This selection consists of extracts from writings of women concerned solely with the pursuit of abstract ideas, historically contextualized. The texts, for the most part, reflect issues widely debated in their contemporary societies. Extracts from lesser-known writers are also included, providing a diversity of arguments spanning four centuries and including some notable contemporary philosophers.

(2007). A Rview Of “Asian Americans in Class: Charting the Achievement Gap Among Korean American Youth”. Educational Studies: Vol. 42, No. 1, pp. 68-71.

I. Immanuel Kant claims that the existence of God cannot be proved by speculative theology, yet that speculative theology is the only means by which the existence of God can definitively be proved. All knowledge, Kant argues, including that of God’s existence, must be based on the forms of possible experience or deduced from premises known to be true: in the case of the existence of God, however, the former is impossible because God transcends experience, and the latter is impossible (...) because the premises themselves, to be known to be true, would have to be grounded in possible experience, while, by the very nature of the question, possible experience has been excluded. Thus, the existence of God cannot be known in the usual sense, that is, by means of the theoretical employment of reason. (shrink)

Narrative explanations in evolutionary biology have seemed fundamentally different from other scientific explanations, and similar to historical explanations. This investigation of the structure of narrative explanations in evolutionary biology reveals that narrative explanations do have a deductive-nomological base, but that their structure contains two significant additional elements as well. The additional elements are: the multidimensional recursive connection between the different sub-explanations in a narrative explanation; and a set of generic explanations which make possible the integration of multiple co-existing processes.

This volume explores two questions of interest to a larger intellectual community: (1) what constituted knoweldge in the context of early modern Germany and (2) how knowledge was gathered, assembled, organized, deployed, and interpreted. The perspective is interdisciplinary and the contributions represent several fields of scholarly inquiry.

In his De Natura et Origine Animae, an answer to a work by Vincentius Victor, Augustine was drawn into attempting to answer some questions about what kind of reality dream-bodies, dream-worlds and dream-pains have. In this paper I concentrate on Augustine's attempts to show that none of Victor's arguments for the corporeality of the soul are any good, and that Victor's inflated claims about the extent of the soul's self-knowledge are the result of mistaking self-awareness for self-knowledge. Augustine takes the (...) position that the feelings we have in dreams and the feelings of the dead, although they are real feelings, are not always the feelings they seem to be. This position is consistent with Augustine's later works, though it departs from his understanding of these issues in his earliest works. (shrink)

Aristotle on Teaching examines teaching in general, and analyzes the objects, procedures, and order found in all student learning, furnishing the guidelines for the culminating section on the inductive and deductive procedures underlying all teaching. It explores Aristotle's doctrine to discover its relevance for the art of teaching, defined as the act of explaining the truth to those being taught, through the lucid explanations of Thomas Aquinas on the writings of Aristotle.

The thesis of underdetermination of theory by evidence has led to an opposition between realism and relationism in philosophy of science. Various forms of the thesis are examined, and it is concluded that it is true in at least a weak form that brings realism into doubt. Realists therefore need, among other things, a theory of degrees of confirmation to support rational theory choice. Recent such theories due to Glymour and Friedman are examined, and it is argued that their criterion (...) of "unification" for good theories is better formulated in Bayesian terms. Bayesian confirmation does, however, have consequences that tell against realism. It is concluded that the prospects are dim for scientific realism as usually understood. (shrink)

This edited text recaptures many of Joe L. Kincheloe's national and international influences. An advocate and a scholar in the social, historical, and philosophical foundations of education, he dedicated his professional life to his vision of critical pedagogy. The authors in this volume found mentorship, as well as kinship, in Joe and express the many ways in which he and his work made profound differences in their work and lives. Joe's research always pushed the limits of what critically reflective and (...) informed teaching entailed, never diluting the import of comprehending the complexity of sociopolitical, cultural, economic, and educational discourses and practices. Dedicated to a praxis of social and political activism rooted in students' development as citizens and workers, the labor of teachers as action researchers, cultural workers, and social mediators is always at the heart of all he achieved. We who were so influenced directly and indirectly by him knew his genius and relished the generosity with which he shared his ideas, advice, encouragement, and art. The world is better because of Joe L. Kincheloe scholarship-inextricably related to "critical" critical thinking and enactment of education that tenaciously interrupts complacency, mediocrity, always responding thoughtfully to particular educational contexts. (shrink)

This paper: (1) gives a schema of the logical structure of functional explanation in biology; (2) shows that it falls under the covering law model of explanation by proving that the explanandum follows from the explanans; and (3) supports the claim that it captures the logical structure underlying the biological usage by analyzing in detail two cases from biology.

St. Augustine of Hippo wrote the ’De Trinitate’ to explain to critics of the Nicene Creed how the Christian doctrine of the divinity and coequality of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is present in Scripture. He also wanted to convince philosophers that Christ is the Wisdom they sought. Augustine’s third purpose was to correlate the biblical truth that all human persons are created to image God, a Trinity, a communion of love, with the first two Commandments of the Old and (...) New Testaments. Augustine succeeded in showing the need for combining faith and reason for a greater understanding of Scripture as well as for a greater understanding of the true nature and destiny of human persons. Augustine emphasized the scriptural revelation of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and used reason to convince philosophers that the one and three-Personed God is philosophically and logically defensible. He concluded that the likeness of human persons to Christ and to the Trinity is accomplished not onl. (shrink)

Pressure is mounting to hold researchers and research institutions accountable for the protection of human subjects. When subjects or their family members believe they have been injured, they are increasingly willing to file lawsuits. Recent cases indicate that institutional review boards and their members may be pulled more and more into the legal fray.On September 17, 1999, 18-year-old Jesse Gelsinger died while participating in research conducted by the University of Pennsylvania's Institute for Gene Therapy. Gelsinger was involved in a Phase (...) I clinical trial testing a new approach to treatment of ornithine transcarbamylase deficiency, a rare metabolic disorder. Although infants affected by the severe form of OTC die shortly after birth, Gelsinger suffered from a relatively mild form. It appears undisputed that the cause of Gelsinger's death was not the disorder itself, but multiple organ system failure triggered by the virus used to carry new genetic material into his system. (shrink)