Henry Longueville Mansel (1820-1871), Anglican theologian and philosopher, has wrongly been remembered as a Kantian agnostic whose ideas led to those of Herbert Spencer. Francesca Norman's book provides a thorough revisioning of Mansel's theology in context and reveals the personal basis of Spencer's animus towards Mansel. Mansel is revealed as an orthodox Anglican theistic personalist whose ideas inspired Newman to write his Grammar of Assent. Located in context, Mansel's personal connections with leading Tory figures such as Lord Carnarvon (...) and Benjamin Disraeli are explored. Key controversies with Frederick Denison Maurice and John Stuart Mill are interpreted with reference to the party political elections of 1859 and 1865. Norman offers a vital vision of nineteenth-century theology, philosophy, and politics. (shrink)

In argumentation, metaphors are often considered as ambiguous or deceptive uses of language leading to fallacies of reasoning. However, they can also provide useful insights into creative argumentation, leading to genuinely new knowledge. Metaphors entail a framing effect that implicitly provides a specific perspective to interpret the world, guiding reasoning and evaluation of arguments. In the same vein, emotions could be in sharp contrast with proper reasoning, but they can also be cognitive processes of affective framing, influencing our reasoning and (...) behavior in different meaningful ways. Thus, a double (metaphorical and affective) framing effect might influence argumentation in the case of emotive metaphors, such as “Poverty is a disease” or “Your boss is a dictator,” where specific “emotive words” (disease, dictator) are used as vehicles. We present and discuss the results of two experimental studies designed to explore the role of emotive metaphors in argumentation. The studies investigated whether and to what extent the detection of a fallacious argument is influenced by the presence of a conventional vs. novel emotive metaphor. Participants evaluated a series of verbal arguments containing either “non-emotive” or “emotive” (positive or negative) metaphors as middle terms that “bridge” the premises of the argument. The results show that the affective coherence of the metaphor's vehicle and topic plays a crucial role in participants' reasoning style, leading to global heuristic vs. local analytical interpretive processes in the interplay of the metaphorical and the affective framing effects. (shrink)

In this paper, we present a simple sequent calculus for the modal propositional logic S5. We prove that this sequent calculus is theoremwise equivalent to the Hilbert-style system S5, that it is contraction-free and cut-free, and finally that it is decidable. All results are proved in a purely syntactic way.

Most people presume that government is always responsible for providing solutions to pollution problems, including transportation pollution. This paper examines the validity of this argument from a minarchist libertarian, property rights principles perspective, and concludes that government cannot solve these problems using command-and-control legislation. The primary policy suggested for government to adopt is the strict adherence to property rights protection and enforcement regarding polluters, including themselves. Further encouragement of market forces could be accomplished by stopping interference within the market at (...) critical points, namely the production of roads, production and sales of automobiles, and the subsidization of alternative fuels. (shrink)

Following the revival in the last decades of the concept of “organism”, scholarly literature in philosophy of science has shown growing historical interest in the theory of Immanuel Kant, one of the “fathers” of the concept of self-organisation. Yet some recent theoretical developments suggest that self-organisation alone cannot fully account for the all-important dimension of autonomy of the living. Autonomy appears to also have a genuine “interactive” dimension, which concerns the organism’s functional interactions with the environment and does not simply (...) derive from its internal organisation. Against this background, we focus on a family of natural philosophical approaches that historically have already strongly taken in account this aspect of autonomy, notably going beyond Kant’s perspective on self-organisation. We thus review Hegel, Plessner, and Jonas’ different perspectives on living beings, focussing in particular on four points: the distinction between organic and inorganic, the theory of biological organisation, the processuality of the living, and the “boundary” between inside and outside, through which the organism establishes its relationship to the environment. We, then, compare the three perspectives on these four points, and finally address the question of what advantages their contribution present—especially compared to Kant’s theory—with respect to the topic of organism’s autonomy. This could help—we hope—to better understand what is at the stake still today. (shrink)

In November 2018, Dr. He Jiankui announced the birth of two baby girls born through the use of in vitro fertilization technology and the use of the gene-editing tool CRISPR-Cas9. There has been nigh uniform international condemnation of the clinical trial for violating international norms governing genomic research, especially research in human embryos that has implications for the germline. At issue also is the question whether the parents and the clinical research team harmed, and therefore wronged, the two girls. Here (...) this question is engaged through application of the reasoning Derek Parfit has provided on the non-identity problem. One concludes that on this reasoning the parents are not morally culpable on that argument, although there is other reasoning that is to be considered to resist the Parfitian conclusion. (shrink)

It is obvious that teaching and research in informal logic is a growth industry, indeed one of burgeoning proportions. Judging by skyrocketing enrolments and the avalanche of books, journals, computer aids, conferences, and workshops during the last decade, it would seem to be no passing fad but the overdue recognition of a societal need.

