A field experiment examined how signs of social class influence compassionate responses to those in need. Pedestrians in two major cities in the United States were exposed to a confederate wearing symbols of relatively high or low social class who was requesting money to help the homeless. Compassionate responding was assessed by measuring the donation amount of the pedestrians walking past the target. Pedestrians gave more than twice as much money to the confederate wearing higher-class symbols than they did to (...) the one wearing lower-class symbols. A follow-up study exposed participants to images of the target wearing the same higher- or lower-class symbols and examined the antecedents of compassionate responding. Consistent with theorizing, higher-class symbols elicited perceptions of elevated competence, trustworthiness, similarity to the self, and perceived humanity compared to lower-class symbols. These results indicate that visible signs of social class influence judgments of others’ traits and attributes, as well as in decisions to respond compassionately to the needs of those who are suffering. (shrink)

A M Quinton; Authority and Autonomy in Knowledge, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 5, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 201–215, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1.

First published in 1953, this seminal introduction to political philosophy is intended for both the student of political theory and for the general reader. After an introduction which explains the nature and purpose of philosophy, Dr Murray provides a critical examination of the principle theories advanced by political philosophers from Plato to Marx, paying special attention to contemporary issues. The book also makes an attempt to define the essential issues of philosophical significance in contemporary politics, with special reference to the (...) conflict between political authority and individual rights, and to show how the different moral assumptions underlying authoritarian and democratic systems of government are ultimately based upon different theories of logic. (shrink)

Mastery imagery has been shown to be associated with more positive cognitive and emotional responses to stress, but research is yet to investigate the influence of mastery imagery ability on imagery’s effectiveness in regulating responses to acute stress, such as competition. Furthermore, little research has examined imagery’s effectiveness in response to actual competition. This study examined (a), whether mastery imagery ability was associated with stress response changes to a competitive stress task, a car racing computer game, following an imagery intervention, (...) and (b), the effects of different guided imagery content on pre-task cognitive and emotional responses. In Session 1, 78 participants (M age = 20.03 years, SD = 1.28) completed ratings of pre-task anxiety intensity and direction, confidence, and perceived control. Imagery ability was also assessed before completing the task. In Session 2, participants were randomly allocated to an imagery condition (positive mastery, negative mastery, relaxation) or control group (no imagery) before completing the task and outcome measures again. For the negative mastery group, greater positive mastery imagery ability was associated with greater perceived control and perceiving anxiety as more facilitative. Furthermore, mastery imagery ability moderated the relationship between anxiety intensity and direction. Altogether, results suggest that positive mastery imagery ability may act as a potential buffer against the effects of negative images. (shrink)

Much of recent ethics has been thoroughly formalistic in character. In the first place it has confined itself to the investigation of the general logical properties of møral discourse and has largely ignored the broad psychological context of motives and purposes in which that kind of discourse has its life. Secondly, it has sought to distinguish the field of discourse that it takes as its subject-matter in a formalistic way, in terms of such properties as its universalisability, its autonomy and (...) its overridingness, without reference to the concrete and specific human interests with which moral discourse is connected and which it might serve to promote. (shrink)

Anthony Quinton's The Nature of Things covers competently a good deal of philosophical ground in hopeful pursuit of a coherent ontology de-scribable as ‘a version of materialism’. He seems to discern two major difficulties for the enterprise: first, that of giving an acceptable account of ontology, and, secondly, that of reconciling his naturalism with his empiricist principles. ‘Naturalism’ is the view that man and his doings constitute a part of nature on the same ontological level as other natural things, (...) and materialism is a naturalist philosophy. Of the second difficulty Quinton writes:…a naturalistic view of the world has had to find its chief philosophical expression through doctrines of a sceptical and subjectivist kind, such as Hume's, which have a tendency to undermine the naturalistic presumptions which inspired them. In this book I have tried to equip materialism with solid philosophical credentials. (shrink)

