Debates in India following on from the Shah Bano case highlight the extent to which gender equality may be compromised by yielding to the dominant voices within a particular religion or cultural tradition. As the Indian Supreme Court noted in Danial Latifi & Anr v Union of India, the pursuit of gender justice raises questions of a universal magnitude. Responding to those questions requires an appeal to norms that claim a universal legitimacy. Liberal feminist demands for a uniform civil code, (...) however, have pitted feminist movements against proponents of minority rights and claims for greater autonomy for minority groups. Against the background of growing communal tensions, many feminists have argued for more complex strategies—strategies that encompass the diversity of women's lives and create a sense of belonging amongst women with diverse religious-cultural affiliations. Liberal theories of rights that abstract from the concrete realities of women's daily lives have not always addressed the institutions and procedures necessary to build that sense of belonging. This article examines the contribution made by discourse ethics theorists to debates on models of multicultural arrangements. It argues that deliberative models of democracy recognize the need for ‘difference-sensitive’ processes of inclusion, potentially assisting feminism in resolving the apparent conflict between the politics of multiculturalism and the pursuit of gender equality. (shrink)

Yet such a contrast fails to provide an adequate account of the full scope of either philosophy or psychoanalysis. On the one hand, philosophical inquiry is not wholly pre-empted by the question of reality; it may also extend into the realm of phantasy, as can be seen in Plato's effort to determine the epistemological value of eikasia or in Husserl's consideration of Phantasie as a basis of insight into essences. On the other hand, psychoanalysts are as concerned about reality as (...) they are about phantasy. Indeed, one of the key phrases of psychoanalytic therapy is "adaptation to reality." The reason for this concern with reality is clear: if phantasies are modifications or distortions of the real, it is imperative to discern what the character of reality is, especially since it is held out as the standard of a sound state of mental health. (shrink)

R. S. Woolhouse; IV*—Leibniz's Reaction to Cartesian Interaction, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 86, Issue 1, 1 June 1986, Pages 69–82, https:/.

Introduction to Sexology [Vvedenie v seksologiiu] by I. S. Kon has finally been published after having made the rounds of publishing houses for many years. This is the first Soviet publication devoted to a description and an analysis of the genesis, development, and state of a new branch of scientific knowledge about man-sexology-which affects every one of us. To be sure, General Sexual Pathology [Obshchaia seksopatologiia], a textbook for physicians edited by G. S. Vasil'chenko, which came out in 1977, has (...) an extensive introductory chapter on sexology, but it is limited to medical problems. Kon's book is an example of an interdisciplinary approach that provides an idea of the most essential components of sexology; it is thus addressed not only to the medical profession, but also to sociologists, philosophers of culture, psychologists, pedagogues, etc. The book takes into account the latest publications in this area of science. (shrink)

Aim To study the views on the acceptability of physician-assisted-suicide of lay people and health professionals in an African country, Togo.Method In February–June 2012, 312 lay people and 198 health professionals in Togo judged the acceptability of PAS in 36 concrete scenarios composed of all combinations of four factors: the patient's age, the level of incurability of the illness, the type of suffering and the patient's request for PAS. In all scenarios, the patients were women receiving the best possible care. (...) The ratings were subjected to cluster analysis and analyses of variance.Results Most lay people were not systematically opposed to PAS, whereas most health professionals were systematically opposed to it. The most important factors in increasing acceptability among people not systematically opposed were advanced age of the patient and incurability of the illness. Additional acceptability was provided by the patient's request to have her life ended, although much less so than in studies in Western countries, and by suffering characterised by complete dependence rather than by extreme physical pain.Conclusions These empirical findings—the first ones gathered in the African continent—suggest that most Togolese lay people are not categorically for or against PAS, but judge its degree of acceptability as a function of concrete circumstances. (shrink)

Confidence ratings have often been integrated into reasoning and intelligence tasks as a means for assessing meta-reasoning processes. Although it is often assumed that eliciting these judgements throughout reasoning tasks has no effect on the underlying performance outcomes, this is yet to be established empirically. The current study examines whether eliciting CR from participants during a fluid-reasoning task influences their performance and how this effect is moderated by their initial self-confidence in their own reasoning abilities. In a first experiment, we (...) found that participants performing CR during Raven's Progressive Matrices significantly outperformed a control group who did not provide ratings. Additionally, a second experiment demonstrated that CR only facilitated performance in participants who have a high level of initial self-confidence in their reasoning ability, whereas they were detrimental to participants low in self-confidence. (shrink)

