The New Rhetoric is founded on the idea that since “argumentation aims at securing the adherence of those to whom it is addressed, it is, in its entirety, relative to the audience to be influenced,” says Chaïm Perelman and L. Olbrechts-Tyteca, and they rely, in particular, for their theory of argumentation on the twin concepts of universal and particular audiences: while every argument is directed to a specific individual or group, the orator decides what information and what approaches will achieve (...) the greatest adherence according to an ideal audience. This ideal, Perelman explains, can be embodied, for example, "in God, in all reasonable and competent men, in the man deliberating or in an elite.” Like particular audiences, then, the universal audience is never fixed or absolute but depends on the orator, the content and goals of the argument, and the particular audience to whom the argument is addressed. These considerations determine what information constitutes "facts" and "reasonableness" and thus help to determine the universal audience that, in turn, shapes the orator's approach. /// The adherence of an audience is also determined by the orator's use of values, a further key concept of the New Rhetoric. Perelman's treatment of value and his view of epideictic rhetoric sets his approach apart from that of the ancients and of Aristotle in particular. Aristotle's division of rhetoric into three genres–forensic, deliberative, and epideictic–is largely motivated by the judgments required for each: forensic or legal arguments require verdicts on past action, deliberative or political rhetoric seeks judgment on future action, and epideictic or ceremonial rhetoric concerns values associated with praise or blame and seeks no specific decisions. For Aristotle, the epideictic genre was of limited importance in the civic realm since it did not concern facts or policies. Perelman, in contrast, believes not only that epideictic rhetoric warrants more attention, but that the values normally limited to that genre are in fact central to all argumentation. "Epideictic oratory," Perelman argues, "has significant and important argumentation for strengthening the disposition toward action by increasing adherence to the values it lauds.” These values are central to the persuasiveness of arguments in all rhetorical genres since the orator always attempts to "establish a sense of communion centered around particular values recognized by the audience.”. (shrink)

An introduction to informal logic, critical thinking and rhetoric utilizing actual public discourse .

This major new work from Quentin Skinner presents a fundamental reappraisal of the political theory of Hobbes. Using, for the first time, the full range of manuscript as well as printed sources, it documents an entirely new view of Hobbes 's intellectual development, and re-examines the shift from a humanist to a scientific culture in European moral and political thought. By examining Hobbes 's philosophy against the background of his humanist education, Professor Skinner rescues this most difficult and challenging of (...) political philosophers from the intellectual isolation in which he is so often discussed. This book presents a splendid exemplification of the 'Cambridge' contextual approach to the study of intellectual history with which Professor Skinner himself is especially associated. It will be of interest and importance to a wide range of scholars in history, philosophy, politics, and literary theory. (shrink)

In this landmark volume of contemporary communication theory, Ronald C. Arnett applies the metaphor of dialogic confession—which enables historical moments to be addressed from a confessed standpoint and through a communicative lens—to the works of German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who pointed to an era of postmodern difference with his notion of "a world come of age." Arnett’s interpretations of Bonhoeffer’s life and scholarship in contention with Nazi dominance offer implications for a dialogic confession that engages the complexity of postmodern narrative (...) contention. Rooted in classical theory, the field of communication ethics is abstract and arguably outmoded. In _Dialogic Confession: Bonhoeffer’s Rhetoric of Responsibility, _Arnett locates cross-cultural and comparative anchors that not only bring legitimacy and relevance to the field but also develop a conceptual framework that will advance and inspire future scholarship. (shrink)

In the field of philosophy, Plato's view of rhetoric as a potentially treacherous craft has long overshadowed Aristotle's view, which focuses on rhetoric as an independent discipline that relates in complex ways to dialectic and logic and to ethics and moral psychology. This volume, composed of essays by internationally renowned philosophers and classicists, provides the first extensive examination of Aristotle's Rhetoric and its subject matter in many years. One aim is to locate both Aristotle's treatise and its subject within the (...) more general context of his philosophical treatment of other disciplines, including moral and political theory as well as poetics. The contributors also seek to illuminate the structure of Aristotle's own conception of rhetoric as presented in his treatise. The first section of the book, which deals with the arguments of rhetoric, contains essays by M. F. Burnyeat and Jacques Brunschwig. A section treating the status of the art of rhetoric features pieces by Eckart Schütrumpf, Jürgen Sprute, M. M. McCabe, and Glenn W. Most. Essays by John M. Cooper, Stephen Halliwell, and Jean-Louis Labarrière address topics related to rhetoric, ethics, and politics. The final section, on rhetoric and literary art, comprises essays by Alexander Nehamas and André Laks. Originally published in 1994. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)

