(2000). Caring at a Distance: (Im)partiality, Moral Motivation and the Ethics of Representation - Partiality, Distance and Moral Obligation. Ethics, Place & Environment: Vol. 3, No. 3, pp. 309-313. doi: 10.1080/713665894.

There is a lapidary saying owing to Etienne Gilson, that is often misquoted or adapted – with ‘metaphysics’ taking the place of ‘philosophy’ – and which is invariably reproduced in isolation. It is that ‘Philosophy always buries its undertakers’. Understanding this remark as Gilson intended it is relevant to the issues of the nature of philosophy, and of what conception of it may be most appropriate or fruitful for us to pursue. The question of the mortality or otherwise of philosophy (...) in general, and of metaphysics in particular, is a significant one for ongoing intellectual enquiry, and it is also relevant to the current position of academic philosophy in Great Britain and in the English-speaking world. (shrink)

(2000). Caring at a Distance: (Im)partiality, Moral Motivation and the Ethics of Representation - Introduction. Ethics, Place & Environment: Vol. 3, No. 3, pp. 303-309. doi: 10.1080/713665900.

Cet essai a été présenté à l’atelier sur La démocratie de l’espace et l’espace de la démocratie, qui a eu lieu à Newcastle, en Angleterre, le 11 janvier 2008. Une version antérieure a été présentée à l’Université de Tokyo le 13 novembre 2007. Il sera publié en néerlandais, traduit par Freek Jansens, sous le titre “het plannen van ruimtes van (on)mogelijkheid” dans une collection éditée par Maarten Hajer et Jantine Grijzen sur les questions de politique contemporaine. Il a été traduit (...) de l’anglais par Martin Blanchard et révisé par Daniel Weinstock. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Buddhist-Christian Studies 21.1 (2001) 139-140 [Access article in PDF] Book Review Dimensionen Der Leere: Gottals Nichts Und Nichts Als Gott Im Christlich-Buddistischen Dialog Dimensionen Der Leere: Gottals Nichts Und Nichts Als Gott Im Christlich-Buddistischen Dialog. By Armin Münch. Münster, Hamburg, London: LIT-Verlag, 1998. 337 pp. This is a most unusual study, pieced together out of hidden facets and neglected aspects of Buddhist and Christian studies and containing an unrivaled (...) overview of the literature. If modernWestern theology, taking its cue from Heidegger, has emphasized the temporality of existence, Münch draws our attention to its "spatiality" in what he calls "dimensional thinking." He is able to point to an astonishing number of thinkers from a variety of disciplines who have taken as their starting point our need to orient ourselves in space. In this light, the kenôsis.assage Philippians 2:5-11 is seen to be patterned on a U-shaped movement linking the dimensions "above" and "below" as distinct from S- and O-shaped movements found elsewhere in the mystical tradition.Münch goesonto establish left/right, behind/before, inside/outside, coming to be/passing away as what he calls "immanentals" (12-13) analogous to the "transcendentals" of scholastic theology. In particular, he seeks out thinkers who have tried to formulate the "fourth dimension," which would take us beyond conventional space-time. Plotinus, Eckhart, and the Kabbala are all examined for their attempts to conceptualize the transcendent in this way.What is the purpose of this exercise? Münch's leading question, to which he eventually returns, is clear: "What is lacking in our idea of God if we are ignorant of Buddhist experience?" (5). His purpose is to evaluate the relative significance of kenôsis ("he emptied himself") and tapeinosis."he humbled himself") in Philippians 2. This becomes apparent when he comes to the leading thinkers of the Kyoto School--Nishida, Nishitani, and Abe--and the debate between Takizawa and Yagi. Here Münch finds evidence of a "backwards-directed," or "dorsal," theology that corresponds to a rearwards movement in Buddhist thinking (264). This interesting hypothesis would need further verification by consulting the textual and extratextual traditions that shaped Japanese Buddhism in the context of their Indian and Chinese origins. In criticizing the work of Perry Schmidt-Leukel, Münch suggests that for Buddhists the balance between the experiences of relationship and transitoriness is not so much a matter of different directions or perspectives of transcendence as a leaving behind of all perspectivity (130-133). The search for salvation is orientated rearward in the Buddhist case, forward in the Christian, but these can be seen as complementary directions on the one road.Münch is able to agree with Ueda that Buddhist "nothingness" is best understood as a "desubstantializing dynamic" (283-284). Shûnyatâ.s the "fullness of nothingness" corresponds to the Christian concept of God. Christ is said to have "gone outside himself" rather than to have "emptied himself out" ["Christus entäusserte sich, aber er entleerte sich nicht!"(287)], to have undergone a metamorphosis. In Münch's view, only trinitarian language can encompass all the dimensions, from zero to the [End Page 139] elusive fourth, which are necessary to express what we mean by God in Buddhist terms (305-306).One of the most original things Münch does is to draw a parallel between the Zen ox-herding pictures and the Christian story. This serves to draw together pictorially, if not conceptually, the sometimes arcane researches that go to make up Münch's mosaic. It is perhaps because spatially dimensional thinking has been so rare in Western science, philosophy, and theology that he must search in such dark corners for evidence of it. The result is an at times bewildering patchwork of apparently unrelated contributions that do not blend smoothly into a unity. This sometimes puzzling heterogeneity is justified, in my view, in that it presents us with a highly diversified tool kit for getting to work on the potential offered... (shrink)

