IN THE PAST THREE YEARS, TWO IMPORTANT CATHOLIC MORAL THINKERS—both well-respected Thomists—have published books on the natural law. Besides offering their own significant contributions to natural law thought, Jean Porter and Russell Hittinger each insightfully surveys developments in natural law thinking from the scholastics, into the early modern period, through today. In importantly similar narrations of the history of natural law, both Porter and Hittinger claim that natural law in the modern period has been understood as a source of (...) specific moral norms that is independent of belief commitments and compelling to all rational creatures, even shorn of—in fact, precisely because it is shorn of—these authoritative commitments. However, both authors claim that this understanding of natural law is highly problematic. If the goal of natural law inquiry is a set of "independent" and "compelling to all" particular norms existing "free-floating" in an "authority-free zone," impossible demands have been made of natural law. Both Porter and Hittinger must and indeed do honor the notion of natural law as universally applicable and binding. Yet both acknowledge that something is necessary, beyond the specific norms of the natural law themselves, in order to identify and justify those norms. (shrink)

In this volume twenty-three major scholars comment on and critically evaluate In Search of a Universal Ethic, the 2009 document written by the International Theological Commission (ITC) of the Catholic Church. That historic document represents an official Church contribution both to a more adequate understanding of a universal ethic and to Catholicism s own tradition of reflection on natural law. The essays in this book reflect the ITC document s complementary emphases of dialogue across traditions (universal ethic) and reflection on (...) broadly applicable ethical guidance within the Christian tradition (natural law). Among other things, the document situates the natural law ethical tradition within the larger search for a universal ethic. Along with its insightful essays, Searching for a Universal Ethic offers — for the first time in published form — the Vatican s official English translation of In Search of a Universal Ethic. Contributors: John Berkman Serge-Thomas Bonino, O.P. David Burrell, C.S.C. Lisa Sowle Cahill Joseph E. Capizzi David Cloutier Anver M. Emon Robert P. George Sherif Girgis Jennifer A. Herdt Russell Hittinger M. Cathleen Kaveny Anthony J. Kelly, C.Ss.R. Fergus Kerr, O.P. Steven A. Long William C. Mattison III Gilbert Meilaender Livio Melina Michael S. Northcott David Novak Jean Porter Martin Rhonheimer Tracey Rowland. (shrink)

Now in its Third Edition, Philosophy of Language: A Contemporary Introduction introduces students to the main issues and theories in twentieth-century philosophy of language, focusing specifically on linguistic phenomena. Author William G. Lycan structures the book into four general parts. Part I, Reference and Referring, includes topics such as Russell's theory of descriptions (and its objections), Donnellan's distinction, problems of anaphora, the description theory of proper names, Searle's cluster theory, and the causal-historical theory. Part II, Theories of Meaning, (...) surveys the competing theories of linguistic meaning and compares their various advantages and liabilities. Part III, Pragmatics and Speech Acts, introduces the basic concepts of linguistic pragmatics and includes a detailed discussion of the problem of indirect force. Part IV, The Expressive and the Figurative, examines various forms of expressive language and what "metaphorical meaning" is and how most listeners readily grasp it. (shrink)

_Philosophy of Language_ introduces the student to the main issues and theories in twentieth-century philosophy of language. Topics are structured in three parts in the book. Part I, Reference and Referring Expressions, includes topics such as Russell's Theory of Desciptions, Donnellan's distinction, problems of anaphora, the description theory of proper names, Searle's cluster theory, and the causal-historical theory. Part II, Theories of Meaning, surveys the competing theories of linguistic meaning and compares their various advantages and liabilities. Part III, Pragmatics (...) and Speech Acts, introduces the basic concepts of linguistic pragmatics, includes a detailed discussion of the problem of indirect force and surveys approaches to metaphor. Unique features of the text: * chapter overviews and summaries * clear supportive examples * study questions * annotated further reading * glossary. (shrink)

