Wherever we go, we leave behind skin cells containing copies of our DNA molecule – unless we go forth hermetically sealed. This makes construction and maintenance of DNA identification databases enormously useful to crime investigators. DNA databases, linking numerical representations of a tiny portion of individuals' DNA with their names and other identifying information, are useful to identify suspects directly by matching DNA found at a crime scene with a DNA profile in a DNA identification database. They are useful indirectly (...) too, because criminal investigations proceed by a process of elimination; and identifying the person whose DNA was found at a crime scene can make it unnecessary to continue investigating others. When the incriminating crime scene sample does not match the DNA of a “person of interest,” that person is freed from the hassles and risks of criminal investigation, including the risk of false conviction. (shrink)

These are replies to the discussions by Kirk Ludwig, Elizabeth Pacherie, Björn Petersson, Abraham Roth, and Thomas Smith of Michael E. Bratman, Shared Agency: A Planning Theory of Acting Together (Oxford University Press, 2014).

The title of this rich, wide-ranging, and rewarding book alludes both to the idea that passions rule, and to the thought that we rule our passions. Blackburn offers a conception of both, one broadly in the spirit of Hume and Adam Smith.

Significant associations have been found between specific human leukocyte antigen (HLA) alleles and organ transplant rejection, autoimmune disease development, and the response to infection. Traditional searches for disease associations have conventionally measured risk associated with the presence of individual HLA alleles. However, given the high level of HLA polymorphism, the pattern of amino acid variability, and the fact that most of the HLA variation occurs at functionally important sites, it may be that a combination of variable amino acid sites shared (...) by several alleles (shared epitopes) are better descriptors of the actual causative genetic variants. Here we describe a novel approach to genetic association analysis in which genes/proteins are broken down into smaller sequence features and then variant types defined for each feature, allowing for independent analysis of disease association with each sequence feature variant type. We have used this approach to analyze a cohort of systemic sclerosis patients and show that a sequence feature composed of specific amino acid residues in peptide binding pockets 4 and 7 of HLA-DRB1 explains much of the molecular determinant of risk for systemic sclerosis. (shrink)

Ayn Rand's first novel, We the Living, offers an early form of the author's nascent philosophy—the philosophy Rand later called Objectivism. Robert Mayhew's collection of entirely new essays brings together pre-eminent scholars of Rand's writing. In part a history of We the Living, from its earliest drafts to the Italian film later based upon it, Mayhew's collection goes on to explore the enduring significance of Rand's first novel as a work both of philosophy and of literature.

John E. Smith has contributed to contemporary philosophy in primarily four distinct capacities; first, as a philosopher of religion and God; second, as an indefatigable defender of philosophical reflection in its classical sense ( a sense inclusive of, but not limited to, metaphysics); third, as a participant in the reconstruction of experience and reason so boldly inaugurated by Hegel then redically transformed by the classical American pragmatists, and significantly augmented by such thinkers as Josiah Royce, william Earnest Hocking, and (...) Alfred North Whitehead; fourth, as an interpreter of philosophical texts and traditions (Kant, Hegel, and Nietzsche no less than Charles Peirce, WIlliam James and John Dewey; German idealism as well as American; the Augustinian tradition no less than the pragmatic). Reason, Experience, and God provides an important and comprehensive look at the work of John E. Smith by collected essays which each address aspects of his life-long work. A response by John E. Smith himself draws a line of continuity between the pieces. (shrink)

We advance a model of human probability judgment and apply it to the design of an extrapolation algorithm. Such an algorithm examines a person's judgment about the likelihood of various statements and is then able to predict the same person's judgments about new statements. The algorithm is tested against judgments produced by thirty undergraduates asked to assign probabilities to statements about mammals.

Ontology is one strategy for promoting interoperability of heterogeneous data through consistent tagging. An ontology is a controlled structured vocabulary consisting of general terms (such as “cell” or “image” or “tissue” or “microscope”) that form the basis for such tagging. These terms are designed to represent the types of entities in the domain of reality that the ontology has been devised to capture; the terms are provided with logical defi nitions thereby also supporting reasoning over the tagged data. Aim: This (...) paper provides a survey of the biomedical imaging ontologies that have been developed thus far. It outlines the challenges, particularly faced by ontologies in the fields of histopathological imaging and image analysis, and suggests a strategy for addressing these challenges in the example domain of quantitative histopathology imaging. The ultimate goal is to support the multiscale understanding of disease that comes from using interoperable ontologies to integrate imaging data with clinical and genomics data. (shrink)

