Background In current Western medical ethics, patient-centered medicine is considered the norm. However, the cultural background of collectivism in East Asia often leads to family-centered decision-making. In Japan, prior studies have reported that family-centered decision-making is more likely to be preferred in situations of disease notification and end-of-life decision-making. Nonetheless, there has been a recent shift from collectivism to individualism due to changes in the social structure. Various personal factors have also been reported to influence moral decision-making. Therefore, this study (...) examined whether the current trend in attitudes of healthcare decision-making in Japan is family-centered or patient-centered among the general public and physicians. In addition, the personal factors that influence this tendency were examined.Methods Three vignettes on disease notification and two vignettes on decision-making during end-of-life care were created, and 457 members of the public and 284 physicians were asked about their attitudes (behavioral intentions) regarding these vignettes.Results Approximately, 95% of physicians were patient-centered in explaining the patient’s severe medical condition. However, approximately 80% of physicians emphasized the wishes of the family over patient wishes when making life-sustaining decisions. Nearly half the general public emphasized the patient’s wishes in the explanation of a severe medical condition and in life-sustaining decisions. In both the public and physician groups, personal factors, particularly the presence or absence of a disease under treatment and prior caregiving experience, influenced ethical attitudes toward medical treatment decisions.Conclusions In relatively low-conflict situations, such as the announcement of a patient’s medical condition, physicians tended to be patient-centered, while they tended to be family-centered in situations of strong conflict in withholding life-sustaining treatment. The fact that personal factors influenced the family-centered response in situations of strong conflict highlights the importance of not only acquiring knowledge of medical ethics but also learning to fairly apply this knowledge in practice. (shrink)

Recently, an increasing number of countries have been allowing voluntary active euthanasia (VAE) and physician-assisted suicide (PAS) as part of palliative care. Japan stands out as the most aged country in the developed world, and while the need for palliative care for older adults with dementia has been noted, there has been reluctance to openly address VAE and PAS. We conducted an online questionnaire survey using a vignette case to investigate the attitudes of Japanese physicians and the general public towards (...) VAE and PAS, and the factors influencing these attitudes. The findings revealed that Japanese physicians did not display support for euthanasia (2%) and assisted suicide (1%); however, the general public supported euthanasia (33%) and assisted suicide (34%). Notably, among the general public, males exhibited significantly higher support for PAS than females. Japanese physicians and the general public expressed a more negative stance towards VAE and PAS compared with their counterparts in Western countries. This disparity may be attributed to the influence of the Buddhist view of life and death and family-centeredness in the Japanese culture, which affects people’s attitudes towards assisted dying. The gap between physicians and the general public could potentially lead to challenges in medical practice, thereby, necessitating the need for open discussions in the future. (shrink)

Background According to some medical ethicists and professional guidelines, there is no ethical difference between withholding and withdrawing life-sustaining treatment. However, medical professionals do not always agree with this notion. Patients and their families may also not regard these decisions as equivalent. Perspectives on life-sustaining treatment potentially differ between cultures and countries. This study compares Japanese physicians’ and citizens’ attitudes toward hypothetical cases of withholding and withdrawing life-sustaining treatment.Methods Ten vignette cases were developed. A web-based questionnaire was administered to 457 (...) citizens and 284 physicians to determine whether they supported withholding or withdrawing treatment.Results In a case where a patient had an advance directive refusing ventilation, 77% of the physicians and 68% of the citizens chose to withhold treatment. In a case where there was an advance directive but the patient’s family requested treatment, 55% of the physicians and 45% of the citizens chose to withhold the ventilator. When a family requested withdrawal of the ventilator but patient wishes were unknown, 19% of the physicians and 48% of the citizens chose to withdraw the ventilator. However, when the patient had also indicated their wishes in writing, 49% of the physicians and 66% of the citizens chose to withdraw treatment. More physicians were prepared to withdraw dialysis (84%) and artificial nutrition (81%) at a patient’s request than mechanical ventilation (49%).Conclusions A significant proportion of Japanese physicians and citizens were reluctant to withhold or withdraw life-sustaining treatment, even in cases where the patient had indicated their wishes in writing. They were more likely to withhold than withdraw treatment, and more likely to withdraw artificial nutrition than mechanical ventilation. Japanese physicians gave significant weight to family views about treatment but were less likely to agree to withdraw treatment than citizens, indicating a potential source of conflict in clinical settings. (shrink)

