It is often supposed that the spectacular successes of our modern mathematical sciences support a lofty vision of a world completely ordered by one single elegant theory. In this book Nancy Cartwright argues to the contrary. When we draw our image of the world from the way modern science works - as empiricism teaches us we should - we end up with a world where some features are precisely ordered, others are given to rough regularity and still others behave (...) in their own diverse ways. This patchwork makes sense when we realise that laws are very special productions of nature, requiring very special arrangements for their generation. Combining classic and newly written essays on physics and economics, The Dappled World carries important philosophical consequences and offers serious lessons for both the natural and the social sciences. (shrink)

One of the strongest strands in Nancy's philosophy is an attempt to rethink community and the very idea of the social in a way that does not ground these ideas in some individual subject or subjectivity. The fundamental argument of this book is that being is always 'being with', that 'I' is not prior to 'we', that existence is essentially co-existence. He thinks this being together, not as a comfortable enclosure in a pre-existing group, but as a mutual abandonment (...) and exposure to each other, one that would preserve the 'I' and its freedom in a mode of imagining community as neither a 'society of spectacle' nor via some form of 'authenticity'. (shrink)

This letter replies to the letter “Colonial and Neocolonial Barriers to Companion Digital Humans in Africa,” by Luís Cordeiro‐Rodrigues, in the same, May‐June 2024, issue of the Hastings Center Report.

How do novel scientific concepts arise? In Creating Scientific Concepts, Nancy Nersessian seeks to answer this central but virtually unasked question in the problem of conceptual change. She argues that the popular image of novel concepts and profound insight bursting forth in a blinding flash of inspiration is mistaken. Instead, novel concepts are shown to arise out of the interplay of three factors: an attempt to solve specific problems; the use of conceptual, analytical, and material resources provided by the (...) cognitive-social-cultural context of the problem; and dynamic processes of reasoning that extend ordinary cognition. Focusing on the third factor, Nersessian draws on cognitive science research and historical accounts of scientific practices to show how scientific and ordinary cognition lie on a continuum, and how problem-solving practices in one illuminate practices in the other. (shrink)

What does it mean to think critically about politics at a time when inequality is increasing worldwide, when struggles for the recognition of difference are eclipsing struggles for social equality, and when we lack any credible vision of an alternative to the present order? Philosopher Nancy Fraser claims that the key is to overcome the false oppositions of "postsocialist" commonsense. Refuting the view that we must choose between "the politics of recognition" and the "politics of redistribution," Fraser argues for (...) an integrative approach that encompasses the best aspects of both. (shrink)

This volume stages a debate between two philosophers, one North American, the other German, who hold different views of the relation of redistribution to ...

Hunting Causes and Using Them argues that causation is not one thing, as commonly assumed, but many. There is a huge variety of causal relations, each with different characterizing features, different methods for discovery and different uses to which it can be put. In this collection of new and previously published essays, Nancy Cartwright provides a critical survey of philosophical and economic literature on causality, with a special focus on the currently fashionable Bayes-nets and invariance methods - and it (...) exposes a huge gap in that literature. Almost every account treats either exclusively how to hunt causes or how to use them. But where is the bridge between? It's no good knowing how to warrant a causal claim if we don't know what we can do with that claim once we have it. This book will interest philosophers, economists and social scientists. (shrink)

Unruly Practices brings together a series of widely discussed essays in feminism and social theory. Read together, they constitute a sustained critical encounter with leading European and American approaches to social theory. In addition, Nancy Fraser develops a new and original socialist-feminist critical theory that overcomes many of the limitations of current alternatives. First, in a series of critical essays, she deploys philosophical and literary techniques to assess the work of Michael Foucault, the French deconstructionists, Richard Rorty, and Jürgen (...) Habermas. Then, in a group of constructive essays, she incorporates their respective strengths in a new critical theory of late-capitalist political culture. Fraser breaks new ground methodologically by integrating the previously divergent insights of poststructuralism, critical social theory, feminist theory, and pragmatism. Thematically, she deals with varied forms of dominance and subordination in modern, industrial, late-capitalist societies. These themes are integrated in an original theory of 'the politics of need interpretation.' This concept becomes the linchpin of the socialist-feminist critical theory. (shrink)

" Nancy Bauer begins her book by asking: "Then what kind of a problem does being a woman pose?

