Other Philosophy Commons^™

Recognition And Domination: A Hegelian Approach To Evolving Gender And Technology Paradigms, Zachary Davis

CMC Senior Theses

This paper aims to develop a strong account of recognition. It begins with a Hegel-inspired account of recognition as a fundamental desire that drives humanity. This account establishes recognition as fundamental to the initial subject formation of independent self-consciousnesses as agents. I offer the lord-bondsman dualism to provide a critique of domination as oppositional to securing the means for recognition. This entails that, as history progresses the world ought to move towards universally adopting mutual recognition relationships without domination. I adopt this goal as an ideal form of recognition. In Chapter 2, I apply this recognitional framework to gender. Through …

Ways In Which Indigenous People’S History In Canada Evince Epistemic Injustice And Resistance, Alisha Jacobs

Major Papers

When it comes to Western academia, Indigenous Peoples around the world have been and continue to be marginalized, especially in terms of representation within the literature. Therefore, this research paper will help remedy this issue by exploring epistemic injustice and the way in which epistemic injustice has and continues to harm Canada’s Indigenous Peoples. It will highlight four different lenses brought forward by Gaile Pohlhaus, Jr. as her framework allows for the representation of many different forms of epistemic injustice, while also acknowledging that no one approach is absolute. Resistance to epistemic injustice by the Indigenous Peoples will be addressed …

Japanese-English Translation: Nishida Kitarō––“Self-Determination Of The Eternal Now” 「永遠の今の自己限定」、西田幾多郎著（昭和六年七月） (July 1931) §1 Of 4; Complete Draft (Supersedes Draft Of 2 Jan 19); Translated By Christopher Southward; Revision And Expansion Underway, Christopher Southward

Comparative Literature Faculty Scholarship

Japanese-English Translation: Nishida Kitarō––“Self-Determination of the Eternal Now” (July 1931) 「永遠の今の自己限定」、西田幾多郎著（昭和六年七月）

§1 of 4; Complete Draft (Supersedes Draft of 2 Jan 2019)

Translated from the Japanese by Christopher Southward; Revision and Expansion Underway, October 2023

Being Curious With Secrecy, Clare Stevens, Elspeth Van Veeren, Brian Rappert, Owen D. Thomas

Secrecy and Society

This article contributes to ongoing attempts to broaden out theorizations of secrecy from an intentional and willful act of concealment to a cultural and structural process. We do so by fostering a conversation between secrecy and curiosity. This conversation is enabled through a review of central themes in secrecy studies and curiosity studies, but also through an examination of a collaboration between the science center “We the Curious” and a network of academic researchers. In doing so, this article makes a case for the benefits of paying more attention to curiosity as a means of facilitating a multifaceted understanding of …

The Psychedelic Dasein: Modelling The Effects Of Psilocybin With Heidegger’S Phenomenology, Eamon Robert Stuart Macdougall

Major Papers

This paper argues that the mystical experience induced by psilocybin (understood through the tradition of Heideggerian phenomenology) modulates the attuned understanding of oneself, the world, and how the individual relates to the world. This kind of particular experience is not accessible to the individual through ordinary consciousness, therefore psilocybin may give us access to a new kind of understanding. This understanding may offer a solution to the empirical deficiencies surrounding the short-term and long-term effects of psilocybin, such as how a meagre two to three high doses have yielded unprecedented results in the treatment of tobacco addiction, and in the …

Selfish, Jacopo Mavica

Senior Projects Spring 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

To Integrate Or To Assimilate: An Epistemic Analysis Of Racial Segregation In Education, Nandini Mittal

CMC Senior Theses

Color has been the demarcating factor in systematically separating particularly Black and white communities, insofar as barring access to education, housing, transportation, and basic civil rights. In the fight against segregation, and a movement towards integration, the area that this we have notoriously failed in is education. This paper is an opportunity to combine the practical with the epistemological (relating to beliefs about knowledge acquisition and validity) and question the hidden or coded elements that are associated with social integration. Where do we draw the line between the social integration and assimilation? I will be exploring the concept of epistemological …

