We establish a probabilized version of modus tollens, deriving from p(E|H)=a and p()=b the best possible bounds on p(). In particular, we show that p() 1 as a, b 1, and also as a, b 0. Introduction Probabilities of conditionals Conditional probabilities 3.1 Adams' thesis 3.2 Modus ponens for conditional probabilities 3.3 Modus tollens for conditional probabilities.

Spatial asymmetries are an intriguing feature of directed attention. Recent observations indicate an influence of temperament upon the direction of these asymmetries. It is unknown whether this influence generalises to visual orienting behaviour. The aim of the current study was therefore to explore the relationship between temperament and measures of spatial orienting as a function of target hemifield. An exogenous cueing task was administered to 92 healthy participants. Temperament was assessed using Carver and White's (1994) Behavioural Inhibition System and Behavioural (...) Activation System (BIS/BAS) scales. Individuals with high sensitivity to punishment and low sensitivity to reward showed a leftward asymmetry of directed attention when there was no informative spatial cue provided. This asymmetry was not present when targets were preceded by spatial cues that were either valid or invalid. The findings support the notion that individual variations in temperament influence spatial asymmetries in visual orienting, but only when lateral targets are preceded by a non-directional (neutral) cue. The results are discussed in terms of hemispheric asymmetries and dopamine activity. (shrink)

Jeffrey has devised a probability revision method that increases the probability of hypothesis H when it is discovered that H implies previously known evidence E. A natural extension of Jeffrey's method likewise increases the probability of H when E has been established with sufficiently high probability and it is then discovered, quite apart from this, that H confers sufficiently higher probability on E than does its logical negation H̄.

Evidentiary propositions E 1 and E 2, each p-positively relevant to some hypothesis H, are mutually corroborating if p > p, i = 1, 2. Failures of such mutual corroboration are instances of what may be called the corroboration paradox. This paper assesses two rather different analyses of the corroboration paradox due, respectively, to John Pollock and Jonathan Cohen. Pollock invokes a particular embodiment of the principle of insufficient reason to argue that instances of the corroboration paradox are of negligible (...) probability, and that it is therefore defeasibly reasonable to assume that items of evidence positively relevant to some hypothesis are mutually corroborating. Taking a different approach, Cohen seeks to identify supplementary conditions that are sufficient to ensure that such items of evidence will be mutually corroborating, and claims to have identified conditions which account for most cases of mutual corroboration. Combining a proposed common framework for the general study of paradoxes of positive relevance with a simulation experiment, we conclude that neither Pollock’s nor Cohen’s claims stand up to detailed scrutiny. I am quite prepared to be told…”oh, that is an extreme case: it could never really happen!” Now I have observed that this answer is always given instantly, with perfect confidence, and without any examination of the proposed case. It must therefore rest on some general principle: the mental process being something like this—“I have formed a theory. This case contradicts my theory. Therefore, this is an extreme case, and would never occur in practice.”Rev. Charles L. Dodgson. (shrink)

This introduction to the Common Knowledge symposium titled “Comparative Relativism” outlines a variety of intellectual contexts where placing the unlikely companion terms comparison and relativism in conjunction offers analytical purchase. If comparison, in the most general sense, involves the investigation of discrete contexts in order to elucidate their similarities and differences, then relativism, as a tendency, stance, or working method, usually involves the assumption that contexts exhibit, or may exhibit, radically different, incomparable, or incommensurable traits. Comparative studies are required to (...) treat their objects as alike, at least in some crucial respects; relativism indicates the limits of this practice. Jensen argues that this seeming paradox is productive, as he moves across contexts, from Lévi-Strauss's analysis of comparison as an anthropological method to Peter Galison's history of physics, and on to the anthropological, philosophical, and historical examples offered in symposium contributions by Barbara Herrnstein Smith, Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, Marilyn Strathern, and Isabelle Stengers. Comparative relativism is understood by some to imply that relativism comes in various kinds and that these have multiple uses, functions, and effects, varying widely in different personal, historical, and institutional contexts that can be compared and contrasted. Comparative relativism is taken by others to encourage a “comparison of comparisons,” in order to relativize what different peoples—say, Western academics and Amerindian shamans—compare things “for.” Jensen concludes that what is compared and relativized in this symposium are the methods of comparison and relativization themselves. He ventures that the contributors all hope that treating these terms in juxtaposition may allow for new configurations of inquiry. (shrink)

