This paper correlates community service goals from 82 business firms with various organizational characteristics, including goals, niches, structure, context, and performance. The results demonstrate that community-service goals are positively correlated with prestige goals, assets goals, superior-design niche, net assets size, and performance on income to net assets. Community-service goals, however, were not significantly correlated with profit goals, low-price niche, multiplicity of outputs, workflow continuity, qualifications, or centralization, as expected.

In the Preface to the Three Dialogues<, Berkeley says that one of his main aims is to refute the free-thinkers. Puzzlingly, however, we are then treated to a dialogue between two Christians in which the free-thinkers never reappear. This is related to a second, more general puzzle about Berkeley's religious polemics: although Berkeley says he is defending orthodox conclusions, he also reminds himself in his notebooks "To use the utmost Caution not to give the least Handle of offence to the (...) Church or Church-men." What is Berkeley worried about? Both of these puzzles are solved by the recognition that the argument against matter in the Three Dialogues is patterned after an argument for atheism that Berkeley attributed to Anthony Collins. Berkeley's aim is thus to use the free-thinkers' own premises and arguments against them. In doing this, however, he rejects doctrines many churchmen held dear -- most notably, the doctrine of divine analogy. (shrink)

These essays emerged from papers presented under the auspices of the American Academy of Religion. This volume contributes to scholarship that explores Christianity's role in modernity, the ongoing implications of historical controversies, and the importance of history in Christian theology.

This essay explores the impact of the ancient principle of the freedom of the Church—identified by the Second Vatican Council as “the fundamental principle” governing “the relations between the Church and governments and the whole civil order”—on both Western civilization and the development of modern Catholic social thought. Arguing that this principle requires the articulation and institutionalization of a new understanding of society and government, it contends this principle revolutionized the structure of Western political life and helped lay the groundwork (...) for Western liberty. At the same time, it maintains that the development in contemporary Catholic social teaching that crystallizes in Dignitatis Humanae must be seen in the context of the ongoing effort of Catholic thought to understand the nature and role of the state towards which the idea of the freedom of the Church points. (shrink)

Berkeley's philosophy is meant to be a defense of commonsense. However, Berkeley's claim that the ultimate constituents of physical reality are fleeting, causally passive ideas appears to be radically at odds with commonsense. In particular, such a theory seems unable to account for the robust structure which commonsense (and Newtonian physics) takes the world to exhibit. The problem of structure, as I understand it, includes the problem of how qualities can be grouped by their co-occurrence in a single enduring object (...) and how these enduring objects can bear spatiotemporal, causal, and other relations to one another. I argue that Berkeley's solution to these problems lies in his views about language. At one level, human language allows us to exploit patterns in our perceptions to construct a highly structured representation of the physical world which allows us to make accurate predictions at minimal cognitive expense. At a deeper level, these patterns occur in perception because our perceptions themselves form a language in which God speaks to us. (shrink)

Each author first presents his own side, and then they interact through two rounds of objections and replies. Pedagogical features include standard form arguments, section summaries, bolded key terms and principles, a glossary, and annotated reading lists.

Traditionally, religious doctrines and practices have been divided into two categories. Those that purport to be justified by natural reason alone are said to be part of natural religion, while those which purport to be justified only by appeal to supernatural revelation are said to be part of revealed religion. One of the central aims of Berkeley's philosophy is to understand and defend both the doctrines and the practices of both natural and revealed (Christian) religion. This chapter will provide a (...) survey of this aspect of Berkeley's thought. (shrink)

Contemporary discussions of the epistemology of testimony are often framed in terms of the disagreement on this topic between Hume and Reid. However, it is widely assumed that, prior to Hume, philosophers in the grip of Enlightenment individualism neglected philosophical questions about testimony, simply treating testimony as ordinary empirical evidence. In fact, although the evidential model of testimony was popular in early modern philosophy, it was also the subject of vigorous debate. This chapter examines Locke's defence of the evidential model (...) of testimony along with the opposing views of three early critics of Locke: G. W. Leibniz, Mary Astell, and Peter Browne. (shrink)