This book celebrates the work of Patricia Werhane, an iconic figure in business ethics. This festschrift is a collection of articles that build on Werhane’s contributions to business ethics in such areas as Employee Rights, the Legacy of Adam Smith, Moral Imagination, Women in Business, the development of the field of business ethics, and her contributions to such fields as Health Care, Education, Teaching, and Philosophy. All papers are new contributions to the management literature written by well-known business ethicists, (...) such as Norman Bowie, Richard De George, Ronald Duska, Edwin Hartman, Michael Hoffman, Mollie Painter-Morland, Mark Schwartz, Andrew Wicks, and others. The volume is comprised of articles that reflect on Werhane’s work as well as build on it as a way to advance further research. At the end of the festschrift, Pat Werhane provides responses to each chapter. The first chapter of the book also includes the overview of Patricia Werhane’s work and her academic career. The book is written to appeal to management scholars and graduate students interested in the areas of Business Ethics, Modern Capitalism, and Human Rights. Patricia Werhane is one of the most distinguished figures in the field of business ethics. She was a founder of the field, she is one of its leading scholars, and she has had a profound impact on the world of business practice. Among her many accomplishments, Pat is known for her original work on moral imagination, she is an acclaimed authority on employee rights in the workplace, and she is one of the leading scholars on Adam Smith. Having been active in Academia for over 50 years, Werhane is a prolific author of over a hundred articles and book chapters, and the author or editor of twenty-seven books, including Adam Smith and his Legacy for Modern Capitalism, Moral Imagination and Management Decision-Making, and co-authored books Organization Ethics in Health Care, Alleviating Poverty Through Profitable Partnerships, Obstacles to Ethical Decision-Making, Corporate Responsibility: The American Experience, and Research Approaches to Business Ethics and Corporate Responsibility. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The destruction of the environment is a matter for moral concern and cannot be halted in the long term by appeals to human utility. However, the inadequacy and naïvety of humanist styles of ethical argument become apparent when attempts are made to extend them to environmental issues. They usually abstract certain supposed features of natural objects, e.g. sentience, and reify these as essential characteristics which operate to carry or ground ethical values. These arguments necessarily lead to the exclusion of (...) objects which are, in fact, ethically valued or entail an unacceptably expansive egalitarianism. Such egalitarianism is often followed by a return to human‐centred prejudices opposed to the originally stated aims of ‘biocentric’ethicists like Taylor. Similarly, those physical and ecological holisms which rely not upon shared ‘natural’features, but upon sharing in nature itself cannot solve this dilemma as they are incapable of explaining differential ethical values. The attempt to place boundaries on moral considerability should be abandoned in favour of an ethical pluralism which places emphasis on the context of valuations. (shrink)

In this article, the insertion of a two-staged highly interesting question in an online, survey-based field experiment is shown to produce better survey completion rate (i.e., decreases completion refusal by 8%) and sample representativeness (increases the number of moderate answer patterns by 12%) than a typical (same) highly interesting question at the beginning of a survey only. Using nonparametric tests and subgroup probability analysis, measured effects include survey completion rates, response bias and reported demographic differences. In regards to sample representativeness, (...) the results also raise questions about the sensitivity of the conventional practice of comparing early to late respondent means scores as a method of investigating nonresponse bias in marketing research. Alternative approaches to measuring potential non-response bias are compared with the tradition of comparing early-wave verses late-wave mean respondent differences. The results indicate that the conventional mean test fails to identify differences in nonresponse bias; the scores of highly interested or opposed respondents in the first waves produce equivalent means to the scores of the less interested or opposed respondents in the latter wave between the surveys (e.g., 1's and 5's vs. 2's and 4's, both averaging to 3's) that are identifiable through kurtosis and probability analysis. (shrink)

What determines whether an action is right or wrong? Morality, Rules, and Consequences: A Critical Reader explores for students and researchers the relationship between consequentialist theory and moral rules. Most of the chapters focus on rule consequentialism or on the distinction between act and rule versions of consequentialism. Contributors, among them the leading philosophers in the discipline, suggest ways of assessing whether rule consequentialism could be a satisfactory moral theory. These essays, all of which are previously unpublished, provide students in (...) moral philosophy with essential material and ask key questions on just what the criteria for an adequate moral theory might be. (shrink)

