This paper presents and criticizes. Alexander's evolutionary theory of morality (1987). Earlier research, on which Alexander's theory is based, is also reviewed. The propensity to create moral systems evolved because it allowed ancestral humans to limit conflict within cooperating groups and thus form larger groups, which were advantageous because of intense between-group competition. Alexander sees moral codes as contractual, and the primary criticism of his theory is that moral codes are not completely contractual but also coercive. Ways of evaluating Alexander's (...) theory as well as modified versions of it are discussed. (shrink)

This essay critiques dual-inheritance theory as presented in Peter Richerson and Robert Boyd's book Not by Genes Alone: How Culture Transformed Human Evolution (2005). The theory states that culture became prominent in human evolution because it allowed relatively rapid adaptation to changing environments by means of imitation. Imitating the behavior of other members of one's community produces adaptive behaviors more readily than either genetic evolution or individual learning. Imitation follows a number of patterns: imitating high-status individuals, imitating the most common (...) forms of behavior, imitating behaviors perceived to be the most effective solutions to various problems relevant to survival. This process combined with occasional innovations in behavior lead to a process of cultural evolution involving populations of cultural variants. Different local human populations were associated with different local populations of cultural variants, and both the human and the cultural populations evolved over time. Human evolution cannot be understood without taking into account these parallel processes of genetic and cultural evolution. Not by Genes Alone traces the implication of dual-inheritance theory for understanding human evolution and refers to various bodies of evidence relevant to the theory. (shrink)

Fashion is at once a familiar yet mysteriously elite world that we all experience, whether we’re buying a new pair of jeans, reading _Vogue_, or watching the latest episode of _Project Runway_. Lars Svendsen dives into that world in _Fashion_, exploring the myths, ideas, and history that make up haute couture, the must-have trends over the centuries, and the very concept of fashion itself. _Fashion _opens with an exploration of all the possible meanings encompassed by the word “fashion,” as Svendsen (...) probes its elusive place in art, politics, and history. Ultimately, however, he focuses on the most common use of the term: clothing. With his trademark dry wit, he deftly dismantles many of the axioms of the industry and its supporters. For example, he points out that some of the latest fashions shown on runways aren’t actually “fashionable” in any sense of the word, arguing that they’re more akin to modern art works, and he argues against the increasingly prevalent idea that plastic surgery and body modification are part of a new wave of consumerism. Svendsen draws upon the writings of thinkers from Adam Smith to Roland Barthes to analyze fashion as both a historical phenomenon and a philosophy of aesthetics. He also traces the connections between the concepts of fashion and modernity and ultimately considers the importance of evolving fashions to such fields as art, politics, and philosophy. Whether critiquing a relentless media culture that promotes perfect bodies or parsing the never-ending debate over the merits of conformity versus individual style, Lars Svendsen offers an engaging and intriguing analysis of fashion and the motivations behind its constant pursuit of the new. (shrink)

The created co-creator theology states that human beings have the purpose of creating the most wholesome future possible for our species and the global ecosystem. I evaluate the human aspect of this theology by asking whether it is possible for human beings to do this. Do we have sufficient knowledge? Can we be motivated to do what is necessary to create a wholesome future for ourselves and our planet? We do not at present have sufficient knowledge, but there is reason (...) to believe that with further scientific research we will be able to acquire it. The more difficult question is whether we can be motivated to cooperate on the scale necessary to fulfill this purpose. Evolutionary theories of human sociality, altruism, and cooperation are reviewed. I conclude that it is possible for human beings to fulfill the purpose defined for us by the created cocreator concept, but doing this will not be easy. (shrink)

This article focuses on the ways gendered experiences varied by race with regard to women's recruitment and participation in the civil rights movement of Mississippi. The author analyzes 13 interviews with both African American and white women who were connected to the movement. By privileging the voices of movement actors, this study begins to illuminate the ways recruitment and participation varied by race. Three types of women's participation are distinguished: high-risk activism, low-risk institutional, and activist mothering and “women's work.” Explanations (...) for these different forms of participation are found in examining two primary patterns of recruitment. (shrink)

The 2017–2018 basic income pilot in the Canadian province of Ontario attempted to alleviate poverty in a precarious economy. With three communities participating, we examine how the pilot was framed by local media, permitting a look at the narratives that were dominant in the participating communities. In essence, were recipients framed as “deserving?” How the media addresses this question can set the foundation for whether policymakers can proceed with basic income. Given that media coverage of poverty alleviation in the United (...) States generally follows an episodic frame, which puts focus on individuals and their particular circumstances (i.e. lifestyle choices), while major Canadian media generally shows a mix of frames, results of a media content analysis at the local level shows basic-income pilot was covered mainly through thematic frames, which emphasizes systemic factors and more general social conditions, which support state action on basic income. (shrink)