This study compares Pairs of subjects with Single subjects in a task of discovering scientific laws with the aid of experiments. Subjects solved a molecular genetics task in a computer micro‐world (Dunbar, 1993). Pairs were more successful in discovery than Singles and participated more actively in explanatory activities (i.e., entertaining hypotheses and considering alternative ideas and justifications). Explanatory activities were effective for discovery only when the subjects also conducted crucial experiments. Explanatory activities were facilitated when paired subjects made requests of (...) each other for explanation and focused on them. The study extends from individual to collaborative discovery activities the importance to the discovery process of setting goals to find hypotheses and evidence (Dunbar, 1993) and to construct explanations of phenomena and processes encountered in examples (Chi, Bassok, Lewis, & Glaser, 1989). (shrink)

Presentism is usually understood as the thesis that only the present exists whereas the rival theory of eternalism is usually understood as the thesis that past, present, and future things are all equally real. The significance of this debate has been threatened by the so-called triviality objection, which allegedly shows that the presentist thesis is either trivially true or obviously false: Presentism is trivially true if it is read as saying that everything that exists now is present, and it is (...) obviously false if read as saying that everything that has existed, exits or will exist is present. If eternalism is taken as the negation of presentism, it is also either trivially false or obviously true. In this paper, I try to respond to the triviality objection on behalf of presentism. In second section, I will examine how the argument proceeds. In third section, I will reflect on three possible ways to respond but will argue that none of them succeeds in giving a satisfactory solution. I will then try to clarify the core idea of presentism and to suggest that if we characterise presentism accurately, the problem will disappear. In fourth section, I will offer a plausible definition of presentism and will show how it can avoid the triviality objection and demonstrate why it is advantageous to accept the version of presentism I offer. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between a firm’s strategy and consumers’ decisions in the presence of the paradox of choice and sharing personal information. The paradox of choice implies that having too many choices does not necessarily ensure happiness and sometimes having less is more. A new model is constructed introducing a factor of information sharing into the model of a previous study that embedded the paradox of choice only (Kinjo and Ebina in AI Soc (...) 30(2):291–297, 2015). A key feature of the model is its disutility function. It is demonstrated that if the sign of the cross derivative of the function is positive (negative) at the optimum, there is a positive (negative) correlation between the degree of sharing personal information chosen by the consumers and the number of products offered by the firm in its recommendation systems. It is also numerically indicated that the profit function of the firm becomes convex or concave depending on the shape of the disutility function. These results suggest that firms should carefully investigate the shape of the disutility function, under the paradox of choice and sharing personal information. (shrink)

To investigate the cognitive processes underlying creative inspiration, we tested the extent to which viewing or copying prior examples impacted creative output in art. In Experiment 1, undergraduates made drawings under three conditions: copying an artist's drawing, then producing an original drawing; producing an original drawing without having seen another's work; and copying another artist's work, then reproducing that artist's style independently. We discovered that through copying unfamiliar abstract drawings, participants were able to produce creative drawings qualitatively different from the (...) model drawings. Process analyses suggested that participants' cognitive constraints became relaxed, and new perspectives were formed from copying another's artwork. Experiment 2 showed that exposure to styles of artwork considered unfamiliar facilitated creativity in drawing, while styles considered familiar did not do so. Experiment 3 showed that both copying and thoroughly viewing artwork executed using an unfamiliar style facilitated creativity in drawing, whereas merely thinking about alternative styles of artistic representation did not do so. These experiments revealed that deep encounters with unfamiliar artworks—whether through copying or prolonged observation—change people's cognitive representations of the act of drawing to produce novel artwork. (shrink)

One short passage on what is called the Receptacle in Plato’s Timaeus has been the subject of much controversy since Cherniss presented an alternative reading of it in 1954. In this paper, I criticize an influential argument presented by Zeyl for a traditional reading, and propose a new interpretation which adopts the alternative reading on important sentences of the passage, but is not accompanied by the defects of Cherniss’ interpretation.

