The category of the admirable has received little attention in the history of philosophy, even among virtue ethicists. I don't think we can understand the admirable without investigating the emotion of admiration. I have argued that admiration is an emotion in which the object is ‘seen as admirable’, and which motivates us to emulate the admired person in the relevant respect. Our judgements of admirability can be distorted by the malfunction of our disposition to admiration. We all know many (...) ways in which admiration misfires when people admire someone who is not admirable. In this paper I focus on a different kind of mistake, one in which there is resistance to moving from admiring to emulating someone admirable. I think that Aristotle's zēlos is in between admiration and envy, and it points us to a predictable line of deviation from admiration to the path of envy, spite and ressentiment. I think these are mistakes to which people in the modern age are particularly prone. (shrink)

The experience of admiration has become the focus of renewed philosophical attention in recent times, singled out by many as an emotion with an important role to play in the moral life. Taken as it stands, this is a claim that invites distinctions, given the complex ways in which this emotion concept features in our ordinary experience and expressive habits. We speak of admiring a person’s integrity and selflessness, but we also speak of admiring her wit or sense of (...) humor, her fine figure, or taste in furnishing. We pause to admire paintings, and we watch admiringly as athletes pull off extraordinary performances. Sometimes we let ourselves be coaxed into declaring the person we admire most—often (though not in... (shrink)

Would you rather your friends, family, and partners envy you, or admire you, when you flourish? Many people would prefer to be admired, and so we often strive to tame our envy. Recently, however, Sara Protasi offered an intriguing defence of “emulative envy” which apparently improves us and our relationships, and is compatible with love. I find her account unconvincing, and defend loving admiration in this article. In Section 2, I summarize Protasi's nuanced account of envy. In Section 2, (...) I argue that irrespective of how we analyze emotions in general we can argue that it is preferable to prioritize the cultivation of some emotions over others. In Section 4, I challenge Protasi's assumptions about the affinity between love and envy. My core argument is in Section 5 where I examine envy's impact on the envier, the envied, and relationships. Envy impedes an authentic relationship to the goods and goals in the envier's life, alienates the envied, and stifles joint-action. From all perspectives admiration typically fares better. After briefly considering the objection that admiration may impede love in Section 6, I conclude, in section seven, that admiration should be preferred to emulative envy in our intimate relationships. (shrink)

My paper considers the role of wonder and admiration in times of crisis. I argue that wonder should be understood in René Descartes’ (1649/1989) sense, as a response to something unfamiliar that is based on the object, rather than our judgements about it. In contrast, in admiration, we must judge the objects as admirable, that they have some valuable traits. In ordinary times, it may be immoral acts that stand out as unfamiliar and so provoke wonder. However, I will focus (...) on the importance of wonder in times of crisis, to recognise the unfamiliar, when many or most are treating the immoral as normal, as Hannah Arendt (2003) describes it. Then admiration is the response that can enable us to take the unfamiliar as valuable moral exemplars and to emulate them. Nevertheless, I will argue, contra Linda Zagzebski (2015) that we can admire a person, action, or character trait without necessarily being motivated to emulate them. Also, I contend that we can have ambivalent feelings mixed with our admiration and still be moved to emulate others. The complexity of the relation between these three emotions and attitudes—wonder, admiration, and emulation—means that while they can contribute to resistance to immorality in times of crisis, they are untrustworthy in myriad ways. (shrink)

This essay examines the reception of Grotius’s pioneering Annotata ad Vetus Testamentum in the ‘Biblia Americana’, a scriptural commentary written by the New England theologian Cotton Mather. Mather engaged with Grotius on issues of translation, biblical authorship, inspiration, the canon, and the legitimate forms of interpreting the Hebrew Bible as Christian Scripture. While frequently relying on the Dutch Arminian humanist in discussing philological problems or contextual questions, Mather in many cases rejected, ignored, or significantly modified Grotius’s farther-reaching conclusions on (...) dogmatically sensitive topics. This strategy marks Mather’s ‘Biblia Americana’ as an exemple of a highly sophisticated but ultimately apologetic type of biblical criticism in the context of the early Enlightenment in British North America. (shrink)

In philosophical analyses of the value of sport, a relatively unheralded feature is the opportunity that sport offers for admiration. While we readily salute many of the things that people admire (...

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Many Mansions? Multiple Religious Belonging and Christian IdentityJames L. FredericksMany Mansions? Multiple Religious Belonging and Christian Identity. Edited by Catherine Cornille. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2002. 152 pp."A heightened and widespread awareness of religious pluralism," according to Catherine Cornille, "has presently left the religious person with the choice not only of which religion, but also how many religions she or he might belong to" (p. 1). (...) What Cornille calls "multiple religious belonging," therefore, merits our theological attention. I agree, even though I am not convinced that the phenomenon is very widespread and certainly not a trend. In any event, Cornille does us a great service in raising the issue of multiple religious belonging. The book should be widely read and discussed.Lest there be any confusion, Cornille is skeptical of bourgeois Westerners making facile claims about being Buddhists or Taoists and does not consider this "belonging." She argues (following Raymundo Panikkar) that religious belonging entails a twofold movement: first, a conscious (not "anonymous") identification with a religious community, and second, being recognized by that community as a member. Promoters of New Age spirituality therefore do not practice multiple religious belonging as defined by Cornille. In fact, New Age religiosity is not a form of belonging at all to the extent that it rejects the normativity of any religious claim. Furthermore, belonging is more than admiration for another religion and acceptance of selected beliefs from that religion. In this case, Christians such as myself, who have dedicated themselves to the study of Buddhism, cultivated Buddhist friends, studied with Buddhist teachers and who practice forms of Buddhist meditation within a Christian liturgical context, but do not self-identify as Buddhists, should not be considered examples of multiple religious belonging. All this seems very sensible to me. Oddly, none of the contributors actually endorse multiple religious belonging as defined by Cornille. There is, however, much discussion regarding possible theological foundations for it.At the beginning of his essay, Jacques Dupuis recognizes that multiple religious belonging poses serious theological problems for Christian believers. Clearly this is [End Page 167] the case. A Christian professing to be a Buddhist is theologically unintelligible. Dupuis, however, goes on to caution theologians such as myself to go slow in coming to any conclusions about the propriety of multiple religious belonging. In this, I also am in agreement. The church should be patient with multiple religious belongers in the hope of learning from them. If this means putting theological concerns on hold for the time being, so be it. This would not be the first time that theology would be playing catch-up ball with new forms of Christian spiritual practice. Multiple religious belonging may prove to be a genuine possibility for Christian spiritual practice. Theology will have a legitimate voice in making such a determination. Dupuis is right to counsel caution.Not all of the contributors take the theological problems posed by multiple religious belonging as seriously as Dupuis does. Raymundo Panikkar, for example, deals with the problem by dismissing the importance of doctrine to religious identity. Apparently, one is free to believe anything one wants and still call oneself a Christian, a Sikh, or a Muslim, provided that one is accepted by these communities as a member. In minimizing the importance of doctrine, Panikkar takes pains to separate faith from mere belief, as if making this strict distinction between the two were the only alternative to fundamentalism. Once faith transcends the institutional boundaries that distinguish religions, the test for religious belonging is sociological, not theological. Conflicting doctrinal claims distinguishing religious communities from one another are not a problem for multiple religious belonging because doctrinal consistency has little to do with one's multiple religious identities.Even more than Panikkar, Francis X. Clooney is untroubled by the theological problems attending multiple religious belonging. Starting with Hindu texts (primarily the Mutal Tiruvantati), Clooney builds bridges to a Christian text (Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius Loyola) and concludes that God will be with us in whatever way suits us. "However someone takes refuge in me," Vishnu assures us in the Gita, "in that way I do favor them." The devotee supplies the imagination. God never fails... (shrink)

ABSTRACTIn philosophical analyses of the value of sport, a relatively unheralded feature is the opportunity that sport offers for admiration. While we readily salute many of the things that people...

