This article’s jumping-off point is the highly incisive but often-ignored claim by the French doctor, Louis-Jacques Tanon, in 1922 that rats acted as plague reservoirs in Paris; in other words, that they harboured the plague bacillus but were refractory to it. This claim partially reframed the fight against this disease in the French capital in the 1920s, which became more centred on surveilling the plague reservoir rather than on destroying rats. Drawing upon Tanon’s hypothesis, this article explores (...) the emergence, evolution, and several iterations of the idea of disease reservoirs in the early twentieth century. On the one hand, it describes the crafting of a range of ideas with which Tanon was directly or indirectly dialoguing, namely, that rats could present a stage called chronic plague, which was especially developed in India; and that human populations, especially children, acted as sources or reservoirs of malaria in Sierra Leone and Algeria. On the other hand, this article shows how Tanon created original reasoning by combining and reformulating some of these ideas and applying them to Paris. Thus, this article contributes to the early history of reasoning in terms of disease reservoirs, as well as presenting a more dynamic history of microbiology by showing how concepts crafted in the “Rest” found their place in Europe. (shrink)

For many religious people there is a problem of doubting various credal statements contained in their religions. Often propositional beliefs are looked upon as necessary conditions for salvation. This causes great anxiety in doubters and raises the question of the importance of belief in religion and in life in general. It is a question that has been neglected in philosophy of religion and theology. In this paper I shall explore the question of the importance of belief as a religious attitude (...) and suggest that there is at least one other attitude which may be adequate for religious faith even in the absence of belief. (shrink)

It is widely held that we can obtain beliefs and withhold believing propositions directly by performing an act of will. This thesis is sometimes identified with the view that believing is a basic act, an act which is under our direct control. Descartes holds that the will is limitless in relation to belief acquisition and that we must be directly responsible for our beliefs, especially our false beliefs, for otherwise we could draw the blasphemous conclusion that God is responsible for (...) them. For Descartes and his followers judgment and assent are acts of the will which may be made both when they ought and when they ought not to be made. They are expressions of freedom of the will and as such we are directly responsible for the beliefs we acquire. Other philosophers who seem to espouse volitionalism include Aquinas, Locke, Kierkegaard, Newman, James, Pieper, Chisholm and Meiland. (shrink)

Moral considerations do not appear to play a large role in discussions of the DSM-IV personality disorders and debates about their empirical validity. Yet philosophical analysis reveals that the Cluster B personality disorders, in particular, may in fact be moral rather than clinical conditions. This finding has serious consequences for how they should be treated and by whom.

Phenomenological psychiatry has suffered from a failure to translate its insights into terms specific enough to be applied to psychiatric diagnosis or to be used in contemporary research programs. This difficulty can be understood in light of the well-known tradeoff between reliability and validity. We argue, however, that with sufficient ingenuity, phenomenological concepts can be adapted and applied in a research context. Elsewhere, we have described a phenomenologically oriented conception of schizophrenia as a self- or ipseity-disorder with two main facets: (...) decline in the sense of existing as a subject of awareness (diminished self-affection) and heightened awareness of aspects of experience that would normally remain tacit or presupposed (hyperreflexivity). This approach is consistent with Minkowski, Blankenburg, and Kimura and offers one possible synthesis of their views. Here we describe two areas of empirical research that are congruent with, or actually inspired by, a phenomenological approach emphasizing such disorders of consciousness and self-experience: (1) Phenomenologically oriented, interview studies show that, whereas negative-symptom patients generally deny any diminishment of affect and thinking, they do describe qualitative alterations of experience suggestive of hyperreflexivity and diminished self-affection. (2) Another line of research suggests that the early detection of schizophrenic symptoms may be enhanced by adopting a phenomenological approach. (shrink)

Affirmative Action is becoming the most controversial social issue of our day. In this essay I examine nine arguments on the moral status of Affirmative Action. I distinguish between weak Affirmative Action, which seeks to provide fair opportunity to all citizens from strong Affirmative Action, which enjoins preferential treatment to groups who have been underrepresented in social positions. I conclude that while weak Affirmative Action is morally required, strong Affirmative Action is morally wrong.

Culinary traditions and food practices are at the center of our daily lives and therefore constitute an important part of culture. Whether they are part of significant rituals or simply routinely enacted, they tell us something about the way we relate to each other and to the non-human world. In other words, food practices have an ethical dimension. Our paper focuses on the possibility to make objective ethical assessments of problematic cultural practices rooted in culinary traditions as a reply to (...) arguments associated with an ethical relativism according to which cultures produce ethical systems that are self-validating and therefore that cannot be criticized objectively. Drawing from examples involving animal cruelty and production methods harmful to the environment, we argue that it is possible to judge ethically questionable food practices from an objectivist standpoint inspired by moral progress, in contrario to a relativist point of view. Following a short discussion of ethical relativism, we present the outline of an acceptability test for questionable food practices and use it to analyse the case of the dog meat industry in South Korea. (shrink)

