Michael A. PetersBeijing Normal UniversityMy deepest condolences to Pepe, Dom and Marcus and to Jim’s grandchildren. Tina and I spent a lot of time at the Marshall family home, often attending dinn...

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:ON BEING OR NOT BEING A THOMIST ROBERT E. LAti'DER St. John's University Jamaica, New York Nineteenth-Century Scholasticism: The Search for a Unitary Method. Gerald A. McCool, S.J. New York: Fordham University Press, 1989. 301 pages (paper). From Unity to Pluralism: The Internal Evolution of Thomism. Gerald A. McCool, S.J. New York: Fordham University Press, 1989. 9248 pages (hardcover). BEFORE I READ Gerald A. McCool's two volumes examining nineteenth (...) and twentieth centrury scholast :i:cism and Thomism, if someone had asked my philosophica ;l o:rientation, I would have replied "I am a Thomist." Having rerud McCool's two books, I still and with a strong sense of gratitude articulate my philosophical self-des,ignation as Thomisit, but what I mean by Thomist has become considerably more nuanced. Not only those who identify themselvies with the thought of St. Thomas but a, wider philosophical and theologiea1l community shou1d be grateful to Father McCool for- his eXiceHent scholarly contribution to the understanding of sicholasticism and Thomism. His two volumes show many of us who call ourselves Thomists where we have been an:d wheve we rare and, by illuminating our past,and present, clarify for us our options for the future. Nineteenth-Century Scholasticism was first published under,the title Catholic Theology in the Nineteenth Century by The Seabury Press in 1977, but it has been re-issued hy Fordham University to ruocompany the appearance of his second volume. In this earlier work McCool ohal'ts in detail the growth and 301 30~ ROBERT E. LAUDER d.wection of scholasticism, especially in relation to two influential Chmich documents: the Apostolic Consititu.tion on Faith Dei Filius, solemnly app:rovced in 1870 by the fathers of the First Vatican Council, and Leo XIII's 1879 encyclical Aeterni Patris. The,earlier,document defined and darified the Church's teaching on the supernatural and free charac1te:r of faith and on the relation between supe:matural faith and natural reason; the encydical was a disciplinary document concerning the method of philosophicaJ instruction for priests. McCool \Stresses that the linking of the two documents in the minds of Roman authorities and theologians gave the documents enormous weight and influence during the nineteenth and well into the twentieth century, but now, more than a hundred years fater, their influence is being and r'easses:sed. Though the present situation in Catholic philosophical and theological circles is not a case history reversing itself, it is an extra011dina :ry example of history leruding to the l'eopening of questions ithat,seemed definitivdy dosed. McCool suggests that there are at ~east two factors affecting contemporary Catholic theology which indicate that ·current historical research into nineteenth-century Catholic theology may point to a genuine option between a deveJoped Thomism and a restored pre-Thomistic nineteenth century system: The first of these is the freedom given to Catholic theologians by the Second Vatican Council to experiment with non-Thomistic theological systems. Aetelf'ni Patris no longer enjoys the status of an irrevocable theological option, based on immutable dogmatic and metaphysical principles. Its theological signification has been relativized. Aeterni Patris must now be considered an historical moment in the dialectical progress of theological development. The second distinctive characteristic of contemporary theology is the current ferment over theological method. This means that the nineteenth-century debate, which the official option of Aetelf'ni Patris seemed to have closed definitively, has been reopened. The disciples of SL Thomas and the partisans of the ' new ' theologies are free once more to submit their diverse theological methods to the judgment of their fellow theologians. (p. 6) GERALD MC COOL AND THOMISM 303 McCool views Joseph Kleutgen as the outstanding representativ ;e of the noo-Thomisit.ic movement in the nineteenth century. Kleutgen was trying to strike a balance between the extremes of fideisim and rationalism. He felt strongly thrut if one says positive and speculative theology are nort intrinsically difforent in their intellootua;} questions from a philosophy of·l'leve!Imtion then either natural veason's proper autonomy has to be compromised by a tmditional :fideism or the distinctiveness and gra.tuity of supernatuml knowledge has to be blurred by... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS people will in fact he causally influenced to do B as well. The former is a philosophical issue and the latter is an empirical one. There are many interesting issues in these last three chapters. But the most important planks in Rachels's radical view are his distinction between biological and biographical life and his Bare Difference argument against the active killing/passive letting die distinotion. This hook contains (...) a number of very important moral issues which are rich· ly discussed. But his case against the rtraditional view must ultimately he judged inadequarte. Rachels himself admits that until now the traditional view has been the only one that is sufficiently worked out in a sophisticated and satisfactory way. In my opinion, Rachels's contribution to the discussion has not changed that situartion. J.P. MORELAND Lynchburg, Virginia Radical Hermeneutics: Repetition, Deconstruction and the Hermeneutic Project. By JoHN D. CAPUTO. Studies in Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1987. Pp. 319. Professor Caputo's impressive book, which is composed of an introduction and three parts, is a closely reasoned, scholarly explanation and defense of what its author calls radical hermeneutics. In his Jn. troduction, which he entitles "Restoring Life rto Its Original Difficulty," Caputo presents what he takes to be the problem of trying l:o make sense of contemporary experience, given the thought developments of the last two centuries. Central to Caputo's project is his reading of traditional metaphysics as a betrayal of the human experi· ence of the flux. He claims that, though metaphysics makes a show of beginning with questions, it quickly forecloses those questions as soon as things begin to look uncertain. In Being and Time Heidegger tried to restore the original difficulty of Being that metaphysics had swept under the rug. Viewing Kierkegaard in his pseudonymous masks, such as the disguise of Contantin Constantius, as involved in making life difficult rather than easy, Capuito links the Danish existentialist's con· cerns to Heidegger's. Caputo argues that radical hermeneutics is for the hardy and not for those who seek some way out of the flux. Meta· physics has illegiitimartely claimed some transcendental high ground ac· cording to Caputo, hut radical hermeneutics will have none of that ap· parently consoling hut ultimately unjustifiable comfort. Rather, her· BOOK REVIEWS meneutics wants to describe the difficulrty we are in and rather than rise above the flux " gets up the nerve to stay with it " (p. 3). Caputo's book is evidence of the author's attempt to "get up the nerve to stay with it " and though difficult reading the hook is nonetheless exciting. Caputo argues Philosophy is scandalized by motion and thus tries either to exclude movement outright from real being (Platonism) or more subversively, to portray itself as a friend of movement and thus to lure it into the philosophical house of logical categories (Hegelianism). Kierkegaard objects to the mummifying work of philosophy, not because he thinks that eternity-the sphere of that which lies outside of time and movement -is an illusion, that the real world is a myth (Fabel), as does Nietzsche, but because he thinks that philosophy makes things too easy for itself. It is ready to sneak out the back door of existence as soon as life begins. It does not have the courage for the flux, for the hard work of winning eternity in time, of pushing forward existentially for the prize which lies ahead. It is not eternity as such (Nietzsche's 'real world') to which he objects but philosophy's effete manner of seeking it. He takes the side of becoming against Being, of existence against thought, of existential 'interest' against metaphysics. For it is on the basis of interest that philosophy founders, that metaphysics comes to grief (pp. 11-12). Impressed with :the radicalization which hermeneutics provides, Caputo sees the protohistory of hermeneutics in thinkers such as Kierkegaard, Husserl, Nietzsche, Meister Eckhart, the late Heidegger and even Derrida, who is a critic of hermeneutics. In Part One Caputo discusses Kierkegaardian repetition and Husserlian conS. (shrink)

This study considers freedom of speech and the rules of engagement in the public sphere; good government, civic responsibility, and public education; and the foundations of religion and society, as seen through the eyes of seventeenth-century Dutch philosopher, Spinoza.

