In this article Grotius’s perception of the legal relevance of consent is analysed with respect to its ongoing importance for an ethical fundament of public international law. It is argued that Grotius views the function of consent as an aspect of human law, which is limited, but also supported by what he views as the overarching framework of divine law. This can be particularly illustrated by Grotius’s idea of a duty of granting consent: such duty reflects the ethical quality of (...) individual interaction within international law. (shrink)

In this article we present and compare two early attempts to establish psychology as an independent scientific discipline that had considerable influence in central Europe: the theories of Johann Friedrich Herbart (1776—1841) and Franz Brentano (1838—1917). While both of them emphasize that psychology ought to be conceived as an empirical science, their conceptions show revealing differences. Herbart starts with metaphysical principles and aims at mathematizing psychology, whereas Brentano rejects all metaphysics and bases his method on a conception of inner perception (...) (as opposed to inner observation) as a secondary consciousness, by means of which one gets to be aware of all of one’s own conscious phenomena. Brentano’s focus on inner perception brings him to deny the claim that there could be unconscious mental phenomena — a view that stands in sharp contrast to Herbart’s emphasis on unconscious, ‘repressed’ presentations as a core element of his mechanics of mind. Herbart, on the other hand, denies any role for psychological experiments, while Brentano encouraged laboratory work, thus paving the road for the more experimental work of his students like Stumpf and Meinong. By briefly tracing the fate of the schools of Herbart and Brentano, respectively, we aim to illustrate their impact on the development of psychological research, mainly in central Europe. (shrink)

Although populism is an ideologically fluid political vehicle, it is not one that is intrinsically anti-business. Indeed, different varieties of populist parties may encourage business activity for utilitarian ends, but with their own ideas on what businesses should be doing. This reality implies that initiatives not related to national greatness or priorities as defined by the populist leadership may be viewed as redundant. Key among such initiatives would be corporate social responsibility (CSR). In a populist environment, it is possible that (...) firms may divert resources away from broad-based CSR under pressure from populist governments. This article explores the relationship between populist governance and CSR with an econometric examination of over a thousand firms in 13 countries under both pro- and anti-business populist governments at varying times from 2012 to 2020. Using dynamic panel data methods, we find strong evidence that firms substitute away significantly from CSR under populism. This effect grows significantly larger under anti-business populists. (shrink)

Professional engineers are under increasing pressure to practice in an environmentally sensitive way. To prepare engineers for this new reality, changes in engineering education are needed. For example, engineering hydrology has traditionally been taught with an emphasis on the interpretation of numerical data bout rainfall and runoff in watersheds. However, to do environmentally sensitive hydrology work, it is necessary to also understand the life forms that share the watershed. In 1997, a project was undertaken in the Department of Civil Engineering (...) at the University of Toronto to enhance an introductory hydrology course by adding information about how hydrological phenomena affect fish. Through carefully structured assignments and exam questions, an assessment was made of the effectiveness of the enhancements in increasing students’ awareness of the life context of hydrology. The project has resulted in a commitment to increased environmental information in the hydrology curriculum, and the implementation of an assessment process for all students, to monitor changes in their environmental knowledge and attitudes. It has also raised questions about ultimate objectives in engineering education. (shrink)

This paper offers a new argument against raising and killing sentient non-human animals for food. It is immoral to non-lethally impair sentient non-human animals for pleasure, and since raising and killing sentient animals for gustatory pleasure impairs them to a much greater degree, it also is wrong. This is because of the impairment principle: if it is immoral to impair an organism to some degree, then, ceteris paribus, it is immoral to impair it to a higher degree. This argument is (...) structurally analogous to Perry Hendricks’s impairment argument for the immorality of abortion. However, the argument is more defensible applied to the raising and killing of sentient nonhuman animals for food because of the sentience of the non-human animals involved. I explain how the argument is distinct from other pro-vegan, pro-vegetarian arguments. (shrink)

