Kritičko čitanje Alchourrónove i Bulyginove skupovnoteorijske defnicije normativnoga sustava pokazuje da njegova deduktivna zatvorenost nije neizbježno svojstvo. Slijedeći von Wrightovu pretpostavku da aksiomi standardne deontične logike opisuju svojstva savršenoga normativnog sustava, uvodi se algoritam za prevođenje iz modalnoga u skupovnoteorijski jezik. Prijevod nam otkriva da plauzibilnost pojedinih metanormativnih načela leži na različitim osnovama. Koristeći se metodološkim pristupom koji prepoznaje različite aktere u normama upravljanome međudjelovanju, pokazuje se da su metanormativna načela obveze drugoga reda upućene različitim ulogama. Poseban slučaj jest zahtjev (...) koji se odnosi na deduktivnu zatvorenost jer se pokazuje da je upućen ulozi koja primjenjuje, a ne onoj koja izdaje norme. Pristup je primijenjen i na slučaj čiste derogacije, što dovodi do novoga rezultata; svojstvo neovisnosti biva svojstvom savršenoga normativnog sustava u odnosu na moguću derogaciju. Ovaj članak na polemički način dodiruje nekoliko točaka iznesenih u Kristanovome nedavnom članku. (shrink)

Naša stvarnost bilježi dramatične promjene u moralnim stavovima ljudi. Kršćanskim i pravno-filozofskim pristupom nastojimo, u svjetlu tih promjena, promišljati pitanje etičkog aspekta zahtjeva kompetentnog pacijenta da umre te odluke liječnika povodom toga zahtjeva. Ovo promišljanje spada u područje ispitivanja osnovnih ljudskih vrijednosti. Ističemo da ljudsko dostojanstvo – kao središnja vrijednost – nije određeno vanjskim uzrocima i ne ovisi o stanju čovjekova zdravlja ili bolesti, ono je nešto unutrašnje, bitno i neotuđivo. Dakle, izvire iz cjelokupne kvalitete čovjekovog života kao osobe, kao (...) duhovno-tjelesnog bića, obdarenog razumom i slobodom, samoodgovornošću i mogućnošću samoodređenja – ukoliko prihvaćamo da je stvoren na sliku Božju . Historijska prizma promatranja ovog problema je zaista šarolika, od potpunog opravdavanja ovakvih zahtjeva, preko jedinstvene osude, sve do danas kada ovo pitanje dovodi do vrlo teških i skoro nerješivih rasprava na područjima morala i prava, uz naglašavanje da dekriminalizacija ovakvih postupaka može dovesti do »klizave nizbrdice«.Naš je polazni stav, s kršćanske pozicije, da ne postoji tako nešto kao što je život bez vrijednosti. Dakle, ističemo kršćanski pristup ljudskom životu i dostojanstvu, koji podrazumijeva postavku da čovjek ne dodjeljuje život te ga samim time niti ne može oduzeti, bez obzira na okolnosti i teškoće koje ga prate.Our reality is facing dramatic changes in the moral attitudes of people. In the light of those changes we are trying to consider the issue of ethical aspect of the competent patient’s request to die and the physician’s decision about it. This elaboration is situated within the field of questioning the basic human values. It is emphasized that the human dignity – being the central value – is not determined by external causes and not dependable on the condition of a person’s health or illnesses. Human dignity is something integral, essential, and inalienable. Thus human dignity springs from the overall quality of human life as of a unique human being, spiritual and physical being gifted with reason and freedom, self-responsibility, and the possibility of self-defining – in case we accept that a man is created in the image and likeness of God . The historical prism of considering this problem comes in varieties of forms, from the complete justifications of these requests, or their condemnation, till the contemporary disputes in the field of morality and law, with an emphasis on the possibility of “slippery slope” argumentation this decriminalization might lead to.Our starting point, from the Christian position, is that something like life without the value does not exist. Therefore we are pointing out the Christian approach to human life and dignity which presupposes the thesis saying that man does not give a life and therefore can not take it away, regardless of the hardship he might be experiencing. (shrink)

Prijateljstvo prati čovjeka od njegovih samih početaka, a očituje se u trajnoj dvostrukoj raspoloženosti: biti s drugim i biti netko drugome. U izlaganju se analizira Aristotelova filozofska refleksija o prijateljstvu. Osobita važnost posvećuje se trima različitim motivacijama koje ljude potiču na stupanje u različite oblike druženja ili prijateljevanja, a to su: zbog koristi, užitka ili, pak, zbog kreposti. Pokazuje se kako prijateljstvo vođeno kriterijem koristi nije istinsko prijateljstvo, jer se njime ne ostvaruje dobro osobe, nego neko korisno dobro koje osoba (...) ima, a koje drugoj osobi treba. Takvo je prijateljstvo, prijateljstvo reciprociteta u kojem se nešto dobiva, umjesto da se netko susretne radi njega samoga. Ovom tipu prijateljstva slično je prijateljstvo iz užitka, budući da ni jedan ni drugi tip prijateljstva ne počiva na bitnom principu zasnovanom na vrijednosti i dostojanstvu ljudske osobe, nego na principu ugode ili koristi kojim se ostvaruje isključivo simbiotsko-egoistični odnos.Posebno se apostrofira kako je pravo, istinsko prijateljstvo ono koje svoje utemeljenje pronalazi u sličnosti prema kreposti, te se stoga ostvaruje u blagotvornoj sličnosti prema dobroti. Naime, samo dobri mogu dobro željeti onom drugom prijatelju koji je također dobar. Prijateljstvo koje počiva na temeljima dobrote biva više prijateljstvo ukoliko se širi horizont dobrote, prave, istinske, nesebične dobrote, u kojoj se prijatelju želi dobro radi njega samoga, a ne zbog možebitne koristi koju očekujemo od njega. Kritički se propituje Aristotelovo mišljenje da nije potrebno doći samo do kreposti na osobnom planu, nego je potrebno postići i krepost na području zajednice, te je stoga za prijateljstvo od presudne važnosti, kao svojevrstan poligon kreposnog djelovanja, kakvi će odnosi vladati u društvu.Freundschaft begleitet den Menschen von Anfang an, und diese offenbart sich in einer dauerhaften zweifachen Verfügbarkeit: mit jemandem sein und für jemanden da sein. In dem Aufsatz wird Aristoteles’ philosophische Reflektierung der Freundschaft analysiert. Besondere Aufmerksamkeit gilt dabei dreierlei Motivationen, die die Menschen zu verschiedenen Freundschaftsbeziehungen anregen. Die Gründe dieser Beziehungen können Eigennutz, Vergnügen oder auch Tugend sein. Es wird gezeigt, dass die auf Eigennutz basierende Freundschaft keine wahre Freundschaft ist, weil dadurch nicht das Gute der Person verwirklicht, sondern das Gute, das eine Person hat, von einer anderen Person ausgenutzt wird. Eine solche Freundschaft nennt man Reziprozitätsfreundschaft, da man von dem anderen etwas erwartet, statt mit ihm seiner selbst wegen Umgang zu pflegen. Diesem Freundschaftstyp ähnelt die zum Vergnügen geschlossenen Freundschaft. Weder der erste noch der zweite Freundschaftstyp lehnen sich an das wesentliche, auf dem Wert und der Würde des Menschen basierende Prinzip an, sondern an das Prinzip des Eigennutzes bzw. des Vergnügens, womit ausschließlich eine symbiotisch-egoistische Beziehung verwirklicht wird.Besonders betont wird die einzig wahre Freundschaft, die sich auf der Tugend gründet und daher ihren Höhepunkt im Guten erreicht. Nur derjenige, der gut ist, kann gut zu dem anderen sein, der auch gut ist. Die auf dem Guten basierende Freundschaft ist ein erhabener Freundschaftstyp, da sich dabei der Horizont des wahrhaftigen Guten und der Selbstlosigkeit weitet und man dem Freund seiner selbst wegen das Gute gönnt und nicht, weil man von ihm etwaserwartet. Auf kritische Weise wird der Standpunkt Aristoteles’ ausgelegt, dem zufolge Tugend auf dem persönlichen Plan allein nicht ausreicht, sondern auch auf dem Plan des Gemeinwesens angestrebt werden muss. Deshalb hängt von der Freundschaft als einem Ausübungsplatz tugendhaften Handelns ab, wie sich die zwischenmenschlichen Beziehungen in der Gesellschaft gestalten. (shrink)

