Philosophy Commons^™

Literary And Poetic Performance In Plato's Laws, Gerard Naddaf

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

Plato’s evaluations of the written and spoken word are complex, even ambiguous. On the one hand, he clearly privileges the give-and-take oral conversation as the paradigm for philosophical discussion, and on the basis of this paradigm he offers strong critiques of the written word, notably in the Phaedrus and Letter 7. On the other hand, he is a most famous enemy of the oral performance of poetry − notwithstanding the fact that in the Republic he gives ‘music’ a prominent place in education. When we turn to the Laws, we encounter another aspect or dimension of Plato’s thinking about the …

Thinking, Thought And Nous In Aristotle's De Anima, Michael Bowler

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

Michael Wedin in his “Tracking Aristotle’s Nous’’ wishes to argue that the most plausible interpretation of De Anima, Book III, chapter 5 is . .that these chapters provide the essentials of a thoroughly finitistic account of individual noetic activity.” I want to argue that Wedin’s account is not the most plausible interpretation of Aristotle’s theory of individual noetic activity. I think Wedin’s interpretation misses a crucial distinction between the actualization of mind and the being of mind, insofar as he argues that mind is identical simpliciter with its object in the act of knowing when in fact, for Aristotle, mind …

How Do We Know There Is A Population-Environment Problem?, Peter J. Taylor

Working Papers on Science in a Changing World

Five fictional friends of the author have agreed to meet and talk, hoping that he was right when he claimed that discussion crossing the usual boundaries of their fields would enrich their different inquiries and concerns. Ecolo, a natural and human ecologist, breaks the ice. He wants to marshall scientific knowledge to persuade others of the seriousness of the population problem. He is questioned by Philoso, whose philosophical bent leads her to observe the models that people use and to ask how they support the claims they make. In turn, the other three join in: Activo, an activist who is …

Memorials 2000, James A. Borland

SOR Faculty Publications and Presentations

No abstract provided.

Can A Postmodern Philosopher Teach Modern Philosophy?, Ladelle Mcwhorter

Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies Faculty Publications

This paper considers the following question: how can those whose thought is informed by poststructuralist values, arguments, and training legitimately teach the history of philosophy? In answering this question, three pedagogical approaches to courses in the history of philosophy are considered and criticized: the representational, the phenomenological, and the conversational. Although these three approaches are seemingly exhaustive, each is problematic because the question they attempt to answer rests on the false assumption that there is one, universally right way to teach philosophy and many wrong ways. In rejecting this assumption, the author considers a new, more concrete, and contextualized question …

Sagp Newsletter 2001.3 (March), Anthony Preus

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

No abstract provided.

The Moral Complexion Of Consumption, Albert Borgmann

Philosophy Faculty Publications

Vigorous consumption is the sign of a prosperous and confident society. Some critics, however, find a high level of consumption morally objectionable. To see what is valid in these objections, one needs to understand the connection between consumption and the characteristic pattern of technology that is highlighted by the device paradigm and gives rise to paradigmatic consumption. Such consumption induces disengagement from reality and a decline of excellence. The response to these debilities is to accept paradigmatic consumption in some areas of life and to make room for focal things and practices in others. Research is needed to determine the …

The Ultimate Bull’S Eye: Considering The Rational Search For Happiness, Philosophical Discussion Group, Armstrong State University

The Philosopher's Stone

No abstract provided.

Clinical Equipoise And Rct Design, Charles Weijer

Philosophy Presentations

This presentation addresses these questions:
• “Upon what ethical grounds may the physician offer RCT enrollment to a patient?”
• Which is the preferred moral basis of the RCT?

Re-Framing The Landscape, Curtis Carter

Catalogues and Gallery Guides

No abstract provided.

