Nineteenth-century Lutheran giants C.F.W. Walther and Søren Kierkegaard both stressed over the application of Martin Luther’s doctrine of Law and Gospel. Both viewed Law and Gospel as concepts to be distinguished and as concepts that dialectically belong together. To his Pelagian audience tempted to abuse the Law and abolish the Gospel, Walther stressed the distinction of Law and Gospel. To his Antinomian audience tempted to abuse the Gospel and abolish the Law, Kierkegaard stressed the dialectic of Law and Gospel. Walther (...) and Kierkegaard’s contrasting Law and Gospel emphases are clearly seen in their contrasting accounts of the Rich Young Ruler in the Synoptic Gospels. (shrink)

Kierkegaard and Luther reveals what Kierkegaard lauded, lanced, missed, and misjudged of Luther and spotlights the concord the two actually shared, namely, the negative yet necessary role that Christian suffering (Anfechtung) plays in Christian life.

No topic could be more relevant in these times than tyranny, “the greatest sickness of the soul.” The Charmides of Plato gives us an opportunity to look deeply into the soul or cognitive structure of one of Athens’s most notorious tyrants, Critias, and looks deeply into its dialectical opposite, the soul and cognitive structure of Socrates.

Food regime theory focuses upon the dynamics, and agents, of change in capitalist food and farming systems. Its exponents have been able to identify relatively stable periods of capital accumulation in the agri-food industries, along with the periods of transition. Recently, scholars have argued that—following a first food regime based upon colonial trade in bulk commodities like wheat and sugar, and a second food regime typified by industrial agriculture and manufactured foods—there is an emerging third food regime. This new regime (...) is one that is lead by global corporations that are profiting from the re-organisation of agri-food chains. The delivery of ‘fresh/healthy’ foods is one manifestation; another is the sale, by supermarkets, of ready-meals and other own-brand products. This paper argues that behind the movement to a putative Third Food Regime are changes to the financial system. ‘Financialisation’—the increased influence of finance capital on the agri-food system—not only provides new opportunities for profit-making by hedge funds and private equity consortia, but also creates a situation in which agri-food companies, including food manufacturers, international commodity traders and supermarkets, may benefit. Supermarkets for example, are moving into banking, and are altering their role as they move from being retailers of products, into the provision of capital. Food regime theory needs to consider what lies ‘behind’ the transformation of food and fibre production, to examine not only the role of finance capital in re-shaping relations up and down the agri-food supply chain, but also investigating the tendency for agri-food capitals to seek profits from financial transactions. (shrink)

The analysis of the financialization of food and farming has tended to focus on issues such as the impact on the productive and input sectors of the food chain, including the role of asset management companies, private equity consortia and other financial institutions in acquiring and managing farmland. However, processes of financialization impact along the whole agri-food supply chain, including the retail and food service sectors. This paper analyses the take-over by a private equity company of Somerfield, one of the (...) UK’s leading supermarket chains, and the impact the subsequent restructuring had on the management and organization of the retailer’s operations. In doing so, the paper not only extends the analysis of the effects of financialization on the food system, but also raises questions about the extent to which the supermarkets are the dominant actors in the establishment and management of agri-food supply chains. (shrink)

Self-regulation has become a mantra for both governments and private industry in the neoliberal era. Yet, problems remain in terms of supermarket accountability and control. Governments everywhere appear to be under increasing pressure to move beyond the self-regulatory model by enacting legislation which better monitors and polices supermarket-supplier relations. In most cases, the appointment of an oversight authority—known variously as an ombudsman, watchdog, or adjudicator—with the power to set standards and apply sanctions, and to whom suppliers can appeal in cases (...) of perceived abuse, has been advocated. This paper investigates the role of watchdogs and ombudsmen as potential governance mechanisms for overseeing supermarket-supplier relations and explores, in detail, escalating pressure for their appointment within the UK and Australia over the last 20 years. The pursuit of regulatory frameworks to monitor, and adjudicate on, problems arising out of changing power relationships along agri-food supply chains in these two countries has been met with strong resistance from supermarkets; however, after 20 years of debate, it appears that these governments may be on the path towards legislating for an independent body to handle disputes. This paper critically examines ‘self-regulation’ and concludes that watchdogs and ombudsmen are only a partial solution, at best, to the problems that are arising from the neoliberal settings which govern relations between food suppliers and food retailers. (shrink)