U radu je istražen utjecaj završenog srednjoškolskog obrazovanja i dobi/godine studije na interkulturalnu efikasnost studenata i njihove preferencije glazbi svijeta, zatim povezanost između interkulturalne efikasnosti i preferencija glazbi svijeta te utjecaj poznatosti na preferencije glazbenih ulomaka. Istraživanje je provedeno na uzorku studenata različitih fakulteta Sveučilišta u Splitu i Sveučilišta u Zagrebu, pomoću upitnika sastavljenog od tri dijela: Upitnik općih podataka, Upitnik interkulturalne efikasnosti te Upitnik za ispitivanje glazbenih preferencija. Rezultati ne potvrđuju utjecaj vrste završene srednje škole ni dobi/ godine studija (...) na razinu interkulturalne efikasnosti studenata, niti na njihove preferencije glazbi svijeta. Potvrđeno je postojanje povezanosti između razine interkulturalne efikasnosti i preferencija glazbi svijeta te između poznavanja glazbe i preferencija glazbenih ulomaka. Dobiveni rezultati imaju značajne glazbeno-pedagoške implikacije, posebno u kontekstu visokoškolskog obrazovanja. The paper explored the influence of high school education and age/year of study on students’ intercultural effectiveness and their world music preferences, the relationship between intercultural effectiveness and world music preferences, and the influence of familiarity of music on music preferences. The research was conducted on a sample of students from different faculties of the University of Split and the University of Zagreb, using a questionnaire composed of three parts: The Sociodemographic Questionnaire, The Intercultural Effectiveness Scale and The Music preferences Questionnaire. The results do not confirm the influence of the type of high school education or age/year of study on the level of the students’ intercultural effectiveness, nor on their world music preferences. The existence of a relationship between the level of students’ intercultural effectiveness, world music preferences and between familiarity of music and music preferences has been confirmed. The obtained results have significant implications for music pedagogy, especially in the context of higher education. (shrink)

Svrha ovog rada bila je utvrditi učestalost sudjelovanja učitelja Glazbene kulture u različitim aktivnostima informalnog cjeloživotnog učenja te saznati njihovo mišljenje o važnosti i doprinosu navedenog razvoju vlastitih kompetencija potrebnih za poučavanje Glazbene kulture. Utvrđeno je da učitelji najviše sudjeluju u informalnim aktivnostima učenja koje ne zahtijevaju dodatno izdvajanje vremena te shodno tome rjeđe sudjeluju u aktivnostima koje zahtijevaju veću njihovu pažnju. Osjećaju se kompetentnima u izvođenju svih glazbenih aktivnosti koje se provode u nastavi Glazbene kulture. Nadalje, vide doprinos i (...) važnost sudjelovanja u aktivnostima informalnog učenja, no podijeljeni su u razmišljaju trebaju li posvetiti više dodatnog vremena aktivnostima informalnog učenja te kada razmišljaju o tome bi li njihova nastava bila jednako kvalitetna da ne primjenjuju nova znanja stečena informalnim učenjem. (shrink)

Vrednovanje i ocjenjivanje u nastavi Glazbene kulture važna je sastavnica odgojno-obrazovnog procesa koja sa sobom nosi razne poteškoće i subjektivnost. U nastavi Glazbene kulture realiziraju se različite glazbene aktivnosti i sadržaji, koji su više ili manje specifični te se navedeno odražava i na vrednovanje i ocjenjivanje. Navedene aktivnosti i sadržaji u okviru Kurikuluma nastavnog predmeta Glazbena kultura za osnovne škole i Glazbena umjetnost za gimnazije organizirane su u okviru tri domene/nastavna područja: Slušanje i upoznavanje glazbe, Izražavanje glazbom i uz glazbu (...) i Glazba u kontekstu. U radu je prikazano istraživanje provedeno tijekom 2019. godine, a koje je obuhvatilo 269 ispitanika, tj. 30 osnovnoškolskih učitelja Glazbene kulture i 239 učenika osmih razreda. Istraživanje je provedeno u Osječko-baranjskoj i Požeško-slavonskoj županiji te je obuhvatilo učitelje Glazbene kulture i učenike osmih razreda šest osnovnih škola od kojih se četiri nalaze u urbanom, a dvije u ruralnom području. Cilj ovog istraživanja bio je doznati stavove učenika i učitelja o vrednovanju i ocjenjivanju u nastavi Glazbene kulture, utvrditi moguću povezanost sociodemografskih varijabla i mišljenja učitelja i učenika te utvrditi na koji se način provodi ocjenjivanje u nastavi Glazbene kulture. Slušanje glazbe i pjevanje su aktivnosti koje se, prema mišljenju i učitelja i učenika, najčešće vrednuju i ocjenjuju u nastavi Glazbene kulture. Ujedno, učitelji u većoj mjeri smatraju da provode individualno i skupno ocjenjivanje nego li to smatraju učenici. Utvrđeno je da učitelji najčešće ocjenjivanje provode tako što tijekom svakog sata prate učenike, skloni su učenike ocijeniti odmah na satu i najčešće usmeno. Utvrđeno je da su učitelji i učenici mišljenja da učenik ne treba imati razvijene glazbene sposobnosti za ocjenu ‘odličan’ u predmetu Glazbena kultura. S obzirom na povezanost sociodemografskih varijabla i mišljenja ispitanika o vrednovanju i ocjenjivanju, pokazalo se kako su područje na kojemu se nalazi škola i spol značajni prediktori učeničkih stavova, dok se kod učitelja nijedna varijabla nije pokazala prediktorskom. Evaluation and grading in the teaching of Music Culture is an important component of the educational process that carries various difficulties and subjectivity with it. In the course of Music Culture, various music activities and contents are realized, which are more or less specific and also reflect on the evaluation and evaluation. The activities and contents of the Curriculum for the Elementary School Music Culture and High School Musical Arts curricula are organized within three domains/teaching areas: Listening and learning about music, Expressing music and with music, and Music in context. The research was conducted in 2019 and included 269 respondents, i.e. 30 elementary music teachers and 239 eighth grade students. The survey was conducted in Osijek-Baranja and Pozega-Slavonia counties and it included Music teachers and eighth grade students from six primary schools, four of whom are in urban and two in rural areas. The aim of this research was to find out students’ and teachers’ views on evaluation and assessment and to determine the possible correlation of sociodemographic variables and teachers’ and students’ opinions on evaluation and assessment in Music Culture teaching and to determine how the assessment is conducted in Music Culture teaching. Listening to music and singing are activities that, in the opinion of both teachers and students, are most commonly evaluated and graded in teaching Music Culture. At the same time, teachers are more likely to carry out individual and group assessments than students. Teachers usually conduct their assessment by monitoring students every class, they tend to evaluate students during class and most often orally. Teachers and students think that student should not have the developed musical skills to score excellently in Music Culture. Considering the correlation between sociodemographic variables and the respondents’ opinions on evaluation and grading, it was shown that the area in which school is located and gender are significant predictors of students’ attitudes, while in the teachers no variables proved to be predictive. (shrink)