Une gemme en agate peu étudiée provenant d’Anapa, datée de la période impériale, présente un grand intérêt, dans la mesure où elle diffère de la plupart des gemmes magiques par sa forme sphérique, sa grande taille et son contenu : elle commence par une référence aux rituels traditionnels grecs d’expulsion et se termine par une liste des parties de la tête humaine semblable à celle que l’on trouve dans un manuel médical hippocratique. La gemme ne serait pas une amulette, comme (...) les éditeurs précédents l’ont supposé, mais plutôt un manuel miniature contenant des instructions pour la fabrication d’amulettes. (shrink)

Thomas Reid often seems distant from other Scottish Enlightenment figures. While Hume, Hutcheson, Kames, and Smith wrestled with the nature of social progress, Reid was busy with natural philosophy and epistemology, stubbornly loyal to traditional religion and ethics, and out of touch with the heart of his own intellectual world. Or was he? I contend that Reid not only engaged the Scottish Enlightenment's concern for improvement, but, as a leading interpreter of Isaac Newton and Francis Bacon, he also developed a (...) scheme to explain the progress of human knowledge. Pulling thoughts from across Reid's corpus, I identify four key features that Reid uses to distinguish mature sciences from prescientific arts and inquiries. Then, I compare and contrast this scheme with that of Thomas Kuhn in order to highlight the plausibility and originality of Reid's work. (shrink)

Theory and practice, reason and revelation, ancients and moderns are the key themes running through the eighteen studies of the literature of political philosophy in Reason's Inquisition. Alfarabi is a pivotal figure, but the range is wide, from Plato and Thucydides to Shakespeare and Hobbes, extending to such contemporary figures as Leo Strauss and Eric Voegelin.

Discussions of monotheism often consider its bigotry toward other gods as a source of conflict, or emphasize its universality as a source of peaceful tolerance. Both approaches, however, ignore the combined danger and liberation in monotheism's 'intolerance.' In this volume, Christopher Haw reframes this important argument. He demonstrates the value of rejecting paradigms of inclusivity in favor of an agonistic pluralism and intolerance of absolutism. Haw proposes a model that retains liberal, pluralistic principles while acknowledging their limitations, and he relates (...) them to theologies latent in political ideas. His volume offers a nuanced, evolutionary, and historical understanding of the biblical tradition's emergence and its political consequences with respect to violence. It suggests how we can mediate impasses between liberal and conservative views in culture wars; between liberal inclusivity and conservative decisionism; and, on the religious front, between apologetics for exclusive monotheism and critiques of its intolerance. (shrink)

In a familiar passage from Plato's Euthyphro, Socrates points to a contrast between "matters of difference that cause hatred and anger," and matters where agreement is reached by seemingly rational means. Where a dispute concerns number, size or weight, we arrive at a decision by counting or measuring. But there are matters of disagreement where such convergence is not to be expected: "the just and the unjust, the beautiful and the ugly, the good and the bad" notorious among them. Socrates's (...) point, in drawing what a modern reader might take to be a contrast between facts and values, is not so easily understood. The Euthyphro passage elicits a concern-call it a concern about "objectivity"-which is often addressed in a characteristically narrow way. How we approach a given concern depends on how we articulate that concern, and this is what I propose to consider here. (shrink)

"Mobile Lifeworlds illustrates how the imaginaries and ideals of Western travellers, especially those of untouched nature and spiritual enlightenment, are consistent with media representations of the Himalayan region, romanticism and modernity at large. Blending tourism and pilgrimage, travel across Nepal, Tibet, Bhutan, and Northern India is often inspired and oriented by a search for authenticity, adventure and Otherness. Such valued ideals are shown, however, to be contested by the very forces and configurations that enable global mobility. The role ubiquitous media (...) and mobile technologies now play in framing travel experiences are explored, revealing a situation in which actors are neither here nor there, but increasingly are 'inter-placed' across planetary landscapes. Beyond institutionalised religious contexts and the visiting of sacred sites, the author shows how a secular religiosity manifests in practical, bodily encounters with foreign environments. This book is unique in that it draws on a dynamic and innovative set of disciplinary and theoretical perspectives, especially phenomenology, the mobilities paradigm and philosophical anthropology. The volume breaks fresh ground in pilgrimage, tourism and travel studies by unfolding the complex relationships between the virtual, imaginary and corporeal dynamics of contemporary mobile lifeworlds"--From publisher's website. (shrink)

