In this treatise, the dimensions of Paulinian stewardship as a way of caring for God’s creation are expounded and analyzed. This is ensued by a critical review on the Epistles of St. Paul in explaining the concept of stewardship as a calling, leading by example, and a way of life. Moreover, as stewardship is equated with the Paulinian core value of community, the attitude, and the action of a steward’s life of service to others and God are highlighted.

To test the notion that shifts in visual imagery and attention are correlated with experiences of emotion, we studied 10 dream reports using an affirmative probe of emotion and a quantitative measure of plot discontinuity. We found that emotion, especially changes in emotion, are correlated with discontinuities in visual imagery. These correlations are quantified using a new graph theoretical method for analyzing narrative reports.

Balancing Change and Tradition in Global Education Reform is an invaluable resource for policymakers, faculty, students, and anyone interested in how decisions made about the education system ultimately affect the quality of education, educational access, and social justice.

Introduction; A.Hazlett Quantification, Naturalness, and Ontology; R.P.Cameron Two Problems of Composition in Collective Action; S.R.Chant Another Look at the Reality of Race, By Which I Mean Racef; J.Glasgow Bringing Things About; N.Judisch Interpretation: Its Scope and Limits; U.Kriegel Empirical Analyses of Causation; D.Kutach Brutal Individuation; A.Hazlett Ghosts in the World Machine? Humility and Its Alternatives; R.Langton& C.Robichaud Is Everything Relative? Anti-Realism, Truth, and Feminism; M.Mikkola Minimalism and Modality: The Nature of Mathematical Objects; K.Miller Are There Fundamental Intrinsic Properties?; A.Ney On (...) the Very Idea of an Ecosystem; J.Odenbaugh The Prince of Wales Problem for Counterfactual Theories of Causation; C.Sartorio Index. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:110 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY History of Aesthetics, Vol. I. Ancient Aesthetics. By Wladyslaw Tatarkiewicz. Ed. J. Harrell. Trans. Adam and Ann Czerniawski. (The Hague-Paris: Mouton and Warszawa: PWN-Polish Scientific Publishers, 1970. Pp. vii-352.) History of Aesthetics, Vol. II. Medieval Aesthetics. By WladySlaw Tatarkiewicz. Ed. C. Barrett. Trans. R. M. Montgomery. (The Hague-Paris: Mouton and Warszawa: PWN-Polish Scientific Publishers, 1970. Pp. vii-315.) These two volumes of Tatarkiewicz' monumental history of (...) aesthetics, the third volume (to 1700) of which is now being prepared for press, have been reviewed already in the major aesthetic journals in Europe and America following their publication in Polish. Since Polish is not one of my languages, I can say nothing about the adequacy of the (rather obscured) translators and their work. The editors of both volumes have done their difficult work thoroughly, though the usual inconsistencies of spelling and such creep in. British spellings of judgement, centre, and colour, for example, appear in one part of a volume, while center, color, and judgment appear in another part. These are rare and not at all irksome details. On p. 220 of volume I, Aristotle has become a Stagiryte (sic). If the editors and translators actually re-checked all of those Greek, Polish and English texts--to say nothing of the Latin--they have earned a very large debt indeed. Again, my selective ignorance eliminates me from assessment. Tatarkiewicz' historical writing is surgical and Lacon-like. His major achievement lies in refraining from philosophical animadversions and for sticking strictly to his topic, no matter how tempting the theoretic distractions. Actually one expects a history of aesthetics to find the locus of aesthetic theory in the usual systematic frameworks of outstanding philosophers, but again Tatarkiewicz knows better than to try to provide these settings. His device is to stay exactly with the texts of authors, and to provide as much evidence for his statements as a printed work will allow. His scholarship is truly prodigious, and the work will live as reference for a long time to come. But it is more than a reference. There are some remarkable novelties included that bear mention. First of all, Tatarkiewicz' opening analysis of what must be included in a history of aesthetics is penetrating and convincing. In addition to the major "dualities" of aesthetics (beauty-art, subjective-objective aesthetics, psychological-sociological aesthetics, descriptive-prescriptive aesthetics, etc.) he simply accepts the necessity to find evidence of aesthetic history among statements by artists, among the inexplicit and inarticulate art works, in the vox populi and cultural actions of people. Thus the "evidence" he adduces will often displease the theoretical purist. Next, one is impressed by the great antiquity of some key issues that are being avidly pursued today. What is impressive is not that they are being repeated now, but that modern writers so rarely recognize (or acknowledge) their historical sources---or seem to care to. A careful study of this history might do much to reduce the growing volume in aesthetics----or at least to change the direction of emphasis significantly. One is surprised to note which figures emerge as of first rate importance in the history of aesthetics, important for different reasons. These figures stand out: Democritus, Plotinus, Aristotle, Vitruvius, the Pseudo-Dionysius, Johannes Scotus Erigena, to