Glazbenim aktivnostima u vrtiću pripada značajna uloga, s obzirom da bavljenje takvim aktivnostima pridonosi razvoju glazbenih sposobnosti, ali i intelektualnom, socijalnom, emocionalnom i tjelesnom razvoju djeteta. U radu su istraženi stavovi odgojitelja predškolske djece prema glazbenim aktivnostima u vrtiću te samoprocjena kompetentnosti za njihovu realizaciju. Rezultati potvrđuju da slušanje glazbe predstavlja značajnu aktivnost slobodnog vremena odgojitelja predškolske djece. Potvrđeno je da odgojitelji kojima se sviđa klasična glazba imaju pozitivnije stavove prema glazbenim aktivnostima u vrtiću. Nije uočena povezanost odlazaka na koncerte (...) klasične glazbe, pohađanja dodatne glazbene poduke, pjevanja u zboru ili klapi te godina radnoga staža sa stavovima prema glazbenim aktivnostima. Rezultati istraživanja ne potvrđuju ni povezanost godina radnoga staža sa samoprocjenom kompetencije za realizaciju glazbenih aktivnosti. I, konačno, većina odgojitelja zadovoljna je opremljenošću vrtića instrumentima za djecu te računalima i projektorima, ali ne i instrumentima za odgojitelje. Musical activities in kindergarten play an important role, especially since engaging in such activities contributes to the development of musical capabilities and intellectual, social, emotional, and physical child development. This research examines the opinions of kindergarten teachers towards musical activities, as well as a self-assessment of their competencies to perform them. The results affirm that listening to music is a significant free time activity for kindergarten teachers. It has also been affirmed that teachers who enjoy classical music have more positive opinions towards musical activities in kindergarten. No connection was noted between opinions towards musical activities and attending classical concerts, additional musical education, singing in choirs or traditional a cappella groups, or years of work experience. The results of this research also did not affirm a connection between years of work experience and self-assessments of competencies to perform musical activities. Finally, the majority of teachers were satisfied with their schools’ stock of children’s instruments, computers, and projectors, but not with instruments for teachers. (shrink)

Glavni cilj ovoga istraživanja bio je povijesno-komparativnom analizom nastavnih planova i programa, odnosno kurikuluma za osnovnu školu istražiti i analizirati ulogu, zastupljenost i načine realizacije školskih kurikuluma u razdoblju od 1951. do 2019. godine. Prema dobivenim rezultatima uočljivo je da se značaj, uloga i aktivnosti školskog kurikuluma razlikuju u različitim reformama, a analizom kurikulumskih dokumenata utvrđeno je da se aktivnostima i sadržajima iz područja školskog kurikuluma želi pridonijeti individualizaciji i fleksibilnosti nastavnog procesa, zadovoljavanju specifičnih mogućnosti, potreba i interesa učenika,povezivanju obiteljskog (...) doma te lokalne i šire zajednice sa školskim okruženjem, poticanju stvaralaštva, interdisciplinarnosti, zajedništva, stjecanju generičkih kompetencija i usavršavanju opće-obrazovnih kompetencija. Na temelju dobivenih rezultata i suvremenih odgojnoobrazovnih polazišta, autorice su predložile smjernice za suvremene školske kurikulume. The main goal of this research was to investigate and analyze the role, representation and ways of realization of school curricula in the period from 1951 to 2019 in the Republic of Croatia using a historical-comparative analysis of curricula, specifically primary school curricula. According to the obtained results, the authors conclude that the importance, role and activities of the school curriculum differ in different eras and within different reform attempts. The analysis of curriculum documents shows that the activities and contents of the school curriculum aim to contribute to individualization and flexibility of opportunities, according to the needs and interests of students, connecting the family home and local and wider community with the school environment, encouraging creativity, interdisciplinarity, togetherness, acquiring generic competencies and improving educational competencies. Based on the obtained results and the foundations of contemporary education the authors proposed guidelines for contemporary school curricula. (shrink)

