Virginia Woolf mentions the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer by name only once in her writings, in a book review published in the Times Literary Supplement in 1917.1 Viscount Harberton, author of the book she is reviewing, argues initially that knowledge gained from books is inferior to that derived from practical experience, but later makes a special case for two writers—Schopenhauer and Herbert Spencer. "No praise is too high for them," comments Woolf sarcastically. In "their books, we are told, we (...) shall find the secret of the universe. After all, then, Lord Harberton is merely one of those cultivated people who play the innocent for a holiday. Still, one reader will give him the benefit of the doubt and take his... (shrink)

Jianjun Mei: Cultural Interaction between China and Central Asia during the Bronze Age Charles Higham: The Origins of the Civilization of Angkor Ralph Hanna: Yorkshire Writers Christopher Ricks: Shakespeare and the Anagram Tony Wrigley: The Quest for the Industrial Revolution Linda Colley: 'This Small Island': Britain, Size and Empire Murray Pittock: Robert Burns and British Poetry Peter Pulzer: Special Paths or Main Roads? Making Sense of German History Wolf Lepenies: Overestimating Culture: A German Problem. Exile and Emigration, The Survival of (...) German Culture Angela Leighton: Elegies of Form in Bishop, Plath, Stevenson Nicholas Stern: Development as a Process of Change: Toward a Dynamic Public Economics Lord Woolf: Human Rights: Have the Public Benefitted? (shrink)

This new book prints a collection of updated lectures and papers written and delivered by Lord Woolf since 1986, following his retirement in 2005 from the office of Lord Chief Justice and a judicial career that has covered part or all of the last four decades. Lord Woolf expresses his personal views and provides a panoramic insight into the main law reforms over this period. The title The Pursuit of Justice reflects Lord Woolf's (...) determination to see that justice is done in the English courts. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:June 25, 2012 (9:21 pm) E:\CPBR\RUSSJOUR\TYPE3201\russell 32,1 060 red.wpd russell: the Journal of Bertrand Russell Studies n.s. 32 (summer 2012): 83–6 The Bertrand Russell Research Centre, McMaster U. issn 0036-01631; online 1913-8032 ibliographies, rchival nventories, ndexes A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF PATRICIA RUSSELL Kenneth Blackwell Russell Archives/Russell Research Centre / McMaster U. Hamilton, on, Canada l8s 4l6 [email protected] B ertrand Russell took his own advice not to marry a woman novelist, (...) but he did marry women who wrote for publication. His third wife, Patricia Russell (née Marjorie Spence, then Patricia Helen Spence, and, after divorcing Russell, Mrs. P.yH. Spence) was no exception. Having studied history at Oxford, she did a great deal of research for Russell and some actual writing. She did some public speaking during the ccny case in 1940, and in 1946 she organized a major meeting in Cambridge for the Save Europe Now organization. Later in the 1940s she began employment in town planning, and brief mentions of that topic show up in Authority and the Individualz (1949). The Bodleian Library, Oxford, has a box of her papers, placed, at her instructions, under a very lengthy embargo. On one occasion while they were in America there was an employment opportunity for her. It involved her writing skills, and her husband drafted the following testimonial. With its strikeouts, it is unWnished in the form in which it survives, and we cannot be sure it was sent. It is dated December 6, 1941. My wife, Patricia Helen Russell, has, throughout the last ten years acted both as my collaborator and as my secretary. In the latter capacity she has drafted and written, on my behalf, letters on a great variety of subjects, and has shown great skill in doing so, both as regards literary style and grasp of the matter concerned. As regards collaboration: In “Freedom and Organization, 1814–1914”, she did a very large part of the research and a considerable part of the actual writing. In “The Amberley Papers”, which was published under our joint names, she did considerably more than half the work, not only as regards detail, but also as regards the general plan. In addition to this work on books, she has written magazine articles on my behalf, sometimes in part, sometimes wholly. Her purely secretarial work has been very extensive and always admirable. (ra1 142.079883) books By “the last ten years” Russell is dating the start of their collaboration to 1932. This is consistent with the acknowledgements he makes to her in several books on which she collaborated with him in various ways, in addition to her title-page June 25, 2012 (9:21 pm) E:\CPBR\RUSSJOUR\TYPE3201\russell 32,1 060 red.wpd 84 kenneth blackwell 1 See Brett Lintott, “Russell’s Aborted Book on Fascism”, Russellz 28 (2008): 39–64. credit in The Amberley Papers. They even planned a joint work, on the rise of Nazism and Fascism,1 but after some years it was discontinued. She contributed much to the unpublished book manuscript, “The Problems of Democracy”, written in 1941–42. Freedom and Organization, 1814–1914. London: George Allen & Unwin; New York: W.xW. Norton, 1934. Preface, p. viii: “Throughout the writing of this book, the work has been shared by my collaborator, Peter Spence, who has done half the research, a large part of the planning, and small portions of the actual writing, besides making innumerable valuable suggestions.” (The Wrst edition omitted “valuable” and an erratum slip was inserted.) In Praise of Idleness and Other Essays. London : George Allen & Unwin; New York: W.xW. Norton, 1935. Preface, p. 6: “I have also to acknowledge the assistance of Peter Spence in suggesting and discussing many of the subjects.” The Amberley Papers: the Letters and Diaries of Lord and Lady Amberley. Edited by Bertrand and Patricia Russell. 2 vols. London: Leonard & Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press; New York: W.yW. Norton & Company, 1937. The preface is signed “B.R.” above “P.R.” From Russell’s letter to The Times Literary Supplement, 20 March 1937: “Your reviewer treats the work as more mine and less my wife’s... (shrink)

