The paper aims at reconstructing the influence of Simonides on a contiguous series of Horatian poems . The starting point is provided by the discovery of new Simonidean fragments published by Peter Parsons and by Martin West in 1992. But the research casts a wider net, including the influence of Theocritus on Horace-and of Simonides on Theoocritus-and the simultaneous and competing presence of Pindar and Simonides in late Horatian lyric. The influence of Simonides is seen in specific textual pointers-e.g., a (...) simile on the death of Achilles in 4.6, the idea of caducity in 4.7-as well as in the composite role-model of Simonides, the immortalizing poet, the flexible praise-singer. Some wider questions are put in perspective: As for Horace's approach to the poetic tradition, the Roman poet is able to glance across whole genealogies of models, without necessarily making a choice, but making the invocation of several predecessors, already linked in a tradition, relevant to his new text. "Odes" 4.7, for instance, features a dialogue of Horace, Homer, Mimnermus and Simonides. The oscillation in modern criticism between an "Alexandrian" and a "classicizing" Horace could be better explained by constructing a complex model of intertextuality: "Pindar" plus "the Pindar in Callimachus"; "Simonides" plus "the Simonides in Theocritus." The dominating influence of Pindar in Book IV could be a part of a richer picture of influence, now difficult to reconstruct since all we have is the four Pindaric books of epinicia, not necessarily the only widely read choral lyric in antiquity. The reuse of early-classical praise poetry includes references to social constructs and cultural models of patronage, gift exchange, and poetic addressee: they are important in Augustan lyric precisely because they are felt as distant and impossible to recreate, and become a part of Horace's deft and often ironical negotiations with the problem of being a lyric poet in Augustan Rome. (shrink)

In the following two passages we read Apollo's epiphany to the Trojan leader Aeneas and Callimachus.

This article discusses changes in post-apartheid South Africa’s economy and society in relation to the country’s re-insertion in the Empire. South Africa ’s specificity in the African context is largely related to the crucial role played in this case by the factory proletariat in defining the collapse of apartheid. Therefore, neoliberalism and the entry in the Empire in this case have to be understood in terms of state responses to a class composition that starting from workplace organisation has expressed a (...) resistance to the imposition of wage labour discipline. While the government of the African National Congress has successfully recodified its nationalist discourse to suit the requirements of capitalist globalisation and liberalization, this process has also been very contradictory. The adoption of a neoliberal agenda has, in particular, emphasized the ANC’s abdication from state sovereignty as a vehicle of strategies of control based on social citizenship. New movements, largely made of multitudes left out of waged employment, have therefore emerged to challenge the ANC’s pro-Empire choice. However, these movements are not based on a « souverainniste » agenda, or on delegation to the state of resistance to the Empire. Rather, in their conscious departure from nationalist and wage-based mythologies, they clarify the biopolitical nature of current processes of contestation and are able to combine grassroots struggles with cognitive abilities of reappropriation. (shrink)

In a recently published study combining transcranial magnetic stimulation and electroencephalography (TMS-EEG), an early component of TMS-evoked potentials (TEPs), i.e., M1-P15, was proposed as a measure of transcallosal inhibition between motor cortices. Given that early TEPs are known to be highly variable, further evidence is needed before M1-P15 can be considered a reliable index of effective connectivity. Here, we conceived a new preregistered TMS-EEG study with two aims. The first aim was validating the M1-P15 as a cortical index of transcallosal (...) inhibition by replicating previous findings on its relationship with the ipsilateral silent period (iSP) and with performance in bimanual coordination. The second aim was inducing a task-dependent modulation of transcallosal inhibition. A new sample of 32 healthy right-handed participants underwent behavioral motor tasks and TMS-EEG recording, in which left and right M1 were stimulated both during bimanual tasks and during an iSP paradigm. Hypotheses and methods were preregistered before data collection. Results show a replication of our previous findings on the positive relationship between M1-P15 amplitude and the iSP normalized area. Differently, the relationship between M1-P15 latency and bimanual coordination was not confirmed. Finally, M1-P15 amplitude was modulated by the characteristics of the bimanual task the participants were performing, and not by the contralateral hand activity during the iSP paradigm. In sum, the present results corroborate our previous findings in validating the M1-P15 as a cortical marker of transcallosal inhibition and provide novel evidence of its task-dependent modulation. Importantly, we demonstrate the feasibility of preregistration in the TMS-EEG field to increase methodological rigor and transparency. (shrink)

In his Tanner Lecture of 1979 called ‘Equality of What?’ Amartya Sen asked what metric egalitarians should use to establish the extent to which their ideal is realized in a given society. What aspect of a person’s condition should count in a fundamental way for egalitarians, and not merely as cause of or evidence of or proxy for what they regard as fundamental?

A significant proportion of conservationists' work is directed towards efforts to save disappearing species. This relies upon the belief that species extinction is undesirable. When justifications are offered for this belief, they very often rest upon the assumption that extinction brought about by humans is different in kind from other forms of extinction. This paper examines this assumption and reveals that there is indeed good reason to suppose current anthropogenic extinctions to be different in kind from extinctions brought about at (...) other times or by other factors. Having considered – and rejected – quantity and rate of extinction as useful distinguishing factors, four alternative arguments are offered, each identifying a way in which anthropogenic extinction is significantly different from other forms of extinction, even mass extinction: (1) Humans are a different kind of natural cause from other causes of extinction; (2) Extinctions brought about by humans are uniquely persistent; (3) Anthropogenic extinctions are effectively random whereas past mass extinctions are rule-bound; (4) The impact of the current anthropogenic extinction event differs from the impact of other extinction events of the past, such that future recovery may not follow past patterns. Together, these four arguments suggest that the present-day extinction event brought about by humans may be unprecedented and that we cannot clearly extrapolate from past to present recovery from extinctions. Although insufficient as justification for the claim that present-day extinctions are undesirable, the arguments provide some ammunition for conservationists' conviction that species extinction – in which humans play an accelerating role – ought to be prevented. (shrink)

Philosophical anthropologist Mircea Eliade once said that "the union of opposites" is a basic category of archaic ontology and comparative world religions. In this paper I develop the theory of contrariety or opposition as a prime focus for East/West comparative philosophy. The paper considers especially Nishida Kitaro's later works and the complex phrase "zettai mujuntekijikodbitsu," variously translated by Schinzinger as "absolute contradictory self-identity," "the self-identity of absolute contradictories," or more simply as "oneness" or "unity" of opposites.

Book Information The Morality of Nationalism. Edited by R. McKim and J. McMahan. Oxford University Press. New York. 1997. Pp. xii + 371. Paperback, $42.95.

In the history of Russian philosophy, V. S. Solovyov is known as one of the prominent spokesmen of theological idealism. Lenin more than once pointed to the need to combat the ideas of this philosopher . He quite properly regarded them as the theoretical foundation of the ideology of "liberal renegacy.".

This volume presents new texts of Cicero's dialogues on political philosophy, De Re Publica and De Legibus, together with corrected versions of the editor's previously published editions of Cato Maior de Senectute and Laelius de Amicitia. The texts are based on a full reconsideration of the manuscript evidence and are presented in a clear and readable form.