Isaiah Berlin is widely acknowledged as a major figure in twentieth-century political philosophy and the history of ideas. His famous Oxford inaugural lecture, Two Concepts of Liberty, especially the last, crucial, section, entitled The One and the Many, has provoked a vast secondary literature. So it is surprising that until now there has been no substantial critical reader dedicated to his work.Editors George Crowder and Henry Hardy have admirably filled this need with this stimulating new volume, which provides a (...) systematic and comprehensive treatment of the main aspects of Berlin's work. The essays (all but two of which are newly commissioned) critically examine Berlin's work across its whole range, including his treatment of Marx, Russian thinkers, Jewish themes, liberty, pluralism, the Enlightenment and Counter-Enlightenment, nationalism, history, and religion.The contributors are: Jonathan Allen (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign); Shlomo Avineri (Hebrew University, Jerusalem); Terrell Carver (University of Bristol); Joshua L. Cherniss (Harvard and Oxford Universities); George Crowder (Flinders University); William A. Galston (University of Maryland); Graeme Garrard (Cardiff University); Ryan Hanley (Marquette University); Henry Hardy (Oxford University); Michael Jinkins (Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary); David Miller (Oxford University); Mario Ricciardi (University of Milan); and Andrzej Walicki (University of Notre Dame).Complete with a valuable bibliography, this outstanding collection of recent scholarship on a seminal thinker shows the continuing relevance and importance of Berlin's many contributions to the understanding of our contemporary predicament.George Crowder (Adelaide, Australia), associate professor in the School of Political and International Studies at Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia, is the author of Classical Anarchism, Liberalism and Value Pluralism and Isaiah Berlin: Liberty and Pluralism.Henry Hardy (Oxford, England), a Fellow of Wolfson College (Oxford, England), Isaiah Berlin's editor, and one of his literary trustees, has edited or co-edited 17 books by Isaiah Berlin, most recently Political Ideas in the Romantic Age, Flourishing: Letters 1928-1946, and The Soviet Mind: Russian Culture under Communism. He is currently working with Jennifer Holmes on an edition of Berlin's letters. (shrink)

Diodorus Siculus was notoriously inconsistent in his statements about the terminal date of his survey of history, the Bibliotheca Historica. In the ‘table of contents’ which he included in the general preface to the whole work, written apparently when he was preparing his manuscript for publication , he specifically names the year 60/59 as the last year of his narrative. Elsewhere, however, he not only gives a figure for the period of history encompassed by his work which would bring it (...) down to 46/5, but he also on several occasions expresses the intention of including within his narrative some account of Julius Caesar's activities in Gaul, which implies a terminal date later than c. 52 B.C. How can this discrepancy be explained? The most economical hypothesis would be that Diodorus set out at first to compose a work that should go down to 46/5, but at some later stage in the composition changed his mind, and set back his terminus to 60/59. His originally intended terminus was most likely the triple triumph of Julius Caesar, whom Diodorus clearly admired beyond all other contemporary leaders. The decision in favour of an earlier terminus will have been due either to simple fatigue or to disillusionment with the course followed by Caesar's heir after 44 b.c. and anxiety about the dangers of dealing with events of a too recent and controversial past. (shrink)

In her dedicated promotion of feminism and pacifism, especially during the 1930s, Vera Brittain (1893–1970) was strongly influenced by Ber­trand Russell’s writings, especially Marriage and Morals (1929) and Which Way to Peace? (1936). Both were members of the Peace Pledge Union, and she continued as a sponsor after Russell abandoned his pac­ifism soon after the beginning of the Second World War. She admired his political and social activism in the aftermath of that war, endorsing it as much as her family (...) situation allowed; and, as chairman of the Peace News board, Brittain intervened in Russell’s support when a dispute broke out between him and the editor. Although their rela­tionship was personally limited, Russell’s influence on her opinions and actions was profound. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy and Rhetoric 36.4 (2003) 353-375 [Access article in PDF] A Rhetoric for Polytheistic Democracy: Walt Whitman's "Poem of Many in One" Peter Simonson Department of Communication University of Pittsburgh This essay aims to generate rhetorically oriented normative communication theory useful for the current socio-intellectual moment. It draws upon Walt Whitman's 1850s poetry as an artistically compelling statement of what I call polytheistic democracy, a form of life (...) marked by three overlapping ideals: pluralistic tolerance for multiple gods and moral orientations; commitment to recognizing, preserving, and artfully representing socio-cultural variety; and receptivity to contact with a diverse range of particular others. Whitman offers theory in the sense of a structured way of seeing. It is normative in that it describes a world that might be, not one that is, and provides orienting visions, regulative ideals, and topoi of praise and criticism that stand available to guide the communicative practices of individuals, groups, and institutions alike.The theory is "rhetorically oriented" in that it draws upon techniques and vocabularies developed within the rhetorical tradition. Methodologically, it is generated through rhetorical criticism and imitatio. I offer a reading that brings out the rhetorical dynamics of Whitman's vision of polytheistic democracy as articulated in his 1856 "Poem of Many in One" (later and canonically titled "By Blue Ontario's Shore"), a central social statement in his much-revised masterwork, Leaves of Grass. In so doing, I hold Whitman up as a model for imitatio, the complex interpretive practice whereby, in Michael Leff's words, historical texts come to serve "as equipment for future rhetorical production" (1997, 201). Imitatio is an intellectually generative process. "As the embodied utterances of the past are interpreted for current application, their ideas and modes of articulation are reembodied, and old voices are recovered for use in new circumstances" (203).I couple imitatio with a neo-pragmatist rhetorical criticism oriented toward practice and reflection in the current cultural moment. Whitman gains significance insofar as he helps us experience, think about, and act [End Page 353] within the worlds we now traverse. 1 Among other qualities, those worlds are marked by heterogeneous groups and people who must continuously find ways to live with one another; by large institutions that stand as steady reminders that individuals may not matter very much; by ubiquitous electronic and print media offering copious streams of symbolic culture; and by countervailing geographical forces of circulation and social segmentation of fleshly bodies in the material spaces of public life. In worlds with such qualities, Whitman is a useful locus of imitatio—someone whose cosmopolitan social imagination, deep pluralism, wide-ranging habits of contact, and attention to corporeal individuals all serve as useful equipment for new rhetorical and moral production."Poem of Many in One" has a self-exemplifying 2 aspect to it, for it models what it aims to cultivate in the world. Whitman's print-based rhetoric provides an overarching vision of polytheistic democracy and mass community, scattered across time and space and actualized partly through individuals. His discourse models this social condition by displaying radical openness to high and low, sacred and profane, the admired and the socially despised. It is rhetorically driven by a copious style and an aesthetically oriented democratic ethos that Whitman's mediated eloquence aims also to generate in its readers. Its success thus hinges on readerly receptivity and cultivated ethos that re-embodies aspects of his sensibility and rhetorical techniques, giving them new momentum in scattered realms of social being.I amplify key components of Whitman's normative vision not to trump competing moral principles and orientations but to supplement them. In this sense, my essay is pluralist all the way down. It is socially pluralist in that I believe in encouraging the development and preservation of multiple sets of normative orientations, with no single principle or moral perspective ordering all others. It is individually pluralist in that I understand moral principles as interpretive and rhetorical resources deployed and judged on the basis of their contingent appropriateness and usefulness. 3 "One does not... (shrink)

