Building on the evidence from the impact of hybrid technology on varietal diversity loss, this paper explores ex ante the possible effects of introduction of Bt eggplant on on-farm varietal diversity of eggplant. The public–private partnership involved in the development and introduction of Bt eggplant provides a great opportunity to develop locally-adapted Bt open-pollinated varieties (OPVs) instead of having a limited number of generic hybrid varieties. The study shows that introduction of multiple Bt OPVs by public institutions will reduce the (...) rate of replacement of OPVs by hybrids and thus help in conserving varietal diversity. However, the cost of developing multiple Bt OPVs is high; hence policy makers need to look at alternative measures to maintain the varietal diversity of crops such as eggplant in its centers of diversity. (shrink)

William Barnes' reputation as one of the pre-eminent British "dialect" poets, the equal of Robert Burns and John Clare, is being increasingly recognized. The range of his writings is extraordinary as evidenced by the contents of this collection, which includes works on etymology, philology, topography, mathematics, ancient history and economics. This collection displays the full diversity of Barnes' considerable intellect. Included are major and lesser-known works, biographical pieces by Thomas Hardy, and the biography by his daughter, Lucy Baxter.

William Beveridge was a key figure in the modernization of British economic and social policy who published widely on unemployment and social security. Among his most notable works and reprinted in this set are, _Full Employment in a Free Society _, and _Pillars of Security_. Beveridge’s Report on social insurance was published in 1942. It proposed that all people of working age should pay a weekly national insurance contribution. In return, benefits would be paid to people who were sick, (...) unemployed, retired or widowed. Beveridge included as one of three fundamental assumptions the fact that there would be a National Health Service of some sort. Beveridge's arguments were widely accepted. He argued that welfare institutions would increase the competitiveness of British industry in the post-war period, not only by shifting labour costs like healthcare and pensions onto the public account but also by producing healthier, wealthier and more productive workers. Beveridge saw full employment as the pivot of the social welfare programme he expressed in the 1942 report. As well as making available some of Beveridge’s key, and in some case, lesser known works, this set includes as its final volume an indispensable overview of Beveridge and his prolific work. (shrink)

Recently, the work of philosopher-psychologist William James has undergone something of a renaissance. In this contribution to the trend, William Gavin argues that James's plea for the "reinstatement of the vague" to its proper place in our experience should be regarded as a seminal metaphor for his thought in general. The concept of vagueness applies to areas of human experience not captured by facts that can be scientifically determined nor by ideas that can be formulated in words. In (...) areas as seemingly diverse as psychology, religion, language, and metaphysics, James continually highlights the importance of the ambiguous, the contextual, the pluralistic, or the uncertain over the foundational. Indeed, observes the author, only in a vague unfinished world can the human self, fragile as it is, have the possibility of making a difference or exercising the will to believe. Taking James's plea seriously, Gavin traces the idea of the vague beyond the philosopher's own texts. In "conversations" with other philosophers--including Peirce, Marx, Dewey, and, to a lesser extent, Rorty and Derrida--the author shows that a version of James's position is central to their thought. Finally, Gavin looks for the pragmatic upshot of James's plea, reaffirming the importance of the vague in two concrete areas: the doctor-patient relationship in medicine and the creation and experiencing of modern art. In conclusion, Gavin argues that James's work is itself vague, in a positive sense, and that as such it functions as a "spur" to the reader. (shrink)