This paper examines the extent to which parents have absorbed New Right ideas about education and acted accordingly. What emerges is that their commitment to the rhetoric of school choice is strong. However, concepts such as the market and competition are viewed less favourably. An important theme here is the avoidance by parents of any collective agenda in discussing education policy, a factor that may thwart those who attempt to predict their responses to government policy for schools.

A leading figure of the Scottish Enlightenment, George Campbell began to write what was to become his most famous work, The Philosophy of Rhetoric, soon after his ordination as a minister in 1748. Later, as a founder of the Aberdeen Philosophical Society, he was able to present his theories, and these discourses were eventually published in 1776. In the spirit of the Enlightenment, Campbell combined classical rhetorical theory with the latest thinking in the social, behavioural and natural sciences. A proponent (...) of 'common sense' philosophy, he was particularly interested in the effect of successful rhetoric upon the mind. Published in two volumes, the work is divided into three books. Volume 2 contains the concluding part of Book 2 and all of Book 3, which shows the author at his most intricate, expanding upon the correct selection, number and arrangement of words required for successful argument. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Libanius the Sophist: Rhetoric, Reality, and Religion in the Fourth Century by Raffaella CribioreRobert J. PenellaRaffaella Cribiore. Libanius the Sophist: Rhetoric, Reality, and Religion in the Fourth Century. Townsend Lectures/Cornell University Studies in Classical Philology. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2013. x + 260 pp. Cloth, $49.95.Raffaella Cribiore has earned her Libanian stripes, especially with her The School of Libanius in Late Antique Antioch (Princeton 2007). When she (...) was invited to give the Townsend Lectures at Cornell University, of which the book under review is the published version, she decided to use that occasion as an opportunity to settle some Libanian misunderstandings, to insist on certain methodological principles, and to offer solutions to some specific problems. The book touches on a good number of discrete points; it might be described as a Libanian mélange. But, as its title indicates, the agenda revolves around matters of rhetoric and religion.In chapter 1, “Rhetoric and the Distortion of Reality,” the central exhibit is Oration 1, Libanius’ so-called autobiography. Cribiore provides a good discussion of its compositional history—the main section (1–155) written in 374 when Libanius was sixty years old and the rest at various sittings from 380 to 393—and of the main lines of its narrative. Any autobiography is, of course, an interpretive construction, a “distortion of reality,” made at a certain point or points in one’s lifetime. Cribiore explores Libanius’ self-interpretations, most famously the [End Page 537] role he allots to Tychē in his life. She shows how Libanius’ letters, written with immediacy at a particular point in time, can sometimes act as a factual corrective to the autobiography. Cribiore wonders whether one source of Libanius’ self-shaping may have been the holy-man tradition. She is struck by commonalities in Libanius’ autobiography and biographies of Apollonius of Tyana, Pythagoras, and Plotinus, although she does not believe that the Philostratean and Neopla-tonic works in question directly inspired Libanius. On the other hand, she argues that he read Athanasius’ life of the Christian monk Antony, in which he “could find much that could help him shape the narrative of his own life” (74). While I would not deny that Libanius might have read this work, I am not convinced that we need to invoke it to explain similarities of motif (or of counter-motif) found in his autobiography. All the commonalities are better seen, in Mortimer Smith’s words, as arising “from the general religious and intellectual milieu” (63).Chapter 2, “A Rhetor and His Audience: The Role of Invective,” depicts Libanius as a master of the emotions—provoking pity, anger, and shame, and also consoling grief—and of invective and satire. Personal invective had deep roots in the classical past; and classical models of invective, especially Demosthenes and Aeschines, were still inspiring emulation in Libanius’ day. Libanius could control the size of his listening or reading audience and suppress proper names or resort to allusion in attacking contemporary figures in his orations, but Cribiore rejects Paul Petit’s view that Libanius kept his most abusive orations “hidden in his file drawers,” intended “only for himself or for an audience of two or three friends” (86–87). They were far more publicly intended than that. The publicity of invective, though, raises a problem: the same Libanius who condemns certain public figures in the orations is very polite to them in the letters. (Cribiore is particularly interested in the case of Proclus, comes Orientis in 383–84.) Does this not make Libanius a hypocrite who can turn easily from invective to flattery? Cribiore tries to mitigate bald inconsistency by observing that traditional invective would have been taken cum grano salis, whereas a friendly and restrained tone would have been expected in letters. Fair enough. But such an observation, based on conventions of genre and the expectations of the audiences, tells us very little about the writer’s actual state of mind and behavior in any particular case. Cribiore’s insistence here on the publicity (more or less) of orations is one side of a coin that first appears in chapter 1, although it is not put to much... