The Mississippi River flows through American history and culture as a mythic waterway brimming with tragedy and hope, and awash in passionate ambitions and harsh realities. In 1953, a young Charles Dee Sharp traveled twice down the Mississippi to make a documentary film of it, taking black-and-white photographs of the river, its communities, and its people. While Sharp’s documentary never came to fruition, the striking images he captured survived as moving and evocative historical testaments to a lost (...) era, now collected in his new book The Mississippi in 1953. These images create a vivid portrait of America’s heartland a half century ago, and they are enriched with excerpts from Sharp’s original trip journal, intriguing anecdotes from the people he encountered along his journey, and an engaging environmental history of the river by historian John O. Anfinson. The Mississippi in 1953 offers an original and poignant look at the living artery of the American landscape and how it molded the United States into the nation it is today. (shrink)

Studies in philosophy: I. Tufts, J.H. On moral evolution. II. Willcos, W.F. The expansion of Europe in its influence upon population. III. Woods, R.A. Democracy a new unfolding of human power. IV. Sharp, F.C. An analysis of the moral judgment. V. Woodbridge, F.J.E. The problem of consciousness. VI. Norton, E.L. The intellectual element in music. VII. Raub, W.L. Pragmatism and Kantianism. VIII. Lyman, E.W. The influence of pragmatism upon the status of theology.--Studies in psychology: IX. Delabarre, E.B. Influence of (...) surrounding objects on the apparent direction of a line. X. Swift, E.J. Beginning a language; a contribution to the psychology of learning. XI. Pierce, A.H. An appeal from the prevailing doctrine of a detached subconsciousness. XII. Woodworth, R.S. The cause of a voluntary movement. XIII. Burnett, C.T. An experimental test of the classical theory of volition. (shrink)

'Most of us are still groping for answers about what makes life worth living, or what confers meaning on individual lives', writes Charles Taylor in Sources of the Self. 'This is an essentially modern predicament.' Charles Taylor's latest book sets out to define the modern identity by tracing its genesis, analysing the writings of such thinkers as Augustine, Descartes, Montaigne, Luther, and many others. This then serves as a starting point for a renewed understanding of modernity. Taylor argues (...) that modern subjectivity has its roots in ideas of human good, and is in fact the result of our long efforts to define and attain the good. The modern turn inwards is far from being a disastrous rejection of rationality, as its critics contend, but has at its heart what Taylor calls the affirmation of ordinary life. He concludes that the modern identity, and its attendant rejection of an objective order of reason, is far richer in moral sources that its detractors allow. Sources of the Self provides a decisive defence of the modern order and a sharp rebuff to its critics. (shrink)

As the expansion of the Internet and the digital formatting of all kinds of creative works move us further into the information age, intellectual property issues have become paramount. Computer programs costing thousands of research dollars are now copied in an instant. People who would recoil at the thought of stealing cars, computers, or VCRs regularly steal software or copy their favorite music from a friend's CD. Since the Web has no national boundaries, these issues are international concerns. The contributors-philosophers, (...) legal theorists, and business scholars, among others-address questions such as: Can abstract ideas be owned? How does the violation of intellectual property rights compare to the violation of physical property rights? Can computer software and other digital information be protected? And how should legal systems accommodate the ownership of intellectual property in an information age? Intellectual Property is a lively examination of these and other issues, and an invaluable resource for librarians, lawyers, businesspeople, and scholars. (shrink)

Theories of consciousness that locate experience in specific neural structures face a recurring empirical problem: organisms routinely maintain coherent identity and goal-directed behavior under conditions that should, on localization assumptions, abolish consciousness or split it cleanly. This paper examines two such cases—unihemispheric slow-wave sleep (USWS) in cetaceans and birds, and split-brain phenomena in commissurotomy patients—and argues that both become predictable rather than anomalous when identity is understood as maintained through constraint satisfaction rather than structural integrity. We show that USWS behaviors (...) cannot be dismissed as reflexive automation; that dream unity in split-brain patients is better understood as retrospective reconstruction by the reporting hemisphere than as real-time global integration; and that memory consolidation proceeds through alternative pathways when canonical routes are unavailable. The framework predicts graded degradation, role reassignment under constraint, and sharp threshold failures—abrupt functional collapse when coherence costs exceed available resources, rather than proportional decline. These predictions distinguish the account from seat-based theories and expose it to empirical falsification. Beyond theoretical clarification, the framework has implications for comparative cognition, clinical assessment of disorders of consciousness, and the evaluation of identity persistence in artificial systems. (shrink)

本研究对中国传统文化核心命题“儒道互补”进行了批判性的去神圣化解构。长期以来，儒道互补被视为中国人的生存智慧，即“达则兼济天下，穷则独善其身”。然而，本研究指出，在现代权力场与职场语境下，这一模式已异 化为一种极其精密的“精神套利策略”。 -/- 其核心逻辑在于：个体通过在儒家的“秩序服从”与道家的“消极解脱”之间进行无缝切换，构建了一套低风险、高收益的心理避险机制。在权力扩张期，儒家被工具化为获取资源与道德优越感的入场券；在责任承担期，道家则 被矮化为逃避公共契约与制度纠偏的解压阀。这种“双重变色龙”式的机会主义，本质上消解了真理的彻底性与道德的刚性。 -/- 研究进一步发现，儒道互补形成了一个封闭的心理回路，导致了文明的“热寂”现象：它通过虚假的“圆融”修辞掩盖了社会结构的根本矛盾，阉割了原本具有解构力量的批判精神。这种文化性格不仅制造了现代职场中广泛存在 的精致利己主义与犬儒色彩，更在根本上阻碍了契约精神与法治思维的建立。本文主张，必须击碎这种伪善的二元博弈，重建具有现代性特征的、不可交易的人格尊严与批判锋芒。 -/- This study conducts a critical de-sacralizing deconstruction of the core proposition of traditional Chinese culture, the “Confucian–Daoist complement.” For a long time, this complement has been regarded as the wisdom of Chinese survival, encapsulated in the maxim: “When successful, one benefits the world; when unsuccessful, one cultivates oneself.” However, this study argues that within the context of modern power structures and workplace environments, this model has degenerated into an alienated “spiritual arbitrage strategy.” -/- Its (...) core logic lies in the seamless switching between Confucian “obedience to order” and Daoist “passive detachment,” through which individuals construct a low-risk, high-return psychological hedging mechanism. During phases of power expansion, Confucianism is instrumentalized as a ticket for acquiring resources and moral superiority; during phases of responsibility-bearing, Daoism is reduced to a pressure-release valve for evading public contracts and institutional correction. This “dual-chameleon” opportunism fundamentally dissolves the integrity of truth and the rigidity of morality. -/- The study further finds that the Confucian–Daoist complement forms a closed psychological loop, leading to a phenomenon of civilizational “heat death”: it conceals the fundamental contradictions of social structures through a false rhetoric of “harmonious integration,” while castrating the critical spirit that originally possessed deconstructive power. This cultural disposition not only produces the refined egoism and pervasive cynicism in modern workplaces, but also fundamentally obstructs the establishment of contractual spirit and rule-of-law thinking. This paper argues that this hypocritical dualistic game must be shattered, and a modern personality characterized by inalienable dignity and critical sharpness must be reconstructed. -/- . (shrink)