The famous ‘trolley problem’ began as a simple variation on an example given in passing by Philippa Foot , involving a runaway trolley that cannot be stopped but can be steered to a path of lesser harm. By switching from the perspective of the driver to that of a bystander, Judith Jarvis Thomson showed how the case raises difficulties for the normative theory Foot meant to be defending, and Thomson compounded the challenge with further variations that created still more (...) puzzles of broader interest. In recent years, her thought experiments have even been co-opted by psychologists engaged in the empirical study of moral judgment . Yet more than thirty years after launching the trolley problem, Thomson has now strikingly reversed course, retracting the very claim she had originally used to raise puzzles for Foot. I shall argue that this reversal is a mistake, leading to a needlessly counterintuitive, contrarian position about damage-control cases. Instead of overturning her earlier position, her new variations merely uncover a surprising insight about the conditions under which one may permissibly sacrifice another for a good end.1. The central case at issue is what Thomson now calls Bystander's Two Options: you are a bystander who sees a runaway trolley headed toward five innocent people who cannot move off the track; you cannot stop the trolley, but you have access to a switch that will divert it onto a side track where one innocent person is trapped. Is it permissible to throw the switch and divert the trolley toward lesser harm? The common answer, and Thomson's earlier one, is that it is: in cases like this, where there is a public threat and we can act on it so …. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:82 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY PEIRGE'S MARGINALIA IN W. T. HARRIS' Hegel's Logic Among the most eminent philosophers of nineteenth-century America were William Torrey Harris (1835-1909) and Charles Sanders Peirce (18391914 ). The former, by his establishment in 1867 of The Journal of Speculative Philosophy, furnished a starting point for American philosophical maturity. The latter, who contributed to that iournal, has been considered America's greatest logician. It may therefore (...) be of interest to examine Peirce's marginalia in the first edition of Harris' chief work, Hegel's Logic: A Book on the Genesis of the Categories of the Mind (Chicago: S. C. Griggs, 1890). Discovered by the present writer on a New York book-stall, in a cheaply priced, coverless, and water-stained copy, and now in his possession, it bears imprinted on the reverse of the title page: "Harvard University: Philos. Dept. Library. Gift of Mrs. Charles S. Peirce. June 28, 1915." Shortly after Peirce, in depressed circumstances, died on April 19, 1914, the Harvard Philosophy Department acquired from his wife the manuscripts that were published in the Collected Papers.1 Harris' Hegel's Logic, which presumably accompanied that transaction, contains several marginal annotations, mostly in faded ink, in a neat, small hand, similar to that reproduced in the frontispiece to Volume IV of Peirce's Collected Papers. Recalling a notable philosophical conjunction, the markings also reveal aspects of Peirce's character and confirm his complex attitude toward Hegel, crucial to the development of his philosophy. Peirce's shifting view and persistent concern regarding Hegel may be traced in some other remarks. For example, in a letter to Harris dated January 1, 1868, he says, "I admit there is music in the logic of Hegel, but that is all I discover there. ''2 In another letter to Harris, dated May 13, 1868, he indicates his ambivalence: "But as I should draw the line... I should come on the same side as Hegel, because I am idealistic. I do not 1eel very much opposed to Hegel, though I think his main point.s tin his own estimate of importance) are wrong. ''s About 1890, Peirce declared, "I reiect his philosophy in toto, ''~ and about 1896, he accused Hegel of reaching "each category from the last preceding by virtually calling 'next!'-5 Yet, in 1903, he acclaimed Hegel "in some respects the greatest philosopher that ever lived. ''6 And, in the very same year, reviewing another treatment of Hegel's logic, and including a reference to Harris' t Eds. Charles Hartshorne, Paul Weiss,and Arthur Burks (Vols.I-VIII; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1958). 2,.C.S. Peirce to W. T. Harris." ed. WallaceNethery, The Personalist,XLIII (19fi2),37. I am indebted to Dr. Nethery for his kindness in letting me see these letters in advanceof publication. sIbid.,40. 4Collected Papers,I, 193. 5 Ibid., I, 246. eIbid., I, 277. NOTES AND DISCUSSIONS 83 treatise, Peirce flatly remarks: "But all these Hegelians--Harris, XVallace, Hibben, Everett, etc.--who dog the steps of their master in almost textual comments, are profoundly unfaithful to the spirit of his philosophy... the Logik now condemns itself. ''7 A constant feature in Peirce's negative attitude toward Hegel concerns the latter's failure to equip himself scientifically to deal with a subject the American considered basically scientific. For instance, about 1899, Peirce writes: Hegel, while regarding scientific men with disdain, has for his chief topic the importance of continuity, which was the very idea the mathematicians and physicists had been chiefly engaged in following out for three centuries. This made Hegel's work less correct and excellent in itself than it might have been; and at the same time hid its true mode of affinity with the scientific thought into which the life of the race had been chiefly laid up. It was a misfortune for Hegelism~ a misfortune for "philosophy," and a misfortune (in lesser degree) for science: Although Peirce adds, "My philosophy resuscitates Hegel, though in a strange costume, ''9 and his dialectic parallels Hegel's, he attempts to escape the Hegelian subjectivism by an "objective logic" and by avoiding Hegel's supposed mathematical ignorance. "Most of what is true in... (shrink)

Research on this topic in Europe and North America has reached a new stage. Prior to 1970, historians told a story of progress in which modern individuals gradually gained mastery of emotions. After 1970 this older approach was put into doubt. Since 1990 research into the history of emotions has increasingly relied on a new methodology, based on the assumption that emotion is a domain of effort, and that it is possible to document variance between emotional standards, on the one (...) hand, and the greater or lesser success of individuals in conforming to them, on the other. Emotional standards are now assumed to display a history that is not progressive, but reflects distinctive features of each period. (shrink)

In Belgium the European elections and those for the regional councils were held on the same day. The elections of June 13th 2004 deserve a threefold analysis. First a comparison can be made with the results obtained five years ago for the same assemblies. lt shows that in Flanders the socialist party has progressed but that this advance was mainly due to the constitution of a cartel with one faction - Spirit - of the defunct Volksunie. The christian democrats made (...) headway, their progress being enhanced by the contribution of N-VA, the other faction stemming from the Volksunie. The liberals declined fairly markedly as did the green party but to a lesser extent than in the elections for the federal parliament. The June 2004 elections saw above all progress for the extreme right Vlaams Blok, which has become the second biggest party of Flanders with 24 pct of the vote. In the Walloon provinces the socialists progress most thereby increasing the gap separating them from the liberals. The christian democrats advance somewhat while the green party Ecolo declines substantially. The parties of the far right gain support and reach 8.73 pct of the vote. In Brussels the socialist advance is very marked allowing this party to conquer first place to the detriment of the liberals who are in decline. The progress made by frenchspeaking christian democrats is significant.A second approach for the analysis consists in comparing the results of the regional elections with those of the European ones. The differences are slight and rnainly due to the popularity of the candidates. In Belgium there was no "eurosceptic" or "sovereignty" list. The third angle consists in comparing the 2004 results with the ones of the parliamentary elections of 2003. One then observes in Flanders a decline of the socialists, a significant fall in support for the liberals and a progression of the christian democrats. But the main development remains the progression of the Vlaams Blok which gains more than 6 pct compared to its good result of 2003. In the Walloon provinces, the socialists remain at their 2003 level but increase their positive gap with regard to the liberals who are in decline. The christian democrats advance by some 2 pct whereas Ecolo recovers a small part of its 2003 loss. The parties of the far right gain some 1.5 pct. In Brussels, the most noteworthy developrnent is the progress of the frenchspeaking socialists who take over the first place from the liberals.In genera!lthese elections are characterised by a reinforcement of the far right to the detriment of the centre parties and by a status quo of the aggregate consisting of socialists and greens, but to the benefit of the former. (shrink)

This article provides an overview of Edmund Husserl’s lesser known account of high-level imaginative empathy. The author discusses Husserl’s solution to what we might call the ‘generalizability problem’; if empathy is conceived as a relation whereby the understanding I have of my own mind allows me to understand your mind, then how does empathy account for potential differences between us? The author also discusses some features that make empathy more generalizable than might be initially thought, as well as its (...) limits. A second major aim is to use this exegesis of Husserl to show a variety of overlaps between his theory and high-level simulation theory. The author also shows how Husserl’s phenomenological theory provides a compelling response to critiques of high-level simulation from authors that utilize a hybrid cognitive science/phenomenological approach. (shrink)

