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In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:American Journal of Philology 121.4 (2000) 637-641 [Access article in PDF] IRAD MALKIN. The Returns of Odysseus: Colonization and Ethnicity. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1998. xiii + 331 pp. 6 maps. Cloth, $45, £35. The latest book from the pen of Irad Malkin is a substantial, creative contribution to the discourse in classical studies on ethnicity and ethnic identity. Malkin rejects the now familiar binary (...) opposition between Greek and Other and argues instead for "the intricate, sometimes hybrid, mutually reflecting world of exploration, contacts, colonization, and coexistence involving various Greek and native populations" (xi). Readers should be aware, however, that myth and other written sources are the means by which "group identity and ethnicity" are principally traced.The basic premise of the book appears in the brief preface: "myths, especially... Greek myths of the returns of Odysseus and other heroes, were used to mediate encounters and conceptualize ethnicity and group identity" with the inhabitants of Albania, Apulia, and southern Italy (xi). A lengthy introduction serves as a précis of the entire work. Malkin agrees that myth is a cultural representation productive of meaning, one which actively influenced history (5). At the outset, a distinction is drawn between nostoi, the narratives of heroes returning from Troy, and Nostoi, those who returned. The most important figure early on is Odysseus, an exceptional Nostos, fit for the protocolonial more than the colonial experience. Later, Greeks who colonized in the Near West (Sicily is left to the side for the most part), turned to other Nostoi "for site orientation and articulations of ethnicities, genealogies, and identities and often of cult."Malkin further proposes that non-Greeks used these myths in their own ways and perhaps in turn affected Greek views of nostoi. For this Malkin calls upon a notion of "the middle ground" (as formulated in the very stimulating book of that title by Richard White), a space both physical and cultural where each side in colonial encounters acts according to the assumed perceptions of the other to create a world comprehensible to both. In effect, Malkin suggests that the nostoi and their contexts serve as Middle Ground for the Greek colonial experience. That non-Greek populations were regarded less as Others, barbaroi, and more as xenoi seems hard to square with colonial encounters which were far from peaceful, however, and readers might keep in mind that in White's Great Lakes "middle ground" the center did not hold: the accommodation failed by the early nineteenth century.The work unfolds over eight chapters and an appendix which covers various "Homeric issues." This final section might usefully have been incorporated [End Page 637] into the introduction or first chapter; there is also a sometimes confusing amount of redundancy between sections. Chapter 1 extends the introduction; in the very first sentences Malkin sets out an explicit assumption: "that the Greeks had the nostoi in their heads" (33) in the ninth century B.C.E. or even earlier. Here Malkin lays out his views on the relationships between stories (i.e., the extant epics to other stories known from the Cycle), and of images in art from the eighth and seventh centuries to stories. Malkin insists that stories which are often considered to be later than Homer are in fact only possible alternatives. The book nearly implies that the nostoi were actually created in the ninth (or tenth) century, as an active and history-making myth. Not all readers will agree with Malkin's conclusions, but all will have to confront what kind of mythology the Greeks had before Homer and before early figurative art.Chapter 2 sets the historical stage by outlining sailing and settlement in "the Sea of Returns," which refers both to an idea and the Ionian and Adriatic Seas. Malkin strongly criticizes the work of other scholars which he regards as insufficiently historically specific, especially that of Carol Dougherty, whose approach, as he also acknowledges, is complementary to his own (readers may be interested in her forthcoming The Raft of Odysseus: The Ethnographic Imagination of Archaic Greece, from Oxford). Malkin'... (shrink)