Could Mark Antony have had all the properties of Julius Caesar and vice versa? This is a puzzle which was raised by N. L. Wilson, and I shall be concerned with it in Part I of this paper. The answer which we give to this puzzle has important implications for our notion of an identifiable individual. In Part II I examine some important consequences of accepting the coherence of a complete exchange of properties between two individuals—which we might call a (...) “biography-swap.” I argue that one consequence is to establish the inadequacy of some views about reference advocated, for example, by Russell and A. N. Prior. This leads on to a more general problem of how it is that concrete particulars are grasped as objects of thought; and in resolving this problem, I argue in Part III that demonstratives play a crucial role in reference to particulars. (shrink)

Part I: WHAT IS ETHICS? Plato: Socratic Morality: Crito. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part II: ETHICAL RELATIVISM VERSUS ETHICAL OBJECTIVISM. Herodotus: Custom is King. Thomas Aquinas: Objectivism: Natural Law. Ruth Benedict: A Defense of Ethical Relativism. Louis Pojman: A Critique of Ethical Relativism. Gilbert Harman: Moral Relativism Defended. Alan Gewirth: The Objective Status of Human Rights. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part III: MORALITY, SELF-INTEREST AND FUTURE SELVES. Plato: Why Be Moral? Richard Taylor: On the Socratic Dilemma. David Gauthier: Morality (...) and Advantage. Gregory Kavka: A Reconciliation Project. Derek Parfit: Later Selves and Moral Principles. Bernard Williams: Persons, Character, and Morality. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part IV: VALUE. Jeremy Bentham: Classical Hedonism. Robert Nozick: The Experience Machine. Richard Taylor: Value and the Origin of Right and Wrong. Friedrich Nietzsche: The Transvaluation of Values. Derek Parfit: What Makes Someone’s Life Go Best? Thomas Nagel: Value: The View from Nowhere. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part V: UTILITARIANISM AND CONSEQUENTIALISM. John Stuart Mill: Utilitarianism. J.J.C. Smart: Extreme and Restricted Utilitarianism. Kai Nielsen: Against Moral Conservatism. Bernard Williams: Against Utilitarianism. John Hospers: Rule-Utilitarianism. Robert Nozick: Side Constraints. Peter Singer: Famine, Affluence and Morality. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part VI: KANTIAN AND DEONTOLOGICAL SYSTEMS. Immanuel Kant: Foundation for the Metaphysic of Morals. W. D. Ross: What Makes Right Acts Right? Onora O’Neill: Kantian Formula of the End in Itself and World Hunger. Thomas Nagel: Moral Luck. Philippa Foot: Morality as a System of Hypothetical Imperatives. Judith Jarvis Thomson: Killing, Letting Die, and the Trolley Problem. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part VII: CONTRACTARIAN ETHICAL SYSTEMS. Thomas Hobbes: The Leviathan. David Gauthier: Why Contractarianism? John Rawls: Contractualism: Justice as Fairness. T.M. Scanlon: Contractualism and Utilitarianism. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part VIII: VIRTUE-BASED ETHICAL SYSTEMS. Aristotle: The Ethics of Virtue. Bernard Mayo: Virtue and the Moral Life. William Frankena: A Critique of Virtue-Based Ethics. Walter Schaller: Are Virtues No More than Dispositions to Obey Moral Rules? Alasdair MacIntyre: The Nature of the Virtues. Susan Wolf: Moral Saints. Louis P. Pojman: In Defense of Moral Saints. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part IX: THE FACT/VALUE PROBLEM: METAETHICS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY. David Hume: On Reason and the Emotions: The Fact/Value Distinction. G. E. Moore: Non-Naturalism. A. J. Ayer: Emotivism. R. M. Hare: Prescriptivism: The Structure of Ethics and Morals. Geoffrey Warnock: The Object of Morality. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part X: MORAL REALISM AND THE CHALLENGE OF SKEPTICISM. J.L. Mackie: The Subjectivity of Values. Jonathan Harrison: A Critique of Mackie’s Error Theory. Gilbert Harman: Moral Nihilism. Nicholas Sturgeon: Moral Explanations. Bernard Williams: Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy. Bruce Russell: Two Forms of Ethical Skepticism. Michael Smith: A Defense of Moral Realism. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part XI: RELIGION AND ETHICS. Plato: Morality and Religion. Immanuel Kant: God and Immortality as Necessary Postulates of Morality. George Mavrodes: Religious and the Queerness of Morality. Kai Nielson: Ethics Without God. Suggestions for Further Reading. Part XII: CONTEMPORARY CHALLENGES TO CLASSICAL ETHICAL THEORY. Part A. Sociobiology and the Question of Moral Responsibility. Charles Darwin: Ethics and the Descent of Man. E.O.Wilson: Sociobiology and Ethics. Michael Ruse: Evolution and Ethics: The Sociobiological Approach. Elliot Sober: Prospects for an Evolutionary Ethics. J.L. Mackie: The Law of the Jungle, Evolution and Morality. Suggestions for Further Readingon Sociobiology. Part B. The Challenge of Determinism to Moral Responsibility and Desert. Galen Strawson: The Impossibility of Moral Responsibility. Louis Pojman: Free Will, Determinism, and Moral Responsibility:A Response to Galen Strawson. Richard Taylor: A Libertarian Defense of Free Will and Responsibility. Suggestions for Further Reading on Moral Responsibility. Glossary of Ethical Terms. (shrink)