The Parliamentary Elections of 17 April 1977 revealed a great stability of the body of electors and largely confirmed the result of the communal elections of 1976. On the 393 seats in Parliament, only 38 went to another political family.Nevertheless, this stability does not exclude movements; in this context should be noted the severe set-back of the «Rassemblement Wallon» which looses nearly half of its voters. lts defeat principally benefits the Liberals and the Christian Democrats and, to a lesser (...) extent, the Socialists. In the Flemish region, the Socialists strengthen their position, whereas the Christian Democrats gain ground. Unexpected is the Liberals's setback. The «Volksunie» slightly recedes.In Brussels, PDF is undeniably successful and even exceeds its 1971 result. Communists are losing ground all over the country.In these elections which have been characterized by rather limited vote variations, the «communal tickets» recede, on the whole, to the benefit of the traditional parties which received a serious blow in 1971, but showed signs of a recovery as soon as 1974. (shrink)

William Faulkner (1897-1962), one of the United States’ most renowned authors, was born on Sept. 25, 1897, in New Albany, Mississippi. He initially focused on poetry, culminating in his first publication: The Marble Faun (1924). Subsequently, he transitioned to prose, producing novels such as The Sound and the Fury (1929), As I lay Dying (1930), Light in August (1932) and Absalom, Absalom! (1936), which are considered his most significant works. Like most of his oeuvre, these novels are set in (...) a fictional Southern region that Faulkner termed ‘Yoknapatawpha county.’ Nearly all works set in this fictional county are characterized by themes of race, incest, the American Civil War, and the decline of the antebellum South. Faulkner frequently employs diverse perspectives and techniques that directly represent the consciousness of his characters. Recognition for his literary achievements came relatively late in his career. The primary catalyst for this recognition was the Nobel Prize for Literature awarded to him in 1949, when he had arguably passed the zenith of his writing career. Faulkner’s extensive oeuvre, which spans from 1924 to 1962, also encompasses lesser-known works, such as Sanctuary (1931) and Intruder in the Dust (1948). In addition to novels, Faulkner authored numerous short stories that are considered among the finest in American literature. These include the story translated here, “Barn Burningr” originally published in 1939, in the June issue of Harper’s magazine. Faulkner died July 6 in Byhalia, Mississippi, of a heart attack. -/- In Dutch: William Faulkner (1897-1962) …, een van de beroemdste schrijvers uit de Verenigde Staten, werd geboren op 25 september 1897 in New Albany, Mississippi. Hij begon aanvankelijk met het schrijven van poëzie, wat resulteerde in zijn eerste publicatie: The Marble Faun (1924). Kort daarna liet hij poëzie voor wat het was en stortte hij zich op het proza. Dit leidde tot romans als The Sound and the Fury (1929), As I lay Dying (1930), Light in August (1932) en Absalom, Absalom! (1936) die als zijn belangrijkste werken worden beschouwd. Net als het merendeel van zijn oeuvre spelen deze romans zich af in een fictioneel Zuiden dat door Faulkner ‘Yoknapatawpha county’ genoemd werd. Vrijwel alle werken die zich in deze fictieve streek afspelen, worden gekenmerkt door thema’s als ras, incest, de Amerikaanse burgeroorlog en de teloorgang van het oude Zuiden. Faulkner maakt vaak gebruik van verschillende perspectieven en technieken die direct het bewustzijn van zijn personages representeren. Pas relatief laat in zijn carrière kreeg hij erkenning voor zijn literaire verdiensten. De belangrijkste stimulans hiervoor was de Nobelprijs voor de literatuur die hem werd toegekend in 1949, toen hij als schrijver eigenlijk al over zijn toppunt heen was. Faulkners omvangrijke oeuvre, dat ontstond in de periode van 1924 tot 1962, omvat ook minder bekende werken, zoals Sanctuary (1931) en Intruder in the Dust (1948). Naast romans schreef Faulkner echter ook nog een groot aantal korte verhalen die tot de absolute top van het Amerikaanse verhaal gerekend worden. Daartoe behoort ook het hier vertaalde verhaal ‘In vlammen op’ (‘Barn Burning’), dat oorspronkelijk werd gepubliceerd in 1939, in het juninummer van het tijdschrift Harper’s. Faulkner stierf op 6 juli in Byhalia, Mississippi, aan een hartaanval. -/- . (shrink)

For the first time, the municipal election of 10 October 1976 was held in new units resulting from the merger of numerous boroughs. This is the reason why the political character of the poll became more outspoken.The results of the present election should be compared not only with the preceding municipal poll in 1970, but also with the result of the two parliamentary elections which took place since then.This analyses leads us to the conclusion that in the Walloon region, «Rassemblement (...) Wallon» suffered an important setback in comparison with 1974 for the benefit of Christian Democrats and to a lesser extentof the Socialist Party.In the Flemish region, a great stability may be noted with respect to the opinion expressed in 1974. At the utmost, a very slight Socialist loss may be observed as wel! as a Liberal quasi status quo and a moderate rise for the Christian Democrats.Although FDF's progress with respect to 1974 cannot be denied, its extent is not sufficient to bring this party back to its 1971 record level. To conclude one might say that should the voters have voted in a similar way to elect a Parliament, the Chambers would not be much different from what they are now, but for a loss of seats for «Rassemblement Wallon» which would benefit to the Christian Democrats in the first place and to a lesser extent to the Socialists and PDF as well. (shrink)

