ABSTRACT The little-studied presidency of Benjamin Harrison offers valuable insights into the surprising role that political ideas can play in government. Harrison was a highly qualified president who demonstrated energetic leadership and political skill, but whose ideological commitment to the Republican party as a quasi-sacred enterprise overrode other important considerations, thereby contributing to one of the greatest economic catastrophes in U.S. history: the Depression of 1893-1897. His ideas about the Republican party were forged in its early years, when it led (...) the political battle against slavery; but when Harrison became president, the party’s interests in trade protectionism, veterans’ pensions, and silver drove him to support policies that eventually sent the economy into a tailspin from which it took years to recover. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Parenting Adults with ASD: Lessons for Researchers and CliniciansCassandra R. Newsom, Amy S. Weitlauf, Cora M. Taylor, and Zachary E. WarrenRecent reviews of treatments for individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) reveal how little we still know about how to help adolescents with ASD and their families successfully transition into adulthood (Shattuck et al., 2012b; Taylor et al., 2012a). Shattuck and colleagues found that services in (...) the United States for adults with ASD were marked by high unemployment rates, a reliance on families to provide care across the lifespan, high turnover rates in front-line service providers, insufficient transition planning for high school students, and generally insufficient services to meet current needs. In a recent Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Comparative Effectiveness Review, the authors similarly found that there is very little evidence available to pinpoint specific intervention approaches for adolescents and young adults with ASD due to a lack of good quality studies. This was especially true for evidence-based approaches to support the transition of youth with ASD to adulthood (Taylor et al., 2012a).For the last decade, with dramatic increases in both ASD awareness and estimates of ASD prevalence, our field has understandably focused intensely on improving early detection and treatment of ASD. Our diagnostic tools and understanding of ASD presentation in very young children has improved tremendously. Different from many of the young adults in these stories, who were often diagnosed in their early teens, we now aim to identify children well before their third birthdays. Research has consistently shown that early and intense ASD-specific intervention can dramatically enhance outcomes for children with ASD. As such, there has been heavy investment in attempting to take full advantage of this early window of neuro-plasticity. However, as these stories illustrate, these children grow up. Their needs change, and our systems are often poorly equipped to help them live fulfilling lives, capitalize on their talents, and obtain independence and equal access, while still providing a safe, supportive environment. Without readily accessible and understandable coordinated systems of care, parents are forced to adopt the multiple roles of case manager, teacher, therapist, community educator, advocate, job coach, housing specialist, financial planner, and often, lifelong caregiver. These stories eloquently illustrate those struggles and successes.Grief and Joy: Opposite Sides of the Same Parenting CoinThe idea of grieving a diagnosis is controversial. Many of the writers seemed to feel conflicted about their grief responses and the validity of their feelings. Research shows that many families view the diagnostic process as extremely stressful (Siklos & [End Page 199] Kerns, 2005; Heiman, 2002). Feelings of sadness, anxiety, and depression are common at the point of diagnosis and may reemerge as milestones pass unmet. Families must modify the futures they imagined for their children and begin to envision new goals and dreams. Anonymous Three described this process when she wrote:Most children grow up, go to school, get jobs, move out of their parents’ home, etc. My husband and I have had to seriously consider how much of these are even possible for a young man with autism, even one who has a good number of functional life skills.Tasks of adolescence and adulthood such as starting high school, driving a car, and moving out of the house may be delayed and hard won if met. Raising a child with ASD appears to have particular challenges. Throughout this process, families begin to redefine what “success” means. Rather than ascribing to societal standards, they find joy in personal milestones. McDonald described the triumph of teaching his nephew to shake women’s hands instead of touching their hair, an important safety goal that took three months to accomplish. Each family thereby creates its own path.People outside of the family often do not understand the complicated interplay of love and obligation as well as the frustration and fulfillment that families experience. Just like any family, the parents of children with ASD describe many joys in addition to their struggles. They see their children’s strengths in a world that too often focuses on their weaknesses. Gifted with the everyday experience of their child’s development, they see past the necessity of a... (shrink)