Orthodox Christianity affirms a bodily resurrection of the dead. That is, Christians believe that at some point in the eschatological future, possibly after a period of (conscious or unconscious) disembodied existence, we will once again live and animate our own bodies. However, our bodies will also undergo radical qualitative transformation. This creates a serious problem: how can a body persist across both temporal discontinuity and qualitative transformation? After discussing this problem as it appears in contemporary philosophical literature on the resurrection, (...) I will argue that George Berkeley's immaterialist metaphysics is more successful than either physicalism or dualism in escaping objections to resurrection based on the problem of qualitative transformation. In order to accomplish this, I will first discuss Berkeley's views on the metaphysics of so-called 'ordinary' objects, including human bodies, and then apply this view to the resurrection of the dead, ultimately showing that, for Berkeley, the radical transformation of the body in the resurrection is no more problematic than the case of a straight oar appearing bent when one end is inserted in water. (shrink)

METAPHYSICS is the most controversial and controverted of the philosophical disciplines. I want to argue, nevertheless, that if it did not already exist in some form, then it would be necessary to invent it. For the need to think fundamentally is not incidental to the inquiring energy of the human mind. That energy has taken form as myth, meditation, and reflection among a variety of peoples of diverse cultures. In our rather abstract and articulate culture, however, fundamental thinking has taken (...) the rational, argumentative and conceptual form of discourse. (shrink)

2. The title has been carefully chosen. It has three terms: being, immediacy, and articulation. The argument is such that, if one of the three collapses into another, the battle is lost. The threatened term is being. For if being is absorbed into immediacy, an exaggerated realism results. But if being is absorbed into articulation, idealism results; and that, it seems, is greatly to be deplored. Being, then, is the prize between "Immediatists" and "Articulatists." If being is reduced to articulation, (...) then whatever it is that the "Immediatist" seeks to save will have been lost. And if being is reduced to immediacy, then articulation will be alien to being, and so will philosophy. It is against this second reduction that Professor Smith chiefly argues, because it is the current one-sided wisdom which makes genuine philosophy impossible. (shrink)

Nevertheless, some of Stirling's students did contract virulent forms of Hegelian speculation. What attracted Stirling and others is indicated in his description of how he first came to know of Hegel.