The purpose of our study is to investigate the effects of the number of products, product attributes, and prices on consumer confusion, conduct a numerical analysis to check the robustness of the results, and present an example of the cell phone market in Japan. Following an ideal point model and embedding the number of products and product attributes, we clarify how these factors affect consumer confusion and purchase probability. We show that as the number of product attributes increases, the choice (...) probability of each product becomes equal, implying that consumer confusion occurs. This result is robust to the introduction of prices as strategic variables. (shrink)

This introduction to Tanabe Hajime (1885-1962), the critical successor of the "father of contemporary Japanese philosophy" Nishida Kitaro (1870-1945), focuses on Hajime's central philosophical ideas and perspective on "self," "world," "knowledge," and the "purpose of philosophizing". Exploring his notable philosophical ideas including the logic of species, metanoetics, and philosophy of death, it addresses his life-long study of the history of Western philosophy. It sets out his belief that Western framework of thinking is incapable of giving sufficient answers to the philosophical (...) questions concerning the self and the world together and discusses the central ideas he developed while working in Eastern traditions such as Confucianism and Daoism. Featuring comprehensive further reading lists, discussion questions and teaching notes, this is an ideal introductory guide to Tanabe Hajime suitable for anyone interested in Japanese and World philosophy, as well as the development of the Kyoto School. (shrink)

This book brings together the work of two significant figures in contemporary philosophy. By considering the work of Tanabe Hajime, the Japanese philosopher of the Kyoto School, and William Desmond, the contemporary Irish philosopher, Takeshi Morisato offers a clear presentation of contemporary comparative solutions to the problems of the philosophy of religion. Importantly, this is the first book-length English-language study of Tanabe Hajime's philosophy of religion that consults the original Japanese texts. Considering the examples of Christianity and Buddhism, Faith (...) and Reason in Continental and Japanese Philosophy focuses on finding the solution to the problem of philosophy of religion through comparative examinations of Tanabe's metanoetics and Desmond's metaxology. It aims to conclude that these contemporary thinkers -- while they draw their inspiration from the different religious traditions of Christianity and Mahayana Buddhism -- successfully reconfigure the relation of faith and reason. Faith and Reason in Continental and Japanese Philosophy marks an important intervention into comparative philosophy by bringing into dialogue these thinkers, both major figures within their respective traditions yet rarely discussed in tandem. (shrink)

It is sometimes argued that there is an analogy between time and modality: What is true of time, mutatis mutandis, should be true of modality, and vice versa. However, I think that the importance of this analogy has not been truly appreciated in the literature. In this paper, I try to offer a plausible account of the relationship between time and modality based on what is known as presentist ersatzism. If the attempt succeeds, it will be shown that ersatzists about (...) time are better able to explain what possible worlds are. (shrink)

This paper aims to improve on Michael Lynch’s functionalist account of truth-grounding. According to Lynch, truth is grounded in another (non-generic) alethic property when the latter has all the conceptually essential features of truth. However, this view faces a problem raised by Marian David (“Lynch’s Functionalist Theory of Truth”) and Crispin Wright (“A Plurality of Pluralisms”), which is that some conceptually essential features of truth are not possessed by the properties usually taken to ground it (such as correspondence and superwarrant), (...) so that Lynch’s account cannot allow truth to be grounded in these properties. In response to this objection, I propose to modify Lynch’s account by restricting the range of truth’s essential features that a truth-grounding property must have to the class of what I call the “bearer-centered” features of truth. They are those features whose possession by truth amounts to certain facts about how propositions bearing truth behave. The resultant account then is that truth is grounded in a property when the latter has all the essential and bearer-centered features of truth. This account is immune to the David–Wright objection because the features they mention do not belong to the class of bearer-centered features. Also, this account is well-motivated by some principled reasons. The account thus serves as a viable functionalist account of truth-grounding. (shrink)

