The conventional historiography of psychoanalysis in America offers few opportunities for the elaboration of anti-racist themes, and instead American ‘ego psychology’ has often been regarded as the most acute exemplar of ‘racist’ psychoanalysis. In this article, consistent with the historiographical turn Burnham first identified under the heading of ‘the New Freud Studies’, I distinguish between histories of psychoanalytic practitioners and histories of psychoanalytic ideas in order to open out an alternative angle of vision on the historiography. For psychoanalytic ideas were (...) in fact omnipresent within American culture at mid-century, and they played a fundamental role in the psychological reworking of race that unfolded in the work of social scientists, literary artists, and cultural critics in the 1940s and early Cold War years, culminating in the Brown v. Board of Education ruling of 1954, a major landmark in the civil rights narrative. By pursuing the implications of psychoanalysis in anti-racist struggles at mid-century, and with particular attention to Richard Wright and his autobiographical novel Black Boy, I move towards unearthing an alternative historical account of the intersection between psychoanalysis and race, which offers new ways for psychoanalysis and the history of the human sciences to think about this period. (shrink)

More than twenty years after its original publication, _The Case for Animal Rights _is an acknowledged classic of moral philosophy, and its author is recognized as the intellectual leader of the animal rights movement. In a new and fully considered preface, Regan responds to his critics and defends the book's revolutionary position.

A conception of an environmental ethic is set forth which involves postulating that nonconscious natural objects can have value in their own right, independently of human interests. Two kinds of objection are considered: those that deny the possibility of developing an ethic ofthe environment that accepts this postulate, and those.that deny the necessity of constructing such an ethic. Both types of objection are found wanting. The essay condudes with some tentative remarks regarding the notion of inherent value.

He puts the issue of animal rights in historical context, drawing parallels between animal rights activism and other social movements, including the anti-slavery movement in the nineteenth century and the gay-lesbian struggle today. He also outlines the challenges to animal rights posed by deep ecology and ecofeminism to using animals for human purposes and addresses the ethical dilemma of the animal rights advocate whose employer uses animals for research."--BOOK JACKET.

The bay was sunlit and filled with boats, many of them just returned from early-dawn trips to the open sea. Fish that a few hours before had been swimming in the water now lay on the boat decks with glassy eyes, wounded mouths, bloodstained scales. The fishermen, well-to-do sportsmen, were weighing the fish and boasting about their catches. As often as Herman had witnessed the slaughter of animals and fish, he always had the same thought: in their behavior toward creatures, (...) all men were Nazis. The smugness with which man could do with other species as he pleased exemplified the most extreme racist theories, the principle that might is right. Herman had repeatedly pledged to become a vegetarian, but Yadwiga wouldn't hear of it. They had starved enough in the village and later in the camp. They hadn't come to rich America to starve again. The neighbors had taught her that ritual slaughter and Kashruth were the roots of Judaism. It was meritorious for the hen to be taken to the ritual slaugheterer, who had recited a benediction before cutting its throat (from Enemies, A Love Story. (shrink)

Tom Beauchamp presents a new edition, designed especially for the student reader, of An Enquiry concerning Human Understanding, the classic work in which David Hume gave a general exposition of his philosophy to a broad educated readership. An authoritative new version of the text is preceded by a substantial introduction explaining the historical and intellectual background to the work and surveying its main themes. The volume also includes detailed explanatory notes on the text, a glossary of terms, and a section (...) of supplementary readings. (shrink)

In this essay, I explore the moral foundations of the treatment of animals. Alternative views are critically examined, including (a) the Kantian account, which holds that our duties regarding animals are actually indirect duties to humanity; (b) the cruelty account, which holds that the idea of cruelty explains why it is wrong to treat animals in certain ways; and (c) the utilitarian account, which holds that the value of consequences for all sentient creatures explains our duties to animals. These views (...) are shown to be inadequate, the Kantian account because some of our duties regarding animals are direct duties to animals; the cruelty account because it confuses matters of motive or intent with the question of the rightness or wrongness of the agent’s actions; and the utilitarian account because it could be used to justifyidentifiable speciesistic practices. I defend a fourth view. Only if we postulate basic moral rights in the case of humans, can we satisfactorily account for why it is wrong to treat humans in certain ways, and it is only by postulating that these humans have inherent value that we can attribute to them basic moral rights. Consistency requires that we attribute this same kind of value to many animals. Their havinginherent value provides a similar basis for attributing certain basic moral rights to them, including the right not to be harmed. Possession of this right places the onus of justification on anyone who would harm these animals. I set forth conditions for such a justification which those who would abuse animals have failed to meet. (shrink)