本文系统考察马克思关于中国的论述，指出其分析主要建立在历史唯物主义与19世纪欧洲资本主义世界体系的理论语境之中。马克思并未从民族或文化本质主义角度评价中国人，而是将中国视为一种不同于欧洲的社会发展路径 ，尤其通过“亚细亚生产方式”概念分析其社会稳定性与历史循环结构。文章认为，马克思对西方资本主义侵略中国持明确而尖锐的批判立场，其理论具有重要历史洞见；但同时也存在根本性局限，即无法理解中国文明以自然秩 序、宇宙法则与非线性演化为核心的文明逻辑。本文在现代文明比较视野下，对马克思中国观进行系统反思，并提出一种超越线性进步史观的文明层级理解框架。 -/- This article offers a systematic examination of Karl Marx’s views on China, arguing that his analysis was deeply embedded in the framework of historical materialism and the nineteenth-century European capitalist world system. Marx did not evaluate the Chinese people in ethnic or cultural-essentialist terms; rather, he approached China as a social formation following a developmental path distinct from that of Europe, most notably through the concept of the “Asiatic mode of production,” which he used to explain China’s structural (...) stability and cyclical historical patterns. While Marx maintained a sharp and explicit critique of Western capitalist aggression against China, his theoretical framework also exhibited fundamental limitations—most notably, an inability to comprehend a civilizational logic grounded in natural order, cosmic principles, and non-linear historical evolution. From a contemporary comparative civilizational perspective, this paper reassesses Marx’s view of China and proposes a framework that transcends linear progressivist historiography. (shrink)

Little is known about how ethical organizational contexts influence employees’ perceived stress levels and well-being. This study used two theoretical lenses, ethical impact theory (Promislo et al. in Handbook of Unethical Work Behavior, M.E. Sharpe, Armonk, 2013) and ethical decision-making theory (Schwartz in J Bus Ethics 139(4): 755–776, 2016), to investigate the relationships among perceived organizational ethics (comprised of ethical climate, leader/manager ethics, and corporate social responsibility), work-related stress, and employee well-being (comprised of vitality, life satisfaction, personal growth initiative, flourishing, (...) positive mental health, and self-actualization). Findings across two studies indicated that organizational ethics was negatively related to work-related stress, and that work-related stress was negatively related to employee well-being. Perceived organizational ethics is positively related to employee well-being, with post hoc mediation tests indicating that work-related stress partially mediates this relationship. Our findings suggest that organizations should be proactive in improving their ethical climate, such as choosing ethical leaders, developing a robust and well-communicated code of ethics, and actively practicing CSR. These measures should reduce excessive work-related stress and improve employee well-being. (shrink)

The turbulence of Charles Curran's academic career in the past decade stands in sharp contrast to the equanimity and intellectual balance of his writings during that strained-filled period. Here is a collection of the most important of those writings.

There are two connected illusions which have become very common today. The first consists in marking a very sharp distinction between reason and faith—even to the point of defining faith as believing without good reason! The second is to take as a model of rationality what we might call “disengaged” reason. One illusion exaggerates the capacities of “reason alone” (allusion to Kant intended); the second sees reason as essentially “dispassionate.” Moreover, the two are closely linked. This paper argues against (...) both, while exploring the link. (shrink)

From flag-waving to the singing of national anthems, the practices and symbols ofpatriotism are inescapable, and modern politics is increasingly full of appeals topatriotic fervour. But if no-one chooses where they were born, and our ethicalobligations transcend national boundaries, then does patriotism make any sense? Doesit encourage an uncritical attachment to the status quo, or is it a crucial way ofunderstanding and applying our freedoms and moral duties? In this engaging book, Charles Jones and Richard Vernon guide us through (...) thesequestions with razor-sharp clarity. They examine the different ways patriotism has beendefended and explained, from a republican attachment to free and democraticinstitutions to an ethical and historical fabric that makes our entire moral life andidentity possible. They outline its relationship to a range of other key concepts, such asnationalism and cosmopolitanism, and skilfully analyse the issues surroundingpartiality to country and whether we should prioritise the welfare of our compatriotsover outsiders. This concise and lucid volume will be essential for both students and general readerswishing to understand the contemporary resonance and historical development ofpatriotism, and how it intersects with debates about global justice, cosmopolitanismand nationalism. (shrink)