arguments concerning whether such changes are creative. [2] Less frequently addressed are questions about how to assess the perceptual implications of these linguistic innovations. [3] Using insights of Ricoeur and, to a lesser extent, M. Merleau Ponty and V. N. Volosinov, I will provide a model for evaluating a certain class of linguistic innovations, namely, new uses of language which rely upon distortion of typical perceptual associations. (Excluded from such new linguistic uses are, for example, analogical innovations, as presented (...) by Saussure.) As my title suggests, I will relate two superficially dissimilar products of language, i.e., metaphor and ideology. I will argue that metaphor and ideology need to be considered jointly (comparatively) to understand linguistic creativity, because -despite their differences -they mutually rely (at their inception) on atypical, even excessive, distortion of the way words shape perception of and reflection on ‘reality.’ My basic thesis is that, in language, the processes of creativity and distortion are interrelated. However, the conclusion I will reach is one which proposes a distinction between and criterion for ‘positive’ changes (which I term ‘creative distortions’) and ‘negative’ changes (which I term ‘distortive creations’). Nevertheless, I do not associate ‘creative distortions’ exclusively with metaphors and ‘distortive creations’ exclusively with ideologies. For metaphor and ideology, I relate ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ to how practical activity is facilitated, using a criterion of expansion or enrichment versus contraction or impoverishment of the semiotic perceptual field. Hence, throughout, even when I make distinctions, I will stress how metaphor and ideology are similar, not how they are different. Textually, the model I will present results from my effort to relate Ricoeur’s views on.. (shrink)

This book is a revised and expanded edition of three lectures delivered by the author as the centerpiece of a symposium on the philosophy of God at Wake Forest University in 1979. Long out of print, in its new edition it should be a valuable resource for scholars and teachers of the philosophy of religion. The first two lectures, after a critique of the incompleteness of St. Thomas Aquinas's famous Five Ways of arguing for the existence of God, explores two (...) lesser-known resources of Aquinas's philosophical ascent of the mind to God. The first is the unrestricted dynamism of the human spirit, both intellect and will, reaching toward the fullness of being as both true (i.e., intelligible) and good. The second is the strictly metaphysical ascent to God from finite to infinite, in the line of Aquinas's later, more Neoplatonically inspired, metaphysics of participation. The third lecture is a critique of Whitehead's process philosophy. It asks: Is process philosophy compatible with Christian theism? This article is heavily revised from its earlier version, distinguishing Aquinas more sharply and critically from Whitehead than in the first edition. (shrink)

In 1837 the German-born astronomer F. G. W. Struve published his famous catalogue of double stars. For Struve this was the culmination of 12 years' detailed observation of a class of celestial objects lying exclusively beyond the solar system; for historians of astronomy it poses the problem of explaining why the study of double stars became a significant part of astronomical endeavour, as it did, during the 1820s and 1830s. For, although Struve's interest was extreme, it was shared to a (...) lesser extent by several eminent contemporaries, including John Herschel, Friedrich Bessel, Johann Encke, James South and Félix Savary. Their combined efforts represented an important transition in astronomy: for the first time one of the emphases of the subject moved beyond the solar system to the so-called fixed stars. The question of the emergence of interest in double stars is of historical significance, therefore, as it is related to the problem of the origins of ‘stellar astronomy’. This essay is thus intended to offer an explanation of astronomers' interest in double stars, and to tackle the related question of whether this transition constituted a major break in the history of astronomy. Furthermore it is proposed that answers to these problems may be found by considering the practice of astronomy dominant during the first half of the nineteenth century. Astronomers in this period were overwhelmingly concerned with a refined form of positional astronomy. The problems they chose to solve were by and large related to the difficulties of the accurate reduction of observational data, and the compilation of reliable tables and star charts, which were then used as a background against which the motions of solar system objects were plotted. By assessing individuals' studies of double stars within this context it can be seen firstly that such studies were no more or less than specific examples of a general case, and secondly that the stars themselves were not usually of intrinsic interest. In general it was the positions of the stars on the. (shrink)

This paper investigates the circumstances under which it is morally permissible to impose non-negligible risks of serious harm on innocent civilians in order not to endanger tangible cultural heritage during armed conflict. Building on a previous account of the value of cultural heritage, it is argued that tangible cultural heritage is valuable because of how it contributes to valuable and meaningful human lives. Taking this account as the point of departure I examine the claim that commanders should be prepared to (...) risk lives of innocent civilians in order to avoid harm to tangible cultural heritage. I argue that imposing high risks of serious harm on innocent civilians without their consent constitutes a wrong that can be justified only in order to avoid a greater evil. It is then argued that damage to cultural heritage sites rarely constitutes the greater evil when weighed against the imposition of non-consensual risks of serious harm on innocent civilians, especially when the risk is substantial. Still, imposing substantial risks might be morally permissible under the condition that they are consensually imposed, even if they are not the lesser evil. However, I argue that even if one has reason to suspect that there are civilians who might consent to at least some significant risks in order to avoid damage to their cultural heritage, it is not clear that commanders should take this into account when deciding what to do. Unless all of those who are at risk consent, the fact that some of those whose lives are at risk consent to the risk of being killed do not make it morally permissible to impose this risk on the group as a whole. (shrink)

This study examined how sales managers react to ethical and unethical acts by their salespeople. Deontological considerations and, to a much lesser extent, teleological considerations predicted sales managers' ethical judgments. Sales managers' intentions to reward or discipline ethical or unethical sales force behavior were primarily determined by their ethical judgments. An organization's perceived ethical work climate was not a significant predictor of sales managers' intentions to intervene when ethical and unethical sales force behavior was encountered.

