First published in 1956, this volume constitutes an attempt to identify the moral basis of Burke's political thought. Given Burke's stated belief that contingent political systems are held together by an essential basis in moral principles, this can be seen as a problem of fundamental importance in gaining an understanding of his theories. The obvious difficulty of such an exposition consists in attempting to create common ground between abstract concepts and the mutability of the empirically observed world. The author meets (...) this difficulty with an approach based upon the subtle analysis of particular aspects in Burke's moral thought as they interact with the world. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in philosophy, political theory, and the development of the British political system. (shrink)

The writings on Burke which I have found most useful are the following: J. MacCunn, The Political Philosophy of Burke, 1913. CE Vaughan, Studies in the..

Sara Parkin: The Positive Deviant: Sustainability Leadership in a Perverse World Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-2 DOI 10.1007/s10806-011-9319-1 Authors Cornelia Butler Flora, Charles F. Curtiss Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Agriculture and Life Sciences, 317 East Hall, Iowa State University, Ames, IA 50011-1070, USA Journal Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics Online ISSN 1573-322X Print ISSN 1187-7863.

The prolonged neglect of Edmund Burke as a political thinker of the first rank appears to be at last coming to an end. In 1949 Ross Hoffman and Paul Levack broke new ground in their Introduction to the selection of writings and speeches which they published with the title Burke’s Politics. Their Introduction was the first serious attempt at a systematic exposition of the principles, moral and political, which inform the vast and miscellaneous variety of his writings, speeches and correspondence. (...) Now Mr. Charles Parkin explores in depth Burke’s political ideas as the expression of a moral philosophy of man and community. He calls his work an essay. It is a remarkable achievement that anything so brief should hold so much. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article: The Philosophical Assessment of Theology: Essays in Honour of Frederick C. Copleston. Edited by Gerard J. Hughes. Language, Meaning and God: Essays in Honour of Herbert McCabe OP. Edited by Brian Davies. God Matters. By Herbert McCabe. Philosophies of History: A Critical Essay. By Rolf Gruner. The ‘Phaedo’: A Platonic Labyrinth. By Ronna Burger. Lessing's ‘Ugly Ditch’: A Study of Theology and History. By Gordon E. Michalson, Jr. Peirce. By Christopher Hookway. Frege: Tradition and Influence. (...) Edited by Crispin Wright. The Private World. Selections from the Diario Íntimo and Selected Letters 1890–1936. By Miguel de Unamuno, translated by Anthony Kerrigan, Allen Lacy, Martin Nozick. A Third Collection: Papers by Bernard J.F. Lonergan, S.J. Edited by Frederick E. Crowe. Philosophical Papers. By Charles Taylor. 2 vols. Principles of Language and the Mind. By T.P. Waldron. The Principle of Double Effect: A Critical Appraisal of its Traditional Understanding and its Modern Reinterpretation. By L.I. Ugorji. Human Rights: Fact or Fancy By Henry B. Veatch. Enlightenment and Alienation: An Essay towards a Trinitarian Theology. By Colin Gunton. Only Human. By Don Cupitt. The Roots of the Modern Christian Tradition. Edited by E. Rpzanne Elder. ‘Africanische Theologie’: Darstellung und Dialog.. By Heribert Rücker. African Religions in Western Conceptual Schemes. By Emefie Ikenga Metuh. The Destiny of Man: Dagaare Beliefs in Dialogue with Christian Eschatology. By Edward Kuukure. The World in Between: Christian Healing and the Struggle for Spiritual Survival. By E. Milingo. Theology in Africa. By Kwesi A. Dickson. The Future of Anglican Theology. Edited by M. Darrol Bryant. Reconciling. By John Coventry. The Genesis of Faith: The Depth Theology of Abraham Joshua Heschel. By John C. Merkle. Anthropology in Theological Perspective. By Wolfhart Pannenberg. Contemporary Approaches to the Study of Religion. Volume II: The Social Sciences. Edited by Frank Whaling. American Sociology: Worldly Rejections of Religion and Their Directions. By Arthur J. Vidich and Stanford M. Lyman. A Critical Theory of Religion: The Frankfurt School. By Rudolf J. Siebert. The Anthropology of Evil. Edited by David Parkin. The Wealth of Christians. By Redmond Mullin. Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel. By Michael Fishbane. Reading the Old Testament: An Introduction. By Lawrence Boadt. Old Testament Theology: Its History and Development. By John H. Hayes and Frederick C. Prussner. God's Conflict with the Dragon and the Sea: Echoes of a Canaanite Myth in the Old Testament. By John Day. Law and Wisdom from Ben Sira to Paul. By Eckhard J. Schnabel. The Order of the Synoptics: Why Three Synoptic Gospels? By Bernard Orchard and Harold Riley. The Making of Mark. By J. Duncan M. Derrett. Argumentation bei Paulus. By Folker Siegert. Christians and the Military: The Early Experience. Edited by Robert J. Daly. Origienes' Eucharistielehre im Streit der Konfessionen; Die Auslegungsgeschichte seit der Reformation. By Lothar Lies. L'église de Cappadoce au IVe siècle d'après la correspondance de Basile de Césarée. By Benpit Gain Cave Monasteries of Byzantine Cappadocia. By Lyn Rodley. Augustine of Hippo, Selected Writings. Translated with an Introduction by Mary T. Clark. Wisdom from St Augustine. By Vernon J. Bourke. A History of Religious Ideas, Vol. 3: From Muhammad to the Age of Reforms. By Mircea Eliade. Les Lectionnaires Copies Annuels: Basse‐Egypte. By Ugo Zanetti. Humanism and Scholasticism in Late Medieval Germany. By James H. Overfield. Wyclif. By Anthony Kenny. The Lady and the Virgin: Image, Attitude and Experience in Twelfth Century France. By Penny Shine Gold. Unquiet Souls: Fourteenth‐Century Saints and Their Religious Milieu. By Richard Kieckhefer. Luther: Theologian for Catholics and Protestants. Edited by George Yule. La Réforme Catholique: Le Combat de Maldonat. By Paul Schmitt. Roman Catholicism in England: From the Elizabethan Settlement to the Second Vatican Council. By Edward Norman. The Life of David Brainerd. Edited by Norman Pettit. Nineteenth Century Religious Thought in the West. Edited by Ninian Smart, John Clayton, Patrick Sherry and Steven T. Katz The Significance of Jesus Christ in Asia. By Hans Staffner. Is the Virgin Mary Appearing at Medjugorje? By René Laurentin and Ljudevit Rupčić. Mary Queen of Peace: Is the Mother of God Appearing in Medjugorje? By Lucy Rooney and Robert Fancy. (shrink)