Pancreatitis is a complex, progressively destructive inflammatory disorder. Alcohol was long thought to be the primary causative agent, but genetic contributions have been of interest since the discovery that rare PRSS1, CFTR and SPINK1 variants were associated with pancreatitis risk. We now report two associations at genome-wide significance identified and replicated at PRSS1-PRSS2 and X-linked CLDN2 through a two-stage genome-wide study. The PRSS1 variant likely affects disease susceptibility by altering expression of the primary trypsinogen gene. The CLDN2 risk allele is (...) associated with atypical localization of claudin-2 in pancreatic acinar cells. The homozygous CLDN2 genotype confers the greatest risk, and its alleles interact with alcohol consumption to amplify risk. These results could partially explain the high frequency of alcohol-related pancreatitis in men. © 2012 Nature America, Inc. All rights reserved. (shrink)

The National Center for Biomedical Ontology is a consortium that comprises leading informaticians, biologists, clinicians, and ontologists, funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Roadmap, to develop innovative technology and methods that allow scientists to record, manage, and disseminate biomedical information and knowledge in machine-processable form. The goals of the Center are (1) to help unify the divergent and isolated efforts in ontology development by promoting high quality open-source, standards-based tools to create, manage, and use ontologies, (2) to create (...) new software tools so that scientists can use ontologies to annotate and analyze biomedical data, (3) to provide a national resource for the ongoing evaluation, integration, and evolution of biomedical ontologies and associated tools and theories in the context of driving biomedical projects (DBPs), and (4) to disseminate the tools and resources of the Center and to identify, evaluate, and communicate best practices of ontology development to the biomedical community. Through the research activities within the Center, collaborations with the DBPs, and interactions with the biomedical community, our goal is to help scientists to work more effectively in the e-science paradigm, enhancing experiment design, experiment execution, data analysis, information synthesis, hypothesis generation and testing, and understand human disease. (shrink)

This paper presents a version of neurophenomenology based on generative modelling techniques developed in computational neuroscience and biology. Our approach can be described as _computational phenomenology_ because it applies methods originally developed in computational modelling to provide a formal model of the descriptions of lived experience in the phenomenological tradition of philosophy (e.g., the work of Edmund Husserl, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, etc.). The first section presents a brief review of the overall project to naturalize phenomenology. The second section presents and evaluates (...) philosophical objections to that project and situates our version of computational phenomenology with respect to these projects. The third section reviews the generative modelling framework. The final section presents our approach in detail. We conclude by discussing how our approach differs from previous attempts to use generative modelling to help understand consciousness. In summary, we describe a version of computational phenomenology which uses generative modelling to construct a computational model of the inferential or interpretive processes that best explain this or that kind of lived experience. (shrink)

Throughout the biological and biomedical sciences there is a growing need for, prescriptive ‘minimum information’ (MI) checklists specifying the key information to include when reporting experimental results are beginning to find favor with experimentalists, analysts, publishers and funders alike. Such checklists aim to ensure that methods, data, analyses and results are described to a level sufficient to support the unambiguous interpretation, sophisticated search, reanalysis and experimental corroboration and reuse of data sets, facilitating the extraction of maximum value from data sets (...) them. However, such ‘minimum information’ MI checklists are usually developed independently by groups working within representatives of particular biologically- or technologically-delineated domains. Consequently, an overview of the full range of checklists can be difficult to establish without intensive searching, and even tracking thetheir individual evolution of single checklists may be a non-trivial exercise. Checklists are also inevitably partially redundant when measured one against another, and where they overlap is far from straightforward. Furthermore, conflicts in scope and arbitrary decisions on wording and sub-structuring make integration difficult. This presents inhibit their use in combination. Overall, these issues present significant difficulties for the users of checklists, especially those in areas such as systems biology, who routinely combine information from multiple biological domains and technology platforms. To address all of the above, we present MIBBI (Minimum Information for Biological and Biomedical Investigations); a web-based communal resource for such checklists, designed to act as a ‘one-stop shop’ for those exploring the range of extant checklist projects, and to foster collaborative, integrative development and ultimately promote gradual integration of checklists. (shrink)