Until recently, struggles for justice proceeded against the background of a taken-for-granted frame: the bounded territorial state. With that "Westphalian" picture of political space assumed by default, the scope of justice was rarely subject to open dispute. Today, however, human-rights activists and international feminists join critics of structural adjustment and the World Trade Organization in challenging the view that justice can only be a domestic relation among fellow citizens. Targeting injustices that cut across borders, they are making the scale of (...) justice an object of explicit struggle. Inspired by these efforts, Nancy Fraser asks: What is the proper frame for theorizing justice? Faced with a plurality of competing scales, how do we know which one is truly just? In exploring these questions, Fraser revises her widely discussed theory of redistribution and recognition. She introduces a third, "political" dimension of justice—representation—and elaborates a new, reflexive type of critical theory that foregrounds injustices of "misframing." Engaging with thinkers such as Jürgen Habermas, John Rawls, Michel Foucault, and Hannah Arendt, she envisions a "postwestphalian" mapping of political space that accommodates transnational solidarity, transborder publicity, and democratic frame-setting, as well as emancipatory projects that cross borders. The result is a sustained reflection on who should count with respect to what in a globalizing world. (shrink)

This book is the first to offer a detailed analysis of Aristotelian and Kantian ethics together, in a way that remains faithful to the texts and responsive to debates in contemporary ethics. Recent moral philosophy has seen a revival of interest in the concept of virtue, and with it a reassessment of the role of virtue in the work of Aristotle and Kant. This book brings that re-assessment to a new level of sophistication. Nancy Sherman argues that Kant preserves (...) a notion of virtue in his moral theory that bears recognisable traces of the Aristotelian and Stoic traditions, and that his complex anthropology of morals brings him into surprising alliance with Aristotle. She develops her argument through close readings of major texts by both Aristotle and Kant, illustrating points of congruence and contrast. (shrink)

In this timely, thoughtful book, which goes to the heart of feminist concerns in the context of larger social, ecological, and theological issues, Nancy R. Howell proposes an ecofeminist worldview based on the organic-relational philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead. In particular, the book explores the ways in which Whitehead's philosophy can help to establish interrelationships among various women's communities, the relationship between humanity and nature, and the theological process of relating the world to God. Howell strives to develop principles (...) that are compatible with the wide spectrum of women's voices from different racial backgrounds and social strata. Specifically, she moves beyond mere acknowledgment of differing perspectives within the woman's movement and seriously engages criticisms of race-privileged white feminism by African American and Latin American activists. A Feminist Cosmology calls for a self-critical reformation of feminist thought based on a more inclusive framework, one that takes into account the diversity of relationships among women, the deep interdependence of humanity and the ecosystem, and ultimately the variety of theological perspectives relating the world to God. (shrink)

Introduction [Nancy L. Rosenblum] I. Varieties of Liberalism Today 1. The Liberalism of Fear [Judith N. Shklar] 2. Humanist Liberalism [Susan Moller Okin] 3. Liberal Democracy and the Costs of Consent [Benjamin R. Barber] II. Education and the Moral Life 4. Undemocratic Education [Amy Gutmann] 5. Civic Education in the Liberal State [William Galston] III. Moral Conflict 6. Class Conflict and Constitutionalism in J. S. Mill’s Thought [Richard Ashcraft] 7. Making Sense of Moral Conflict [Steven Lukes] 8. Liberal Dialogue (...) Versus a Critical Theory of Discursive Legitimation [Seyla Benhabib] IV. Repairing Individualist and Communitarian Failings 9. Cross-Purposes: The Liberal--Communitarian Debate [Charles Taylor] 10. Democratic Individuality and the Meaning of Rights [George Kateb] 11. Pluralism and Self-Defense [Nancy L. Rosenblum] 12. The Permanent Structure of Antiliberal Thought [Stephen Holmes]. (shrink)

How the new conspiracists are undermining democracy—and what can be done about it Conspiracy theories are as old as politics. But conspiracists today have introduced something new—conspiracy without theory. And the new conspiracism has moved from the fringes to the heart of government with the election of Donald Trump. In A Lot of People Are Saying, Russell Muirhead and Nancy Rosenblum show how the new conspiracism differs from classic conspiracy theory, why so few officials speak truth to conspiracy, and (...) what needs to be done to resist it. Classic conspiracy theory insists that things are not what they seem and gathers evidence—especially facts ominously withheld by official sources—to tease out secret machinations. The new conspiracism is different. There is no demand for evidence, no dots revealed to form a pattern, no close examination of shadowy plotters. Dispensing with the burden of explanation, the new conspiracism imposes its own reality through repetition and bare assertion. The new conspiracism targets democratic foundations—political parties and knowledge-producing institutions. It makes it more difficult to argue, persuade, negotiate, compromise, and even to disagree. Ultimately, it delegitimates democracy. Filled with vivid examples, A Lot of People Are Saying diagnoses a defining and disorienting feature of today's politics and offers a guide to responding to the threat. (shrink)

(No abstract is available for this citation).