陈汉生（Chad Hansen）为《斯坦福哲学百科全书》撰写的"庄子"（2014年新写，2024年修订）与"道家"（2025年实质性修订）两条目，代表西方汉学界对"道& quot;之哲学性质最具影响力的当代诠释：拒绝将"道"读作西方式的命题真理或自然法则，转而将其诠释为"路径"（path）——一种引导性的、语境索引的、可习得的实 践隐喻。本文将陈汉生的论证与老-杨创世纪宇宙观（Lao-Yang Genesis Cosmology, LYGC）进行系统比较，指出二者在拒斥"真理/法则"形而上学这一点上构成罕见的会通，但在"道"是否具有非任意的客观锚点、"效法链"（人法地、 地法天、天法道、道法自然）是否表征真实的宇宙等级秩序等根本问题上，构成尖锐分歧。本文论证：陈汉生的语言哲学诠释虽然精细自洽，但其"路径"隐喻因缺乏物理实在的锚定，最终滑向索引相对主 义的自我消解；而LYGC通过将"道"锚定于银河系这一真实天体物理结构，为"路径"隐喻提供了陈汉生体系所缺失的客观基础。 Chad Hansen’s Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entries on "Zhuangzi" (rewritten 2014, revised 2024) and "Daoism" (substantively revised 2025) represent the most influential contemporary Western reading of dao as "path" rather than as propositional Truth or Law. This paper places Hansen’s argument in systematic dialogue with the Lao-Yang Genesis Cosmology (LYGC), identifying a rare convergence in the joint rejection of Truth/Law metaphysics, alongside a sharp divergence over whether dao possesses a non-arbitrary objective anchor and whether (...) the Cosmic Following Chain (人法地—地法天—天法道—道法自然) expresses a real cosmic hierarchy. The paper argues that Hansen’s linguistic-pragmatist path metaphor, while internally rigorous, ultimately collapses into indexical relativism for want of physical grounding — a gap LYGC closes by anchoring dao in the literal astrophysical structure of the Milky Way. (shrink)

Anselm described god as “something than which nothing greater can be thought” [1, p. 93], and Descartes viewed him as “a supreme being” [7, p. 122]. I first capture those characterizations formally in a simple language for monadic predicate logic. Next, I construct a model class inspired by Stoic and medieval doctrines of grades of being [8, 20]. Third, I prove the models sufficient for recovering, as internal mathematics, the famous ontological argument of Anselm, and show that argument to be, (...) on this formalization, valid. Fourth, I extend the models to incorporate a modality fit for proving that any item than which necessarily no greater can be thought is also necessarily real. Lastly, with the present approach, I blunt the sharp edges of notable objections to ontological arguments by Gaunilo and by Grant. A trigger warning: every page of this writing flouts the old saw “Existence is not a predicate” and flagrantly. (shrink)

Parsons criticizes Dummett’s recent argument that Husserl was not an analytic philosopher because Husserl did not accept that a philosophical account of thought can be attained only through a philosophical account of language, the thesis which Dummett takes to define the analytic tradition. Dummett locates the beginning of the conceptual break between the analytic and the continental traditions in Husserl’s transcendental turn of 1905–1907, after which Husserl came to subscribe to a essentially non-linguistic general conception of intentionality. Parsons agrees with (...) Dummett that Husserl did not view the philosophy of language as basic to the philosophy of thought, but argues that Husserl was quite aware of the need for an account of the linguistic expression of thought. The problem that led Husserl away from accepting the fundamental status of philosophy of language was whether particular perceptual experiences must have a propositional or language-like structure in order to be said to have genuine content. In concluding that not all perceptual experience is propositional in structure, Husserl’s position is relevant to contemporary debates about thought and consciousness, especially the notion of non-conceptual mental. Through this critique of Dummett’s interpretation, Parsons suggests that the distinction between the analytic and continental traditions is neither as sharp nor as philosophically principled as many have supposed. (shrink)

Using as case studies the initiatives developed by two museum curators, the Belgian bibliographer Paul Otlet (1868–1944) and the Austrian social scientist Otto Neurath (1882–1945), and their subsequent collaboration with an extended network of scientists, philanthropists, artists, and social activists, this article provides a portrait of the general movement toward the creation of a new form of museum: the “museum of the future,” as Neurath labeled it. This museum would be able to enlighten the people by showing the nature of (...) modern industrial civilization. The promoters of the “museum of the future” intended to reform museum practices by organizing exhibitions of social facts, but also by integrating several dimensions – architecture, commerce, entertainment, pedagogy, and science and technology – to create a holistic frame to address their audience. However, the effortlessly circulating museum Neurath and Otlet envisioned stood in sharp contrast to the many, often immaterial, boundaries they encountered in their attempt to implement their vision. Ever-growing nationalism, the professionalization of social science, and the increasing commercialization of scientific vulgarization are some of the factors that help explain their failure. (shrink)

Michael Polanyi’s conceptions of tacit knowing and emergent being are used to correct a reductionism that developed from, or reacted against, the excesses of several Cartesian assumptions: (a) the method of universal doubt; (b) the emphasis on reductive analysis to unshakeable foundations, via connections between clear and distinct ideas; (c) the notion that what is real are the basic atomic substances out of which all else is composed; (d) a sharp body-mind substance dualism; and (e) the notion that the (...) seat of consciousness can be traced to a point in the human body. The reductivist project in biology began with the emphasis Descartes put on the body as a machine. Polanyi reappropriates the machine metaphor to demonstrate how mechanistic explanations are not fully reductive. He shows how an eliminative materialism that would reduce mind to brain is unwarranted if either an interlevel mechanistic reduction or an intralevel successional reduction is posited. (shrink)

The advent of an unregulated and financial form of capitalism, combined with a sharp rise in income inequalities and economic insecurity since the 1970s, appears to pose, at first glance, a significant challenge for the relevance of the works of first-generation critical theorists, which are often confined to an historically specific ‘artistic’ critique of the bureaucratic stage of capitalist development. Through an analysis of the various concerns and demands expressed by members of the alter-globalization and Occupy movements, the article (...) nevertheless aims to demonstrate that first-generation critical theory can continue to play a significant role in conceptualizing contemporary forms of resistance by: (1) capturing the social malaise engendered by neoliberal capitalism; and (2) informing the practice of resistance in contemporary capitalist societies. (shrink)

Media organizations are simultaneously key elements of an effective democracy and, for the most part, commercial entities seeking success in the market. They play an essential role in the formation of public opinion and the influence on personal choices. Yet most of them are commercial enterprises seeking readers or viewers, advertising, favorable regulatory decisions for their media, and other assets. This creates some intrinsic difficulties and produces some sharp tensions within media ethics. In this article, we examine such tensions (...) - in theory and practice. We then consider the feasibility of introducing an ethics regime to the media industry - a regime that would be effective in a deregulated environment in protecting public interest and social responsibility. In the article, we also outline a rationale and a methodology for the institutionalization of an acceptable and workable media ethics regime that aims to protect the integrity of the industry in a future of undoubtedly increasing commercial pressure. (shrink)