THE THEME, "The Intelligibility of Nature," is exceedingly broad. It stretches like a vast domain in which one can only hope to leave a few footprints, some fragile impressions that are all but lost in the expanse. In attempting to understand the natural world, the enterprise that is most familiar to many of us is inherited from the Greeks and their Latin heirs, both classical and mediaeval, and this enterprise continues in our own day in the form of the modern (...) sciences of nature. Nowadays, we are more informed about the knowledge acquired by the Egyptians, Babylonians, and others prior to the Greeks. We are more conscious of the achievements of the Chinese in physics and the Indians in mathematics. And we are more aware of the medical and zoological lore present in oral traditions, such as those of Africa. Moreover, we are only now beginning to appreciate their contributions and their potential for new forms of enquiry, including other ways of approaching nature. The terms in which the topic is here designated, however, are conceived in Greek and expressed in Latin. Nevertheless, even within this cultural tradition of natural enquiry, the topic is quite broad enough. Like a grammarian of old parsing a sentence, I am forced to begin by distinguishing parts of the theme. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:THE GOD OF LOVE * KENNETH L. SCHMITZ John Paul II Institute Washington, D.C. GOD WITHOUT BEING introduces English readers to a body of work by the French philosopher, Jean-Luc Marion. It has caused no little stir among French philosophers and theologians. For it is a remarkable book, frequently brilliant, sometimes dazzling, often original, more often still, troubling. Troubling, not so much by its conclusions as by the (...) means used to arrive at them, and the implications suggested by those means. The book begins with phenomenology, passes on to ontology in the Heideggerian vein, and culminates in a theology of agapic love. I almost wrote that it passes through Heideggerian ontology to agape, but that is what is most troubling about the book. One puts it down wondering, despite critical reassurances from the author, whether the analysis has ever freed itself from the shaping hand of Heideggerian ontology, or has done so at too high a cost. It is not that the author accepts Heidegger; indeed his critical exegesis is perhaps the most brilliant part of a very striking book. But nonetheless, Heidegger's stamp is so heavy upon the analysis, his presuppositions so ingrained in it, that the conclusions themselves, while expressly "beyond" Heidegger, nevertheless trail his ontology in their train. In a preface written nearly ten years after the French book first appeared, Marion reassures his English readers (perhaps with a touch of unintended condescension) that God exists. In- *Jean-Luc Marion, God Without Being. Hors-Texte, tr. by Thos. A. Carlson. \Vith a foreword by David Tracy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991; being a translation of Dieu sans l'etre: Hors-Texte, Librairie Artheme Fayard, 1982. 495 496 KENNETH L. SCHMITZ deed, his argument is meant to tell against any ordinary atheism, and his exposition of the Eucharist glows with Catholic piety. There can be no doubt, too, that his exegesis often opens up surprising senses of the Biblical texts, such as those of the Wisdom literature in the Old Testament and the letters of St. Paul in the New. The first chapter carries out a phenomenology of the difference between the idol and the icon. The idol is not false or illusory in any ordinary sense. On the contrary, its luminescence is an actual reflection of the divine. The fulguration catches the human eye, mind and spirit as it gazes at the embodied manifestation in wonder. But, instead of letting the fulguration measure the import of the disclosure, the gaze stops at the luminous idol and freezes the divine light within the scope of the worshipper's merely human gaze, interest and aim. The aim, then, provides the measure and meaning of the light, referring it back to the human intention. And so the idol divides the fulguration, retaining for the gaze what is so extraordinarily visible, while it lets go what is unattainable through its effort and on its own terms. Marion expresses this remainder by the neologism: invisable, from viser: to aim. We have here an initial insistence upon the inability to reduce God to a concept. The analysis exposes the logic of a first level of idolatry, idolatry which takes form as the regionalization of the divine. Thus, to choose a portentous example, Nietzsche unmasks the regional " God of morality" proclaimed by Kant and other modern thinkers. It is quite the reverse with the icon. The luminosity of the icon presents its visage to the believer who receives it as the face that endows the visible with the inexhaustible invisibility of God. It is of signal importance to Marion's thesis, however, that the invisible is not thereby offered to human sight or conception, but rather that the visible features of the icon ask to be transgressed, giving way-neither to the sight of sense or mind-but to veneration ( 19). For the iconic intention is not determined by any human gaze, but rather by the mysterious initiative of the true revealing God. Whereas the idol shines with a radiance bor- THE GOD OF LOVE 497 rowed from the divine but confined within the limits of the human gaze, the icon glows with an alien glance that stems from its divine... (shrink)

In one of his earlier essays he offered a sketch of what a philosophy ought to accomplish. It includes elements which have remained constant throughout thirty years of philosophical activity. He wrote then that the task of philosophy remains what it has always been: to "explain, not explain away, the world we all in some sense know." Prodded by the irritant of science and helped with the newly powerful instrument of modern logic, philosophy must build a system of explanation without (...) reduction. His later philosophy vigorously defends non-scientific ways of understanding and resists any capitulation of philosophy to science or logic, but both remain important for an adequate philosophy. The history of philosophy becomes perhaps even more important as time passes. PIP is taken up with long and intricate reflections on philosophers of every time and sort. In his early sketch, nevertheless, the history of philosophy is said to be valuable for avoiding past mistakes. The five errors he singles out have as their counterpart the embryonic concerns of the modal philosophy. (shrink)