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:What Do You Mean, Rhetoric Is Epistemic?William D. HarpineIn 1967, Robert L. Scott (1967) advocated that "rhetoric is epistemic." This concept has enriched the work of rhetorical theorists and critics. Scott's essay is founded in a concept of argumentative justification in rhetoric, viewed as an alternative to analytic logic. Other writers, including Brummett (1976), Railsback (1983), and Cherwitz and Hikins (1986), have offered variations on Scott's theme. The thesis (...) that rhetoric is epistemic has been controversial, however, and from the tone of the debate one may draw two conclusions: many rhetorical theorists feel that Scott was on to something important, and the thesis as it has been developed is flawed. Much of the dispute centers on what the thesis means. These discussions have not yet adequately clarified that issue.The philosopher's most fundamental obligation is to define terms with care. It is in precisely this respect that the rhetoric-is-epistemic theorists have fallen short. Some of the key terms in this literature include rhetoric, knowledge, certainty, and truth. In too many cases, the writers on rhetorical epistemology have not defined their key terms at all. In other cases, their definitions are inadequate or inconsistent. This essay undertakes to sort out the most important definitional problems, which center on the rhetoric-is-epistemic theorists' habit of equivocating about the meanings of "rhetoric" and "certainty." The result makes it possible to endorse the validity of Scott's essentially ethical conclusions, while dismissing a number of unnecessary complexities in the arguments made by rhetoric-as-epistemic theorists. Finally, a few alternatives that might lead to more robust foundations for the rhetoric-as-epistemic thesis are suggested.In 1978, after reviewing four distinct interpretations of the claim that rhetoric is epistemic, Leff concluded that clarification of what that claim means "deserves more disciplined treatment than it has received in the recent literature" (1978, 77). The same could still be said. After some [End Page 335] thirty years of active research and speculation on the topic, one now sees fewer publications specifically advocating that rhetoric is epistemic. The distinguished rhetorical theorist Barry Brummett (1990) has declared the thesis deceased (69-72).All the same, textbook authors treat the thesis as a given, despite their tendency to interpret it in wildly different ways. Foss, for example, puts forward a view that "in the field of communication, the idea that rhetoric creates reality is known as the notion that rhetoric is epistemic, which simply means that rhetoric creates knowledge; epistemology is the study of the origin and nature of knowledge" (1989, 122; emphasis in the original). This version of the thesis, claiming that rhetoric actually "creates reality," might be more ontological than it is epistemic.1 Herrick takes a dialectical view that "through rhetorical interaction, people come to accept some ideas as true and to reject others as false. Thus, rhetoric's epistemic function in society can be seen in some ways to be a result of its benefit of testing ideas." Herrick continues that "once an idea has been tested thoroughly by a group, community, and society, it becomes part of what these groups take to be knowledge." Herrick contrasts this with the rejected view that "knowledge is all objective in nature and comes to us by way of direct experience or education" (1997, 22). Both Herrick and Foss offer interesting theses, and both attribute their views to Scott, but their views are obviously very different. There can be no surer evidence of the failure to use terms precisely.Brummett (1990) attributes the demise of rhetoric-is-epistemic research to the failure of critics to employ the idea in rhetorical criticism. Brummett might be right to the extent that much of the rhetoric-is-epistemic literature is indeed exceptionally abstract. Specific discussions might clarify some issues. Nonetheless, some notable rhetorical critics have indeed employed a concept that rhetoric is epistemic (e.g., Scott and Klumpp 1984; Sullivan 1992). The issues remain unclear. Furthermore, rhetorical criticism per se cannot clarify the meanings of theoretical terms. More likely, one sees less and less published research about the thesis that rhetoric is epistemic precisely because the thesis has not been laid out clearly... (shrink)