Over the past few years we have witnessed a sharp resurgence in feminist activism as young women have become increasingly interested in feminist ideas as a means of making sense of their lives. This resurgence in feminist practice is evidenced by the formation of myriad groups and networks across Britain and the initiation of various feminist projects and campaigns, reported regularly and widely in local and national media. This article examines the renaissance of this new feminism through the example (...) of one of the most active and publicly visible organisations, UK Feminista. It draws on ethnographic research into young women’s feminist activism, exploring the emergence of UK Feminista as part of this new wave of feminist activism in Britain. We argue that the wave metaphor has multifarious meanings and that to understand how the political practice of a small feminist organisation contributes to the amplification of this wave of feminist activism it is helpful to draw on concepts developed within social movement theory such as cycles of protest, repertoires of action and collective identities. We show how UK Feminista mobilises young women and provides resources to existing and new feminist organisations and activist groups, commenting particularly on its use of the Internet and social media as a mobilising device. We explore the role of the Internet in young women’s engagement with feminism, the forms of activism in which they take part and the importance of feminist cultural memory to the construction of a collective feminist identity. Our analysis reveals the significant part played by a small mobilising structure, UK Feminista, in the resurgence of feminist activism in the UK. (shrink)

'Most of us are still groping for answers about what makes life worth living, or what confers meaning on individual lives', writes Charles Taylor in Sources of the Self. 'This is an essentially modern predicament.' Charles Taylor's latest book sets out to define the modern identity by tracing its genesis, analysing the writings of such thinkers as Augustine, Descartes, Montaigne, Luther, and many others. This then serves as a starting point for a renewed understanding of modernity. Taylor argues (...) that modern subjectivity has its roots in ideas of human good, and is in fact the result of our long efforts to define and attain the good. The modern turn inwards is far from being a disastrous rejection of rationality, as its critics contend, but has at its heart what Taylor calls the affirmation of ordinary life. He concludes that the modern identity, and its attendant rejection of an objective order of reason, is far richer in moral sources that its detractors allow. Sources of the Self provides a decisive defence of the modern order and a sharp rebuff to its critics. (shrink)

Although Spinoza’s words about intuition, also called “the third kind of knowledge,” remain among the most difficult to grasp, I argue that he succeeds in providing an account of its distinctive character. Moreover, the special place that intuition holds in Spinoza’s philosophy is grounded not in its epistemological distinctiveness, but in its ethical promise. I will not go as far as one commentator to claim that the epistemological distinction is negligible (Malinowski-Charles 2003),but I do argue that its privileged place (...) in Spinoza’s system belongs primarily to its ethical importance, by which I mean that intuition’s value is prized by virtue of the agency it confers upon those who enjoy it. Spinoza often notes that what distinguishes the “wise man” is that he is more powerful, able to do more. That is,the wise and free person with whose description the Ethics culminates is set apart not, first and foremost, by virtue of possessing a scientific account of the true cosmological order. The Ethics is perhaps called an ethics, rather than a treatise on metaphysics or knowledge, because it concludes with a demonstration of how one comes to be able to do what is best and to live a more joyful life. Intuitive science is essential to the characterization of the power to think and live well. (shrink)

Charles Darwin, in his species notebooks, engaged seriously with the quinarian system of William Sharp Macleay. Much of the attention given to this engagement has focused on Darwin’s attempt to explain, in a transmutationist framework, the intricate patterns that characterized the quinarian system. Here, I show that Darwin’s attempt to explain these quinarian patterns primarily occurred before he had read any work by Macleay. By the time Darwin began reading Macleay’s writings, he had already arrived at a skeptical (...) view of the reality of these patterns. What most interested Darwin, as he read Macleay, was not the quinarian system itself. Rather, Darwin’s notes on his reading primarily concerned certain background principles animating Macleay’s work, in particular: the non-existence of a saltus between human and animal minds, the difficulty of establishing boundaries between species and varieties, and Macleay’s method of variation. Darwin’s interest in the last of these left a mark on his discussion of taxonomic methodology in the Origin. (shrink)

Just as it is impossible to understand the American religious landscape without some familiarity with evangelicalism, one cannot grasp the shape of contemporary Christian ethics without knowing the contributions of evangelical Protestants. This newest addition to the Library of Theological Ethics series begins by examining the core dynamic with which all evangelical ethics grapples: belief in an authoritative, inspired, and unchanging biblical text on the one hand, and engagement with a rapidly evolving and increasingly post-Christian culture on the other. It (...) explores the different roles that scholars and popular figures have played in forming evangelicals' understandings of Christian ethics. And it draws together the contributions of both senior and emerging figures in painting a portrait of this diverse, vibrant, and challenging theological and ethical tradition. This book represents the breadth of evangelical ethical voices, demonstrating that evangelical ethics involves nuance and theological insight that far transcend any political agenda. Contributors include David P. Gushee, Carl F. H. Henry, Jennifer McBride, Stephen Charles Mott, William E. Pannell, John Perkins, Soong-Chan Rah, Gabriel Salguero, Francis Schaeffer, Ron Sider, Helene Slessarev-Jamir, Glen H. Stassen, Eldin Villafañe, Allen Verhey, Jim Wallis, Nicholas Wolterstorff, and John Howard Yoder. The Library of Theological Ethics series focuses on what it means to think theologically and ethically. It presents a selection of important, and otherwise unavailable, texts—English-language texts and translations that have fallen out of print, new translations, and collections of significant statements about problems and themes of special importance—in an easily accessible form. This series enables sustained dialogue on new and classic works in the field. (shrink)