The central role played by Darwin's analogy between selection under domestication and that under nature has been adequately appreciated, but I have indicated how important the domesticated organisms also were to other elements of Darwin's theory of evolution-his recognition of “the constant principle of change,” for instance, of the imperfection of adaptation, and of the extent of variation in nature. The further development of his theory and its presentation to the public likewise hinged on frequent reference to domesticates.We have seen (...) that Darwin's reliance on the analogy between domesticated varieties and wild species was a bold and original step, in light of contemporary views on the nature of domesticates. However, as Darwin undoubtedly foresaw, his reliance on the analogy created difficulties as well as solving problems, and these began with his Malthusian codiscoverer of the principle of natural selection, Alfred Russel Wallace. Wallace's paper “On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type,” presented to the Linnean Scoiety along with the first public unveiling of Darwin's theory, states: We see, then, that no inferences as to varieties in a state of nature can be deduced from the observation of those occurring among domestic animals. The two are so much opposed to each other in every circumstance of their existence, that what applies to the one is almost sure not to apply to the other. Domestic animals are abnormal, irregular, artificial; they are subject to varieties which never occur and never can occur in a state of nature.62Much has been made of the similarity of views of Darwin and Wallace, but this quotation surely reveals how utterly different their views were on what to Darwin was an important matter. Several critics of the Origin saw Darwin's reliance on the domesticates as his Achilles heel. As Young has pointed out, Samuel Wilberforce included the following passage in his attack on the Origin: Nor must we pass over unnoticed the transference of the argument from the domesticated to the untamed animals. Assuming that man as the selector can do much in a limited time, Mr. Darwin argues that Nature, a more powerful, a more continuous power, working over vastly extended ranges of time, can do more. But why should Nature, so uniform and persistent in all her operations, tend in this instance to change? Why should she become a selector of varieties?63Another critic, Fleeming Jenkin, found the analogy a weakness in Darwin's theory because of the limited extent of variation in any one direction in domestic animals and plants.64 We have already seen that Darwin had confided a similar view to his notebook thirty years earlier, but changed his mind as a result of his profound study of domesticates. De Beer's reference to “an English country gentleman's knowledge of domestic plants and animals and their breeding”65 fails totally to recognize the originality and depth of Darwin's knowledge of domesticates.Why did Darwin, against the currents of his time, rely so heavily on mankind's experience with domesticated organisms to shape his theory about species in nature? On reason is that only with domesticates was an approach that came close to experimental verification possible. Darwin fully realized the inadequacies of the experiment, as is emphasized by his repeated contrasting of selection under nature and selection by man. Yet the extensive experience and data of plant and animal breeders offered the only reliable base against which Darwin could continually challenge his views. As he wrote in the introduction to Variation, with domestication, “man ... may be said to have been trying an experiment on a gigantic scale.”66 Given Darwin's high opinion of the quantitative work of Malthus and Quetelet (as emphasized by Schweber),67 and his unremitting efforts to secure data by which to test his theories, it was inevitable that he should attach high significance to domesticated varieties. John Tyndall, in his Belfast address of 1874, said: “The strength of the doctrine of Evolution consists, not in experimental demonstration (for the subject is hardly accessible to this mode of proof), but in its general harmony with scientific thought.”68 Darwin would have agreed with the latter thought, but I think he would have challenged the preceding one on the grounds that long experience with domesticated varieties did provide an element of experimental demonstration. It gave him confidence in his theory, and he used his vast knowledge of artificial selection boldly and creatively. (shrink)