"... stimulating and insightful... a thoroughly researched and timely contribution to the secondary literature of ethics... " —Library Journal "His important new work establishes Scott... as one of the foremost interpreters of the Continental philosophical tradition of the US.... Necessary for anyone working in ethics or the Continental tradition." —Choice "... a provocative discourse on the consequences of the ethical in the thought of Nietzsche, Foucault, and Heidegger." —The Journal of Religion Charles E. Scott's challenging book advances the broad (...) claim that ethics as a way of judging and thinking has come into question as philosophers have confronted suffering and conflicts that arise from our traditional systems of value. (shrink)

Patrick Stokes has argued that although many conspiracy theories are true, we should reject the policy of particularism (that is, the policy of investigating conspiracy theories if they are plausible and believing them if that is what the evidence suggests) and should instead adopt a policy of principled skepticism, subjecting conspiracy theories – or at least the kinds of theories that are generally derided as such – to much higher epistemic standards than their non-conspiratorial rivals, and believing them only if (...) they are proven up to the hilt. The reason is that although some conspiracy theories are true (or otherwise epistemically kosher) there is a widespread practice of conspiracy theorizing which leads to the social acceptance of conspiracy theories which (much like Lord Byron) are mad, bad and dangerous to ‘know’, leading to radically false beliefs about the natural and political worlds (for instance to Trump’s claim that Global Warming is a ‘Chinese Hoax’). Thus Stokes is a defender of the epistemic status quo in which the punditocracy routinely dismisses and sneers at ‘conspiracy theories’, simply because they are conspiracy theories, whilst admitting sotto voce that once in a blue moon there are some conspiracy theories that are true. It is just the he would prefer the epistemic policy of the punditocracy to be the policy of the populace at large. Stokes seems to be suggesting that although particularism looks like a sensible epistemic policy (and might indeed be the correct policy in an ideal world), if it were put into practice at the level of public debate it would give a specious air of plausibility to many false and dangerous conspiracy theories with pernicious social effects. I reply that the actual moral costs of conspiracy ‘skepticism’ (as it is currently practiced) exceed the likely costs of particularism, especially if it is informed by some sensible heuristics, ruling out some conspiracy theories as crazy and ruling in others as relatively sane. For the conspiracy ‘skepticism’ as currently practiced is highly selective, pouring scorn and contempt on conspiracy theories which threaten current elites whilst giving the conspiratorial concoctions of those elites something close to a free pass. (shrink)

Charles Crittenden here offers an original solution to one of the traditional dilemmas of philosophy—whether there can be any thing not existing, since to say that some thing does not exist seems to presuppose its existence. Drawing on the tools of Wittgensteinian philosophy and speech act theory, Crittenden argues that we can and often do make reference to unreal objects such as fictional characters, though they do not exist in any sense at all.

