My paper discusses the philosophical interrelationship between perfection, truth, and knowledge. The connection that exists between these three concepts underscores the argument of my paper that they are all one and the same thing. -/- The concepts of perfection, truth and knowledge are analysed in that order. I analyse perfection and demonstrate the practicalities of my arguments. Truth is then scrutinized and defined to illustrate its intimate relationship with perfection leading to the conclusion that knowledge being ‘truth that is perfect’. (...) -/- In dealing with the theory of knowledge, I take into account the justification of knowledge and highlighted arguments that I found to be insufficient. I derive a premise to refute and replace both the traditional and contemporary views of knowledge. -/- In the paper presented, I consider views of some prominent philosophers including; Locke, Russell, Plato, Aristotle and Leibniz. (shrink)

While virtually everyone recognizes the moral permissibility of whistleblowing under certain circumstances, most theorists offer relatively conservative accounts of when it is allowed, and are reluctant to offer a full recommendation of the practice as an important tool towards addressing ethical failures in the workplace. We think that accounts such as these tend to overestimate the importance of professional or personal obligations, and underestimate the moral obligation to shine light on severe professional malfeasance. Of course, a whistleblower, even an anonymous (...) one, often faces serious threats of retaliation and harm to their professional livelihoods and well-being. To address these challenges we argue in favor of a practice that we will call Preemptive Anonymous Whistleblowing (PAW). Such whistleblowing is preemptive in that a whistleblower provides information about malfeasance to a party in a position to do something about it without first raising the worry to one’s immediate superiors. At first blush, such preemption may seem unsettling, and PAW admittedly raises a number of worrisome issues. We defend PAW, however, as part of a larger argument that whistleblowing is morally required more often than is commonly thought. The availability of PAW as an option provides a method for allaying the concern that whistleblowing can be overly burdensome due to the risks of job and career. Insofar as that concern can be allayed, it is feasible for there to be substantial moral requirements to engage in whistleblowing in cases where severe harms can be prevented. With high enough stakes, there is a moral requirement for whistleblowing. (shrink)

James P. Sterba postulates a conflict situation between ‘poor’ and ‘rich’ persons in order to establish the legitimacy of a welfare right superior to unlimited private property rights. Sterba does not recognize the moral options available to the non-poor in his conflict scenario, nor the generally voluntary character of enduring unemployment, or how few people would satisfy his own restrictive criteria for poverty. His definition mischaracterizes the general state of the poor as one of imminent decline when in fact, (...) for most of human history it was one of stasis, and since comparatively free societies emerged, it has been one of general improvement. He fails to grasp that the processes by which others become non-poor in a libertarian society also make most of the poor better off. Consequently, consideration of future generations also turns out to weigh heavily against justification of a welfare right, contrary to Sterba’s claim. (shrink)

Jansen and Wall suggest a new way of defending hard paternalism in clinical research. They argue that non-therapeutic research exposing people to more than minimal risk should be banned on egalitarian grounds: in preventing poor decision-makers from making bad decisions, we will promote equality of welfare. We argue that their proposal is flawed for four reasons.First, the idea of poor decision-makers is much more problematic than Jansen and Wall allow. Second, pace Jansen and Wall, it may be practicable for regulators (...) to uncover the values that a potential research participant holds when agreeing to enter a research project, so their claim that we must ban such research projects for all if we are to ban them for poor decision-makers looks to be unmotivated. Third, there seem to be cases where the liberty to enter the sort of research project Jansen and Wall discuss is morally weighty, and arguably should outweigh concerns of egalitarian distribution. Fourth, banning certain types of research, which seem on the face of it to offer an unfavourable risk-benefit ratio, would have unwelcome consequences for all clinical research, which Jansen and Wall do not recognize. (shrink)

Not only did he found his own school of philosophy, known as eclecticism, but he reintroduced into French intellectual life the study and appreciation of the history of philosophy, and produced studies and translations--of Plato and Proclus, Descartes and Pascal--that stand to this day as paradigms of exegetical thoroughness. And it was he who first pointed out to his countrymen that there was some serious philosophical work being carried out on the other side of the Rhine.

In addition to the infant cry being a signal for attention, it may also be a critical component of the early formation of attachments with caregivers. We consider the complex development of that attachment, which involves reciprocal interactive signaling and a host of evolutionarily conserved caregiver factors.

The author examines the history of pragmatism and maintains that a thematic continuity runs through the classical pragmatists, neopragmatitsts and contemporary pragmatists. This continuity can be vaguely characterized as an integration of theory and practice, but experience gives theory its content such that action is always guiding the formation of knowledge. There are four implications of this continuity. Pragmatists are centrally concerned with the human relationship to a process-oriented and evolving conception of nature. For pragmatists, our beliefs are regarded not (...) as propositions that map onto a separate and fixed reality, but instead their truth emerges out of the habits beliefs generate. Pragmatism emphasizes an openness to possibility since our access to the world of experience is mediated by a variety of selective interests, intellectual histories, varying linguistic and discursive practices. Pragmatists are deeply concerned with the social and political problems that confront us on a daily basis. The author also examines the manner in which James understands the term “metaphysics” given that pragmatism is a method for settling “metaphysical disputes.” Jamesian existential pluralism implies to maximize all possibilities that can satisfy everyone as much as possible without impeding and harming another's capacity to experience a rich and novel world. The author analyzes Todd May’s approach to the analytic-continental divide and concludes that if settlement embraces James’s thick conception of experience, then the resulting ontological pluralism is the best settlement possible, and this commitment to pluralism requires dissolving the exclusionary practices the analytic-continental divide suggests philosophically. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article: On Human Nature. By Edward O. Wilson.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer earned critical acclaim for its use of metaphor to explore the conflicts of growth, power, and transgression. Its groundbreaking stylistic and thematic devices, boldness and wit earned it an intensely devoted fan base—and as it approached its zenith, attention from media watchdog groups and the Federal Communications Commission. The grim and provocative evolution of the show over its final two seasons polarized its audience, while also breaking new ground for critical and philosophical analysis. The thirteen essays (...) in this collection, divided into the perspectives of feminist, cultural, auteur and fan studies, explore the popular series’ conclusion, providing a multifaceted examination of Buffy’s most controversial two seasons. Lynne Y. Edwards is associate professor of media and communication studies at Ursinus College. Elizabeth L. Rambo is associate professor of English at Campbell University. James B. South is associate professor of English at Campbell University. James B. South is associate professor and chair of the philosophy department at Marquette University. (shrink)