Background The legitimacy of conscientious objection to abortion continues to fuel heated debate in Italy. In two recent decisions, the European Committee for Social Rights underlined that conscientious objection places safe, legal, and accessible care and services out of reach for most Italian women and that the measures that Italy has adopted to guarantee free access to abortion services are inadequate. Nevertheless, the Ministry of Health states that current Italian legislation, if appropriately applied, accommodates both the right to conscientious objection (...) and the right to voluntary abortion. Main body One empirical argument used to demonstrate that conscientious objection does not create barriers to abortion is the “no correlation” argument, which the Italian Committee for Bioethics employed to demonstrate that no association exists between conscientious objection and waiting times for voluntary abortion in Italy and to support the weak form of conventional comprise adopted by the Italian legislation to balance the conflict between women’ autonomy and healthcare professionals’ moral integrity. Conversely, we showed how the “no correlation” argument fails to demonstrate the absence of a relationship between the number of conscientious objectors and waiting times for voluntary abortion, and that the limitations of the “no correlation” argument itself demonstrate how it is still difficult to describe the real effect of conscientious objection on the access to abortion services and to evaluate the suitability of conventional compromise to effectively balance conflicting moral principles. Conclusion Further studies are needed to better describe the relationship between conscientious objection and waiting times for voluntary abortion. If new evidence would show that the increasing proportion of objectors does undermine the efficacy of the Italian law and the right of a woman to freely obtain a voluntary abortion, new ways will need to be found to address the conflict between moral principles and restrict the protection accorded to the principle of moral integrity. This would inevitably imply the need to constrain and to redefine the terms and conditions for claiming conscientious objection. (shrink)

Iris Murdoch has long been known as one of the most deeply insightful and morally passionate novelists of our time. This attention has often eclipsed Murdoch's sophisticated and influential work as a philosopher, which has had a wide-ranging impact on thinkers in moral philosophy as well as religious ethics and political theory. Yet it has never been the subject of a book-length study in its own right. Picturing the Human seeks to fill this gap. In this groundbreaking book, author (...) class='Hi'>Maria Antonaccio presents the first systematic and comprehensive treatment of Murdoch's moral philosophy. Unlike literary critical studies of her novels, it offers a general philosophical framework for assessing Murdoch's thought as a whole. Antonaccio also suggests a new interpretive method for reading Murdoch's philosophy and outlines the significance of her thought in the context of current debates in ethics. This vital study will appeal to those interested in moral philosophy, religious ethics, and literary criticism, and grants those who have long loved Murdoch's novels a closer look at her remarkable philosophy. (shrink)

A Philosophy to Live By highlights Murdoch's distinctive conception of philosophy as a spiritual or existential practice and enlists the resources of her thought to explore a wide range of thinkers and debates at the intersections of moral philosophy, religion, art, and politics.

Economic and sanitary crises have great repercussions on access to food and the health of the population. In this context, austerity policies can have devastating effects on social rights. The purpose of this essay is to reflect on the impact of various types of crises on the Human Right to Adequate Food and Nutrition (DHANA) and on Food and Nutritional Security (SAN) of vulnerable populations and to identify of public policies, programs and actions developed based on the relief of the (...) damage caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. From the collection of information carried out in a non-systematic way on government websites and scientific databases, documents were read in full, categorized, and critically analyzed. Three different contexts, Africa, Latin America, and Portugal, are presented by the authors who work in these realities, with the intention of contributing to mitigate the food problems that worsen and are derived from the pandemic situation. (shrink)

Hacia fines del siglo XIX y principio del XX se desarrolla en la Argentina un importante debate en torno al derecho penal, en el que muchos intelectuales, formados bajo la influencia del biologicismo darwiniano, intervienen para cuestionar el Código Penal, vigente desde 1887. En nuestro trabajo analizamos los desarrollos de José Ingenieros sobre el tema, profundizando el estudio de los conceptos que propone y atendiendo a la transformación radical que éstos implican en lo que hace a la comprensión del derecho, (...) de la delincuencia y de su tratamiento. A lo largo del trabajo reconocemos en las formulaciones de Ingenieros una renovación del campo conceptual en el tratamiento del delito, de acuerdo con un nuevo esquema de estudio e investigación de la delincuencia, una nueva clasificación de los sujetos criminales y nuevo sentido para la institución jurídica. A partir de allí analizamos sus consecuencias en términos de un nuevo mapa disciplinar para el tratamiento de la delincuencia, en el que la psicología pasaría a ocupar un rol protagónico, poniendo de manifiesto sus potencialidades para la intervención normalizadora del campo social. In the end of 19th Century and the beginning of the 20th it develops in Argentine an important discussion around penal law, in which many intellectuals, under the influence of Darwinian biologicism, query the Penal Code, current since 1887. In our article we analyze Jose Ingenieros' explanations about this topic, studying the concepts that he proposes and attending to the radical transformation that they imply for the understanding of law, of crime and of its treatment. In this paper we recognize in Ingenieros' formulations a renovation of the conceptual field in the treatment of crime, according with a new outline of the study and investigation of crime, a new criminal's classification and a new sense for the legal institution. We also analyze its consequences in terms of a new disciplinary map for crime's treatment, in which psychology assumes a central place, showing its potentialities for the normalizing intervention in the social field. (shrink)