Research indicates that actors who intentionally bring about harmful consequences are blamed more for their actions than those who do so unintentionally. However, in many instances of harmful behavior, intentions are ambiguous. The Culpable Control Model of Blame (CCM) predicts that the degree to which an actor is blamed for causing a harmful outcome is strongly influenced by information about the actor’s character, motives, or desires and that initial blame assessments impact important blame-related criteria such as judgements regarding the actor’s (...) intent. Deviant causal sequences, those in which negative outcomes occur in ways that the actor did not foresee, are highly unlikely, or are coerced, include circumstances that could mitigate assignment of blame. Such sequences provide a test of predictions derived from the CCM. Findings of three studies supported a model in which participants ascribed greater blame to an actor with opprobrious character, motives, or desires, which, in turn, affected judgments of a main criterion related to intent, and, in the last step, accounted for ascriptions of intent. These findings support the CCM’s contention that blame-reactions to an actor and outcome influence judgments about criteria, such as intent, that are often considered to be determinants rather than consequences of blame. (shrink)

In the Aharonov- Bohm effect, electromagnetic potentials alter the two-slit interference pattern formed by an electron beam. We discuss here a curious feature of this effect, namely that, even though the interference pattern changes, none of its moments are shifted.

A large body of research has indicated international students in the United States and abroad experience difficulties understanding what academic integrity is and how to avoid academic misconduct, 159–172 2011; Brown & Howell, 2001; Gullifer and Tyson Studies in Higher Education, 39, 1202-1218 2014). While most studies focus on academic misconduct and academic corruption in research ethics, 339-358 2014), this study analyzes the length, English-language readability, and translation of academic integrity policies of 453 four-year U.S. institutions of higher education. Findings (...) indicate average academic integrity policies are over 2000 words long, are written above the 16th-grade reading level, and are very rarely translated into a language other than English. In addition, no institutions published their academic integrity policies in full on their institutional international student website, possibly rendering the policy difficult to locate on the institution’s website for international students. Implications for research, policy, and practice are addressed. (shrink)

Background: This study tested the core tenets of how facial scars are perceived by characterizing layperson response to faces with scars. The authors predicted that scars closer to highly viewed structures of the face (i.e., upper lip and lower lid), scars aligned against resting facial tension lines, and scars in the middle of anatomical subunits of the face would be rated less favorably. Methods: -/- Volunteers aged 18 years and older from the United States were recruited through Amazon’s Mechanical Turk (...) to complete a face rating survey. Scars were digitally added in different locations and orientations for a total of 14 unique scars added to each face. Each participant rated 50 different faces on confidence, friendliness, and attractiveness. Data were analyzed using linear mixed effects models. Results: -/- A total of 88,850 ratings [82,990 scarred (93.4 percent)] for attractiveness, friendliness, and confidence were analyzed. In univariate linear mixed effects models, the presence of a facial scar did not significantly impact attractiveness (β = 0.016, SE = 0.014, z = 1.089, p = 0.276). A second set of linear mixed effects models identified interactions between location, subunit placement, and orientation to facial tension lines. Scars located on the lower lid mid subunit perpendicular to facial tension lines were rated less attractive (β = −0.065, SE = 0.028, z = −2.293, p = 0.022). Conclusions: -/- On average, a single well-healed facial scar does not negatively affect first impressions of attractiveness, confidence, or friendliness. Specific scar location and orientation combinations, however, such as a perpendicular scar at the mid-lower eyelid, may result in lower perceived attractiveness, confidence, and friendliness. (shrink)

The United Nations ‘Protect, Respect and Remedy’ Framework,developed by the U.N. Special Representative JohnRuggie, brings together social expectations and law into anemerging policy framework of direct relevance to corporate social responsibility, CSR. The principle source of the Framework’s significance for the policy and practice of CSR is its definition of the theory of business responsibility for human rights as arising from business activities and relationships, and its deployment of due diligence for human rights risk as the core operational concept of (...) this theory of responsibility. The article considers the responsibility to respect human rights in light of theories about polycentric regulatory regimes and draws the conclusion that the Ruggie Framework creates a regulator dynamic in which both voluntarism and law have relevant and reinforcing roles to play in governing business behavior. In the wake of the adaptation of the Framework by the UN, the challenge for the field of CSR will be to adapt to an emerging reality in which business responsibility for ‘the social’ is increasingly a question of compliance and beyond. (shrink)