According to the subset view of realization, a property realizes another if the causal powers of the latter are a subset of those of the former. Against this view, some authors (in particular, Kevin Morris and Paul Audi) have argued that it has an untenable consequence that realizing properties are less fundamental than the properties they realize, because the subset view characterizes realized properties as parts (subsets) of their realizers whereas it is generally true that a part is prior to (...) its whole. This paper defends the subset view from this “part-whole” objection, by arguing that if we compare individual powers of realizer and realizee with particular attention to their manifestation conditions, it turns out that each power of a realizee is grounded in some power of its realizer. This grounding relation between powers, I shall argue, allows subset theorists to explain why a realizer is more fundamental than its realizee, even while having the latter as a part. (shrink)

In Ideas II and other works, Edmund Husserl gives a constitutional analysis of material reality. His basic thought on this matter is that a material thing is constituted when it is shown to causally depend on its surrounding circumstances. In this essay, I will first try to show that this appeal to causal dependence involves an important problem, namely, the circularity or regress problem. I then consider how this problem can be solved from both theoretical and exegetical standpoints. As a (...) key that could lead to a solution, I propose the hypothesis that Husserl’s notion of reality is holistic. By attributing this notion to Husserl, I argue that we can find a satisfactory answer to the aforementioned problem, as well as a perspicuous way of understanding some of his passages. (shrink)

In this paper, we generalize a result of Brown and Simpson [1] to prove that RCA0+Π0∞-BCT is conservative over RCA0 with respect to the set of formulae in the form ∃!Xφ, where φ is arithmetical. We also consider the conservation of Π00∞-BCT over Σb1-NIA+∇b1-CA.

According to the “truthmaker maximalism”, every true contingent proposition is made true by something in the world, called its truthmaker. Although at first sight the maximalism seems to be a natural position, it has serious difficulties, especially concerning negative truths. In view of this, many truthmaker theorists adopt some non-maximalist position. It is not clear, however, whether these non-maximalists are justified, since existing reasons to justify the non-maximalism are not good enough. In this paper, then, I shall propose a new (...) reason for the non-maximalism, which consists in the observation that the maximalism cannot acknowledge the widely accepted view that certain inferences involving logical constants are valid in the properly logical sense. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Neither/Nor:Ruminating on the Metanoetic Pharmakon in Nietzsche and Other BuddhasTakeshi Morisato (bio)A Compliment to the Philosopher Chef and His table d'hôte intellectuelleIf a book title were comparable to the name of a restaurant, the table of contents would be their menu. Jason Wirth's Nietzsche and Other Buddhas (hereafter NOB) initially reminded me of a fusion restaurant with a strong "Asian" flavor, an ambiguous genre that we would see anywhere (...) in continental Europe. As one could easily imagine, this is not necessarily a compliment to the chef. By integrating various ingredients and different techniques from diverse culinary traditions, a fusion restaurant might claim to create a new dish or a unique course that transcends the conventional categories of our dietary practice. Like what Kant says about the uniqueness of nonsense, however, their end product could fail to be original or, what is worse, could even be offensive to those who are very familiar with any of the specific culinary traditions. If what comes after comparative philosophy results in this kind of "fusion philosophy," its success will have to feed on our ignorance of intellectual histories.1 Our feeding frenzy in this new, fashionable modus operandi may starve us to death of philosophy rather than liberate us from the hunger that has propelled us into a philosophical search in the first place. To borrow Wirth's use of the "felicitous analogy from Kierkegaard," it might as well be that "the last thing that we need is more food. Rather we need to lose something, to shed our gluttony. We need a medicinal poison to take away an unhealthy poison."2As you can see, I was initially skeptical about the soundness of a philosophical menu that mixes Zen, Schopenhauer, Hakuin, James, Pure Land, Shinran, Tanabe, Deleuze, Dōgen, and Nishida (in order of appearance) with an explosive spice or the deadly meat, Nietzsche. Could this be a process of ventriloquizing Nietzsche through Asian philosophical traditions? Or are we washing down the strong aftertaste of reading Nietzsche or Schopenhauer with Pure Land or Zen water? How could we stomach all of these thinkers and traditions in one setting without causing serious indigestion in our hearts-and-minds? To my surprise, Wirth's text gives a performative proof that they can indeed be read together and examined with the purpose of giving us food for thought. What makes NOB particularly successful in referring to different thinkers is its emphasis on "rumination." It [End Page 1070] self-reflectively questions what it is to read any text philosophically and what it means to integrate texts into one's process of thinking such that its creative insight points toward the nutrients that it has found in the process of digesting ideas from diverse intellectual traditions.This philosophical process of "rumination" is not merely an external comparison of ideas from different philosophical traditions. Nor is it an imposition of one tradition over another. Rather, by harmoniously fusing together various insights, the author's very process of understanding the cultural, linguistic, and historical milieu of his existence delves into fundamental issues concerning our human condition in the world today. NOB, in this sense, renders a final form of "comparative philosophy," where a thinker is liberated from conventional categories of philosophizing (especially in reference to the almost obsolete distinction between "East and West") and proves that what philosophers can stomach and integrate into their process of (self-)understanding should count as "philosophy." That is to say, depending on the capacity of the thinker to deal with a variety of intellectual resources, some intellectual traditions or a combination of ideas that are seemingly counterintuitive to most scholars in the field of philosophy could generate a tremendous force that accelerates the (re)new (ed) sense of philosophy.3 The "philosophy of food" in chapter 5 especially demonstrates this excellence, and we should anticipate a longer sequel that would mark Wirth's original contribution to the history of philosophy.Two Counterfeit NegativesA food critic, however, must entertain the possibility of some improvement, even when the dish is well prepared and its overall presentation is exquisite. I would like to draw our attention to two... (shrink)

