Explores the extraordinary states of expanded consciousness that arise during comas, both positive and negative.

A. F. Norman has recently suggested that a hitherto overlooked passage in Suidas is a fragment from the history of Eunapius of Sardis. He is clearly correct in referring the passage to an incident at the siege of Maiozamalcha during the Persian campaign of the emperor Julian, but I am not so sure that he is right in ascribing it to Eunapius, or in the conclusions he draws from this ascription. I give in parallel columns the accounts of Ammianus Marcellinus, (...) Zosimus, and the passage from Suidas, together with a further version of the incident, unfortunately without names, from the pen of Libanius. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Radical Roots Challenging the Tradition The Liberal Ironist Essays Against the Tradition Pragmatism References.

This article discusses the ethics of knowledge production from a cultural point of view, in contrast with the more usual emphasis on the ethical issues facing individuals involved in KP. Here, the emphasis is on the cultural environment within which individuals, groups and institutions perform KP. A principal purpose is to suggest ways in which reliable scientific knowledge could be produced more efficiently. The distinction between ethical hazard and ethical behaviour is noted. Ethical hazards cannot be eliminated but they can (...) be reduced if the cultural ambience is suitable. The main suggestions for reducing ethical hazards in KP relate to the review process. It is argued that some defects of the current, largely anonymous, review process could be ameliorated by a process of comprehensive, open and ongoing review. This includes partial professionalisation of the work of reviewing. Review at several stages is a vital part of the long filtering that incorporates some claims into the canon of reliable knowledge. The review process would be an acknowledged and explicit part of KP—a respected, public and rewarded activity. COOR would be expensive but cost-effective. The costs should be built explicitly into research culture. Finally, the considerations about a more ‘KP friendly’ culture lead to advocacy of a ‘long-term, short-term’ synthesis; that is, of the synthesis of long-term vision, such as a more cooperative and less competitive culture, with incremental changes which may be implemented in the short term. (shrink)

An analysis of the collective engagement with the disease known as Alzheimer’s and the dementia reputed of it reveals recourse to a socially standardized formula that attributes causal agency to the brain in the absence of clinching knowledge. I propose that what Baudrillard calls the model of molecular idealism stipulates such a neurological view of determinism in order to provide caregivers with reassurance in the face of the perplexing character of dementia and the depressing reactions to mortality that it brings (...) to the surface. (shrink)

From Wodehouse to the White House: A Corpus-Assisted Study of Play, Fantasy and Dramatic Incongruity in Comic Writing and Laughter-Talk In this paper I consider two discourse types, one written and literary, the other spoken and semi-conversational, in an attempt to discover if there are any similarities in the ways in which humour is generated in such apparently diverse forms of communication. The first part of the paper is concerned with the explicitly comic prose of P. G. Wodehouse, whilst in (...) the second part of the paper, we investigate the laughter-talk, defined as the talk preceding and provoking, intentionally or otherwise, an episode of laughter, occurring during press briefings held at the White House during the Clinton era and the subsequent Bush administration. Both studies, by employing corpus analysis techniques together with detailed discourse reading, integrate quantitative and qualitative approaches to the respective data sets. (shrink)

: In earlier work, Bernard R. Goldstein and the present author have introduced a procedural rule for historical inquiry, which requires that one take pains to establish the credibility of any citation of ancient thought by later writers in antiquity through a process of verification. In this paper, I shall apply what I call the Rule of Ancient Citations to Simplicius' interpretation of Aristotle's remarks in Meta L. 8, which is the primary point of departure for the modern understanding of (...) Greek planetary theory. I first sketch several lines of argument that lead me to conclude that Simplicius' interpretation should not be accepted because it assumes a concern with planetary phenomena unknown to the Greeks before the late 2nd and early 1st centuries BC. Then, after showing that there is a fairly well defined range of readings of Aristotle's remarks more in keeping with what we actually know of astronomy in the 5th and 4th centuries BC, I conclude that neither Aristotle's report about the Eudoxan and Callippan accounts of the celestial motions nor Simplicius' interpretation of this report is a good starting point for our understanding of early Greek planetary theory. (shrink)

This book, first published in 1978, is a radical approach to the philosophical distinction between Being and beings, in which the life of Socrates is used as the metaphor for the theoretical life, in contrast to the continuous historical interest in that life as an object for biographical reconstruction and description. Professor Blum's main concern is to develop a story that coordinates stages of the theoretical life to practices which exemplify man's ideal relationship with language.

The authors focus on the ways in which various models of the distribution of power in society treat interest groups and evaluate their significance.

(1986). Reason and Nuclear Deterrence. Canadian Journal of Philosophy: Vol. 16, Supplementary Volume 12: Nuclear Weapons, Deterrence and Disarmament, pp. 129-159.

Michael Tooley defends infanticide by analysing ‘A has a right to X’ as roughly synonymous with ‘If A desires X, then others are under a prima facie obligation to refrain from actions that would deprive him [or her] of it.’ An infant who cannot conceive of himself or herself as a continuing subject of experiences cannot desire to continue existing. Hence, on Tooley’s analysis, killing the infant is not impermissible, for it does not go against any of the infant’s desires. (...) However, Tooley’s argument in support of his analysis seems to justify, instead, a slightly more subtle analysis—namely, ‘A has a right to X’ is roughly extensionally equivalent with ‘Unless A expresses his or her desire that not‐X, then others are under a prima facie obligation to refrain from actions that would deprive him or her of X.’ But given this analysis, the infant’s purported lack of any capacity to conceive of himself or herself as a continuing subject of experiences implies that we cannot be released from any duty that we might have not to harm him or her. In short, Tooley’s argument in support of his analysis actually implies that infanticide may well be impermissible. (shrink)

K. Danziger, Marking the Mind: A History of Memory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. 305 pp. £24.99. ISBN: 978-0-521-89815-7 (hdbk) and 978-0-521-72641-2 (pbk).