Of laws in general -- Of laws directly derived from the nature of government -- Of the principles of the three kinds of government -- That the laws of education ought to be relative to the principles of government -- That the laws given by the legislator ought to be relative to the nature of government -- Consquences of the principles of different governments, with respect to the simplicity of civil and criminal laws, the form of judgements, and inflicting of (...) punishments -- Consquences of the different principles of the three governments, with respect to sumptuary laws, luxury, and the condition of women -- Of the corruption of the principles of the three governments -- Of the laws in the relation they bear to defensive force -- Of laws, in the relation they bear to offensive force. (shrink)

Intercultural Digital Ethics faces the central challenge of how to develop a global IDE that can endorse and defend some set of universal ethical norms, principles, frameworks, etc. alongside sustaining local, culturally variable identities, traditions, practices, norms, and so on. I explicate interpretive pros hen ethical pluralism ) emerging in the late 1990s and into the twenty-first century in response to this general problem and its correlates, including conflicts generated by “computer-mediated colonization” that imposed homogenous values, communication styles, and so (...) on upon “target” peoples and cultures via ICTs as embedding these values in their very design. I contrast different kinds of ethical pluralisms as structural apparatus for understanding what differences may mean and allow for, as these emerged in the 1990s forwards with EP. As interwoven with phronēsis, a form of reflective judgment and virtue, EP more radically preserves irreducible differences and so fosters positive engagements across deep cultural differences. I show how EP emerged in the context of empirical research on “Cultural Attitudes towards Technology and Communication” beginning in 1998, and then in specific applications within Internet Research Ethics beginning in 2000. I summarize its main characteristics and trace how it has further been taken up in ICE, IRE, Intercultural Information Ethics, and virtue ethics more broadly. I respond to important criticisms and objections, arguing that EP thus stands as an important component for a contemporary IDE that seeks an ethical cosmopolitanism in place of computer-mediated colonization. (shrink)

Are they needed? To be sure. The Darwinian industry, industrious though it is, has failed to provide texts of more than a handful of Darwin's books. If you want to know what Darwin said about barnacles (still an essential reference to cirripedists, apart from any historical importance) you are forced to search shelves, or wait while someone does it for you; some have been in print for a century; various reprints have appeared and since vanished." -Eric Korn,Times Literary Supplement (...) class='Hi'>Charles Robert Darwin (1880-1882) has been widely recognized since his own time as one of the most influential writers in the history of Western thought. His books were widely read by specialists and the general public, and his influence had been extended by almost continuous public debate over the last 130 years. New York University Press' edition makes it possible for the first time to review Darwin's public literary output as a whole, plus his scientific journal articles, his private notebooks, and his correspondence. This is the first complete edition containing all of Darwin's published books, featuring definitive texts recording original paginations with Darwin's indexes retained. All illustrations and plates are presented, inclucing 82 color plates of birds and mammals and several folding maps and plates. The set also features a general introduction and index, and textural introductions in each volume. (shrink)

This article defends the thesis that in theorizing about the mind we need to accord first-person (“introspective” or “reflective”) judgments about experience a “selective provisional trust.” Such an approach can form part of a descriptive psychology. It is here so employed to evaluate some influential interpretations of research on attention to conclude that—despite what conventional wisdom suggests—an “introspection-positive” policy actually offers us a better critical perspective than its contrary. What supposedly teaches us the worthlessness of introspection actually shows us why (...) we need to take it seriously. (shrink)

Numbers are symbols manipulated in accord with the axioms of arithmetic. They sometimes represent discrete and continuous quantities, but they are often simply names. Brains, including insect brains, represent the rational numbers with a fixed-point data type, consisting of a significand and an exponent, thereby conveying both magnitude and precision.