Next SectionObjective The purpose of this article is to investigate the need for ethics support in Dutch healthcare institutions in order to understand why ethics support is often not used in practice and which factors are relevant in this context. Methods This study had a mixed methods design integrating quantitative and qualitative research methods. Two survey questionnaires, two focus groups and 17 interviews were conducted among board members and ethics support staff in Dutch healthcare institutions. Findings Most respondents see a (...) need for ethics support. This need is related to the complexity of contemporary healthcare, the contribution of ethics support to the core business of the organisation and to the surplus value of paying structural attention to ethical issues. The need for ethics support is, however, not unconditional. Reasons for a lacking need include: aversion of innovations, negative associations with the notion of ethics support service, and organisational factors like resources and setting. Conclusion There is a conditioned need for ethics support in Dutch healthcare institutions. The promotion of ethics support in healthcare can be fostered by focusing on formats which fit the needs of (practitioners in) healthcare institutions. The emphasis should be on creating a (culture of) dialogue about the complex situations which emerge daily in contemporary healthcare practice. (shrink)

The research presented in this volume demonstrates that it is no longer reasonable to ask whether or not synesthesia is real--we must now ask how we can account ...

The deadly attacks on a public meeting and on a Jewish citizen in Copenhagen in February 2015 have given rise to a vast amount of public discussion and interpretation of the events themselves, their background, their causes, their significance, and their repercussions. During these discussions, various conceptions of publicness and public space have been articulated. Indeed, one may view the killings as a ‘critical discourse moment’ in which a range of discourses have been employed to help interpret, understand, and deal (...) with what happened. In several of these discourses, conceptions of publicness play a central part. This article sets out to investigate the conceptions of publicness that were articulated in the Danish public spheres following the attacks. The article maps out some of the key different and partly contradictory notions of publicness that the reactions to the killings brought to the fore. The investigation thus focuses on the articulation of normative expectations and ideals of public spheres, on the limitations and restrictions that were acknowledged, and on the main societal problems and national contexts to which publicness was viewed as related. The analysis will cover national newspapers and center on the discursive resources of the media elite in early responses to the attacks, for example in editorials, or comments by writers, academics, debaters, and intellectuals. (shrink)

This paper sketches some developments in the discussion of liberal nationalism since the early 1990s and proposes a generic understanding of nationalism according to which its main feature is the act of sorting people into members and non-members of the nation with a view to regulating access to political goods linked to the state. One discussion of liberal nationalism that has recently received renewed attention is the relation between nationalism and multiculturalism. Liberal nationalism sees nationalism as a response to increased (...) diversity and involves normative demands on nationalism for accommodating this diversity. In light of the proposed generic understanding of nationalism, the question arises whether such a liberal nationalism is coherent. This question requires us to distinguish between a substantive and a performative perspective on nationalism, raising the possibility that liberal nationalism can be substantively coherent but performatively incoherent. (shrink)

In this essay we discuss a class of apparently metaphorical idioms, exemplified by “fine as frog's hair,” that do not afford any obvious interpretation, and appear to have originated, at least in part, in language play. We review recent trends in both play theory and metaphor theory, and show that a playful approach to language is often an important element in the use and understanding of metaphors (and idioms generally), even when metaphors can be readily interpreted by means of a (...) vehicle-to-topic mapping. Based on this evidence we call for a more deliberate inclusion of language play in metaphor theory and analysis. (shrink)

My comment makes a point out ofRousseau's original insight: that education forsocial participation ought to start within thestudent's lifeworld, and not, as in our days, with the immediatedemands of modern, time-ridden consumerculture. When time is turned into a commodityand place is turned into a transit point forpeople constantly on the move, presence in acommon lifeworld is lost. I take issue with thedominant thinking of education in terms of timeand efficiency, and suggest that we startthinking of education more in terms of (...) placeand presence. I propose that modern thinkers ofeducation – of which I mention a few here –contributed significantly to the pedagogy ofplace or presence. I don't see time as a stringmade up of past-present-future, but rather asan expanding mental and pragmatic universe ofhere-and-nows. The term kairos catchesthis presence as the capacity for doing theright thing at the right moment, that is, themoment when the past has prepared the ground sothat the future can come as a gift. Thisconception is, I think, an important ground forthe idea of an education for citizenship. (shrink)