“To hear silence is to find stillness in the midst of the restlessness that makes creative life possible and the inescapability of death acceptable.” So writes Mark C. Taylor in his latest book, a philosophy of silence for our nervous, chattering age. How do we find silence—and more importantly, how do we understand it—amid the incessant buzz of the networks that enmesh us? Have we forgotten how to listen to each other, to recognize the virtues of modesty and (...) reticence, and to appreciate the resonance of silence? Are we less prepared than ever for the ultimate silence that awaits us all? Taylor wants us to pause long enough to hear what is not said and to attend to what remains unsayable. In his account, our way to hearing silence is, paradoxically, to see it. He explores the many variations of silence by considering the work of leading modern and postmodern visual artists, including Barnett Newman, Ad Reinhardt, James Turrell, and Anish Kapoor. Developing the insights of philosophers, theologians, writers, and composers, Taylor weaves a rich narrative modeled on the Stations of the Cross. His chapter titles suggest our positions toward silence: Without. Before. From. Beyond. Against. Within. Between. Toward. Around. With. In. Recasting Hegel’s phenomenology of spirit and Kierkegaard’s stages on life’s way, Taylor translates the traditional Via Dolorosa into a Nietzschean Via Jubilosa that affirms light in the midst of darkness. Seeing Silence is a thoughtful meditation that invites readers to linger long enough to see silence, and, in this way, perhaps to hear once again the wordless Word that once was named “God.”. (shrink)

"_The Moment of Complexity_ is a profoundly original work. In remarkable and insightful ways, Mark Taylor traces an entirely new way to view the evolution of our culture, detailing how information theory and the scientific concept of complexity can be used to understand recent developments in the arts and humanities. This book will ultimately be seen as a classic."-John L. Casti, Santa Fe Institute, author of _Gödel: A Life of Logic, the Mind, and Mathematics_ The science of complexity (...) accounts for that inscrutable mix of chaos and order that governs our natural world. Complexity explains how networks emerge and function, how species organize into ecosystems, how stars form into galaxies, and how just a few sequences of DNA can account for so many different life forms. Recently, the idea of complexity has taken the worlds of business and politics by storm. The concept is used to account for phenomena as varied as the behavior of the stock market, the response of voting populations, and the effects of risk management. Even Disney has used complexity theory to manage crowd control at its theme parks. Given the startling development of new information technologies, we now live in a moment of unprecedented complexity, an era in which change occurs faster than our ability to comprehend it. With _The Moment of Complexity_, Mark C. Taylor offers a timely map for this unfamiliar terrain opening in our midst, unfolding an original philosophy through a remarkable synthesis of science and culture. According to Taylor, complexity is not just a breakthrough scientific concept, but the defining quality of the post-Cold War era. The flux of digital currents swirling around us, he argues, has created a new network culture with its own distinctive logic and dynamic. Drawing on resources from information theory and evolutionary biology, Taylor explains the operation of complex adaptive systems in social and cultural processes and captures a whole new zeitgeist in the making. To appreciate the significance of our emerging network culture, he claims, we need not only to understand contemporary scientific and technological transformations, but also to explore the subtle influences of art, architecture, philosophy, religion, and higher education. _The Moment of Complexity_, then, is a remarkable work of cultural analysis on a scale rarely seen today. To follow its trajectory is to learn how we arrived at this critical moment in our culture, and to know where we might head in the twenty-first century. (shrink)

This paper considers alternative styles of philosophy, based on art or science, through an investigation of Rudolf Carnap and Martin Heidegger. Carnap’s criticism of Heidegger’s account of das Nichts is analysed in relation to Immanuel Kant’s theory of the imagination. Heidegger’s account of the work of art demonstrates philosophies that take science as their model, over-emphasize cognition, and do not adequately consider the importance of apprehension.