Generics have historically proven difficult to analyse using the tools of formal semantics. In this paper, I argue that an influential theory of the meaning of generics due to Sarah-Jane Leslie, the Psychological Theory of Generics, is best interpreted not as a theory of their meaning, but as a theory of the psychological heuristics that we use to judge whether or not generics are true. I argue that Leslie’s methodology is not well-suited to producing a theory of the meaning of (...) generics, since it takes speakers’ judgments at face value and ignores the non-semantic factors that might affect these judgments. Leslie’s theory therefore overfits the data of our linguistic intuitions. I present a reconceptualised version of the Psychological Theory of Generics as a theory of how heuristics affect our judgements of the truth values of generics and discuss the application of this reconceptualised theory to some of the puzzles posed by generics, including their apparent content-sensitivity, their inferential asymmetry and their association with stereotyping and prejudice. (shrink)

Environmental ethics rests on a mistake. At least a common conception of what such an ethic must be like rests on a mistake. To make this clearer, I first explain this conception, then characterize and defend the charge I make against it.

Whether people possess free will has been a long-lasting philosophical debate. Recent attention in social psychology has been given to the behavioral consequences of believing in free will. Research has demonstrated that manipulating free will beliefs has implications for many social behaviors. For example, free will belief manipulations have been associated with cheating, aggressiveness, and prejudice. Despite this work, some of these findings have failed to replicate. Testing theoretical predictions, such as whether believing in free will influences behavior, depends on (...) theoretical, auxiliary, statistical, and inferential assumptions (TASI). In this paper we apply the TASI category of assumptions to the free will belief debate. In doing so we demonstrate why these assumptions should be considered when appraising the influence of free will belief manipulations on free will beliefs and behavior. To provide a nuanced view of free will beliefs, we believe researchers should pay careful attention to these critical assumptions. (shrink)

An introduction to functionalism in the philosophy of psychology/mind, and review of the current state of debate pro and con. Forthcoming in the Routledge Companion to the Philosophy of Psychology (John Symons and Paco Calvo, eds.).

Jan Narveson has rendered a valuable service with his examination of two recent publications on the general topic of the treatment of animals. Not only has he given us the means for securing a better understanding of many of the most important arguments common to these two volumes; what is more, he has advanced a position which fails to receive any attention in either, and a position which, should it happen to be correct, would fatally undermine perhaps the most basic (...) thesis advanced by those who argue for the rights of animals-the thesis, namely, that we have as much reason for believing that many animals have rights as we have for believing that humans do. Narveson's position is that this thesis can be seen to be false, if, as he thinks may be the case, egoism can give us a “coherent and quite theoretically smooth account of our moral intuitions”. (shrink)

Philosophy written in English is overwhelmingly analytic philosophy, and the techniques and predilections of analytic philosophy are not only unhistorical but anti-historical, and hostile to textual commentary. Analytic usually aspires to a very high degree of clarity and precision of formulation and argument, and it often seeks to be informed by, and consistent with, current natural science. In an earlier era, analytic philosophy aimed at agreement with ordinary linguistic intuitions or common sense beliefs, or both. All of these aspects of (...) the subject sit uneasily with the use of historical texts for philosophical illumination. In this book, ten distinguished philosophers explore the tensions between, and the possibilities of reconciling, analytic philosophy and history of philosophy. Contributors: M. R. Ayers, John Cottingham, Daniel Garber, Gary Hatfield, Anthony Kenny, Steven Nadler, G. A. J. Rogers, Tom Sorell, Catherine Wilson, Yves Charles Zarka. (shrink)

Addresses such topics as child pornography, feminism, deep ecology, vivisection, Christian theology and career choice.

This volume will collect Tom Beauchamp's 15 most important published articles in bioethics, most of which were published over the last 25 years, and most of ...