While attending seminary school in Pennsylvania, Martin Luther King Jr. cultivated “the arts of pulpit oratory,” the habit of visualizing philosophical problems and other objects of criticism by invoking many-sided jewels and multi-runged ladders. This article appropriates King's jewels and ladders as tools for humanizing juridico-discursive practice toward migrants/emigrants/immigrants and refugees. By drawing attention to the process whereby persons are subordinated and become subpersons, we are able to see how the standpoint of racialized dehumanization is historically patterned and furthermore involves (...) an overlap of legal, political, and artistic expressions. Consequently, jewels and ladders become theoretical as well as practical tools for visualizing the moral standing of migrant/refugee populations in modernity. (shrink)

. Caring at a Distance: partiality, Moral Motivation and the Ethics of Representation - Moral Motivation - How Far Can You Travel in Five Minutes? Ethics, Place & Environment: Vol. 3, No. 3, pp. 319-322.

While a narratological reading of the Gospels is relatively well accepted, their characterisation as parts of the genre of ancient biography was much antagonised in former times. Although things have changed thanks to seminal monographs on the problem from the second half of the 20th century and to continuing work, some questions remain open. Therefore, a narratological comparison of Gospels with concrete representatives of the ancient bios could possibly help to clarify the relations between both. In what follows, the oldest (...) Gospel is read simultaneously with Plutarch’s Biography of the Younger Cato. Three observations are made: a) The structures of the narratives of Cato and of Jesus match to a high degree. Both protagonists carry out certain duties while operating in public. In most instances, they achieve great successes. From a certain point on, however, they irrevocably approach failure and ruin. This structure of story seems to form the basis both of the Gospel and of the biography of Cato, written ca. three decades later. b) Obviously, both works narrate the life of a man, his exceptional character, his extraordinary operations in public and his non-natural violent dead. In Plutarch’s version, the Younger Cato fails in the end. At first sight, also Mark’s Jesus fails to accomplish his mission. By God’s action he is turned into the saviour of the faithful however. This claimed unsurpassed relevance of the story is contrasted with the laconism of the narration. c) Both narrations are composed out of both factual and fictional elements. Thus, readers cannot separate both elements precisely in every instance. Both stories are imagined worlds designed for the in narratology so called game of fiction. As can be learned in Plutarch, authors of stories like the Life of Cato or the Gospel of Mark guarantee a certain sense of responsibility in their work. Summed up, the narratological comparison has illustrated both the close affinity and the individual specifications of both narratives. It thus helps to clarify the position- fixing of the Early Christian literature within its Graeco-Roman context. (shrink)