select only a few. The first Polish philosopher, Vitelo, anticipates much modern psychologizing in advancing the work of Alhazen. Ockham, not so surprising, contributes major advances, as do Augustine and Aquinas. BOOK REVIEWS 111 One fascinating item is the author's extensive account of the most violent and extended controversy in the history of aesthetics---the veneration of images and the disputes between the Iconoclasts and the Iconophiles. This sometimes physical battle raged for over 100 years! The Byzantine society, obviously, took art seriously. Tatarkiewicz' great labor is an object lesson in historiography and bibliographic technique. At one and the same time it demonstrates how much of value remains to be discovered by careful adherence to the detail of scholarship, while it also displays how much fruitful scholarship depends upon a brilliant and profoundly informed mind. Such a work, in short, could only have descended from a fully mature... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Who Needs Classical Music? Cultural Choice and Musical Value by Julian JohnsonWilliam M. PerrineJulian Johnson, Who Needs Classical Music? Cultural Choice and Musical Value. Oxford University Press, 2002.In Who Needs Classical Music? Cultural Choice and Musical Value, British musicologist and composer Julian Johnson defends the value of classical music in a commercialized culture fixated on the immediate gratification of popular music. At 130 pages divided into six chapters, (...) Johnson’s book is a reasonably accessible and engaging presentation of his topic. This short book contains relevant and sometimes controversial insights of interest to professional music educators. In this review I will provide a brief summary of the author’s primary arguments accompanied by critical commentary.Johnson argues that commercial forces in our society limit serious reflective discourse on music. The marketplace treats music as a commodity which derives its value from relative commercial success. In this context, classical music is relegated to one possible cultural choice among many legitimate options and is in danger of losing its distinctive features as an art form that transcends commercial concerns. Preference for particular musical products becomes an identity marker for an individual’s place within society, and criticism of a particular style of music is perceived as a personal attack. The process of turning classical music into a commodity has been aided by critics who have condemned the Western [End Page 96] canon as elitist, patriarchal, and arrogant. These critics have instead advocated a democratization of culture, placing greater emphasis on the validity of popular art forms and active participation in music-making rather than the more passive contemplation. Johnson describes this as a “pseudo-democratic” attack which encourages downward social mobility. When combined with the omnipresence of commercial culture, this approach undermines individual musical value by assuming the equal validity of all aesthetic judgments. Democracy is damaged when, refusing to discriminate between cultural products, society fails to recognize human individuality and excellence.Johnson is at his strongest when he argues for the importance of classical music fulfilling its function as art. The author argues that different types of music fulfill different functions. In contemporary society music is valued and chosen for how it is used. Music is described as “good” when it functions to provide background music for activities or when it successfully complements or enhances the listeners’ moods. Focusing solely on social use or reception, however, tends to neglect objective differences in the formal structure of music. This is the point at which Johnson begins to distinguish between classical and popular music. Popular music is composed to ensure a uniformity of affect, and deliberately avoids formal or harmonic complexity. As an aspect of popular culture, it is tied to contemporary fashion trends and rapidly becomes obsolete. Like other types of fashion, music becomes a means for expressing a current position within a larger social and cultural space. It is the music of youth; its commercial saturation of the culture blurs the boundaries between youth and adulthood. Johnson claims that the process of commercialization leads to a bland standardization. Classical music can also function as a type of popular music when it submits itself to market processes, but in doing so the music loses its distinctive features.In his discussion on popular music, Johnson presents what might be his most controversial claim: that popular music serves a pornographic function. He defines pornography as “the process by which the humane is reduced to the status of things” (p. 59) and argues that popular music takes pleasure in debasing humanity by reducing individuals to material commodities and denying the spiritual. This contention echoes Allan Bloom’s concern in The Closing of the American Mind that rock music desensitizes and debases youth by destroying imagination and deadening their capacity for passion and wonder. The strength of this language undermines Johnson’s contention in his introduction to the paperback edition that he is not trying to set up a binary opposition between art and popular music in which the classical is “better.” Moreover, if pornography is a form of dehumanization and is a legitimate concern in music, it is important to point out that such a charge is not exclusive to... (shrink)