In his autobiography, Mr Leonard Woolf very forcibly protests Lord Keynes's familiar account of the kind of influence G. E. Moore had exerted over those who were later to become members of the Bloomsbury Group. You will remember that Keynes, writing in 1938 about his early beliefs as an undergraduate at Cambridge, maintained of himself and his companions: ‘We accepted Moore's religion … and discarded his morals … meaning by “religion” one's attitude towards oneself and the ultimate and (...) by “morals” one's attitude towards the outside world and the intermediate. (shrink)

The interactions between literature and science and between literature and psychoanalysis have been among the most thriving areas for interdisciplinary study in recent years. Work in these 'open fields' has taught us to recognize the interdependence of different cultures of knowledge and experience, revealing the multiple ways in which science, literature, and psychoanalysis have been mutually enabling and defining, as well as corrective and contestatory of each other. Inspired by Gillian Beer's path-breaking work on literature and science, this volume presents (...) fourteen new essays by leading American and British writers. They focus on the evolutionary sciences in the nineteeth-century; the early years of psychoanalysis, from Freud to Ella Freeman Sharpe; and the modern development of the physical sciences. Drawing on recent debates within the history of science, psychoanalytic literary criticism, intellectual history, and gender studies, the volume makes a major contribution to our understanding of the formation of knowledge. Among its recurrent themes are: curiosity and epistemology; 'growth', 'maturity', and 'coming of age' as structuring metaphors ; taxonomy; sleep and dreaming and elusive knowledge; the physiology of truth; and the gender politics of scientific theory and practice. The essays also reflect Beer's extensive influence as a literary critic, with close readings of works by Charlotte Brontë, Alfred Lord Tennyson, George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, Henry James, Oscar Wilde, H. G. Wells, Edith Ayrton Zangwill, Charlotte Haldane, Virginia Woolf, George Orwell, and Karin Boye. (shrink)

Cicero's philosophical works introduced Latin audiences to the ideas of the Stoics, Epicureans and other schools and figures of the post-Aristotelian period, thus influencing the transmission of those ideas through later history. While Cicero's value as documentary evidence for the Hellenistic schools is unquestioned, Cicero: The Philosophy of a Roman Sceptic explores his writings as works of philosophy that do more than simply synthesize the thought of others, but instead offer a unique viewpoint of their own. In this volume Raphael (...) Woolf describes and evaluates Cicero's philosophical achievements, paying particular attention to his relation to those philosophers he draws upon in his works, his Romanizing of Greek philosophy, and his own sceptical and dialectical outlook. The volume aims, using the best tools of philosophical, philological and historical analysis, to do Cicero justice as a distinctive philosophical voice. Situating Cicero's work in its historical and political context, this volume provides a detailed analysis of the thought of one of the finest orators and writers of the Roman period. Written in an accessible and engaging style, Cicero: The Philosophy of a Roman Sceptic is a key resource for those interested in Cicero's role in shaping Classical philosophy. (shrink)

This paper argues for the presence in Plato’s work of a conception of thinking central to which is what I call the Transparency View. According to this view, in order for a subject to think of a given object, the subject must represent that object just as it is, without inaccuracy or distortion. I examine the ways in which this conception influences Plato’s epistemology and metaphysics and explore some ramifications for contemporary views about mental content.