La autora presenta algunas criticas generales al proyecto de reducir las leyes causales a probabilidades. Además, muestra que las leyes causales son imprescindibles para poder diferenciar las strategias efectivas de las que no lo son y da un criterio para considerar cuando podemos deducir causalidad a través de datos estadísticos.

For over twenty years Nancy Hartsock has been a powerful voice in the effort to forge a feminism sophisticated and strong enough to make a difference in the real world of powerful political and economic forces. This volume collects her most important writings, offering her current thinking about this period in the development of feminist political economy and presenting an important new paper, “The Feminist Standpoint Revisited.”Central themes recur throughout the volume: in particular, the relationships between theory and activism, (...) between feminism and Marxism, and between postmodernism and politics. Readers will appreciate Hartsock’s account of how so much of her theoretical work grew directly out of the demands of the activist life. The Feminist Standpoint Revisited is an important record and a timely reevaluation of the development of feminist thought, as well as a contribution to current work. It will be a valuable resource for feminist theorists in a wide variety of disciplines. (shrink)

In “Avoiding a ‘Death Panel Redux,” Nicole M. Piemonte describes how she tried to fire palliative care after first refusing to let it—and any mention of death, from any source—into her dying mother's room. One way to read this is as a familiar human story about the profound difficulty of facing death, a story that, too often, is reduced to the word “denial.” But Piemonte and Hermer suggest that there is another way to read this story, in terms of the (...) structure that was absent from the earliest conversations and relationship‐building among this patient, her daughter, and the doctors. If advance care planning had been part of the structure all along, if everyone—oncologists, patients, loved ones—talked about prognosis, preferences, benefits, burdens, and goals from the time a life‐threatening disease was diagnosed, as a normal part of good care, would Piemonte have understood her own role as caregiver and advocate differently? If, early on, her fifty‐year‐old mother had been asked, “what do you want to do with the rest of your life?” and had been assured that this question mattered and encouraged to talk about her hopes (such as attending her daughter's wedding), might her treatment and care have been organized in a different way? (shrink)

_Virtue as Social Intelligence: An Empirically Grounded Theory_ takes on the claims of philosophical situationism, the ethical theory that is skeptical about the possibility of human virtue. Influenced by social psychological studies, philosophical situationists argue that human personality is too fluid and fragmented to support a stable set of virtues. They claim that virtue cannot be grounded in empirical psychology. This book argues otherwise. Drawing on the work of psychologists Walter Mischel and Yuichi Shoda, Nancy E. Snow argues that (...) the social psychological experiments that philosophical situationists rely on look at the wrong kinds of situations to test for behavioral consistency. Rather than looking at situations that are objectively similar, researchers need to compare situations that have similar meanings _for the subject_. When this is done, subjects exhibit behavioral consistencies that warrant the attribution of enduring traits, and virtues are a subset of these traits. Virtue can therefore be empirically grounded and virtue ethics has nothing to fear from philosophical situationism. (shrink)

Ein Gespräch zwischen zweien, die sich nicht sicher sind, ob sie schon denken -/- Der Begriff des Denkens zieht sich als emphatischer Begriff durch das Werk von Jean-Luc Nancy. Zugleich lehnt er es ab, sich selbst als »Denker« bezeichnen zu lassen. Denken ist für ihn stets mit einem »noch nicht« zu versehen. Anknüpfend an Heideggers berühmte Vorlesung »Was heißt Denken?« spricht Nancy in diesem Band mit dem Philosophen und Kurator Daniel Tyradellis über das, was Denken macht: über prägende (...) Lektüren und einflussreiche Lehrer, über Misosophie und das Unerträgliche, über ästhetische Erfahrungen und ihre Medien. In Nähe und Abgrenzung zu Heidegger entsteht ein Bild des Denkens, das darum ringt, dem »uns« und dem »wir« Raum zu geben und das Mit-Sein als ontologische Kategorie zu fassen. (shrink)

