and Facebook. (shrink)

O objetivo deste trabalho é apresentar a versão carrolliana de dois paradoxos clássicos e um original, acompanhadas da reconstrução e exame do tratamento lógico oferecido por Carroll e de como tais paradoxos foram tratados por outros autores.

No word in English is shorter than the word I.' And yet no word is more important in philosophy. When Descartes said I think therefore I am' he produced something that was both about himself and a universal formula. The word I' is called an indexical' because its meaning always depends on who says it. Other examples of indexicals are you,' here,' this' and now.' John Perry discusses how these kinds of words work, and why they express important philosophical (...) thoughts. He shows that indexicals pose a challenge to traditional assumptions about language and thought. Over the years a number of these papers, now included in this book, have sparked lively debates and have been influential in philosophy, linguistics and other areas of cognitive science. With seven new papers, including the previously unpublished What Are Indexicals?,' the present volume expands on an earlier version of this book published in the early nineties. Also included are the well-known papers Frege on Demonstratives,' Cognitive Significance and New Theories of Reference,' Evading the Slingshot,' The Prince and the Phone booth', Fodor on Psychological Explanations', and related papers on situation semantics, direct reference, and the structure of belief. This book also includes afterwords written by the author that discuss responses to his work by Gareth Evans, Robert Stalnaker, Barbara Partee, Howard Wettstein and others. (shrink)

We introduce the computable FS-jump, an analog of the classical Friedman–Stanley jump in the context of equivalence relations on the natural numbers. We prove that the computable FS-jump is proper with respect to computable reducibility. We then study the effect of the computable FS-jump on computably enumerable equivalence relations (ceers).

This thesis investigates how children ought to be influenced with respect to religion. To answer this question, I develop a theory of cognitive curriculum content and apply it to the teaching of religious beliefs and beliefs about religions. By ‘a theory of cognitive curriculum content,’ I mean a theory that determines which truth-claims belong on the curriculum, and whether or not teachers ought to promote students’ belief of those claims. I extend this theory to help educators to decide which attitudes (...) address on the curriculum and whether or not to promote them. I then apply this to the case of religious attitudes and attitudes about religions. I argue that where having or failing to have a certain attitude makes a significant difference to students’ lives, it ought to be addressed by curricula. Where failing to have the attitude is irrational, this failure ought to be remedied; where having the attitude is irrational, that attitude ought to be discouraged; and where neither having nor failing to have the attitude is irrational, that attitude ought to be introduced and discussed without encouragement or discouragement. In so far as is practicable, educators should aim to acquaint students with arguments for and against having these attitudes and initiate them into the practice of assessing their soundness. The implications of this theory for extra-curricular influence, such as upbringing in the home, are also explored. (shrink)

According to most contemporary philosophers, the Indiscernibility of Identicals is obviously true. We might therefore expect earlier philosophers to endorse it. But I will use a puzzle about identity over time to argue that Descartes would reject it.

From the "New York Times" bestselling author of "If I Stay" Allyson Healeys life is exactly like her suitcase--packed, planned, ordered. Then on the last day of her three-week post-graduation European tour, she meets Willem. A free-spirited, roving actor, Willem is everything shes not, and when he invites her to abandon her plans and come to Paris with him, Allyson says yes. This uncharacteristic decision leads to a day of risk and romance, liberation and intimacy: 24 hours that will transform (...) Allysons life. A book about love, heartbreak, travel, identity, and the "accidents" of fate, "Just One Day" shows us how sometimes in order to get found, you first have to get lost... and how often the people we are seeking are much closer than we know. The first in a sweepingly romantic duet of novels. Willems story--"Just One Year"--is coming soon. (shrink)

Elizabeth Anscombe was one of the most gifted and productive philosophers of the decades following the Second World War. Her writings present challenges to readers: some of them are very difficult to comprehend while others seem philosophically-minded yet situated outside of philosophy as such. There are also the issues of whether she had a philosophical method and of the influence of Wittgenstein on the manner of her approach. A summary and estimate of Anscombe’s enduring contributions is presented before exploring the (...) style and aims of her philosophical work. Then two of her writings on religion are examined and their implications for her attitude to philosophy considered. (shrink)

Journal of Political Philosophy, EarlyView.

Sawai et al. (2022) provide a good summary of the bioethical debate about brain organoids with an eye toward future directions. Like many contemporary texts in bioethics, they call for engagement w...

A comprehensive exploration of pragmatic themes emerging from neuroscientific research,illustrating why neurophilosophy should take this advancing pragmatist direction seriously.

