The earlier volume in this series dealt with two religions of Indian origin, namely, Buddhism and Jainism. The Indian religious scene, however, is characterized by not only religions which originated in India but also by religions which entered India from outside India and made their home here. Thus religious life in India has been enlivened throughout its history by the presence of religions of foreign origin on its soil almost from the very time they came into existence. This volume covers (...) three such religions—Zoraoastrianism, Judaism, and Islam. In the case of Zoraostianism, even its very beginnings are intertwined with India, as Zoroastrianism reformed a preexisting religion which had strong links to the Vedic heritage of India. This relationship took on a new dimension when a Zoroastrian community, fearing persecution in Persia after its Arab conquest, sought shelter in western India and ultimately went on to produce India’s pioneering nationalist in the figure of Dadabhai Naoroji ( 1825-1917), also known as the Grand Old Man of India. Jews found refuge in south India after the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 C.E. and have remained a part of the Indian religious scene since then, some even returning to Israel after it was founded in 1948. Islam arrived in Kerala as soon as it was founded and one of the earliest mosques in the history of Islam is found in India. Islam differs from the previously mentioned religions inasmuch as it went on to gain political hegemony over parts of the country for considerable periods of time, which meant that its impact on the religious life of the subcontinent has been greater compared to the other religions. It has also meant that Islam has existed in a religiously plural environment in India for a longer period than elsewhere in the world so that not only has Islam left a mark on India, India has also left its mark on it. Indeed all the three religions covered in this volume share this dual feature, that they have profoundly influenced Indian religious life and have also in turn been profoundly influenced by their presence in India. (shrink)

Hawthorne and Magidor's criticisms of the model of presupposition and assertion that I have used and defended are all based on a rejection of some transparency or introspection of assumptions about speaker presupposition. This response to those criticisms aims first to clarify, and then to defend, the required transparency assumptions. It is argued, first, that if the assumptions are properly understood, some prima facie problems for them do not apply, second, that rejecting the assumptions has intuitively implausible consequences, and third, (...) that the 'margin of error' argument against the principle of positive introspection has a false premiss. The paper concludes with a response to a criticism of what Hawthorne and Magidor call 'the uniformity principle' that is used in the model to explain some pragmatic phenomena. (shrink)

The metaphorical nature of biological language is examined and the use of metaphors for providing the linguistic context in which similarities and differences are made is described. Certain pervasive metaphors which are characterised by systemic properties are noted, and in order to provide some focus to the study, systemic metaphors associated with machine, text and organism are discussed. Other systemic metaphors such as society and circuit are also reported. Some details concerning interrelations between automaton and organism are presented in the (...) light of the previous discussion.An approach towards the analysis of biosystem metaphors is outlined which relates part-whole, organisational level and systemic metaphors in a single model. Examples are provided throughout the discussion and mainly come from computing. The potential for metaphorical transfers between these domains is considered. (shrink)

The threat of malpractice litigation in the United States is encouraging physicians again to assume responsibility for their patients. The fundamental ethical problem, however, is that this approach denies the patient's moral agency. In this essay, responsibility to patients, rather than for them, is discussed as an alternative to the emerging neo-paternalism. Responsibility to avoids the ethical problems of assuming responsibility for moral agents and could reduce the threat of litigation as well.

pt. 1. De dicto: Necessary and contingent truths, by G. W. Leibniz. New essays concerning human understanding, by G. W. Leibniz. Introduction to the critique of pure reason, by Immanuel Kant. On the nature of mathematical truth, C. G. Hempel. Two dogmas of empiricism, by W. V. O. Quine. In defense of a dogma, by H. P. Grace and P. F. Strawson. The a priori and the analytic, by A. Quinton. The truths of reason, by R. Chisholm.--pt. 2. De re: (...) Reference and modality, by W. V. O. Quine. De re et de dicto, by A. Plantinga. World and essence, by A. Plantinga.--Bibliography (p. 200-202). (shrink)

A subspace V of an infinite dimensional fully effective vector space V ∞ is called decidable if V is r.e. and there exists an r.e. W such that $V \oplus W = V_\infty$ . These subspaces of V ∞ are natural analogues of recursive subsets of ω. The set of r.e. subspaces forms a lattice L(V ∞ ) and the set of decidable subspaces forms a lower semilattice S(V ∞ ). We analyse S(V ∞ ) and its relationship with L(V (...) ∞ ). We show: Proposition. Let U, V, W ∈ L(V ∞ ) where U is infinite dimensional and $U \oplus V = W$ . Then there exists a decidable subspace D such that U |oplus D = W. Corollary. Any r.e. subspace can be expressed as the direct sum of two decidable subspaces. These results allow us to show: Proposition. The first order theory of the lower semilattice of decidable subspaces, Th(S(V ∞ )), is undecidable. This contrasts sharply with the result for recursive sets. Finally we examine various generalizations of our results. In particular we analyse S * (V ∞ ), that is, S(V ∞ ) modulo finite dimensional subspaces. We show S * (V ∞ ) is not a lattice. (shrink)

In numerous texts Leibniz claimed that while metaphysical necessity is inconsistent with free choice, moral necessity is not. A question naturally arises concerning what Leibniz took moral necessity to be. In a series of recent articles Michael Murray has argued that the concept of moral necessity Leibniz utilized is one developed and deployed by a group of 17th century Spanish Jesuits. This chapter argues that Leibniz's commitment to certain deep metaphysical principles suggests otherwise.