The present study examines section five of Poroi and Xenophon’s proposal to restore the reputation of Athens. After outlining his plan for ‘justly’ supplying the dēmos with sufficient sustenance in Poroi 1-4, section 5 addresses the desire to regain hegemony after Athens had lost the Social War. Xenophon does not adopt an anti-imperialist stance; instead he seeks to re-align imperial aspirations with Athenian ideals and earlier paradigms for securing hegemony. Xenophon’s ideas in Poroi are contextualized with consideration for his ‘Socratic’ (...) distinction between tyranny and kingship, as well as his wider advice for ruling well. It is shown that his proposals for securing the consent of the allies reiterates ideas that Xenophon outlines across his corpus, especially Hiero and Cyropaedia. In Poroi Xenophon therefore applies his political thought in an attempt to re-direct Athenian ambitions away from policies that prompted charges of being a ‘tyrant polis’ and towards ‘legitimate rule’. (shrink)

Paul Wood’s edited volume, Thomas Reid and the University, exceeds the bounds of its title. This last instalment of The Edinburgh Edition of Thomas Reid, collects artifacts from Reid’s pedagogical...

The year 2019 witnessed the 20th Jubileum of the Växjö conference series on quantum foundations and probability in physics. This has been the longest running series of conferences on the subject in history. Many old and new friendships were forged at Linnaeus University and the beautiful surrounding lakes of Småland, where once yearly everyone gathers to renew the debate and report their latest progress. 2019 also represents the Porcelain Anniversary—18 years—of the point of view on quantum theory known as QBism. (...) In this regard, the 2001 meeting in the series was pivotal in more ways than one. Not only did it instigate Fuchs’s break [1] from the earlier (Jaynes style) “objective Bayesianism” and neo-Copenhagen thinking of Caves et al. [2], but it was the first meeting at an international scale to indicate that the quantum information revolution might have something genuine to contribute to quantum foundational thought. That meeting set the pace far beyond Växjö by the participation of a number of luminaries of quantum information: The late Asher Peres, Daniel Greenberger, David Mermin, Herbert Bernstein, Carlton Caves, Rüdiger Schack, Richard Jozsa, Benjamin Schumacher, and John Smolin. One could almost hear a battle cry echo from the woods, “Quantum foundations from quantum information or die!” The foundations debate had turned so stale by the time, it would surely die without an influx of new thinking. (shrink)

This unique interpretation of Alfarabi's thought stresses the ways in which the tenth-century Arab philosopher self-consciously broke the metaphysical tradition that began with Plato. By examining Alfarabi's work as more than an extension or continuation of Greek philosophy, Colmo rethinks what medieval philosophy is and challenges almost universal assumptions about the origins of modernity.

I consider the question of how literally one can construe the “gauge argument,” which is the canonical means of understanding the putatively central import of local gauge symmetry principles for fundamental physics. As I argue, the gauge argument must be afforded a heuristic reading. Claims to the effect that the argument reflects a deep “logic of nature” must, for numerous reasons I discuss, be taken with a grain of salt.