IN THIS ESSAY I PRESENT NEW RESOURCES FOR THINKING ABOUT THE RElation between asceticism and ethics. The aims of the essay are threefold. The first is to highlight the work of scholars who interpret asceticism within the wider context of theories of moral formation and education in order to call attention to the cultural dimensions of asceticism. The second is to deploy ascetic concepts and tropes to analyze contemporary debates over the ethics of consumption and to suggest that asceticism may (...) have surprising descriptive and diagnostic power in a culture marked by a pervasive consumerism. The third and final aim of the essay is to draw some of the constructive implications of this analysis for the debate over consumption and for the adequacy of naturalist versus nonnaturalist approaches to ethics. (shrink)

This volume also includes "Metaphysics and Ethics," a classic essay by Iris Murdoch.

Jan WoleĔski Kazimierz Twardowski and the Development of Philosophy of Science in Poland Kazimierz Twardowski studied with Brentano and followed his style of doing philosophy, in particular, the thesis that the method of philosophy is  ...

The university reform can be considered as the favorable scenario for the explanation of some supposed of the university philosophy. The definitions that were operated at the beginning of the century may have been the basis on which the discourse of university reformism was constructed. In one way or another, both elements are linked. In the article we approach the question from the reading and review of the editorial, philosophical and university proposal of the Revista de Filosofí­a. Cultura, ciencia, educación (...) and Valoraciones. These are two publications that are presented as expressions of university reformism, while trying to delimit the philosophical field. (shrink)

Pragmatism, taken not just as a philosophical movement but as a way of addressing problems, strongly influenced the debate on the foundations of probability during the first half of the twentieth century. Upholders of different interpretations of probability such as Hans Reichenbach, Ernest Nagel, Rudolf Carnap, Frank Ramsey, and Bruno de Finetti, acknowledged their debt towards pragmatist philosophers, including Charles Sanders Peirce, William James, Clarence Irving Lewis, William Dewey and Giovanni Vailati. In addition, scientist-philosophers like Ernst Mach, Ludwig Boltzmann, Henri (...) Poincaré, Pierre Duhem, and Karl Pearson, who heralded a conception of science and knowledge at large that was close to pragmatism, were very influential in that debate. Among the main interpretations of probability – frequentism, propensionism, logicism and subjectivism -, the latter is no doubt the closest to the pragmatist outlook. This paper concentrates on three representatives of the subjective theory, namely Frank Ramsey, Bruno de Finetti and Émile Borel. (shrink)

This volume broadens our concept of reasoning and rationality to allow for a more pluralistic and situational view of human thinking as a practical activity. Drawing on contributors across disciplines including philosophy, economics, psychology, statistics, computer science, engineering, and physics, _Reasoning, Rationality, and Probability_ argues that the search for strong theories should leave room for the construction of context-sensitive conceptual tools. Both science and everyday life, the authors argue, are too complex and multifaceted to be forced into ready-made schemata.

The Institute Vienna Circle held a conference in Vienna in 2003, Cambridge and Vienna a?

Not limited to merely mathematics, probability has a rich and controversial philosophical aspect. _A Philosophical Introduction to Probability_ showcases lesser-known philosophical notions of probability and explores the debate over their interpretations. Galavotti traces the history of probability and its mathematical properties and then discusses various philosophical positions on probability, from the Pierre Simon de Laplace's “classical” interpretation of probability to the logical interpretation proposed by John Maynard Keynes. This book is a valuable resource for students in philosophy and mathematics and (...) all readers interested in notions of probability. (shrink)

Na análise do equilíbrio trabalho-família, tem-se salientado o efeito de extravasamento (spillover). Neste estudo, realizado por entrevista semiestruturada a uma amostra de 102 mães portuguesas (incluindo 79 sinalizadas por mau trato e negligência), abordam-se os impactos da situação profissional da..