We show how faceted search using a combination of traditional classification systems and mixed-membership topic models can go beyond keyword search to inform resource discovery, hypothesis formulation, and argument extraction for interdisciplinary research. Our test domain is the history and philosophy of scientific work on animal mind and cognition. The methods can be generalized to other research areas and ultimately support a system for semi-automatic identification of argument structures. We provide a case study for the application of the methods to (...) the problem of identifying and extracting arguments about anthropomorphism during a critical period in the development of comparative psychology. We show how a combination of classification systems and mixed-membership models trained over large digital libraries can inform resource discovery in this domain. Through a novel approach of “drill-down” topic modeling—simultaneously reducing both the size of the corpus and the unit of analysis—we are able to reduce a large collection of fulltext volumes to a much smaller set of pages within six focal volumes containing arguments of interest to historians and philosophers of comparative psychology. The volumes identified in this way did not appear among the first ten results of the keyword search in the HathiTrust digital library and the pages bear the kind of “close reading” needed to generate original interpretations that is the heart of scholarly work in the humanities. Zooming back out, we provide a way to place the books onto a map of science originally constructed from very different data and for different purposes. The multilevel approach advances understanding of the intellectual and societal contexts in which writings are interpreted. (shrink)

In their recent paper ‘Why lockdown of the elderly is not ageist and why levelling down equality is wrong’ Savulescu and Cameron attempt to argue the case for subjecting the ‘elderly’ to limits not imposed on other generations. We argue that selective lockdown of the elderly is unnecessary and cruel, as well as discriminatory, and that this group may suffer more than others in similar circumstances. Further, it constitutes an unjustifiable deprivation of liberty.

:Within the literature surrounding nonhuman animals on the one hand and cognitively disabled humans on the other, there is much discussion of where beings that do not satisfy the criteria for personhood fit in our moral deliberations. In the future, we may face a different but related problem: that we might create beings that not only satisfy but exceed these criteria. The question becomes whether these are minimal criteria, or hierarchical, such that those who fulfill them to greater degree should (...) be afforded greater consideration. This article questions the validity and necessity of drawing divisions among beings that satisfy the minimum requirements for personhood; considering how future beings—intelligent androids, synthezoids, even alternate-substrate sentiences—might fit alongside the “baseline” human. I ask whether these alternate beings ought to be considered different to us, and why this may or may not matter in terms of a notion of “human community.” The film Blade Runner, concerned in large part with humanity and its key synthezoid antagonist Roy Batty, forms a framing touchstone for my discussion. Batty is stronger, faster, more resilient, and more intelligent than Homo sapiens. His exploits, far beyond the capability of normal humans, are contrasted with his frailty and transient lifespan, his aesthetic appreciation of the sights he has seen, and his burgeoning empathy. Not for nothing does his creator within the mythos term him “more human than human.”. (shrink)

Dramatic events involving dangerous microbes often focus attention on isolation and quarantine as policy instruments. The incident in May-June 2007 involving Andrew Speaker and drug-resistant tuberculosis joins other communicable disease crises that have forced contemplation or actual application of quarantine powers. Implementation of quarantine powers, which encompasses authority for both isolation and quarantine actions, is important not only for the handling of a specific event but also because the use of such authority provides a window on broader issues of public (...) health and the legal rules, ethical principles, and governance systems that support it. Debates about quarantine powers reflect political and social attitudes about public health that often tell us more about this policy endeavor than acts of isolation and quarantine themselves. (shrink)

This article examines the evolution of bioethics over the past four decades since the publication of John Harris’ seminal work, “The Value of Life” (1985). It argues that while the core principles articulated by Harris remain relevant, bioethics has undergone significant transformation across four key domains. First, the expanding frontiers of biotechnology have necessitated engagement with complex issues beyond individual clinical ethics. Second, there has been a widening of the circle of moral concern to encompass nonhuman animals, disability rights, and (...) global health equity. Third, bioethics has become increasingly entangled with public policy and governance. Finally, the field has seen substantial academic proliferation and institutionalization. These developments have pushed bioethics to adapt its frameworks and methodologies while maintaining fidelity to foundational principles. This article concludes by considering the future challenges and opportunities for bioethics in an increasingly complex technological and social landscape. (shrink)

Aspects of the Pratyabhijñā philosophical theology for monistic Śaivism of the ninth- and tenth-century Kashmiri thinkers Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta are interpreted in relation to their relevance and pre-sumptiveness to contemporary Western thought. It is claimed that the Pratyabhijñā system elucidates important features of our past and present deliberations about the role of interpretation in experience and provides us with a sound way of arguing for the reality of God.