These long-awaited, well-edited volumes complete the projected ten-volume edition, six volumes of which appeared in 1931-5. Volume VII contains, among other things, the important but previously unpublished "On the Logic of drawing History from Ancient Documents," "The Association of Ideas," and "Habit," as well as a sharp criticism of telepathy. Volume VIII reprints Peirce's major reviews of such works as Frazer's Berkeley, Royce's The World and the Individual, and Pearson's Grammar of Science, and contains some of his correspondence with (...) pivotal figures such as Carus, Dewey, James, and Lady Welby. The bibliography is superb.--P. W. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 41.3 (2003) 414-415 [Access article in PDF] Gregorio Piaia, editor. La presenza dell'aristotelismo padovano nella filosofia della prima modernità: Atti del Colloquio internazionale in memoria di Charles B. Schmitt (Padova, 4-6 settembre 2000). Rome and Padua: Antenore, 2002. Pp. 488. Paper, € 38.00.Dedicated to the impact of Paduan Aristotelianism on early modern philosophy, this volume, edited by Gregorio Piaia, presents the proceedings (...) of a much-anticipated conference held in memory of Charles B. Schmitt at the University of Padua on September 4-6, 2000, jointly co-sponsored by Padua's Department of Philosophy, the Centro per la Storia dell'Università di Padova, the Seminar für Philosophie und Geistesgeschichte der Renaissance of the University of Munich, the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Natural Philosophy of the Catholic University of Nijmegen, and the Foundation for Intellectual History of London. It was indeed Schmitt's merit (one thinks first and foremost of The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy he edited in 1988) to have revised in the most critical and convincing way the image historians of philosophy had of Renaissance Aristotelianism as a backward-looking movement unable to express any vitality, to say nothing about its influence on later philosophers. Obviously, the Paduan Aristotelians did not achieve the same impact as Descartes and they did not produce the sharp reactions the libertins provoked. Yet, their impact was substantial, as many contributors show, with a concentration in the north of central Europe, i.e., in Germany and in Scandinavia.The volume opens with a paper by Stefano Perfetti on the physician, statesman, and philosopher Giulio Cesare Scaligero, who belongs among the Paduan Aristotelians because he received his education at Padua. The works of the "pure Aristotelian" (following the definition of this movement provided by Wilhelm Risse) Giacomo Zabarella, surely the most celebrated of the group, is the subject of papers by Francesco Bottin, Ian McLean, Sachicko Kusukawa, Daniel A. Di Liscia, Heikki Mikkeli, Merio Scattola, David A. Lines, Antonino Poppi, Paul Richard Blum, Giovanna Varani, Gregorio Piaia, and Giuseppe Micheli. They have looked into the impact of Zabarella's philosophy, logic, and theory of demonstration (the celebrated regressus) in contexts such as Lutheran Germany and Scandinavia, Reformed Germany and Holland, and Catholic Italy and France during the impressive span from the publication of Melanchthon's Dialectic in 1520 to that of Kant's Critique of Judgment in 1790. Less known today, but quite influential until 1648, was the "eclectic Aristotelian" (to use Schmitt's phrase) and colleague (and antagonist) of Zabarella, Francesco Piccolomini, whom Jill Kraye, Heikki Mikkeli, Merio Scattola, and David A. Lines consider in their papers. Piccolomini became famous for his mediation between Aristotelianism and Platonism. He revived "the soul of Aristotle and the spirit of Plato," as a contemporary said. Pierre Bayle and Jakob Brucker highlighted Piccolomini's efforts to combine Aristotelian and Platonic philosophy; and modern scholars have identified many [End Page 414] Platonizing elements in his Aristotelianism. In the hope of producing a more accurate and complete picture of eclectic Aristotelianism within the context of Renaissance moral philosophy, Jill Kraye's paper explores a neglected side of Piccolomini's ethical thought, namely his careful account of Stoicism. Finally, a group of papers with a more general scope needs to be mentioned, namely Heinrich C. Kuhn's survey of works of Paduan Aristotelians in German libraries, Charles H. Lohr's paper on the sources of Calvinist theories of science, and Ekhard Kessler's paper on the relation of logic to hermeneutics. As a last remark, of the seventeen contributions to this important volume, which no research library should be without, eight are in Italian, six in English, and three in German. Riccardo Pozzo Università di Verona... (shrink)

Charles Darwin famously argued that that life on earth was not the product of intelligent design, and that it instead had arisen through the entirely natural of process of evolution via natural selection. Darwin’s theory of evolution (together with Mendel’s theory of genetics) now forms the foundation of all the biological sciences. Jurassic Park, however, raises an interesting question: just how does Darwin’s theory apply to lifeforms that are the products of explicit, intelligent design? In this essay, I examine (...) cluster of issues in the philosophy of biology that turn out to be central in figuring out the answer to this question. Among other things, I discuss the difficulties in drawing sharp boundaries biological systems and non-biological systems, and between the products of natural selection and those of artificial selection. I also consider more generally how the process of evolution via natural selection is changed when intelligent agents begin to directly manipulate genetic material. (shrink)

William Sharp Macleay developed the quinarian system of classification in his Horæ Entomologicæ, published in two parts in 1819 and 1821. For two decades, the quinarian system was widely discussed in Britain and influenced such naturalists as Charles Darwin, Richard Owen, and Thomas Huxley. This paper offers the first detailed account of Macleay’s development of the quinarian system. Macleay developed his system under the shaping influence of two pressures: (1) the insistence by followers of Linnaeus on developing artificial (...) systems at the expense of the natural system and (2) the apparent tension between the continuity of organic nature and the failure of linear classification schemes (which continuity seemed to require). Against what he perceived as dogmatic indolence on the part of the Linnaeans, Macleay developed a philosophy of science in which hypotheses that exceeded the available evidence should be proposed and subjected to severe tests. He also developed a novel comparative anatomical methodology, the method of variation, to aid in his search for the natural system. Using this method, he developed an intricate system that showed how organic nature could be continuous without being linear. A failure to appreciate these facets of Macleay’s thought has led to several misunderstandings of him and his work, most notably that he was an idealist. These misunderstandings are here rebutted. (shrink)