According to classical theism, the universe depends on God in a way that goes beyond mere (efficient) causation. I have previously argued that this ‘deep dependence’ of the universe on God is best understood as a type of grounding. In a recent paper in this journal, Aaron Segal argues that this doctrine of deep dependence causes problems for creaturely free will: if our choices are grounded in facts about God, and we have no control over these facts, then we do (...) not control our choices and are therefore not free. This amounts to a grounding analogue of the Consequence Argument for the incompatibility of free will and determinism. If successful, it would have application beyond classical theism: similar concerns would apply to any view that takes our choices to be grounded in a deeper reality which is beyond our control. However, I show that the argument is not successful. Segal’s Grounding Consequence Argument is so closely analogous to the Causal Consequence Argument that any response to the one provides a response to the other. As a result, if you don’t think that prior causes (whether deterministic or indeterministic) undermine free will, you shouldn’t think that prior grounds undermine free will. (shrink)

This paper provides a new defence against the logical problem of evil, based on the naturalistic functional/teleological theory of mind (NFT). I argue that if the NFT is self-consistent then it is consistent with theism. Further, the NFT entails that it is not possible for created minds to exist in the absence of evil. It follows that if the NFT is self-consistent then the existence of God is consistent with the existence of evil.

An infinitary characterisation of the first-order sentences true in all substructures of a structure M is used to obtain partial reduction of the decision problem for such sentences to that for Th(M). For the relational structure $\langle\mathbf{R}, \leq, +\rangle$ this gives a decision procedure for the ∃ x∀ y-part of the theory of all substructures, yet we show that the ∃ x 1x 2 ∀ y-part, and the entire theory, is Π 1 1 -complete. The theory of all ordered subsemigroups (...) of $\langle\mathbf{R}, \leq, +\rangle$ is also shown Π 1 1 -complete. Applications in the philosophy of science are mentioned. (shrink)

This essay seeks to dispel two common misunderstandings of the argument of We Hold These Truths. Contrary to what is sometimes asserted, it argues, Murray does not turn the American founding into an expression of Thomistic political theory. Although he emphasizes the Christian and medieval roots of the American democratic experiment, Murray also recognizes—even if he does not explore the point systematically—the imprint left on the American founding bydistinctively modern intellectual currents. Likewise, it maintains that although the rejection of the (...) natural law tradition under the impact of Enlightenment rationalism figures prominently in Murray’s account of the crisis of the modern West, Murray’s account of the role of natural law in this crisis must be seen against the backdrop of a broader analysis whose focus is theological and spiritual in nature, and which sees the ultimate source of this crisis in modern culture’s rejection of Christian revelation. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Gadamer On Art, Morality, and AuthorityKenneth L. BuckmanMary Devereaux claims that the problem of morality in the twentieth century and the anxiety caused by the fear of moral chaos fall into two main responses: (1) one looks to the past because the past seems to afford what the present lacks, i.e., a commonly shared and stable moral reality; and (2) one looks to the present and comes to terms (...) with the way things are, a strategy of accommodation that revises our over inflated notions of knowledge and justification, particularly moral justification. 1 She sees Gadamer’s work as an additional option that responds to this problem. Devereaux says Gadamer’s response to the collapse of traditional morality is a turn to the experience of art wherein one derives morals from an extra-moral sense. Thus, Gadamer’s aesthetic example serves as a source of moral value. Devereaux says Gadamer’s project fails, in that his account contains an optimistic and unquestioned assumption that art always operates to our benefit (p. 71). However, Gadamer is appreciative of the deficiencies and dangers inherent in the kind of view he holds and does not hold an excessively optimistic, romanticized, naive, or prescriptive view of tradition. Gadamer’s account is a descriptive explication of the manner in which societies acquire the authority to form values.Devereaux’s account is to a large extent fair and accurate. However, despite her empathy with Gadamer’s account, she has reservations about the accuracy of Gadamer’s description of art and questions the depth to which he understands the current ethical crisis. She maintains that Gadamer’s analysis indicates a preference for a certain kind of art [End Page 144] (i.e., classical), and much of twentieth-century art (Tinguely, Cage, Burden, etc.) is outside the purview of Gadamer’s analysis. Though each individual artwork, in Gadamer’s view, can serve as a metaphor for ordering in general, Burden et al. aim, “not simply to introduce new materials or new subject matter within an existing artistic framework, but to alter the frame” (p. 69). These artists reconceive the very nature of artistic activity and change the rules by substituting the accidental, the incomplete, and the self-contradictory in place of selection and craft (pp. 69–70). Recent artistic principles have deconstructed the notion of order, showing the failure of order itself. Should we even grant that certain types of traditional art function as Gadamer has indicated? Though we might hope for the desired result of moral cohesion, Devereaux says, we are still faced with the problem of availability and the extent to which a person’s contact with art generates the necessary moral education. Her most serious charge is Gadamer’s “unquestioned assumption” that art always operates to our benefit (p. 71). The reliance on shared tradition, Devereaux argues, positions Gadamer to argue that the interaction with texts serves the positive moral function of social cohesion. However, Gadamer’s willingness to assign normative authority to tradition opens him to serious charges of conservatism, most prominently from the criticism and viewpoint of feminists and black scholars, and he “does not acknowledge those for whom the authority of that tradition is deeply and unquestionably problematic. Might not a coherent tradition, if achieved, function oppressively?” (p. 71). Devereaux claims that Gadamer rejects this possibility.Devereaux’s criticisms thus fall into these five areas: (1) Gadamer privileges a certain kind of art (i.e., classical); (2) for Gadamer art serves as an ordering, but it does not fulfill that capacity; (3) Gadamer is unclear about the availability and the degree of contact members of a society must have with art in order for the artwork to function in its moral capacity; (4) Gadamer wrongly assumes that art always operates to our benefit; and (5) Gadamer’s acceptance of the normative authority of tradition is oppressive. Devereaux errs in all of these criticisms.Devereaux’s criticism of Gadamer’s aesthetic theory in general, disconnected for the moment from its supposed moral implications, is that his analysis is concerned with traditional or classical forms of art, ignoring the less integrative forms of art of the late twentieth century. Though it may... (shrink)