Prior generations’ electoral crises (e.g., gerrymandering) have dealt mainly with political maneuverings around geographical shifts. We analyze four recent (1998–2003) American electoral crises: the Clinton impeachment controversy, the 2000 Florida presidential election, the Texas legislators’ flight to Oklahoma and New Mexico, and the California gubernatorial recall. We show that in each case temporal manipulation was at least as important as geographical. We highlight emergent electoral practices surrounding the manipulation of time, which we dub “temporal gerrymandering.” We suggest a theory of (...) postmodern electoral crises, in which the rules of time and space are simultaneously in flux. These crises expose concerns with early American democratic theory, which was based on an understanding of “the people” as geographically and temporally unidimensional. Representative systems, therefore, were designed largely without reference to geographic and temporal complexity. (shrink)

Barion, J. Was es heisst, ein Philosoph zu sein.--Flach, W. Die Objektivität der Erkenntnis.--Schmidt, G. Die Transzendentalität des Seingedankens.--Winterhager, E. Das Sich-Haben des Subjekts.--Hartmann, K. Analytische und kategoriale Transzendentalphilosophie.--Marx, W. Systemidee und die Problematik ihrer Begründung.--Röd, W. Transzendentalphilosophie und deskriptive Philosophie als wissenschaftliche Theorien.--Vuillemin, J. Caractères et fonctions des signes.--Ritzel, W. Zur Theorie praktischer Wissenschaft.--Hufnagel, E. Relationen--zum Streit um die pädagogische Anthropologie.--Derbolav, J. Politik und Moral.--Wolandt, G. Standpunkte der Kunstphilosophie.

The aim of this paper is to show that doxastic compatibilists are making a strong case for genuine doxastic freedom when modelled on compatibilist free will. Unfortunately, their arguments from analogy can be used for the introduction of rather odd forms of freedom that concern our emotions, e.g. “freedom of fear” and “freedom of anger”. The author argues that this problem of overgeneralisation also concerns free will compatibilists who originally provided the weak conditions that are used by doxastic compatibilists. She (...) points out the possibilities and costs of avoiding these consequences and concludes that the standard compatibilist picture is not tenable. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Platonopolis: Platonic Political Philosophy in Late AntiquityMichael F. WagnerDominic J. O'Meara. Platonopolis: Platonic Political Philosophy in Late Antiquity. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2003. Pp. xi + 249. Cloth, $55.00.Porphyry tells of Plotinus's failed petition to emperor Gallienus to (re)establish a "city of philosophers" conformed to Plato's laws, named Platonopolis (Vit. Plo.12). O'Meara here articulates primary themes and developments in philosophical political thought in the classical Neoplatonic period, from Plotinus's (...) day in the mid-third century into the sixth century. Concurrently, he addresses head on "the conventional view that the Platonist philosophers of Late Antiquity had no political philosophy" (3). This view exemplifies the more general perspective that the Neoplatonists were simply disinterested in this-worldly affairs in lieu of "an immaterial world... our true 'homeland,' where we can at last attain the good we desire" (3). Consequently, O'Meara provides both a unique study of an important [End Page 205] topic and a compelling case for a more complete, balanced understanding of Neoplatonic other-worldly-ness. O'Meara's study covers key figures from four main groups of (neo)Platonists: Plotinus and his students; the schools in Syria and Asia Minor inspired by Iamblichus; the Athenian school (Plutarch, Proclus, Damascius et al.); and the Alexandrian school (Hyapatia, Philoponus, Olympiodorus et al.). He organizes his investigation (chapters) into three Parts.The pivotal concept in O'Meara's two-pronged endeavor is divinization - "assimilation and unification, as far as possible, to god" (31, Proclus) - a concept whose meaning for classical Neoplatonists ranges from "becoming a god" to "imitating some form of divine life, in one way or another" (31). Part I focuses on the Neoplatonists' shared association of a human soul's divinization with virtue-osity [my jargon], beginning with Plotinus's distinction between political virtue(s) and purification—or purificatory virtue(s). O'Meara emphasizes the relevance of the resulting "scale of virtues" to a life of continued activity—for example explicating Plotinus's denial that a "purified" soul is somehow exempt from the rightness-of-acting expected of the politically virtuous soul: rather, "reaching higher principles and different measures he will act [directly, immediately] according to these" (43, En. I,2,7).Another organizing theme as O'Meara's investigations proceed beyond Plotinus is the significance of the increasing complexities of particular Neoplatonic metaphysical systems, and so also of their moral systems - e.g. their "scales of virtue." Part I also articulates related attempts (beginning with Porphyry and Iamblichus) to articulate programs of moral and philosophical study - i.e. a related "scale of sciences." Of special note here are proposals by some Neoplatonists to divide the "practical sciences" associated on this scale with political virtuousness into legislative science(s) and judicial science (56). Implicit in the Neoplatonic scale(s) of virtue(s) was the thesis that as one progresses towards divinization "lower" virtue-osity is not transcended in the sense of lost or dismissed but rather it is included or incorporated into a higher form. Arguably, "lower" sciences are likewise not merely aids or stepping-stones towards something "higher," but genuine topoi of study and knowledge in their own right.Part II is the true heart of O'Meara's outstanding scholarly and philosophical inquiry. Here is where he fulfills his intent to discern a substantive tradition of political philosophy and to articulate its key themes and concepts. Though he associates this part of his investigation with Plato's conceit of the philosopher's return to the cave, he immediately parses this "descent" as a "divinization of political life through philosophy" (71). He articulates various Neoplatonists' approaches to questions inspired by Plato's cave allegory—e.g. Is the philosopher socially obligated to "return"? Could s/he then still be happy? (His investigation here does seem to overlook Neoplatonic conceptions of choice, volition, or will as these might pertain to such questions.) O'Meara recognizes, however, that the more fundamental link between Neoplatonic metaphysics and Neoplatonic ethical-political thought derives from Plotinus's conception "of fecundity, of an [overflowing] abundance" (74) in his highest One, and so in a soul assimilated to It. In Proclus's formulation: "that which... (shrink)