The paper argues that contemporary consciousness studies can profit from Charles S. Peirce’s philosophy of consciousness. It confronts mainstream tendencies in contemporary consciousness studies, including those which consider consciousness as an unsolvable mystery, with Peirce’s phenomenological approach to consciousness. Peirce’s answers to the following contemporary issues are presented: phenomenological consciousness and the qualia, consciousness as self-controlled agency of humans, self-control and self-reflection, consciousness and language, self-consciousness and introspection, consciousness and the other, consciousness of nonhuman animals, and the question of (...) a quasi-consciousness of the physical universe. A detailed account of Peirce’s three modes of consciousness is presented: (1) primisense, qualisense or feeling-consciousness, (2) altersense (consciousness of the other), and (3) medisense, the consciousness of cognition, thought, and reasoning. In contrast to consciousness studies that establish a rather sharp dividing line between conscious and unconscious states of mind, Peirce adopts the principle of synechism, the theory of continuity. For him, consciousness is a matter of degree. An important difference between Peirce’s concept of qualia and current theories of qualia in human consciousness is discussed. The paper shows how consciousness, according to Peirce, emerges from unconscious qualia and vanishes into equally unconscious habits. It concludes with a study of the roles of qualia, habit, and self-control in Peirce’s theory of signs, in particular in qualisigns and symbols, and the question of signs as quasi-conscious agents in semiosis. (shrink)

Charles Parsons’ book “Mathematical Thought and Its Objects” of 2008 (Cambridge University Press, New York) is critically discussed by concentrating on one of Parsons’ main themes: the role of intuition in our understanding of arithmetic (“intuition” in the specific sense of Kant and Hilbert). Parsons argues for a version of structuralism which is restricted by the condition that some paradigmatic structure should be presented that makes clear the actual existence of structures of the necessary sort. Parsons’ paradigmatic structure is (...) the so-called ‘intuitive model’ of arithmetic realized by Hilbert’s strings of strokes. This paper argues that Hilbert’s strings, considered as given in intuition, cannot play the role Parsons assigns to them: the criteria of identity of these strings do not have the sharpness that Parsons wants to see in them, and Parsons inadvertently projects abstract structures into his ‘intuitive model’. This diagnosis is exemplified with respect to (a) Parsons’ distinction between addition and multiplication on the one hand and exponentiation on the other and (b) his analysis of arithmetical knowledge in simple cases like “7 + 5 = 12”. All in all, it is claimed that Parsons book contains many important insights with respect to, for example, different versions structuralism, the notion of “natural number” and its uniqueness, induction, predicativity and other things, for which he is rightly famous, but that his way of drawing on the notion of intuition leaves too many questions unanswered. (shrink)

Sympathy became a central topic of post-Darwinian literature when Alfred Russel Wallace (1864) denied that “natural selection” applied to civilized humans. He suggested that humans are connected by sympathetic bonds and thus they do not allow those with lesser capacity to perish. The chapter discusses two public controversies. First, George Darwin’s 1874 proposal to begin a systematic policy of negative eugenics by prohibiting some marriages. Second, a letter from Darwin to Charles Bradlaugh puts the trade-off between happiness and natural (...) selection in sharp relief. Bradlaugh and Annie Besant stood trial in 1877 for distributing an “obscene” manual on contraception. Darwin declined to testify for them, calling attention to what he had written about the trade-off between the goals of individuals in avoiding misery for their children and the goal of racial perfection by means of “natural selection.”. (shrink)

Heinz Von Forester characterizes the objects “known” by an autopoietic system as eigen-solutions, that is, as discrete, separable, stable and composable states of the interaction of the system with its environment. Previous articles have presented the FBST, Full Bayesian Significance Test, as a mathematical formalism specifically designed to access the support for sharp statistical hypotheses, and have shown that these hypotheses correspond, from a constructivist perspective, to systemic eigen-solutions in the practice of science. In this article several issues related (...) to the role played by language in the emergence of eigen-solutions are analyzed. The last sections also explore possible connections with the semiotic theory of Charles Sanders Peirce. (shrink)

Thomas Henry Huxley and Charles Darwin discovered in 1857 that they had a fundamental disagreement about biological classification. Darwin believed that the natural system should express genealogy while Huxley insisted that classification must stand on its own basis, independent of evolution. Darwin used human races as a model for his view. This private and long-forgotten dispute exposes important divisions within Victorian biology. Huxley, trained in physiology and anatomy, was a professional biologist while Darwin was a gentleman naturalist. Huxley agreed (...) with John Stuart Mill's rejection of William Whewell's sympathy for Linnaeus. The naturalists William Sharp Macleay, Hugh Strickland, and George Waterhouse worked to distinguish two kinds of relationship, affinity and analogy. Darwin believed that his theory could explain the difference. Richard Owen introduced the distinction between homology and analogy to anatomists, but the word homology did not enter Darwin's vocabulary until 1848, when he used the morphological concept of archetype in his work on Cirripedia. Huxley dropped the word archetype when Richard Owen linked it to Plato's ideal forms, replacing it with common plan. When Darwin wrote in the Origin of Species that the word plan gives no explanation, he may have had Huxley in mind. Darwin's preposterous story in the Origin about a bear giving birth to a kangaroo, which he dropped in the second edition, was in fact aimed at Huxley. (shrink)

"One of the most profound and illuminating studies of this century to have been published in recent decades."--John Gray, New York Times Book Review Hailed as "a magisterial critique of top-down social planning" by the New York Times, this essential work analyzes disasters from Russia to Tanzania to uncover why states so often fail--sometimes catastrophically--in grand efforts to engineer their society or their environment, and uncovers the conditions common to all such planning disasters. "Beautifully written, this book calls into (...) class='Hi'>sharp relief the nature of the world we now inhabit."--New Yorker "A tour de force."-- Charles Tilly, Columbia University. (shrink)

Richard J. Bernstein argues that many of the important themes in philosophy during the past 150 years are variations and developments of ideas that were prominent in the classical American pragmatists: Charles S. Peirce, William James, John Dewey, and George H. Mead. The pragmatic thinkers reject a sharp dichotomy between subject and object, mind-body dualism, the quest for certainty, and the spectator theory of knowledge. They seek to bring about a sea change in philosophy that highlights the social (...) character of human experience and normative social practices, the self-correcting nature of all inquiry, and the continuity of theory and practice. And they - especially James, Dewey, and Mead - emphasize the democratic ethical-political consequences of a pragmatic orientation. Many of the themes developed by the pragmatic thinkers were central to the work of major twentieth-century philosophers such as Wittgenstein and Heidegger, but the so-called analytic/Continental split obscures this underlying continuity. Bernstein develops an alternative reading of contemporary philosophy that brings out the persistence and continuity of pragmatic themes. He explains why the discussion of pragmatism is alive, varied, and widespread"--Jacket. (shrink)