: Dr. Smith is an internist in private practice who works at an inner city clinic affiliated with a university hospital. He is also a member of the university faculty. Many of Dr. Smith’s patients have type 2 diabetes mellitus and struggle with health care and other costs. Thinking about opportunities to better serve his patients and advance his career, Dr. Smith considers conducting clinical research in his office. ACME is a respected pharmaceutical company that for decades has engaged in (...) research, development, and production of widely used drugs. Several of ACME’s oral agents for type 2 diabetes will soon go off patent. In an effort to retain its market share in this class of drugs, ACME wants to complete clinical trials expeditiously and obtain approval for its new oral hypoglycemic medicine. The company approaches Dr. Smith to be a coinvestigator in its multicenter clinical trial. (shrink)

In classes that examine entrenched injustices like sexism or racism, students sometimes use “distancing strategies” to dissociate themselves from the injustice being studied. Education researchers argue that distancing is a mechanism through which students, especially students of apparent privilege, deny their complicity in systemic injustice. While I am sympathetic to this analysis, I argue that there is much at stake in student distancing that the current literature fails to recognize. On my view, distancing perpetuates socially sanctioned forms of ignorance and (...) unknowing, through which students misrecognize not only their complicity in injustice, but also the ways that injustice shapes the world, their lives, and their knowledge. Thus, distancing is pedagogically problematic because it prevents students from understanding important social facts, and because it prevents them from engaging with perspectives, analyses, and testimonies that might beneficially challenge their settled views and epistemic habits. To substantiate this new analysis, I draw on recent work on epistemologies of ignorance, especially José Medina’s account of “active ignorance.” In order to respond to student distancing, I argue, it is not sufficient for teachers to make students aware of injustice, or of their potential complicity in it. Beyond this, teachers should cultivate epistemic virtue in the classroom and encourage students to take responsibility for better ways of knowing. The article ends by outlining several classroom practices for beginning this work. (shrink)

This paper brings together the work of Nicholas Wolterstorff and William Alston in speech-act theory with the aim of providing a deeper understanding of the nature of divine speaking through the medium of Scripture. Despite the fecundity of Wolterstorff's seminal work on the philosophical theology of Scripture, aspects of his speech-act centric account are underdeveloped and would benefit from the contributions of William Alston. In particular, his account of divine speech-acts could be fruitfully expanded by incorporating the concept of ‘taking (...) responsibility’ that is central to Alston's analysis of the nature of illocutionary acts. This would elucidate both the way in which readers of Scripture encounter divine practical authority in the reading process and the nature of the response of faith that is demanded of them. (shrink)

This volume gathers together for the first time are all the key texts in a crucial debate in modern philosophy, centered on Leibniz's famous 1695 essay, the "New System of the Nature of Substances and their Communication," in which he introduced his strikingly original theory of metaphysics. His "system" became increasingly famous and drew him into discussion and development of these ideas, both in public and in private, with a variety of thinkers, most notably the great French philosopher Pierre Bayle. (...) Woolhouse's and Francks's new English edition gives the only full representation of this debate, and will therefore be essential reading for anyone who wishes to gain a proper understanding of Leibniz's philosophy and its intelletual context. All the texts are newly translated and extensively annotated; many appear in English for the first time. (shrink)

I MAKE NO APOLOGIES for writing about this well-worn topic. For, although there has been an enormous amount written about the account Hume gives of the nature of moral evaluation, commentators are as far from agreement as ever. My own contribution to the controversy has, if anything, not only added to the variety of opinions but also has increased the general confusion. For this I must accept some responsibility. I have certainly laid myself open to some misinterpretation, and the view (...) I have so far expressed in print may also need some modification. I shall here attempt to clarify what precisely my view now is, and why I prefer it to some alternative views advanced by those who find my interpretation of this aspect of Hume's philosophy unacceptable. II. Since what I want to defend is in all important respects my earlier interpretation of the Treatise, 2 I shall for the most part, though not exclusively, be concerned with what Hume says in this, his early, but major, work. (shrink)

