Des « libertés» proclamées en 1789 à la loi sur la librairie de 1810, les dynamiques qui traversent le monde de l'imprimé constituent encore un des objets les plus originaux pour renouveler l'histoire des savoirs d'une période révolutionnaire riche en bouleversements institutionnels et en mutations épistémologiques. Dans la perspective d'une histoire sociale des savoirs, l'analyse des actions construites par et dans l'imprimé permet de préciser la compréhension des transformations sociales, institutionnelles et théoriques qui caractérisent cette période. Alors que le chantier (...) reste encore largement ouvert, il s'agit de présenter ici quelques jalons d'une analyse visant à replacer l'imprimé au coeur des interrogations sur les mutations des sociabilités, des identités et des productions intellectuelles en Révolution. (shrink)

Few philosophers or theologians exerted as much influence on the shape of medieval thought as Thomas Aquinas. He ranks amongst the most famous of the Western philosophers and was responsible for almost single-handedly bringing the philosophy of Aristotle into harmony with Christianity. He was also one of the first philosophers to argue that philosophy and theology could support each other. The shape of metaphysics, theology, and Aristotelian thought today still bears the imprint of Aquinas' work. In this extensive and deeply (...) researched study, Eleonore Stump examines Aquinas' major works, _Summa Theologiae _and _Summa Contra Gentiles, _and clearly assesses the vast range of Aquinas' thought. Philosophers, theologians, and students of the medieval period alike will find this unrivalled study an indispensable resource in researching and teaching Aquinas. (shrink)

This paper considers briefly the approach to the problem of evil by Alvin Plantinga, Richard Swinburne, and John Hick and argues that none of these approaches is entirely satisfactory. The paper then develops a different strategy for dealing with the problem of evil by expounding and taking seriously three Christian claims relevant to the problem: Adam fell; natural evil entered the world as a result of Adam's fall; and after death human beings go either to heaven or hell. Properly interpreted, (...) these claims form the basis for a consistent and coherent Christian solution to the problem of evil. (shrink)

Social stimuli grab our attention: we attend to them in an automatic and bottom-up manner, and ascribe them a higher degree of saliency compared to non-social stimuli. However, it has rarely been investigated how variations in attention affect the processing of social stimuli, although the answer could help us uncover details of social cognition processes such as action understanding. In the present study, we examined how changes to bottom-up attention affects neural EEG-responses associated with intentional action processing. We induced an (...) increase in bottom-up attention by using hypnosis. We recorded the electroencephalographic µ-wave suppression of hypnotized participants when presented with intentional actions in first and third person perspective in a video-clip paradigm. Previous studies have shown that the µ-rhythm is selectively suppressed both when executing and observing goal-directed motor actions; hence it can be used as a neural signal for intentional action processing. Our results show that neutral hypnotic trance increases µ-suppression in highly suggestible participants when they observe intentional actions. This suggests that social action processing is enhanced when bottom-up attentional processes are predominant. Our findings support the Social Relevance Hypothesis, according to which social action processing is a bottom-up driven attentional process, and can thus be altered as a function of bottom-up processing devoted to a social stimulus. (shrink)

This work argues that Christ's atonement disarms human resistance to God's love and so brings about acceptance of divine forgiveness.

Aquinas is sometimes taken to hold a foundationalist theory of knowledge. So, for example, Nicholas Wolterstorff says, “Foundationalism has been the reigning theory of theories in the West since the high Middle Ages. It can be traced back as far as Aristotle, and since the Middle Ages vast amounts of philosophical thought have been devoted to elaborating and defending it‥ ‥ Aquinas offers one classic version of foundationalism.” And Alvin Plantinga says, “we can get a better understanding of Aquinas … (...) if we see [him] as accepting some version of classical foundationalism. This is a picture or total way of looking at faith, knowledge, justified belief, rationality, and allied topics. This picture has been enormously popular in Western thought; and despite a substantial opposing ground-swell, I think it remains the dominant way of thinking about these topics.”. (shrink)

The ways in which the decisions we make for others differ from the ones we make for ourselves has received much attention in the literature, although less is known about their relationship to our p...