The structure of this discussion will be tripartite. First it will set out a way of distinguishing between rhetoric and strictly rational argumentation. Next it will consider some of the ramifications of this proposed way of looking at the matter – in particular what its implications are for rationality and for rhetoric, respectively. Finally it examines how this perspective bears on the project of philosophizing. The paper's ultimate aim, accordingly, is to consider what light such an analysis can shed upon (...) philosophy and philosophizing. (shrink)

This book examines a widespread, and often misunderstood, doctrine within the medieval Aristotelian tradition, namely the inclusion of Aristotle's Rhetoric and Poetics within the scope of the Organon. It studies this doctrine, as presented by the Islamic philosophers Al- Fārābī, Avicenna, and Averroes, from a purely philosophical perspective, and argues that the logical construal of the arts of rhetoric and poetics is both interesting and illuminating. The book begins by examining some prevalent misconceptions regarding the logical interpretation of the Rhetoric (...) and Poetics. Chapter two considers the Greek background of the doctrine, first through an examination of the Aristotelian divisions of the sciences, and then through an examination of the beginnings of the logical classification of the Rhetoric and Poetics among the Greek commentators from the school of Alexandria. The remainder of the work is devoted to a detailed consideration of the Arabic philosophers' development of the doctrine, both their understanding of its general epistemological and logical underpinnings, and their elaboration of the specific logical structures upon which poetical and rhetorical discourse is based. Consideration is also given to the relationship between contemporary philosophical views of rhetoric and poetics, and the views of these medieval authors. (shrink)

This book is a critically informed challenge to the traditional histories of rhetoric and to the current emphasis on Aristotle and Plato as the most significant classical voices in rhetoric. In it, Susan C. Jarratt argues that the first sophists—a diverse group of traveling intellectuals in the fifth century B.C.—should be given a more prominent place in the study of rhetoric and composition. Rereading the ancient sophists, she creates a new lens through which to see contemporary social issues, including the (...) orality/literacy debate, feminist writing, deconstruction, and writing pedagogy. The sophists’ pleasure in the play of language, their focus on historical contin-gency, and the centrality of their teaching for democratic practice were sufficiently threatening to their successors Plato and Aristotle that both sought to bury the sophists under philosophical theories of language. The censure of Plato and Aris-totle set a pattern for historical views of the sophists for centuries. Following Hegel and Nietzsche, Jarratt breaks the pattern, finding in the sophists a more progressive charter for teachers and scholars of reading and writing, as well as for those in the adjacent disciplines of literary criticism and theory, education, speech communication, and ancient history. In tracing the historical interpretations of sophistic rhetoric, Jarratt suggests that the sophists themselves provide the outlines of an alternative to history-writing as the discovery and recounting of a set of stable facts. She sees sophistic use of narrative in argument as a challenge to a simple division between orality and literacy, current discussions of which virtually ignore the sophists. Outlining similarities between _écriture féminine _and sophistic style, Jarratt shows that contemporary feminisms have more in common with sophists than just a style; they share a rhetorical basis for deployment of theory in political action. In her final chapter, Jarratt takes issue with accounts of sophistic pedagogy focusing on technique and the development of the individual. She argues that, despite its employment by powerful demagogues, sophistic pedagogy offers a resource for today’s teachers interested in encouraging minority voices of resistance through language study as the practice of democracy. (shrink)