The article interprets Franz Caucig’s Socrates with a Disciple and Diotima?, one of several paintings commissioned for Palais Auersperg in Vienna, now housed at the Slovenian National Gallery. Socrates and a young man are in a pastoral setting beneath a plane tree near a river. They are addressed by a woman, and a chariot with maidens can be seen in the background. The scene is from Plato’s Phaedrus, since Socrates never leaves Athens, except for military service and in this scene (...) from the Phaedrus. The woman addressing Socrates and Phaedrus in the painting cannot be Diotima because her chariot has two white horses, indicating a goddess. The most likely goddess would be the goddess in the poem of Parmenides of Elea, the source of the soul-chariot analogy in the Phaedrus. The setting of Caucig’s Socrates painting bears a remarkable similarity to his Amnytus painting, which features political references to Napoleon’s subjection of Gorizia, Caucig’s homeland. Caucig’s Phaedrus remarks upon Napoleon’s conquests, Hegel’s lectures on Parmenides, and David’s idealized painting of Napoleon crossing the Alps. (shrink)

This essay concerns Scott Shapiro's criticism that H.L.A. Hart's theory of law suffers from a Although other philosophers of law have summarily dismissed Shapiro's criticism, I argue that it identifies an important requirement for an adequate theory of law. Such a theory must explain why legal officials justify their actions by reference to abstract propositional entities, instead of pointing to the existence of social practices. A virtue of Shapiro's planning theory of law is that it can explain this phenomenon. Despite (...) these sympathies, however, I end with the suggestion that Shapiro's criticism of Hart, as it stands, is incomplete. Careful attention to Hart's notion of the internal point of view indicates that he was aware that legal justification ends with abstract objects, not practices, and that he offered his own explanation of this phenomenon. (shrink)

This article delineates the core concerns and motivations of the ontological work of Gilles Deleuze, and is intended as a programmatic statement for a general philosophical audience. The article consists of two main parts. In the first, two early writings by Deleuze are analysed in order to clarify his understanding of ontology broadly, and to specify the precise aim of his understanding of being in terms of difference. The second part of the article looks at the work of Heidegger and (...) Derrida in order to distinguish Deleuze's conceptions of ontology and difference from theirs. A final section clarifies Deleuze's efforts to undertake the construction of an ontology divergent from the dominant tradition and in contrast to the emphasis on the closure of metaphysics in the thought of Heidegger and Derrida. (shrink)

Abstract:S. N. Balagangadhara, Sarika Rao, Jakob De Roover, and Marianne Keppens One of the best-known aspects of Indian society is its "rigid caste system" and the "evil practices of untouchability." It is a truism today to say that Indian society is divided into four castes, which are not allowed to mix. Many Indian texts are brought forward as evidence of this understanding of Indian society. The ancient Indian text Mānavadharmaśāstra or "Laws of Manu" takes a central place in such accounts. (...) This is especially the case for its verses on varṇasankara, translated as "mixing of social classes" or "intermixture of castes." Given the important role these verses play in the understanding of Indian culture, society, and policymaking, it is crucial to translate them accurately. Using one verse in one text, this article focuses on the standard translation and deals both critically and constructively with the received view. (shrink)

In his case report, A Logic in Madness, Aaron Hauptman details the case of Mr. A, an intelligent college student with Asperger’s syndrome, who became severely depressed subsequent to what he perceived as a rejection by what he viewed as “the love of his life.” Dr. Hauptman describes Mr. A as suicidal and as suffering from all the hallmarks of a major depression. At the urging of his family, he presents himself to a psychiatric inpatient unit and agrees to a (...) voluntary hospitalization. However, he refuses pharmacological treatment or electroconvulsive therapy, both of which his clinicians are considering given the severity of his case. Dr. Hauptman describes the young man’s response... (shrink)

Volume 8 of this landmark edition follows Peirce from May 1890 through July 1892—a period of turmoil as his career unraveled at the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey. The loss of his principal source of income meant the beginning of permanent penury and a lifelong struggle to find gainful employment. His key achievement during these years is his celebrated Monist metaphysical project, which consists of five classic articles on evolutionary cosmology. Also included are reviews and essays from The Nation in (...) which Peirce critiques Paul Carus, William James, Auguste Comte, Cesare Lombroso, and Karl Pearson, and takes part in a famous dispute between Francis E. Abbot and Josiah Royce. Peirce's short philosophical essays, studies in non-Euclidean geometry and number theory, and his only known experiment in prose fiction complete his production during these years. Peirce's 1883-1909 contributions to the Century Dictionary form the content of volume 7 which is forthcoming. (shrink)

This thesis is neither e page to page commentary nor en assessment of Hume's place in the history of Philosophy. It mainly consists in an attempt at justifying a certain approach to the Interpretation of his theory of value with special reference to morals.