If Hegel's philosophy were to be characterized by a phrase, it might be “The Dialectical System of Absolute Spirit.” The phrase would seem formidable to some but merely pretentious to others. There are recent signs of an exhumation of the systematic features of Hegel's philosophy in the English-speaking world, and it is to be hoped that the durable clichés of an earlier English period will not prevent a fresh look at Hegel's philosophy. There is, of course, no denying his systematic (...) ambitions, nor any wish on my part to do so. It is just these that I find fascinating. He sought to bring within a comprehensive intellectual order the whole of reality—and a little more besides, say his detractors. In the Phenomenology of Spirit by a turbulent dialectic he scrabblesup to the top of Mount Parnassus in order to clutch the petticoats of the Absolute. In the Science of Logic and in the first part of the Encyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences he lays out the logical paradigm of intellectual necessities which are subsequently exhibited in the philosophy of nature and of concrete spirit. (shrink)

The central unifying element in the philosophy of Peter Browne is his theory of analogy. Although Browne's theory was originally developed to deal with some problems about religious language, Browne regards analogy as a general purpose cognitive mechanism whereby we substitute an idea we have to stand for an object of which we, strictly speaking, have no idea. According to Browne, all of our ideas are ideas of sense, and ideas of sense are ideas of material things. Hence we can (...) conceive of spiritual things – including even our own spirit – only by analogy. One interesting application Browne makes of his theory is an account of how concepts such as knowledge can be correctly applied to beings that have no intrinsic properties in common, such as non-human animals, humans, angels, and God. I argue that this is best understood as what, in the contemporary literature, is known as a ‘multiple realizability’ problem and that Browne's solution to this problem has important similarities to functionalist theories in recent philosophy of mind. (shrink)

This paper investigates the differences in perceptions between business students and service-sector managers regarding the role that ethics and social responsibility serve in determining organizational effectiveness. An organizational effectiveness instrument containing business ethics and social responsibility items served as a questionnaire for a sample of 151 senior business undergraduates and 53 service-sector managers. The results indicated that while students acting as managers rate some social responsibility issues as more important than do managers, they also rate ethical conduct and a few (...) dimensions of social responsibility lower than do managers. The findings have direct implications for both business practitioners and educators. (shrink)