Scholars are divided over the question of whether managerial aspirational talk that contradicts current business practices can contribute to corporate social responsibility (CSR). In this conceptual article, we explore the rhetorical dynamics of aspirational talk that either impede or foster CSR. We argue that self-persuasive CSR rhetoric, as one enactment of aspirational talk, can attract attention and scrutiny from organizational members. Continued adherence to this rhetoric, however, creates and perpetuates tensions that lead to a vicious circle of disengagement. A virtuous (...) circle, by contrast, requires a shift toward an agonistic rhetoric that transcends tensions by rearticulating aspirations in concurrence with situated understandings of responsible corporate practice. Our arguments contribute to a better understanding of how communication becomes constitutive of CSR and address the debate on decoupling between talk and action. (shrink)

This paper aims at showing how the New Rhetoric’s insights allow for an integration of argumentation studies in linguistic investigation, and more specifically in discourse analysis. Claiming that argumentativity is a constitutive feature of discourse, it endeavors to explore logos as both reason and language by analyzing patterns of reasoning in their discursive actualization. In this approach, the attempt at influencing the audience’s representations is analyzed in the complexity of a discourse explored in its formal and socio-institutional dimensions.

. Although the pages of Journal of Business Ethics have hosted an ongoing dialogue on the ethics of rhetoric and persuasion, the debates have been unable to account for the underlying morality of the human propensity to engage in rhetorical discourse as a part of living in society. In this paper, I offer natural-law ethical theory as a moral paradigm in which to examine rhetoric. In this context, I assert that rhetoric services reason, which in turn services our dispositions or (...) inclinations that are one ideological foundation of natural-law theory. As rhetoric affects the apprehension of these dispositions it subsumes a related morality in which rhetorical endeavors can be seen as “natural”. So endowed, I believe that this conception of rhetoric offers a number of philosophical and practical implications, one of which is a new way to assess the morality of commercial manifestations of rhetoric such as spin and the use of puffery in advertising. (shrink)

Jamie Dow presents an original treatment of Aristotle's views on rhetoric and the passions, and the first major study of Aristotle's Rhetoric in recent years. He attributes to Aristotle a normative view of rhetoric and its role in the state, and ascribes to him a particular view of the kinds of cognitions involved in the passions.

Paying more attention to the rhetorical side of argumentation raises epistemological questions. In this article I argue that rhetoric has to be an integral part of argumentative models if such models are to be considered rational. In other words, I claim that rhetoric is a necessary condition for argumentation studies. I am aware that this view may appear provocative. I hope to show that it is not the case, if we consider rationality to be a concept that encompasses more than (...) just a strictly logical way of thinking. Indeed, I would like to defend a humanistic conception of rationality as the background for a theory of rhetoric in order to underscore the specific rationality of the humanist frame of thinking for a .. (shrink)

Considered the most original thinker in the Italian philosophical tradition, Giambattista Vico has been the object of much scholarly attention but little consensus. In this new interpretation, David L. Marshall examines the entirety of Vico's oeuvre and situates him in the political context of early modern Naples. He demonstrates Vico's significance as a theorist who adapted the discipline of rhetoric to modern conditions. Marshall presents Vico's work as an effort to resolve a contradiction. As a professor of rhetoric at the (...) University of Naples, Vico had a deep investment in the explanatory power of classical rhetorical thought, especially that of Aristotle, Cicero, and Quintilian. Yet as a historian of the failure of Naples as a self-determining political community, he had no illusions about the possibility or worth of democratic and republican systems of government in the post-classical world. As Marshall demonstrates, by jettisoning the assumption that rhetoric only illuminates direct, face-to-face interactions between orator and auditor, Vico reinvented rhetoric for a modern world in which the Greek polis and the Roman res publica are no longer paradigmatic for political thought. (shrink)

This collection presents stimulating and diverse essays by scholars from several different fields; the contributors have made important contributions to the ...