Our capacity for planning agency is a core capacity that underlies interrelated forms of mind-shaped practical organization: cross-temporal organization of individual agency, shared agency, social rules, and rule-guided organized institutions. A function of our capacity for planning agency is the support of these forms of practical organization. I highlight Peter Godfrey-Smith's contrast between the ‘Wright function’ of something as ‘the effect it has which explains why it is there’ and ‘Cummins functions’ that ‘are capacities or effects of components of (...) systems, which are salient in the explanation of capacities of the larger system’. Drawing on Paul Grice's strategy of ‘creature construction’, I articulate a sequence of nested constructions: from temporally extended planning agency to shared agency to shared policies to social rules to rule-guided organized institutions. We see our capacity for planning agency as part of an explanation of how we achieve such practical organization, and as having nested Cummins functions of supporting those forms of organization. This sheds light on related ideas in H.L.A. Hart's theory of law, a challenge from J. David Velleman, the centrality of such forms of organization to the philosophy of action, and the moral and political significance of our capacity for planning agency. (shrink)

Despite a large and multifaceted effort to understand the vast landscape of phenotypic data, their current form inhibits productive data analysis. The lack of a community-wide, consensus-based, human- and machine-interpretable language for describing phenotypes and their genomic and environmental contexts is perhaps the most pressing scientific bottleneck to integration across many key fields in biology, including genomics, systems biology, development, medicine, evolution, ecology, and systematics. Here we survey the current phenomics landscape, including data resources and handling, and the progress that (...) has been made to accurately capture relevant data descriptions for phenotypes. We present an example of the kind of integration across domains that computable phenotypes would enable, and we call upon the broader biology community, publishers, and relevant funding agencies to support efforts to surmount today's data barriers and facilitate analytical reproducibility. (shrink)

Scholars of classical philosophy have long disputed whether Aristotle was a dialectical thinker. Most agree that Aristotle contrasts dialectical reasoning with demonstrative reasoning, where the former reasons from generally accepted opinions and the latter reasons from the true and primary. Starting with a grasp on truth, demonstration never relinquishes it. Starting with opinion, how could dialectical reasoning ever reach truth, much less the truth about first principles? Is dialectic then an exercise that reiterates the prejudices of one's times and at (...) best allows one to persuade others by appealing to these prejudices, or is it the royal road to first principles and philosophical wisdom? In From Puzzles to Principles? May Sim gathers experts to argue both these positions and offer a variety of interpretive possibilities. The contributors' thoughtful reflections on the nature and limits of dialectic should play a crucial role in Aristotelian scholarship. (shrink)

No philosopher in the second half of the twentieth century or the opening decade of the twenty-first did more to recover the voice of philosophy in the conversation of humankind than John Edwin Smith (1921-2009). From The Social Infinite (1950), his landmark study of Josiah Royce, to "Niebuhr's Prophetic Voice" (2009), he has shown in compelling detail how philosophical reflection is relevant to contemporary life. Indeed, virtually all of the eventual developments within contemporary philosophy in recent decades worthy of (...) our unqualified support (above all, the acknowledgment of history, the abiding importance of the religious dimension of human experience, the hermeneutic character of all our intellectual understandings, including those of experimental inquirers, the irreducibility of persons, the ubiquity of symbols, and the cutting edge of philosophical critique) were ones to which Smith was committed at the outset of his career. He not only anticipated these developments but also pointed the way forward beyond the stultifying impasses of so much contemporary thought. In particular, his conceptions of subjectivity, symbolization, interpretation, experience and philosophy itself provide invaluable resources for twisting free from our present impasses. The essays in this volume make the salience and implications of Smith's writings on these and other topics manifest. The authors assembled here bear eloquent witness to the wit of the man no less than the depth of the philosopher from whom they learned how to take up the urgent task of philosophical reflection in a world riven by seemingly intractable conflicts and characterized by mutual misunderstanding. John E. Smith was a widely learned man; he was also a deeply wise one. Hence, it should be no surprise that he aids us in creating ways to address such conflicts and to counter such misunderstanding. (shrink)