(Deutsch:) Es werden zunächst drei Hinsichten unterschieden, nach denen die in einer Situation offenstehenden Möglichkeiten vorstrukturiert erscheinen: materiell, sozial und subjektiv. Während in materieller Hinsicht Möglichkeiten schlicht vorgegeben sind, werden Möglichkeiten gesellschaftlich als zulässig oder unzulässig skandiert, d.i. hervorgehoben, oder bleiben unskandiert. In subjektiver Hinsicht sind es vor allem die Fähigkeiten des Einzelnen, die diese Möglichkeiten er- oder verschließen. Technisierung erscheint in dieser Perspektive als sichernde Vorstrukturierung von Möglichkeitsräumen, die subjektiv stets mit der Abblendung oder Abschattung bestimmter Sachverhalte und Möglichkeiten, (...) der Erzeugung einer Zone der Latenz, einhergeht. Wie aus emanzipatorischer Perspektive mit dieser Dynamik umzugehen ist, ist Thema des letzten Abschnitts. -/- (English:) At the beginning of the text, I distinguish between three respects in which the options and possibilities within a given situation are prestructured: materially, socially, and subjectively. While certain options and possibilities are simply predetermined by the physical structure of a situation, many options are socially accentuated (skandiert) as admissible or inadmissible, while other options remain unaccented. With respect to the subject, options are primarily made accessible and disclosed through the particular capabilities of the agent. From such a point of view, mechanization (Technisierung) can be described as the safe-guarding prestructuring of spaces of possibility, which is always linked with the fading of certain circumstances and possibilities, the establishment of a domain of latency. How to cope with this dynamic from an emancipatory perspective is the subject of the last section of the paper. (shrink)

Menschen sind häufig nicht ganz bei der Sache. Oft finden wir sie abwesend, nicht ganz da, sich in Tagträume verlierend, in Gedanken schon bei der nächsten Sache; finden sie irgendwie nicht ganz hinein in die Situationen, mit denen sie sich gerade konfrontiert finden. Der Beitrag entwickelt die These, dass die Rede von der "Immersivität" von Erfahrung nicht erst bei technologisch oder ästhetisch mediierten Erlebnissen des Versetztseins in künstliche oder virtuelle "Welten" und Umgebungen am Platz, gewöhnliche menschliche Erfahrung vielmehr ganz grundsätzlich (...) durch eine immersive Dynamik des Hineinfindens in und Hinausgeratens aus Situationen charakterisiert ist: Noch bevor wir uns ein bewusstes Bild konkreter Umstände und Möglichkeiten gemacht haben, finden wir uns gewöhnlich schon in Situationen verortet. Diese zeichnen bestimmte Rhythmen und Richtungen, Valenzen und Tendenzen, Bedeutsamkeiten und Möglichkeiten vor. Der Beitrag skizziert eine Phänomenologie der Immersion, die auch ein tieferes Verständnis technologisch oder ästhetisch mediierter Immersionserfahrungen verspricht. (shrink)

Der Aufsatz untersucht, inwiefern der Sprache in der Phänomenologie die Rolle zukommt, das Individuum deiktisch in den Situationen seiner Existenz zu orientieren, indem sie kategorial auf Gegebenheiten seiner Erfahrung zeigt. Phänomenologisches Philosophieren geht in dieser Hinsicht über das bloße, innertheoretische Geben und Nehmen von Gründen sowie die Absicherung objektiver Wissensbestände (zu denen es gleichfalls nicht in Opposition tritt) hinaus, und zielt dabei evokativ auf orientierende Erkenntniseffekte im Subjekt. Statt als innersprachliche "Deskriptionen" oder Bezeichnungen von Phänomenen fungieren phänomenologische Begriffe und Beschreibungen (...) als verbale Zeigegesten, die dem Individuum im erfolgreichen Fall die bezeigten (und in diesem Sinne "be-deuteten") Phänomene selbst vor Augen führen. (shrink)