Oberman, H. A. Quoscunque tulit foecunda vetustas.--Bouwsma, W. J. The two faces of humanism.--Gilmore, M. P. Italian reactions to Erasmian humanism.--Dresden, S. The profile of the reception of the Italian Renaissance in France.--IJsewijn, J. The coming of humanism to the Low Countries.--Hay, D. England and the humanities in the fifteenth century.--Spitz, L. W. The course of German humanism.

New Blackfriars, Volume 102, Issue 1101, Page 658-676, September 2021.

Contemporary philosophy, to be useful to Orthodox Christian theology, must capture the “essence” of the divine and human activity in the world in the scientific sense of Edmund Husserl. Scholastic philosophy is no longer an academically privileged supporter of theology in the interpretation of the universe. In its place, this paper suggests that phenomenological philosophy becomes the unique and transcendent partner, as it were, in the interpretive dialogue. The methodological thinking of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger offers a way of (...) philosophical understanding that is more satisfactory than the traditional scholastic metaphysics in giving meaning to contemporary human experience. A phenomenological eco-theological approach captures the essences of a subject’s immediate and holistic perception of the environment. Indo-Pacific Journal of Phenomenology , September 2008, Volume 8, Edition 2. (shrink)

The physical properties of human beings and other organisms as well as their social behavioral traits are manifestations of both genetic inheritance and environment. Recent behavioral research has indicated that certain characteristics or behaviors—such as schizophrenia, divorce, and homosexuality—are highly heritable and are not governed exclusively by social environment. A balanced view of human behavior includes the effects of social learning as well as of genetically determined behavior. A new paradigm promotes enhanced understanding and acceptance of human diversity, be it (...) cultural, racial, or sexual, and has the potential to unite scientists and theologians by creating common grounds of understanding. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Mystery of Problems for Modern Theological MethodologyBruno M. Shah O.P.Recent trends in Catholic theology emphasize the category of "mystery." But "problems," which can seem distinct from and even opposed to mysteries, have a constitutive role in the work of theology as well. If the object of faith is God, and if theology's goal is typically defined as "faith seeking understanding," then the object of theology must include the (...) seeking's problematical quotient. At the very least, problems condition the faith-and-reason labor of theological enquiry. This essay claims that problems philosophically orient and index the theological articulation of mysteries—not the mysteries themselves—particularly in a modern key, and that they require explicit attention in theological methodology and pedagogy.First, I explain my concern with the "return to mystery" in conciliar-era Catholic theology. This explanation entails, second, describing the special attention to "problems" in neo-Kantianism, which bequeaths the tension between the empirical world and transcendental freedom to modern theology. These two historiographical matters in methodology set up the tension between problems and mysteries for Catholic thinking. Third, I briefly return to Aristotle's thoughts on the matter, which are a lodestone for the tradition. Fourth, I evaluate the positions of Jacques Maritain and Gabriel Marcel, the most important conciliar-era thinkers who thematized the relationship between problems and mysteries. My treatment will show how both ontological (Maritain) and existential (Marcel) dynamics of mystery are necessarily linked to metaphysical and spiritual problems. The [End Page 1265] critical ascertaining of theological mystery formally requires orientation via philosophical problems.My concern here is fundamental, ecclesial, and professional, interested that those who serve the Church through theological writing and teaching do so in a recognizably common or compatible manner, and in a way that can meaningfully stimulate theological interest. If the teaching of theology would invite students to embark upon the via inventionis