Since Descartes, the quest for the foundation in epistemology has suffered a series of setbacks. The consequence of the opposition against an epistemic foundation is epistemic skepticism. The irony of the skeptic position is that scepticism in all its hues is self-refuting. Although the establishment of a foundation is essential for coherent epistemology, the quest for epistemic foundation has suffered some oppositions because most attempts at establishing foundational epistemology have focused on intentional signs or products – beliefs, concepts, propositions, etc. (...) In this essay, I argue that in order to establish foundational epistemology, cognitional and intentionality analysis should take priority over conceptual analysis. Hence, instead of focusing on intentional signs or products, attention should be paid to intentional acts – experiencing, understanding and judging – of the knowing subject. In other words, I argue that paying adequate attention to human cognitional structure is vital in the defense of epistemic foundation and that the foundation is found in the structure of human knowing rather than in the products of human knowing. Focusing on cognitional analysis will help to account for both epistemic foundation and epistemic pluralism. The shift from conceptual to cognitional and intentionality analysis has implications for the articulation of the African perspective on knowledge since the human cognitional structure is the same, but contextual differences arise because of one's epistemic environment. Following the example of Bernard Lonergan, I argue that self-knowledge or self-affirmation of the knower, as he terms it, is the paradigmatic case for the establishment of epistemic foundation. (shrink)

(2023). God and suffering in Africa: An exploration in natural theology and philosophy of religion. South African Journal of Philosophy: Vol. 42, No. 4, pp. 348-360.

Surveying 2,500 years of philosophically oriented literary theory, Patrick Hogan provides students and teachers of literature with both explication and ...

Ein rortyanischer Pragmatismus sieht sich im Kontext der Debatte um „postfaktische Politik“ mit dem Vorwurf konfrontiert, dass er mit seiner Kritik an Wahrheit und Objektivität für deren Entstehung und Erfolg mitverantwortlich ist. Nach einer Klärung der Bedeutung des Begriffs „postfaktische Politik“ werde ich darlegen wie eine rortyanische Pragmatistin diesen Vorwurf in seiner einfachen und raffinierten Variante entkräften kann. Hierbei erörtere ich die Unterschiede zwischen einer subjektivistischen und einer objektivistischen Verteidigungsstrategie und argumentiere dafür, dass die letztgenannte erfolgsversprechender ist. Abschließend skizziere ich, (...) wie eine Rezeption von Rortys Denken konstruktiv etwas zur Lösung der Probleme beitragen kann, die unter dem Stichwort „postfaktische Politik“ diskutiert werden. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Proceedings of the ALSC (1995 Convention)Patrick HenryGiven the oppressively politicized character of academic literary studies today, it took courage and conviction to found a new literary society in 1994. The Association of Literary Scholars and Critics is dedicated to the study of literature as a source of pleasure and insight. This would be banal were it not for the way in which culture wars, identity politics, and race (...) and gender issues have come to dominate university literature departments. More than merely a handful of scholars wish to reverse this trend: in less than two years, the ALSC has grown to 1800 members and its first conference, held in Minneapolis, September 22–24, 1995, was a notable success.Because we favor a true pluralism, and like many others are tired of the predictable posturing that permeates so much literary scholarship today, we invited the ALSC to publish its first conference proceedings in our pages. The meeting offered much variety, with classicists and modernists, poets, fiction writers, and critics trading ideas on literature and aesthetics. Despite worries by its detractors that the ALSC represents reaction or blind traditionalism, there was a refreshing openness to the proceedings, with lucid examples of critical reading and topics from metaphor in Dickens and Auden’s Alcaic stanza in “In memory of Sigmund Freud,” to the Islamic influence on Dante’s Commedia—a connection that belies the charge that the Western canon is inevitably Eurocentric. If the ALSC can revive a sense of wonder before the greatest works of literary art and provide an alternative to the complacency and pretentiousness of contemporary theory, it deserves support from us all.For twenty years it has said on our inside back cover that Philosophy and Literature “owes allegiance to no particular school or style of criticism or philosophy.” Our only loyalty is to literature and philosophy; they constitute our field of interest. It has never been our aim to adopt the correct ideology. We remain skeptical of ideological commitments and will continue to publish exciting jargon-free articles representative of the entire spectrum of approaches to literature and philosophy.Copyright © 1996 The Johns Hopkins University Press... (shrink)

The language of “participant-driven research,” “crowdsourcing” and “citizen science” is increasingly being used to encourage the public to become involved in research ventures as both subjects and scientists....

This syllabus was submitted to the Rhodes College Office of Academic Affairs by the course instructor.