ABSTRACT This paper proposes a vision of rhetoric as metaphysical enactment. This position contrasts with traditionally accepted views of rhetoric as phenomenological practice, evidenced prominently in contemporary rhetorical theory. I advance a framework that employs metaphorical accommodation and indicates a way that rhetoric can be situated as a perpetually productive force. The analytic tradition affords a method and vocabulary that when placed in conversation with rhetorical studies offers an alternative for viewing rhetoric as metaphysical enactment. I determine that rhetorical theory (...) should engage with rhetoric as a measure of action, activity, and vitality that raises our awareness and connects us. (shrink)

In early modern theories of ‘proper’ style, ambiguously, difficulty could convey a sense of excellence on one hand (of national belonging, imperial ambition or manly ‘virility’) while also being deployed to denigrate unseemly (too feminine or foreign) speech. Difficulty erupts precisely in the points of friction: when boundaries around ablebodymindedness are drawn or when the available forms of expression are insufficient. Instead of eradicating difficulty altogether, I sift through early modern French, English and Italian writing on rhetoric to make a (...) case for paying closer attention to difficulty, lingering with it, and seeing what these friction points ultimately reveal. The contemporary concept of ‘disability gain’ posits disability not as a defect to be remedied, erased or cured, but rather as a mode of being in the world that allows for innovation, creativity and even added affects, resources or alternative epistemologies. Instead of considering, in the pedagogical domain, how to construct conceptual ‘on-ramps’ for simplifying difficulty, what would we gain by leaning into the unclear, uncertain and potentially joyful ‘other’ forms of communication itself, such as dysfluency, stuttering or Remi Yergeau’s concept of the rhizomatic neuroqueer? (shrink)

Although John Dewey has had the most profound effect on education, less is known about the philosophy of education of the original founder of pragmatism, Charles Peirce Using Peirce’s theory of formal rhetoric, I try to show that Peirce’s philosophy of education, when fully understood, is aligned with Dewey’s pedagogy of experiential learning, and can provide a justification for the promotion of active learning in the classroom. Peirce’s rhetoric, as one part of his logical or semiotic theory, argues that reasoning (...) alone is not sufficient to gain knowledge, but that it must be embedded within a community of inquiry, of a certain sort. Applying this to the classroom, I argue that we, as teachers, should endeavor to create the features of a proper community of inquiry in the classroom, one that emphasizes engagement of the students in doing research rather than passively receiving information about its results. (shrink)

La question de ce petit livre est simple : peut-on aller au-delà du constat de crise et d'impuissance dont le philosophe se fait le prophète depuis plus d'un siècle? Peut-on parler de la science sans complexe d'infériorité, de Dieu sans obscurantisme, d'existence sans tomber dans la banalité du café du commerce, de politique sans consacrer le cynisme, de morale sans faire dans le sermon? Bref, la philosophie peut-elle aider à faire comprendre et à dépasser les apories du temps présent qu'elle (...) a fait siennes, comme un malade ressasse sa propre maladie pour se donner le sentiment qu'ainsi il peut la mettre à distance à défaut de la vaincre? Toutes ces questions sont aujourd'hui les nôtres, et il ne faut pas avoir peur de parler des grands problèmes qui agitent les hommes depuis l'aube des temps, car si la philosophie a un sens, c'est bien en ce qu'elle envisage les questions ultimes dans une plus ou moins grande systématicité selon les époques. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This article develops a theory of rhetorical impression through a critical genealogy of the term phantasia. The genealogy demonstrates cause for understanding phantasia as impression, not image. I trace phantasia as impression through the work of Plato and Aristotle but ultimately argue that the stoics offer the most productive leads for thinking through impressions, materiality, and sensations together. Specifically, I demonstrate how the stoics' concept of lekton can productively mediate the relationship between rhetoric, materiality, imagination, and idealism. In the (...) closing section, I suggest how a theory of rhetorical impression can address lacunae in existing new materialist approaches. (shrink)