Are the actions of a person operating out of the gifts of the Holy Spirit the same as the actions of that person operating out of infused virtue? Answering this question provides an opportunity to offer a Thomistic account of how the gifts of the Holy Spirit are distinct from, yet related to, the infused virtues. This article begins with two recent arguments for how the gifts differ from the infused virtues. It then rejects those arguments based on Aquinas's mature (...) writing on the gifts. The following section offers an account of the role of the gifts in the graced life of discipleship, including their relationship to the infused virtues, through a focus on the relationship between habit and act. The article concludes with three areas for further research and a nod toward pastoral application of this argument in sacramental preparation for confirmation. (shrink)

This manuscript is the introductory article for the special issue of the Journal of Social Studies Research titled Teaching Disciplinary Thinking, Literacy, and Argumentation Skills. In it, the authors provide an historical overview of disciplinary thinking as outlined by Edwin Fenton and Sam Wineburg. They talk about how the C3 Framework is a melding of a focus on disciplinary thinking outlined by Fenton and Wineburg with the emphasis on preparing K-12 students for their future roles as democratic citizens as stressed (...) by scholars like Shirley Engle. Then, the focus of the manuscript shifts to highlight the underdeveloped areas of disciplinary thinking in civics, geography, and economics. The authors define economic, civic, and geographic thinking and provide habits of mind for each of these disciplines along with classroom activities for each. They close with arguments for why K-12 social studies teachers and social studies education scholars should focus on developing K-12 students’ civic, economic, and geographic thinking skills. (shrink)

The article reflects upon the possibility of educating sensitivity to the pain of the different Other by using feature cinema. The authors rely on the methodology suggested by Stanley Louis Cavell and Andrew Klevan, and also on the suggestions and conclusions by William B. Russell, III and Stewart Waters. The authors of this article reflected upon the results of their own interview with gymnasium students and selected three feature films suggested by them as a case study for the (...) possibility of developing not only critical thinking but also sensitivity to the pain of the unfamiliar Other. All three movies concern the humiliation and pain of the African people. The article raises questions for possible discussion in ethics class and suggests philosophical literature by E. Fromm, and K.R. Popper as a possible theoretical basis: moving from the concrete ethical problem discerned in the movie to the philosophical text and vice versa. (shrink)