The age of information, media, and virtuality is transforming every aspect of human experience. Questions that have long haunted the philosophical imagination are becoming urgent practical concerns: Where does the natural end and the artificial begin? Is there a difference between the material and the immaterial? In his new work, Mark C. Taylor extends his ongoing investigation of postmodern worlds by critically examining a wide range of contemporary cultural practices. Nothing defines postmodernism so well as its refusal of (...) depth, its emphasis on appearance and spectacle, its tendency to collapse a three-dimensional world in which image and reality are distinct into a two-dimensional world in which they merge. The postmodern world, Taylor argues, is a world of surfaces, and the postmodern condition is one of profound superficiality. For many cultural commentators, postmodernism's inescapable play of surfaces is cause for despair. Taylor, on the other hand, shows that the disappearance of depth in postmodern culture is actually a liberation repleat with creative possibilities. Taylor introduces readers to a popular culture in which detectives--the postmodern heroes of Paul Auster and Dennis Potter--lift surfaces only to find more surfaces, and in which fashion advertising plays transparency against hiding. Taylor looks at the contemporary preoccupation with body piercing and tattooing, and asks whether these practices actually reveal or conceal. Phrenology and skin diseases, the "religious" architecture of Las Vegas, the limitless spread of computer networks--all are brought within the scope of Taylor's brilliant analysis. Postmodernism, he shows, has given us a new sense of the superficial, one in which the issue is not the absence of meaning but its uncontrollable, ecstatic proliferation. Embodying the very tendencies it analyzes, Hiding is unique. Conceived and developed with well-known designers Michael Rock and Susan Sellars, this work transgresses the boundary that customarily separates graphic design from the story within a text. The product of nearly three decades of reflection and writing, Hiding opens a window on contemporary culture. To follow the remarkable course Taylor charts is to see both our present and past differently and to encounter a future as disorienting as it is alluring. (shrink)

This book deals with a central problem in the writings of Soren Kierkegaard, the themes of time and the self as developed in the pseudonymous writings. Arguing that a most effective way to grasp the unity of Kierkegaard's dialectic of the stages of existence is to focus on the dramatic presentation of time and the self that appears at each stage, Mark C. Taylor pursues these themes from the viewpoints of theology, philosophy, psychology, and related areas of study. (...) The author works from the original texts and makes much use of untranslated primary and secondary material. His concluding evaluation offerse a critical perspective from which to view Kierkegaard's interpretation of time and selfhood and indicates the importance of Kierkegaard's work for our time. Mark C. Taylor teaches religion at Williams College. Originally published in 1975. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)

The journey to the cemetery is always solitary even when I am with people who are closest to me. In the graveyard, the we is dispersed and the I stripped bare." In Grave Matters, Taylor's ghosts become our own.

Maurice Merleau-Ponty was described by Paul Ricoeur as 'the greatest of the French phenomenologists'. The essays in this volume examine the full scope of Merleau-Ponty's philosophy, from his central and abiding concern with the nature of perception and the bodily constitution of intentionality to his reflections on science, nature, art, history, and politics. The authors explore the historical origins and context of his thought as well as its continuing relevance to contemporary work in phenomenology, philosophy of mind, cognitive science, biology, (...) art criticism and political and social theory. What emerges is a fresh image of Merleau-Ponty as a deep and original thinker whose philosophical importance has been underestimated, in part owing to the influence of intellectual movements such as existentialism and structuralism, into which his work could not be easily assimilated. New readers will find this the most convenient and accessible guide to Merleau-Ponty currently available. (shrink)

Herbert Spencer: Legacies explores and assesses the impact of the ideas and work of the great Victorian polymath Herbert Spencer across a wide range of disciplines. In the course of the essays a significant re-evaluation of his influence on Victorian and Edwardian thought is provided. Spencer's contribution to the fields of sociology, anthropology, psychology, biology and ecology are considered, alongside his influence on key figures in science and philosophy. The book brings together scholars from a wide range of disciplines to (...) explore Spencer's nuanced and complex ideas and will be invaluable for historians of science and ideas, and all those interested in the intellectual culture of the late Victorian and Edwardian period. Contributors: Peter J. Bowler, James Elwick, Mark Francis, Bernard Lightman, Chris Renwick, Vanessa L. Ryan, John Skorupski, Michael W. Taylor, Stephen Tomlinson, and Jonathan H. Turner. (shrink)