Frege believes (1) that his definition of number is (partly) arbitrary; (2) that it "makes" numbers of certain extensions; (3) that without such a definition we cannot even think or understand arithmetical propositions. this position is part of a view according to which mathematics in general involves the free construction of objects, their properties, and the very contents of mathematical propositions. frege tries to avoid excess subjectivism by the kantian device of treating alternative systems of arithmetic (e.g.) as different appearances (...) of a single realm of unstructured truths. (shrink)

The “scarred villain” trope, where facial differences like scars signify moral corruption, is ubiquitous in film (e.g., Batman’s The Joker). Strides by advocacy groups to undermine the trope, however, suggest cinematic representations of facial differences could be improving with time. This preregistered study characterized facial differences in film across cultures (US vs. India) and time (US: 1980-2019, India: 2000-2019). Top-grossing films by country and decade were screened for characters with facial differences. We found that the scarred villain trope has actually (...) worsened with time, although in tandem with progress in also representing non-villainous characters with facial anomalies. Country of origin did not predict the presence of facial differences in villains or heroes. “Action” and “fantasy” movies were the most likely genres to depict villains with facial differences. Finally, villains’ facial differences crossed more facial subunits and were more likely to involve lips, chin, and mandible than when present in heroes. Our findings underscore the need for critical reflection on the role of cultural practices—even when seemingly innocuous—in shaping and maintaining negative biases against already stigmatized groups. (shrink)

The introduction and elimination rules for material implication in natural deduction are not complete with respect to the implicational fragment of classical logic. A natural way to complete the system is through the addition of a new natural deduction rule corresponding to Peirce's formula → A) → A). E. Zimmermann [6] has shown how to extend Prawitz' normalization strategy to Peirce's rule: applications of Peirce's rule can be restricted to atomic conclusions. The aim of the present paper is to extend (...) Seldin's normalization strategy to Peirce's rule by showing that every derivation Π in the implicational fragment can be transformed into a derivation Π' such that no application of Peirce's rule in Π' occurs above applications of →-introduction and →-elimination. As a corollary of Seldin's normalization strategy we obtain a form of Glivenko's theorem for the classical {→}-fragment. (shrink)