Sex And Gender Through An Analytic Eye: Butler On Freud And Gender Identity, Anna Gullickson '00

Honors Projects

In her book. Gender Trouble, Judith Butler reinforces the conception held by many feminist philosophers that gender identity is not natural but rather culturally-constructed. Butler supports this conception of gender mainly by reading (and misreading) Freud. I will undertake a critical reconstruction of Butler's claims about gender identity which are based on Freud. In order to complete this project, I will outline (J) currents of feminism leading us to this question of the constructedness of gender, (2) Freud's theories, especially his account of sexual development and (3) two of Butler's main criticisms of Freud. Through this exploration, I will explain …

Review Of Alchemies Of The Mind: Rationality And The Emotions, William Miller

Reviews

Suppose that 16 years ago you had written not one but two superlative books. Would you suffer from anxiety of influence with regard to early versions of yourself, as if, to twist Harold Bloom, your early self now played an insurmountably glorious Milton to your later romantic phases? Did Shakespeare say to himself: ‘No way I can beat Hamlet, so why write again?’ Jon Elster wrote two gems in the 1970s and 1980s, Ulysses and the Sirens and Sour Grapes. Not that they have deterred him from publishing at a stupendous rate since, though he has never recaptured that earlier …

Relational Autonomy, Self-Trust, And Health Care For Patients Who Are Oppressed, Carolyn Mcleod, Susan Sherwin

Philosophy Publications

No abstract provided.

Future Philology! By Ulrich Von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff - Translated By G. Postl, B. Babich, And H. Schmid, Babette Babich

Articles and Chapters in Academic Book Collections

Ulrich von Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Möllendorff's

FUTURE PHILOLOGY! a reply to FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE’S Ordinarius Professor of Classical Philology at Basel „birth of tragedy“

Translated by Gertrude Postl, Babette E. Babich, and Holger Schmid (Greek and Latin translations by Babette Babich and Holger Schmid. Additional corrections to the Greek by James I. Porter and Alexander Nehamas)

Nietzsche And Eros Between The Devil And God’S Deep Blue Sea: The Problem Of The Artist As Actor–Jew–Woman, Babette Babich

Articles and Chapters in Academic Book Collections

In just one aphorism in The Gay Science, Nietzsche arrays “The Problem of the Artist” in a complex, highly reticulated constellation. Addressing every member of the excluded grouping of disenfranchised “others,” Nietzsche turns to the destitution of a god of love keyed to the self- or inward-turning absorption of the human heart. His ultimate and irrecusably tragic project to restore the innocence of becoming requires the affirmation of the problem of suffering as the task of learning how to love. Nietzsche sees the eros of art as what can teach us how to make things beautiful, desirable, lovable in the …

The Gay Science, David B. Allison

Research Resources

No abstract provided.

Catharine Beecher: America's First Female Philosopher And Theologian, Mark Hall

Faculty Publications - Department of History and Politics

No abstract provided.

The Good Of Agency, Lawrence C. Becker

Philosophy Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Disability, Strategic Action, And Reciprocity, Lawrence C. Becker

Philosophy Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Beautiful Knowledge, Or, Reproducing The University Again? Walter Benjamin And The Institution Of Knowledge, Graham Macphee

English Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Poetry, Life, Literature, Lawrence Kimmel

Philosophy Faculty Research

The question and theme of the poetry of life reaches deep into the essential questions of human existence. In the sense that poetry is the central core of literature, it is essential to the meaning of our lives. This question does not necessarily place human life, nor indeed biological life at the center of inquiry. We will examine the sense in which life itself is poetry, and great literature--in this essay we will refer only to that--is recognized by its capacity to capture and express that poetry. When it does this it penetrates to the heart of human accord and …

Crossblood: Literature And The Drama Of Survival, Lawrence Kimmel

Philosophy Faculty Research

Native Americans have witnessed the disappropriation of their lands and suffered the destruction of their way of life, yet have found strength to endure, to preserve their identities as a people through the communal character and power of their language and stories.

