Movatterモバイル変換

Direct download   Export citation   Bookmark  

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   22 citations  

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Schopenhauer's Pessimism and the Unconditioned Good MARK MIGOTTI SCHOPENHAUERTOOK PESSIMISMtO be a profound doctrine that had long been accepted by the majority of humanity, albeit usually in the allegorical form given to it by one or another religious creed. Accordingly, he credited himself, not with the discovery of pessimism, but with the provision of a satisfactory philosophical exposition and defense of its claims. It was, he contended, only within (...) the context of his philosophy, animated by the "single thought" that "the world is the self-knowledge of the will,"' that the ultimate significance of pessimism and the arguments demonstrating its inescapability can be brought to light. If, nevertheless, he sometimes appears to protest too much, to defend pessimism as if it were a striking and novel affair, he would have attributed this to the fact that he was, unfortunately, writing in the midst of one of the most naively optimistic cultures known to world history. 2 The philosophical reception of Schopenhauer's pessimism since the publication of The World as Will and Representation in 1818 would, one suspects, have been taken by him as further evidence of modern Western philosophy's optimistic somnambulance. For while other, comparably fundamental aspects of his thought--for example, his theories of action, of the self, and his criticisms of Kant--have received a welcome amount of fruitful, critical attention, his I would like to thank John Atwell, David Schmidtz, Susan Haack, Rudolf Makkreel and, especially,two anonymous referees, for prompting me to make substantial improvements to an earlier draft of this paper. ' Arthur Schopenhauer, Der handschrifllicher Nachlass 1, ed. Arthur Hiibscher (Frankfurt-amMain : Kramer, 1967),462; Manuscript Remains 1, trans. E. F.J. Payne(NewYork: Berg Publishing, 1988), 512. 'See, for example, Arthur Schopenhauer, D/e Welt als Wille und VorsteUung II. In Arthur Schopenhauer. Ziircher Ausgabe, ed. Arthur Hiibscher et. al. (Zurich: DiogenesVerlag, 1977),w 4:721, 732-33; The World as Will and Representation II, trans. E. F. J. Payne(New York: Dover Press, 1969),615, 625-26. Future references to this work willbe made within the text, by the abbreviation WW followed by section number, German edition volume and page number and English translation page number. [643] 644 JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 33:4 OCTOBER ~995 pessimism has not. Amongst enthusiastic followers it has sometimes been swallowed more or less whole, but from more independent-minded readers it has generally met with disdainful mockery or well-intentioned neglect.3 The aim of this paper is to help rectify' this imbalance. In the first of its four sections, I present an account of Schopenhauerian pessimism that can claim a good measure of textual support, and the essential features of which are found often enough in the secondary literature to warrant calling it the mainstream interpretation.4 In section 2 I show that, as critics have charged, the arguments for pessimism on this interpretation suffer from a pair of fatal ambiguities, and in section 3 I sketch an alternative argument for pessimism, one not so obviously open to the sort of knock-down refutation to which the first argument succumbs. In the paper's final section l explore further the philosophical consequences of this alternative argument for pessimism. 3Gyorg'yLukacs, "Schopenhauer," chapter ~,section 4 of The Destruction of Reason, trans. Peter Palmer (London: Merlin Press, 1979), 19~-243, isthe locusclassicusof an attitude of superior scorn. BryanMagee, The Philosophy of Schopenhauer (Oxford: "the Clarendon Press, 1983), z3-14, D. W. Hamlyn, Schopentmuer (London: Routledge, z98o), *43, Michael Fox, "Schopenhauer on Death, Suicide, and Renunciation." in Schopenhauer: His Philosophical Achievement, ed. Michael Fox (Totowa, NJ: Barnes and Noble Books, 198o), ]47-7o, and David Cartwrigh*, "Schopenhauer on Suffering, Death, Guilt, and the Consolation of Metaphysics,"in Schopenhauer: New Essays in Hotwr ofHis 2ooth Birthday, ed. Eric yon der Luft (Lewiston,NY: Edwin Mellen Press, t988), 66, all incline to the viewthat it was temperament, not argument, that drove Schopenhauer to pessimism, whilePatrick Gardiner, Schopenhatwr (London: Penguin Books, ]963), does not discuss pessimism by name. Not even Nietzsche, the deepest and most astute of Schopenhauer'scritics,can resistbarbs of the following sort: "Schopenhauer, although a pessimist, in ]act played the flute... (shrink)

Direct download(3 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   14 citations  