Etos označava način opažanja i međudjelovanja sa svijetom, a pomoću hexisa oblikuje ono što je Pierre Bourdieu nazvao habitusom, »sistemom trajnih i promjenjivih dispozicija«. Teorija habitusa je, postavljajući se između poosobljeng i tjelesnog hexisa i objektivnih društvenih struktura, percipirana kao deterministička i time izložena različitim kritikama. Među ostalim, teoretičarka JudithButler zamašno poglavlje jedne od svojih zadnjih knjiga posvećuje kritičkoj prilagodbi Bourdieuovih analiza jezika. Pojam ‘habitusa’, kako ga misli Bourideu, iznova postavlja probleme odnosa između potpunog strukturalističkog determinizma i egzistencijalističke slobode bez (...) ograničenja, ne uspijevajući se bez ostatka oteti tim oprekama, štoviše, naginjući prema određenom obliku determinizma. Djelovanjeaktera zapravo je, u kasnijoj elaboraciji, određeno determinizmima, koji među njima odmjeravaju društveni svijet i koji upisuju svoj odraz u temeljne dispozicije njihova habitusa. Ovaj pojam-posrednik kao princip djelovanja aktera, jednako kao i drugi nosivi elementi ili temeljni pojmovi Bourdieuove teorije nadišli su okvire sociologije, postavši integralnim dijelom kulturalnih studija i književne teorije. Bourdieu je pojam habitusa, kako se pokazuje u članku, vremenom modificirao, otvarajući ga prostoru novih mogućih interpretacija.L’ethos désigne la manière de percevoir le monde et d’ y agir. Avec l’hexis il forme ce que Pierre Bourdieu a défini comme habitus, «système de dispositions durables et transposable ». La théorie de l’habitus, se situant à lajonction entre hexis personnalisé et corporel et les structures sociales objectives, était, pour sondéterminisme, exposée aux critiques différentes . On a pu reprocher au concept d’ habitus de poser à nouveaules problèmes qu’ il entendait résoudre: entre le déterminisme absolu des structuralistes et la liberté sans limite des existentialistes, mais ce concept,pensé par Bourdieu pour dépasser cette opposition, n’ y parvient sans doute qu’ incomplete­ment, penchant vers une certaine forme de déterminisme. L’ action des acteurs est, en effet,en dernière analyse, le produit des déterminismes que fait peser sur eux le monde social et quitrouvent leur reflet dans les dispositions constitutives de leur habitus. Cette notion médiatriced’ habitus comme principe d’ action des acteurs qui, comme d’ autre éléments clefs de la théorieou concepts recteurs de Bourdieu dépasse, cependant, le cadre de la sociologie et devient partie intégrale des études culturelles etde la théorie littéraire. La notion d’habitus Bourdieu avait, au cours du temps, alors, modifié,en ouvrant l’ espace pour accueillir d’autres, nouvelles interprétations. (shrink)

U radu se analizira Talesovo shvaćanje duše, uz primarno oslanjanje na Aristotelove kapitalne uvide i konzultiranje relevantnih doksografskih bilješki. Istraživanjem je utvrđeno da je Stagiranin miletskog fizičara, uzimajući u obzir njegovo navodno stajalište da kamen ima dušu zato što pokreće željezo, situirao u kategoriju mislilaca koji su smatrali da je duša načelo kretanja. Autor je zatim konstatirao da je mišljenje da je duša pomiješana u cjelini povezano s poznatom sintagmom koja se pripisuje Talesu: »sve je puno bogova«. Ako se ove (...) formulacije povežu s izjavama o kamenu magnetu i jantaru, onda se dobiva mogući zaključak da je, po Milećaninu, sve oduševljeno, tj. oživljeno, kako organski tako i neorganski dijelovi kozmosa. Konačno, ako ovi stavovi jesu autentično Talesovi, onda je on »rodonačelnik filozofije« i zbog toga što govori o jednosti čitave stvarnosti, odnosno zato što se na ovaj način vitalistički ustanovljuje jedinstvo cjeline svega. (shrink)

U ovom radu predstavljena su mišljenja i stavovi nastavnika matematike o ispitima iz matematike na Državnoj maturi u Hrvatskoj. Cilj rada bio je ispitati mišljenja nastavnika o prikladnosti srednjoškolskih udžbenika matematike za pripremu učenika za ispite državne mature, općim zahtjevima ispita, ocjenjivanju i bodovanju na ispitima te o uspjehu učenika. Istraživanje je provedeno putem upitnika na prigodnom uzorku od 308 nastavnika matematike koji poučavaju u srednjim školama u Hrvatskoj. Rezultati pokazuju da nastavnici matematike školske udžbenike ne smatraju prikladnima za pripremu (...) učenika za ispit više razine. Nastavnici smatraju da je vrijeme predviđeno za ispit više razine nedovoljno. Većinom su zadovoljni rezultatima svojih učenika, no neopredijeljeni su po pitanju kriterija i bodovanja na maturi. Nastavnici strukovnih škola u većoj su mjeri nezadovoljni zahtjevima i postavkama državne mature u odnosu na gimnazijske nastavnike. Rezultati ovog empirijskog istraživanja mogu poslužiti kao polazište za ponovno razmatranje općih zahtjeva državne mature iz matematike nakon više od deset godina nakon njezina uvođenja. (shrink)

»Sve što postoji u onom drugom je drugačije nego u sebi« . Ljudski svijet je posredovani svijet te može biti posve odvojen od onoga što je svijet u sebi, a što se danas naziva neposrednošću, životom, autentičnom egzistencijom. Racionalnost, simboličko mišljenje, jezik, povezuju nas s realnošću, ali prepušteni sebi samima zarobljavaju beskonačnu različitost stvarnosti i supstituiraju bogatstvo života hiperrealnošću i ekstenzijama .Izgubljeni smo u simbolima jer nam nedostaje, kaže Kuzanski, tankoćutnost za razlikovanje simbola od onoga što oni simboliziraju. Kant to (...) proširuje na razlikovanje svijeta za nas od svijeta po sebi, upozoravajući da je naše iskustvo svijeta određeno naočalama kroz koje ga gledamo. Kuzanski nam nudi naočale koje omogućuju spomenutu tankoćutnost. Uspoređuje ih s dragocjenim kamenom berilom kroz koji postaje vidljivo ono što je inače nevidljivo. To je medij tankoćutniji od jezika. Za Platona njegovo poznavanje bijaše uvjet da se uđe u Akademiju.“Whatever exists, exists otherwise in something else than it exist in itself” . The world of man is a mediated indirect world and it can exist completely separate from what the world in itself is, the latter being referred to today as immediacy, Life, authentic existence. Rationality, symbolic thought, and language connect us to the reality, but when they are left to themselves they reduce otherwise infinite variety within the reality and substitute the richness of life with hyperreality ad extensions .We are lost in the world of symbols, according to Cusanus, because we lack the sensibility to differentiate the symbol from the signified symbolized. Kant extends this to the opposition between the worldforus and the worldperse, thereby pointing out that our experience of the world is determined by the spectacles through which we see it. Cusanus on the other hand offers the spectacles that enable us to achieve the before mentioned sensibility, comparing them to the semiprecious stone beryl, which enables otherwise invisible objects to become visible if observed through the stone. The concerned medium is thus more sensible than language. Plato made the cognition of this medium a prerequisite for entry into his Academy. (shrink)