The serious formal investigation of n-valued systems of logic for n>2 dates back to Post's 1921 doctoral dissertation. The primary use for such structures, however, has been as model-theoretic devices in the investigation of systems of lower order. Ackermann's short book now comes as a welcome addition to the literature dealing with the formal properties and applications of n-valued systems in their own right. Ackermann begins with a general discussion of implicational calculi in which fundamental ideas of validity, well-formedness, and (...) other basic notions are set forth elegantly and clearly. While assuming the classical implicational calculus as an underlying substructure, Ackermann next motivates a consideration of possible modifications of the formal system in the direction of greater generality by means of the standard Lewis objections to the reading of "⊃" as "implies." This leads to the well known story of strict entailment, introduction of modal operators, and then a four-valued matrix as an underlying semantics for the expanded system. There then follows a good general discussion of the properties of many-valued logics, various nonstandard propositional calculi, and an admirable presentation of the Lukasiewicz-Tarski propositional calculus, accompanied by a number of important metatheorems. Ackermann also includes chapters on alternative multivalued [[sic]] systems and a glance at their applications. One would like to see, however, some discussion of such controversial matters as n-valued quantificational theory and the well-known objections to the entire program of nonstandard logistic theory. There is a good bibliography of important books and articles in the field.—H. P. K. (shrink)

This will be an admittedly opinionated review that gives with one hand and takes with the other. Let me be clear though from the outset that there is much to admire and agree with here. Perhaps, the biggest complaint is the failure of the author to engage with other highly relevant literature in philosophy of science and metaphysics that would yield her natural allies or would provide natural foils that ought to be named and engaged. On the allies side, there (...) are many people now writing in the vein of emergence that have made many of the same claims and used many of the same case studies to bolster their claims as Thalos. Surely, this requires a response on her part given that “emergence” is one of her primary foils. Rather than discussing those people’s work, she chooses to focus on a particular brand of emergence as a foil and thereby throws out the baby with the bathwater. Thalos also fails to engage the huge and highly relevant literature on the causal (or d .. (shrink)

The many admirable, endearing—and frustrating—features of Boston Personalism are beautifully reflected in this book. It should be welcomed for several reasons. It is timely; indeed, it comes at a moment that may show an upsurge of interest in the Personalist tradition. It is handsome; Mercer University Press should be praised for producing a book that is a physical delight to hold and to read. It is solid; the editors should be congratulated for successfully turning a series of videotaped lectures (...) into a book with intellectual substance and thematic integrity. The lectures themselves, given in 1984 as part of a course taught by Paul Deats and John Lavely at Boston University, were funded by a grant from the Divisions of Higher Education of the United Methodist Church. (shrink)

Socrates’ admirers and successors in the fourth century and beyond often felt the need to explain Socrates’ reputed relationship with Alcibiades, and to defend Socrates against the charge that he was a corrupting influence on Alcibiades. In this paper I examine Plato’s response to this problem and have two main aims. First, I will argue in Section 2 that (...) two central points: that motivations associated with the spirited part of the soul play a decisive role in moral education, particularly in the case of exceptionally ambitious and talented individuals; and that the democratic Many themselves, not Socrates, are primarily responsible for the corruption of promising young men like Alcibiades. These points are connected, moreover: the Many exert a moral influence on the young by shaping and exploiting their spirited motivations. I aim to show that Plato develops and dramatizes this diagnosis of the problem of Alcibiades in three earlier dialogues—Protagoras, Gorgias, and Symposium—as well as in Book 6 of the Republic. My second main claim will be that the psychological and educational theories of the Republic are informed by Plato’s diagnosis of the problem of Alcibiades, and that they are conceived, at least in part, as a solution to that problem. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Evil as the Good?A Reply to Brook ZiporynDavid R. LoyI was surprised to receive this lengthy response to my short review—yet not displeased, for the important question is, of course, how much Professor Ziporyn's reply helps to clarify the issues at stake, which we agree deserve to be pursued. One of the many admirable aspects of his Evil and/or/as the Good is that, in addition to presenting the (...) Tiantai ethical position in its historical context, it argues forcefully for the validity and relevance of that approach today. Moreover, I am pleased at the way Ziporyn's response focuses the argument of his rich and dense book, so I welcome this opportunity to continue the discussion. And perhaps those who have read this far will also be pleased that I am able to present my main concerns somewhat more concisely.Ziporyn begins with the relationship between ultimate and provisional truth, usually the crux of the matter from a Mahāyāna perspective. In response to a point I make—that ethically the nondual 'ultimate' point of view needs to be supplemented by a provisional 'lower truth' that distinguishes between good and evil—he emphasizes that according to Tiantai "conventional truth and ultimate truth are actually identical" (his italics) and that the conventional truth embraces all possible assertions, beliefs, and positions. Later, he elaborates that "provisional truth is a portion of ultimate truth, in a peculiar omnicentric sort of whole/part relation in which each part in fact contains the whole." The important term remains identity, for according to Tiantai "the idea that two entities might be mutually implicative and dependent, not adventitiously but in their nature, and yet not identical, is logically impossible." Ethically, of course, this means something more than the interdependence of good and evil: it is not only that "the most horrible evils are ineradicable, built into the absolute unchangeable nature of all existence, and fully and eternally present even in Buddhahood," but that "greed, anger, and delusion would be seen to be identical with Buddhahood, in accordance with precisely this Tiantai doctrine of the interpenetration of good and evil."As in the original review, my main point is that this emphasis on the identity of conventional truth and ultimate truth is an important insight, but one that turns out to be quite problematic ethically. Its value is mostly epistemological and metaphysical: it helps us escape from the kind of dualism that often postulates some 'higher' transcendental reality corresponding to a 'higher' ultimate truth. Instead, the 'higher' is not separate from the provisional and conventional, but the truth (whether realized or not) is that the whole 'ultimate' is completely contained within each conventional part or provisional position.Dōgen somewhere makes the point that the goal is not to eradicate concepts (which is a dualistic approach to practice, seeking a purified mind that transcends language) but to liberate concepts. What becomes important is our ability to move [End Page 348] (and play) freely among the multiplicity of linguistic possibilities—in Ziporyn's terms, to 'recontextualize' without getting stuck in any particular context or conceptual system. Nothing is lacking in any of these possibilities; in terms of Indra's Net, each node manifests the whole. We are not liberated from language, except in the sense that we are not trapped in any particular language game; rather, we are liberated in language. We should not blame the victim: the problem is not language itself, but our tendencies to cling to some concepts, et cetera, more than others- including, for example, our dualistic tendency to discriminate between 'good' and 'evil' in order to identify with the former by annihilating the latter (a very timely topic, unfortunately).But good and evil for Ziporyn are more than interdependent. He claims that they are identical, and that is where difficulties arise. The epistemological point about the identity of the two truths becomes more problematical when we move into ethics, where the 'cash value' is somewhat more obvious and immediate, in the sense that we need ethics to help us cope with moral choices that we find ourselves required to make in daily life, in circumstances not always... (shrink)