The paper problematises the reliability and ethics of using social media data, such as sourced from Twitter or Instagram, to carry out health-related research. As in many other domains, the opportunity to mine social media for information has been hailed as transformative for research on well-being and disease. Considerations around the fairness, responsibilities and accountabilities relating to using such data have often been set aside, on the understanding that as long as data were anonymised, no real ethical or scientific issue (...) would arise. We first counter this perception by emphasising that the use of social media data in health research can yield problematic and unethical results. We then provide a conceptualisation of methodological data fairness that can complement data management principles such as FAIR by enhancing the actionability of social media data for future research. We highlight the forms that methodological data fairness can take at different stages of the research process and identify practical steps through which researchers can ensure that their practices and outcomes are scientifically sound as well as fair to society at large. We conclude that making research data fair as well as FAIR is inextricably linked to concerns around the adequacy of data practices. The failure to act on those concerns raises serious ethical, methodological and epistemic issues with the knowledge and evidence that are being produced. (shrink)

This lavishly illustrated book highlights the conservation importance of congregatory animals species--those which gather in vast groups. It also focuses on the irreplaceability of the congregation sites which are able to support such large gatherings of animals, fish, or birds.

According to deontic justice theory, individuals often feel principled moral obligations to uphold norms of justice. That is, standards of justice can be valued for their own sake, even apart from serving self-interested goals. While a growing body of evidence in business ethics supports the notion of deontic justice, skepticism remains. This hesitation results, at least in part, from the absence of a coherent framework for explaining how individuals produce and experience deontic justice. To address this need, we argue that (...) a compelling, yet still missing, step is to gain further understanding into the underlying neural and psychological mechanisms of deontic justice. Here, we advance a theoretical model that disentangles three key processes of deontic justice: The use of justice rules to assess events, cognitive empathy, and affective empathy. Together with reviewing neural systems supporting these processes, broader implications of our model for business ethics scholarship are discussed. (shrink)

Russell B. The Art of Rational Conjecture // The Art of Philosophizing and Other Essays. — New York : Philosophical Library, 1968.

__Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action: Twenty Years of Challenge and Progress_ _is a collection of thirteen essays assessing the scholarly contributions to the _Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action_ series, which is comprised of five volumes resulting from international research conferences co-sponsored by the Vatican Observatory and the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences between 1991 and 2000. The overarching goal of the series is to advance the engagement of constructive theology with the natural sciences with special attention to the (...) theme of divine action and to investigate the philosophical and theological elements within science. This volume is divided into three sections: In Section One, contributors review the history of the series and the development of new research methodology and discuss philosophical issues raised by the laws of nature and the limits of science; in Section Two, authors provide philosophical analysis of specific issues in the series; and in Section Three, contributors offer theological analyses of specific issues. The five volumes in the series include: _Quantum Cosmology and the Laws of Nature_ ; _Chaos and Complexity_ ; _Molecular and Evolutionary Biology_ ; _Neuroscience and the Person_ ; and _Quantum Mechanics _, and are distributed by University of Notre Dame Press. (shrink)

Human connection is universally important, particularly in the context of serious illness and at the end of life. The presence of close family and friends has many benefits when death is close. Hospital visitation restrictions during the Coronavirus pandemic therefore warrant careful consideration to ensure equity, proportionality, and the minimization of harm. The Australian and New Zealand Society for Palliative Medicine COVID-19 Special Interest Group utilized the relevant ethical and public health principles, together with the existing disease outbreak literature and (...) evolving COVID-19 knowledge, to generate a practical framework of visiting restrictions for inpatients receiving palliative and end-of-life care. Expert advice from an Infectious Diseases physician ensured relevance to community transmission dynamics. Three graded levels of visitor restrictions for inpatient settings are proposed, defining an appropriate level of minimum access. These depend upon the level of community transmission of COVID-19, the demand on health services, the potential COVID-19 status of the patient and visitors, and the imminence of the patient’s death. This framework represents a cohesive, considered, proportionate, and ethically robust approach to improve equity and consistency for inpatients receiving palliative care during the COVID-19 pandemic and may serve as a template for future disease outbreaks. (shrink)