ABSTRACT The purpose of this research is to examine ethical climate as a mediator iin the relationship between ethical leadership and workplace bullying. An online questionnaire was answered by 223 Portuguese employees, who had worked for at least 6 consecutive months at the same organization. Results support the mediating role of ethical climate on the relationship between ethical leadership and bullying at work, suggesting that ethical leaders can contribute to the minimization of bullying through their impact on ethical climate and (...) employees’ behavior. Drawing on the social learning theory and the social information processing theory, this study clarifies the mediating role of ethical climate. (shrink)

Echeverría, Alberdi y Bilbao pueden ser considerados tres de los pensadores más representativos de las lecturas que el siglo XIX hiciera sobre la Revolución independentista en América. Sus construcciones teóricas fueron elaboradas a la luz de las consecuencias políticas de la Revolución, pero también a partir de la lectura de una serie de teóricos políticos franceses que, de manera contemporánea, pensaban el proceso revolucionario francés. Situar a estos autores en el contexto de los debates intelectuales del momento es un modo (...) de ampliar la lectura y de descubrir las principales particularidades de un pensamiento que se define ante las nuevas condiciones de la política moderna.Echeverría, Alberdi and Bilbao may be considered to be three of the finest 19th Century's interpreters of the Latin American Revolution of the Independence. Their theories were developed in light of the political consequences of the Revolution, but also based on an assessment of a series of French political philosophers that, at the same time, were thinking the French revolutionary process. Placing these authors in the context of the theoretical discussions of their time is a way to extend the understanding and to identify the singularities of a view defined on the horizon of the new conditions of the modern politics. (shrink)

https://revistes.uab.cat/enrahonar/article/view/v37-galavotti.

The Common Cause Principle, stating that correlations are either consequences of a direct causal link between the correlated events or are due to a common cause, is assessed from the perspective of its viability and it is argued that at present we do not have strictly empirical evidence that could be interpreted as disconfirming the principle. In particular it is not known whether spacelike correlations predicted by quantum field theory can be explained by properly localized common causes, and EPR correlations (...) are known to be unexplainable only by common causes that are required to satisfy conditions that are empirically not tested. (shrink)

Harold Jeffreys' ideas on the interpretation of probability and epistemology are reviewed. It is argued that with regard to the interpretation of probability, Jeffreys embraces a version of logicism that shares some features of the subjectivism of Ramsey and de Finetti. Jeffreys also developed a probabilistic epistemology, characterized by a pragmatical and constructivist attitude towards notions such as ‘objectivity’, ‘reality’ and ‘causality’. 1 Introductory remarks 2 The interpretation of probability 3 Jeffreys' probabilistic epistemology.

One of the first to criticize the verifiability theory of meaning embraced by logical empiricists, Reichenbach ties the significance of scientific statements to their predictive character, which offers the condition for their testability. While identifying prediction as the task of scientific knowledge, Reichenbach assigns induction a pivotal role, and regards the theory of knowledge as a theory of prediction based on induction. Reichenbach’s inductivism is grounded on the frequency notion of probability, of which he prompts a more flexible version than (...) that of Richard von Mises. Unlike von Mises, Reichenbach attempts to account for single case probabilities, and entertains a restricted notion of randomness, more suitable for practical purposes. Moreover, Reichenbach developed a theory of induction, absent from von Mises’s perspective, and argued for the justification of induction. This article outlines the main traits of Reichenbach’s inductivism, with special reference to his book Experience and prediction. (shrink)

This volume sheds new light on the multifarious personality of Bruno de Finetti and his outstanding contributions not only to probability and statistics, but also to economics and philosophy. Rather than focusing on de Finetti's technical work on probability, the essays collected here address the philosophy underpinning all of de Finetti's writings, a view Richard Jeffrey labelled "radical probabilism". Special attention is devoted to de Finetti's ideas on economics, which are inspired by the same philosophical approach, while an effort is (...) made to highlight some lesser known aspects of de Finetti's production. The volume ends with an Appendix on de Finetti's book L'invenzione della verit (The invention of truth), written in 1934 and published in 2006, which contains an extensive presentation of de Finetti's philosophical viewpoint, revolving around the idea that our knowledge is the product of human thought, which in such enterprise is guided by considerations of utility, rather than metaphysical principles. (shrink)

This paper investigates the kind of empiricism combined with an operationalist perspective that, in the first decades of our Century, gave rise to a turning point in theoretical physics and in probability theory. While quantum mechanics was taking shape, the classical (Laplacian) interpretation of probability gave way to two divergent perspectives: frequentism and subjectivism. Frequentism gained wide acceptance among theoretical physicists. Subjectivism, on the other hand, was never held to be a serious candidate for application to physical theories, despite the (...) fact that its philosophical back-ground strongly resembles that underlying quantum mechanics, at least according to the Copenhagen interpretation. The reasons for this are explored. (shrink)

Richard Jeffrey has labelled his philosophy of probability radical probabilism and qualified this position as Bayesian, nonfoundational and anti-rationalist. This paper explores the roots of radical probabilism, to be traced back to the work of Frank P. Ramsey and Bruno de Finetti.