All of Freud's more recent writings extol the virtues of the scientific method. “The Future of an Illusion” ends with the definite suggestion that religious instruction be taken from the list of topics taught every child and that in its place children be taught to interpret reality in terms of natural science. A similar theme runs through “Civilization and its Discontents”; if there be any hope for humanity, it lies in the scientific method. Finally, Freud's “New Introductory Lectures” ends with (...) the following lines—lines which must be very reassuring to many admirers of Freud who have been somewhat discomfited by some of the recent highly speculative passages from his pen. (shrink)

Joining his monumental erudition in the phenomenology of religion with affinity and skill in the arts, Gerardus van der Leeuw has produced a really beautiful work. Tracing the genesis of the various arts from an original unity in expressive religious dance, through their assertions of independence as distinctive secular forms marked by the individualism of their practioners, he tries to show that each art form structurally expresses an aspect of the holy. His concern is to prepare for the reunification of (...) the arts based on a religious esthetics. The writing is somewhat diffuse but graceful, the presentation descriptive rather than argumentative. Throughout, one senses the quality of the author's cultivation and concern. The posthumous translation and publication of this work gives his many admirers in the English-speaking world a fitting memorial of a beloved master.—W. G. E. (shrink)

Rachel Zuckert - The Purposiveness of Form: A Reading of Kant's Aesthetic Formalism - Journal of the History of Philosophy 44:4 Journal of the History of Philosophy 44.4 599-622 Muse Search Journals This Journal Contents The Purposiveness of Form: A Reading of Kant's Aesthetic Formalism Rachel Zuckert In the "critique of aesthetic judgment," Kant claims that when we find an object beautiful, we are appreciating its "purposive form." Many of Kant's readers have found this claim one of his least (...) interesting and most easily criticized claims about aesthetic experience. Detractors hold up his aesthetics as a paradigmatic case of narrow formalism; and even many admirers of Kant's aesthetics take Kant's claims about form to be problematic, but argue that they are inessential to his aesthetics . Though these critics come to differing evaluations of Kant's aesthetics as a whole, they agree on two points. First, interpretively: that when Kant claims that it is the "form" of an object we find beautiful, he means that in aesthetic appreciation, we find certain spatial and/or temporal properties aesthetically pleasing—and that such properties are exclusively responsible for an object's beauty. Second, evaluatively: that Kant is wrong, at least about this. In this paper, I shall propose that we need not endorse either claim. I shall argue that one may interpret Kant's.. (shrink)

James Woodward’s Making Things Happen presents the most fully developed version of a manipulability theory of causation. Although the ‘interventionist’account of causation that Woodward defends in Making Things Happen has many admirable qualities, Michael Strevens argues that it has a fatal flaw. Strevens maintains that Woodward’s interventionist account of causation renders facts about causation relative to an individual’s perspective. In response to this charge, Woodward claims that although on his account X might be a relativized cause of Y relative (...) to some perspective, this does not lead to the problematic relativity that Strevens claims. Roughly, Woodward argues this is so because if X is a relativized cause of Y with respect to some perspective, then X is a cause of Y simpliciter. So, the truth of whether X is a cause of Y is not relative to one’s perspective. Strevens counters by arguing that Woodward’s response fails because relativized causation is not monotonic. In this paper I argue that Strevens’ argument that relativized causation is not monotonic is unsound. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Rights of Women: Reclaiming a Lost Vision by Erika BachiochiAngela KnobelThe Rights of Women: Reclaiming a Lost Vision by Erika Bachiochi (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2021), 422 pp.Erika Bachiochi's The Rights of Women is animated by a clear vision: a vision of men and women as possessors of the same nature and engaged in the same shared enterprise. Men and women possess the (...) same nature because they are rational animals and hence fulfilled by living a life that exhibits the fullness of their rational human nature, and they are engaged in the same enterprise because both naturally pursue the same good: the common good of their families and societies. Bachiochi argues that this Aristotelian and communitarian understanding of the relationship between the sexes was the original vision of feminism: it was the vision of the early feminist Mary [End Page 742] Wollenstonecraft, and likewise the vision that inspired and animated our nation's founding mothers. As feminism's most famous advocates began to adopt the language of the Enlightenment and its incoherent emphasis on "rights," however, Wollenstonecraft's robust and sensible understanding of the right relationship between the sexes was gradually left behind. Modern feminism, Bachiochi argues, needs to reclaim Wollenstonecraft's vision, and has indeed already begun to do so in the communitarian and dignitarian work of Mary Ann Glendon.As is evident from the preceding, there are three distinct claims advanced in Bachiochi's book. First—and this I take to be the overarching thesis of the book—there is a claim about how feminism ought to understand the relationship between the sexes (i.e., in terms of Aristotelian flourishing and natural law). Second, there is the claim that feminism originally did understand the relationship between the sexes in this way. Finally (this is the third thesis), there is the claim that modern feminists have lost this vision, and that the solution to our current woes is to reclaim it. It is important to notice that truth of the first thesis does not depend on the truth of the second or the third, or vice versa. Because the first thesis is to my mind the most interesting and important of the three, it will be the focus of my remarks here. But it is worth making a few brief remarks about the other two theses, if only because so much of the book's content is devoted them.Did early feminists have a clear vision of the right relationship between the sexes, a vision informed by Aristotle and natural law? Did later feminists discard that clear vision? Is Enlightenment philosophy to blame? This is a common narrative, particularly in pro-life circles, and I think there is certainly an element of truth to it. I think Bachiochi rightly recognizes an Aristotelian strain in Wollenstonecraft, and rightly applauds the early feminist advocacy of virtue. What I am not quite ready to accept, though, is the "clear" part of the clear vision. Early feminists subscribed to many admirable views. They also seem to have held some less admirable ones. However laudable her advocacy of virtue and chastity may have been, for instance, Wollenstonecraft seems to have had a very dim view of men (45). Similarly, I found the "voluntary motherhood" movement, which Bachiochi applauds, repellent. If disharmony between the sexes arose from men having too much control over women's sexual lives, harmony will hardly be restored by reversing the equation and instead giving women complete control over sex (109). My own instinct (which this book only reaffirmed) is to think that feminism as a movement has always been a bit confused, has always had some good goals and some that were less so. I think this, in [End Page 743] part, because I am not sure that a coherent "feminism" is possible. I shall say more about this below.Bachiochi's real claim, of course, is that there is a right way to understand men and women, and consequently a right way to be a feminist. But my genuine appreciation for and affirmation of her view of what the right relationship between the... (shrink)

