Welfare: The Social Issues in Philosophical Perspective. [REVIEW]G. M. -1973 -Review of Metaphysics 27 (1):154-154.detailsThis volume provides a clarification of the concept of welfare and an appraisal of the programs of our present welfare state. Welfare, Rescher contends, is not concerned with the whole of human happiness but with those factors necessary for minimal well-being. These factors, which include physical and mental health, material prosperity and environmental resources, are objectively determinable. Because of this, men are not necessarily the best judges of their own welfare, a view which Rescher acknowledges as heretical. Other self-acknowledged heresies (...) are that many present welfare-supportive programs are ill-conceived, that democratic processes are poor guarantors of the general welfare, and that welfare is often of less importance than such social values as freedom and justice. Certainly the gloomiest of his conclusions is that it is unrealistic to expect that continual improvement in welfare will increase human happiness. Rather than bring contentment, increases in welfare often produce increased expectations and consequent dissatisfaction at their nonfulfillment. In addition, the continual rise in our expectations may outdistance present achievements and lead to better disappointment. In appraising the welfare program of our society, Rescher argues that it has failed not only to achieve its professed goal of increasing the welfare of the poorest segment of society but also has resulted in an unfortunate change of attitude in our youth towards individual responsibility and self-reliance. Along with future success in reducing poverty, he hopes to see our society increase its concern with such non-welfare values as human excellence and creativity. Readers will find this book a stimulating, unorthodox blend of philosophical theorizing and relevant empirical material.—M. G. (shrink)
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Is linguistics a part of psychology?G. Fitzgerald -unknowndetailsNoam Chomsky, the founding father of generative grammar and the instigator of some of its core research programs, claims that linguistics is a part of psychology, concerned with a class of cognitive structures employed in speaking and understanding. In a recent book, Ignorance of Language, Michael Devitt has challenged certain core aspects of linguistics, as prominent practitioners of the science conceive of it. Among Devitt’s major conclusions is that linguistics is not a part of psychology. In this thesis I defend (...) Chomsky’s psychological conception of grammatical theory. My case for the psychological conception involves defending a set of psychological goals for generative grammars, centring on conditions of descriptive and explanatory adequacy. I argue that generative grammar makes an explanatory commitment to a distinction between a psychological system of grammatical competence and the performance systems engaged in putting that competence to use. I then defend the view that this distinction can be investigated by probing speakers’ linguistic intuitions. Building on the psychological goals of generative grammar and its explanatory commitment to a psychological theory of grammatical competence, I argue that generative grammar neither targets nor presupposes non-psychological grammatical properties. The latter nonpsychological properties are dispensable to grammarians’ explanations because their explanatory goals can be met by the theory of grammatical competence to which they are committed. So generative grammars have psychological properties as their subject matter and linguistics is a part of psychology. (shrink)
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On Moschus'Megara.G. Giangrande -1969 -Classical Quarterly 19 (01):181-.detailsIn the following pages I shall emend or explain certain passages of the Epyllion. For the sake of brevity I shall refer the reader, wherever possible, to the material collected by Breitenstein, whose monograph I have recently reviewed. The conoscenti will hardly need to be reminded, for the purposes of my discussion, that the author of Megara was, to appropriate Geffcken's words, '‘ein doctus poeta, wie alle Alexandriner’ , steeped in the knowledge of Homer, Apollonius, and Theocritus . First of (...) all, an emendation. (shrink)
Gravitation theory in the spacetimeR×S 3.G. Zet,C. Pasnicu &M. Agop -1991 -Foundations of Physics 21 (4):473-481.detailsA geometric formulation of the gravitation theory in the spacetime R × S 3 is given. A linear connection is introduced on the tangent bundle T(R × S 3 ) and then the connection coefficients and the Riemann curvature tensor are calculated. It is shown that their expressions differ from those of Carmeli and Malin [Found. Phys.17, 407 (1987)] by supplementary terms due to the noncommutativity of derivatives used on the spacetime R × S 3 . The Einstein field equations (...) are written as usually and a comparison with other results is given. Finally, some observations about a possible gauge theory of gravitation in the spacetime R × S 3 are made. (shrink)
An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education. [REVIEW]R. D. G. -1959 -Review of Metaphysics 12 (3):493-493.detailsWritten from the viewpoint of contemporary philosophical analysis, this book provides a simple--and biased--introduction "to philosophical thinking for those students of education in universities and training colleges who would otherwise have no formal contact with philosophy."--R. D. G.
When consent is unbearable: an alternative case analysis.G. J. Agich -1979 -Journal of Medical Ethics 5 (1):26-28.detailsDr Agich takes up a previous difficult case related by Dr Kottow in an earlier issue of the Journal. He analyses the three ethical problems as presented in the case and offers his own opinion of it as well as his own conclusions with regard to the medical ethical aspects of it. Unlike Dr Kottow, Dr Agich's reading of the case indicates that the application of the principle of informed consent does not rule out ethical decisions for the physician, but (...) emphasizes the relevance of ethical analysis beyond the issue of informed consent. (shrink)
An analytical solution of the stochastic Navier-Stokes system.G. Adomian -1991 -Foundations of Physics 21 (7):831-843.detailsThis paper, using the author's decomposition method and recent generalizations, presents algorithms for an analytic solution of the stochastic Navier-Stokes system without linearization, perturbation, discretization, or restrictive assumptions on the nature of stochasticity. The pressure, forces, velocities, and initial/boundary conditions can be stochastic processes and are not limited to white noise. Solutions obtained are physically realistic because of the avoidance of assumptions made purely for mathematical tractability by usual methods. Certain extensions and further generalizations of the decomposition method have provided (...) the basis for the solution. (shrink)