French thought in the twentieth century is typically described as marked by a major fault line, a rupture or grande coupure, that emerged in the 1960s, the heyday of the ‘crisis of the subject.’ Before this time French philosophy, together with associated fields, were focused on issues of subjectivity—first in the vein of Bergsonian vitalism but then shifting, with Sartre and Merleau-Ponty in the late 1930s and 1940s, to forms of phenomenology and existentialism inspired first by Husserl and then, even (...) more decisively, by Heidegger.1 But starting mid-century, developments in the ‘human sciences’ of linguistics, anthropology, and psychoanalysis began to offer a different.. (shrink)

Theories of equal human rights have experienced an exponential growth during the past thirty or forty years. From declarations of human rights, such as the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights, to arguments about the rights of fetuses versus the rights of women, to claims and counter claims about the rights of minorities to preferential hiring, the rights of animals to life and well-being, and the rights of trees to be preserved, the proliferation of rights affects every phase of (...) our socio-political discourse. Hardly a month goes by without a new book appearing on the subject. (shrink)

This paper offers a comparative investigation of anomalous self-experiences common in schizophrenia instrument) and those of normal individuals in an intensely introspective orientation. The latter represent a relatively pure manifestation of certain forms of exaggerated self-consciousness, one facet of the disturbance of core- or minimal-self postulated as central in schizophrenia. Significant similarities with schizophrenia-like experience were found but important differences also emerged. Affinities included feelings of passivity, fading of self or world, and alienation from thoughts, feelings, or lived-body. Differences involved (...) confusion between self and world and severe dislocation or erosion of first-person perspective, qualities unique to schizophrenia. The purpose is threefold: 1, place the putatively schizophrenic experiences of self-disorder in a broader, comparative context; 2, evaluate hypotheses concerning core processes in schizophrenia; 3, orient investigation of possible pathogenetic pathways as well as psychotherapeutic interventions. (shrink)

It is a widely held belief that one can will to believe, disbelieve, and withhold belief concerning propositions. It is sometimes said that we have a duty to believe certain propositions. These theses have had a long and respected history. In one form or another they receive the support of a large number of philosophers and theologians who have written on the relationship of the will to believing. In the New Testament Jesus holds his disciples responsible for their beliefs, reprimands (...) them for doubting, and speaks of the ability to believe as if it were optional. Paul makes it clear that he thinks propositional belief is a necessary condition for salvation. If a man confesses Christ as Lord with his lips and believes in his heart that God has raised him from the dead, he shall be saved . The writer of Hebrews implies that unless we have certain propositional beliefs we cannot please God . In the New Testament most cases of pistis involve more than a propositional attitude. They involve the idea of trust and faithfulness. Nevertheless, a prima facie case for saying that the volitional theses can be found in the New Testament can be made. Forms of volitionalism can be found stated more explicitly in the writings of the early Church, in the writings of Irenaeus, in the Athanasian Creed, and in Augustine. Acquinas describes faith as an act of the intellect moved by the will. Descartes is perhaps the classic example of a volitionalist, holding that if we were not responsible for our beliefs , then God would be - which is tantamount to blasphemy in that it makes God into a deceiver. (shrink)

There is a large amount of scientific work on emotion in psychology, neuroscience, biology, physiology, and psychiatry, which assumes that it is possible to study emotions and other affective states, objectively. Emotion science of this sort is concerned primarily with 'facts' and not 'values', with 'description' not 'prescription'. The assumption behind this vision of emotion science is that it is possible to distinguish factual from evaluative aspects of affectivity and emotion, and study one without the other. But what really is (...) the basis for distinguishing fact and value in emotion and affectivity? And can the distinction withstand careful scientific and philosophical scrutiny? The essays in this collection all suggest that the problems behind this vision of emotion science may be more complex than is commonly supposed. (shrink)

This paper offers an intellectual portrait of the French psychoanalyst, Jacques Lacan, by considering his incorporation of perspectives associated with “modernism,” the artistic and intellectual avant-garde of the first half of the twentieth century. These perspectives are largely absent in other alternatives in psychology, psychiatry, and psychoanalysis. Emphasis is placed on Lacan’s affinities with phenomenology, a tradition he criticized and to which he is often seen as opposed. Two general issues are discussed. The first is Lacan’s unparalleled appreciation of the (...) paradoxical nature of human experience, together with his treatment of paradox as almost a criterion of truth. These points are illustrated by considering Lacan’s conceptions of the self and of erotic desire. The second issue is Lacan’s focus on the “ontological dimension,” on overall styles or modalities of what might be termed “transcendental subjectivity”: namely, what he calls the registers of the “Imaginary,” the “Symbolic,” and the “Real.” By emphasizing the incommensurable yet interdependent nature of these modalities, Lacan offers a synthesis of dynamic/conflictual and formal/ontological dimensions of the human condition. This paper offers an encompassing portrait of Lacan’s major ideas that is at odds with the widespread assumption that Lacan is somehow a deeply anti-humanist thinker who derides the subjective dimension. Lacan’s most distinctive contributions are fundamentally concerned with the nature of human experience. They show strong affinities with hermeneutic forms of phenomenology inspired by Heidegger, a philosopher who focused on ontological modes of Being and considered paradox as a mark of truth. (shrink)