Both as cardinal and as Pope Benedict XVI, one of Josef Ratzinger's consistent concerns has been the foundational moral imperatives of the natural law. In 2004, then Cardinal Ratzinger requested that the University of Notre Dame study the complex issues embedded in discussions about "natural rights" and "natural law" in the context of Catholic thinking. To that end, Alasdair MacIntyre provided a substantive essay on the foundational problem of moral disagreements concerning natural law, and eight scholars were invited to (...) respond to MacIntyre's essay, either by addressing his work directly or by amplifying his argument along other yet similar paths. The contributors to this volume are theologians, philosophers, civil and canon lawyers, and political scientists, who reflect on these issues from different disciplinary perspectives. Once the contributors' essays were completed, MacIntyre responded with a closing essay. Throughout the book, the contributors ask: Can a persuasive case for a foundational morality be made etsi Deus daretur? And, of course, persuasive to whom? The exchanges that take place between MacIntyre and his interlocutors result, not in answers, but in rigorous attempts at clarification. __Intractable Disputes about the Natural Law__ will interest ethicists, moral theologians, and students and scholars of moral philosophy. "Lawrence Cunningham has assembled an esteemed group of scholars to provide incisive analyses of the contemporary state of natural law theory, particularly in light of Alasdair MacIntyre's groundbreaking work. The essays are lucid, engaging, and intellectually sophisticated. __Intractable Disputes about the Natural Law_ _is a must-read not only for moral theologians, but for anyone concerned about the conceptual foundations of human rights, human dignity, and moral dialogue in pluralistic societies." --_Stephen J. Pope, Boston College_ "MacIntyre's first essay, on its own, would make this book an important scholarly contribution. But the ensuing contributions enable the book to flourish further, with contributions on subjects both readily associated with natural law and moral disagreement as well as those more creatively connected to the genesis of the text. Cunningham's volume both broadens and deepens contemporary thinking on a perennial topic, and will richly reward its readers." --_William C. Mattison III, The Catholic University of America_. (shrink)

Education for Total Liberation is a collection of essays from leaders in the field of critical animal pedagogy (CAP). CAP emerges from activist educators teaching critical animal studies and is rooted in critical theory as well as the animal advocacy movement. Critical animal studies (CAS) argues for an interdisciplinary approach to understanding our relationships with nonhuman animals. CAS challenges two specific fields of theory: (1) animal studies, rooted in vivisection and testing on animals in the hard sciences and (2) human-animal (...) studies, which reinforces a socially constructed binary between humans and animals and adopts abstract theoretical approaches. In contrast, CAS takes a progressive and committed approach to scholarship and sees the exploitation of nonhuman animals as interrelated with oppression of humans based on class, gender, race, ability, sexuality, age, and citizenship. CAS promotes the liberation of all animals and challenges all systems of domination. Education for Total Liberation is appropriate for undergraduate and graduate level readers (and beyond) who wish to learn from examples of radical pedagogical projects shaped by CAS and critical pedagogy. Contributing to this collection are Anne C. Bell, Anita de Melo, Carolyn Drew, Amber E. George, Karin Gunnarsson Dinker, Sinem Ketenci, John Lupinacci, Anthony J. Nocella II, Sean Parson, Helena Pedersen, Ian Purdy, Constance L. Russell, J.L. Schatz, Meneka Repka, William E. Shanahan III, and Richard J, White. (shrink)

Seventeen television journalists from Indianapolis and Terre Haute responded to a computer simulation of a situation involving privacy of an AIDS testing site. Seven different forms of reasoning were used to deal with elements of the situation. It was found, using a 3D scale for analysis, that consequentialist forms of reasoning were dominant for respondents in this sample. Noncosequentialist thinking was also demonstrated and the nature of ethical reasoning was highly individualized.