INDICE -/- Note biografiche Introduzione, di Riccardo Faucci -/- Parte I - Da Verri a Toniolo 1. Jeremy Bentham: Contemporary Interpretations, di M.D.A. Freeman 2. Su Helvétius, Beccaria e Bentham, di Letizia Gianformaggio 3. L'etica utilitaristica di Pietro Veti, di Vincenzo Polignano 4. ll liberismo interventista di Vincenzo Emanuele Sergio, di Anna Li Donni 5. Il concetto di " felicità pubblica, nella << Genesi del diritto penale » di Romagnosi, e il rapporto Romagnosi-Bentham, di Robertino Ghiringhelli 6. « La più (...) grande felicità per il maggior numero » all'Accademia dei Georgofili ( 18)0-1850), di Gabriella Gioli 7. Una nota su Manzoni critico dell'utilitarismo, di Maurizio Mori 8. Sul concetto di utile in Francesco Ferrara e in Maffeo Pantaleoni, di Daniela Parisi Acquaviva 9. Sul pensiero sociale cristiano di fronte all'edonismo, di Luciano Avagliano 10. Giuseppe Toniolo e il recupero cattolico dell'utile e del valore, di Anna Camaiti -/- Parte II Aspetti di storia del pensiero economico nell’età classica -/- 1. La filosofia economica di Thomas Hobbes, di Marco Bertozzi 2. Ordinamento del sapere, modelli metodologici ed economia politica in Adam Smith, di Sergio Cremaschi 3. Elementi classici nel pensiero di Adam Smith: giurisprudenza romana e morale stoica, di Gloria Vivenza 4. Il “lusso” negli economisti italiani del Settecento, di Cosimo Perrotta 5. Prezzi naturali, prezzi di mercato e legge degli sbocchi nel dibattito fra Malthus e Ricardo, di Lilia Costabile 6. Marx e la moneta, di Roberto Petrini -/- . (shrink)

Epikurs Lehre erfreut sich wachsender Aufmerksamkeit. Doch verdient auch die Geschichte des Epikureismus, insbesondere der Kaiserzeit, Interesse. Keineswegs verschwindet die diesseits orientierte Lehre Epikurs trotz wachsendem Streben der Philosophie nach Transzendenz in der Spatantike. Eine Analyse paganer wie auch christlicher Autoren zeigt, dass insbesondere Epikurs Ethik und ihr Angebot praktischer Lebenshilfe als Teil einer "praeparatio philosophica" uberlebt, ins Mittelalter vermittelt wurde und in der Renaissance Auferstehung feierte. Die Vortrage dieses Bandes begeben sich deshalb auf Spurensuche. Unter verschiedenen Gesichtspunkten gehen sie (...) der Tradition des Epikureismus in der spaten Republik und der Kaiserzeit nach und folgen ihnen bis zur Renaissance. Inhalt: Einleitung Graziano Arrighetti: Filodemo fra poesia, mito e storia Marcello Gigante: Seneca, ein Nachfolger Philodems? Dieter Timpe: Der Epikureismus in der romischen Gesellschaft der Kaiserzeit Martin F. Smith: Digging up Diogenes: New Epicurean texts from Oinoanda in Lycia Diskin Clay: Diogenes and his gods Matthias Baltes: Epikureische Theologie Mauro Tulli: L'epitome die Epicuro e la trasmissione del sapere nel Medioplatonismo Carlos Levy: Philon d'Alexandrie et l'epicurisme Tiziano Dorandi: Plotina, Adriano e gli Epicurei di Atene Franco Ferrari: La falsita delle asserzioni relative al futuro: un argomento epicureo contro la mantica in Plut. Pyth. orac. 10 Keimpe A. Algra: The Treatise of Cleomedes and its Critique of Epicurean Cosmology Christoph Markschies: Epikureismus bei Origenes und in der origenistischen Tradition Jose Kany-Turpin: Lactance, un critique mesestime de l'epicurisme Therese Fuhrer: Zwischen Skeptizismus und Platonismus: Augustins Auseinandersetzung mit der epikureischen Lehre in conf. 6 Dominic O'Meara: Epikur bei Simplikios Clemens Zintzen: Epikur in der Renaissance Michael Erler: Epikur in Raffaels "Schule von Athen"? Register. (shrink)

My argument owes much to two contemporary philosophical scholars of the development of modern physics beginning with Newton and extending through the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries: George Smith and Howard Stein. From the former I take a conception of theory-mediated measurement, from the latter a conception of abstract structures in the phenomena. The relevant notion of phenomena, as we shall see, is closely related to Newtonian scientific methodology, a methodology that is clearly embraced by both philosophers. The (...) conception of abstract structures, however, is not so clear, and it is especially to be distinguished from the more recent conception of “structural realism.”. (shrink)