Ethical theory today is dominated by utilitarianism and by deontological theories . We also find, though to a much lesser extent, virtue ethics, feminist 'care' theories , social contract theories, and rights-based theories. But often missing from the discussion-and from most ethics textbooks-is natural law theory. Natural law theory has a long history, starting with the Stoics. It is influential outside of the Anglo-American world , and it has its powerful defenders today . But nevertheless it is virtually absent (...) from most contemporary studies in ethics and, even when it is mentioned, it is often quickly rejected. Why is this theory so widely ignored or rejected? There are a number of reasons that have been given. Some raise the problem of the distinction between 'is' and 'ought'-that is, that contrary to a basic claim of natural law theory, one cannot infer a moral statement of what one' ought 'to do from a descriptive statement of the kind of being one' is. 'Some attack the theory because it is a' naturalistic 'theory, and it commits ' the naturalistic fallacy'-that moral properties are 'simple,' and cannot be defined in terms of something that is natural And there is today a widespread scepticism that questions whether there are such things as objective, universal moral standards-ie, standards which apply to all human beings, regardless of the culture from which they come or the time in which they live. In any case, even if there are such standards, we might still ask Where do they come from? Can we know what they are? And can we be certain that they are legitimate? Many, if not most of these questions were, however, addressed by Jacques Maritain. In this paper, I want to outline Maritain's distinctive account of natural law and its metaphysical and epistemological dimensions. This account not only provides a more sophisticated understanding of natural law, but gives us good reason to challenge the marginalization of it in contemporary moral philosophy. The object of this short essay has been to present Jacques Maritain's account of natural law. For Maritain, the 'natural law' is "an order or a disposition that the human reason can discover and according to which the human will must act in order to be in accord with the essential and necessary ends of the human being. "Such an account proposes not only a description of human behaviour, but a standard of moral action and a foundation for human rights . Maritain's adopts the view that this law is not only related to human nature, but is known naturally. He believes that, given his arguments concerning the metaphysical and epistemological dimensions, we have a historically sensitive version of a natural law theory that accords with human experience, that bridges the is / ought gap, and that explains how differences in moral knowledge do not count against a natural law view. If we take this approach-an approach that Maritain believes is rooted in St Thomas-Maritain believes that one can respond to at least some of the major criticisms of natural law theory. There is, of course, more to a natural law theory than an account of its metaphysical and epistemological dimensions. Clearly, more needs to be said concerning its relation to other kinds of law . We also need to specify what exactly we know of natural law. And it is also important to see how Maritain's account compares with other natural law theories , especially the 'rationalist' accounts that were popular in the eighteenth century. Nevertheless, it is clear from the discussion throughout this essay that Maritain's theory is not one that one should hastily reject-and that it should be included among the major moral theories of today. (shrink)

This chapter addresses Augustine’s solution to the perplexity that plagued him in his earlier years—how can evil exist in a world created by an omniscient, omnipotent, perfectly good God? In Confessions 7 he gives his reasons for rejecting Manichaean dualism. Book 13 emphasizes the doctrine of creation ex nihilo, with its entailment that everything that exists is good. But not all creatures are equally good. Augustine regards sin as the willful abandonment of greater goods for lesser ones, when the (...) abandonment is contrary to God’s commands. The chapter concludes with a brief discussion of Augustine’s handling of two spectacular cases of sin, the devil’s defection from God and Adam and Eve’s fall. (shrink)

When laws or legal principles mention mental states such as intentions to form a contract, knowledge of risk, or purposely causing a death, what parts of the brain are they speaking about? We argue here that these principles are tacitly directed at our prefrontal executive processes. Our current best theories of consciousness portray it as a workspace in which executive processes operate, but what is important to the law is what is done with the workspace content rather than the content (...) itself. This makes executive processes more important to the law than consciousness, since they are responsible for channeling conscious decision-making into intentions and actions, or inhibiting action.We provide a summary of the current state of our knowledge about executive processes, which consists primarily of information about which portions of the prefrontal lobes perform which executive processes. Then we describe several examples in which legal principles can be understood as tacitly singling out executive processes, including principles regarding defendants’ intentions or plans to commit crimes and their awareness that certain facts are the case, as well as excusatory principles which result in lesser responsibility for those who are juveniles, mentally ill, sleepwalking, hypnotized, or who suffer from psychopathy. (shrink)

Ludwig Wittgenstein concludes his Tractatus with the injunction, "What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence." As the concluding proposition of a tersely written, tightly organized work, the reader would expect it to have a strong bite. Yet the statement has been variously ignored, dismissed, and misunderstood, interpreted as the inspired words of a mystic or as the final banishing of metaphysics from philosophical discourse. It is with the help of Janik and Toulmin’s work that it becomes (...) clear how the proposition serves as the crown to a book which Wittgenstein maintained was primarily an ethical work. In presenting the Viennese Weltanshauung of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, there emerges the picture of a society where appearances ruled in all areas of cultural life, in the government, and in the arts. Viennese society was characterized by a vast impotent bureaucracy, the Strauss waltz, and the feutillion. The leader in the inevitable reaction was Karl Kraus. He instigated a critique of Viennese society through an ingenious and refined use of cultural modes of expression. Along with him, leaders emerged for each of the special arts, language, music, architecture, painting, sculpture, who, in their own particular role, tried to restore truth and responsibility to the affairs of men. The development of the characters and the issues involved make this book important. Of lesser value, unfortunately, are the chapters dealing specifically with the work of Wittgenstein, who is represented as one of the emergent leaders. Although we are rhetorically persuaded that his talk of "simples," "representation," "depicting," or "language games" is tied up with the critique of a fundamentally sophistical intellectualism, we are not led on to seeing how the critique was carried out.—W. A. F. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:William Righter GOLDEN RULES AND GOLDEN BOWLS In one of his last interviews Michel Foucault remarked on the relation of any search for a perfect existence to the source of those forms of obligation which paradoxically make it possible, and hence on the variable shapes of the interdependence of the beauty of life with the moral understanding by which we accept the nature of our obligations. He sees (...) this in terms of the way these obligations establish themselves, by recognition and submission, by what he calls "the mode of subjection {mode d'assujettissement), that is, the way in which people are invited or incited to recognize their moral obligations. Is it, for instance, divine law, which has been revealed in a text? Is it a natural law, a cosmological order, in each case the same for every living being? Is it a rational rule? Is it the attempt to give your existence the most beautiful form possible?"' If we wish to do something like finding the most beautiful form of life, we face problems of moral calculation, we must formulate principles of choice, and above all learn to make our submission to the necessity such principles may imply. "What is the mode d'assujettissementT'' Foucault asks: It is that we have to build our existence as a beautiful existence; it is an aesthetic mode. You see, what I have tried to show is that nobody is obliged in classical ethics to behave in such a way as to be truthful to their wives, to not touch boys and so on. But if they want to have a beautiful existence, if they want to have a good reputation, if they want to be able to rule others, they have to do that. So they accept those obligations in a conscious way for the beauty or glory of existence. The choice, the aesthetic choice or political choice, for which they"decide to accept this 262 WtLLiAM Righter263 kind ofexistence—that's the mode d'assujettissement. It's a choice, a personal choice.2 At some levels this choice looks quite simply like a calculative sacrifice of the lesser thing for the greater. But an important element of the incommensurate enters into the choice. The beauty, the glory of the thing far surpasses the small normative commitments one undertakes for its sake, both in degree and in belonging to another and superior order. The beautiful form of existence is separated by some enormous gulffrom those social and human arrangements that must be submitted to it. Yet one is aware of basing the beauty of life on these lesser forms of obligation. Many things may be subjected, as one sees in The Golden Bowl, to the greater principle, where almost anything may be sacrificed as long as the beauty of that principle is in view. But how do we assess this disproportion and see the propriety of subjection established? For subjection could come to serve many principles, and in The Golden Bowl we shall observe the studied operation of subjection in a world where principles are continuously and meticulously examined and re-examined. The Foucaultian conjunction of obligation and the "glory of existence" touches the heart of a work where the fascination with the incommensurate moves uneasily between alternative versions of that glory. What is the overriding principle that underwrites and legitimates such anexistence?James's involvementwith such a "particular attaching case" seems to proceed from the fullest sense of the difficulty, from the fullest rendering of incompatible versions ofthat existence, brought into the closest and tightest formalbond. The very simplicity of the action somehow produces an enforced contemplation of a bizarrely closed world, in which the dynamics of the two marriages shape a conflict that seems inevitable, even strangely natural. It can be expressed in a few words. A widowed American millionaire, Adam Verver, has in his late forties retired to the life of a collector of objects of art. In his travels with his daughter Maggie, they collect also ahusband forher, a Roman prince. To ease the consequences for her father Maggie promotes his marriage to her closest school friend Charlotte. Unknown to the Ververs she and the Prince were once lovers... (shrink)