_A leading thinker asks why “faster” is synonymous with “better” in our hurried world and suggests how to take control of our runaway lives_ We live in an ever-accelerating world: faster computers, markets, food, fashion, product cycles, minds, bodies, kids, lives. When did everything start moving so fast? Why does speed seem so inevitable? Is faster always better? Drawing together developments in religion, philosophy, art, technology, fashion, and finance, Mark C. Taylor presents an original and rich account of (...) a great paradox of our times: how the very forces and technologies that were supposed to free us by saving time and labor now trap us in a race we can never win. The faster we go, the less time we have, and the more we try to catch up, the farther behind we fall. Connecting our speed-obsession with today’s global capitalism, he composes a grand narrative showing how commitments to economic growth and extreme competition, combined with accelerating technological innovation, have brought us close to disaster. Psychologically, environmentally, economically, and culturally, speed is taking a profound toll on our lives. By showing how the phenomenon of speed has emerged, Taylor offers us a chance to see our pace of life as the product of specific ideas, practices, and policies. It’s not inevitable or irreversible. He courageously and movingly invites us to imagine how we might patiently work towards a more deliberative life and sustainable world. (shrink)

Driving anxiety is a relatively undervalued topic of research, despite the fact that it can have a substantial detrimental impact on an individuals’ life. The prevalence of driving anxiety in motor vehicle crash survivors has been found to range from 18-77%. Although driving anxiety can develop without crash involvement, no information currently exists on the prevalence of driving anxiety in the general population. One barrier to gathering this information is that most of the instruments are designed to measure driving anxiety (...) in MVC survivors. However, the Driving and Riding Avoidance Scale is one instrument that shows promise as a more general measure of driving anxiety, although previous research has noted the need for some minor adaptations. Therefore, the present study investigated the psychometric properties of an adapted version of the DRAS and the level of driving anxiety amongst a sample of 210 Polish participants. Internal consistency for the overall DRAS was.91 and ranged from.77 to.85 for the subscales. Factor analysis of the DRAS resulted in two clear factors, with the first containing driving avoidance items and the second consisting solely of riding avoidance items. Therefore it appears that the DRAS can be a useful measure of driving avoidance in samples drawn from the general population as well as MVC survivors. (shrink)

In the fall of 2005, Mark C. Taylor, the controversial public intellectual and widely respected scholar, suddenly fell critically ill. For two days a team of forty doctors, many of whom thought he would not live, fought to save him. Taylor would eventually recover, but only to face a new threat: surgery for cancer. "These experiences have changed me in ways I am still struggling to understand," Taylor writes in this absorbing memoir. "After the past year, (...) I am persuaded that I have done enough fieldwork to write a book that combines philosophical and theological reflection with autobiographical narrative. Writing is not only possible but actually seems necessary." _Field Notes from Elsewhere_ is Taylor's unforgettable, inverted journey from death to life. Each of his memoir's fifty-two chapters and accompanying photographs recounts a morning-to-evening experience with sickness and convalescence, mingling humor and hope with a deep exploration of human frailty and, conversely, resilience. When we confront the end of life, Taylor explains, the axis of the lived world shifts, and everything must be reevaluated. As Taylor sorts through his remembrances, much that once seemed familiar becomes strange, paradoxical, and contradictory. He reads his experience with and against ghosts from his past, recasting the meaning of mortality, sacrifice, solitude, and abandonment, along with a host of other issues, in light of modern ways of dying. "You never come back from elsewhere," Taylor concludes, "because elsewhere always comes back with you.". (shrink)

England and Wales are moving toward a model of ‘opt out’ for use of personal confidential data in health research. Existing research does not make clear how acceptable this move is to the public. While people are typically supportive of health research, when asked to describe the ideal level of control there is a marked lack of consensus over the preferred model of consent. This study sought to investigate a relatively unexplored difference between the consent model that people prefer and (...) that which they are willing to accept. It also sought to explore any reasons for such acceptance. (shrink)

Explores the strategies of design, contrast, and resonance in the works of Hezel, Heidegger, Bataille, Blanchot, Derrida, and Kierkegaard The history of society and culture is, in large measure, a history of the struggle with the endlessly ...

