This chapter discusses slavery in South Africa. Chattel slavery existed in early colonial South Africa from the inception of the Dutch permanent settlement in 1658 until formal emancipation of slaves in the British empire in the 1830s. More than 80,000 slaves were imported from throughout the Indian Ocean world during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Although in the time of apartheid this slave heritage was buried in the public consciousness, since the 1990s museums, historians, and archaeologists have unearthed and published (...) a considerable historical record, endorsed by new heritage legislation which gives special value to sites of slavery. Slave history is taught in universities and schools. However, especially for those descended from slaves in the Western Cape region, the evocation of a slave past has been a vexed process, with slave heritage serving as both a resource and a weapon in contemporary identity struggles. (shrink)

This essay argues that Antony and Cleopatra’s pitting of Egypt against Rome is a cipher of aesthetic resistance to modern rationality. The coordinates are Adornian. Antony’s and Cleopatra’s complex identities elude the disenchanting, nominalist machinery in which diffuse indeterminacy necessitates conceptual imposition. Here, the individuals are essentially dramatized: sensate, embodied selves composed and expressed in relations of passionate recognition. The lovers’ deaths, and especially Cleopatra’s self-conscious theatre, rewrite the ascetic, dominative, and pseudo-theatrical rationality of Octavian Rome. The protest, the passion (...) and singularity, lives mainly through its expressive emphases – such as hyperbole – and the re-functioning of the very dominative roles and norms being opposed. This reflects the restricted but critical – aesthetic – status of early modern drama, and specifies its opposition to the deepening attack on sensate knowing in its world. (shrink)

Unwarranted, by NYU law professor Barry Friedman, offers a diagnosis of some of the contemporary ills of American policing and a prescribed cure. Between 2014 and 2016, incidents of fatal shootings...

Introduction : the provocation of Levinas -- Being's other -- "Would you like to do a bit of theology?" : Levinas and theological turn -- The disturbance of theology -- Preferring the shadows : the "little faith" of Israel -- The return of God?

The 'postmodern condition,' in which instrumentalism finally usurps all other considerations, has produced a kind of intellectual paralysis in the world of education. The authors of this book show how such postmodernist thinkers as Derrida, Foucault, and Lyotard illuminate puzzling aspects of education, arguing that educational theory is currently at an impasse. They postulate that we need these new and disturbing ideas in order to "think again" fruitfully and creatively about education.

John Dewey stated that ‘[h]owever far apart philosophy and educational theory may later have become, in their beginnings they were strictly identical.' Dewey's ‘progressivism' in Democracy and Education rests on this communion. A self-reflective philosophical education by the community, about the community, for the community, would create the conditions for the advance of social justice. But new progressive ideas championing redistributive justice might appear to be in worryingly short supply. That is one reason, among many, why Philip Kitcher’s The Main (...) Enterprise of the World is to be welcomed. His rethinking about education amounts to a radical re-education of our thinking about social justice, seeking redistribution of wealth, reduction of privilege, and a redefinition of what is valuable for people and planet in regard to production, distribution, and consumption. I will summarize his book and offer critical thoughts on it relating to three themes: the relation of his proposed Deweyan Society to some current and powerful criticisms of Western rationality; his proposals for classrooms; and the extent to which its own pragmatic philosophical justifications are open to deeper philosophical and educational significance. (shrink)

This book addresses concerns about educational and moral standards in a world increasingly characterised by nihilism. On the one hand there is widespread anxiety that standards are falling; on the other, new machinery of accountability and inspection to show that they are not. The authors in this book state that we cannot avoid nihilism if we are simply _laissez-faire_ about values, neither can we reduce them to standards of performance, nor must we return to traditional values. They state that we (...) need to create a new set of values based on a critical assessment of contemporary practice in the light of a number of philosophical texts that address the question of nihilism, including the work of Nietzsche. (shrink)

Sinnott, Nigel Review of: Dare to stand alone: The story of Charles Bradlaugh, by Bryan Niblett, Oxford: Kramedart Press, 2010, 2011, viii, 391 pp., 4 plates. ISBN 978-0-9564743-0-8.

Sinnott, Nigel I had been looking forward to 29 July 1962 for a very long time. It marked the end often years spent at two English private boarding schools with their ethos of 'muscular Christianity': a proto-fascist mix of semi-monastic living, lots of compulsory sport and relentless Anglican religious indoctrination. I had loathed almost every day I had spent at these schools, as I disliked ball games and strenuous exercise from the outset, and by the time I was ten, (...) or maybe a few months older, I was a staunch atheist. I was by temperament a studious, imaginative and inquiring boy, but I loathed the formality, petty regimentation, narrow conservative mind-set, intolerance and sometimes brutality of the school system in which I found myself. I had spent a decade feeling confined, frustrated, very bored, often cold and sometimes frightened. I resolved that, if I ever had children of my own, they would never be brought up and 'educated' like this. (shrink)