History, Cognition And Nostromo: Conrad’S Explorations Of Torture, Trauma, And The Human Rage For Order, Richard Ruppel

English Faculty Articles and Research

Focusing on Joseph Conrad’s Nostromo, this essay historicizes the treatment of what we now call post-traumatic stress disorder, demonstrating how Conrad anticipated our current understanding and treatment of the illness. The second part of the essay addresses Nostromo’s treatment of historiography. Part three is concerned with epistemology and the relationship between neurological discoveries concerning the gap between perception and consciousness, relating those discoveries to Conrad’s use of delayed decoding.

The Pathology And Etiology Of Philosophy, Lydia Tucke

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

While much time is spent theorizing about philosophical concepts and theories, little thought has been given to the philosophy and psychology of philosophy itself. I argue that philosophy (or the act of philosophizing) should be considered a form of anxiety. I will examine whether or not philosophy should be evaluated as a mental disorder as well. Finally, I will explore the ways in which one can cope with the anxiety seen in philosophizing.

Who Gets To Know? Combating Colonial Epistemic Oppression, Timothy J. Cotter

Senior Independent Study Theses

This Independent Study thesis is divided into five chapters. In the introduction, I explain the focus of the paper. In the second chapter, “Landscapes of Epistemic Injustice,” I clarify the concept of epistemic injustice by breaking it down into hermeneutical injustice and testimonial injustice. I argue that we have obligations to each other as knowers and producers of knowledge, and the content of these obligations within a given situation depends upon the social position of both the speaker and the audience or audiences. In the third chapter, “Epistemic Oppression and Colonialism,” I contend that Western colonial projects frequently enact third-order …

Trust, Power, And Transformation In The Prison Classroom, Fran Fairbairn

Journal of Prison Education and Reentry (2014-2023)

This article does three things. First, it asks a new question about transformative education, namely ‘what is the role of power and trust in the decision of whether to transform one’s meaning scheme in the face of new information or whether to simply reject the new information?’ Secondly, it develops a five-stage model which elaborates on the role of this decision in transformative learning.[1] Finally, it uses grounded-theory and the five-stage model to argue that power and trust play an important role in facilitating transformative learning.

[1] This account should be thought of as complementary to (not exclusionary of) Mezirow’s …

Between Mysticism And Philosophical Rationality: Al-Ghazālī On The Reasons Of The Heart, Marilie Coetsee

Comparative Philosophy

In his seminal Orientalism and Religion (1999), Richard King argues that Western scholars of religion have constructed a conceptual dichotomy between “mysticism” and “rationality” that has caused them to systematically distort the claims and arguments of Eastern thinkers. While King focuses primarily on Western scholarship on the Buddhist and Hindu traditions, this essay shows that his argument can also be extended to apply to Western scholarship on al-Ghazālī, whose sympathy for Sufism and apparent rejection of Greek philosophy has often earned him the reputation of being a champion of Islamic mysticism. I argue that al-Ghazālī transcends the dueling categories of …

Introduction To Philosophy, Ryan Mcelhaney

Open Educational Resources

No abstract provided.

Mutual Aid As Spiritual Tacit Knowledge Within Doukhobor Epistemology, Rachel L. Neubuhr Torres

University Honors Theses

The relationship between Michael Polanyi’s concept of tacit knowledge and religion is a topic that is rarely explored. Applying tacit knowledge to the study of religion and spirituality allows us to think about how we connect with the world and how we address the concern of what one feels to be true of their existence, or existential intuition. In the latter half of the 1800s the Russian prince turned anarchist, Peter Kropotkin, wrote extensively on the theory of mutually beneficial cooperation, or mutual aid, as being one of the most important factors of evolution. As Kropotkin began writing his series …