This chapter explores the concept of knowing as a contested terrain within the education. It takes, as its starting point, the classical philosophical distinction between knowing how, knowing that and the lesser-attended-to notion of knowing by acquaintance. Charting key historical debates pertaining to knowing that and knowing how, the chapter considers the extent to which conceptions of these forms of knowing evident in educational policy and practice are often limited and reductive. The chapter then explores how contemporary work within (...) the philosophy of education has served to challenge too-stringent conceptions of propositional and practical knowledge – often by reference to the Aristotelian conception of phronesis. With a view to building on this literature and taking it in a new direction, the chapter ends by exploring what might need to be at stake in a richer conception of knowledge for education. In connection with this, it offers a sketch of a renewed account of knowing by acquaintance, developed in relation to the phenomenological philosophy of Martin Heidegger. (shrink)

This article leverages insights from the body of Adam Smith’s work, including two lesser-known manuscripts—the Theory of Moral Sentiments and Lectures in Jurisprudence —to help answer the question as to how companies should morally prioritize corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives and stakeholder claims. Smith makes philosophical distinctions between justice and beneficence and perfect and imperfect rights, and we leverage those distinctions to speak to contemporary CSR and stakeholder management theories. We address the often-neglected question as to how far a (...) company should be expected to go in pursuit of CSR initiatives and we offer a fresh perspective as to the role of business in relation to stakeholders and to society as a whole. Smith’s moral insights help us to propose a practical framework of legitimacy in stakeholder claims that can help managers select appropriate and responsible CSR activities. (shrink)

Previous studies on economic convergence have been handicapped by the lack of sufficient serial data. Real GDP per capita are now available for 56 states. With some interpolation, we create series from 1870 to 1992 for Northern (developed countries) and Southern (lesser developed countries) aggregates. The data are explored by extending the leadership-long cycle perspective to deal with convergence. We find that NorthSouth gap. We believe that convergence is unlikely any time soon without radical restructuring of global economic growth (...) prospects. (shrink)

This is a study of Roman adaptations of Stoic doctrine that seeks to portray a model of the self functioning as a mediator between philosophical and traditional values (1). The author’s aim is ‘to let the Roman Stoics’ self arise out of a comprehensive analysis of their extant philosophical work and to conduct that analysis from the vantage point of the specific question of social embeddedness. Such an approach yields a Stoic self that is constituted by the encounter between challenges (...) and normative expectations’ (2). Overall, this aim is met. The Roman Stoics referred to are Seneca, Musonius Rufus, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and to a lesser extent Hierocles, who ‘all had to come to terms with the sociopolitical challenges of imperial Rome’ (3). The tame thesis advanced is that the doctrine of these Roman Stoics ‘shows a distinctive pattern of emphasizing social responsibility’ (3). This social responsibility includes commitments to the political community, marriage, and parenthood. (shrink)

Many current theories of human rights are flawed in that they fail to recognise differences between fundamental human rights and others of lesser significance. If some rights are superior to others than it is possible to formulate a hierarchy of rights, and rules to resolve potential conflicts of rights. Only by self-examination can we determine what is personally significant in how we live meaningful and directed lives. This in turn aids in defining social values and determining the rights individuals (...) should reasonably expect to be provided by society. (shrink)