This essay argues that in overlooking the assault on the autonomy, unity, and tenacity of the classical world underway in Europe after 1880, historians have failed to appreciate an important element of historiographical reorientation at the fin de siècle. This second "revolution" in humanistic scholarship challenged the conviction of the educated elite that European culture was rooted exclusively in classical antiquity in part by introducing as evidence non-textual forms of evidence; the testimony of artifacts allowed writers to reach beyond romantic-nationalist (...) histories toward the identification of cultural areas, defined by morphological similarities, and to disrupt the traditional categories of the civilized and the barbaric. The essay focuses on a relatively obscure Austrian art historian, Josef Strzygowski, whose insistence upon Europe's dependence on Oriental forms and upon the superior historical value of material, over textual, evidence provided critics of philologically-based humanism with two important argumentative avenues. Strzygowski also represents a para-academic type, whose rise to power and prestige contributed to the so-called "decline of the German mandarins." In sketching his career, the essay attempts to show how this "decline" is bound up with the waning institutional and popular status of Renaissance humanism--and a corresponding rise of biologistic Germanophilia--in the two intellectual milieux Strzygowski inhabited . A final section suggests that this antihumanist crusade contributed not only to the articulation of racist historiography, but also to the eventual transference of politico-moral legitimacy to a non-elitist, anthropological definition of culture. (shrink)

This article presumes to achieve a relatively definitive philosophical treatment of the creation-science issue (concerning teaching evolution in the schools) identified as a complex and troublesome piece of public rhetoric requiring careful attention to a number of distinct points to gain an adequate response to it. Questions of fact, theory, logic, professional responsibility, human being, metaphysics, education, law, religion, and ethics are all critically examined with a sampling of pertinent sources. As an unexpected movement in our time creation-science rhetoric represents (...) many conflicting interests, most significantly a confused but legitimate call for philosophical thinking which should not go unheeded. (shrink)

The ways in which the Aristotelian sciences are related to each other has been discussed in the literature, with some focus on the subalternate sciences. While it is acknowledged that Aristotle, and Plato as well, was concerned as well with how the arts were related to one another, less attention has been paid to Aristotle's views on relationships among the arts. In this paper, I argue that Aristotle's account of the subalternate sciences helps shed light on how Aristotle saw the (...) art of rhetoric relating to dialectic and politics. Initial motivation for comparing rhetoric with the subalternate sciences is Aristotle's use of the language of boundary transgression, germane to the Posterior Analytics, when discussing rhetoric’s boundaries, as well as the language of "over" and "under" found in APo. First, I discuss three passages in Rhetoric Book I and argue that Garver's (1988) account cannot be correct. Second, I look to the subalternate sciences, especially focusing on optics and the distinction between "unqualified" optics and mathematical optics. Third, I discuss rhetoric's dependence on both dialectic and politics. (shrink)

The ‘constructivist turn’ in political representation literature has clarified that representation is crucial in forging identities – through the creation of ideological and symbolic representations that mobilize and coalesce otherwise scattered and undefined social forces – and thus also why it is essentially an interpretative and performative activity. In this article I argue that, as a consequence of this emphasis on interpretation and performativity, this approach makes clear why the ethos of representatives is important in representation. To prove this, I (...) employ some insights from rhetoric. Rhetorical persuasion and democratic representation, indeed, call for a similar kind of judgment, as they both need to mediate between opposing exigencies: rhetoric between attentiveness to the specificity of the audience and the creation of new beliefs, and representation between being responsive to specific interests and giving them a new articulation. Mediating this tension requires an exercise of judgment that, being directed toward the future, inevitably introduces uncertainty into the relation. This is why both in rhetoric and representation the ethos is an essential element. However, as I argue in the conclusion, the personal qualities that should be considered relevant here are above political qualities, rather than technical or moral ones. (shrink)

In the past few years, we have become increasingly focused on technology use that is impulsive, unthinking, and distractive. There has been a strong push to understand such technology use in terms of dopamine addiction. The present article demonstrates the limitations of this so-called neurobehaviorist approach: Not only is it inconsistent in regard to how it understands humans, technologies, and their mutual relationship, it also pathologizes everyday human behaviors. The article proceeds to discuss dual-systems theory, which helpfully discusses impulsive technology (...) use in terms of habit instead of addiction, but can be criticized for its mentalist celebration of conscious control. Finally, the article introduces a phenomenological approach whose conceptualization of habit manifests many of the experiential qualities that we try to capture with addiction, but remains non-pathologizing and opens a space for learning: While tech addiction is bad and must be eliminated, good tech habits can be trained and cultivated. (shrink)