Presentists believe that only present things exist. Their theories, at first glance, seem to offer many admirable features: a simple ontology, and a meaningful, objective status for key temporal phenomena, such as the present moment and the passage of time. So intuitive is this theory that, as John Bigelow puts it, presentism was “believed by everyone...until at least the nineteenth century”. Yet, in the last 200 years presentism has been beset by criticisms from both physicists and metaphysicians. One of (...) the most significant criticisms is that presentists cannot provide an acceptable system of truthmaking. If there is no past, how can there still be truths about the past? In this paper, I introduce a new theory of presentism, which addresses this problem in a novel way: by simply denying that there are any truths about the past. While prima facie an unintuitive position, I will argue that a sensible presentist philosophy of this kind can be described, so long as it is accompanied by an appropriate system of physics. I will also indicate at certain points that adopting presentism could allow us to understand fundamental physics in new, more intuitive ways. By the end of the paper, I hope to not only show that hard presentism is a defensible theory of time, but also that it could offer a number of advantages to the physicist and the philosopher alike. (shrink)

Was Parmenides a distinguished ‘astronomer’ and ‘biologist’ other than the great ‘philosopher’ he has been unanimously considered from the times of Plato onwards? Many admirers of the ‘philosopher’ are not just refractory to consider this possibility: they simply ignore what Parmenides was able to discover in the additional domains I have just mentioned. But he was great as an ‘astronomer’ and a ‘biologist’ too, probably not less great than as a ‘philosopher’.The aim of this paper is to supply (...) the basic information about Parmenides' achievements in these domains, that were of the highest order, I presume.Presocratic Philosophy and ‟Natural Theology”. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Richard Rorty Lays Down the LawLeon SuretteRichard Rorty has found a large cross-disciplinary academic audience for his argument that philosophy ought to abandon its self-appointed role as a foundational discipline and adopt the “ironic” and “conversational” practices of literary criticism. Explicitly invoking early pragmatism—which argued that philosophy should join the natural sciences and regard itself as “the workshop of being, where we catch fact in the making” 1 —Rorty (...) argues that philosophers should now abandon the natural sciences, and become “edifiers” and “ironist theorists” on the model of literary criticism. 2Rorty’s pragmatism amounts to the claim that philosophy ought to wind up and put away its long preoccupation with metaphysics, ontology, and epistemology and abandon the pretense of deductive rigor to become “dialectical.” This newly reformed philosophy would, as Rorty puts it, “play off vocabularies against one another, rather than merely... infer propositions from one another” (CIS, p. 78). Rorty’s belief in philosophy as a form of conversation may owe less to American pragmatism, however, than to Continental hermeneutics (particularly Hans Georg Gadamer’s Truth and Method). Nevertheless, I intend to take him at his word, and apply the fundamental tenet of pragmatism to his own theorizing. I take the following remark by William James as definitional of American pragmatism: “What practical difference would it make to any one if this notion rather than that notion were true? If no practical difference whatever can be traced, then the alternatives mean practically the same thing, and all dispute is idle. Whenever a dispute is serious, we ought to be able to show that some practical difference that must follow from one side or the other’s being right” (PR, p. 26).In the light of this pragmatic principal, most philosophical and [End Page 261] literary theories make little if any practical difference to the practice of literary criticism, although philosophy and theory can displace, occlude, or banish it. The whole issue turns on what is meant by the term, literary criticism. Rorty assumes that criticism is an interpretive activity, and that nothing further need be said. Yet interpretation is not the sole activity of literary criticism, nor is the practice of literary interpretation sufficiently well formulated to serve as a model upon which philosophy could reform itself.Although Rorty’s proposed reformation of philosophy on the model of literary criticism is seen by many literary critics as a friendly takeover, it can just as easily be seen as hostile, as an updating and domestication of Hans Georg Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics, which would make interpretation foundational for all of the knowledge industries. With respect to his paternalistic attitude toward literary criticism, Rorty is very much within a philosophical tradition of foundationalism that begins, as far as literary criticism is concerned, with Plato’s Ion. Whereas Plato argued that literary criticism is a misguided or unworthy form of discourse, Rorty turns it into an approved variety of philosophical discourse. But he can achieve this end only by occluding (through misrepresentation) the praxis of literary criticism as it has been constituted both within and without the academy.Rorty’s project of “edification” through the reform of philosophy as “conversation” was first proposed in Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (pp. 360, 371) and has subsequently been refined in Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity, where it becomes the Nietzschean project of “making the best selves for ourselves that we can” (p. 80). This goal is said to be achieved through “literary criticism,” which he describes as “the attempt to play off vocabularies against one another” (pp. 78–79). Such an idea is enormously flattering to literary critics, and, not surprisingly, has garnered Rorty many admirers in literature departments. But it rests upon a highly selective characterization of literary criticism—a characterization which conforms roughly to New Critical and Deconstructive practice, though not to longer-standing critical practices.Rorty ignores literary criticism’s long standing self-definition as the reinterpretation or redescription of object texts. Instead, he assumes that the practice of Harold Bloom, in which both “creative” and critical discourse are regarded as varieties of usurpation or “misprision,” is standard. Rorty speaks of “literary discourse” as a... (shrink)

Whitehead's process view of God has inspired many admirers and provoked many critics. This article does not only examine this view of God as generally opposed to traditional theism, but it also explains why a process God is for Whitehead a necessary requirement for the metaphysical nature of the actual world. After discussing God's necessary functions in the world, the paper assesses the significance of Whitehead's process conception of God through a comparison with the traditional theistic view (...) of God. (shrink)

Comparatively under-valued in the past, cats today enjoy privileged status as domestic pets, following a long process of reassessment that started in the eighteenth century. This article shows how the first book in French devoted to the species, Les Chats (1727) by François-Auguste de Paradis de Moncrif, contributed to this change. Previously, the cat was seen as a feminine and frivolous creature, but the “historiogriffe”, (historian of claws as Voltaire called him), took it as a historical subject, combining two models (...) of masculinity, the erudite and the courtly, which had been kept apart in the Quarrel between the Ancients and Moderns. His erudition allowed him to criticize cat-phobia by referring to Oriental custom, but also to quote many admirers of cats of both sexes in high French society. Moncrif thus succeeded in bringing together a learned emotional community of cat-lovers, male and female, to show that it was perfectly justified and reasonable to be fond of a cat. (shrink)