According to alethic pluralism, sentences belonging to different domains of discourse can be true by having different alethic (i.e., truth-constituting) properties. Against this pluralistic view, Jamin Asay has recently argued that pluralists' appeal to multiple alethic properties is ill-motivated because the main advantages of pluralism can already be obtained within the framework of standard truthmaker theory. In response to this objection, this paper argues that Asay's claim does not hold with respect to one of the central advantages of pluralism, namely, (...) the ability to offer a proper understanding of the realism/anti-realism debate. This is because, first, when simply construed, truthmaker theory can only provide an inadequate understanding of the debate, and second, when construed in certain ways that allow it to avoid inadequacy, it becomes committed to multiple alethic properties. (shrink)

In this translation of his 1936 essay, Tosaka Jun critically examines Tanabe Hajime’s “logic of species,” paying particular attention to its basis, i.e. the logic of “absolute mediation” that Tanabe had devised earlier. In 1936, the logic of species had only been developed within a few texts, including “The Logic of Social Being” (1934–5) and “The Logic of Species and the World Schema” (1935). Interestingly enough, Tosaka agrees to a certain extent with Tanabe’s criticism of the “logic of nothingness” lying (...) at the bottom of Nishida Kitaro’s philosophy, according to which criticism the place of nothingness represents a mystical immediacy. Tosaka, however, also criticizes Tanabe’s own position, claiming that his idea of absolute mediation, in which all immediacies are mediated, leads to a logical absolutism neglecting the materiality of nature. Tosaka claims that the temporal relationship between the mediator and the mediated should be addressed in terms of a “chronology” in which nature exists prior to the subject. Not only Tosaka’s immanent criticism of Tanabe contributed to the development of the “Kyoto School” (an expression Tosaka invented himself in 1932), but the question of “chronology,” with regard to mediation, has a modern theoretical significance as a point of contention in the contemporary debate between realism and constructivism. (shrink)

This study examined the effect of fake news on electoral outcome. Using post-election surveys, previous studies found associations between exposure to fake news and voting behavior, though these observational studies failed to show that these changes were actually caused by fake news. To examine whether fake news really affects voting behavior, we need to experimentally manipulate voters’ exposure to fake news in real elections and see if voters regret their vote choice knowing that the information was false. For this purpose, (...) our study focused on Mexico’s 2018 presidential election, which provided an ideal setting. During the campaign, false information about a scandal allegedly involving Ricardo Anaya, a candidate from the National Action Party, was widely disseminated. However, his innocence was officially acknowledged after the election. Using this correction of fake news as a treatment, we tested a sample of 1,561 individuals to assess whether the retraction of fake news caused post-election regret: would Mexican voters have voted differently if they had not been exposed to such false information. Our multivariate analyses found that the retraction of fake news did cause post-election regret among voters with lower internal political efficacy, but voters associated with higher political knowledge and internal political efficacy were not affected by the retraction and were less likely to experience regret. About 20% of the respondents experienced post-election regret, and of those, about 35% would have switched their vote to Anaya. The findings corroborate lasting effects of fake news, which may have non-negligible effects on electoral outcomes. (shrink)

