This is an excellent addition to Bobbs-Merrill's "Text and Commentary Series." In addition to the text of the Principles, there are eleven critical essays, three of which are original with this volume. Turbayne has arranged the essays to parallel the unfolding of the major themes in the Principles. Thus, he himself opens with "Berkeley's Metaphysical Grammar," which picks up and develops the theme of the centrality of the study of language to the philosophical enterprise, a point Berkeley makes in (...) his "Preface." Next, W. H. Hay and Richard Van Iten are paired together with different perspectives on Berkeley's nominalism. By way of comment on esse is percipi, G. E. Moore and W. T. Stace present their respective refutations of idealism and realism. Richard Popkin discusses skepticism and Berkeley. Popper examines the ways in which Berkeley anticipated Mach and Einstein, as well as significant features of contemporary philosophy of science. Turbayne and Cornman offer differing appraisals of the philosophy of mind that is sketched in the Principles. Paul Olscamp attempts to systematize the elements of Berkeley's critical theory. Finally, J. D. Mabbott treats of "The Place of God in Berkeley's Philosophy" and argues for a radical voluntarism in Berkeley--a not surprising analysis, but one which often gets buried under the epistemological issues raised in the Principles. Turbayne has also supplied an excellent introduction, a chronology of Berkeley's life, a working bibliography, and an analytical index. This enhances the usefulness of an already first-rate book.--E. A. R. (shrink)

An important contribution to the foundations of probability theory, statistics and statistical physics has been made by E. T. Jaynes. The recent publication of his collected works provides an appropriate opportunity to attempt an assessment of this contribution.

The view that we are animals -- animalism -- is often misunderstood. It is typically stated in unhelpful or misleading ways. Debates over animalism are often unclear about what question it purports to answer, and what the alternative answers are. The paper tries to state clearly what animalism says and does not say. This enables us to distinguish different versions of animalism.

With so much attention being paid to the development and refinement of appropriate criteria and tests for death, little attention has been given to the broader conceptual issues having to do with its definition or with the relation of a definition to its criterion. The task of selecting the correct criterion is, however, virtually impossible without proper attention to the broader conceptual setting in which the definition operates as the key feature. All of the issues I will discuss arise because (...) of this lack of concern with conceptual matters. Such problems as incorrectly diagnosing a patient as dead prior to the harvesting of his or her organs, defending the idea that death is reversible, and advocating a brainstem criterion of death, are all, I believe, errors that derive from this misplaced emphasis. (shrink)

(1983). Orthodoxie religieuse et sciences humaines suivi de (religious) orthodoxy, rationality and scientific knowledge. History of European Ideas: Vol. 4, No. 3, pp. 346-348.

The uniqueness of logic is upheld and contrasted with twenty roles of a wider responsive order that includes us and our procedures. Empirical responses are precise, but different in different approaches. Procedures and findings are independent of (not separable from) their concepts. Two-way feedback obviates a top-down derivation of findings from assumptions, hypotheses, history, or language. The postmodern problems of interpretation, conditions of appearances and relativism involve the ancient error of making perception the model-instance of experience. Instead, bodily interaction functions (...) in language and precedes perception and interpretation. Logic, space time locations and individuated referents involve positional relations derived from comparing. Beyond Kuhn, Feyerabend, Newton and Einstein, if we can give interaction priority over comparing, the responsive objectivity of both can be upheld. A new empiricism, neither naive nor constructivist, uses the words order, explication, truth, and exactly to build on Wittgenstein and on Dilthey's hermeneutic. Natural language is metaphor-like, originally crossed. Logic must ignore its assumptions. It must render everything as a machine and drop humans and animals out. A new discipline is proposed, to move between the logical and the responsive orders, to deal with the machine/human interface and the social uses of science such as bioengineering. (shrink)

In the fifth book of Livy there is a passage of which hitherto no good explanation has been forthcoming: Romae interim multiplex seditio erat, cuius leniendae causa coloniam in Volscos, quo tria milia civium Romanorum scriberentur, deducendam censuerant; triumvirique ad id creati terna iugera et septunces viritim diviserant.

As scientific and engineering efforts become increasingly global in nature, the need to understand differences in perceptions of research ethics issues across countries and cultures is imperative. However, investigations into the connection between nationality and ethical decision-making in the sciences have largely generated mixed results. In Study 1 of this paper, a measure of biases and compensatory strategies that could influence ethical decisions was administered. Results from this study indicated that graduate students from the United States and international graduate students (...) studying in the US are prone to different biases. Based on these findings, recommendations are made for developing ethics education interventions to target these decision-making biases. In Study 2, we employed an ethics training intervention based on ethical sensemaking and used a well-established measure of ethical decision-making that more fully captures the content of ethical judgment. Similar to Study 1, the results obtained in this study suggest differences do exist between graduate students from the US and international graduate students in ethical decision-making prior to taking the research ethics training. However, similar effects were observed for both groups following the completion of the ethics training intervention. (shrink)

An important contribution to the foundations of probability theory, statistics and statistical physics has been made by E. T. Jaynes. The recent publication of his collected works provides an appropriate opportunity to attempt an assessment of this contribution.

The "gang of four" — Wang Hung-wen, Chang Ch'un-ch'iao, Chiang Ch'ing and Yao Wen-yuan — have created great chaos by confusing the relations between ourselves and the enemy, obliterating the differences between the two kinds of contradiction, wrecking Chairman Mao's policy of uniting with, educating and reforming intellectuals, calling intellectuals the "stinking number nine," smothering the revolutionary initiative of the broad masses of intellectuals, and destroying the ranks of revolutionary intellectuals.