The Aesthetics Of Enchantment, Lawrence Kimmel

Philosophy Faculty Research

There are two preliminary things to be stated at the outset of any philosophical consideration of enchantment. First, traditional philosophy has been antagonistic toward the idea of enchantment: as a foundational discipline of reason, philosophy has defined itself in opposition to the non-rational. The main traditions of philosophy have regarded any form of discourse other than that centered in reason as alien, the other, as something which obscures or undermines those procedures which alone can determine knowledge and value. I presume here that enchantment would be considered “non-rational”, and also that such a designation is problematic in a number …

Paradox And Metaphor: An Integrity Of The Arts, Lawrence Kimmel

Philosophy Faculty Research

Art is movement, movement is life. Surprisingly, the spareness of paradox in art promotes a fullness of life. We must first speak as simply as possible about art as a fundamental human activity. Only then can we hope to say something of consequence about the so-called “fine arts” — which may be misleading as a description. In substance, the reference “fine art” simply means useless art: “fine” as being free from utility. Art is imaginatively productive, it makes something, whether painting, poem, or partita. But this making has no independent utility, and its character as a work of art …

Fantasy And Purchasing Power: The World Wide Web As A Utopian Space And The New Capitalist Arena, Cheyla Samuelson

Faculty Publications

A review of The World Wide Web and Contemporary Cultural Theory by Andrew Herman.

The Way Of Water And Sprouts Of Virtue, By Sarah Allan (Book Review), Jane Geaney

Religious Studies Faculty Publications

Sarah Allan, in The Way of Water and Sprouts of Virtue, explores the premise that linguistic concepts are rooted in culturally specific imagery. Allan argues that in the process of translation the target language inevitably grafts its own imagery onto the concepts of the original language. Therefore the translation process fails to capture the range of meaning and the structural relations between terms in the original language. Allan's work elaborates this point via an analysis of the metaphors related to water and plants in early Chinese philosophical thought.

"This Is Not A Christ": Nietzsche, Foucault, And The Genealogy Of Vision, Gary Shapiro

Philosophy Faculty Publications

There is nothing surprising about linking the names of Nietzsche and Foucault, something that Foucault himself frequently did. We know that the practices of archaeology and genealogy owe much to On the Genealogy of Morals; and in The Order of Things Foucault celebrates Nietzsche for being able to look beyond the epoch of "man and his doubles,'' thinking of the Obermensch as designating that which is beyond man, and for serving, along with Mallarme, as one of the prophets of the hegemony of language in the emerging episteme of the postmodern world. Here I want to focus on other affinities, …

From Evidence To Belief: Developmental Precursors For False Belief Ascriptions, Jill De Villiers, Angelika Kratzer, Tom Roeper

Philosophy: Faculty Publications

Recently, a fruitful line of inquiry has linked children’s acquisition of the language of the mind to their developing understanding of other minds. In particular, a cascade of linguistic effects regarding sentences embedded under mental verbs has been shown to occur around the age of four years for the average child, roughly the age when children start passing standard false belief tests. This set of linguistic effects is summarized briefly below. In the proposed study, we will turn our attention to possible precursors for the ability to ascribe a false belief to another person. These precursors include knowledge about how …

Language And Theory Of Mind: What Are The Developmental Relationships?, Jill De Villiers

Philosophy: Faculty Publications

In this chapter I will try to ground the claim, both theoretically and empirically, that false-belief reasoning requires a sophisticated command of syntax. One of the oldest philosophical questions asks whether one can have thinking without language, and if so, what are its limits? In the domain of theory of mind this question achieves new significance. Is this what distinguishes us from the rest of the animal kingdom? Is this what language is good for? And not just words, but syntax? The first section of this chapter grapples with the fundamental issue of the contribution language makes, if any, to …

The Possibility Of An Ethical Politics: From Peace To Liturgy, John Drabinski

Articles, Book Chapters, Essays

This essay examines the possibility of developing an ethical politics out of the work of Emmanuel Levinas. Levinas’ own work does not accomplish this kind of politics. He opts instead for a politics of peace, which, as this essay argues, falls short of the demands of the ethical. Thus, this essay both provides an account of Levinas’ own politics and develops resources from within Levinas’ own work for thinking beyond that politics. An alternative, liturgical politics is sketched out. In a liturgical politics, law must be thought on a redistributive model. Redistribution, it is argued, responds more adequately to the …