Pioneer transcription factors, by virtue of their ability to target nucleosomal DNA in silent chromatin, play crucial roles in eliciting cell fate decisions during development and cellular reprogramming. In addition to their well‐established role in chromatin opening to activate gene expression programs, recent studies have demonstrated that pioneer factors have the complementary function of being able to silence the starting cell identity through targeted chromatin repression. Given recent discoveries regarding the repressive aspect of pioneer function, we discuss the basis by (...) which pioneer factors can suppress alternative lineage programs in the context of cell fate control. (shrink)

In Plato’s Timaeus, two different theories – the Receptacle theory and the geometrical particle theory – are presented to explain change in the natural world. In this paper, I argue that there is tension between the two theories. After examining several possible solutions for this tension, I conclude that Plato does not present it as something ready to be solved within the dialogue but, rather, as something to be understood in a way that maintains both theories. Finally, I also argue (...) that the contrast between the two theories in the Timaeus derives from a similar contrast in the Phaedo. (shrink)

The strong immanent realism (i.e., the view that there exist universals as entities capable of being wholly present wherever their instances are located) has been traditionally criticized for having certain absurd consequences. Although Gilmore (2003) replied to these criticisms by taking spatial relations involving universals as relativized to their locations, his reply has been rebutted by Keskinen et al. (2015). This paper aims to defend the strong immanent realism by proposing a new version of the relativization strategy, according to which (...) a spatial relation is to be relativized just to the extent that it contains universals or concrete particulars among its terms. This version, it will be argued, can satisfactorily address the objections hitherto posed to the strong immanent realism. (shrink)

The Manifestation Requirement, advanced by Dummett in his critique of semantic realism, has been criticized for being behavioristic, and the responses have been made that the critics are mistaken. However, the dispute has failed to exhibit the point of the Requirement. In this paper, I shall argue (1) that, in the light of Anscombe's theory of practical knowledge, knowledge of linguistic meaning is to be seen as the knowledge-how that forms the basis of the practical knowledge that an agent has (...) of his own intentional actions, (2) that such knowledge of linguistic meaning is to be based on mutual agreements in a community, and (3) that the Manifestation Requirement is a condition for the possibility of such mutual agreements. As a result, the Manifestation Requirement finds its basis on the idea that language and linguistic acts are tools that we use while continually improving them. (shrink)

There is a familiar tension between the two main components of non-reductive physicalism, which are physicalism, on the one hand, and the non-reducibility or autonomy of so-called special sciences (i.e., sciences other than physics), on the other. While it is often claimed that this tension can be satisfactorily resolved by adopting the subset account of realization (defended by e.g., Shoemaker (2001) and Wilson (2011)), this paper challenges that popular view, by elaborating some critical comments by Funkhouser (2014). Then, after examining (...) Funkhouser’s own position, this paper proposes a new way of resolving the aforementioned tension, which consists in refining the subset account’s analysis of realization on the basis of various dependence relations between causal powers. (shrink)

Japanese philosopher Miki Kiyoshi 三木清 wrote an important text on translation entitled “Disregarded Translations”. Among all Kyoto School thinkers, Miki was probably the most prolific writer. His interests spanned various intellectual topics such as philosophy, literature, religion, politics, and journalism. This paper offers a brief introduction to Miki’s conception of translation as well as, for the first time, an English translation of his text. “Disregarded Translations” deals with Japanese scholars’ propensity to revere Western philosophical texts in their original forms, while (...) ignoring the outstanding wealth of insight that their translations can provide in their own language. (shrink)