Im Umgang mit dem, was geschieht, lassen sich grundsätzlich zwei Weisen unterscheiden: Einer offenen, irritationsfreudigen Umgangsweise steht eine Erlebensweise gegenüber, die eher dazu neigt, Erlebtes zu vereindeutigen, mit ihm so schnell wie möglich fertig zu werden, es möglichst schnell möglichst abschließend zu begreifen. Während eine Person, die ersterem zuneigt, etwa einen in alltäglicher Konversation geäußerten Satz daraufhin abklopft, welche Über- und Hintersinne noch mit ihm angespielt und ausgesagt sein könnten, ob das, was sie zu hören meinte, auch wirklich das ist, (...) was gemeint war, weiß jemand, der eher letzterem zugeneigt ist, meist recht schnell recht genau, was sie oder er gehört hat, was das wohl zu bedeuten und wie man damit weiter zu verfahren hat. Während erstere dabei Gefahr läuft, die Welt durch Vervieldeutigung unnötig zu verkomplizieren, die Geschmeidigkeit der alltäglichen Gesprächs- und Interaktionsmechanik durch unnötige Rückfragen, Fremd- und Selbstirritationen zum Stocken zu bringen, läuft letztere Gefahr, sich – für sich selbst unbemerkt – in einer verarmten Welt einzurichten, an der viele, von anderen registrierte Phänomene durch vorschnelle Vereindeutigung einfach unregistriert vorbeigleiten. (shrink)

Human moral rights place justified limits on what people are free to do to one another. Animals also have moral rights, and arguments to support the use of animals in scientific research based on the benefits allegedly derived from animal model research are thus invalid. Animals do not belong in laboratories because placing them there, in the hope of benefits for others, violates their rights.

The research importance of biobanked biological materials and their derived data is growing, especially as these are increasingly linked with individual and population‐level medical and health information. The number, diversity, and size of biobanks are growing in tandem. So, too, is the number of individuals whose donations are being used in biobank‐supported research, with or without their knowledge. Pretty soon, we all will be “participants” in a variety of research projects we know nothing about. Until recently, our leftover tissue or (...) deidentified medical information could be used for research without our consent or even our knowledge. Even if we've been asked–as the current regulations require when research uses are anticipated‐we were most likely asked to give a blanket consent to any future use, with no prospect of learning about or controlling how our material is later used. This is an ethically problematic state of affairs, but there are options for improving it. (shrink)

Historical myths are appealing primarily because they provide people with views of life and their role in it as significant and enduring. These worldviews help people manage death anxiety by enabling them to view themselves as part of something great that stretches far into the past and endures indefinitely into the future. We review empirical evidence supporting this analysis.

This is a collection of essays about how political thought inhabits the dimensions of time and history. As John Robertson explains in his introduction, time and history are ‘separable concepts’ (2)...

Some feminist philosophers criticize the idea of human rights because, they allege, it encapsulates male bias; it is therefore misguided, in their view, to extend moral rights to non-human animals. I argue that the feminist criticism is misguided. Ideas are not biased in favour of men simply because they originate with men, nor are ideas themselves biased in favour of men because men have used them prejudicially. As for the position that women should abandon theories of rights and embrace an (...) ethic that emphasizes care: women who made this choice would not so much liberate themselves from the patriarchy as they would conform to its representation of women as emotional, subjective and irrational. There is, then, no good reason to withhold ascribing rights to non-human animals, based on the criticisms of rights made by some feminists. (shrink)

This paper argues for the importance of a passive form of embodiment for educational purposes to capture tacit environmental influences. G. Buck’s account of learning as experience is put in discussion with psychological approaches to reveal the limitation of what psychology can achieve, especially when it comes to situated experiences within educational environments. As a solution to overcome this problem a concept of passive embodiment is developed that allows for a body that is receptive to multisensory environmental influences. Böhme’s concept (...) of atmospheres in relation to Schmitz’ New Phenomenology provide a theoretical framework to understand how these situated experiences are evoked by certain situations. This allows for a new understanding of passive, embodied experiences within educational environments by incorporating the tacit influences of the setting. (shrink)

This text develops students' ability to philosophise and learn about philosophy and education. It challenges readers to use philosophy as a tool within education and as a set of theories to understand education by developing solutions to problems as they occur within practice. Assuming no pre-existing philosophical background, this book explores topics such as: the limits of a religious-based education; the desire for 'alternative facts' or 'truths'; and the struggle in the teacher-student relationship. This book will support all those on (...) Education, Childhood or Youth Studies courses in developing a critical perspective and understanding the true value of philosophy within education. (shrink)