Against the turbulent backdrop of Enlightenment Scotland, Adam Smith lays out a succinct and highly engaging account of Smith's life and times, reviews his work as a whole and traces his influence over the past two centuries. Dispelling myths and debunking caricatures, this book explores his ideas in detail, from ethics to law to economics and government and the impact of those ideas on thinkers as diverse as Karl Marx, Charles Darwin, John Maynard Keynes and Friedrich Hayek. Adam Smith emerges (...) as one of the founders of modern social psychology and behavioural theory, offering a strikingly modern evolutionary theory of political economy, which recognises the often complementary roles of markets and the state. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to examine the actuality of Simone Weil's concept of the impersonal, as expressed in La personne et le sacré. To this end, I address the theme of authenticity by proposing two alternative models. According to the first model, "being oneself" corresponds to the immediate self-expression. Weil's critique of the "person's right to self-fulfillment", on the other hand, gives rise to an anthropology of mediation, which constitutes a second model centered on the notion of work. (...) Hence, my original contribution consists in the argumentation of the thesis that in Weil's oeuvre the access to the self is structured in concordance to a "work of desire", which constitutes the human being's essence. Taking up the various allusions to the "desire for the good", scattered throughout the Weilian corpus, the article unveils what this affective work, that transforms the subject, consists of, and emphasizes the importance of the experience of the transcendent Good as a condition for a free interpretation of the value of the desired goods. (shrink)

In his paper ‘The truth behind conscientious objection’ Nir Ben-Moshe develops a new approach aimed at justifying conscientious objection (CO) without relying on respect of moral integrity of the conscientious objector or tolerance towards her moral views.1 According to Ben-Moshe, the problem with justifications of CO based on moral integrity and tolerance is that ‘truth of conscience’s claims is irrelevant to their justification’. He argues, to the contrary, that whether the claims of the conscientious objector are true or false makes (...) a difference in assessing whether their objection is justifiable or not. He goes on explaining that someone’s CO can be justified if it can be proved that ‘conscience can express true moral claims’. Ben-Moshe then proceeds to explain how one can determine true moral claims. He develops an account of conscience that is modelled on that of Adam Smith. In particular, he uses the idea of the ‘impartial spectator’ to show how a true claim of conscience can emerge after careful thinking from the point of view of an impartial perspective. So, if the healthcare practitioner wants to object to a certain medical procedure after considering the issue at hand from the moral standpoint of such impartial spectator, then her claims of conscience are true (or …. (shrink)

_Abstract_: The overarching aim of this paper is to provide a comprehensive account of melancholic depression from the perspective of hermeneutic phenomenology. More specifically, we propose that this condition should be interpreted as an alteration in the intentional arc that affects corporeality, temporality, and spatiality, rather than as a mood disorder. In fact, classifying melancholic depression as a mood disorder seems a particularly poor choice; the mood disorder is not a cause but a consequence of a primary disturbance in operative (...) intentionality. Our paper comprises four sections: (1) We provide a methodological and conceptual framework for our theoretical work, adopting a hermeneutic phenomenological perspective on melancholic depression, and underlining the main differences between melancholia and depression. (2) We offer a detailed reconstruction of the different interpretations of melancholic depression and their relationships to the issue of temporality. (3) We analyze the disruption of intentionality in melancholic depression and how it affects corporeality and directionality. (4) We focus on the disruption of moods and affects in melancholic depression, observing how they shape subjective experience. The goal of this theoretical contribution is to underscore the role of operative intentionality and its disruptions in melancholic depression. We argue that taking elements such as intentionality, embodiment, and spatiality into consideration could help to direct therapies along more promising paths. _Keywords_: Melancholic Depression; Operative Intentionality; Corporeality; Directionality; Temporality; Mood Disorders _La depressione melancolica. Un’interpretazione fenomenologico-ermeneutica_ _Riassunto_: L’intento generale di questo contributo è di fornire un’interpretazione della depressione melancolica attraverso la fenomenologia ermeneutica. Più specificatamente, la nostra ipotesi è che questa condizione potrebbe essere interpretata come un’alterazione dell’arco intenzionale la quale impatta la corporeità, la temporalità e la spazialità, e non come un disordine dell’umore. Infatti, classificare la depressione melancolica come un disordine dell’umore ci sembra una scelta particolarmente limitata; il disordine dell’umore non è la causa ma la conseguenza di un disturbo a livello primario dell’intenzionalità operativa. Il nostro contributo si articola in quattro sezioni: nella prima, forniamo una cornice metodologica e concettuale finalizzata a chiarificare le fondamenta teoretiche del nostro lavoro, ad illustrare l’utilizzo della fenomenologia ermeneutica in riferimento alla depressione melancolica, e a sottolineare le differenze principali tra melancolia e depressione. Nella seconda sezione, ricostruiamo in modo dettagliato le diverse interpretazioni della depressione melancolica e la loro relazione con la temporalità. Nella terza sezione, analizziamo l’alterazione dell’intenzionalità nella depressione melancolica e come essa impatti sia la corporeità che la direzionalità. Infine, nell’ultima sezione ci concentriamo sull’alterazione degli stati umorali e della componente affettiva, osservando come questi elementi vadano a caratterizzare l’esperienza soggettiva. Il fine di questo contributo teoretico è di evidenziare il ruolo dell’intenzionalità operativa e delle sue alterazioni nella depressione melancolica. La nostra tesi è che prendere in considerazione alcuni elementi, come l’intenzionalità, l’embodiment e la spazialità, possa contribuire a delineare interventi terapeutici in modo più promettente. _Parole chiave_: Depressione melancolica; Intenzionalità operativa; Corporeità; Direzionalità; Temporalità; Disturbi dell’umore. (shrink)