Direct download   Export citation   Bookmark   5 citations  

Export citation   Bookmark  

One important task of metaphysics is to answer the question of what it is for an object to exist. The first part of this book offers a systematic reconstruction and critique of contemporary views on existence. The upshot of this part is that the contemporary debate has reached an impasse because none of the considered views is able to formulate a satisfactory answer to this fundamental metaphysical question. The second part reconstructs Thomas Aquinas’s view on existence (esse) and argues that (...) it contributes a new perspective which allows us to see why the contemporary debate has reached this impasse. It has come to this point because it has taken a premise for granted which Aquinas’s view rejects, namely, that the existence of an object consists in something’s having a property. A decisive contribution of Aquinas’s theory of esse is that it makes use of the ideas of metaphysical participation and composition. In this way, it can be explained how an object can have esse without being the case that esse is a property of it. This book brings together a reconstruction from the history of philosophy with a systematic study on existence and is therefore relevant for scholars interested in contemporary or medieval theories of existence. (shrink)

Direct download(3 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   1 citation  

ABSTRACT In this article I consider alternate but often complementary models for women’s republicanism from those discussed by Sandrine Bergès. In particular, I make use of Bergès’s insights about extending philosophical inquiry beyond traditional texts to analyse how militant political action was both informed by and informed the creation of philosophical texts, and consider the possibility of bringing direct action into the realm of philosophical investigation.

No categories

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   2 citations  

Rawls’s difference principle and the position dubbed ‘luck egalitarianism’ are often viewed as competing theories of distributive justice. However, recent work has emphasised that Rawlsians and luck egalitarians are working with different understandings of the concept of justice, and thus not only propose different theories, but different theories of different things. Once they are no longer seen in direct competition, there are some questions to be asked about whether these two theories can be consistently endorsed alongside one another. In this (...) essay, I (begin to) investigate whether Rawls’s theory (or elements of it) and (some form of) luck egalitarianism can be consistently endorsed. -/- I begin by outlining the main aspects of Rawls’s theory and luck egalitarianism, showing them to be different kinds of theory and therefore not in direct competition. I then propose an understanding of how these ideas came to be seen to be in direct competition. Finally, I outline five different ways in which one might consistently be (some kind of) a luck egalitarian and (some kind of) a Rawlsian, and try to say something about what is to be said for and against each of these ways of combining the theories. (shrink)

Export citation   Bookmark   10 citations  

Export citation   Bookmark  

No categories

Direct download   Export citation   Bookmark  

Export citation   Bookmark  

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Refugees of a Crisis in ReferenceHolocaust Memoir and the Deconstruction of Paul de ManPatrick Lawrence (bio)Since discovery of Paul de Man’s wartime journalism, the debate over perceived ethical deficiencies in the philosophies of postmodernism in general, and deconstruction in particular, has intensified. At times more or less vitriolic or persuasive, this debate has brought about a crisis of scholarship to accompany the crisis of reference that is one of (...) its central points.1 At the horizon of the discussion is the Holocaust and its potential to reform modes of representation. As Jeremy Varon notes in his essay “Probing the Limits of the Politics of Representation”:the premises and insights of a variety of discourses, notably postructuralism [sic], deconstruction, psychoanalysis in its newer versions, metahistory, and postmodern theory in general, have at once been applied to and checked against the Holocaust. Such discourses often approach the Holocaust as a kind of limit case that tests the strengths and weaknesses of their various interpretive strategies.(Varon 84)It seems natural because of its (perhaps incomprehensible) magnitude and significance that the Holocaust should occasion self-testing and soul searching on the part of a variety of discourses, notably those that already inclined to such activities.2 Because of its status as at once radically historical and radically ahistorical (in that its import for history cannot be denied, but that the scope of its horror may transform notions of historicity), the Holocaust calls for a reassessment of all aesthetic, poetic, and theoretical paradigms. In the context of such novel and difficult historicity, the problematization of reference that de Manian deconstruction occasions takes on new and complex implications that need particular attention. This is especially important because, like American deconstruction, artistic representations of the Holocaust also assert a new, problematic relationship with their referent.My intention is not to delve into this debate exhaustively. Rather, I attempt an understanding of the problems of some specific critical-theoretical tenets proposed by Paul de Man as they interact with Holocaust memoirs. Doing so may be a way to understand the larger issue by exploring its expression in a narrow vein: that of literature. Holocaust memoirs as a group have been read as making new claims about their relation to a particular referent—about the inability of fully representing the Holocaust in existing modes—but they also make simultaneous claims about the utter necessity of attempting to do so. It will be helpful to see how this revolution of the relationship of [End Page 17] writing to its referent is perhaps at odds with that other similar revolution, that of deconstruction. I also attempt to put this potential conflict into a frame that may elucidate the reasons for their disconnect, using Lyotard’s well-known attempt at establishing an order of postmodern ethics: The Differend, as well as approaches to trauma and memory suggested by Derrida.My aim here is also not to delve into judgments of guilt or innocence with respect to de Man himself and his activities during World War II. I instead venture into the ways, both positive and negative, but inherently problematic, that his writings come into contact with an event recognized by many as a limit event, one that demands recognition of its historicity, even as it engenders a body of literature that expresses the difficulty of understanding the event itself.There is much in de Man’s writings that forces us to consider the restraints and potential of the means of construction of written texts. Exploring this can lead toward a better understanding of the way that individual texts create and manipulate meaning. To this end, much can be gained from de Manian criticism that makes apparent the contradictory tendency of linguistic constructions to indicate something outside themselves (their referential potential), even while their structures and conventions cast in doubt the reality of this “something.” One makes use of this discourse, not in the hopes of destroying the privilege of referentiality that underlies the structures of testimony, victimization, and trauma, but in the hopes of finding a way for the discourse of memoir (and autobiography) to be reconciled with the discourse of deconstruction in such a way that... (shrink)

