This essay defends a version of the Doctrine of Double Effect (DDE) – the doctrine that there is normally a stronger reason against an act that has a bad state of affairs as one of its intended effects than against an otherwise similar act that has that bad state of affairs as an unintended effect. First, a precise account of this version of the DDE is given. Secondly, some suggestions are made about why we should believe the DDE, and about (...) why it is true. Finally, a solution is developed to the so-called ‘closeness problem’ that any version of the DDE must face. (shrink)

In Argument, Inference and Dialectic Pinto argues that critical practice can furnish us with the necessary guidance to answer our questions about argument and inference; we do not need to develop a theory of argument/inference. Pinto’s provocative remarks raise questions about the appeal to practice, and recall problems that Toulmin encounters in development of his innovative theory in The Uses of Argument. In this paper, I juxtapose and reflect on these developments.

Ellis (philosophy, Claark Atlanta U.) describes a number of different kindsf abnormalities that result from the detrimental effects of narcissism onhe ability to love. Developing the notion of a culture of narcissism firstroposed by Christopher Lasch, he presents a theory of the role played byove in human attempts to grapple with ontologica.

A drop of blood drawn from thy country's bosom Should grieve thee more than streams of foreign gore.—Shakespeare, First Part of King Henry the SixthA system of ethics produced by prohibitions is a community's condition of possibility. What maintains this system is the community's identity, the way members of the group mythically describe and convince themselves through mutual mimesis of their mutual belonging, that is, of their mutual ethics of nonviolence. This maintained space of ethical mutuality is defined against a (...) larger external space of mutual violence.First removed from mutual mimetic violence through prohibitions, community and its self-description as identity are then separated from outsiders through the... (shrink)

After Napoleon's final defeat of 1815 and before the beginnings of the second great wave of French colonialism in the 1830s, during a period of great internal political crisis, French society produced an object called The Death of Sardanapalus. This painting represented what was then a somewhat familiar figure, the "Oriental," an outsider behaving badly and set to die for it.Based on the mimetic theory, this essay argues that in the relation it determines with its viewers, this painting's representation of (...) violence is a form of ritualistic activity, one that allows for contained and predictable events of unifying violence against outsiders. Among the effects of the French political conflicts was a crisis in such... (shrink)

Published in 1913 as _La Philosophie Bergsonienne_, this incisive critique of the thought of Henri Bergson was Jacques Maritain's first book. In it he shows himself already to have an authoritative grasp of the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas and an uncanny ability to demonstrate its relevance to alternative philosophical systems such as that of Henri Bergson. Volume 1 in the series _The Collected Works of Jacques Maritain_, this edition faithfully reproduces the 1955 translation published by the Philosophical Library. It (...) would be difficult to overestimate Bergson’s role in extricating French philosophy from the deadening materialism that dominated the Sorbonne. It was that cultural milieu that brought Maritain and his wife Raïssa to the brink of suicide. They drew back for two major reasons. First were the lectures of Henri Bergson at the Collège de France, in which the Maritains found a defense of metaphysics, of the transcendent beyond the material, within which they could find meaning in life. The second reason was their conversion to Catholicism, a move they and many of their contemporaries made after being introduced to Bergson’s work. Soon after his conversion, Jacques Maritain immersed himself in the thought of Thomas Aquinas and was struck by the comparative weaknesses of Bergson. This book is Maritain’s relentless criticism of the philosophy of the man whose lectures had meant so much to him. Its ferocity marks it as a young man’s book, written in part to exorcize the defects of Bergson’s philosophy as they were understood by one now schooled in Thomism. Twenty-five years later, Maritain, while not retracting his criticisms, regretted their intemperance and, as a result, moderated his assessment of Bergson in a long preface to the second edition. In it, we find a philosopher who mastered his craft and a critic of rare perception and refinement. (shrink)

Philip and Roger Knight, a private eye and a Notre Dame professor, work to solve the murders of a trustee and her husband.--.