This article provides the first English translation of Tanabe’s early essay, “The Limit of Logicism in Epistemology: A Critique of the Marburg and Freiburg Schools”. The key notion that the young Tanabe seeks to define in relation to his detailed analyses of contemporary Neo-Kantian epistemology is the notion of “pure experience” presented in Nishida’s philosophy. The general theory of epistemology shared among the thinkers from these two prominent schools of philosophy in early 20 th century Germany aimed to eliminate the (...) empirical residues in Kant’s theory of knowledge while opposing naïve empiricism and the uncritical methodology of positive science. Their “logicistic” approach, according to Tanabe, seems to contradict Nishida’s notion of pure experience, for it cannot allow any vestige of empiricism in its systematic framework, which is specifically designed to ground scientific knowledge. Yet given that the Neo-Kantian configuration of epistemology does not create the object of knowledge, it must face sensation or representational content as its limiting instance. Thus, to ground a Neo-Kantian theory of knowledge while taking account of this limit of logicism involves explaining their understanding of the unity of subject and object in human knowing. For this, Tanabe argues, recourse to Nishida’s notion of pure experience is indispensable. (shrink)

The present volume is the latest example of what scholars of Japanese philosophy have been up to in recent years. The papers collected here, most of them presented at conferences held in Barcelona and Nagoya during 2016, have been arranged in four thematic parts. The first two parts cover the history of Japanese philosophy, as their topics extend from premodern thinkers to twentieth century philosophers; the last two parts focus on Nishida and Watsuji respectively.

Is there anything that is given immediately? This question seems to be of crucial importance for Phenomenology, a field perhaps known most principally for its attempt to return directly to the “things themselves.” The seeming simplicity of the idea is appealing: after all, where better for us to start in any philosophical investigation than with things as they appear to us in their most pure or “immediate” state? When put in its historical context as well, Husserl’s phenomenological project could even (...) be interpreted as a breath of fresh air in the midst of the environment of early 20th century philosophy in comparison with the seemingly constructive philosophy of its Neo-Kantian contemporaries. Indeed, rather than starting with a merely systematic account of our cognition and reality, is it not better for us to first return to the world just as it is given to us in perception or intuition in order to have a more faithful account of these issues? (shrink)

If a book title were comparable to the name of a restaurant, the table of contents would be their menu. Jason Wirth's Nietzsche and Other Buddhas initially reminded me of a fusion restaurant with a strong "Asian" flavor, an ambiguous genre that we would see anywhere in continental Europe. As one could easily imagine, this is not necessarily a compliment to the chef. By integrating various ingredients and different techniques from diverse culinary traditions, a fusion restaurant might claim to create (...) a new dish or a unique course that transcends the conventional categories of our dietary practice. Like what Kant says about the uniqueness of nonsense, however, their end product could fail to be... (shrink)

This is a review essay on Daisuke Kachi’s recent book, Agents: Contemporary Substance Ontology (sic. Shunjusha, 2018). The book develops and partially defends an ontology that takes the category of substance as the most fundamental one. The author provides in it a new perspective on substance, which consists in characterizing substances as bearers of what he calls “substance modalities” (of which there are four kinds, that stem from the factors of essence, power, past persistence, and future persistence respectively). The first (...) part of this review essay gives an extended overview of Kachi’s book while the second discusses some problems it may face. (shrink)

A number of philosophers today endorse the view that material substances (e.g., cats, stones, atoms) can be analyzed as bundles of “particular properties” or “tropes”. Among several developments, the theory that Peter Simons proposed is seen as the most successful one. Simons’ theory seems to owe its high reputation to mainly two advantages which he claims for his theory: the capacity for avoiding infinite regress, and the explanatory adequacy for the phenomenon of change. In this paper, however, I try to (...) object to this high appraisal, by showing that the two alleged advantages in fact cannot be simultaneously secured by Simons’ position. To this aim, I proceed as follows: First, I present Simons’ theory and explain its alleged two advantages. Next, I take up Arda Denkel’s criticism and show that the explanatory adequacy will be lost unless Simons accepts a certain revision of his theory. Finally, I show that as a result of the revision needed, Simons’ position comes to lose the capacity for avoiding infinite regress in turn. (shrink)