Augustine is the person from the ancient world about whom we know most. He is the author of an intimate masterpiece, the Confessions, which continues to delight its many admirers. In it he writes about his infancy and his schooling in the classics in late Roman North Africa, his remarkable mother, his sexual sins ('Give me chastity, but not yet,' he famously prayed), his time in an outlawed heretical sect, his worldly career and friendships and his gradual return (...) to God. His account of his own eventual conversion is a classic study of anguish, hesitation and what he believes to be God's intervention. It has inspired philosophers, Christian thinkers and monastic followers, but it still leaves readers wondering why exactly Augustine chose to compose a work like none before it. Robin Lane Fox follows Augustine on a brilliantly described journey, combining the latest scholarship with recently found letters and sermons by Augustine himself to give a portrait of his subject which is subtly different from older biographies. Augustine's heretical years as a Manichaean, his relation to non-Christian philosophy, his mystical aspirations and the nature of his conversion are among the aspects of his life which stand out in a sharper light. For the first time Lane Fox compares him with two contemporaries, an older pagan and a younger Christian, each of whom also wrote about themselves and who illumine Augustine's life and writings by their different choices. More than a decade passed between Augustine's conversion and his beginning the Confessions. Lane Fox argues that the Confessions and their thinking were the results of a long gestation over these years, not a sudden change of perspective, but that they were then written as a single swift composition and that its final books are a coherent consummation of its scriptural meditation and personal biography. This exceptional study reminds us why we are so excited and so moved by Augustine's story. Praise for Pagans and Christians 'This open-hearted and learned book is one that any scholar of the ancient world and of early Christianity would be proud to have written... Lane Fox has opened his pages to let in an entirely new world.' Peter Brown, New York Review of Books 'A work of generous humanity and recondite erudition... of consuming interest to all of us who want to know and understand the consequences of the ancient world.' Henry Chadwick, Financial Times Praise for The Unauthorised Version 'I don't know where one would turn for an account of the Bible so clear, so lively and, in many respects, so just.' Frank Kermode, Guardian 'Magnificent... delivered with authority and verve. Learned but never pedantic, he is an unfailingly incisive, thought-provoking, humane, courteous, and often entertaining guide.' Economist. (shrink)

For many centuries, heroic virtue has been for the Congregation of the Causes of the Saints the golden rule to assess sanctity. It was Prospero Lambertini who developed the criteria, setting an extremely high standard that at the same time fitted the various types and stages of human life. With the shift from admiration to imitation of the saints, new methods of studying their life became necessary. From the 20th century onwards, heroicity of virtue was defined by the Congregation (...) in terms not of unusual and extraordinary actions, but the constant and exact fulfilment of the duties of one’s state of life. Sanctity in the canonical sense, according to the Second Vatican Council, differs in degree and does not constitute a different species in the genus “good Catholic”. The new laws for beatification employ no longer the courtroom model, investigating separate virtues, but the academic model of researching and writing a doctoral dissertation, with the accent on a person’s spiritual growth. What makes the saints different from other Christians is their particularly focused passion; the real significance of their life, however, only becomes clear when it is over. It is then, too, that we can understand their specific mission and their meaning for the life of the Church, as tradition at its most living and models of holiness for their particular age. The study of the live of the saints , necessary to assess sanctity, needs its own method. Belonging as they do to a tradition that is essentially religious, the true image of the saints is best perceived by the light of faith. Hagiology cannot, however, ignore modern science. Not only does it depend on the material gathered by historians, it also needs history and psychology for its interpretation. The final judgment pertains to the Pope, or to be more precise, to the Spirit. (shrink)

Many past and present events in the world clearly reflect the miserable failure of modern leadership across the globe. This has significantly contributed to the crisis of survival of humankind today. If humans and their environment are to survive, we need to search for the appropriate leadership model. To that effect this paper discusses the major tenets of the Gandhian and Machiavellian models of leadership in a comparative manner. The paper shows how and why the Gandhian model is admirable, (...) attractive, timely, relevant and redeeming, while the Machiavellian model is not. (shrink)

Although it is not immediately evident from the title page, this book is dedicated to William A. Wallace. This will be welcome news indeed to Wallace's many admirers, and a fitting tribute to a scholar who has contributed so much to the history and philosophy of science. The sixteen articles that comprise the volume are almost evenly split between the philosophy and history of science, with seven articles included within philosophy of science in Part I under the rubric (...) of "Contemporary Issues," and nine articles on the history of science in Part II bearing the title "Historical Studies." In a helpful, brief introduction, the editor briefly describes each article, most of which emphasize methodology. (shrink)

Many academic works as well as many works of art are such that if they had never been produced, no one would be worse off. Yet it is hard to resist the judgment that some such works are good nonetheless. We are rightly grateful that these works were created; we rightly admire them, appreciate them, and take pains to preserve them. And the authors and artists who produced them have reason to be proud. This should lead us to (...) question the view that in order for a thing to be good, in a sense which implies that the thing merits our attention and positive concern, it needs to be good for someone or something whose welfare is enhanced by it. (shrink)

Offers many fresh insights that will give even longtime readers of Shakespeare a new appreciation of the great master. Scholars have long debated the extent of Shakespeare's education. Although his friend and admirer Ben Jonson said of him, "thou hadst small Latine and lesse Greek," Shakespeare's plays reveal a wide familiarity with literary and philosophical works from the Renaissance, the Middle Ages, and the classical age. Philosopher Farhang Zabeeh delves into this fascinating topic in this detailed study of the (...) philosophical influences evident in Shakespeare's plays and sonnets. Readers will be surprised and delighted to discover in Shakespeare unmistakable echoes of Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Dante, Montaigne, and other famous thinkers. In one chapter, the author makes a convincing case that one of the bard's most famous comic characters, John Falstaff, is a parody of Socrates. In other chapters, he demonstrates indirect references to Plato in Shakespearean passages concerning appearance versus reality, as well as the influence of Aristotle's ethics. Other common philosophical themes evident in the plays concern the nature of time, subjectivity versus objectivity, and political and moral values. (shrink)

'The many virtues of Constitutional Justice are evident throughout the piece. The author should be congratulated for even attempting to construct a normative theory of liberal constitutionalism... Constitutional Justice is a work that faithfully carries on the grand tradition of normative legal thought. No small task, and Allan succeeds admirably.' -Law and Politics Book ReviewThis book offers a systematic interpretation of the ideal of the rule of law, arguing that the principles it identifies provide the foundations of a liberal (...) democratic legal order. It explains the essential connections between a range of matters fundamental to the relationship between citizen and state, including freedoms of speech and conscience, civil disobedience, procedural fairness, administrative justice, the right of silence, and equal protection or equality before the law. The principles of public law are interpreted in the light of liberal legal and political philosophy.Readership: Scholars and students of law, philosophy, and politics. (shrink)

James Doyle’s book is provocative and timely. It is an important contribution to the current wave of Anscombe scholarship, and it offers valuable insights into general metaethical ques­tions, such as: In what senses might morality be “unintelligible”? Or: To what extent does a divine law ethics rest on practical reason? Here, I do not want to summarize the many ad­mirable features of Doyle’s book. I will instead focus on his two main theses, of which I re­main unconvinced.