Nelson, L. The impossibility of the "Theory of knowledge."--Moore, G. E. Four forms of skepticism.--Lehrer, K. Skepticism & conceptual change.--Quine, W. V. Epistemology naturalized.--Rozeboom, W. W. Why I know so much more than you do.--Price, H. H. Belief and evidence.--Lewis, C. I. The bases of empirical knowledge.--Malcolm, N. The verification argument.--Firth, R. The anatomy of certainty.--Chisholm, R. M. On the nature of empirical evidence.--Meinong, A. Toward an epistemological assessment of memory.--Brandt, R. The epistemological status of memory beliefs.--Malcolm, N. A definition (...) of factual memory.--Martin, C. B. and Deutscher, M. Remembering.--Ayer, A. J. Basic propositions.--Reichenbach, H. Are phenomenal reports absolutely certain?--Goodman, N. Sense and certainty.--Lewis, C. I. The given element in empirical knowledge.--Alston, W. Varieties of privileged access.--Schlick, M. The foundation of knowledge.--Russell, B. Epistemological premisses, basic propositions, and factual premisses.--Firth, R. Coherence, certainty, and epistemic priority.--Sellars, W. Empiricism and the philosophy of mind.--Quinton, A. The foundations of knowledge. (shrink)

These are exciting times for philosophy and psychiatry. After drifting apart for most of this century, the two disciplines, if not yet fully reconciled, are suddenly at least on speaking terms. With hindsight we may wonder why they should have ignored each other for so long. As Anthony Quinton pointed out in a lecture to the Royal Institute of Philosophy a few years ago, it is remarkable that philosophers, in a sense the experts on rationality, should have had so (...) little to say about the phenomena of irrationality. There have been partial exceptions, of course. Descartes and Kant both touched on madness; and there were, notably, important philosophical influences on the development of modern psychiatry in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Yet even John Locke, who was a doctor as well as philosopher, confined himself to a fair-l y superficial distinction between what we should now call mental illness and mental defect—those with, in Locke's view, respectively too many ideas and too few. (shrink)

This volume provides a balanced set of reviews which introduce the central topics in the philosophy of time. This is the first introductory anthology on the subject to appear for many years; the contributors are distinguished, and two of the essays are specially written for this collection. In their introduction, the editors summarize the background to the debate, and show the relevance of issues in the philosophy of time for other branches of philosophy and for science. Contributors include J.M.E. McTaggart, (...) Arthur N. Prior, D.H. Mellor, Sydney Shoemaker, Graeme Forbes, Lawrence Sklar, Michael Dummett, David Lewis, W.H. Newton-Smith, and Anthony Quinton. (shrink)

El propósito de la investigación será analizar algunos textos de Ferdinand Ebner y de Emmanuel Levinas, con el fin de considerar a la persona, al mismo tiempo, apelada y libre respondiente al llamado: pasividad y actividad constitutivas de su existencia. Desde la Antigüedad, se ha considerado que la capacidad de «tener palabra» (λόγον ἔχον) es el elemento que nos distingue del resto de los animales; sin embargo, el tratamiento filosófico que recibió la noción de ‘palabra’ (λόγος, verbum), en la mayoría (...) de las ocasiones restó el carácter dialógico, trascendente o comunitario, acentuando ¾en mayor medida¾ el carácter lógico, inmanente o íntimo de la persona. Considero que el personalismo puede volver a ser esa provocación filosófica que, a modo de gozne, ayude a reunir los polos gnoseológico y ético, tan comúnmente disociados, a través de una antropología que considere a la palabra como intimidad en apertura y comunión responsable. (shrink)

El artículo busca exponer el pensamiento de Emmanuel Levinas en su obra Humanismo del otro hombre en torno a cuatro cuestiones fundamentales: identidad, relación, libertad y trascendencia. Opuesta a la postura de Nietzsche y de otros autores modernos respecto a cada una de estas cuestiones, Levinas presentará una solución paradójica a estas cuatro grandes claves antropológicas que sirven de fundamento para elaborar una teoría de la justicia: la identidad será entendida como vulnerabilidad; la relación como heteronomía; la libertad como diaconía (...) y Obra; la ética como el encuentro religioso fundamental. (shrink)