Epikurs Lehre erfreut sich wachsender Aufmerksamkeit. Doch verdient auch die Geschichte des Epikureismus, insbesondere der Kaiserzeit, Interesse. Keineswegs verschwindet die diesseits orientierte Lehre Epikurs trotz wachsendem Streben der Philosophie nach Transzendenz in der Spatantike. Eine Analyse paganer wie auch christlicher Autoren zeigt, dass insbesondere Epikurs Ethik und ihr Angebot praktischer Lebenshilfe als Teil einer "praeparatio philosophica" uberlebt, ins Mittelalter vermittelt wurde und in der Renaissance Auferstehung feierte. Die Vortrage dieses Bandes begeben sich deshalb auf Spurensuche. Unter verschiedenen Gesichtspunkten gehen sie (...) der Tradition des Epikureismus in der spaten Republik und der Kaiserzeit nach und folgen ihnen bis zur Renaissance. Inhalt: Einleitung Graziano Arrighetti: Filodemo fra poesia, mito e storia Marcello Gigante: Seneca, ein Nachfolger Philodems? Dieter Timpe: Der Epikureismus in der romischen Gesellschaft der Kaiserzeit Martin F. Smith: Digging up Diogenes: New Epicurean texts from Oinoanda in Lycia Diskin Clay: Diogenes and his gods Matthias Baltes: Epikureische Theologie Mauro Tulli: L'epitome die Epicuro e la trasmissione del sapere nel Medioplatonismo Carlos Levy: Philon d'Alexandrie et l'epicurisme Tiziano Dorandi: Plotina, Adriano e gli Epicurei di Atene Franco Ferrari: La falsita delle asserzioni relative al futuro: un argomento epicureo contro la mantica in Plut. Pyth. orac. 10 Keimpe A. Algra: The Treatise of Cleomedes and its Critique of Epicurean Cosmology Christoph Markschies: Epikureismus bei Origenes und in der origenistischen Tradition Jose Kany-Turpin: Lactance, un critique mesestime de l'epicurisme Therese Fuhrer: Zwischen Skeptizismus und Platonismus: Augustins Auseinandersetzung mit der epikureischen Lehre in conf. 6 Dominic O'Meara: Epikur bei Simplikios Clemens Zintzen: Epikur in der Renaissance Michael Erler: Epikur in Raffaels "Schule von Athen"? Register. (shrink)

This article sketches a theory of time-binding communication, which is to say communication that unifies widely separated times much as space-binding communication unifies widely separated places. Drawing from the work of Harold Innis, it first describes the function and character of time-binding communication as a means to social continuity. Then, following Alasdair MacIntyre and Michael Oakshott, it explains the nature and necessary circumstances of this sort of time-binding communication, or tradition. It discusses the character, consequences, and causes of decadence (...) - radical discontinuity - as these have been described by Richard Weaver, C. E. M. Joad, and Jacques Barzun. Finally, it turns to David Lowenthal's notion of the past as a 'foreign country' in an effort to explain the relations between modernity and both tradition and decadence, as well as the geography of tradition and decadence in the modern world. (shrink)