Direct download(4 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

ZUSAMMENFASSUNGIm Rahmen des Artikels wird die Debatte zwischen Schelling und Eschenmayer inden Jahren 1803–1804 als eine Kontroverse analysiert, die deren vorherige um die Naturphilosophie weiterführt. Der Zentralgedanke Eschenmayers wird in dessen Theorie der »Potenzierung« gesehen. Auf dieser Grundlage entwickelt Eschenmayer 1803 eine Theorie der intellektuellen Anschauung, die seine Theorie des »Überganges« in methodischer Hinsicht tragen und dabei den Glauben in einer grundsätzlichen Bedeutung für das Wissen und die Philosophie wiedereinführen soll. Ferner soll damit die Generierung von Differenz in der absoluten (...) Identität erklärbar sein. So erscheint die Debatte über den Zusammenhang von Philosophie und Religion von 1803 und 1804 zunächst als eine Debatte um die Methodik und die Theorie der Philosophie selbst. Die Analyse von Schellings Methodik, der »Konstruktion«, macht die tiefen Differenzen zwischen Eschenmayer und Schelling deutlich. In der Konsequenz hat auch die von Schelling zwischen 1802 und 1804 präsentierte Religionsphilosophie eine grundlegend andere Bedeutung als Eschenmayers.SCHLUSSELWORTENIDENTITÄTSPHILOSOPHIE, NATURPHILOSOPHIE, INTELLEKTUELLEANSCHAUUNG, RELIGION.ABSTRACTWithin the scope of this article the debate between Schelling and Eschenmayer inthe years 1803–1804 is analysed as a controversy, that continuies the former concerning the philosophy of nature. The central thought of Eschenmayer in his theories of matter and also in his theorie of the philosophy proceeding to »Nichtphilosophie«, is seen in the »Potenzierung«. On this basis he develops a theory of »Intellektuelle Anschauung« that should bear methodically his »progress in Nichtphilosophie« and reintroduce the religious belief in a fundamental meaning for the philosophy. Moreover it should explain the genesis of difference in the absolute identity. So the debate about the connection of philosophy and religion in 1803 and 1804 seems to be mainly one about the methods and theory of philosophy. Looking at Schellings method of »Konstruktion« the fundamental differences between both get visible. In the consequence Schellings philosophy of religion, that he presented between 1802and 1804, has strictly another meaning than Eschenmayers.KEY WORDSphilosophy of identity, philosophy of nature, intellectual intuition, religion. (shrink)

No categories

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

Direct download   Export citation   Bookmark  

Export citation   Bookmark  

Scientific claims are selected in part for their ability to survive. Scientists can pursue an r-strategy of broad, easy-to-spread ideas, or a K-strategy of stress-tested, bulletproof statements. The “generalizability crisis” is an exquisite mutation that allows dull, K-strategic methodology articles to spread nearly as quickly as the fast-breeding, r-strategic memes of pop-psychology.

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

No categories

Export citation   Bookmark  

Direct download   Export citation   Bookmark  

I argue that Moorean theories of value have a difficult time accommodating the resonance requirement, that is, the platitude that we should value what’s valuable, while a sophisticated reflective endorsement theory of value and the resonance requirement are perfectly consistent. To this extent, a sophisticated reflective endorsement theory has a significant advantage over the Moorean approach. The reflective endorsement theory that I endorse emphasizes systematic exposure to possible sources of satisfaction, as well as a similarity principle of practical rationality.