and not merely yield to the via doctrinae, there must be fundamental advertence to ontological and existential problems as the theologically constitutive point of departure.1 Theologians do well to think in correlative terms of problems and mysteries. As a fifth and final point, then, I suggest that the quintessential starting point for (fundamental) theology today is the problem and mystery of the human person.Historical Context 1: The Return to MysteryContemporary Church life and theology have witnessed a "return to mystery."2 "Mystery" refers to some range or dynamic of reality that is essentially inaccessible apart from some feature of religious or spiritual practice. Christian reference to "mystery" or "mysteries" etymologically intimates that there are realities of which we cannot and/or ought not to speak, even as these mysteries have in some way been disclosed.3 Mysteries, therefore, are tensional in that they indicate at once contact and transcendence, knowledge and nescience. Christians and others communicate in religious mysteries through liturgical exercise and creedal confession, as well as through personal prayer and even existential trial. They are mediations of what is categorically transcendent, of what constitutively eludes or escapes [End Page 1266] the categories of our objectifying consciousness. Accordingly, the mysterious regards the inarticulable.That the substance of religious mysteries is real or true cannot be proven beyond all question, not according to commonly accessible human criteria of justification. For Christians, the gift of faith provides the convincing motive to believe in the reality of Christian mysteries through a kind of thinking with felt decision. Granting this claim, the work of theology is to reflect upon the mysteries of faith and develop expressible knowledge. Theology articulates (the) faith, extrapolating upon the reasons that the heart has for its belief. To do this work, theology trades upon fixed standards of confessional speech, liturgical practice, and perhaps also moral action, which provide lexical cogency and communicable intelligibility.The late nineteenth century witnessed attacks upon theology's claims to objectively or universally valid expression, owing especially to challenges from both epistemology and historiography.4 The surge of post-Enlightenment liberalism was surely catalytic as well. The Catholic Church initially aggregated these attacks in terms of "modernism." But then—as the standard history continues—conciliar theology gave fresh and viable riposte to what was... (shrink)

This collection of original essays explores the connections between the philosophies of Alfred North Whitehead and the classical American pragmatists.

This volume collects P. M. S. Hacker's papers on Wittgenstein and related themes written over the last decade. Hacker provides comparative studies of a range of topics--including Wittgenstein's philosophy of psychology, conception of grammar, and treatment of intentionality--and defends his own Wittgensteinian conception of philosophy.

The concept of normal is so familiar that it can be hard to imagine contemporary life without it. Yet the term entered everyday speech only in the mid-twentieth century. Before that, it was solely a scientific term used primarily in medicine to refer to a general state of health and the orderly function of organs. But beginning in the middle of the twentieth century, normal broke out of scientific usage, becoming less precise and coming to mean a balanced condition to (...) be maintained and an ideal to be achieved. In Normality, Peter Cryle and Elizabeth Stephens offer an intellectual and cultural history of what it means to be normal. They explore the history of how communities settle on any one definition of the norm, along the way analyzing a fascinating series of case studies in fields as remote as anatomy, statistics, criminal anthropology, sociology, and eugenics. Cryle and Stephens argue that since the idea of normality is so central to contemporary disability, gender, race, and sexuality studies, scholars in these fields must first have a better understanding of the context for normality. This pioneering book moves beyond binaries to explore for the first time what it does—and doesn’t—mean to be normal. (shrink)