In this paper we present a sequent calculus for the modal propositional logic GL (the logic of provability) obtained by means of the tree-hypersequent method, a method in which the metalinguistic strength of hypersequents is improved, so that we can simulate trees shapes. We prove that this sequent calculus is sound and complete with respect to the Hilbert-style system GL, that it is contraction free and cut free and that its logical and modal rules are invertible. No explicit semantic element (...) is used in the sequent calculus and all the results are proved in a purely syntactic way. (shrink)

In this paper, I analyse the issue of conscientious objection in relation to cosmetic surgery. I consider cases of doctors who might refuse to perform a cosmetic treatment because: (1) the treatment aims at achieving a goal which is not in the traditional scope of cosmetic surgery; (2) the motivation of the patient to undergo the surgery is considered trivial; (3) the patient wants to use the surgery to promote moral or political values that conflict with the doctor's ones; (4) (...) the patient requires an intervention that would benefit himself/herself, but could damage society at large. (shrink)

The commonalities of Douglas Walton's Slippery Slope Arguments and James Davies's Ways of Thinking are obvious: both are written by Canadian philosophers; both lie within the broad field of informal logic; and both make appeals in support of dialogical reasoning. But there the similarities end. The former is the work of a prolific author writing a treatise focussing narrowly on one topic within informal logic; the latter is the product of a newcomer to book-writing, and his is a textbook intended (...) for beginning students. (shrink)

In this essay, I present eating as a vital theological concern and an integral part of the church’s ministries and mission in the world. I argue that food is not reducible to the status of a commodity but is instead God’s love made delectable. The production and the sharing of good food is a witness to God’s presence among us.

It is well known that Felix Klein took a decisive step in investigating the invariants of transformation groups. However, less attention has been given to Klein’s considerations on the epistemological implications of his work on geometry. This paper proposes an interpretation of Klein’s view as a form of mathematical structuralism, according to which the study of mathematical structures provides the basis for a better understanding of how mathematical research and practice develop.

Ethnomethodology research has systematically investigated discursive practices of categorisation, looking at the various ways by which social actors ascribe both themselves and others to identity categories to accomplish various kinds of social actions. Drawing on a data corpus of oncological visits collected in an Italian hospital, involving both native and non-native patients, the present work analyses how participants in these intercultural medical encounters invoke and make relevant social identity categories by the marking of collective pronouns in their talk. Our results (...) showed that whilst institutional identities prevailed, categorial formulations related to cultural or linguistic identities were rarely displayed in interactions with non-native patients. Conversational participants made very little of their linguistical or cultural background and when they did so, their cultural and linguistic identities were deployed for rhetorical and pragmatical aims, such as testing and negotiating common knowledge and epistemic authority. This study shows how even speakers’ minimal lexical choices, such as marked pronouns, impact the negotiation of meanings and activities in life-saving sites such as oncological visits. (shrink)