Gender and public markets have long been intertwined in Peru. The vast majority of market-sellers are women, and significantly this kind of work has been intimately related to women’s empowerment and agency within a deeply patriarchal society. However, with the arrival of COVID-19 the woman-centred space of the marketplace became compromised. While once a place of female empowerment, during the pandemic the market became seen as a dangerous ‘viral vector’, with 79% of Lima market sellers testing positive for Coronavirus during (...) the first lockdown of 2020. Further still, a gender-segregated quarantine policy drove women to the markets en-masse; a policy that was withdrawn early due to its spectacular, although unsurprising, failure, causing a total inability to social distance on ‘women’s days’. As such, this paper investigates the extent to which the pandemic increased the ‘feminised burden of care’ to include deadly viral infection during the gender segregated quarantine. Applying an intersectional, post-colonial framework, the ‘feminised burden of care’ is approached as stratified along racial and class lines since markets are not spaces for all women. Furthermore, this paper will show how these intersecting structures of power that have persisted through time may become more visible and observable in times of crisis, such as through Peru’s short-lived gender segregated quarantine. With this in mind, it will be possible to suggest that the events of 2020 were more than just policymaker missteps, but a persistence and exacerbation of long-existing entangled structures of colonial and patriarchal powers. As such, it can be inferred that in an emergency, it is these power structures that were automatically adopted as the first port of call, and thereby perpetuate and strengthen them into the future. (shrink)

The complexity of these terms and their relationship with truth and truthfulness are put on display by the contributors to this volume.

“Living involves being exposed to pain every second—not necessarily as an insistent reality, but always as a possibility,” writes Arne Vetlesen in _A Philosophy of Pain_, a thought-provoking look at an inevitable and essential aspect of the human condition. Here, Vetlesen addresses pain in many forms, including the pain inflicted during torture; the pain suffered in disease; the pain accompanying anxiety, grief, and depression; and the pain brought by violence. He examines the dual nature of pain: how we attempt to (...) avoid it as much as possible in our daily lives, and yet conversely, we obtain a thrill from seeking it. Vetlesen’s analysis of pain is revealing, plumbing the very center of many of our most intense and complicated emotions. He looks at pain within different arenas of modern life such as family and work, and he specifically probes at a very common modern phenomenon, the idea of pushing oneself to the limit. Engaging throughout with the ideas of thinkers such as Søren Kierkegaard, Sigmund Freud, Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Max Horkheimer, Theodor Adorno, Alice Miller, Susan Sontag, and Melanie Klein, _A Philosophy of Pain_ asks which came first, thinking or feeling, and explores the concept and possibility of empathy. Vetlesen offers an original and insightful perspective on something that all of us suffer and endure—from a sprained ankle to a broken heart. Although pain is in itself unpleasant, our ability to feel it reminds us that we are alive. (shrink)

It has been described as a "tame longing without any particular object" by Schopenhauer, "a bestial and indefinable affliction" by Dostoevsky, and "time's invasion of your world system" by Joseph Brodsky, but still very few of us today can explain precisely what boredom is. _A Philosophy of Boredom_ investigates one of the central preoccupations of our age as it probes the nature of boredom, how it originated, how and why it afflicts us, and why we cannot seem to overcome it (...) by any act of will. Lars Svendsen brings together observations from philosophy, literature, psychology, theology, and popular culture, examining boredom's pre-Romantic manifestations in medieval torpor, philosophical musings on boredom from Pascal to Nietzsche, and modern explorations into alienation and transgression by twentieth-century artists from Beckett to Warhol. A witty and entertaining account of our dullest moments and most maddening days, _A Philosophy of Boredom_ will appeal to anyone curious to know what lies beneath the overwhelming inertia of inactivity. (shrink)

Essays on the French writer and critic Georges Bataille, that examine his thought in relation to Hegel, Nietzsche, and Derrida.

His is a journey marked by the questioning of experience itself, until what is reached is sovereign laughter, non-knowledge, and a Presence in no way distinct from Absence, where "The mind moves in a strange world where anguish and ecstasy ...

At the most basic class impulse in the bud, hope is something beyond the mere impulse class, it has absorbed the fantastic imagination, ideological presumption is capacity. Hope is the most remarkable people the impulse to want to work with the community, awareness of the concept of composition and properties constitute a part of our anthropological basis. But those who hope in the imagination of people. The history of mankind is not only a history of class struggle, including also a (...) hope, planning, pre-presumption, poetry, education, philosophical discourse, political programs and struggles of history. Looking for hope and have every kind of political significance. Presumption is - hope - a dream not only the scope of Marxism is the political reality of the scope of the revolution. (shrink)