Psychological essentialism is the hypothesis that humans represent some categories as having an underlying essence that unifies members of a category and is causally responsible for their typical attributes and behaviors. Throughout the past several decades, psychological essentialism has emerged as an extremely active area of research in cognitive science. More recently, it has also attracted attention from philosophers, who put the empirical results to use in many different philosophical areas, ranging from philosophy of mind and cognitive science to social (...) philosophy. This article aims to give philosophers who are new to the topic an overview of the key empirical findings surrounding psychological essentialism, and some of the ways the hypothesis and its related findings have been discussed, extended, and applied in philosophical research. (shrink)

In this paper, I develop an essentialist model of the semantics of slurs. I defend the view that slurs are a species of kind terms: Slur concepts encode mini-theories which represent an essence-like element that is causally connected to a set of negatively-valenced stereotypical features of a social group. The truth-conditional contribution of slur nouns can then be captured by the following schema: For a given slur S of a social group G and a person P, S is true of (...) P iff P bears the “essence” of G—whatever this essence is—which is causally responsible for stereotypical negative features associated with G and predicted of P. Since there is no essence that is causally responsible for stereotypical negative features of a social group, slurs have null-extension, and consequently, many sentences containing them are either meaningless or false. After giving a detailed outline of my theory, I show that it receives strong linguistic support. In particular, it can account for a wide range of linguistic cases that are regarded as challenging, central data for any theory of slurs. Finally, I show that my theory also receives convergent support from cognitive psychology and psycholinguistics. (shrink)

According to an influential research program in cognitive science, philosophy, and linguistics, there is a deep, special connection between generics and pernicious aspects of social cognition such as stereotyping. Specifically, generics are thought to exacerbate our propensity to essentialize, lead us to overgeneralize based on scarce evidence, and lead to other epistemically dubious patterns of inference. Recently, however, several studies have put empirical and theoretical pressure on some of the main tenets of this research program. The goal of this paper (...) is to bring these results together in a comprehensive narrative and systematically evaluate their impact on the hypothesis that generics have a uniquely problematic effect on our social and cognitive capacities. (shrink)

Introduction Since my work in medieval logic has concentrated on dialectic. I have tried to trace scholastic treatments of dialectic to discussions of it in ...

In the event that a patient has lost their decision-making capacity due to illness or injury, a surrogate is often appointed to do so on their behalf. Research has shown that people take less risk when making treatment decisions for other people than they do for themselves. This has been discussed as surrogates employing greater caution for others given the accountability they are faced with. We tested the prediction that making accountability salient reduces risk- taking for others relative to the (...) self by manipulating the information shown to participants while they made treatment choices. One group was asked to focus on the consequences for the recipient’s family, another on the legal implications of their decisions, and another was not given additional information. Participants reduced their risk-taking for others compared to themselves, irrespective of the condition they were in. Although participants in each condition reported thinking about these factors to different extents, there were no clear differences in risk-taking between groups. However, we did find that, across all participants, thinking about legal consequences reduces risk-taking. We suggest that future research investigates how the effect of thinking about accountability on surrogate choices is mediated by feelings of accountability, in order to further examine the explanations suggested in the literature. (shrink)

This new Companion to Aquinas features entirely new chapters written by internationally recognized experts in the field. It shows the power of Aquinas's philosophical thought and transmits the worldview which he inherited, developed, altered, and argued for, while at the same time revealing to contemporary philosophers the strong connections which there are between Aquinas's interests and views and their own. Its five sections cover the life and works of Aquinas; his metaphysics, including his understanding of the ultimate foundations of reality; (...) his metaethics and ethics, including his virtue ethics; his account of human nature; his theory of the afterlife; his epistemology and his theory of the intellectual virtues; his view of the nature of free will and the relation of grace to free will; and finally some key components of his philosophical theology, including the incarnation and atonement, Christology, and the nature of original sin. (shrink)

The objective of this paper is to show that pornography dehumanizes women through essentialization. First, I argue that certain acts of subject-essentialization are acts of subject-dehumanization. Second, I demonstrate, by reviewing evidence about the linguistic material that we find in and around pornography, that pornography systematically deploys content that essentializes women in the ways identified as problematic. It follows that pornography dehumanizes women.