Theoretical identity statements of the form "water is H2O‟ are allegedly necessary truths knowable a posteriori, and assert that nothing could be water and not be H2O. The necessary a posteriori nature of these identity claims has been taken by Kripke, Putnam and Donnellan to justify a move from talk of reference (language) to talk of essence (metaphysics), and has motivated much of contemporary essentialism. In this paper I will contest this move from reference to essence, and argue that (i.) (...) the only way to derive essentialism from semantics (specifically direct reference) is to assume it as a premise, (ii.) that contemporary essentialism is a metaphysical assumption not a thesis, and (iii.) – assuming the accuracy of the analogy between proper names and natural kind terms – present an alternative version of natural kinds classification that is interest-relative, dependent on practical application and reflects the contingent state of affairs which is our world. (shrink)

World Ethics: The New Agenda identifies different ways of thinking about ethics, and of thinking ethically about international and global relations. It also considers several theories of world ethics in the context of issues such as war and peace, world poverty, the environment and the United Nations. The discussion is grounded in an awareness of the post-9/11 world in which we live and offers a more detailed exploration of the idea of global citizenship and a global or cosmopolitan ethic.

Sinnott, Nigel I enjoyed the article on Islam by Dr John Perkins, as it said a number of things that needed saying; but I did at times feel it was a bit too black and white in its approach.

Sinnott, Nigel The son of a stonemason, Joseph Symes was born at Portland, Dorset, England, on 29 January 1841, a birthday he was proud to share with Thomas Paine. He joined the Wesleyan church in 1858, became a local preacher, and, encouraged by his devout mother, in 1864 entered the Wesleyan College at Richmond-upon-Thames.

Sinnott, Nigel Review of: Worst words, by Don Watson with Helen Smith Sydney: Vintage Books, 2015. 439 pp., pbk., ISBN 978 0 85798 344 2.

There is a new myth of the heterogeneous that is reducing the concept of humanity to a sinful enlightenment. In this article I investigate the contribution that a renewed understanding of liberal arts education might offer for the idea of a humanist education and for the concept of humanity; and this at a time when not only the concept of humanity per se, and of a humanist education in particular are suspected of Western imperialism and rational logocentrism, but also, in (...) England at least, when the tuition fees of humanities students have trebled. I argue that within a concept of modern metaphysics first principles are re-formed to have their universality in instability and struggle. This instability and struggle is the modern culture of rational education, and speaks of a non-abstract comprehension of two of modernity’s most contested terms: freedom and humanity. (shrink)

Nigel Blake; Justifying Peace Education: a reply to Professor Flew, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 20, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 257–264, https://.

Nigel Harris argues that the notion of national capital is becoming redundant as cities and their citizens, increasingly unaffected by borders and national boundaries, take center stage in the economic world. Harris deconstructs this phenomenon and argues for the immense benefits it could and should have, not just for western wealth, but for economies worldwide, for international communication and for global democracy.

Cognitive science has always included multiple methodologies and theoretical commitments. The philosophy of cognitive science should embrace, or at least acknowledge, this diversity. Bechtel’s (2009a) proposed philosophy of cognitive science, however, applies only to representationalist and mechanist cognitive science, ignoring the substantial minority of dynamically oriented cognitive scientists. As an example of nonrepresentational, dynamical cognitive science, we describe strong anticipation as a model for circadian systems (Stepp & Turvey, 2009). We then propose a philosophy of science appropriate to nonrepresentational, dynamical (...) cognitive science. (shrink)

Can theories of mental imagery, conscious mental contents, developed within cognitive science throw light on the obscure (but culturally very significant) concept of imagination? Three extant views of mental imagery are considered: quasi‐pictorial, description, and perceptual activity theories. The first two face serious theoretical and empirical difficulties. The third is (for historically contingent reasons) little known, theoretically underdeveloped, and empirically untried, but has real explanatory potential. It rejects the “traditional” symbolic computational view of mental contents, but is compatible with recentsituated (...) cognition and active visionapproaches in robotics. This theory is developed and elucidated. Three related key aspects of imagination (non‐discursiveness, creativity, and seeing as) raise difficulties for the other theories. Perceptual activity theory presents imagery as non‐discursive and relates it closely to seeing as. It is thus well placed to be the basis for a general theory of imagination and its role in creative thought. (shrink)

What can computers do in principle? What are their inherent theoretical limitations? These are questions to which computer scientists must address themselves. The theoretical framework which enables such questions to be answered has been developed over the last fifty years from the idea of a computable function: intuitively a function whose values can be calculated in an effective or automatic way. This book is an introduction to computability theory (or recursion theory as it is traditionally known to mathematicians). Dr Cutland (...) begins with a mathematical characterisation of computable functions using a simple idealised computer (a register machine); after some comparison with other characterisations, he develops the mathematical theory, including a full discussion of non-computability and undecidability, and the theory of recursive and recursively enumerable sets. The later chapters provide an introduction to more advanced topics such as Gildel's incompleteness theorem, degrees of unsolvability, the Recursion theorems and the theory of complexity of computation. Computability is thus a branch of mathematics which is of relevance also to computer scientists and philosophers. Mathematics students with no prior knowledge of the subject and computer science students who wish to supplement their practical expertise with some theoretical background will find this book of use and interest. (shrink)

"The Blackwell Guide to Philosophy of Education" is state-of-the-art map to the field as well as a valuable reference book.