Philosophy confronts two existential crises: the threats to its existence from scientists like Stephen Hawking who claim that philosophy is dead; and the threat to life itself from catastrophic climate change. The essay’s first theoretical part critiques Nietzsche’s claim that philosophy’s primary function is to guarantee the future of life. The essay’s second practical part claims that philosophy must meet the challenge of life’s extinction through a revised model for ethics in education. Taking its start from recent conceptualizations of philosophy (...) as a ‘field discipline,’ this part considers African American models for delivering ethics in education to under-resourced communities. The third part shows how these theoretical models may be actualized in the practice of an African field philosopher. (shrink)

Population ethics contains several principles that avoid the repugnant conclusion. These rules rank all possible alternatives, leaving no room for moral ambiguity. Building on a suggestion of Parfit, this paper characterizes principles that provide incomplete but ethically attractive rankings of alternatives with different population sizes. All of them rank same-number alternatives with generalized utilitarianism.

​Rosamond Rhodes contends, by reference to seven examples, that medical ethics is distinctly different from non-medical ethics. Each of those examples, on proper examination, illustrates precisely the opposite contention. It is clear not only that medical ethics relies on the same principles as non-medical (and indeed non-professional) ethics, but that it should so rely. A distinctively medical ethics would be dangerous: it would divorce ethical medical decision-making from the patients whom medicine exists to serve.

ABSTRACT Thaddeus Metz is probably the leading expert on the meaning of life. His latest book admirably displays his intellectual agility and fairness: arguments, counter-arguments, examples and counter-examples come in wave after wave that may compel most of us to slow down the pace of reading. If you have ever had the delight of interacting with Professor Metz at a conference, you know his irrepressible energy and love for debate. In this brief essay, I challenge some of Metz’s terminology, raise (...) a worry about the role of metaphysics in the meaning of life literature, suggest a reply to the religious relational account of meaning, and firm up the intuition that meaning is enhanced in a theistic cosmos. (shrink)

Charles Baudouin was a French psychoanalyst. Born in Nancy, a town that played a significant role in the history of psychoanalysis, he was a contemporary of Freud, Jung and Adler. After receiving his degree in philosophy, he moved to Geneva where his early work and first book focused on suggestion and hypnosis, later becoming interested in literature and the relation between psychoanalysis and education. Largely forgotten, Charles Baudouin' s work warrants greater attention from both psychoanalysts and historians alike. (...) He was a prolific... (shrink)

BackgroundEarly in the COVID-19 pandemic, the urgent need to discover effective therapies for COVID-19 prompted questions about the ethical problem of randomization along with its widely accepted solution: equipoise. In this scoping review, uses of equipoise in discussions of randomized controlled trials of COVID-19 therapies are evaluated to answer three questions. First, how has equipoise been applied to COVID-19 research? Second, has equipoise been employed accurately? And third, do concerns about equipoise pose a barrier to the ethical conduct of COVID-19 (...) RCTs?MethodsGoogle Scholar and Pubmed were searched for articles containing substantial discussion about equipoise and COVID-19 RCTs. 347 article titles were screened, 91 full text articles were assessed, and 48 articles were included. Uses of equipoise were analyzed and abstracted into seven categories.Results and discussionApproximately two-thirds of articles used equipoise in a way that is consistent with the concept. They invoked equipoise to support RCTs of specific therapies, RCTs in general, and the early termination of RCTs after achieving the primary outcome. Approximately one-third of articles used equipoise in a manner that is inconsistent with the concept. These articles argued that physician preference, widespread use of unproven therapies, patient preference, or expectation of therapeutic benefit may undermine equipoise and render RCTs unethical. In each case, the purported ethical problem can be resolved by correcting the use of equipoise.ConclusionsOur findings highlight the continued relevance of equipoise as it supports the conduct of well-conceived RCTs and provides moral guidance to physicians and researchers as they search for effective therapies for COVID-19. (shrink)

Seneca’s Letters sketch a theory of attentive action according to which distraction is caused by inconsistent beliefs about values, such that the degree of an agent’s attention to an endorsed action is proportionate to the consistency of her beliefs about value, i. e. her proximity to virtue. The agent’s activity of attentive action is co-ordinated with a state of alertness to her interests, which accordingly triggers switches in attention that sustain the endorsed action in single-minded agents or cause distraction if (...) the new interest is irrelevant to it. Seneca’s theory reflects the older Stoic conception of the tensional mental strength of the virtuous agent, which Chrysippus identified as the causal factor over and above virtue that ensures her successful performance of right action. (shrink)