Karl Bühler hat zur Entwicklung von Karl Poppers Forschungsgebieten drei wichtige Beiträge geleistet. Erstens hat er Popper in die laufende Forschung der Mitglieder der Würzburger Schule eingeführt, und die Richtung dieser Forschung hat in wichtigen Punkten Popper ein Leben lang beeinflusst. Dabei hatte er sich zunächst die nicht-assoziative Psychologie der Schule zu eigen gemacht. Dann griff er auf die Denkpsychologie von Otto Selz zurück und entwickelte davon ausgehend sein eigenes Forschungsgebiet der Methodologie. Zweitens betrafen die damals behandelten Probleme auch methodologische (...) Fragen: Wie ist die Beziehung zwischen Logik und Psychologie? Wie ist eine deduktivistische Methodologie möglich? Drittens hat Bühler ihn eine Zwei-Welten-Theorie gelehrt. Heinrich Gomperz war der erste, der Popper darauf hinwies, dass er bereits davon ausgegangen war, dass Ideen unabhängige Entitäten sind. Diese Entitäten hat er dann viel später mit John Eccles als Teile der dritten Welt bezeichnet. Auch als Gesprächspartner war Gomperz für Popper wichtig, insofern als Popper versuchte, eine klare Theorie über die Beziehungen zwischen Psychologie und Logik und danach zwischen Psychologie und Methodologie zu finden. Und Gomperz war es auch, der Poppers Augenmerk auf die Geschichte der griechischen Philosophie lenkte und ihm den großen Unterschied zwischen Platon und Sokrates klarmachte. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that Norton's case against Brown's rationalism about thought experiments suffers from serious shortcomings, which relate to the nature of induction.

The history of the transformation of late Roman fiscal administrative structures into those of the middle Byzantine period have been at the centre of discussions of the nature of the Byzantine state for over a century, and not simply because they were fundamental to the ways in which late Roman and early Byzantine government could function. For the fiscal administration of the empire reflected both the social structure of the society in which the state was rooted as well as the (...) logistical and environmental constraints which informed the way in which the imperial court and the emperors could run their empire. Brandes' important contribution to this discussion is perhaps one of the most significant publications yet to appear, not only because he is able to take into account all the latest research (and the literature exploited is exhaustive) but also because we now have at our disposal a far better basis in the contemporary sources than hitherto – and in particular, in the form of the vast wealth of sigillographic data which earlier scholars such as Bury or Dölger or Lemerle could only begin to appreciate. (shrink)

In this monograph I propose to interpret John Locke's view of central metaphysical notions such as substance, essence and identity to the backdrop of his distinction between distinct and confused ideas. I show that Locke draws this traditional distinction in a novel way—as a distinction pertaining only to the way ideas are related to our use of language. This distinction, I argue, allows him to radically rethink traditional questions of metaphysics and to mount a linguistic criticism of traditional metaphysical (...) views about substance, essence and identity. Furthermore, I propose that taking into account the linguistic dimension of Locke's metaphysical thought helps recognize the coherence of his overall picture of substance, essence and identity. (shrink)

The contribution inquires what impact pragmatism and phenomenology had and still have on education? A logical starting point to answer this question is to back to the roots as it were and to relate Otto Friedrich Bollnow and John Dewey with respect to their understanding of experience and the role experience plays in education. Both have defended their understanding of experience in the context of major debates in the field of education. Dewey in 1938 after facing major criticism for (...) the idea of a progressive education, which defines the foundations of the the process of learning on experiences rather than on a canon of knowledge. Bollnow positions himself in the methodological dispute of the 1960s and 1970s concerning a philosophical versus an empirical approach in education. Focusing on experience, Bollnow takes a third position in this debate, arguing that experience, while being empirical, needs to be interpreted hermeneutically. Amos points out that Bollnow and Dewey share the quest for orienting education toward experience, but also draws attention to some major differences. Dewey’s account of experience is an optimistic one. Bollnow on the other hand points to the danger of incrustation and rigidity of well-experienced positions. (shrink)