As many authors have acknowledged in these pages, Will Kymlicka has produced an admirable attempt to reconcile the differences of communitarians and liberals. However, Kymlicka's synthesis ignores the aspects of each theory which make his task impossible. Particularly, his analysis rests upon a misleading picture of communitarian community and an incomplete appreciation of the divergent liberal and communitarian understandings of freedom and pluralism. In the process of demonstrating the incompatibility of these theories, the similarities between communitarianism and nationalism are (...) explored. (shrink)

Many people profess to believe that acting morally, or as we ought to act, involves the self-conscious acceptance of some (quite specific) constraints or rules that place limits both on the pursuit of our own interests and on our pursuit of the general good. Though these people do not regard the furtherance of our own interests or the pursuit of the general good as ignoble ends, or ones that we are morally required to eschew, they believe that neither can (...) be regarded as providing us with morally sufficient reason to take action. Those who hold such a view believe that there are certain sorts of acts that are wrong in themselves, and thus morally unacceptable means to the pursuit of any ends, even ends that are morally admirable, or morally obligatory. (How strong the prohibition is against performing such acts is a matter that will be taken up later.) Philosophers call such ethical views ‘deontological’ (from the Greek deon , ‘duty’), and contrast them to views that are ‘teleological’ in structure (from telos , Greek for ‘goal’). Those who hold teleological views reject the view that there are special kinds of acts that are right or wrong in themselves. For teleologists, the rightness or wrongness of our acts is determined by a comparative assessment of their consequences. [...] The focus of this essay is on deontological theories. (shrink)

While many commentators have remarked on Nietzsche’s admiration for the Greek historian Thucydides, most reduce the affinity between the two thinkers to their common commitments to “political realism” or “scientific naturalism.” At the same time, some of these same commentators have sought to minimize or dismiss Nietzsche’s enthusiasm for the Greek sophists. We do not deny the importance of realism or naturalism, but we suggest that, for Nietzsche, realism and naturalism are rooted in a rejection of moral absolutism and (...) its leading advocates, Socrates and Plato. Through careful exegesis of crucial sections from Daybreak, we show that, as early as 1880 (if not earlier), Nietzsche regarded the agonistic, anti-absolutist stance of the sophist Protagoras as an indispensable model both for Thucydides’s history and for his own philosophy. (shrink)

Many commentators have argued that on Hume’s account, pride turns out to be something that is unstable, context-dependent, and highly contingent. On their readings, whether or not an agent develops pride depends heavily on factors beyond her control, such as whether or not her house, which is beautiful, is also the most beautiful in her neighborhood and whether or not her neighbors will admire the beauty of her house rather than become envious of it. These aspects of Hume’s theory (...) of pride, the peculiarity requirement and the social dependency of pride, stand in tension with Hume’s claims that virtue reliably produces pride-in-virtue and that pride-in-virtue serves as a powerful motive to virtue. If pride depends on the affirmation of others and arises only from qualities that are peculiar to their possessor, will the virtuous person reliably develop pride-in-virtue? And if not, can pride-in-virtue serve the motivational role Hume attributes to it? This paper tackles these problems by showing how the virtuous develop pride-in-virtue and how the desire for pride-in-virtue can serve as a powerful and admirable motive to virtue. (shrink)

Many environmental problems are now more serious and urgent than ever. In high‐income countries, health care is part of the problem. In Principles of Green Bioethics: Sustainability in Health Care, Cristina Richie focuses on medical developments, techniques, and procedures, and she proposes four principles for green bioethics: distributive justice, resource conservation, simplicity, and ethical economics. Richie is right to emphasize the need for green bioethics, and I admire her aim to bring environmental concerns back into bioethics, but I was (...) disappointed with this book. Since Plato, much of ethics has focused on the characteristics or principles of the ideally just society. This work in ethics seeks to transcend the culture in which we live in order to provide guidance about what we should do. I think it would be better to start with the messy, problematic, and unjust situations in which we are enmeshed. (shrink)

Of the many teachings on triadic semiotic that I was fortunate to receive in my life, none was more long-lasting and stimulating than what I learned by reading and exchanging ideas with Joseph Ransdell. And most salient among the ideas he explained with such admirable clarity were those related to iconicity, that apparently simple but most enigmatic relationship of formal identity between a sign and its object. That is why the main objective of this article is a discussion of (...) the semiotic quality that is embodied in some kind of material substance, called ‘hypoicon’ in Peircean semiotic.1 The hypoicon is the kind of sign whose functioning is based on its likeness to its dynamical object,2.. (shrink)

Wittgenstein's move is admirably motivated and directed, but it suffers from basic flaws which involve it in as many problems as it has warded off. This paper will attempt to trace out some of these flaws, and also to suggest how they might have been avoided. In the process, it will invoke the aid of the ancient aphorist who seems in some ways to have been a kindred spirit of Wittgenstein, and who shares with him a stress upon the (...) public or the "common" as the key to overcoming philosophy's perplexities: Heraclitus of Ephesus. The sage who, wearied by the abstruseness of vain speculation and by the chatter of the marketplace, went off to play with the children in the temple of Artemis, may have some useful hints for the gardener in the Irish monastery, wearied by the hum of the idling engine forever "gunned" by the professional philosophers. (shrink)

Among the many points of interest in N.G. Wilson's admirable new text of Aristophanes is his handling of the closing scene ofLysistrata, and in particular the question of the heroine's role in that scene. In the new OCT we find the short speech 1273–8 ascribed to Lysistrata, while the apparatus notes ‘legato tribuunt quidam’. The song which follows is also given to Lysistrata, but the apparatus comments ‘quis canat incertum est.’ Finally Lysistrata is presumed to speak the single line (...) 1295 inviting the Spartan ambassador to sing a fresh song. (shrink)

Over many long years, whenever a modest and not quite disinterested emissary of a member Association of the International Council of Philosophy and the Humanistic Studies came to visit Jean d'Ormesson at his headquarters in the rue Miollis, patiently clearing his path through mountains of dossiers and brochures, he did not, unlike the title of this paper, associate Jean d'Ormesson with the CIPSH - he simply identified the man before him with the CIPSH itself. An equation born of an (...) admiration barely suppressed under a veneer of polite restraint, an identification perhaps suggested to them by the president or secretary of their home association. Nevertheless a quite unfair one for anyone able to perceive with a greater deal of clarity (the office was very dark in overcast weather) what the ‘Secretary-General’ was, as well and much more, outside of the rue Miollis: the writer, the chronicler of his time, soon to become the assiduously active Academician, or even, dare I suggest, the blue-eyed charmer who graced debates on television. But this summary judgement could readily be forgiven, for the host of the premises had the good taste, when welcoming one to CIPSH, to assume only his mantle as Secretary-General. Besides, for the delegates of member Associations - and it was in this capacity that I first met Jean d'Ormesson before becoming his collaborator on the executive Bureau of CIPSH, and then briefly his successor - he appeared as the effective intermediary with that far-off but richly resourced galaxy called UNESCO. He was the man of warmth and charm who could be relied on to safeguard the subsidies that helped support our conferences and fund our voluminous compilations, which were vital tools for our research. (shrink)

