Recent advances in human genetics suggest that it may become possible to genetically manipulate telomerase and embryonic stem cells to alter the mechanisms of aging and extend the human life span. But a life span significantly longer than the present norm would be undesirable because it would severely weaken the connections between past‐ and future‐oriented mental states and in turn the psychological grounds for personal identity and prudential concern for our future selves. In addition, the collective effects of longer lives (...) might lower the quality of life for all people. These two problems provide reasons against genetic manipulation of cells to alter the length of the human life span. (shrink)

What is the role of consciousness in nature? The science of consciousness has largely neglected the question through its emphasis on human experience. In this précis of A Philosophy for the Science of Animal Consciousness, I outline how we can move from a top-down approach that begins with investigations in humans to an evolutionary bottom-up approach that targets the adaptive origins of even the most minimal forms of subjective experience. I will also offer an introduction to the central thesis of (...) the book, i.e. the pathological complexity thesis, according to which consciousness evolved in order to enable animals to adaptively respond to their life history challenges. (shrink)

A small, insignificant-looking intellectual with absurdly long legs, Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) was a veritable Hans Christian Andersen caricature of a man. A strange combination of witty cosmopolite and melancholy introvert, he spent years writing under a series of fantastical pseudonyms, lavishing all the splendor of his magnificent mind on a seldom-appreciative world. He had a tragic love affair with a young girl, was dominated by an unforgettable Old Testament father, fought a sensational literary duel with a popular satiric magazine, and (...) died in the midst of a violent quarrel with the state church for which he had once studied theology. Yet this iconoclast produced a number of brilliant books that have profoundly influenced modern thought. In this classic biography, the celebrated Kierkegaard translator Walter Lowrie presents a charming and warmly appreciative introduction to the life and work of the great Danish writer. Lowrie tells the story of Kierkegaard's emotionally turbulent life with a keen sense of drama and an acute understanding of how his life shaped his thought. The result is a wonderfully informative and entertaining portrait of one of the most important thinkers of the past two centuries. This edition also includes Lowrie's wry essay "How Kierkegaard Got into English," which tells the improbable story of how Lowrie became one of Kierkegaard's principal English translators despite not learning Danish until he was in his 60s, as well as a new introduction by Kierkegaard scholar Alastair Hannay. (shrink)

The author nationally recognized for the quality and depth of his teaching in religious studies has written the first full-scale introduction to the history and methods of the study of religion.

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and other psychiatric disorders can interfere with a person’s capacity to control the nature of his mental states and how they issue in his decisions and actions. Insofar as this sort of control is identified with free will, and psychiatric disorders can impair this control, these disorders can impair free will. The will can be compromised by dysregulated neural networks that disable the mental mechanisms necessary to regulate thought, motivation, and action. Neural and mental dys-function result in (...) the maladaptive and pathological behaviors associated with these disorders. In “Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Free Will, and Control,” Gerben Meynen (2012) rightly .. (shrink)

Designed to introduce beginning students of philosophy to a number of problems which are appropriate subjects for reflection. These problems relate to the human condition, human nature, the definition of the good life, authority, & freedom, the religious quest, & the future.

A general survey of Aristotle's contributions to physics (in the Ancient sense of the word), including his "De anima" but leaving out his zoological works, with some attention for the differences between his science and modern science.

In addition to the obvious social and ethical risks, there are philosophical hazards behind artificial intelligence and machine learning. I try to raise here some critical points that might counteract some naive optimism, and warn against the possibility that synthetic intelligence may surreptitiously influence the agenda of science before we can realize it.

Our pretheoretic sense of the relation of logical consequence arises from our experience of deductive inference. By ignoring the priority of inference and failing to provide an account of the ontological grounds of the conceptual experience and of the modal and truth elements in the statement of our pretheoretical sense, informal and technical accounts are at best partial. This paper proposes an ontological analysis of both elements which accounts for our conceptual experience and differentiates genuine from ersatz logical consequence.

Patočka, J. Erinnerungen an Husserl.--Landgrebe, L. Philosophische Anthropologie - eine empirische Wissenschaft?--Schmidt, G. Was ist der Mensch?--Polin, R. Être et ordre.--Funke, G. Handeln aus Pflicht.--Kohlenberger, H. Zum Problem der Teleologie des Handelns.--Schaller, K. Theorie der Bildsamkeit.--Berlinger, R. Die Weltgestaltung der Philosophie.--Fink, E. Phronesis und Theoria.--Krońska, I. Atome und Menschen.--Dembowski, H. Martin Luthers Disputatio de Homine von 1536.--Heintel, E. Aristotelismus und Transzentalismus im "Begriff" bei Hegel.--Orth, E. W. Husserl und Hegel.--Baczko, B. Zum Problem der Leiblichkeit in der Anthropologie von Marx.--Kolakowski, L. (...) Richard Avenarius et le suicide apparent de la philosophie.--Biemel, W. Der Beginn von Prousts À la recherche du temps perdu.--Van Breda, H. L. L'itinéraire husserlien de la phénoménologie pure à la phénoménologie transcendentale. (shrink)

In his classic paper on social costs, social scientist R. H. Coase has argued that in a world without transaction costs in the "buying and selling," of social benefits and damages, resource allocation would be unaffected by a change in the apportioning of liabilities. That is, whether or not a social nuisance-causer must pay damages to those to whom he is a nuisance, will not, in an efficient economy with no transaction costs, have any effect on resource allocation. In this (...) paper, the author intends to show that there is a certain class of nuisances that are not amenable to Coasean solutions even if one grants Coase 's intuitive notions of prudence and rationality, it is considered these situations only in the short term, and considerations of equity are ignored. This class of nuisances comprises certain of those instances in which the interests of a tenant are not identical with those of his landlord. The article also purposes to shed light on the merits of an "unearned increment" tax on the value of land. (shrink)

Joseph Bracken proposes to modify Whitehead’s tendency to see the comprehensive entities of everyday life as but aggregations of actual occasions. While there are resources in Polanyi’s notion of an emergent cosmos to counter Whitehead’s atomism and reductionism, Bracken’s use of Polanyi’s theory of a morphogenetic field as a corrective is argued to be only partially successful. Bracken must explain how morphogenetic fields evolve and arise. This step would require replacing Whiteheadian reductionism with a principle of ontological parity that honors (...) the reality of interaction between entities and the integration of their operational principles within basic ontological levels and setting forth principles of emergence to explain how these levels and fields arise. (shrink)