Wittgenstein započinje svoja Predavanja o religioznom vjerovanju tvrdeći kako ne bi proturječio religioznoj osobi koja vjeruje u Strašni sud, iako on osobno ne dijeli takva uvjerenja. Kasnije izjavljuje kako nije siguran mogu li religiozni vjernici i pojedinci koji ne vjeruju istinski razumjeti jedni druge. Neki filozofi tumače ove primjedbe kao dokaz da je Wittgenstein smatrao kako su religijski i nereligijski diskursi nesumjerljivi, u tom smislu da nereligiozna osoba ne može razumjeti religioznu kada ova govori o svojim vjerovanjima, kao i da (...) su religiozna vjerovanja imuna na kritiku izvana kao posljedica te navodne nesumjerljivosti. Hilary Putnam je tvrdio da je Wittgenstein vjerovao kako dijalog između religioznih i nereligioznih osoba podrazumijeva određeno nesporazumijevanje, koje međutim nije posljedica nesumjerljivosti. Predlažem drugačije sagledavanje „nesuprotstavljenosti“ i Wittgensteinovog shvaćanja religioznog vjerovanja, pri čemu se slažem s Putnamom da se teza o nesumjerljivosti ne može pripisati Wittgensteinu. (shrink)

Mišljenje koje ukazuje na značenje posrednika u procesu spoznaje jednim svojim dijelom ulazi u područje gnoseologije. Probijajući se do biti promišljanoga, te odstranjujući ono što pripada posrednicima u procesu spoznaje, ovo je mišljenje dijelom i svojevrsna »proširena hermeneutika «. Proučavajući napredovanje spoznaje o posredovanosti same spoznaje, te napredovanje iskustva u kontekstu medija posredovanja, ovo je mišljenje i svojevrsna fenomenologija. Sabirući u sebi teorijsko, praktičko i poetičko, filozofija medija želi biti mišljenje koje nije određeno slikom, gramatikom, pojmom, kontekstom, performanceom, psihologijom nastupa, (...) tehnologijom – ali sve to želi imati u sebi sačuvano i nadvladano. Transmisija znanja više nije samo stvar riječi. Nakon lingvističkog obrata i ikoničkog obrata, sve smo bliže shvaćanju da je i jednom i drugom obratu u osnovi bio medijski obrat. (shrink)

Avicennino razumijevanje bitka je određeno religijskim kontekstom njegove misli i jezikom u kojem je ta misao ostvarena.Ideja Prvoga počela kao Počela bitka utemeljena je na poimanju da su bića u svijetu kontingentna: biće može postojati, ali može i ne postojati, jer njegovo postojanje ovisi o nekom uzroku. A budući da lanac uzrokâ ne može biti beskonačan, mora postojati neki prvi uzrok, čiji bitak – budući da prvi uzrok nije uzrokovan – mora biti nužan. Taj prvi neuzrokovani uzrok nužnoga bitka jest (...) podarivatelj bitka svemu kontingentnome. Odatle i Avicennina ideja o bitku koji se »pridružuje« bîti.No arapski jezik također upućuje na takovu ideju. Budući da u arapskome nema glagola koji znači ‘biti’, arapski logičari nisu mogli formulirati čisti egzistencijalni iskaz. Zato su umjesto egzistencijalnog iskaza rabili atributivni iskaz koji se po dogovoru smatrao egzistencijalnim. U takovu iskazu bitak uistinu jest »nešto« što se atribuira bîti bića, a ta konceptualizacija bitka osnova je Avicennine ideje o bitku kao svojevrsnom prigodku bîti.Avicennas Seinsverständnis ist durch den religiösen Zusammenhang seiner Gedanken und die Sprache, in der diese Gedanken zum Wort gekommen sind, bestimmt.Die Idee des ersten Prinzips als des Seinsprinzips gründet sich auf der Auffassung, dass das Seiende in der Welt kontingent ist: das Seiende kann existieren, aber auch nicht existieren, weil seine Existenz von einer Ursache abhängt. Da die Kette von Ursachen nicht unendlich sein kann, muss eine erste Ursache existieren, die selbst nicht verursacht ist. Diese erste unverursachte Ursache des notwendigen Seins gibt allem Kontingenten das Sein. Daher stammt Avicennas Idee des dem Wesen „zukommenden“ Seins.Auch die arabische philosophische Terminologie weist auf eine solche Idee hin. Da es im Arabischen kein Verb in der Bedeutung ‘sein’ gibt, konnten die arabischen Logiker nicht die reine existenziale Aussage formulieren. Deshalb haben sie statt der existenzialen Aussage die attributive Aussage in der existenzialen Bedeutung verwendet. In einer solchen Aussage ist das Sein tatsächlich „etwas“ was dem Wesen des Seienden attribuiert wird. Diese Konzeptualisation ist bei Avicenna die Grundlage für die Idee des Seins als des eigenartigen Akzidenz des Wesens. (shrink)

Arthur Schopenhauer , filozof postkantovske tradicije, u svojim se djelima Svijet kao volja i predodžba i O temelju morala u velikoj mjeri bavio i etičkim pitanjima. Pri tome je bilo nemoguće zaobići Kantovo etičko naučavanje, koje je Schopenhauer podvrgnuo detaljnoj kritici. Schopenhauer je Kantu spočitavao rigorizam u etici, koji je za njega neprihvatljiv s obzirom da predstavlja čisti formalizam, a ne govori ništa o zbiljskim motivima koji pokreću ljudsko ponašanje. Za te Kantove odredbe Schopenhauer je pronašao mjesto unutar uređenja pravne (...) države, jer se pravne države ne tiču motivi koji nekoga navode na određeno ponašanje, već isključivo formalno zadovoljenje načela pravednosti.Arthur Schopenhauer , the philosopher of postKantian tradition, in his writings The World as Will and Representation and On the Basis of Morality, has been dealing a lot with ethical questions. In that way, it was impossible to skirt from Kant’s ethical teaching, which Schopenhauer submitted to detailed criticism. Schopenhauer reproached him his ethical rigorism, which was unacceptable for Schopenhauer, knowing the fact that it represents pure formalism, but it does not tell anything on real motives that are driving force of a human behaviour. These Kant’s instructions were placed by Schopenhauer in the frame of establishing legal state, because the system in itself is not considered of human motives as being a reason for certain behaviour, while the system is exclusively considered of a formal fulfillment of a principle of justice. (shrink)