Approaches To Narrative Instruction For Second Language Learners, Mathew Peters

MA TESOL Collection

Narratives have reemerged as a dominant form of rhetoric over the last fifty years. This dominant use of narrative discourse has only increased with the rise of social media. Walther Fisher (1987) proposed the narrative paradigm as a unifying theory of human communication. His major claim is that people are inherently storytellers and that people use a narrative rationality and a logic of good reasons to inform their beliefs, values, and actions. This paper utilizes his theories, along with recent findings in neuroscience, to establish an argument for greater inclusion of narratives into second language teaching. Narratives can have a …

El Cuerpo Como Principio De Exterioridad Un Análisis Acerca De La Unidad En La Intuición Espacial De La Estética Trascendental, Nestor Saúl Murillo Mejía

Filosofía y Letras

En este artículo se analizarán varias tesis expuestas por Kant acerca de la unidad del espacio. El objetivo principal es indagar acerca del carácter cognitivo de lo externo en la intuición y su relación con el espacio absoluto. Se defenderá la tesis según la cual el cuerpo, como principio de exterioridad, permite representar la unidad del espacio independientemente de cualquier síntesis categorial; es decir, la independencia epistémica, que hace de la intuición el fundamento subjetivo del conocimiento, permite que el espacio posea una unidad y realidad independiente de los conceptos.

Structure, Neutrostructure, And Antistructure In Science, Florentin Smarandache

Branch Mathematics and Statistics Faculty and Staff Publications

In any science, a classical Theorem, defined on a given space, is a statement that is 100% true (i.e. true for all elements of the space). To prove that a classical theorem is false, it is sufficient to get a single counter-example where the statement is false. Therefore, the classical sciences do not leave room for partial truth of a theorem (or a statement). But, in our world and in our everyday life, we have many more examples of statements that are only partially true, than statements that are totally true. The NeutroTheorem and AntiTheorem are generalizations and alternatives of …

Trusting In Order To Inspire Trustworthiness, Michael Pace

Philosophy Faculty Articles and Research

This paper explores the epistemology and moral psychology of “therapeutic trust,” in which one trusts with the aim of inspiring greater trust-responsiveness in the trusted. Theorists have appealed to alleged cases of rational therapeutic trust to show that trust can be adopted for broadly moral or practical reasons and to motivate accounts of trust that do not involve belief or confidence in someone’s trustworthiness. Some conclude from the cases that trust consists in having normative expectations and adopting vulnerabilities with respect to the trusted; others that trust involves accepting (without necessarily believing) that someone will prove trustworthy. Although there are, …

The People Who “Burn”: “Communication,” Unity, And Change In Belarusian Discourse On Public Creativity, Anton Dinerstein

Doctoral Dissertations

The main intellectual problem I address in this study is how everyday communication activates the relationship between creativity, conflict, and change. More specifically, I look at how the communication of creativity becomes a process of transformation, innovation, and change and how people are propelled to create through everyday communication practices in the face of conflict and opposition. To approach this problem, I use the case of communication in modern-day Belarus to show how creativity becomes a vehicle for and a source of new social and cultural routines among the independent grassroots communities and initiatives in Minsk. On one level, I …

Real Possibility: Modality And Responsibility, Julia Gaul

Honors Scholar Theses

Imagine: someone is backing out of a parking space and does not look in their rear view mirror. They subsequently hit a car that was passing by. One could argue that they simply could have avoided the accident had they looked in their mirror. This non-actual possibility, that they could have looked in the mirror, seems legally and morally relevant. One could also argue that they could have avoided the accident had they stuck their feet out of their window and sung La Marseillaise.

My leading questions is: how do we distinguish possibilities that are legally and morally relevant from …

Objectivity, Dagfinn Føllesdal

Comparative Philosophy

No abstract provided.