PurposeTo use the power of knowledge acquisition and machine learning in the development of a collaborative computer classification system based on the features of age-related macular degeneration (AMD).MethodsA vocabulary was acquired from four AMD experts who examined 100 ophthalmoscopic images. The vocabulary was analyzed, hierarchically structured, and incorporated into a collaborative computer classification system called IDOCS. Using this system, three of the experts examined images from a second set of digital images compiled from more than 1000 patients with AMD. Images (...) were annotated, and features were identified and defined. Decision trees, a machine learning method, were trained on the data collected and used to extract patterns. Interrelationships between the data from the different clinicians were investigated.ResultsSix drusen classes in the structured vocabulary were largely sufficient to describe all the identified features. The decision trees classified the data with 76.86% to 88.5% accuracy and distilled patterns in the form of hierarchical trees composed of 5 to 15 nodes. Experts were largely consistent in their characterization of soft, and to a lesser extent, hard drusen, but diverge in definition of other drusen. Size and crystalline morphology were the main determinants of drusen type across all experts.ConclusionsMachine learning is a powerful tool for the characterization of disease phenotypes. The creation of a defined feature set for AMD will facilitate the development of an IDOCS-based classification system. (shrink)

William Wood’s study, Blaise Pascal on duplicity, sin, and the fall, is an in-depth exploration of Pascal’s views of sin, human fallenness, and self-deception. While Wood is a tutorial fellow in Theology at Oriel College, Oxford University, his book engages work in analytic philosophy, as well as historical theology. Concisely put, according to Pascal, sin is a kind of idolatry, with some created thing replacing God as the sinner’s highest good. This replacement involves a turning away from the truth, (...) as God is the source of truth or even identical with it. As sin involves choosing a lesser good over the greatest good, it involves self-deception on the part of the sinner. One deceives herself in choosing the lessor good, and so sin is a fall into duplicity and an on-going adoption of a false self-image. Presenting this false self-image to others, one deceives other people and even oneself. As Woods puts it:... having spontaneously imagined a false, but alluring, interpretation of his m .. (shrink)

The two books make a notable contribution in drawing together many of the philosophical problems about time, and the associated literature. The expositions are also valuable for their interdisciplinary strengths, especially in the history and philosophy of science and (to a lesser extent) in theology, and for the clarity and thoroughness of Craig's approach. However, the two books do not present, as might at first appear, a side by side exposition of the respective strengths and weaknesses of the A-series (...) and the B-series views of time. They are, rather, one interconnected defence of the A-series view. Some of the strengths and weaknesses of Craig's exposition and defence of the A-series view are noted. (shrink)

Alnwick distances himself from Scotus, as he appears in Lectura Oxoniensis and the commentary on Metaphysics, though the natural propensity of the will is affirmed in q. 9 d. 49 of Book Four of Reportata Parisiensia. However, this question could be spurious, or else more susceptible to the Parisian influence of teaching of Henry of Ghent, with whom Alnwick aligns himself when he sanctions without any doubt the fact that man desires to pass from a lesser good, guaranteed by (...) philosophical speculation of an Aristotelian- Averroist matrix, to a supreme good, which coincides with the clear vision of divine essence, because man knows that essence both naturaliter and supernaturaliter. Alnwick tenaciously debates natural knowledge in the prologue to the Commentary on the Sentences, thanks to the use of discursus, which serves to set up a chain of syllogistic deductions in order to arrive at quidditative concepts of divinity in both an affirmative and negative sense. These concepts assure the wayfarer a general k... (shrink)

The two books make a notable contribution in drawing together many of the philosophical problems about time, and the associated literature. The expositions are also valuable for their interdisciplinary strengths, especially in the history and philosophy of science and (to a lesser extent) in theology, and for the clarity and thoroughness of Craig's approach. However, the two books do not present, as might at first appear, a side by side exposition of the respective strengths and weaknesses of the A-series (...) and the B-series views of time. They are, rather, one interconnected defence of the A-series view. Some of the strengths and weaknesses of Craig's exposition and defence of the A-series view are noted. (shrink)

We consider the question: under what circumstances can the concept of adaptation be applied to groups, rather than individuals? Gardner and Grafen (2009, J. Evol. Biol.22: 659–671) develop a novel approach to this question, building on Grafen's ‘formal Darwinism’ project, which defines adaptation in terms of links between evolutionary dynamics and optimization. They conclude that only clonal groups, and to a lesser extent groups in which reproductive competition is repressed, can be considered as adaptive units. We re-examine the conditions (...) under which the selection–optimization links hold at the group level. We focus on an important distinction between two ways of understanding the links, which have different implications regarding group adaptationism. We show how the formal Darwinism approach can be reconciled with G.C. Williams’ famous analysis of group adaptation, and we consider the relationships between group adaptation, the Price equation approach to multi-level selection, and the alternative approach based on contextual analysis. (shrink)

The use of multiple means of determination to “triangulate” on the existence and character of a common phenomenon, object, or result has had a long tradition in science but has seldom been a matter of primary focus. As with many traditions, it is traceable to Aristotle, who valued having multiple explanations of a phenomenon, and it may also be involved in his distinction between special objects of sense and common sensibles. It is implicit though not emphasized in the distinction between (...) primary and secondary qualities from Galileo onward. It is arguably one of several conceptions involved in Whewell’s method of the “consilience of inductions” (Laudan 1971) and is to be found in several places in Peirce. (From M. Brewer and B. Collins, eds., (1981); Scientific Inquiry in the Social Sciences (a festschrift for Donald T. Campbell), San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, pp. 123–162.). (shrink)

Willard van Orman Quine once said that he had a preference for a desert ontology. This was in an earlier day when concerns with logical structure and ontological simplicity reigned supreme. Ontological genocide was practiced upon whole classes of upper-level or ‘derivative’ entities in the name of elegance, and we were secure in the belief that one strayed irremediably into the realm of conceptual confusion and possible error the further one got from ontic fundamentalism. In those days, one paid more (...) attention to generic worries about possible errors than to actual errors derived from distancing oneself too far from the nitty-gritty details of actual theory, actual inferences from actual data, the actual conditions under which we posited and detected entities, calibrated and ‘burned in’ instruments, identified and rejected artifacts, debugged programs and procedures, explained the mechanisms behind regularities, judged correlations to be spurious, and in general, to the real complexities and richness of actual scientific practice. (shrink)