Analiza studentskih poteškoća vezanih za određenu nastavnu temu može pomoći predavaču u stjecanju boljeg uvida u studentsko razumijevanje određene teme, što je preduvjet za visokokvalitetnu nastavu. Svrha ovog istraživanja sastojala se u demonstriranju načina na koji analize ometača mogu biti iskorištene za identificiranje studentskih poteškoća u određenom području. Kako bismo mogli provoditi invarijantna mjerenja i lako povezati studentske poteškoće s razinama njihovih postignuća, odlučili smo se studiju provesti u okviru Rasch formalizma. Naše istraživanje obuhvatilo je 14 zadataka iz područja valne (...) optike i 286 studenata s pet sveučilišta u Sloveniji, Hrvatskoj te Bosni i Hercegovini. Rasch modeliranje korišteno je za procjenu težine zadataka i sposobnosti studenata, kao i za kreiranje krivulja vjerojatnosti ponuđenih opcija što nam je omogućilo povezivanje razine razumijevanja studenata s izborom pojedinačnih ometača. Utvrđeno je da svih 14 zadataka funkcionira u skladu s Rasch modelom. Za 10 zadataka imali smo ometače koje je odabralo najmanje 25 % studenata. Kod nekoliko od ovih 10 zadataka krivulje vjerojatnosti ponuđenih opcija ukazuju na to da atraktivnost pojedinačnih ometača ovisi o razinama sposobnosti učenika. Možemo zaključiti da analiza ometača primjenom Rasch modeliranja može dati vrlo korisne informacije za diferencijaciju nastave fizike. (shrink)