Many contemporary discussions of forgiveness assume forgiveness is fundamentally admirable. Examining Aristotle’s account, however, demonstrates that there is a tension between desert and forgiveness that is often overlooked in contemporary discussions. Through examining the neglected concept of sungnōmē, which forestalls blame, I conclude that Aristotelian blame is justified only on grounds of fairness. This conclusion is evidence that Aristotelian blame is not merely an instrumental or descriptive tool, but rather a way of holding agents morally accountable. Through examining the (...) emphasis Aristotle places on the role of blame and its role in maintaining honor, I show that forgiveness is incompatible with Aristotle’s account because when the victim decides to forgive, she lets go of blame on grounds other than desert. For Aristotle, when she does so, she accepts less than she is worth, and so forgiving a wrongdoer undermines the victim’s honor. As a result, Aristotle rejects forgiveness as positively vicious. Aristotle’s response to the tension is to reject forgiveness as positively vicious since it involves accepting less than what one deserves. -/- In my dissertation, I resolve this impasse by both defending the value of forgiveness and seeking to resolve the tension by explaining why we can choose to forgive without undermining our own honor. Contra Aristotle, I argue that cultivating the disposition to be forgiving is part of flourishing individual and communal life. The choice to let go what of one deserves, however, need not mean that honor is relinquished. Instead, I defend an alternative account of honor in which honor lies not in demanding what is deserved but instead in committing to the consistent pursuit of the good. On this account, honor is related to the ongoing commitment to a coherent and compelling identity rooted in seeing ethical values as central to the conception of one’s self, rather than outwardly-mediated Aristotelian honor. Honor is thus bound up in commitment to the good life generally, and does not rely on getting what one deserves. My account thus reconciles Aristotelian blame with forgiveness, demonstrates what is valuable about honor, and why it is still worth pursuing in our modern world. (shrink)

Many rights theorists argue that global poverty violates certain human rights, so that responsibility to address poverty involves carrying out the duties that correspond with relevant rights-claims. Liberatirians argue that the rights and duties associated with global poverty, especially what are sometimes thought of as “positive” rights, or rights of assistance, are inappropriately agent-neutral, giving them less justificatory force than agent-relative rights and duties. To counter libertarian concerns, Thomas Pogge tries to reframe the responsibilities corresponding to human rights as (...) institutional rather than as belonging to agents. While admirable, his approach inadequately expalains the relationships between institutional responsibility and individual and collective action. A better way to respond to libertarian concerns—that is also compatible with Pogge’s emphasis on institutional responsibility—is to show that the duties regarding global poverty are indeed agent-relative, but by virtue of individual and collective action within institutions. (shrink)

Many wonder at the abundance of disputes, opposing views and schools in philosophy. This abundance is surprising in view of the fact that philosophers are known for their striving and high regard for rationality. (There are, of course, philosophers who attempt to oppose, mostly by rational argumentation, the view that philosophy should be a rational discipline.) Why are all these admirably smart and rational people in so much disagreement with each other? Suvar Köseraif argues that the explanation of this (...) phenomenon may lie in the fact that when two perfectly rational agents A 1 and A 2 disagree about matters of truth, there seems no way they can settle their dispute in purely rational ways. For suppose A1 believes in the truth of claim Q on the basis of premises P and a valid argument P.'.Q, and A 2 believes that ~Q on the basis of premises R and a valid argument R.'. ~Q. Then it would seem on logical, hence rational, grounds that A 1 must reject A2's reasons R, since P.'. ~R is also valid. Thus the reasons P, which led Ai to rationally accept Q, also constitute rational reasons for A 1 to reject R, and consequently reject the argument A2 adduces for ~Q. Symmetrically, A 2 cannot but reject the reasoning A1 adduces for Q. So the dispute between A1 and A 2 concerning the truth of Q cannot be resolved—unless either side compromises its rationality and yields to such nonrational methods as threats, brainwashing, offers of money, etc. If all this is right, we have (rational) reason to be pessimistic about the value of rationality not only in philosophy, but in any sphere of thought, including science. I attempt to offer a rational counterargument against Köseraif's. (shrink)

As with so many mystics, Alexis karpouzos intuitively know the oneness of cosmic creation and historic humanity as part of all that is and all there isn't. So, the originality of Alexis Karpouzos thought is that it crosses the most diverse fields, the most opposing philosophies, to unite them into an often contradictory and broken whole. Marx and Heidegger, Nietzsche, Freud and Heraclitus, poets and political theorists all come together in the same distance and the same unusual proximity. Alexis (...) karpouzos use Pre-Socratics philosophy and generally the ancient Greek philosophy, as well as the pre-philosophical thinking of The Upanishads, the Vedas and Buddhism in India, of Lao Tzu, of Zen Buddhism and the Taoist tradition in China, of the Arab mystics and poets, with their metaphysical religiosity as the metaphysical basis for the interpretation and understanding of the world and existence. At the same time the ancient metaphysics is connect with Hegel’s dialectical ontology and with the modern thinking of Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Heidegger, and others as the interpretive context for understanding the central problems of the technical and scientific world during his time. Novalis, Hölderlin, Rimbaud, Whitman, Eliot and others show the dreamy nature of existence, the transcendence of the Cosmos, welcome the infinity. For Alexis karpouzos the combination of ancient and modern thought creates the holistic experience of universal space-time and the consciousness of the unity. The poetic thought of Alexis karpouzos is a expressions of soul's inner experiences, expression of universality. The inspiring visual images and the symbolic use of language offer a description of elevating experiences of consciousness, a glimpse of higher worlds. The philosophy of Alexis karpouzos speak to the human experience from a universal perspective, transcending all religions, cultural and national boundaries. Using vivid images and a direct language that speaks to the heart, his philosophy evokes a sense of deep communication with the collective unconscious, a sense of connection to all the creatures of the world, compassion for others, admiration for the beauty of nature, reverence for all life, and an abiding faith in the invisible touch of world. Alexis karpouzos thoughts are often terse and paradoxical, challenging us to to break out of the box of limiting beliefs and see things from a new perspective. Above all, Alexis karpouzos continually calls to us to wake up and explore the mysteries within our own selves, i.e the mysteries of universe. (shrink)

Kant once wrote, “Many historians of philosophy... let the philosophers speak mere nonsense.... They cannot see beyond what the philosophers actually said to what they really meant to say.’ Rae Langton begins her book with this quotation. She concludes it, after a final pithy summary of the position that she attributes to Kant, with the comment, “That, it seems to me, is what Kant said, and meant to say”. In between are some two hundred pages of admirably clear, tightly (...) argued exegesis, supplemented by detailed references, in which she offers what the dust jacket blurb fairly describes as “a new interpretation and defence of Kant’s doctrine of things in themselves.” This is an extremely engaging and thought-provoking book. I am pleased to recommend it. (shrink)