Wandering in Darkness reconciles the existence of an omniscient, omnipotent, perfectly good God with suffering in the world. Eleanore Stump presents the moral psychology and value theory within which the theodicy of Thomas Aquinas is embedded. She explicates Aquinas's account of the good for human beings, including the nature of love and union among persons, and then argues that some philosophical problems are best considered in the context of narratives. In the context of famous biblical stories and against the backdrop (...) of Aquinas's other views, Stump argues that Aquinas's theodicy gives a powerful explanation for God's allowing suffering. This explanation constitutes a consistent and cogent defense for the problem of suffering. (shrink)

How feasible are conceptual engineering projects of social concepts that aim for the engineered concept to be deployed in people's ordinary conceptual practices? Predominant frameworks on the psychology of concepts that shape work on stereotyping, bias, and machine learning have grim implications for the prospects of conceptual engineers: conceptual engineering efforts are ineffective in promoting certain social‐conceptual changes. Since conceptual components that give rise to problematic social stereotypes are sensitive to statistical structures of the environment, purely conceptual change won't be (...) possible without corresponding world change. This tradition, however, tends to ignore that concepts don't only encode statistical, but also causal information. Paying attention to this feature of concepts, I argue, shows that conceptual engineering is not only possible. There is an imperative to conceptually‐engineer. (shrink)

In two recent papers, Rose and Nichols present evidence in favor of the view that humans represent category essences in terms of a telos, such as honey-making, and not in terms of scientific essences, such as bee DNA. In this paper, I challenge their interpretation of the evidence, and show that it is directly predicted by the main theory they seek to undermine. I argue that their results can be explained as instances of diagnostic reasoning about scientific essences.

Why do children learn language more easily than adults do? This puzzle has fascinated cognitive and language scientists for decades. In the present letter, we approach the language learning puzzle from a cognitive perspective that is inspired by evidence from the perceptual and motor learning literature. Neuroscientific studies show that two memory systems in the brain are involved in human learning: an early implicit procedural memory system and a late-developing cognitive or declarative memory system. We argue that higher cognitive development (...) constrains implicit statistical learning processes that are essential for learning patterns and regularities in languages, that is, the adult cognitive architecture has a cost. This is supported by experimental evidence showing that acquisition of implicit linguistic knowledge is enhanced under cognitive depletion in adults. More research is needed to test the cognitive cost hypothesis as it could partly solve the language learning puzzle. (shrink)

Some defenders of the principle of alternative possibilities (PAP) have responded to the challenge of Frankfurt-style counterexamples (FSCs) to PAP by arguing that there remains a flicker of freedom -- that is, an alternative possibility for action -- left to the agent in FSCs. I argue that the flicker of freedom strategy is unsuccessful. The strategy requires the supposition that doing an act-on-one''s-own is itself an action of sorts. I argue that either this supposition is confused and leads to counter-intuitive (...) results; or, if the supposition is acceptable, then it is possible to use it to construct a FSC in which there is no flicker of freedom at all. Either way, the flicker of freedom strategy is ineffective against FSCs. Since the flicker of freedom strategy is arguably the best defense of PAP, I conclude that FSCs are successful in showing that PAP is false. An agent can act with moral responsibility without having alternative possibilities available to her. (shrink)