continent. 1.2 (2011): 136-140. In early 2011, Cow Heavy Books published The Official Catalog of the Library of Potential Literature , a compendium of catalog 'blurbs' for non-existent desired or ideal texts. Along with Erinrose Mager, I edited the project, in a process that was more like curation as it mainly entailed asking a range of contemporary writers, theorists, and text-makers to send us an entry. What resulted was a creative/critical hybrid anthology, a small book in which each page opens (...) to a new iteration of textual desire. These texts explore the material possibilities of the book. Somewhat parallel to the call of N. Katherine Hayles who, in her book Writing Machines , urges literary theorists to take up the practice of Medium Specific Analysis (to account for the way the medium in which it is presented conditions or at least bears on a literary text). I see in the imagined works of The Official Catalog a call for the innovative writers of today to become Medium-Responsive. This would mean thinking through the specific (materially constrained) possibilities offered by the media in which texts are presented, and in thinking of the literary text as a kind of art in the greater context of other arts and the book as a medium situated within the context of many other media. In doing so, the contemporary writer refutes the chorus of critics who lament the death of the book by consistently reinvigorating literary innovation. The following are selections from The Official Catalog of the Library of Potential Literature that show possible paths for (thinking about) new writing that engages with its medium. —Ben Segal, Editor THE CUBE Even the most radical non-linear texts have tended to exploit or subvert only the sequential possibilities of print—from the continuous loop of Joyce's Finnegans Wake to the shuffled cards of Marc Saporta's Composition No. 1 —but The Cube takes such multiplicities to an entirely new level. Set in a grid, the book's words can be read conventionally, across the page, as well as down each column—with either route making complete grammatical sense. But they can also be read as stacked strata and mined like lexical core samples through the layered pages of the book. Each path tells the same story from a different perspective (the narrative, naturally, hinges on the potential outcomes of a throw of cubed dice). By opening up the z-axis to reading in this way, The Cube recognizes the book as a three-dimensional sculptural space. Taking its lead from Armand Schwerner's (If Personal) and Raymond Queneau's Cent mille milliards de poèmes , The Cube reads like a experiment by Christian Bök precision printed by Emily McVarish. Craig Dworkin is the editor, most recently, of The Consequence of Innovation: 21st Century Poetics (Roof Books, 2008), The Sound of Poetry/The Poetry of Sound , with Marjorie Perloff (U. Chicago Press, 2009), and Against Expression: An Anthology of Conceptual Writing , with Kenneth Goldsmith (Northwestern UP, 2010). He teaches at the University of Utah. HE GOES In He Goes , we read notes, letters and e-mails from a scholar father to his novelist daughter. We read of the father's musings on Beckett, on Pinter, on Anne Frank; his description of a woman hanging laundry from a line. We read about his journey toward dying, followed by a brief, third person account of his death, and his obituary. Then a long series of blank pages that demand to be read in real time, non-sentence by non-sentence, blank page by blank page. Finally—and it is here that this peculiar little book begins to soar—the dead father writes to his as-of-yet-still-living daughter. He does not write from death. He does not write from life. The words unprint, unstamp, unkindle. Still, they require no translation. The father "writes" (for lack of a better word) about the serendipitous, the commonplace; he recommends another book. He jokes. He asks his daughter how her stomach is. He says forget about presence in absence, darling; screw words as memorial and the guys in garbage cans and loss as redemption and I can't go on I must go on. He goes, "Love, Fodder." He goes, "incidentally." He goes, "I thought you might like to know." Elizabeth Graver is the author of a story collection, Have You Seen Me? , and three novels: Unravelling ; The Honey Thief ; and Awake . Her work has been anthologized in Best American Short Stories , Best American Essays , and Prize Stories: the O. Henry Awards . She teaches at Boston College. THE PAPER ARCHIVIST A stunning package and a triumph of imagination, The Paper Archivist at times looks to be less a book than an abstract expressionist painting. Softly bound, its contents unfold to a single sheet of uneven thickness and texture—a canvas splattered with colored lines, stickers, broken sentences, and nonsense pictographs. But by following the directions to fold, dip, smell, rub, scratch, and tear the sheet according to the contingencies of the weather and using only the objects at hand, the reader slowly brings the forces hidden in the noise into a glorious sculptural convergence, processing a different story and shape each time. This is the rare book that continues to stir, whirl, and pop on every new reading. Sean Higgins blogs at BOMBlog where he is responsible for the column Volumes and Territories, as well as Ghost Island , a fledgling collaborative intellectual collective. THE SLOW BOOK The Slow Book , written by an anonymous author at the dawn of literacy, on a minor planet (otherwise notable only as the source of that exceptionally hardy, not very tasty grain called “shef” sowed on hostile planets as an early step to colonization), and encoded into a series of punctures on a strip of copper coiled inside a clever device, something between a player piano and an old-fashioned film projector, is being released into print, as was the author’s intention, at a rate of one word per century (local time). Each word is, across the Forty Galaxies, agreed to be uncannily apt for the century in which it appears—even “of,” in a century during which the highest value was attached to fidelity, whether to ideals, worlds, or romantic love; even “the,” which governed two centuries, one extraordinarily materialistic, during which advances in propulsion and navigation accelerated the exchange of exceptional objects between the remotest planets of the Forty, and one in which the central concern, both of philosophers and the common man, was whether, in an age of rapidly proliferating hypothetical worlds, anyone or anything concretely existed at all. Even those words published long before interstellar contact can be seen in retrospect to have transgalactic pertinence. As a result, attempts to abstract the machine from its publishers, Hobson & Hui, in order to “predict the future” for insight or gain by “fast- forwarding” the copper strip have been many and ingenious. While, in centuries of skepticism (“maybe”), or of unrest (“go”) the book has been nearly forgotten, in others it seems to haunt every thought, every deed, despite the fact that the subject of The Slow Book is still unclear. So far only a few sentences exist in print; everyone knows them, can quote them, offer the standard exegeses and assorted heresies; yet certainties are the stuff of adolescence; mature readers are forced to acknowledge that these sentences are probably only a preamble to the main argument. They contain no proper nouns, nor can we identify any definite theme. There is even disagreement about their tone, whether coolly ironic, as some insist, or ardent. The appearance of an unusual grammatical case, sometimes called the future pluperfect continuous, used to describe events that at some future point will have always been true (but are not yet)—hitherto known to appear only in the synthetic dogmas of the Thanatographical Society, and in certain highly circumscribed religious contexts—has suggested to some scholars that the Slow Book was originally intended for ritual use, but the proximity of the usage to a term designating a small hand plow that, as Pott and Mielcke have convincingly shown, would have borne a distinctly obscene double meaning in its culture of origin in the author’s time, argues otherwise. It is likewise unclear whether the situation that seems to be—with teasing incompleteness—sketched out in these few lines is intended as an illustration of general principles, a case study, a dramatic scene, or an extended metaphor. In short, we have no idea what The Slow Book is about. In our own time, we believe that it is almost certainly a work of fiction, but that may be because we live in the century of “if”. In each age, perhaps, we see the book we most need to read. Some have dared to suggest that the metal strip is blank until, with millennial fanfare, it advances into its new position, that no ur-text exists, that the book itself is brought into being—written—by our need. But that is exactly the sort of thing we would believe, in 7645. Shelley Jackson is the author of the story collection The Melancholy of Anatomy , the novel Half Life , and hypertexts including Patchwork Girl . The recipient of a Howard Foundation grant, a Pushcart Prize, and the 2006 James Tiptree Jr Award, she has also written and illustrated several children's books, including The Old Woman and the Wave ; Sophia, the Alchemist's Dog ; and Mimi's Dada Catifesto . Her stories and essays have appeared in Conjunctions , McSweeney's , The Paris Review , and Cabinet Magazine . In 2004 she launched her project SKIN , a story published in tattoos on 2095 volunteers. THE BOOK OF SOUNDS The Book of Sounds is just that: a book of sounds made when letters are construed in new ways to bring forth out of the alphabet new forms of speech. A book meant to be read out loud, The Book of Sounds is not unlike Laurie Anderson's O Superman or Brian Eno's Music for Airports in its attempt to make music out of the most primary and simplest of methods. It breaks language down to its barest bones and makes out of the page a drum that has never before been beaten upon. Peter Markus is the author of a novel, Bob, or Man on Boat (Dzanc Books) as well as two books of short fiction, Good, Brother and The Singing Fish , both of which were published by Calamari Press. A new collection of stories, We Make Mud , is now available from Dzanc Books. PARADISE OF THE BLIND by Celan Solen Although the reclusive Celan Solen published his first and only book in 1963—paying out-of-pocket for a limited edition of the slim collection No One May Have the Same Knowledge Again —he remained in American obscurity for almost three decades. In 1992 a micro-press in Istanbul brought out No One in Turkish. A German translation followed in 1995. Soon it became clear in literary circles Solen was a world-class (if highly unclassifiable) artist—lyrical, dense, enigmatic—who could undo the conventional short story in 397 words by inventing impossible worlds housed in impossible whirls (in “Small Sadnesses,” a single chartreuse tree frog in Borneo unknowingly holds time together by its very presence in the universe, while each letter of its tale refers, not to itself, but to the one preceding it in the alphabet). By his disappearance last year, Solen was considered master by a generation of writers and critics (except, alas, for those gentlemen in the Swedish Academy). Imagine, then, that generation’s delight at the discovery, locked away in the author’s safe-deposit box, of his second and final composition. Had Lynch’s Lost Highway been book instead of film, and had it been penned by Beckett at his least certain, revised by Barthelme at his most formally deranged, and typeset by Derrida at his most semiotically catastrophic, the result might have been something like Paradise of the Blind : interlacing narratives of a man composed of borrowed organs (whose most cheerless and difficult to locate, god, could only have been invented by an empty heart), a nonexistent medieval painting blamed for the ruin of future hope, and the spread of a philosophy that holds earth a mistake constantly recurring in the dream of a fish lying on the floor of the Atlantic (if the fish wakes, our world winks off)—all contained in a text packed with typed-over passages, torn postcards, poems that can be deciphered only when held up to a mirror, pages ornamented with trompe-l'œil paperclips and coffee stains and buzzing houseflies, some busy with illegible runes that dissolve when exposed to light, three that smell like roses or lemons (depending on whether a man or woman is reading), two that stain with the bloody fingerprints of the those who handle them, one that ignites when brushed with breath, thirteen sewn from baby skin, one that moans when touched, and one that screams—yet all without mass, unimaginable, and invisible. Lance Olsen is author of more than 20 books of and about innovative fiction, including, most recently, the novels Calendar of Regrets (2010) and Head in Flames (2009). He teaches experimental narrative theory and practice at the University of Utah. SUPERSTRUCTURE! by Barbara D'Albi As soon as I opened the third drawer of Barbara D'Albi's wooden novel, everything became hopeless. Now in Ithaca, there was no going back. And it wasn't just the intricate series of shelves, hinged doors and locked drawers which D'Albi layered into the book, no, lo, I was constructed anew by the story. Who else but D'Albi to imagine a God who becomes a carpenter and gets killed?! And makes it good! You want stories? D'Albi is a skyscraper, built with planes and levers. Momentarily I wondered where I could shelve this book, and then I thought: no matter; I couldn't put it down. Adam Robinson lives in Baltimore, where he runs Publishing Genius. He is the author of Adam Robison and Other Poems and Say, Poem. 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This paper offers a novel, qualitative approach to evaluating the outcomes of integrating humanities and ethics into a newly revised pre-clerkship medical education curriculum. The authors set out to evaluate medical students’ perceptions, learning outcomes, and growth in identity development. Led by a team of interdisciplinary scholars, this qualitative project examines multiple sources of student experience and perception data, including student essays, end-of-year surveys, and semi-structured interviews with students. Data were analyzed using deductive and inductive processes to identify key categories (...) and recurring themes. Results suggest that students not only engaged with the curricular content and met the stated learning objectives but also acknowledged their experience in the humanities and ethics curriculum as an opportunity to reflect, expand their perceptions of medicine (and what it means to be “in” medicine), connect with their classmates, and further cultivate their personal and professional identities. Results of this qualitative study show how and in what ways the ethics and humanities curriculum motivates students past surface-level memorization of factual knowledge and encourages thoughtful analysis and evaluation about how the course material relates to and influences their thinking and how they see themselves as future doctors. The comprehensive qualitative approach reflects a holistic model for evaluating the integration of humanities and ethics into the pre-clerkship medical education curriculum. Future research should examine if this approach provides a protective factor against the demonstrated ethical erosion and empathy decrease during clinical training. (shrink)