The well known conference of Paul Ricœur ‘Love and Justice’, pronounced when he received Leopold Lucas award in 1989, shows a dialectical tension between those two notions, and searches deeper in the philosophical –and even theological– basis that reveals love as rectification and safeguard of justice; without love, justice would be cruel, utilitarian and, paradoxically, unfair, remembering us the old Roman adage: “summum ius, summa iniuria”. Moreover, Levinas, in his “Talmudic Lesson on Justice”, compiled after in New Talmudic Readings, presents (...) a less intuitive position, but no less interesting: justice is the place of forgiveness and love, it becomes humane everything it touches, and that’s why it doesn’t need correction; a justice that needed love, had maybe never been true justice. Here lies a critic that complements and improves both, the theory exposed by Paul Ricœur and its Rawlsian basis. (shrink)

Resumen El presente artículo realiza un análisis de los apoyos otorgados por los cárteles de narcotráfico en México, desde la lectura del aparato crítico de Slavoj Žižek, quien sienta las bases para la interpretación de la ayuda humanitaria como un acto violento. Por lo que, el siguiente texto abarca desde la filosofía Žižekianay el psicoanálisis lacaniano, el fenómeno de la violencia ejercida por la figura del comunista liberal, en un comparativo con el crimen organizado mexicano, intentando desentrañar la estructura básica (...) de la dinámica social que impera en la ayuda humanitaria. Así mismo se define la violencia en general y algunas de sus manifestaciones en la sociedad; estableciendo los elementos esenciales de una ideología, distinguiéndola como una herramienta adecuada para el análisis social, esperado así, resolver cómo se constituye en realidad. Palabras clave: Violencia, sistémica, ayuda humanitaria, goce, realidad.This article presents the analysis of the aid provided by drug trafficking cartels in Mexico. It arises from a critical reading of Slavoj Žižek’s work regarding violence and ideology which lays the foundation for the interpretation of humanitarian aid as a violent act. Hence, the coverage of the article from Žižekian philosophy and Lacanian psychoanalysis, the phenomenon of violence exerted by the figure of the liberal communist, in comparison to Mexican organized crime, trying to unravel the basic structure of social dynamics which prevail in humanitarian aid. Likewise, violence in general and some of its manifestations in society are defined; establishing the essential elements of an ideology, distinguishing it as a suitable tool for social analysis, thus expected, solving how it is actually constituted. Key words: Violence, systemic, humanitarian aid, enjoyment, reality. (shrink)

This collection includes papers by such leading thinkers as Michael Ayers, J.A. Passmore, Ian Hacking, Hide Ishiguro, G.E.M. Anscombe, David Pears, A.M. Quinton, and Richard Wollheim.

Anthony Quinton; I*—The Presidential Address: Social Objects, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 76, Issue 1, 1 June 1976, Pages 1–28, https://doi.

Bambrough, R. Essay on man.--Quinton, A. Has man an essence?--Warnock, G. J. Kant and anthropology.--Honderich, T. On inequality and violence, and the differences we make between them.--Cherry, C. Agreement, objectivity and the sentiment of humanity in morals.--Gregory, I. Psycho-analysis, human nature and human conduct.--Gosling, J. The natural supremacy of conscience.--Scruton, R. Reason and happiness.--Wollheim, R. Needs, desires, and moral turpitude.--Hollis, M. My role and its duties.--Watkins, J. Three views concerning human freedom.--Letwin, S. R. Nature, history, and morality.--Passmore, J. Attitudes (...) to nature.--Benson, J. Hog in sloth, fox in stealth: man and beast in moral thinking.--Hare, R. Contrasting methods of environmental planning.--Self, P. Techniques and values in policy decisions. (shrink)

Anthony Quinton; The a Priori and the Analytic, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 64, Issue 1, 1 June 1964, Pages 31–54, https://doi.org/10.1093/a.