This paper addresses the question of whether or not Epicurus was a psychological hedonist. Did he, that is, hold that all human action, as a matter of fact, has pleasure as its goal? Or was he just an ethical hedonist, asserting merely that pleasure ought to be the goal of human action? I discuss a recent forceful attempt by John Cooper to answer the latter question in the affirmative, and argue that he fails to make his case. There is considerable (...) evidence in favour of a psychological reading of Epicurean hedonism, evidence that includes some of the very texts that Cooper cites in support of the ethical reading. (shrink)

In A Room of One's Own and Three Guineas, Virginia Woolf considers with energy and wit the implications of the historical exclusion of women from education and from economic independence. In A Room of One's Own, she examines the work of past women writers, and looks ahead to a time when women's creativity will not be hampered by poverty, or by oppression. In Three Guineas, however, Woolf argues that women's historical exclusion offers them the chance to form a (...) political and cultural identity which could challenge the drive towards fascism and war. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more. (shrink)

Fraud and misconduct in scientific research appears to be increasing since 1980 when several cases were disclosed. Earlier instances were handled awkwardly, but the scientific community has since mobilized and issued guidelines about responding to allegations of misconduct and about the responsible conduct of research. Scientists, editors and the institutions of science are slowly learning how to cope with this problem.

It is a truism that agents can do the right action for the right reason. To put the point in terms more familiar to ethicists, it is a truism that one’s motivating reason can be one’s normative reason. In this short note, I will argue that Jonathan Dancy’s preferred view about how this is possible faces a dilemma. Dancy has the choice between accounting for two plausible constraints while at the same time holding an outlandish philosophy of mind by his (...) own lights or giving up his view's central tenet. At the end, I will suggest a view similar to Dancy’s that avoids the dilemma. (shrink)

Normative reasons have become a popular theoretical tool in recent decades. One helpful feature of normative reasons is their weight. The fourteen new essays in this book theorize about many different aspects of weight. Topics range from foundational issues to applications of weight in debates across philosophy.

This paper offers a critical examination of the notion of epistemic authority in Plato. In the Apology, Socrates claims a certain epistemic superiority over others, and it is easy to suppose that this might be explained in terms of third-person authority: Socrates knows the minds of others better than they know their own. Yet Socrates, as the text makes clear, is not the only one capable of getting the minds of others right. His epistemic edge is rather a matter of (...) first-person authority: while others falsely think they are wise, Socrates is in a position to realize he is ignorant. By contrast with, say, a Cartesian picture, for Plato third-person authority with regard to the mind is relatively commonplace, whereas first-person authority is as rare as Socrates. I discuss the basis for this view, and some of its implications for the notion of a distinctively first-person mode of access. (shrink)

This paper sets out to re-examine the famous Wax Tablet model in Plato's Theaetetus, in particular the section of it which appeals to the quality of individual souls' wax as an explanation of why some are more liable to make mistakes than others (194c-195a). This section has often been regarded as an ornamental flourish or a humorous appendage to the model's main explanatory business. Yet in their own appropriations both Aristotle and Locke treat the notion of variable wax quality as (...) an important part of the model's utility in dealing with mistake. What, then, is its status for Plato? I shall argue that the section on variable wax quality is there to suggest to the reader a tempting way of misinterpreting the model. This will highlight the distinctive character of the model in its original version, and provide an unusual example of a philosopher describing how not to read one of his own doctrines. (shrink)