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

No categories

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   5 citations  

Professor Richard Pring's BJES Vol. 48, No. 1 editorial shares a widespread unease regarding government centralisation of state-funded research (not only on education). Unfortunately the editorial compromises with this trend by suggesting it is obvious to academic experts where research should be so concentrated. Instead, an alternative model of research is advocated to counter so far as is possible the tendency towards centralisation.

Direct download(4 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

An American conservative movement developed rapidly after World War II. It brought together intellectuals and politicians opposed to the New Deal in domestic policy and Soviet communism in foreign policy. The movement's first presidential candidate, Barry Goldwater, lost the election of 1964 but its second, Ronald Reagan, won the election of 1980. It has remained an influential force in American life up to the present, despite strong internal contradictions, which include disagreements about centralized power, about religion, about tradition, about elites, (...) and about the free market. To some of the movement's early luminaries, such as Russell Kirk, free-market capitalism was the antithesis of conservatism since it required perpetual innovation and the sweeping away of traditional forms. To others, such as Ayn Rand, capitalism was the heart and soul of conservatism because it alone preserved the dignity and freedom of the individual. (shrink)

No categories

Direct download(5 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

We characterize Weihrauch reducibility in $ \operatorname {\mathrm {E-PA^{\omega }}} + \operatorname {\mathrm {QF-AC^{0,0}}}$ and all systems containing it by the provability in a linear variant of the same calculus using modifications of Gödel’s Dialectica interpretation that incorporate ideas from linear logic, nonstandard arithmetic, higher-order computability, and phase semantics.

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   1 citation  

One contested moral commitment shared by the American Medical Association and American Nurses Association has to do with the place of conscience in the practice of medicine. These organizations, each in their own way, urge their respective members to engage in careful moral discernment regarding their professional life, and they assert the existence of an obligation on the part of others to respect the conscientious objections of healthcare professionals and to accommodate objecting individuals. Yet despite the value that these organizations (...) place on conscience and objector rights, these organizations do not offer elaborate philosophical defenses of their positions. This shortcoming is exposed by the light of contemporary philosophical challenges to conscience-friendly policies. What such challenges demand is a philosophical defense of these organizations’ moral commitments and corresponding policy recommendations. The point of this article is to indicate how the Catholic philosophical tradition’s account of the nature and importance of conscience can philosophically underwrite these organizations’ conscience-related principles and practices. It can be seen, then, that the Catholic tradition is far from inimical to the contemporary practice of medicine and that, on the contrary, this tradition offers philosophically serious grounds on which to rest some of the most morally significant values and guidelines endorsed by these contemporary health-professional organizations and their members. (shrink)

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   1 citation  

Since Descartes, the quest for the foundation in epistemology has suffered a series of setbacks. The consequence of the opposition against an epistemic foundation is epistemic skepticism. The irony of the skeptic position is that scepticism in all its hues is self-refuting. Although the establishment of a foundation is essential for coherent epistemology, the quest for epistemic foundation has suffered some oppositions because most attempts at establishing foundational epistemology have focused on intentional signs or products – beliefs, concepts, propositions, etc. (...) In this essay, I argue that in order to establish foundational epistemology, cognitional and intentionality analysis should take priority over conceptual analysis. Hence, instead of focusing on intentional signs or products, attention should be paid to intentional acts – experiencing, understanding and judging – of the knowing subject. In other words, I argue that paying adequate attention to human cognitional structure is vital in the defense of epistemic foundation and that the foundation is found in the structure of human knowing rather than in the products of human knowing. Focusing on cognitional analysis will help to account for both epistemic foundation and epistemic pluralism. The shift from conceptual to cognitional and intentionality analysis has implications for the articulation of the African perspective on knowledge since the human cognitional structure is the same, but contextual differences arise because of one's epistemic environment. Following the example of Bernard Lonergan, I argue that self-knowledge or self-affirmation of the knower, as he terms it, is the paradigmatic case for the establishment of epistemic foundation. (shrink)

No categories

Direct download(3 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

Export citation   Bookmark  

Export citation   Bookmark  

No categories

Direct download(11 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

No categories

Direct download   Export citation   Bookmark  

No categories

Direct download(5 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

Direct download(4 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

La question Qu'est-ce que la littérature? ne saurait être première ; il faut d'abord résoudre celle des critères de l'évaluation. Mener une réflexion théorique entre pôle artistique et pôle esthétique ou questionner les genres ainsi que le lien entre littérature et politique semble aisé pour définir la valeur de l'oeuvre littéraire, mais une réponse globale reste un horizon fuyant. Dans sa quête pour trancher la tête intelligente de l'hydre, cet ouvrage continue de couper des têtes qui se régénèrent doublement!