Metrisch gebundene Texte sind aus dem altsprachlichen Unterricht nicht wegzudenken: Vergil, Ovid, Horaz, Catull und Martial sind nur einige typische Autoren für die Dichtungslektüre im Lateinunterricht; Homer, Sophokles und Euripides sind typische Beispiele für den Griechischunterricht. Die Curricula schlagen eine Vielzahl poetischer Texte als mögliche Lektüren vor. Allein diese unvollständige Autorenauswahl zeigt schon, dass man allein mit der Behandlung von daktylischem Hexameter und elegischem Distichon nicht besonders weit kommt, will man nicht die Textauswahl nach solchen rein formalen Kriterien unnötig und (...) unzulässig einschränken oder bei allen anderen Metra so tun, als läse man Prosa. Denn ein solches Vorgehen ermöglicht zwar eine Übersetzung, ein wirkliches Verständnis der Texte bleibt den Schülern aber verwehrt, da ihnen die Wirkung des Metrums, der Einschnitte, der Betonung bestimmter Positionen im Vers und nicht zuletzt ästhetische Aspekte verborgen bleiben oder allenfalls indirekt durch den metrischen Vortrag des Lehrers oder eine stilistische Analyse erschlossen werden. -/- Der vorliegende Band widmet sich daher grundlegenden Fragen zum Thema lateinischer und griechischer Prosodie und Metrik im Unterricht unter Einbeziehung der Lehrpläne und einer Befragung von Lehrkräften. Daneben finden sich Praxisbeispiele zu Catull, Ovid, Terenz und Homer, Überlegungen zur Beziehung von Musik und Metrik sowie eine Anregung zum Dichten in lateinischer Sprache. -/- Mit Beiträgen von: Gregor Bitto, John Bulwer, Fabiola Dengler, Boris Dunsch, Magnus Frisch, Hans-Joachim Glücklich, Christoph Kugelmeier, Immanuel Musäus, Jens Pickenhan, Anna Elissa Radke, Wolfgang Schoedel, Katharina Waack-Erdmann und Heike Wolf. (shrink)

In 1768 Immanuel Kant presented an argument showing the necessity of absolute space, i.e. substantivalism in contrast to relationalism, based on the property of handedness. While there is large consensus about the fallacy of Kant’s argument, a more recent debate exists – mainly stimulated by John Earman – about the status of the Kantian argument in view of modern physics and its fundamentally built-in parity violation, which leads to a preferred handedness. According to Earman the relationalist has no means (...) to distinguish one handedness in the cosmos without reference to an absolute structure of space. After recapitulating the historical background of the Newton/Leibniz debate on the ontological status of space as well as the Kantian argument, this paper offers a systematic consideration of arguments about handedness in modern physics. The goal is to show that “Earman’s challenge” can be rejected. (shrink)

Die Philosophie des Barockscotismus war einerseits durch die rückwärtsgewandte Anknüpfung an den mittelalterlichen Denker Johannes Duns Scotus, andererseits durch die Anknüpfung an die Entwicklung in der zeitgenössischen Scholastik, vor allem der Jesuitenscholastik, geprägt. Welche Art von Metaphysik hat diese besondere philosophiehistorische Konstellation hervorgebracht? Um diese Frage zu beantworten, analysiert die vorliegende Arbeit das Metaphysikwerk des wichtigsten Repräsentanten des frühneuzeitlichen Scotismus, Bartholomaeus Mastrius (1602-1673); sie erschließt außerdem eine Vielzahl von kaum bis gar nicht erforschten Metaphysikwerken aus der Franziskanerscholastik des 17. und (...) 18. Jahrhunderts. Das eigenartige, erstaunliche Vielfalt einschließende Profil einer in Vergessenheit geratenen philosophischen Tradition wird deutlich. Durch den Fokus auf ein philosophiehistorisches Phänomen außerhalb des Mainstreams leistet die Arbeit einen Beitrag zu einer differenzierteren Sichtweise der intellektuellen Kultur der europäischen Frühmoderne. Baroque-age Scotist philosophy was, on the one hand, characterised by recourse to the Medieval thinker John Duns Scotus and, on the other hand, by an adaptation to trends in contemporary scholasticism, first of all that of the Jesuits. What kind of metaphysics did this particular constellation within the history of philosophy produce? In order to answer this question, the present book analyses the work on metaphysics by the most important representative of early modern Scotism, Bartolomeo Mastri (1602-1673). In addition, the book investigates a multitude of scarcely or never studied works on metaphysics from the Franciscan scholastic tradition of the 17th and 18th centuries. The peculiar profile of a forgotten philosophical tradition with its astonishing plurality becomes apparent. By focusing on a phenomenon from the history of philosophy outside the mainstream, this work contributes to a more differentiated view on the intellectual culture in early modern Europe. (shrink)