Pursuing Jacques Derrida's reflections on the possibility of "religion without religion," John Llewelyn makes room for a sense of the religious that does not depend on the religions or traditional notions of God or gods. Beginning with Derrida's statement that it was Kierkegaard to whom he remained most faithful, Llewelyn reads Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche, Feuerbach, Heidegger, Sartre, Levinas, Deleuze, Marion, as well as Kierkegaard and Derrida, in original and compelling ways. Llewelyn puts religiousness in vital touch with the struggles (...) of the human condition, finding religious space in the margins between the secular and the religions, transcendence and immanence, faith and knowledge, affirmation and despair, lucidity and madness. This provocative and philosophically rich account shows why and where the religious matters. (shrink)

Educational Research is commonly regarded as a rational pursuit aimed at the production of objective knowledge. Researchers are expected to avoid value bias by detaching themselves from the normative conceptions of education that shape practice in schools and classrooms, and by casting themselves in the role of the impartial spectator. It is assumed that, as a rational pursuit, educational research is not directly concerned with changing practice but simply with discovering facts about it.This paper claims that it is possible to (...) construct a view of educational research as a form of rational and disciplined inquiry that does not depend on any underpinning spectator theory of knowledge. Nor, the paper claims, does it imply any underpinning foundational principles of rational action and choice. Rather it implies a form of disciplined conversation in which reasons for action are scrutinised, critiqued and modified without resort to foundational principles of rationality. Drawing particularly on the work of John Dewey, Richard Rorty and Amartya Sen, the paper casts educational research as a practical science—a form of action research—that is underpinned by a democratic conception of rationality. In doing so, it contrasts educational research, shaped by a pragmatic theory of knowledge, with research on education that is shaped by a spectator theory. (shrink)

John Wilson; The Teaching Profession: a case of self-mutilation, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 20, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 245–250, https://doi.

In this provocative book, John Keane calls for a fresh understanding of the vexed relationship between democracy and violence. Taking issue with the common sense view that 'human nature' is violent, Keane shows why mature democracies do not wage war upon each other, and why they are unusually sensitive to violence. He argues that we need to think more discriminatingly about the origins of violence, its consequences, its uses and remedies. He probes the disputed meanings of the term violence, (...) and asks why violence is the greatest enemy of democracy, and why today's global 'triangle of violence' is tempting politicians to invoke undemocratic emergency powers. Throughout, Keane gives prominence to ethical questions, such as the circumstances in which violence can be justified, and argues that violent behaviour and means of violence can and should be 'democratised' - made publicly accountable to others, so encouraging efforts to erase surplus violence from the world. (shrink)

This book is an exploration of the relationship between philosophy and political inquiry. John G. Gunnell is seeking to explain certain dimensions of how philosophy has influenced political science and political theory but also how these latter fields have understood and deployed philosophy. When social scientists and social theorists turn to the work of philosophers for intellectual authority what they extract is often selective and in the service of some prior agenda. The philosophers whose work he discusses have all (...) in various degrees been objects of the conversation of political theory, but close acquaintance with that work is often limited and derivative. Gunnell's goal is to initiate a more genuine "conversation" with certain philosophers and political theorists. (shrink)

This article contains John Dewey's remarks given at the funeral of G.H. Mead in Chicago in 1931.

Included in William Wollaston, The Religion of Nature Delineated, ed. Stanley Tweyman (Delmar, NY: Scholars' Facsimiles & Reprints, 1974 [1724]). Editor: Stanley Tweyman .

Branching time logics have been studied in computer science since the 1980s primarily to model the tree of computations for discrete transition systems. Inconsistency measures for propositional log...

This is both a small and a large book. In number of pages it is modest, but it aspires to sort through a very large topic indeed. One of the challenges for a naturalist theology, which is to say a naturalist conception of the divine, and perhaps more importantly of the sacred, is to resolve the obvious problem of accommodating as an element of nature an entity that has for the most part been understood as supernatural. Yalcin’s book attempts to (...) do just that. Though I have some misgivings about this and that detail, which I will mention below, Yalcin succeeds, I would say, in articulating a coherent, plausible, creative, and wholly interesting understanding of the sacred on strictly naturalist grounds.It is... (shrink)

This in-depth examination of the major theories of economic justice focuses on the central question: What should the economic distribution of goods and services be based on?

A short, smart guide to living the good life through the teachings of Epicurus. As long as there has been human life, we’ve searched for what it means to be happy. More than two thousand years ago, the Greek philosopher Epicurus came to his own conclusion: all we really want in life is pleasure. Though today we tend to associate the word “Epicurean” with indulgence in the form of food and wine, the philosophy of Epicurus was about a life well (...) lived even in the hardest of times. As John Sellars shows in this concise, approachable guide, the ideal life envisioned by Epicurus and his followers was a life much more concerned with mental pleasures and the avoidance of pain. Their goal, in short, was a life of tranquility or contentment. In The Pocket Epicurean Sellars walks us through the history of Epicureanism, starting with the private garden on the edge of ancient Athens where Epicurus and his students lived in the fourth century BC, and where women were as welcome as men. Sellars then moves on to ancient Rome, where Epicurean influence flourished thanks to the poet Lucretius and his cohort. Throughout the book, Sellars draws on the ideas of Epicurus to offer a constructive way of thinking about the pleasures of friendship and our place in the world. (shrink)