Direct download   Export citation   Bookmark  

Export citation   Bookmark  

(2023). God and suffering in Africa: An exploration in natural theology and philosophy of religion. South African Journal of Philosophy: Vol. 42, No. 4, pp. 348-360.

No categories

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

On the one hand, anger and gratitude are crucial in appreciating what one owes to oneself or others; on the other, they disturb one's internal balance and reinforce one's dependence upon others. This book explores the tension between these two attitudes in the work of French Enlightenment writers such as Rousseau, Diderot, Marivaux, and Challe.

Direct download   Export citation   Bookmark  

Le propos de cet article est d’interroger l’usage déroutant de la première personne chez Nietzsche, qui semble tout à la fois, en introduisant des notations biographiques, constituer une entorse à l’analyse philosophique et entrer en contradiction avec son rejet de la réalité du moi. À l’examen, il s’avère que ces textes n’ont pas pour fonction de renvoyer à une unité empirique, mais doivent se comprendre comme le signe d’un problème que la philosophie bien entendue doit affronter, à savoir le défi (...) constitué par l’aptitude à évaluer les valeurs. Sous cet angle, l’écriture à la première personne ne vise pas la mise en avant d’un modèle qu’il s’agirait pour les penseurs d’imiter, mais a pour objet, tout au contraire, de révéler la situation atypique qui confère à Nietzsche un privilège quant à l’entreprise philosophique : l’étendue du spectre pulsionnel qui le caractérise, lui permettant de connaître et d’apprécier une vaste série de conditions d’existence, de la maladie à la santé. (shrink)

No categories

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

Thomas Aquinas has argued that the passion of hope is the movement of the sensitive appetite and the first of the irascible passion. The first part of the article aims to explore the cause and the mechanism of the passion of hope, and tries to clarify the relationship between the passion of hope and the perception. In human beings, it is possible that the passion of hope is caused by false judgement of the perception, which will lead to the result (...) of false hope. In Aquinas’s argument, the problem of false hope could be solved through the moral virtue and the prudence. In the second part of this article, the aim is to analyse how the virtue of magnanimity, humility and the prudence work impact on the passion of hope and perfect it.Contribution: This research concentrates on the topic of the passion of hope of Thomas Aquinas, and provides a new perspective on the understanding of the relationship between the passion and the virtue. (shrink)

Direct download(3 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

Direct download(3 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

No categories

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   1 citation  

We present in this article a new logical system inspired from linear logic. This system is designed in order to express causality and dynamism. The cut elimination theorem holds for this logic. Examples of applications are given.

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   1 citation  

No categories

Direct download   Export citation   Bookmark  

Direct download(5 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   1 citation  

Reply to Fred Crowe's Note on 'The History That is Written' (in this issue of jdma).

No categories

Direct download(4 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

No categories

Export citation   Bookmark  

No categories

Direct download   Export citation   Bookmark  

The development of a methodologically naturalistic approach to physiological and experimental psychology in the nineteenth century was not primarily driven by a naturalistic agenda. The work of R. Hermann Lotze and G. T. Fechner help to illustrate this claim. I examine a selected set of central commitments in each thinkers philosophical outlook, particularly regarding the human soul and the nature of God, that departed strongly from a reductionist materialism. Yet, each contributed significantly to the formation of experimental and physiological psychology. (...) Their work was influenced substantively by their respective philosophical commitments. Nevertheless, the evaluation of the merits of their specific proposals, Fechner's psychophysics and Lotze's local sign hypothesis respectively, did not depend upon sharing their metaphysical views regarding the human soul or the nature of God. A moderate, but significant, distinction between the contexts of discovery and of justification aids in understanding this balancing act. (shrink)

Direct download(3 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark  

Direct download(2 more)   Export citation   Bookmark   1 citation  

This essay explores ways in which musicologists might extend work undertaken by humanities scholars in the interdisciplinary field of trauma studies that has highlighted the centrality of traumatic experience to modernist creativity. It is focussed around a case study of a musical composition that represents the emotional aftermath of a traumatic event, the Sixth Symphony of the Soviet composer Nikolay Myaskovsky. A central concern is to demonstrate how the symphony’s musical symbolism is strikingly evocative of typical features of post-traumatic mentation, (...) such as dissociation and emotional numbing, and the inhibition of the ability to mourn. It closes by considering the potential implications of the findings for understanding work by other modernist composers. (shrink)

No categories

Direct download(4 more)   Export citation   Bookmark