Granville Sharp (1735–1813) was a White English scholar and one of Britain’s most vocal abolitionists. In 1787, he founded the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade, together with Thomas Clarkson. This chapter is an excerpt from Sharp’s 1769 work A Representation of the Injustice and Dangerous Tendency of Tolerating Slavery, his first of many antislavery tracts. This text is significant for at least two reasons. First, it contains an intriguing argument that it is illegitimate to (...) deprive enslaved Black people of their humanity and concomitant rights, and to view them as having the legal status of nonhuman animals. Second, Sharp examines a newspaper from New York and expresses disgust about the ways in which the paper’s advertisements dehumanize enslaved people who are for sale or have run away. (shrink)

In close collaboration with the late Matthew Lipman, Ann Margaret Sharp pioneered the theory and practice of 'the community of philosophical inquiry' (CPI) as a way of practicing 'Philosophy for Children' and prepared thousands of philosophers and teachers throughout the world in this practice. In Community of Inquiry with Ann Margaret Sharp represents a long-awaited and much-needed anthology of Sharp's insightful and influential scholarship, bringing her enduring legacy to new generations of academics, postgraduate students and researchers in (...) the fields of education, philosophy, philosophy of education, Philosophy for Children and philosophy of childhood. Sharp developed a unique perspective on the interdependence of education, philosophy, personhood and community that remains influential in many parts of the world. This perspective was shaped not only by Sharp's work in philosophy and education, but also by her avid studies in literature, feminism, aesthetic theory and ecumenical spirituality. Containing valuable contributions from senior figures in the fields in which Sharp produced her most focused scholarship, the chapters in this book present a critical overview of how Sharp's ideas relate to education, philosophy of education, and the Philosophy for Children movement as a whole. The historical and philosophical nature of this collection means that it will be a vital resource for philosophers and educators. It should also be of great interest to teacher educators and those involved in the study of pragmatism and feminism, as well as the history of education across the globe, particularly in the United States of America. (shrink)

The two great modern naturalists, Linnaeus and Darwin, expressed their intuition about how best to visualize patterns of affinities, that is, morphological similarities and divergences between taxa. Linnaeus suggested that “all plants show affinities on all sides, like a territory on a geographical map,” while Darwin thought that it was virtually impossible to understand the affinities between living and extinct species without a genealogical tree. Genealogical trees follow the diachronic, evolving logic of a timeline, whereas maps depict a synchronous pattern (...) of extant taxa. Although the two seem unrelated, various naturalists made attempts to combine them. Surprisingly, these resulted in three-dimensional images that, in order to be observed, had to be projected on paper. The naturalists Max Fürbringer and Richard Bowdler Sharpe were aware of this fact, but even Darwin himself twice combined the basic intuitions underlying the two modes of representation to produce three-dimensional images. This article is a brief history of the efforts to merge genealogical trees and map-like cross sections of affinities into one three-dimensional image. (shrink)

"Philosophical anthropology on the grandest scale....Gellner has produced a sharp challenge to his colleagues and a thrilling book for the non-specialist. Deductive history on this scale cannot be proved right or wrong, but this is Gellner writing, incisive, iconoclastic, witty and expert. His scenario compels our attention."—Adam Kuper, _New Statesman_ "A thoughtful and lively meditation upon probably the greatest transformation in human history, upon the difficult problems it poses and the scant resources it has left us to solve them."— (...) class='Hi'>Charles Larmore, _New Republic_. (shrink)

Montesquieu and the Old Regime offers a bold reinterpretation of Montesquieu’s intellectual and ideological legacy, challenging conventional views that label him as a conservative apologist. Instead, the book situates Montesquieu as a sharp critic of the Old Regime and a visionary advocate for a national republic and democratic society in France. Drawing inspiration from England, Montesquieu envisioned a political system that dismantled monarchical and aristocratic structures. Through detailed analyses of his major works, such as The Spirit of the Laws, (...) The Persian Letters, and Considérations, the author reveals Montesquieu’s systematic critique of absolutism and his engagement with theories of divine right and raison d’état, presenting him as a pivotal figure in republican thought. The book delves into Montesquieu’s dual role as a critic and idealist. It traces his intellectual evolution from deconstructing Old Regime ideologies to crafting an alternative vision grounded in the republican tradition of Aristotle, Machiavelli, and Harrington. The analysis highlights how Montesquieu’s works, particularly The Spirit of the Laws, reflect his mature thinking and aspirations for civic renewal through republican governance. By integrating his unpublished writings, such as the Pensées, and emphasizing the continuity in his thought, the book positions Montesquieu as a transformative thinker whose ideas extended beyond political philosophy to address broader sociological and historiographical concerns. This study not only deepens the understanding of Montesquieu’s legacy but also situates him as a key voice in the intellectual movement challenging the Old Regime. (shrink)

It is a great honor to have such excellent commentary on my book, and I am happy to have the opportunity to discuss these issues with others who have done such important work on the topics. I will reply to the commentaries separately, beginning with the critique by Charles Mills (2013) and moving on to Karen Jones’s (2013). Reply to MillsRevisiting my projectMills considers four views that pose challenges to my account of race as a hierarchical social category.(1) Kitcher (...) (2007) and Andreasen (1998) (and others) argue that there is a biological reality to race. If, as I argue, it is not helpful to draw a sharp boundary between the social and the natural, should we embrace their framework and allow that race is both social and biological? Or is biologism’s history too troublesome for that? Am I implicitly committed to a problematic naturalism about race myself, given that I embrace a broad naturalism?So a remapping of this contrast would be something like the “natural” unmediated by hum .. (shrink)