Robustness properties of three equality of variances tests, the jackknife procedure, the k-sample Box-Andersen test, and Levene’s z test, were investigated and compared in a Monte Carlo study employing small samples from underlying gamma distributions and gamma mixtures. Overall, the jackknife test yielded rejection proportions usually closer to nominal levels under departures from normality, but the Box-Andersen test performed relatively well when departures from normality were not extreme. Four recommendations regarding testing variances were offered.

It is shown in this article that many positions that are usually considered incompatible or antagonistic can be synthesized into a unified framework, creating a model of transpersonal development based around plurality and complexity. The model focuses on evolutionary developmental biology as well as around psychological theories. A large degree of variability in the nature of transpersonal experience in the life cycle is to be expected, due to differences in both the “timing of onset” of transpersonal characteristics and the “length (...) of developmental period.” Numerous developmental patterns are identified, using the work of some prominent transpersonal theorists. (shrink)

Criminal laws are created to achieve various ends. These include reducing the incidence of wrongdoing, and holding wrongdoers responsible for their wrongs. Some criminal laws are created to further the first of these ends by means of compliance. The second end is to be furthered only if, regrettably, some fail to comply. These criminal laws are made to be followed. Other criminal laws are not created with compliance in mind. Conviction, in these cases, is no regrettable fallback. It is the (...) primary means by which the law is to contribute to ends and. Laws of this second kind are made to be broken. My concern in this paper is with the creation of such laws. Section 1 sharpens the contrast drawn above, and considers some arguments for enacting laws that are made to be broken. The following sections develop an argument against. Section 2 introduces what I call the identification principle. It argues that the principle is an implication of the ideal of the rule of law, and that it binds state officials who make, apply and enforce criminal laws. Section 3 argues that when laws are made to be broken, the identification principle is violated. Section 4 concludes. (shrink)

Butler refused to be satisfied with just one leading principle, or rational basis for human action, but in the end settled for three: self-love, to provide for our ‘own private good’; benevolence, to consider ‘the good of our fellow creatures’ ; and conscience, ‘to preside and govern’ over our lives as a whole. By so doing he hoped to ensure a completeness to our ethical scheme, so that nothing would be omitted from our moral deliberations. Yet by so doing he (...) also exposed himself to severe criticism. For any such appeal to a plurality of principles, as Green remarked, is ‘repugnant both to the philosophic craving for unity, and to that ideal of “singleness of heart” which we have been accustomed to associate with the highest virtue’. More specifically, by appealing to a plurality of principles Butler faced the charges of circularity, where the principles come to define and defend each other; inconsistency, where the principles ‘take turns’ at being primary and hence render each other superfluous; and incompleteness, where the ‘primary principle’ is itself undefined or undefended. As the tale has been told Butler stands accused of all three of these errors. (shrink)

ABSTRACTCriminal law confers powers and grants permissions. In doing so it does not treat all alike. Some state officials are given powers and permissions that are much more extensive than those given to private persons. As a result, steps taken to achieve criminal justice are often serious crimes if taken by members of the latter group, while being perfectly lawful when taken by members of the former. My question here is what justifies this asymmetry. I consider two candidate explanations. One (...) appeals to impossibility. Another appeals to efficiency. While explanations of the first kind have become increasingly popular, I offer some reasons to doubt that they succeed. I conclude with a preliminary defence of a view that appeals to efficiency. (shrink)

Man in the past.--Man in the present.--Man in the future.--Man as an intellective animal.

We often hold others responsible, and are held responsible ourselves. Many philosophers claim that to evaluate such holdings, we must consider the standing of the holder. Many also claim that both hypocrites and meddlers lack standing. Little has been said, however, about what exactly standing is—about what it is that hypocrites and meddlers are supposed to lack. Though talk of standing is now widespread, ‘we do not,’ in Joseph Raz’s words, ‘have an unproblematic grasp of the phenomena referred to’ by (...) such talk. In this paper I attempt to improve that grasp. I offer an account of what it is to have, and lack, standing to hold others responsible. And I offer some reasons why, if this account is accepted, both hypocrites and meddlers should lack standing. (shrink)

Bernard Williams is one of the most influential figures in ethical theory, where he has set a considerable part of the current agenda. In this collection a distinguished international team of philosophers who have been stimulated by Williams's work give responses to it. The topics covered include equality; consistency; comparisons between science and ethics; integrity; moral reasons; the moral system; and moral knowledge. Williams himself provides a substantial reply, which shows both the directions of his own thought and also his (...) present view of earlier work of his which has been extensively discussed for twenty years. This volume will be indispensable reading for all those interested in ethical theory. (shrink)