Probability is the subject of considerable attention by Nagel, who devoted to it several writings. In the 1930s, Nagel put forward his “truth frequency” view of probability intended as a variant of the frequency theory minus the flaws to which this latter was susceptible. This paper illustrates how, according to Nagel, the issue of the meaning of probability should be addressed; Nagel’s criticism of the major interpretations of probability advanced in the literature, and the main traits of his “truth-frequency” theory.

Empirismo logico e gli inizi della filosofia della scienza -- Oltre l'empirismo logico -- I modi del ragionamento scientifico -- La probabilità -- La spiegazione scientifica -- Realismo e antirealismo scientifica -- Filosofie delle scienze -- Scienza e valore.

According to a long tradition in philosophy of science, a clear cut distinction can be traced between a context of discovery and a context of justification.

Le premier Congrès pour l’unité de la science (Congrès international de philosophie scientifique) qui s’est tenu à Paris en 1935 comprenait deux sessions, consacrées l’une à l’induction, l’autre aux probabilités. Des représentants éminents du mouvement pour une philosophie scientifique ont présenté des communications dans ces sessions: dans la première sont intervenus Hans Reichenbach, Moritz Schlick et Rudolf Carnap, dans la seconde, Reichenbach, Bruno de Finetti, Zygmunt Zawirski, Schlick et Janina Hosiasson, — dans cet ordre. Les sujets abordés concernaient la nature (...) des lois scientifiques, le problème du sens et le principe de l’empirisme, ainsi que des questions connexes portant sur la confirmation des hypothèses scientifiques. Sur la nature des probabilités, les principales interprétations étaient représentées, à savoir le logicisme, le fréquentisme et le subjectivisme. Fut également examinée la possibilité de construire une logique probabiliste. Ce chapitre passe en revue les différentes contributions présentées dans ces deux sessions, à partir du texte publié dans les actes du Congrès. (shrink)

La transmisión de la filosofía al continente americano puede rastrearse materialmente por medio del examen de las redes comerciales que procuraron la numerosa llegada de libros que alimentaron a las primeras bibliotecas coloniales. En ellas se resguardaron variadas obras filosóficas y humanísticas que fueron fundamentales en la promoción y el desarrollo de la cultura escrita y la educación. Al revisar algunos aspectos centrales del comercio, el control librario y la colección de obras afines en las primeras bibliotecas privadas y religiosas, (...) se pretende reconstruir, al menos en sus rasgos característicos, el devenir de la filosofía en el Nuevo Mundo. The transmission of philosophy to the Americas can be traced through the examination of the commercial networks that provided the first colonial libraries with books. These vast collections contained various philosophical and humanistic works that were a key factor in the promotion and the development of written culture and education. Reviewing some aspects on trading, book inventory and the collection of related works in the first private and religious libraries, the main goal is to reconstruct, at least in its characteristic features, the development of philosophy in the New World. (shrink)

This contribution claims that the two fundamental notions of causation at work in the health sciences are manipulative and mechanistic, and investigates what kinds of evidence matter for the assessment of causal relations. This article is a development of our 2007 article, ‘Plurality of Causality’, where we argue for a pluralistic account of causation with an eye to econometrics and a single medical example. The present contribution has a wider focus, and considers the notion of evidence within a whole range (...) of disciplines belonging to the health sciences. Section 1 addresses the relations between kinds of evidence and causal accounts, and it is shown how different notions of causation can be employed in various medical cases. Section 2 calls attention to issues crucial for any adequate epistemological theory of causation, such as the distinctions between types and tokens, observational and experimental regimes, explanation and prediction. Lastly, the notion of context is articulated, highlighted in its role in the assessment of causal links. All these issues are tackled in the framework of what we label a ‘bottom–up’ epistemology. (shrink)