Romance sui generis, sua estrutura narrativa se tece a partir de contos interconectados, sempre eivados de paixões intensas a ponto de pôr em cheque não só os limites entre fantasia e fato, como também a própria noção de realidade. Sua densa trama psicológica, exuberantemente simbólica, toca aspectos profundos da existência humana. Seu título é uma referência à menção de G.W. Hegel à 'Coruja de Minerva', em que afirma que apenas quando as civilizações aproximam-se de sua decadência final, de sua derradeira (...) agonia, pode a Filosofia expressar algo de substancial conteíudo acerca de sua história, pois tais verdades mais profundas a respeito só poderiam ser capturadas ao saírem de cena ao sobrevir do "crepúsculo", ou seja, apenas em retrospecto. Portanto, a reflexão dos filósofos abordaria a história humana de maneira análoga ao olhar da coruja de caça ao sobrevoar os campos ao cair da noite. Estaria uma última 'Coruja de Minerva' já pairando sobre a humanidade neste século 21, tão obscurecido por temores e sinais apocalípticos? (shrink)

This article presents the complicated ethical dilemmas that arise in the procedures and proceedings of the Nursing Disciplinary Committee, which deals with matters of life and death (e.g. patients' rights to quality. and safe care, professional integrity and account ability, and the nurse's future). The article also describes the composition and function of the Committee, the type of case it deliberates, its limitations, and the dilemmas its members may encounter.

The article suggests that in a modern context, where value pluralism is a prevailing and possibly, even ethically desirable interaction condition, institutional economics provides a more viable business ethics than behavioural business ethics, such as Kantianism or religious ethics. The article explains how the institutional economic approach to business ethics analyses morality with regard to an interaction process, and favours non-behavioural, situational intervention with incentive structures and with capital exchange. The article argues that this approach may have to be prioritised (...) over behavioural business ethics, which tends to analyse morality at the level of the individual and favours behavioural intervention with the individual’s value, norm and belief system, e.g. through ethical pedagogy, communicative techniques, etc. Quaker ethics is taken as an example of behavioural ethics. The article concludes that through the conceptual grounding of behavioural ethics in the economic approach, theoretical and practical limitations of behavioural ethics, as encountered in a modern context, can be relaxed. Probably only then can behavioural ethics still contribute to raising moral standards in interactions amongst the members (stakeholders) of a single firm, and equally, amongst (the stakeholders of) different firms. (shrink)

Standard views of personal identity over time often hover uneasily between the subjective, first-person dimension (e. g. psychological continuity), and the objective, third-person dimension (e. g. biological continuity) of a person’s life. Since both dimensions capture something integral to personal identity, we show that neither can successfully be discarded in favor of the other. The apparent need to reconcile subjectivity and objectivity, however, presents standard views with problems both in seeking an ontological footing of, as well as epistemic evidence for, (...) personal identity. We contend that a fresh look at neutral monism offers a novel way to tackle these problems; counting on the most fundamental building blocks of reality to be ontologically neutral with regards to subjectivity and objectivity of personal identity. If the basic units of reality are, in fact, ontologically neutral – but can give rise to mental as well as physical events – these basic units of reality might account for both subjectivity and objectivity in personal identity. If this were true, it would turn out that subjectivity and objectivity are not conflictive dimensions of personal identity but rather two sides of the same coin. (shrink)

Gyenis and Rédei (G&R) have shown that any prior _p_ on a finite algebra _A_, however chosen, significantly restricts the set of posteriors derivable from _p_ by Jeffrey conditioning (JC) on a nontrivial measurable partition (i.e., a partition consisting of members of _A_, at least one of which is not an atom of _A_). They support this claim by proving that the set of potential posteriors _not derivable_ from _p_ in this way, which they call the _Bayes blind spot of (...) p_, is large, having cardinality _c_ and normalized Lebesgue measure 1, as well as being of second Baire category for a natural metrizable topology. In the present paper, we establish results analogous to those of G&R for probability measures on any infinite sigma algebra of subsets of a countably infinite set (which requires distinctly different treatments of the topological and measure-theoretic cases). We also show, in both the finite and infinite cases, that all of the limitative results for a single prior _p_ continue to hold for the intersection of the Bayes blind spots of countably many priors. This leads us to reject the claim of G&R that the large size of blind spots in the single prior case is attributable to the limitations imposed by priors. We argue instead that it is the so-called _rigidity property_ of JC that accounts for the large size of Bayes blind spots. G&R also prove that _any_ potential posterior _q_ can be derived from a prior _p_ by at most two applications of JC on nontrivial partitions. But they remark that their particular two-stage derivation of an \(r \in BS(p)\) from _p_ is barely distinguishable from a single, complete reassessment on a trivial partition. We show, however, that there are two-stage derivations of _r_ from _p_ that require no direct assessment of the probability of any atom at either stage. Finally, in order to situate the aforementioned limitative results in the proper context, we demonstrate that a probability revision that would amount to complete reassessment within a Jeffrey evidentiary framework may arise, in a different evidentiary framework, in a way that involves no direct assessment of the probability of any atom, as, for example, in a generalization of Jeffrey’s solution to the problem of old evidence and new explanation. (shrink)