ABSTRACT The article reports on a survey of English primary school head teachers? opinions on disruptive behaviour, coupled with a one?day exercise in the monitoring of disruptive incidents in the same schools. Eighty?five highly experienced head teachers from 38 local education authorities responded to an extensive questionnaire and 77 schools monitored incidents. Schools were categorised by the LEAs as potentially ?difficult?, ?of average difficulty? and ?easy? in respect of intake. Thirty?six Principal Educational Psychologists contributed briefly on a question on age (...) of onset. Findings relate to (a) an examination of the question whether the age of onset of disruptive behaviour is getting earlier, (b) the differing perceptions of questions concerning disruptive behaviour of head teachers, in schools of varying potential difficulty of intake, and (c) the coping strategies used and favoured by head teachers in their work with disruptive behaviour. (shrink)

The purposes and methods of medieval Kashmiri thinkers Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta in creating the Pratyabhijñā philosophical apologetics for monistic Śaivism are examined. These thinkers structure their philosophy with the argumentative standards of Nyāya in the pursuit of universal intelligibility, while at the same time homologizing their discourse to tantric myth and ritual. How the Śaivas implement their project with their theory of recognition is also summarized.

This paper addresses the knowledge required for individuals to evaluate Information and Communications Technologies decisions that relate to the organization and management of cyberspace, and to hold accountable the parties responsible for those decisions, whether the responsible party is a government actor, market actor or private individual. The authors argue that the Open Systems Interconnection model, with certain modifications, should serve as a primary educational tool in helping individuals to gain the understanding of ICT necessary to protect public interests related (...) to cyberspace. (shrink)

We present a rendering of some common grammatical formalisms in terms of evolving algebras. Though our main concern in this paper is on constraint-based formalisms, we also discuss the more basic case of context-free grammars. Our aim throughout is to highlight the use of evolving algebras as a specification tool to obtain grammar formalisms.

In this paper we look at the manual analysis of arguments and how this compares to the current state of automatic argument analysis. These considerations are used to develop a new approach combining a machine learning algorithm to extract propositions from text, with a topic model to determine argument structure. The results of this method are compared to a manual analysis.

Abstract:This article aims to explore the idea that enhancement technologies have been and will continue to be an essential element of what we might call the “human continuum,” and are indeed key to our existence and evolution into persons. Whereas conservative commentators argue that enhancement is likely to cause us to lose our humanity and become something other, it is argued here that the very opposite is true: that enhancement is the core of what and who we are. Using evidence (...) from paleoanthropology to examine the nature of our predecessor species, and their proclivities for tool use, we can see that there is good reason to assume that the development ofHomo sapiensis a direct result of the use of enhancement technologies. A case is also made for broad understandings of the scope of enhancement, based on the significant evolutionary results of acts that are usually dismissed as “unremarkable.” Furthermore, the use of enhancement by modern humans is no different than these prehistoric applications, and is likely to ultimately have similar results. There is no good reason to assume that whatever we may become will not also consider itself human. (shrink)

The original article has been corrected. The Introduction to the special issue Anticolonialism and Solidarity with Others was based upon an incorrect table of contents. This has been corrected.