Current theories of emotions and emotional machines often assume too homogeneous a conception of what emotions are in terms of whether they are experienced as one's own emotions (“internal” emotions) or whether they are perceived as the emotions of other agents (“external” emotions). In contrast, this paper argues, first, that an answer to the question of whether machines can possess emotions requires such a distinction—the distinction between internal emotions-had and external emotions-perceived. Second, it argues that the emotions we perceive in (...) other agents can be explicated as indicators of likely imminent paths or patterns of behavior of those agents. As will be shown, perceiving emotions in others does not necessarily involve the ontological attribution of corresponding emotions-had to the subject which is perceived as exhibiting a particular emotion-perceived. Thus, it will be shown that we can, for example, perceive an agent as angry without (ontologically) attributing anger (as an emotion-had) to that agent. If we apply this reasoning to emotional robots, it follows that there is no deception involved in perceiving a robot as exhibiting a particular emotion, as long as its behavior realizes and continues to realize the behavioral form of that external emotion-perceived. Thus, a robot’s behavior can fully instantiate emotions-perceived. In order to elaborate these claims, the presented view will be contrasted with Gibson’s conception of “affordances.” The final section discusses whether these considerations might have broader implications for our view of human perception in general. (shrink)

Intro -- Title -- Contents -- Publisher's Acknowledgment -- Introduction -- Madhyamaka's Promise as Philosophy -- 1. Trying to Be Fair -- 2. How Far Can a Mādhyamika Reform Customary Truth? Dismal Relativism, Fictionalism, Easy-Easy Truth, and the Alternatives -- Logic and Semantics -- 3. How Do Mādhyamikas Think? Notes on Jay Garfield, Graham Priest, and Paraconsistency -- 4. "How Do Mādhyamikas Think?" Revisited -- 5. Prasaṅga and Proof by Contradiction in Bhāviveka, Candrakīrti, and Dharmakīrti -- 6. Apoha Semantics: What (...) Did Bhāviveka Have to Do with It? -- 7. What Happened to the Third and Fourth Lemmas in the Tibetan Madhyamaka? -- Ethics and the Spiritual Path -- 8. Madhyamaka Buddhist Ethics -- 9. Reason, Irrationality, and Akrasia (Weakness of the Will) in Buddhism: Reflections upon Śāntideva's Arguments with Himself -- 10. Yogic Perception, Meditation, and Enlightenment: The Epistemological Issues in a Key Debate between Madhyamaka and Chan -- Madhyamaka in Contemporary Debates -- 11. On Minds, Dharmakīrti, and Madhyamaka -- 12. Serious, Lightweight, or Neither: Should Madhyamaka Go to Canberra? -- Notes on the Articles -- Abbreviations -- Bibliography -- Index -- About the Author -- Studies in Indian and Tibetan Buddhism Titles Previously Published -- About Wisdom Publications -- Copyright. (shrink)

The question of whether free will exists has been debated extensively for centuries. Instead of debating this complex issue, recent work in psychology has sought to understand the consequences of beliefs in free will. That is, how are people’s behaviors influenced when they either believe or do not believe in free will? Amongst many outcomes, research has identified free will beliefs to influence achievement, perseverance, and aggressiveness. We believe that beliefs in free will could also exert influence on health behaviors. (...) Health promotion from a psychological perspective has typically adopted social cognitive models to understand and predict health behaviors. We contend that free will beliefs could be included in these models to understand and change health behavior. We provide examples of how a popular social cognition theory, the theory of planned behavior, could be aligned with beliefs in free will. We suggest that the relationship between free will beliefs and theory constructs (attitude, subjective norm, perceived behavioral control, intention) could be positive in health enhancing behaviors and negative in health risk behaviors. Experimentally testing these relationships is needed in future research. This may provide further insights into the consequences of free will and contribute to the explanation of health behavior. (shrink)

Alleged refutations of utilitarianism are not uncommon, so it is unlikely that the title of the present essay will raise eye-brows. ‘Another paper about utility's failure to account for our duty to be just’, is apt to be the prevailing reaction to the title's stated objective. This is understandable. For utilitarianism has been taken to task on just this score more than a score of times. And rightly so, I believe, though I shall not argue that point here. Here I (...) intend to offer a refutation of utilitarianism which turns, not on the duty of justice, but on the value of friendship, a refutation which, so far as I am aware, has never previously been advanced in the not inconsiderable body of literature critical of that theory. (shrink)