We propose an analogy between optical holography and neural behavior as a hypothesis about the physical mechanisms of neural reuse. Specifically, parameters in optical holography (frequency, amplitude, and phase of the reference beam) may provide useful analogues for understanding the role of different parameters in determining the behavior of neurons (e.g., frequency, amplitude, and phase of spiking behavior).

Hans Wagner (1917–2000), using the achievements of German transcendental philosophy, gives a transcendental argument for the idea of human dignity. He claims that to ground the validity of human thinking and all its products (e.g. culture), we must accept the validity of the idea of human dignity. The structure of my paper is as follows: First, I consider what it means to give a transcendental justification of something. I reconstruct the neo-Kantian’s understanding of transcendental method. Then I argue that (...) Wagner’s idea of human dignity as a foundation of every ethics and law is nothing other than a fruitful interpretation and continuation, perhaps only making explicit Kant’s main ethical ideas. To make this more clear I present the relation between Kant’s ethics and the material ethics of values and, following Wagner, I argue that grounding ethics on the idea of self-determination of human will does not necessarily lead to formalism in the form in which it was criticised by the representatives of the material ethics of values. Finally, I reconstruct Wagner’s argument for the claim that the idea of human dignity is a transcendental condition for the possibility of ethics and law in general. (shrink)

In this paper I shall venture into an area with which I am not very familiar and in which I feel far from confident; namely into phenomenology. My main motive is not to get away from standard, boring, methodological questions like those of induction and demarcation; but the conviction that a phenomenological account of the empirical basis forms a necessary complement to Popper's falsificationism. According to the latter, a scientific theory is a synthetic and universal, hence unverifiable proposition. In fact, (...) in order to be technologically useful, a scientific hypothesis must refer to future states-of-affairs; it ought therefore to remain unverified. But in order to be empirical, a theory must bear some kind of relation to factual statements. According to Popper, such a relation can only be one of potential conflict. Thus a theory T will be termed scientific if and only if T is logically incompatible with a so-called basic statement b, where b is both empirically verifiable and empirically falsifiable. In other words: T is scientific if it entails ¬b; where b, hence also ¬b, is an empirically decidable proposition. (shrink)

In this thesis I argue for the following theory: constitutive Russellian phenomenal bonding panpsychism. To do so I do three main things: 1) I argue for Russellian panpsychism. 2) I argue for phenomenal bonding panpsychism. 3) I defend the resultant phenomenal bonding panpsychist model. The importance of arguing for such a theory is that if it can be made to be viable, then it is proposed to be the most promising theory of the place of consciousness within nature. This is (...) because constitutive Russellian panpsychism has all the theoretical virtues of physicalism and dualism but does not face the problems they do. The combination problem, however, is the most significant problem for the Russellian panpsychist, and, hence, in order to show the viability of the theory I address this problem. Moreover, I present a novel ”mereological argument’ for panpsychism which makes it necessary that the Russellian panpsychist addresses the combination problem. The focus of this thesis is therefore addressing this problem. I argue that the combination problem can indeed be solved. To do so I argue for the phenomenal bonding solution proposed by Goff. I argue that this solution works and that we can form a positive concept of the phenomenal bonding relation. This forces the panpsychist to make sense of how experiencing subjects can be proper parts of other experiencing subjects. I then argue that this can indeed be made sense of and show that we can indeed be composite subjects made of other subjects. To show that we can be subjects made up of other subjects I defend this proposal from various objections from throughout the literature. All these objections can be responded to by the constitutive Russellian phenomenal bonding panpsychist. Ultimately this leaves us with a novel and interesting account of what conscious subjects are, and what the material world is: they are both composite entities made wholly of conscious matter. (shrink)