In May 2010, philosophers, family and friends gathered at the University of Notre Dame to celebrate the career and retirement of Alvin Plantinga, widely recognized as one of the world's leading figures in metaphysics, epistemology, and the philosophy of religion. Plantinga has earned particular respect within the community of Christian philosophers for the pivotal role that he played in the recent renewal and development of philosophy of religion and philosophical theology. Each of the essays in this volume engages with some (...) particular aspect of Plantinga's views on metaphysics, epistemology, or philosophy of religion. Contributors include Michael Bergman, Ernest Sosa, Trenton Merricks, Richard Otte, Peter VanInwagen, Thomas P. Flint, Eleonore Stump, Dean Zimmerman and Nicholas Wolterstorff. The volume also includes responses to each essay by Bas van Fraassen, Stephen Wykstra, David VanderLaan, Robin Collins, Raymond VanArragon, E. J. Coffman, Thomas Crisp, and Donald Smith. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:156 BOOK REVIEWS and appreciation of Mary's place in our faith lives needs to be con· tinually nourished. This book contributes much to fulfill this need. In the book the author gives a good historical background to each of the issues raised: Mary's Motherhood, Virginity, Immaculate Concep· tion and Assumption. His chapter on Private Devotions and Appari· tions is a good analysis of the facts and gives some good (...) insights into a particularly delicate aspect of our Marian heritage. Throughout the book the author displays a familiarity with the latest scriptural developments regarding Mary and these are blended well with theological reflection which help to clarify and deepen our grasp of the mystery who is Mary. It will serve as an excellent intro· duction for those who are interested in pursuing further certain Marian themes. It sets up clearly the " state of the question. " And for anyone wishing to have a clear and intelligible understanding of the Catholic position on Mary, this is a book to read. This book is well structured; one's interest is captured and maintained throughout. The reviewer's hope is that this is but the first of several works on Mary by Fr. Frederick Jelly. GEORGE KIRWIN, O.M.I. Boston, Massachusetts The Risk of Interpretation: On Being Faithful to the Christian Tradi· tion in a Non-Christian Age. By CLAUDE GEFFRE. Translated by David Smith. New York/Mahwah: Paulist Press, 1987. Pp. vi + 298. $12.95 {paperback). Several years ago, M.-D. Chenu described himself, in his preface to Claude Ge:ffre's A New Age in Theology {New York: Paulist, 1972), as " one who, not without some boldness and certain risks, has reacted against decay in theology and envisaged opportune breakthroughs in historical and speculative method. " In the present work, Geffre shows himself likewise willing to take the risk involved in the work of theology. Since theology is a hermeneutical task "from beginning to end," it involves "the risk of distortion and error," but unless theology is willing to take that risk by presenting a creative interpretation of Christianity, it runs the no less serious risk of "simply handing on a dead past" {pp. 1-2). The present work comprises a collection of fifteen articles and lectures, three of which were previously unpublished, eight of which have been reworked, and all of which have been organized into a consistent BOOK REVIEWS 157 presentation. The hook is divided into three parts, concerned respectively with theological methodology, certain "fundamental realities of Christian revelation, " and Christian praxis in face of the new histori· cal, social, and cultural conditions of our non-Christian age. The author begins with a lucid presentation of the shift that has occurred in the last twenty years from a theology which understood itself as " constituted knowledge " to a theology of "pluralistic interpretation " (i.e., from " dogmatic theology to hermeneutical theology ") (p. 11). Under the influence of such thinkers as Dilthey and Gadamer, theologians have become aware of the critical importance of the present situation of the interpreter or speaker in establishing the meaning of a text or articulating a speculative truth. This new awareness of " a certain kind of dogmatic theology that is offered to us as the only authentic way of interpreting the christian message" (p. 14). In Chapter II, Geffre takes up the structuralist critique of hermeneutics. He responds to their contention that the meaning of a text can he found only in " the structures of the text and the mechanics of its functioning" by making judicious use of Paul Ricoeur's notion of the " world of the text, " and thus separates himself both from the position of the structuralists and from the sort of hermeneutics which pretends to find the meaning of a text by discovering the intention of its author. He thus shows how theology may employ much that is valuable in the method 0£ the structuralists without falling victim to their criticisms. Geffre contrasts the hermeneutical model for doing theology with what he calls the " dogmatic model, " characterizing them as " two paradigms of theological study... separated by an epistemological revolution " (Chapter III). While the dogmatic model, which was characteristic of theological work from the Council... (shrink)

Radical ecology typically brings to mind media images of ecological activists standing before loggers' saws, staging anti-nuclear marches, and confronting polluters on the high seas. Yet for more than twenty years, the activities of organizations such as the Greens and Earth First! have been influenced by a diverse, less-publicized group of radical ecological philosophers. It is their work—the philosophical underpinnings of the radical ecological movement—that is the subject of _Contesting Earth's Future_. The book offers a much-needed, balanced appraisal of radical (...) ecology's principles, goals, and limitations. Michael Zimmerman critically examines the movement's three major branches—deep ecology, social ecology, and ecofeminism. He also situates radical ecology within the complex cultural and political terrain of the late twentieth century, showing its relation to Martin Heidegger's anti-technological thought, 1960s counterculturalism, and contemporary theories of poststructuralism and postmodernity. An early and influential ecological thinker, Zimmerman is uniquely qualified to provide a broad overview of radical environmentalism and delineate its various schools of thought. He clearly describes their defining arguments and internecine disputes, among them the charge that deep ecology is an anti-modern, proto-fascist ideology. Reflecting both the movement's promise and its dangers, this book is essential reading for all those concerned with the worldwide ecological crisis. (shrink)