For those to whom John Bowring's name means anything, the most likely association with it is the complex and question-begging term ‘Benthamite’. Contemporaries certainly used the term, particularly when they wanted to suggest that his actions were narrowly ideological or theoretical. But to some of Bowring's contemporaries another association served hostile intent almost as well: his Unitarianism.

In this paper an attempt is made to provide an analysis of the meaning of the term function and related terms as they are used by R. K. Merton in the first chapter of his book Social Theory and Social Structure. Several problems are suggested which must be solved if statements about functions are to be considered scientifically adequate. Secondly the term functionalism is defined and several of Merton's functionalist explanations of social phenomena are stated and criticized.

The theoretical framework adopted in the exact sciences, for constructing and testing deterministic theories on the one hand, and modelling and analysis of observed phenomena on the other, is often implicitly assumed to be that of structural stability. In view of recent developments in nonlinear dynamics, it is argued here that in general it may not be possible to assume strict determinism and structural stability simultaneously; either strict determinism holds, in which case the fragility framework may turn out to be (...) the appropriate framework for the study of certain phenomena in the exact sciences, or ‘structural stability’ is restored at the expense of introducing stochasticity. In this sense a certain degree of indeterminacy may be unavoidable even at the classical level. (shrink)

R.K. Elliott's essays on aesthetics put forward a number of common themes that together constitute a unified approach to aesthetics. Throughout his writing, Elliott combines analytic rigour with sympathy for ideas in continental philosophy. This book, the first to gather together Elliott's key essays, powerfully illuminates the unifying role of imagination and the aesthetic in human experience.

The many comments on good and evil found in the writings of A. N. Whitehead are exhibited in his mind against the two categories of positive and negative value. His concern in value-considerations is with the “trinity” of truth, beauty and goodness on the one hand, and with falsehood, ugliness and evil on the other. For him, “value” is a word employed for “the intrinsic reality of an event” and very frequently in his treatment of the value-theme he uses the (...) term “importance” as having equivalence to “value.”. (shrink)

Section 1. Prologue -- section 2. The whole being -- section 3. Engaging with wholeness -- section 4. Wholeness in Kashmiri Shaivism -- section 5. The Buddhist perspective -- section 6. Wholeness in the modern world -- section 7. The workings of wholeness in our world -- section 8. Epilogue.

R K Elliott; Louis Arnaud Reid: a remembrance, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 20, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 3–6, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-97.

A Hilbert-style version of an implicational logic can be represented by a set of axiom schemes and modus ponens or by the corresponding axioms, modus ponens and substitution. Certain logics, for example the intuitionistic implicational logic, can also be represented by axioms and the rule of condensed detachment, which combines modus ponens with a minimal form of substitution. Such logics, for example intuitionistic implicational logic, are said to be D-complete. For certain weaker logics, the version based on condensed detachment and (...) axioms (the condensed version of the logic) is weaker than the original. In this paper we prove that the relevant logic T→, and any logic of which this is a sublogic, is D-complete. (shrink)

J. o. urmson's contention that russell held that 'to show that 'x' is an incomplete symbol is tantamount to showing that there are no x's' is shown to rest partly upon a misreading of "principia", pp. 71-72, where russell reveals what he means by a 'definite proof' that a symbol is incomplete, and partly upon a misunderstanding of russell's use of the expression 'logical fiction'.

Urmson is correct in holding that russell's use of "logical fiction" does usually involve ontological implications. But the issue is more complex than he seems to realize. Because russell's program of logical construction is revisionary, The question "are there really x's?" is ambiguous and can be taken as asking either: (a) are there x's as thought of pre-Analytically? or (b) are there x's as thought of post-Analytically? russell gives different answers in each case.