Wonder: A Phenomenological Exploration, Henry R. Kramer

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This paper presents a phenomenology of wonder through careful description of the internal state of wonder, defined here as “full engagement with something that bewilders you.” This phenomenology explores what is at stake in regards to our inhibitions toward wonder, how we can overcome those inhibitions, what the experience of wonder is like, and what effects wonder can have on our lives and ethical activity. This includes an investigation of the relationships between wonder and topics such as judgment, attention, engagement, imagination, play, and our ethical treatment of the more-than-human world. This paper demonstrates that by cultivating wonder we are …

In Defense Of Non-Anthropocentrism—A Relational Account Of Value And How It Can Be Integrated, Ian I. Weckler

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Climate change has been show to be caused by humans. Human-centric behaviors have affected the world to the extent that many believe we have entered a new geologic epoch. This epoch— the Anthropocene—has prompted exploration into the ethical relationship between humans and the rest of the world. We know that a purely anthropocentric ethical system of values has lead ecological imbalance and environmental destruction, and that a non-anthropocentric (or humancentric) ethical system of value would be better suited for maintaining and regaining a habitable environment. However, past conceptions of non anthropocentrism have relied on abstract conceptions of value that fail …

Ephesians And Ecumenism, Toby Eisenberg

Religious Studies Theses and Dissertations

Christian ecumenism has made great strides during the twentieth century but is now widely seen as needing a new path. Avery Dulles has proposed an “exchange of gifts” notion of dialogue in which the participant churches share their understanding of the Christian life and all of the reasons they have for holding their particular doctrines and practices, drawing on whatever normative sources they believe are appropriate. The approach enables the participants to bear testimony in love in the hopes that they may better understand and appreciate each other more fully, thereby opening a path to increased doctrinal consensus and thus …

Beyond Rigidity: The Unfinished Semantic Agenda Of Naming And Necessity, By Scott Soames, Heimir Geirsson

Heimir Geirsson

n Naming and Necessity Saul Kripke criticized descriptivist theories of proper names and suggested a ‘better picture’ as a replacement. But while the ‘better picture’ that Kripke provided was very interesting and stimulating, it was little more than a sketch of a theory that needed much work and refinement. While Kripke argued that proper names are not synonymous with definite descriptions or clusters of definite descriptions, he was silent on what the semantic contents of names might be. Further, he even speculated in the introduction to his book that the apparatus of propositions might break down given his arguments, thus …

Justification And Ways Of Believing, Heimir Geirsson

Heimir Geirsson

One of the issues that has been hotly discussed in connection with the direct designation theory is whether or not coreferential names can be substituted salva veritate in epistemic contexts. Some direct designation theorists believe that they can be so substituted. Some direct designation theorists and all Fregeans and neo-Fregeans believe that they cannot be so substituted. Fregeans of various stripes have used their intuition against free substitution to argue against the direct designation theory. Some direct designation theorists have used the same intuitions to argue against the view that belief reports of simple declarative sentences can be accounted for …

The Reliable Revisionist, Caitlyn Schaffer

Philosophy: Student Scholarship & Creative Works

The present text explores how the topic of head and heart is much more complicated than one would expect, according to Paul Henne and Walter Sinnot-Armstrong, contributors of Neuroexistentialism. “Does Neuroscience Undermine Morality” aims at figuring out the problem of which moral judgments we can trust, judgments from one’s head (revisionism) or judgments from one’s heart (conservatism). My hypothesis suggests the opposite of the authors, I believe that if you are a revisionist, your first order intuitions are reliable. After setting the framework, I make three main arguments. (A.) If you are able to self-correct then you can identify errors …

Replies To Laura Guerrero, Rachanna Kamtekar, And Jennifer Nagel, Ethan A. Mills

Comparative Philosophy

No abstract provided.

Classical Indian Skepticism: Reforming Or Rejecting Philosophy, Jennifer Nagel

Comparative Philosophy

No abstract provided.

Don’T Stop Believing: An Argument Against Buddhist Skepticism, Laura Guerrero

Comparative Philosophy

No abstract provided.