The Asher’s Bakery case raises questions around discrimination against political causes and freedom of religious conscience. Using the Asher’s case, this essay builds on Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen’s work to develop a theory of discrimination which accounts for discrimination of political causes. The essay explores the normative implications of this account including the rights members of salient political causes, and discusses various objections; in particular, how discrimination claims should be balanced against freedom of religious conscience in a liberal society and how religion’s (...) ‘specialness’ can be defended. By offering a critique of the Asher’s case, the essay aims to provide a framework for dealing with similar cases where claims of discrimination from political groups meet claims of religious discrimination. (shrink)

This article asks whether enhancement can truly lead to something beyond humanity, or whether it is, itself, an inherently human act. The ‘posthuman’ is an uncertain proposition. What, exactly, would one be? Many commentators suggest it to be an endpoint for the use of enhancement technologies, yet few choose to codify the term outright; which frequently leads to unnecessary confusion. Characterizing and contextualizing the term, particularly its more novel uses, is therefore a valuable enterprise. The abuse of the term ‘Human’, (...) especially in the context of the enhancement debate and the myriad meanings ascribed to it, could give ‘posthuman’ very different slants depending on one's assumptions. There are perhaps three main senses in which the term ‘human’ is employed: the biological, the moral, and the self-idealizing. In the first of these, ‘human’ is often conflated with Homo sapiens, and used interchangeably to denote species; in the second, ‘human’ generally refers to a community of beings which qualify as having a certain moral value; and the third, the self-idealizing sense, is more descriptive; a label denoting the qualities that make us who we are as beings, or ‘what matters about those who matter’. So, what might enhancement make us? A novel species or genus of hominid? Or, perhaps, a morally more valuable being than a regular human? Of course, there's a third option: that a posthuman is a being which embodies our self-ideal more successfully than we do ourselves – one ‘more human than human’. Which to choose? (shrink)

How do attempts to foresee the future actually change it? For thousands of years, humans have called upon foresight to shape their own actions in order to adapt and survive; as Charles Darwin revealed in his theory of natural selection, the capacity to do just that is key to the origin of species. The uses of foresight, however, can also be applied to help us further our understanding across a variety of realms in everything from warfare, journalism and music, to (...) ancient civilizations, space weather and science. In a thought-provoking new addition to the Darwin College Lecture Series, eight distinguished authors each present an essay from their area of expertise devoted to the theme of 'foresight'. This provocative read reveals foresight as a process that can be identified across all areas of human endeavour, an art which can not only predict the future, but make it anything but inevitable. (shrink)

The World Health Assembly adopted the new International Health Regulations on May 23, 2005. The new IHR represent the culmination of a decade-long revision process and an historic development for international law and public health. The new IHR appear at a moment when public health, security, and democracy have become intertwined, addressed at the highest levels of government. The United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan, for example, identified IHR revision as a priority for moving humanity toward “larger freedom.” This article analyzes (...) the new IHR and their implications for global health and security in the 21st century.The WHA instructed the WHO Director-General to revise the IHR in 1995 because the Regulations did not provide an effective framework for addressing the international spread of disease. Doubts about the IHR's effectiveness had, however, been present long before 1995. The critiques identified the narrow scope of the regulations, the lack of compliance by states, and the absence of a strategy for responding to rapid changes in public health's global economic and technological environments. (shrink)

We consider the use ofevolving algebra methods of specifying grammars for natural languages. We are especially interested in distributed evolving algebras. We provide the motivation for doing this, and we give a reconstruction of some classic grammar formalisms in directly dynamic terms. Finally, we consider some technical questions arising from the use of direct dynamism in grammar formalisms.

Our paper builds on earlier research to show how Bimal Krishna Matilal and Henry Odera Oruka challenge dominant narratives of the West-centered progress of philosophical and other forms of critical rationality. On the basis of persisting “enlightenment” and colonialist prejudices, a majority of Western philosophers have ignored philosophical inquiry in non-Western cultures. Both philosophical decolonizers had much of their upbringing and education while their countries were British colonies, earned their Ph.D.s in the West, and became renowned philosophers at Oxford and (...) the University of Nairobi. Oruka advocated mainly oral but increasingly written philosophical reflections in various ethnic traditions of Kenya and East Africa, though his ideas have also been applied to other cultures of the continent. Matilal focused on South Asian, Sanskrit philosophical traditions, which though comprising a large written literature are also often oral in their origins and ongoing pedagogical and hermeneutic culture. Beyond just demonstrating that Africans, Indians, and others can think for themselves, the two thinkers have laid the groundwork for, and initiated a number of more substantive philosophical engagements. The perhaps initially slow but exponentially increasing exchanges among non-Western peoples are well exemplified by the dialogs being organized in the present issue, as well as other efforts throughout the global academy. (shrink)