Relatively little attention has been paid to Socrates' argument against akrasia in Plato's "Protagoras" as an example of Socratic method. Yet seen from this perspective the argument has some rather unusual features: in particular, the presence of an impersonal interlocutor ("the many") and the absence of the crisp and explicit argumentation that is typical of Socratic elenchus. I want to suggest that these features are problematic, considerably more so than has sometimes been supposed, and to offer a reading of the (...) argument that accounts for them. My reading revolves around the connections between Socratic method, consistency and akrasia. I argue that Socrates' discussion of akrasia aims at exposing the interlocutor's inconsistency, and to this extent is typical of Socratic inquiry; but it is also untypical, insofar as Socrates' chief concern here is with the inconsistency between an interlocutor's statements and his actions (what I call "word-deed inconsistency") rather than, as more usually, inconsistency among an interlocutor's various statements ("word-word inconsistency"). I use this reading to show how the akrasia argument, despite its untypical features, is not just a variant, but in an important way a paradigm, of Socratic method. (shrink)

You are irrational when you are akratic. On this point most agree. Despite this agreement, there is a tremendous amount of disagreement about what the correct explanation of this data is. Narrow-scopers think that the correct explanation is that you are violating a narrow-scope conditional requirement. You lack an intention to x that you are required to have given the fact that you believe you ought to x. Wide-scopers disagree. They think that a conditional you are required to make true (...) is false. You aren’t required to have any particular attitudes. You’re just required to intend to x or not believe you ought to x. Wide-scope accounts are symmetrical insofar as they predict that you are complying with the relevant requirement just so long as the relevant conditional is true. Some narrow-scopers object to this symmetry. However, there is disagreement about why the symmetry is objectionable. This has led wide-scopers to defend their view against a number of different symmetry objections. I think their defenses in the face of these objections are, on the whole, plausible. Unfortunately for them, they aren’t defending their view against the best version of the objection. In this paper I will show that there is a symmetry objection to wide-scope accounts that both hasn’t been responded to and is a serious problem for wide-scope accounts. Moreover, my version of the objection will allow us to see that there is at least one narrow-scope view that has been seriously underappreciated in the literature. (shrink)

It’s natural to say that when it’s rational for me to φ, I have reasons to φ. That is, there are reasons for φ-ing, and moreover, I have some of them. Mark Schroeder calls this view The Factoring Account of the having reasons relation. He thinks The Factoring Account is false. In this paper, I defend The Factoring Account. Not only do I provide intuitive support for the view, but I also defend it against Schroeder’s criticisms. Moreover, I show that (...) it helps us understand the requirements of substantive rationality, or what we are rationally required to do when responding to reasons. (shrink)

My dissertation is a systematic defense of the claim that what it is to be rational is to correctly respond to the reasons you possess. The dissertation is split into two parts, each consisting of three chapters. In Part I--Coherence, Possession, and Correctly Responding--I argue that my view has important advantages over popular views in metaethics that tie rationality to coherence (ch. 2), defend a novel view of what it is to possess a reason (ch. 3), and defend a novel (...) view about what it is to act and hold attitudes for normative reasons (ch. 4). In Part II--Foundationalism, Deception, and The Importance of Being Rational--I argue that foundationalists about epistemic rationality should think that the foundational beliefs are held for sufficient reasons (ch. 5), argue that my view solves the New Evil Demon problem for externalism (and solves a related and underapprieciated problem) (ch. 6), and argue that my view can vindicate the thought that we ought to be rational (ch. 7). (shrink)

Gill’s rich and comprehensive discussion of Stoic ethical thought adopts an approach that would surely have found favour with the Stoics themselves: to present.

Errol Lord explores the boundaries of epistemic normativity. He argues that we can understand these better by thinking about which mental states are competitors in rationality’s competition. He argues that belief, disbelief, and two kinds of suspension of judgment are competitors. Lord shows that there are non-evidential reasons for suspension of judgment. One upshot is an independent motivation for a certain sort of pragmatist view of epistemic rationality.

You are irrational when you are akratic. On this point most agree. Despite this agreement, there is a tremendous amount of disagreement about what the correct explanation of this data is. Narrow-scopers think that the correct explanation is that you are violating a narrow-scope conditional requirement. You lack an intention to x that you are required to have given the fact that you believe you ought to x. Wide-scopers disagree. They think that a conditional you are required to make true (...) is false. You aren’t required to have any particular attitudes. You’re just required to intend to x or not believe you ought to x. Wide-scope accounts are symmetrical insofar as they predict that you are complying with the relevant requirement just so long as the relevant conditional is true. Some narrow-scopers object to this symmetry. However, there is disagreement about why the symmetry is objectionable. This has led wide-scopers to defend their view against a number of different symmetry objections. I think their defenses in the face of these objections are, on the whole, plausible. Unfortunately for them, they aren’t defending their view against the best version of the objection. In this paper I will show that there is a symmetry objection to wide-scope accounts that both hasn’t been responded to and is a serious problem for wide-scope accounts. Moreover, my version of the objection will allow us to see that there is at least one narrow-scope view that has been seriously underappreciated in the literature. (shrink)