The idea that the womb moved freely about a woman's body causing spasmodic disease enjoyed great popularity among the ancient Greeks, beginning in the classical period with Plato and the Hippocratic writers and continuing on into the Roman and Byzantine periods. Armed with sophisticated analyses of the medical tradition and new texts pertaining to the magical, this essay describes how both approaches to the wandering womb develop side by side in mutual influence from the late classical period onwards. Of special (...) interest will be the tendency in both traditions to imagine both demons and errant wombs as wild animals and to use fumigations to control both. It concludes with a discussion of the historical development of and consequences for the idea that women alone possessed an internal organ that was variously interpreted as a mechanically defective body-part, a sentient and passionate animal, and then finally a demon with malicious intent, who bites and poisons the female body. It also argues against the hypothesis or assumption that midwives or wet-nurses were the original source for the idea of the wandering womb, suggesting that the syndrome never fit comfortably into the category of gynecological illness, because the womb was not the site of disease, but rather a cause of spasmodic disease in other areas of the body. (shrink)

The book as a symbol of totality and logocentric order has become a familiar motif in histories of medieval culture. In recent years numerous studies have examined in detail not only how this “idea of the book” and its dependent metaphors rendered all experience “legible,” but also how the tasks of ensuring a correct “reading” devolved upon exegesis and commentary.

Marleen Eijkholt presents a new argument in healthcare ethics, the false hope harms (FHH) argument. In brief, false hope promotes a host of individual harms (e.g., financial, physical, and psychological harms) and system‐level harms (e.g., distrust of medical practitioners, increased complexity of care and the associated costs), all of which provide reason for healthcare providers to stop promoting false hope in medicine. The goal of this paper is to show that the FHH argument is unsuccessful.

As noted in Part 1 of this two-part review, school attendance is an important foundational competency for children and adolescents, and school absenteeism has been linked to myriad short- and long-term negative consequences, even into adulthood. Categorical and dimensional approaches for this population have been developed. This article (Part 2 of a two-part review) discusses compatibilities of categorical and dimensional approaches for school attendance and school absenteeism and how these approaches can inform one another. The article also poses a multidimensional (...) multi-tiered system of supports pyramid model as a mechanism for reconciling these approaches, promoting school attendance (and/or prevention of school absenteeism), establishing early warning systems for nimble response to school attendance problems, assisting with global policy review and dissemination and implementation, and adapting to future changes in education and technology. (shrink)

Religion has become a vital resource for attempts to rethink the meaning of the political. This article rehearses the efforts of two recent figures, René Girard and Giorgio Agamben, to transform the political by renewing its connection to religion. Both thinkers struggle to escape politics as defined by Carl Schmitt's friend/enemy distinction. Girard and Agamben do clash ideologically, but their inquiries into sacrifice and messianism take similar courses. Regarding origins, Girard argues for the sacrificial crisis as the common parent to (...) religion and politics. Conversely, for Agamben, the Roman figure of homo sacer distinguishes politics from religion. With respect to the future, Girard's messianism installs Christian belief as the only way to move beyond violence. By contrast, Agamben steers Pauline messianism toward the efforts to displace sovereignty and reopen the political. I conclude that Agamben breaks with Schmitt while Girard reinscribes his politics at a higher level. Key Words: Giorgio Agamben • Rey Chow • Christianity • René Girard • homo sacer • messianism • politics • sacred • sacrifice • Carl Schmitt. (shrink)

This article explores at least two dominant critiques of assisted dying from a disability rights perspective. In spite of these critiques, I conclude that assisted dying ought to be permissible. I arrive at the conclusion that if we respect and value people with disabilities, we ought to permit assisted dying. I do so in the following manner. First, I examine recent changes in legislation that have occurred since the Royal Society of Canada Expert Panel on End-of-Life Decision-Making report, published in (...) this journal. I suggest that these changes are likely to only strengthen opposition to assisted dying from disability rights activists and people with disabilities. Second, I focus on respect for people with disabilities and in particular, respect for their autonomy and decision-making abilities. Third, I explore the opposition to assisted dying that focuses on risk and the vulnerability of people with disabilities. Here I suggest that this risk ought not to be of special concern. Ultimately, I conclude that upholding respect for the disabled requires the legalization of assisted dying, rather than the denial of access in a misguided effort to protect people with disabilities. (shrink)