Against the domination of moral deliberation by rights-talk In Defence of War asserts that belligerency can be morally justified, even while it is tragic and morally flawed. Recovering the early Christian tradition of just war thinking, Nigel Biggar argues in favour of aggressive war in punishment of grave injustice.

Nigel Blake; Peace Education and National Security, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 19, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 27–38, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.

Three experiments on neural grafting with adult rat hosts are described. Working memory impairments were produced by lesioning the hippocampus or severing its connections with the septum by ablating the fimbria-fornix. The results suggest that the survival and growth of a neural graft, whether an autograft or a xenograft, is not a necessary condition for functional recovery on a task tapping working memory.

Men and women report having significantly different numbers of sexual partners, which is impossible in a large sample. Schmitt's target article is no exception. This focuses discussion on the nature of the samples, their heterogeneity, and the locale they are drawn from. Further, we query how humans determine, for example, sex ratio, in the context of large numbers.

This chapter explains how an Irish documentary program presenting the vistas of Derreen, County Kerry recalls the aesthetics of the sublime, which is described by Edmund Burke as a sense of awed exhilaration. However, the program’s aim is to remind viewers that this landscape must be regarded as an alien insult, since Derreen was part of the land acquired by Sir William Petty, a significant beneficiary of the Cromwellian confiscation of Ireland. Petty’s descendants, earls of Shelburne and marquises of Lansdowne, (...) presided over centuries of hardship, emigration, and famine as a product of the “Anglo-Saxon mindset.” This was reinforced by a new scientific spirit that treated land as a commodity to be appropriated, mapped, secured, and exploited for immediate profit. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Characteristics and Development of Critical Theory The Educational Relevance of Critical Theory Distinctive Insights and Contributions Differing Receptions of Critical Theory Critical Theory and the Student Movement An “Other” Critical Pedagogy?

Mental imagery (varieties of which are sometimes colloquially refered to as “visualizing,” “seeing in the mind's eye,” “hearing in the head,” “imagining the feel of,” etc.) is quasi-perceptual experience; it resembles perceptual experience, but occurs in the absence of the appropriate external stimuli. It is also generally understood to bear intentionality (i.e., mental images are always images of something or other), and thereby to function as a form of mental representation. Traditionally, visual mental imagery, the most discussed variety, was thought (...) to be caused by the presence of picturelike representations (mental images) in the mind, soul, or brain, but this is no longer universally accepted. (shrink)

Theories of superior collicular and hippocampal function have remarkable similarities. Both structures have been repeatedly implicated in spatial and attentional behaviour and in inhibitory control of locomotion. Moreover, they share certain electrophysiological properties in their single unit responses and in the synchronous appearance and disappearance of slow wave activity. Both are phylogenetically old and the colliculus projects strongly to brainstem nuclei instrumental in the generation of theta rhythm in the hippocampal EECOn the other hand, close inspection of behavioural and electrophysiological (...) data reveals disparities. In particular, hippocampal processing mainly concerns stimulus ambiguity, contextual significance, and spatial relations or other subtle, higher order characteristics. This requires the use of largely preprocessed sensory information and mediation of poststimulus investigation. Although collicular activity must also be integrated with that of “higher” centres, its primary role in attention is more “peripheral” and specific in controlling orienting/localisation via eye and body movements toward egocentrically labelled spatial positions. In addition, the colliculus may exert a nonspecific influence in alerting higher centres to the imminence of information potentially worthy of focal attention. Nevertheless, it is noteworthy that collicular and hippocampal lesions produce deficits on similar tasks, although the type of deficit is usually different in each case. Functional overlap between hippocampus and colliculus is virtually certain vis-à-vis stimulus sampling, for example in the acquisition of information via vibrissal movements and visual scanning. In addition, insofar as stimulus significance is a factor in collicular orienting mechanisms, the hippocampus — cingulate – cortex — colliculus pathway may play a significant role, modulating collicular responsiveness and thus ensuring an attentional strategy appropriate to current requirements. A tentative “reciprocal loop” model is proposed which bridges physiological and behavioural levels of analysis and which would account for the observed degree and nature of functional overlap between the superior colliculus and hippocampus. (shrink)

Abstractα/β barrels have an ill‐defined origin. Evidence exists which favours their divergent evolution from a common ancestral barrel and convergent evolution to a stable fold. However, recent sequence and structural information for the flavin oxidase/dehydrogenase family of barrel enzymes indicate that sub‐families of α/β barrels have evolved divergently. The modular fusion of barrel domains with core structures from other gene families has also contributed to the evolution of related but catalytically distinct enzyme molecules within each sub‐family of the flavin oxidases/dehydrogenases. (...) An analysis of the structures and sequences of the flavin oxidases/dehydrogenases has now enabled studies focusing on the evolutionary origins and modular assembly of this important family of proteins to be initiated. (shrink)