"Religion," Mark C. Taylor maintains, "is most interesting where it is least obvious." From global financial networks to the casinos of Las Vegas, from images flickering on computer terminals to steel sculpture, material culture bears unexpected traces of the divine. In a world where the economies of faith are obscure, yet pervasive, Taylor shows that approaching religion directly is less instructive than thinking about it. Traveling from high culture to pop culture and back again, About Religion approaches (...) cyberspace and Las Vegas through Hegel and Kant and reads Melville's The Confidence-Man through the film Wall Street. As astonishing juxtapositions and associations proliferate, formerly uncharted territories of virtual culture disclose theological vestiges, showing that faith in contemporary culture is as unavoidable as it is elusive. The most accessible presentation of Taylor's revolutionary ideas to date, About Religion gives us a dazzling and disturbing vision of life at the end of the old and beginning of the new millennium. (shrink)

"There is no rigorous and effective deconstruction without the faithful memory of philosophies and literatures, without the respectful and competent reading of texts of the past, as well as singular works of our own time. Deconstruction is also a certain thinking about tradition and context. Mark Taylor evokes this with great clarity in the course of a remarkable introduction. He reconstitutes a set of premises without which no deconstruction could have seen the light of day." – _Jacques Derrida (...) __"This invaluable philosophical sampler brings together many of the threads out of which deconstruction is woven. taylor's anthology does not make deconstruction easy; much more usefully, it provides a meticulous guide to the sources – and significance – of the difficulties. – Barbara E. Johnson _"The book will be of great value as a set of readings with authoritative explanation for all those interested in the current relations of literature and philosophy. It is the best book of its kind I know. – _J. Hillis Miller, Yale University_. (shrink)

Nots is a virtuoso exploration of negation and negativity in theology, philosophy, art, architecture, postmodern culture, and medicine. In nine essays that range from nihility in Buddhism to the embodiment of negativity in disease, Mark C. Taylor looks at the surprising ways in which contrasting concepts of negativity intersect. In the first section of this book, Taylor discusses the question of the "not" in the religious thought of Anselm, Hegel, Derrida, and Nishitani. In the second part, he (...) analyzes artistic efforts "to figure not" in the work of artists Arakawa and Madeline Gins, architect Daniel Libeskind, pop artist David Sallee, and pop icon Madonna. The final section consists of a deeply personal and scientifically informed chapter that discusses the workings of negativity in immunology and illness. Taylor's essays work toward a sense of the not as unnameable as it is irrepressible--an "unthinkable third" that falls between being and nonbeing. Bringing together concerns that span Taylor's early investigations of Hegel and Kierkegaard and recent studies of art and architecture, Nots is an important contribution by one of the most original and distinctive voices now writing on the American scene. Religion and Postmodernism series. (shrink)

What are the primary characteristics that define what it means to be human? And what happens to those characteristics in the face of technology past, present, and future? The three essays in Image, by leading philosophers of religion Mark Taylor, Mary-Jane Rubenstein, and Thomas Carlson, play at this intersection of the human and the technological, building out from Heidegger's notion that humans master the world by picturing or representing the real.Taylor's essay traces a history of capitalism, dwelling (...) on the lack of humility, particularly in the face of our own mortality, that is the persistent failure of humans, before turning to art as a possible way to bring us back to earth and recover humility before it is too late. Rubenstein zeroes in on the delusions of imaginative conquest associated with space travel. Through a genealogy of the modern "view from space" from the iconic Earth rise photo of 1968 up to the new privatized American space race, Rubenstein provides an analysis of the perils of the one-world and the false unity it projects. In his essay, Carlson takes as his starting point the surveillance capitalism of facial recognition technology. He dives deep into Heidegger to meditate on the elimination of individuals through totalizing gestures and the relationship between such elimination and our encounters with mortality. Each of these essays, in its own way, reflects on the nature of imagination, the character of technological vision in contemporary culture, and the implications of these for the kinds of sociality and love that condition our human experience. (shrink)