In Three Guineas, first published in June, 1938 Virginia Woolf set about answering three questions. How should war be prevented? Why does the government not support education for women? Why are women prevented from engaging in professional work? Many at the time saw the matter of how best to prevent war as entirely unconnected with “women’s issues”; Woolf linked together the answers, and connected them too with discussions of such matters as social class, in what has come to (...) be acknowledged as a landmark both of feminist and of anti-war writing. Included in the first and other early editions—and integral to the work—was a series of five photographs of men of high position wearing garments that mark their status . Unlike most editions available today, this facsimile edition includes the illustrations as well as the text of the original. (shrink)

Excitation at widely dispersed loci in the cerebral cortex may represent a neural correlate of consciousness. Accordingly, each unique combination of excited neurons would determine the content of a conscious moment. This conceptualization would be strengthened if we could identify what orchestrates the various combinations of excited neurons. In the present paper, cholinergic afferents to the cerebral cortex are hypothesized to enhance activity at specific cortical circuits and determine the content of a conscious moment by activating certain combinations of postsynaptic (...) sites in select cortical modules. It is proposed that these selections are enabled by learning-related restructuring that simultaneously adjusts the cytoskeletal matrix at specific constellations of postsynaptic sites giving all a similar geometry. The underlying mechanism of conscious awareness hypothetically involves cholinergic mediation of linkages between microtubules and microtubule-associated protein-2 . The first reason for proposing this mechanism is that previous studies indicate cognitive-related changes in MAP-2 occur in cholinoceptive cells within discrete cortical modules. These cortical modules are found throughout the cerebral cortex, measure 1–2 mm2, and contain approximately 103–104cholinoceptive cells that are enriched with MAP-2. The subsectors of the hippocampus may function similarly to cortical modules. The second reason for proposing the current mechanism is that the MAP-2 rich cells throughout the cerebral cortex correspond almost exactly with the cortical cells containing muscarinic receptors. Many of these cholinoceptive, MAP-2 rich cells are large pyramidal cell types, but some are also small pyramidal cells and nonpyramidal types. The third reason for proposing the current mechanism is that cholinergic afferents are module-specific; cholinergic axons terminate wholly within individual cortical modules. The cholinergic afferents may be unique in this regard. Finally, the tapering apical dendrites of pyramidal cells are proposed as primary sites for cholinergic mediation of linkages between MAP-2 and microtubules because especially high amounts of MAP-2 are found here. Also, the possibility is raised that muscarinic actions on MAP-2 could modulate microtubular coherence and self-collapse, phenomena that have been suggested to underlie consciousness. (shrink)

Objectivists about obligation hold that obligations are determined by all of the normatively relevant facts. Perspectivalists, on the other hand, hold that only facts within one’s perspective can determine what we are obligated to do. This chapter argues for a perspectivalist view. It argues that what you are obligated to do is determined by the normative reasons you possess. This view is anchored in the thought that our obligations have to be action-guiding in a certain sense—we have to be able (...) to act for the reasons that obligate us. The chapter argues that we have this ability—the ability to act for the right reasons—only if we possess those reasons. Thus, objectivism is false. The second half of the chapter argues that problems having to do with new information do not plague the particular perspectival view presented. (shrink)

This book provides a new interpretation of Kants critical work that shows Kants deep connection to Spinoza, and reveals new directions for thinking about Kant in relation to contemporary European philosophy.

Burd se ha propuesto redimir nuestra tradicional inferioridad en los estudios maquiavélicos, y creo que quedará patente que ha dado una explicación mucho más satisfactoria de El príncipe que la que cualquier país poseyera con anterioridad. Su edición comentada proporciona todas las respuestas a un conocido problema de la historia de Italia y de la literatura política. En realidad, el antiguo problema ha dejado de existir, y ningún lector de este volumen continuará preguntándose cómo un hombre tan inteligente y razonable (...) llegó a proponer consejos tan execrables. (shrink)