In Doing, Jean-Luc Nancy, one of the most prominent and lucid articulators of contemporary French theory and philosophy, examines the precarious but urgent relationship between being and doing. His book is not so much a call to action as a summons to more vigorous thinking, the examination and reflection that must precede any effective action. The first section of the book considers this matter tersely: Jean-Luc Nancy's quickness of language and grace of humor lead the reader carefully past (...) the dangers of oversimplification, toward a general awareness of meaningful being. In the last section, Nancy examines the realities of terrorist actions--specifically those that shocked Paris a few years ago, and more generally the frightening world of politics without conscience, where conscience is the root of all thinking. (shrink)

Jonathan Lear in Radical Hope tackles the idea of cultural devastation, in the specific case of the Crow Indians. What do we mean by “annihilation” of a culture? The moral point of view that he imagines as he reconstructs the eve and aftermath of this annihilation is not second personal, of obligation, but first personal, in the collective and singular, as told by the Crows, with Lear as “analyst.” Radical Hope is a study of representative character of a people—of virtue, (...) courage, resilience, and hope in the face of cultural collapse. The leading questions are shaped by ancient Greek ethics, but with a twist: On the brink of cultural death , what counts for us as good living and what is the nature of the virtues or excellences that constitute it? How might a leader, a phronimos , exemplify it? This puts it too narrowly. The questions, also, are Wittgensteinian: How does a nation go on, when the concepts and way of life it has lived by for centuries are no more? What does it mean to go on? What does it mean to stop when the marks of going on are no longer? (shrink)

The claims of randomized controlled trials to be the gold standard rest on the fact that the ideal RCT is a deductive method: if the assumptions of the test are met, a positive result implies the appropriate causal conclusion. This is a feature that RCTs share with a variety of other methods, which thus have equal claim to being a gold standard. This article describes some of these other deductive methods and also some useful non-deductive methods, including the hypothetico-deductive method. (...) It argues that with all deductive methods, the benefit that the conclusions follow deductively in the ideal case comes with a great cost: narrowness of scope. This is an instance of the familiar trade-off between internal and external validity. RCTs have high internal validity but the formal methodology puts severe constraints on the assumptions a target population must meet to justify exporting a conclusion from the test population to the target. The article reviews one such set of assumptions to show the kind of knowledge required. The overall conclusion is that to draw causal inferences about a target population, which method is best depends case-by-case on what background knowledge we have or can come to obtain. There is no gold standard. (shrink)

The obsession is pursued of a word, a sign, a thought that is identical with the thing it signifies, where there is no space between the two. And the nightmare is entertained that, if such an identity is not attained, then intellectual work in general is worth nothing and should be destroyed.

A deeply informed exploration of what Stoic ideas have to offer us today Stoicism is the ideal philosophy of life for those seeking calm in times of stress and uncertainty. For many, it has become the new Zen, with meditation techniques that help us face whatever life throws our way. Indeed, the Stoics address a key question of our time: how can we be masters of our fate when the outside world threatens to unmoor our well-being? In Stoic Wisdom, Georgetown (...) philosophy professor Nancy Sherman, an expert in ancient and modern ethics, shows what a practical modern Stoicism really looks like. Drawing on the wisdom of Stoic thinkers Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Seneca and others, Sherman paints a portrait that uncovers the true subtlety and power of Stoic ideas. That portrait reveals a truth often ignored: that the Stoics never thought self-sufficiency was only about rugged self-reliance and mental discipline. We are at home in the world, they taught, when we are connected to each other in cooperative efforts. While mastery of one's self is essential, we also must draw on our deepest relationships for true strength and resilience. Bringing these ancient ideas to bear on 21st century environments-from Silicon Valley to first responders in a pandemic, to soldiers on the battlefield-Sherman shows how Stoicism can both prepare us for an uncertain future and help us cope with traumatic events. Stoic Wisdom will appeal to anyone feeling helpless or looking for deeper, meaningful strength and goodness in addressing life's biggest and smallest challenges. (shrink)

Nancy Fraser’s powerful new book documents the “movements of feminism” and the shifts in the feminist imaginary since the 1970s. Fraser follows the history of feminism from the ferment of the New Left, during which “Second Wave” feminism emerged as a struggle for women’s liberation alongside other social movements, to its emersion in identity politics following the decline of its initial utopian energies. Alongside this detailed history, Fraser recognizes the need for a reinvigorated feminist radicalism to respond to the (...) crisis in neoliberalism. She argues for a feminism that could join other egalitarian movements in struggles aimed at subjecting capitalism to democratic control, while retrieving the core utopian insights of feminism’s earlier phases. (shrink)