With fundamentalists dominating the headlines and scientists arguing about the biological and neurological basis of faith, religion is the topic of the day. But religion, Mark C. Taylor shows, is more complicated than either its defenders or critics think and, indeed, is much more influential than any of us realize. Our world, Taylor maintains, is shaped by religion even when it is least obvious. Faith and value, he insists, are unavoidable and inextricably interrelated for believers and nonbelievers (...) alike. Using scientific theories of dynamical systems and complex adaptive networks for cultural and theological analysis, After God redefines religion for our contemporary age. Taylor begins by asking a critical question: What is religion? He then proceeds to explain how Protestant ideas in particular undergird the character and structure of our global information society—the Reformation, Taylor argues, was an information and communications revolution that effectively prepared the way for the media revolution at the end of the twentieth century. Taylor’s breathtaking account of religious ideas allows us to understand for the first time that contemporary notions of atheism and the secular are already implicit in classical Christology and Trinitarian theology. Weaving together theoretical analysis and historical interpretation, Taylor demonstrates the codependence and coevolution of traditional religious beliefs and practices with modern literature, art, architecture, information technologies, media, financial markets, and theoretical biology. After God concludes with prescriptions for new ways of thinking and acting. If we are to negotiate the perils of the twenty-first century, Taylor contends, we must refigure the symbolic networks that inform our policies and guide our actions. A religion without God creates the possibility of an ethics without absolutes that leads to the promotion of creativity and life in an ever more fragile world. The first comprehensive theology of culture since the pioneering work of Paul Tillich, After God is a radical reconceptualization of religion and Taylor’s most pathbreaking work yet, bringing together various strands of theological argument and cultural analysis four decades in the making. (shrink)

Dissertation Summary—Mark Taylor My dissertation explores forgiveness and revenge within a narrative conception of human lives. In Chapter One, I lay out an account of human life stories and argue for its advantages in understanding the value of redemption. In particular, I suggest that the goods we care about in our lives depend on their integration into the way we see ourselves as persons who exist through time. Forgiveness and revenge can recontextualize moments from our past and infuse (...) them with a new meaning. Building on Peter Goldie’s work, I identify unity, purpose, direction, and truth as qualities of life stories toward which forgiveness contributes. I examine some of the psychological literature to understand the role our internal narrative plays in making sense of the world (and the lack of sense when that narrative fails). I conclude by defending against a well-known objection from Galen Strawson against narrative analysis. In Chapter Two I take up a qualified defense of the rationality of revenge. My motivation in doing so is a link in the logic between revenge and forgiveness. If revenge is always straightforwardly irrational, forgiveness is undermined. My strategy to defend revenge is to give a taxonomy characterizing it and then pick out its most justifiable form. I argue that revenge at its best is a form of caring about one’s past, or the past of a loved one. I defend this form of revenge against various objections, especially that it is pointless or involves a rational error about one’s own untouchable value as a person. I argue that the point of revenge is to ‘change the ending’ of the offender and victim’s relationship. I also argue that focus on objective value misses the point: what is threatened is not the victim’s objective value as a person, but the value of a life story worth having. In Chapter Three I lay out my own account of forgiveness. I first provide several characteristic features of forgiveness, and then describe two camps in the literature that disagree about whether forgiveness is primarily a private matter of the heart or a public matter of treatment. I then argue for what I call ‘inaugurated forgiveness’ as a synthesis between these emotional and behavioral views. I suggest that forgiveness begins with a commitment toward the offender, but takes time to come to its emotional culmination. The nature of that commitment is a second-order endorsement of the desires of love over the desires of resentment. I also highlight the importance of hope as the operative forward-looking virtue rather than trust. Forgiveness involves committing oneself to openness to eventual redemption and reconciliation, but does not require the unjustified trust that the offender can be redeemed or reconciled at the moment of forgiveness. In Chapter Four I examine the underlying reasons for forgiving and avenging. I argue that personal reasons have a legitimate role to play in these practices, rather than merely impersonal considerations. Impersonal reasons, such as generic respect for personhood, or desert, play a dominant role in the literature where a major concern is to find a justification of forgiveness within a moral justice conception. Personal reasons are tied to the basic cares and commitments of a life, and these projects are what the life is about as a whole. There is thus an important connection between the narrative direction of a life and its ground projects. Forgiving for personal reasons is a way of giving appropriate weight to the particular life one has. I argue that personal reasons give us a way of understanding how forgiveness is elective and generous. I conclude by using this analysis to briefly outline some strategies for arguing for forgiveness over revenge. For example, I suggest that arguments against revenge need to begin from the victim’s ground projects, such as each person’s commitment to seeing the world truly, or the desire for one’s community to flourish; I suggest that forgiveness usually allows better epistemic access, and better protects one’s intimates. (shrink)