We are accustomed to thinking of space and time as particulars or individuals—even if we should hesitate to describe them as things or objects or substances. We say ‘space has three dimensions’, ‘material things occupy space’, ‘the debris has disappeared into space’ and we talk in a comparable fashion about time. Not only do we think of space and time as individuals but, in many connections at any rate, we think of them as unique individuals. When we talk about spaces (...) and times in the plural, when we say ‘fill up the spaces on the form’, ‘it could go in the space between the lamp and the door’, ‘there were peaceful times in the early years of their marriage’ we think of these multiple spaces and times as parts of the unique allencompassing space and the unique all-encompassing time. Kant believed that we could not help thinking of them in this way. We do, at any rate, in fact think like this and it is this conviction that I want to examine. (shrink)

En este texto analizamos la concepción de ciencia en santo Tomás de Aquino, en contraste con la visión moderna. Nos centramos en la epistemología expuesta en la primera cuestión de la Summa Theologiae, donde Tomás presenta las características y fundamentos de la ciencia, para demostrar el carácter científico y sapiencial de la teología. Este análisis se complementa con su doctrina en los proemios a sus comentarios sobre Aristóteles y otras obras. La era moderna ha reducido la razón a un enfoque (...) meramente técnico e instrumental, así ha oscurecido la inquietud humana por la verdad. El hombre, al querer comprometerse con esta búsqueda, se enfrenta a limitaciones culturales que dificultan el acceso a otras dimensiones de la razón. Frente a esto, santo Tomás ofrece una visión más amplia, donde la ciencia no sólo define su objeto, sino que también indaga en sus causas últimas, integra certeza y sentido en una actitud contemplativa que la modernidad ha dejado de lado. (shrink)

This research aims to analyses Leibniz’ Monadologic Ontology and his theory of expression as opposed to those readings of Leibniz’ work that define monads as isolated entities that lack that all possible relation. The analysis will also show that, beyond his notion of Personal Identity, underlies a logic of Otherness able to dialogue with contemporary Personalism. This logic of otherness, if our reading of Leibniz is right, it is especially ostensible in the ‘spirits’, which expressive nature establish not only a (...) systematic bond with the totality of beings that integrate the world, but also a notion of Personal Identity. Such notion allows that otherness acquires a prescriptive character: to place us in other’s situation and thus understand their needs and, through this, acknowledge our place in the cosmos. In order to achieve this we will carry four tasks: first, we will analyze in depth the application of his theory of expression to Monadologic ontology and his notio completa. Second, we will appreciate what implicatures have both for the specific case of spirits, emphasizing the communitarian nature of these rational monads. Third, we will rebuild a Leibnizian theory of Personal Identity and finally, we will compare the results with the main Personalists’ body of thesis. (shrink)

Resumen En este trabajo se explora el problema del cuerpo vivo en la fenomenología trascendental de Edmund Husserl y el entrelazamiento que tiene con la conciencia trascendental. Para ello se exploran diversas capas o momentos del tema. Primero: la justificación de la ausencia de un tratamiento del cuerpo en Ideas I debido a su enfoque estático. Segundo: el problema propiamente dicho de la constitución del cuerpo vivo en Ideas II desde una fenomenología genética. Tercero: la posibilidad de una ética de (...) la corporalidad a partir del análisis de las ubiestesias y la constitución de ciertos valores. Cuarto: que el cuerpo representa un problema metafísico o que su tratamiento puede ser enfocado desde la metafísica, ya que se trata del cuerpo y la subjetividad trascendental como factum del mundo.In this work, we explore the problem of the living body in the transcendental phenomenology of Edmund Husserl and the interlacing that it has with transcendental conscience. To do this, we present several layers or moments of the theme. First, the justification of the absence of body in Ideas I due to their static approach treatment. Second, the problem of the constitution of the living body in Ideas II from a genetic phenomenology. Third, the possibility of an ethic of physicality from analysis of the ubiestesias and the constitution of the values. Quarter, that the living body represents a metaphysical problem, because the living body and the transcendental subjectivity are facts factum) in the world. (shrink)

The aim of the Oxford Readings in Philosophy series is to bring together important recent writings in major areas of philosophical inquiry, selected from a variety of sources, mostly periodicals, which may not be conveniently available to the university student or the general reader. The editor of each volume contributes an introductory essay on the items chosen and on the questions with which they deal. A selective bibliography is appended as a guide to further reading.