Two widely accepted assumptions within cognitive science are that (1) the goal is to understand the mechanisms responsible for cognitive performances and (2) computational modeling is a major tool for understanding these mechanisms. The particular approaches to computational modeling adopted in cognitive science, moreover, have significantly affected the way in which cognitive mechanisms are understood. Unable to employ some of the more common methods for conducting research on mechanisms, cognitive scientists’ guiding ideas about mechanism have developed in conjunction with their (...) styles of modeling. In particular, mental operations often are conceptualized as comparable to the processes employed in classical symbolic AI or neural network models. These models, in turn, have been interpreted by some as themselves intelligent systems since they employ the same type of operations as does the mind. For this paper, what is significant about these approaches to modeling is that they are constructed specifically to account for behavior and are evaluated by how well they do so—not by independent evidence that they describe actual operations in mental mechanisms. (shrink)

This article reports the findings of a survey examining if there are gender and career stage differences between male and female practitioners regarding ethical judgment. The results show that, on average, females adopted a more strict ethical stance than their male counterparts on 7 out of 19 vignettes. Males on the other hand, demonstrated a more ethical stance than their female counterparts on 2 out of 19 vignettes. The results furthermore indicate there is a significant difference in ethical judgment across (...) career stages. Overall, it appears that practitioners in later career stages display higher ethical judgment than practitoners in lower career stages. Implications are provided for both practitioners and academicians. (shrink)

In this engaging book, Douglas Anderson begins with the assumption that philosophy—the Greek love of wisdom—is alive and well in American culture. At the same time, professional philosophy remains relatively invisible. Anderson traverses American life to find places in the wider culture where professional philosophy in the distinctively American tradition can strike up a conversation. How might American philosophers talk to us about our religious experience, or political engagement, or literature—or even, popular music? Anderson’s second aim is to find places (...) where philosophy happens in nonprofessional guises—cultural places such as country music, rock’n roll, and Beat literature. He not only enlarges the tradition of American philosophers such as John Dewey and William James by examining lesser-known figures such as Henry Bugbee and Thomas Davidson, but finds the theme and ideas of American philosophy in some unexpected places, such as the music of Hank Williams, Tammy Wynette, and Bruce Springsteen, and the writingsof Jack Kerouac.The idea of “philosophy Americana” trades on the emergent genre of “music Americana,” rooted in traditional themes and styles yet engaging our present experiences. The music is “popular” but not thoroughly driven by economic considerations, and Anderson seeks out an analogous role for philosophical practice, where philosophy and popular culture are co-adventurers in the life of ideas. Philosophy Americana takes seriously Emerson’s quest for the extraordinary in the ordinary and James’s belief that popular philosophy can still be philosophy. (shrink)

_An ambitious new history of philosophy in English that broadens the canon to include many lesser-known figures__ “[This] lively chronicle of philosophy in English is a splendid accomplishment sufficient unto itself. Highly intelligent, always even-handed, quietly but consistently witty, _Witcraft _is an excellent guide along the twisted and tricky path of human thought.”—___Wall Street Journal__ Ludwig Wittgenstein once wrote that “philosophy should be written like poetry.” But philosophy has often been presented more prosaically as a long trudge through canonical (...) authors and great works. But what, Jonathan Rée asks, if we instead saw the history of philosophy as a haphazard series of unmapped forest paths, a mass of individual stories showing endurance, inventiveness, bewilderment, anxiety, impatience, and good humor? Here, Jonathan Rée brilliantly retells this history, covering such figures as Descartes, Locke, Kant, Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, Mill, James, Frege, Wittgenstein, and Sartre. But he also includes authors not usually associated with philosophy, such as William Hazlitt, George Eliot, Darwin, and W. H. Auden. Above all, he uncovers dozens of unremembered figures—puritans, revolutionaries, pantheists, feminists, nihilists, socialists, and scientists—who were passionate and active readers of philosophy, and often authors themselves. Breaking away from high-altitude narratives, he shows how philosophy finds its way into ordinary lives, enriching and transforming them in unexpected ways. (shrink)

The last two decades have seen two significant trends emerging within the philosophy of science: the rapid development and focus on the philosophy of the specialised sciences, and a resurgence of Aristotelian metaphysics, much of which is concerned with the possibility of emergence, as well as the ontological status and indispensability of dispositions and powers in science. Despite these recent trends, few Aristotelian metaphysicians have engaged directly with the philosophy of the specialised sciences. Additionally, the relationship between fundamental Aristotelian concepts—such (...) as "hylomorphism", "substance", and "faculties"—and contemporary science has yet to receive a critical and systematic treatment. _Neo-Aristotelian Perspectives on Contemporary Science _aims to fill this gap in the literature by bringing together essays on the relationship between Aristotelianism and science that cut across interdisciplinary boundaries. The chapters in this volume are divided into two main sections covering the philosophy of physics and the philosophy of the life sciences. Featuring original contributions from distinguished and early-career scholars, this book will be of interest to specialists in analytical metaphysics and the philosophy of science. (shrink)

Although philosophy has been only a minor contributor to cognitive science to date, this paper describes two projects in naturalistic philosophy of mind and one in naturalistic philosophy of science that have been pursued during the past 30 years and that can make theoretical and methodological contributions to cognitive science. First, stances on the mind–body problem (identity theory, functionalism, and heuristic identity theory) are relevant to cognitive science as it negotiates its relation to neuroscience and cognitive neuroscience. Second, analyses of (...) mental representations address both their vehicles and their contents; new approaches to characterizing how representations have content are particularly relevant to understanding the relation of cognitive agents to their environments. Third, the recently formulated accounts of mechanistic explanation in philosophy of science both provide perspective on the explanatory project of cognitive science and may offer normative guidance to cognitive science (e.g., by providing perspective on how multiple disciplinary perspectives can be integrated in understanding a given mechanism). (shrink)