I argue that predicativism, the view that proper names are predicates, is a viable theory of the semantics of proper names given a certain hypothesis about the grammar of definiteness. Extant versions of predicativism hold that a singular name in argument position constitutes the predicative component of a covert definite description. I show that these versions cannot accommodate semantic and typological data, specifically: syntactic and semantic disparities between bare and non-bare occurrences of such names in English, the distinctive modal rigidity (...) displayed by names, as opposed to common noun definite descriptions, and cross-linguistic data that feature seemingly distinct determiners for names in argument position. I propose that predicativism needs to embrace a view of definite marking as complex, consisting of a definite article and a bindable, familiarity-tracking constituent, which I call _index_. I show that this view is empirically motivated and typologically attested. The resulting version of predicativism can accommodate elegantly the observed semantic data when coupled with language-specific morpho-phonological generalizations. I finally address criticisms of and alternatives to my version of predicativism. (shrink)

Noam Chomsky (1928 – ) Noam Chomsky is an American linguist who has had a profound impact on philosophy. Chomsky’s linguistic work has been motivated by the observation that nearly all adult human beings have the ability to effortlessly produce and understand a potentially infinite number of sentences. For instance, it is very likely that … Continue reading Noam Chomsky →.

This article suggests that the historical figuration of Islam as well as the discourse of secularization has played a fundamental role in the constitution of Islam’s externality to Europe. The historical figuration of Islam as Europe’s enemy is haunting Europe. The European secularist anxiety today, which insists on the separation between the domains of the private and the public needs to be understood against the backdrop of this history. If Islam’s inability to separate the religious and the political was historically (...) the dominant motif through which Islam was registered as the arch-enemy, the post-secular, post-Enlightenment period registers Islam as an enemy through a cultural gesture. Derrida’s understanding of spectrality and the concept autoimmunity are deployed to suggest that Islam as a specter haunting Europe undermines the sovereign constitution of a self-identical Europe, but this haunting needs to be seen as Europe’s chance for a self-destructive conservation of Europe. European identity has to be rethought and renewed differently and this rethinking requires that we attend to the present as well as the past and future of Europe, which requires the opening of Europe to otherness and responsibility to the other. Such a rethinking of Europe’s history necessitates thinking about colonialism as well the living embodiments of this colonial legacy today, which are the immigrants. (shrink)

Increasing the ethicality of a project and the usefulness of the data enhances the probability that social good will result from the research; a combination of ethical and methodological soundness is therefore crucial. From 1999‐2002 I conducted a qualitative study of women’s, men’s, and mixed Internet chat room conversations. In this article, I discuss the particular ethical issues that arose, outlining my ethical decision‐making process within the context of current debates. I also describe the methodological concerns, demonstrating why a synthesized (...) method responsive to the advantages and disadvantages of cyberspace was necessary, and how the data were enhanced by this choice of method and by certain characteristics of cyberspace. In discussing the details of my study, my overall goal is to provide an assessment of the social good of the project with a view to increasing the probability of more ethical and useful Internet‐based research outcomes more generally. (shrink)

Excerpt from Activism It is not without hesitation that the present essay is submitted to the public. It would seem, however, at this time especially, when all of us are groping for whatever stray gleams of light may come our way, that a possibly fresh point of view may not be entirely supererogatory. For in the midst of the cataclysmic changes taking place on every side many of us find ourselves forced to a new searching of the spirit. The older (...) creeds and philosophies are crumbling or becoming metamorphosed. And in the intellectual world, no less than in the sphere of politics and industry, we are everywhere faced with the necessity of a revaluation of values. In philosophy a newer Idealism, Realism, and Pragmatism, as well as such iconoclastic doctrines as Behaviorism in psychology, and the Relational theory in physics, have swept many of the long received dogmas into a historic past; while many old questions have been answered with surprising solutions, and many strange and hitherto unsuspected problems have been discovered to confront us. To meet some of these newer conditions - to envisage some of these many problems from a possibly fresh angle - is the endeavor of the hypothesis here briefly outlined. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. (shrink)

Originally a religious term, from the sixth century B.C. on, the word "t'ien," or "heaven," played a significant role in discourse among philosophical schools. The earliest of these was Juism . This study analyzes statements concerning T'ien in three early Juist texts: the Analects, Mencius, and Hsun Tzu. ;Previous analyses of the role of T'ien in Juism have viewed that role in terms of a model of evolving meanings of "t'ien" during the late Chou period, which claims that the term (...) originally denoted an anthropomorphic deity, but increasingly came to denote "Nature." Studies of the role of T'ien in Juist texts have explored whether this model fits those texts. ;This essay holds that to identify characteristically Juist meanings of the term "t'ien," we must do more than identify referential images which may have been associated with its uses in Juist texts. We should, instead, explore the function which uses of the term may have had in relation to the activities and goals of the early Juist school. ;The focus of those activities and goals has traditionally been understood as a political program. This study argues that early Juism was essentially a socially insular cult devoted to mastery of traditional ritual skills; political purism functioned to shelter the cult from political responsibilities and dangers. ;If this is correct, the role of T'ien in early Juist texts should reflect a disjunction between ritual and political spheres. And indeed we find that throughout the three texts analyzed, the term "t'ien" is generally employed to picture a supreme ethical entity--whether a god, Fate, or Nature--as a prescriptive basis for ritual practice in the present, or as a descriptive force ensuring that Juist political efforts will be futile in the present and successful in the future. ;Thus, in early Juist rhetoric, T'ien is used to justify Juism's ritual focus and legitimize its contemporary withdrawal from political activity. This is the characteristic instrumental meaning of the term "t'ien" in early Juist texts, remaining central despite changes in connotative imagery associated with the term in late Chou thought. (shrink)

Aristotle's Organon provides an ingeniously systematic way to identify the discrete nature of disciplines that concern human thought and expression. While such an approach helps to understand the unique properties that warrant the recognition of disciplines as discrete, Aristotle's system of classification does not capture well the dynamics, synergy, and symbiotic relationships that appear when disciplines intersect. Perhaps, in fairness to Aristotle, his task was not to explore such relationships, but that does not mean that we should not try to (...) better understand the nature and impact of disciplines such as rhetoric by examining their interplay within the dynamics of social interaction. It is this dynamism of... (shrink)

La question des racines, des sources et des successions tient une place importante dans l'ecclésiologie nord-africaine. Certaines expressions de Tertullien, de Cyprien, d'Optat de Milève et d'Augustin, particulièrement celles qui comportent caput, radix, princeps et quelques mots apparentés, doivent parfois être entendues comme indiquant la source d'une chose, plutôt que comme des mots signifiant pouvoir et autorité.