Research on collaborative professionalism may be enriched by inquiries into the lived experiences of teachers. The question of what collaboration is like for teachers has not been taken up widely in the literature. The meaning of collaboration as a coming together of individuals who share, design, and co-create for purposes that are aligned with generative possibilities of producing something new, of understanding something in a novel way, and to combine perspectives, personalities, experiences and expertise, represents a new area for research. (...) This paper presents a phenomenological analysis of teachers’ lived experiences of collaboration. To ask these questions requires an orientation to the lived experience of teacher collaboration. For the purposes of this paper, two themes – collaboration and a creative imaginary, and collaboration and relationality – are described as unique structures of human experience. This research supports the conclusion that research in the field of collaborative professionalism and teacher collaboration may be significantly deepened by inquiries into concrete lived experiences of teacher collaboration. (shrink)

‘Good’ is nothing specific but is transcendentally or generally applied over specific, and specified, ‘categories’. These ‘categories’ may be seen—at least for the purposes of this note—as under Platonic Forms. The rule that instances under a category or form need a Form to be under is valid. It may be tautological: but this is OK for rules. Not being specific, however, ‘good’ neither needs nor can have a specifying Form. So, on these grounds, the Form of the Good is otious. (...) Any rule of the kind, ‘Everything needs a Form, so good needs a Form of the Good’ is mistaken, in that good is not a kind, but a transcendental. To give a Form to the transcendental ‘good’ is a mistake: it is a Rylian category mistake. And the Form of the Good either does no work, or works unprofitably in any but an aesthetic sense. (shrink)

Despite any shortcomings of Kant's transcendental philosophy, the spirit of Kant's approach is correct. In particular, Kant is correct to believe an accurate account of the types of “access” humans possess to internal and empirical content should form the groundwork for epistemic and ethical investigation and epistemic and ethical investigations cannot successfully circumvent this groundwork. In this context, the term “access” concerns the mental processes that render internal and external experience possible. In supporting the above claims, this article outlines and (...) defends what can be considered a weak version of Kant's transcendental approach. This weaker approach does not require the achievement of synthetic a priori judgments, which permit deductive conclusions concerning possible experience. (shrink)

This syllabus was submitted to the Rhodes College Office of Academic Affairs by the course instructor.

It is uncontroversial that there is a historical connection between Reid and American pragmatism. What is unclear is whether, as has recently been suggested, Reid’s own views—in particular, his epistemological views—contain an important pragmatist element. This chapter agues in the affirmative, but suggests that commentators have mischaracterized the pragmatist character of Reid’s position, including his response to the skeptic: “the primacy of practice” constitutes an essential feature of his epistemological views proper and his distinctive “third way” between dogmatism and skepticism.

Reflections on Commercial Life , an anthology of writings, from the ancient Greeks to contemporary thinkers, provides students, scholars, and general readers an opportunity to develop a more self-conscious and critical relationship to commercial life. Selections are drawn from seminal works of high intellectual and literary quality. Through an inquiry into history, nature, and outcomes, this volume offers the opportunity to explore, as never before, alternatives to modern commercial life.

Pre-diabetes is a risk factor for the development of diabetes, not a disease in its own right. The prevalence increases with age and reaches nearly 50% of those aged over 75 years in the USA. While lifestyle modification and treatment are likely to benefit those with many years of life ahead of them, they are unlikely to benefit patients with a limited life expectancy. Despite this, some very elderly patients in the UK and elsewhere are being labelled as pre-diabetic. While (...) ideal practice would be to carefully consider the impact of any potentially abnormal blood test before it is taken, this is not always possible in routine practice. In this paper, we discuss a pragmatic, ethical approach for clinicians managing pre-diabetic blood tests in very elderly patients. We argue that a ‘see-saw’ model of paternalism should be used in deciding which patients to inform that they can be labelled as pre-diabetic. Those patients that may benefit from the label should be informed, and those that will not, should not. Where the benefits/drawbacks are unclear, the result and its potential significance should be discussed in depth with the individual patient. We do not advocate withholding information from any patient. Instead we suggest clinicians use individual patient circumstances to contextualise the relevance of pre-diabetes to the patient and consider the benefits and drawbacks before informing them. This approach has the potential to be used for other pre-conditions and risk factors in addition to pre-diabetes. (shrink)

The central topic of current philosophy of religion has been the meaning and the truth of the assertion that God exists. The roots of this preoccupation lie in the natural theology, and the criticism of that theology, of the eighteenth century in the West. The arguments of Hume and Kant are still the basis of contemporary discussion. While this attachment to eighteenth-century concerns may manifest a laudable sense of reverence for our ancestors, it has led the philosophy of religion into (...) lamentable delinquencies and impoverishments. (shrink)