This article presents evidence supporting the claim that ethical reasoning is a skill that can be taught and assessed. We propose a working definition of ethical reasoning as 1) the ability to identify, analyze, and weigh moral aspects of a particular situation, and 2) to make decisions that are informed and warranted by the moral investigation. The evidence consists of a description of an ethical reasoning education program—Ethical Reasoning in Action —designed to increase ethical reasoning skills in a variety of (...) situations and areas of life. ERiA is housed at a public, major comprehensive U.S. university—James Madison University—and assessment of the program focuses on interventions delivered prior to and during orientation for incoming first-year students. Findings indicate that the interventions measurably enhance the ability of undergraduate students to reason ethically. ERiA’s competency-targeted program and positive student learning outcomes offers a promising model for higher education ethics programs seeking to connect classroom learning in ethics to decision-making in everyday life. (shrink)

Negotiation is a complex and dynamic decision process during which parties perceptions, preferences, and roles may change. Modelling such a process requires flexible and powerful tools. The use of rule-based formalism is therefore expanded from its traditional expert system type technique, to structuring and restructuring non-trivial processes like negotiation. Using rules we build a model of a negotiation problem. Some rules are used to infer positions and reactions of the parties, other rules are used to modify problem representation when such (...) a modification is necessary. We illustrate the approach with a contract negotiation case between two large companies. We also show how this approach could help one party to realize that negotiations are being carried on against their assumptions and expectations. (shrink)

Wegner (2002) fails to (1) distinguish conscious will and voluntariness; (2) account for everyday willed acts; and (3) individuate thoughts and acts. Wegner incorrectly implies that (4) we experience acts as willed only when they are caused by unwilled thoughts; (5) thoughts are never true causes of actions; and (6) we experience ourselves as first performing mental acts which then cause our intentional actions.

The process of integration of digital technologies into the structure of social production and distribution leads to a series of definite trends in capitalist development. These trends are regular and interdependent. The acceleration of information exchange provides an opportunity to replace the Fordism with a thriftier network model, which involves outsourcing and reducing the longevity of contractual obligations and hiring relationships, which leads to the precarization of labor of a certain social group, which can be described as “precariat”. The change (...) in working conditions leads to the change in ways of increasing labor productivity, which is the reason for the emergence of “societies of control” characterized by: distributed power, embedding previously external coercion into the personality, affective engineering, prolongation of the educational process, increasing tempo and rhythm of work, spreading the project as the form of work replacing routine forms, and the emergence of a liquid short-term identity inherent in representatives of the precariat. This article aims to discover and demonstrate the interconnection between these processes. Achieving this goal will open the way to a more thorough separate study of each of these processes in the future but this research will be made from the perspective of their systemic unity. According to the purpose of the article, the structure of work is the following: the first section is devoted to the acceleration of social time, which is connected with the compression of social space and with the change in scale in which commercial and state enterprises can operate. Quick positive feedback, which is provided by the digital network, leads to changes in the infrastructure of enterprises and the transformation of production and logistics models. In addition, the acceleration of the feedback between the employee and the employer leads to the precarization of labor, which is accompanied by the appearance of “societies of control”. (shrink)

This inaugural lecture considers three main aspects of the relationship between science and morality in Greco-Roman antiquity: first some of the ancient debates on the morality of particular scientific research programmes, especially in connection with the practice of human and animal dissection and vivisection; secondly ancient attempts to secure the autonomy and objectivity of natural scientific inquiry; and thirdly the continuing influence - in certain areas of ancient science - of values, including moral and political values, and of the assumption (...) of the privileged position occupied by human beings in the animal kingdom and the cosmos. (shrink)

This article deals with the relationship between the thought of Michel Foucault and that of Axel Honneth, arguing in favour of the former against the latter. I begin by considering Honneth’s early engagement in The Critique of Power with Foucault’s thought. I rebut Honneth’s criticisms of Foucault here as a misreading, one which prevents Honneth from coming to grips with Foucault’s position and hence the challenge that it poses to Honneth’s project. I then move on to offer a Foucauldian critique (...) of Honneth’s own position, arguing for a Foucauldian alternative to Critical Theory. (shrink)

The farther the headlong passage of time takes us from the October days of 1917, the more deeply the significance of that great seminal event is impressed in the history of mankind. The revolution that began half a century ago in a single country, Russia, marked a fateful turning point in world history, the beginning of a new epoch defined by the transition from capitalism to socialism and communism on a world scale.