British systematics was distinctly marked by a raft of vituperative controversies around the turn of the 1830s. After the local collapse of broad consensus in the Linnaean system by 1820, the emergence of new schemes of classification—most notably, the “quinarian” system of William Sharp Macleay—brought with it an unprecedented register of public debate among zoologists in Britain, one which a young Charles Darwin would bitterly describe to his friend John Stevens Henslow in October 1836 as possessing a “mean (...) quarrelsome spirit,” conducted in “a manner anything but like that of gentlemen.” This article aims to provide a social and conceptual account of the remarkable tenor of zoological discourse in Britain in the late 1820s and early 1830s, with joint attention to the philosophical and interpersonal commitments at play. In doing so, it analyzes the three of the period’s most striking public controversies, each of which counted key advocates of the quinarian system as central participants. (shrink)

A book that describes in great detail a search in a far-off land for a creature that ends up being extinct is like a carefully cooked meal brought to a meticulously set table for a guest who never appears. The antecedent drama and preparation work up to a crescendo of glumness and confusion, leading to a sharp feeling of tragedy and loss—the feeling we all experience, in other words, on the death of someone we love. In this case, however, (...) the loss is of a large, flightless, aquatic species of penguin.A professor emeritus of anthropology at the University of Iceland, Pálsson details a journey made in 1858 to Eldey Island, just off the southwest coast of Iceland, by two Englishmen obsessed with birds, and especially bird eggs. John Wolley and Alfred Newton were hoping against hope to find garefowl—instances of the once-abundant species known to us as great auks. In the decade preceding Wolley and Newton's expedition, sightings of the species had dwindled. The great auk had been hunted for its meat, skin, oil, and feathers for ages, but Victorians could not imagine a reality in which any of God's creations might be wiped out forever by human hands. The Swedish taxonomist Carl Linnaeus believed that extinction itself was impossible, and Charles Darwin, who published On the Origin of Species the year after Wolley and Newton returned—argued that in the long process of life's evolution, natural selection, not human intervention, favors survival of the fittest species and varieties––and the demise of all the rest.But this prejudice of biologists was about to change. For Wolley and Newton, despite their great efforts, came up short. There were people still around whom they interviewed who had hunted and traded the great auk, there were eggs here and there to be procured, and auks stuffed and mounted. There were fisherman's tales, and auk bones, and plenty of lore. But there was not one living great auk to be found. All had been hunted to oblivion.Extinction was the name that Victorians, as late as the late 1880s, would finally fasten to this sad phenomenon. The word had been used previously to describe the history of landed families: When a line became extinct, the name and succession of property and practices went with it. Pálsson shows how this new conceptual coupling was influenced directly by Wolley and Newton's expedition. Hence the meticulously prepared meal, at which the guest of honor never appears. It was these two egg collectors who introduced the concept of unnatural extinction into modern language and thought.Extinction itself was recognized, in the early nineteenth century, by Europe's conservative doyen of natural history, the Frenchman Georges Cuvier. He opposed the evolutionism of Lamarck, his countryman, but floods and chaos, or even the whims of God, might explain the flamboyant Ichthyosaurs and Plesiosaurs then being unearthed (including by Mary Anning, an unsung female paleontologist). Pushing a species off the cliff with human hands was another thing altogether. In line with this sentiment, when hunters in Europe, North America, and Greenland had found the breeding grounds of the great auk empty, they assumed that the birds had simply gone elsewhere to breed for a time. Now, as the two disappointed naturalists morphed from ornithologists into anthropologists, the veil of ignorance had been lifted. What did the slaughter of these animals say of us? What did their disappearance mean for the natural order? And could such tragedies be reversed? These were questions that had never before been asked.Wolley died in 1859, and it would be left to the younger Newton to become the champion of unnatural extinction (he called it “Newtonian extinction”), arguing for human complicity and responsibility and urging politicians in Britain to place bird protection, and wild game protection more broadly, on the agenda. While Victorians, including Darwin, generally believed that extinction was consistent with a balance of nature, Newton had exposed the lie involved in this assumption. The boundaries between science and sentiment were being redrawn, and Newton, who had a lame leg and walked all his life with a stick, began to demand the authority to speak for what was right. Hunting for human purposes was all right, he argued against “mere sentimentalists,” but it needed experts to determine under what conditions population replacement could be safeguarded. Newton's campaign, until this very day, raises questions of the human relation to nature. Are we a part of creation, or above it, or beside it? Do we carry special responsibility for other creatures, and if so, why? These are conundrums each modern generation faces, and as a recent book by David Sepkoski argues, each generation deserves the extinction story that it begets.However human behavior and legislation transiently resolve around questions of biodiversity and the inherent value of life, endlings—the name given to the last of their kind—are special. They touch people, and their stories—famous ones like those of dodos and carrier pigeons, and less famous ones like those of golden toads and Steller's sea cows—are told and retold. Perhaps they remind us humans of our own evanescence. For its part, the last great auk, with its waddling gait, large beak, and useless stubby wings, remains precious to us, as does the knowledge that despite its terrestrial awkwardness, it once flew with its wings in the sea “as swiftly as flying birds in the air.” The great auk, and the story of how it went extinct, matter. Whatever our views of extinction, they hold a mirror up to ourselves. (shrink)

Reconfiguring the human -- Lines, planes, and bodies: redefining human action -- Action as affect -- The transindividuality of affect -- The tongue -- Renaturalizing ideology: Spinoza's ecosystem of ideas -- The matrix -- Ideology critique today? -- The fly in the coach -- "I am in ideology," or the attribute of thought -- What is to be done? -- Man's utility to man: reason and its place in nature -- The politics of human nature -- Reason and the human (...) essence -- Man's utility to man -- Nonhuman utility -- Beyond the image of man -- Desire for recognition? Butler, Hegel, and Spinoza -- Spinoza in Hegel -- Desire in Hegel -- Conatus and cupiditas in Spinoza -- From interpersonal recognition to impersonal glory -- Judith Butler's post-Hegelian politics of recognition -- The impersonal is political: Spinoza and a feminist politics of imperceptibility -- The politics of recognition -- Elizabeth Grosz's critique of the politics of recognition -- Thinking beyond the (hu)man -- A politics of imperceptibility -- Nature, norms, and beasts -- The beast within -- Animal affects (and) the first man -- Ethics as ethology? (shrink)