This paper argues that modern society does not meet the problems posed by the experience of disease in a satisfactory way. It attempts to show this by examining the distinction between disease and plague. Disease is formulated as necesssarily involving the self in unforeseeable ways with what is other to itself: the challenge of disease is treated as the challenge of this involvement. On the other hand, plague as an abstract threat is that towards which the collective shows principled indifference. (...) The strength and the limits of this indifference are explored. Subsequent upon this, the paper examines the consequences of the loss of the distinction between disease and plague, particularly with respect to the implications of that loss for the treatment, management, and control of disease in modern society. (shrink)

While we agree that the frame problem, as initially stated by McCarthy and Hayes (1969), is a problem that arises because of the use of representations, we do not accept the anti-representationalist position that the way around the problem is to eliminate representations. We believe that internal representations of the external world are a necessary, perhaps even a defining feature, of higher cognition. We explore the notion of dynamically created context-dependent representations that emerge from a continual interaction between working memory, (...) external input, and long-term memory. We claim that only this kind of representation, necessary for higher cognitive abilities such as counterfactualization, will allow the combinatorial explosion inherent in the frame problem to be avoided. (shrink)

West and non-West -- Western rationality and postcolonialism -- Rationality, theory and thinking -- The problem -- At home -- Abroad -- Identities -- Who are we? -- Who are the 'others' ? -- Why is the West more 'advanced'? -- Why is the non-West a 'threat'? -- Ideas -- Individual -- Society -- Freedom -- Faith -- Market -- Change -- Interpretations -- To think is to theorise -- To theorise is to explain -- To explain is to act (...) -- To act is to think (again) -- Epilogue: Three questions -- Secularism -- Human rights -- Sovereignty. (shrink)

La notion de chair s’élabore chez Merleau-Ponty, à l’encontre du primat husserlien du toucher, dans l’articulation du toucher et du voir. C’est par cette articulation, ce recouvrement l’un par l’autre des champs sensoriels que Merleau-Ponty peut penser la chair comme chair du monde, élément de l’Être. L’auto-appréhension charnelle doit se comprendre d’abord selon une visibilité errante, dans la transitivité des regards qui se voient et s’échangent le paysage commun de leurs vues. Mais, remontant au cœur même de ce « transitivisme (...) », c’est dans la rencontre des corps, dans leur enlacement, que Le visible et l’invisible décrit au plus près l’opération de cette réversibilité. Naissance du monde dans la figure d’une scène primitive où les corps se donnant l’un à l’autre ouvrent un espacement originaire. Cette réflexivité essentiellement est inaccomplie, les corps ne se touchent que dans l’écart qui les unit. La chair, Merleau-Ponty y insiste, ne se rejoint que dans l’immi­nence d’une auto-affection toujours différée, par là elle est différenciée, polymorphe, et elle demeure ouverte. De cette ouverture de la chair naît l’expression. La voix s’élève dans une autre réflexivité, celle d’un sonore qui s’entend et, plus proprement, celle des voix qui s’écoutent. Incarnation sonore, la voix est la chair vive du sens. Entre la caresse et la voix, c’est à un même mouvement de réflexivité et d’expressivité charnelle que Merleau-Ponty nous fait donc assister, un même élan de la chair qui s’exhausse de son anonymat élémentaire pour naître à soi dans l’expression. (shrink)

No. South African Journal of Philosophy Vol. 25(1) 2006: 48-61.

Le jour du Grand Pardon, présence du blanc, mon taleth immaculé, le seul taleth vierge de la famille,Comme les plumes des coqs et poules que Haim Aimé veut blanches pour le sacrifice d’avant Kippour,Le rabbin les égorge dans le jardin après les avoir tâtées sous l’aile en tenant le couteau entre les dents,puis passées au-dessus de nos têtes en prononçant nos noms, inoubliables bêtes blanches ensanglantées...

"I think this is an outstanding book. The coverage is comprehensive, the lines of thought and exposition are clear, and the level of discussion is very high yet remarkably lively and accessible. It has an underlying intellectual seriousness and engagement which shines out through the individual chapters, and the author's unwillingness to make do with secondary analyses and received ideas gives it a strength and freshness of approach which is extremely welcome." -- Professor William Outhwaite, University of Sussex Social Theory (...) in the Twentieth Century offers an easy-to-read but provocative account of the development of social theory. Patrick Baert covers a wide range of key figures and schools of thought, including Giddens, Foucault and Habermas. Written in a lively style and avoiding jargon, this book is aimed at students who wish to understand the main debates and dilemmas driving social theory. Rather than providing a neutral summary of the different thinkers and theories, Baert challenges the conventional readings of social theory with new and original interpretations. In effect, he bridges the gap between philosophy and social theory by placing the theoretical views within wider historical traditions. Social Theory in the Twentieth Century will undoubtedly become the standard introduction to social theory for students in sociology, politics, and anthropology. (shrink)