Hervaeus Natalis distinguishes two types of items that can have esse obiective in the intellect: objects of acts of intellection (man, this cat, etc.) and properties unapprehended by these acts, or background properties (being a species, being a particular, etc.), that are beings of reason. Yet, his conception of the esse obiective of objects evolved. First, he had a neutral conception of esse obiective: items presenting themselves to the intellect are cognized, transparently, without being altered in the process. Later, he (...) developed an ontologically committing conception of the objective being of objects: items presenting themselves to the intellect take on rational being (esse rationis) as such. This evolution transpires because Hervaeus introduces intentional relations as what makes the cognized item be objectively in the intellect and includes them within the class of background properties (being of reason). Both these conceptions manage to account for our access to extra-mental things. -/- . (shrink)

The psycho-social day-to-day experience of COVID-19 pandemic has shone some light on the wider scope of health vulnerability and has correspondingly enlarged the ethical debate surrounding the social implications of health and healthcare. This emerging paradigm is neither a single-handed problem of biomedical scientists nor of social analysts. It instead needs a strategically oriented collaborative and interdisciplinary preventive effort. To that effect, this article presents some socio-ethical reflections underscoring the judicious use of the insight from care ethics as an asset (...) in minimizing the possible propagation of the COVID-19 virus and the escalation of its vulnerability in the day-to-day human interaction. It further emphasizes that if this insight is overlooked, the effects of the diverse facets of the “shadow pandemics” of COVID-19—fallouts on both the affected and the infected—may equally be deadly. (shrink)

Little is known about how ethical organizational contexts influence employees’ perceived stress levels and well-being. This study used two theoretical lenses, ethical impact theory (Promislo et al. in Handbook of Unethical Work Behavior, M.E. Sharpe, Armonk, 2013) and ethical decision-making theory (Schwartz in J Bus Ethics 139(4): 755–776, 2016), to investigate the relationships among perceived organizational ethics (comprised of ethical climate, leader/manager ethics, and corporate social responsibility), work-related stress, and employee well-being (comprised of vitality, life satisfaction, personal growth initiative, flourishing, (...) positive mental health, and self-actualization). Findings across two studies indicated that organizational ethics was negatively related to work-related stress, and that work-related stress was negatively related to employee well-being. Perceived organizational ethics is positively related to employee well-being, with post hoc mediation tests indicating that work-related stress partially mediates this relationship. Our findings suggest that organizations should be proactive in improving their ethical climate, such as choosing ethical leaders, developing a robust and well-communicated code of ethics, and actively practicing CSR. These measures should reduce excessive work-related stress and improve employee well-being. (shrink)

Yang returns to the problem of referential ambiguity, addressed in the opening paper by Gleitman and Trueswell. Using a computational approach, he argues that “big data” approaches to resolving referential ambiguity are destined to fail, because of the inevitable computational explosion needed to keep track of contextual associations present when a word is uttered. Yang tests several computational models, two of which depend on one‐trial learning, as described in Gleitman and Trueswell’s paper. He concludes that such models outperform cross‐situational learning (...) models, thereby formalizing, reinforcing, and advancing the conclusions offered by Gleitman and Trueswell. (shrink)

In interviews, it may happen that a respondent gives an answer which seems well formatted, but is not receipted as acceptable by the interviewer. In this article I examine one way in which interviewers display their diagnosis of the problem and act to bring about its solution. In the cases I describe, the interviewers defer revision of the question until they have established a new, more personalized basis for it, informed by their knowledge of the respondents' circumstances. There are three (...) things of interest. The first is how this actually works conversationally; it seems to be structured as an insertion sequence and played out by presequential turns which are highly projective of the respondent's agreement. The second is that the scenario that the interviewer inserts is a positive example of what would have been an answer to the `failed' original question. The third is that there is a difference between the original, general question and its subsequent, specific revision. I argue that all these features manifest interviewers' solution of their dilemma in choosing between literal and sensitive questioning. (shrink)

First Published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Foucault’s invitation to the subject is to become free of themselves by learning to think differently. Such a project has as its goal the mastery of the self, and can be understood as a Foucaultian ‘politics of ourselves’. Foucault’s ethical turn is an invitation for subjectivity to undertake its own radical education. Whilst this invitation has characteristics unique to Foucault’s philosophical discipline, I argue that it sheds light upon a diversity of practices of subjectivity from the psychotherapeutic and mystic traditions. (...) By seeing these currently available technologies of self in the Foucaultian lens we are given the opportunity to appreciate their work on subjectivity as necessarily political and social, a radical education not limited to the realm of individualistic aspiration and narcissistic temptations. The paper concludes by drawing attention to some implications for education, and for a teacher education that embraces the ‘radical reflexivity’ of some psycho-spiritual practices. (shrink)