Although Thomistic philosophy has often been equaled to a Christianized Aristotelianism, Eleonore Stump weakens this common conception through the unraveling of the notions of virtue and passion within the Thomistic ethics, and comparing these with their Aristotelian counterparts.The exposition of the Thomistic theory of virtue serves as a starting point to the development of the classification of the passions that Thomas Aquinas presents. Given their different cultures, one pagan and the other Christian, Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas construct two different theoretical (...) apparatus, dependant on their own fundamental final realities: non-personal metaphysics for the former, and Trinity for the latter. In the case of Aquinas, the perfection of virtues and the passions do not only depend on rationality, but God plays a main role in this respect. (shrink)

It is hard to overestimate the importance of the work of Augustine of Hippo, both in his own period and in the subsequent history of Western philosophy. Until the thirteenth century, when he may have had a competitor in Thomas Aquinas, he was the most important philosopher of the medieval period. Many of his views, including his theory of the just war, his account of time and eternity, his understanding of the will, his attempted resolution of the problem of evil, (...) and his approach to the relation of faith and reason, have continued to be influential up to the present time. In this 2001 volume of specially-commissioned essays, sixteen scholars provide a wide-ranging and stimulating contribution to our understanding of Augustine, covering all the major areas of his philosophy and theology. (shrink)

L’écriture n’est pas mon médium privilégié. Ma « médiumnité » suit d’autres logiques, celles du poème vidéosonique dans lequel l’image percute le son et vice-versa à la manière d’un cri ou d’un silence qui peut mener à la stupéfaction. Ici, je livre troubles et fulgurances suite à la disparition d’une personne exceptionnelle, Dominique Malaquais.

Car sickness is a major concern for car passengers, and with the development of autonomous vehicles, increasing numbers of car occupants are likely to be affected. Previous laboratory studies have used EEG measurements to better understand the cerebral changes linked to symptoms. However, the dynamics of motion in labs/simulators differ from those of a real car. This study sought to identify specific cerebral changes associated with the level of car sickness experienced in real driving conditions. Nine healthy volunteers participated as (...) front passengers in a slalom session inducing lateral movements at very low frequency. They were continuously monitored via EEG recordings and subjectively rated their level of symptoms after each slalom, using a 5-point likert scale. Car-sickness symptoms evolved concomitantly with changes in theta and alpha power in the occipital and parietal areas. These changes may reflect altered sensory integration, as well as a possible influence of sleepiness mitigating symptoms. (shrink)

In a preceding issue of Faith and Philosophy Stewart Goetz criticized a paper of mine in which I try to show that libertarians need not be committed to the principle of alternative possibilities (PAP) and that Frankfurt-style counterexamples to PAP are no threat to libertarianism. In my view, the main problem with Goetz’s arguments is that Goetz does not properly understand my position. In this paper, I respond to Goetz by summarizing my position in as plain a way as possible. (...) Goetz’s charge against my position has two parts, first, that it isn’t libertarian and, second, that it provides no good reason for libertarians to abandon PAP. This paper briefly presents my answers to these two parts of Goetz’s charge. (shrink)

The aim of the paper is to discern between philosophy and theology. A philosopher is looking after impersonal wisdom, a theologian searches for a personal God. This differentiation is fundamental because knowledge of persons differs from knowledge that. The author shows how taking into account the fact that theology is based on the second-person knowledge changes the way one should approach the hiddenness argument.

The understanding of God’s mode of existence as eternal makes a significant difference to a variety of issues in contemporary philosophy of religion, including, for instance, the apparent incompatibility of divine omniscience with human freedom. But the concept has come under attack in current philosophical discussion as inefficacious to solve the philosophical puzzles for which it seems so promising. Although Boethius in the early 6th century thought that the concept could resolve the apparent incompatibility between divine foreknowledge and human free (...) will, some contemporary philosophers, such as William Hasker, have argued that whatever help the concept of eternity may give with that puzzle is more than vitiated by the religiously pernicious implications of the concept for notions of God’s providence and action in time. In this paper, I will examine and respond to Hasker’s arguments against the doctrine of God’s eternity. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: The Concept and Difficulties Associated with It The History of the Concept Applications of the Concept to Issues in the Philosophy of Religion Works cited.