Where does my body begin? Where does it end? What is inside my body? What is outside? What is primary? What is secondary? What is natural? What is artificial? Science fiction has long imagined a future fusion of humanity with technology. Today, many of us—especially people with health issues such as autoimmune diseases—have functionally become hybrids connected to other machines and to other bodies. The combination of artificial intelligence with implants, transplants, prostheses, and genetic reprogramming is transforming medical research and (...) treatment, and it is now also transforming what we thought was human nature. Mark C. Taylor identifies this process as “intervolution” and explores how it is weaving together smart things and smart bodies to create new forms of life. Our wired bodies are no longer freestanding individuals, but interconnected nodes in worldwide networks. Recognizing this transformation overturns deeply entrenched distinctions and oppositions between minds and bodies. Intervolution reveals that we are already cyborgs, integral cogs in what will become a superorganism of bodies and things. (shrink)

Mark C. Taylor recounts a poignant love affair not with a person but with a place that, paradoxically, cannot be easily localized. For many years, Taylor has lived in the Berkshire Mountains, where he writes and creates land art and sculpture. In a world of mobile screens and virtual realities, where speed is the measure of success and place is disappearing, his work slows down thought and brings life back to earth to give readers time to ponder (...) the importance of place before it slips away. Taylor extends reflection beyond the page and returns with new insights about what is hiding in plain sight all around us. Weaving together words, objects, and images, his artful work enacts what it describes. Things long familiar suddenly appear strange, and the strange, unexpected, and unprogrammed unsettle readers in surprising ways. This timely meditation gives pause in the midst of harried lives and turns attention toward what we usually overlook: night, silence, touch, grace, ghosts, water, earth, stones, bones, idleness, infinity, slowness, and contentment. Recovering Place is a unique work that lingers long after the book is closed. (shrink)

He notes that the order of the book is random and arbitrary, and that there is no unity, thematic or otherwise--an innovative approach to making sense of the universe. Several of the dozen essays have been previously published. No index.

Socrates provides an argument at the end of the Apology that he believes gives hope that death is a blessing. This argument, grounded on the claim that death is one of two things, has been the subject of much derision and some recent defense. In this essay, I build on the work of other sympathetic commentators to show that Socrates' argument, when taken in context, not only makes good sense, but unifies Socrates' speech into a cohesive exhortation toward virtue.

Belief in substance dualism, the idea that mind and matter are two different kinds of substances, has been found to be a strong predictor of belief in free will. Why? Here, we test whether believing that mind and matter are different kinds of substance correlates with differences in how people think of free will and/or differences in how people interpret the scenarios used to test their conceptions. We provided participants (N = 515) with two hypothetical scenarios where the world was (...) presented either as deterministic or not and asked them whether they thought that a given decision could be free in that world. Incompatibilist free will requires that determinism, the idea that at any instant only one possible future can follow from the state of the world, is false. Compatibilists hold that free will is possible even if determinism is true. In this study, we investigate if substance dualists are more compatibilist. We find that they are not, and that both dualists and physicalists agree that free will is incompatible with determinism. In addition, we show that dualists and physicalists are equally likely to commit bypassing, i.e., to misinterpret determinism as excluding mental causation. We also show that dualists have a stronger tendency to commit intrusion, i.e., to misinterpret determinism by importing indeterministic metaphysics into their interpretation of deterministic descriptions. (shrink)