Philosophy Commons^™

Translation In And Of Philosophy, Hussein Barrada

Theses and Dissertations

Paul Ricoeur in his essay The Paradigm of Translation, presents an understanding of translation that is found between two positions that are irreconcilable. These two positions represent on the one hand, the difference that exists between languages and on the other hand, the common ground that languages must have for them to be translatable into one another. Following Ricoeur’s paradigm, the thesis will aim to unpack an understanding of translation as a tension that occurs between its theoretical impossibility and the reality of its everyday practice. The theoretical impossibility of translation lies in the fact that for one language …

Language As The Medium: A Literature Review. Harnessing The Prolific Power Of Dramatic Language As A Therapeutic Tool In Drama Therapy, Edward Freeman

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

Language in and of the theatre, with its palate of variegated writing styles and playwrights from throughout time, has the potential to be harnessed, focused, and systematized for use as a therapeutic tool within drama therapy – the field’s artistic medium. Drama therapy could benefit from having a specific medium germane to its artform which has the potential to provide practitioners with a common resource and means of communication, assessment, diagnosis, and treatment planning, as well as align the field with other creative arts therapies. Language encompasses all forms of human communication – speaking, writing, signing, gesturing, expressing facially – …

Placing God: Defining “Post-Christianity” For Contemporary Japanese Christians, Leryan Anthony Burrey

Master's Projects and Capstones

This work suggests that we consider a new, working definition of post-Christianity. This new paradigm is in response to Western Christian thought being too dominant a force that fails to take into enough account other global experiences— like those of Japanese Christians. These reflections are based on scholarly opinions claiming that Christianity is a “global culture,” and ultimately argues for more international inclusivity in Western Christian thought and institutions, especially regarding the Asia-Pacific. Moreover, this paper illuminates how iitoko dori allows Christian thought to peacefully coexist in Japan’s greater society. The research also explores specific Japanese cultural practices that make …

The Feeling Of Foam & Other Essays, Ryan Erickson

Graduate School of Art Theses

I create conceptual drawings, collages, sculptures, and installations to humorously destabilize and ultimately question how human language, formal methodologies, and social institutions function. While seemingly embracing an aesthetic of rationality, I undermine it with absurdity. In my work, I take a fundamentally dialectical position by skewering the rational to the illogical as neither can exist without the other.

How To Have Impossible Conversations: A Practical Review, J. T. Byrd, Brant Wenger

Liberty Theological Review

Boghossian, Peter & James Lindsay. How to Have Impossible Conversations: A Very Practical Guide. NY: Lifelong Books, 2019. Kindle. 234 pp. $16.99

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 …

Review Of Lorraine Daston's Against Nature, Kyle Johannsen

Between the Species

Lorraine Daston's Against Nature seeks to explain why, in spite of compelling objections to the contrary, human beings continue to invest nature with moral authority. More specifically, she claims that our propensity to moralize nature is traceable in part to human nature. Though I criticize Daston for not paying adequate attention to John Stuart Mill's narrow sense of 'nature', I also highly recommend her book.

Circle Of Circles: Rethinking Idealism Through Hegel's Epistemology, Sila Ozkara

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation’s central thesis is that Hegel’s approach to knowledge and philosophy is “circular”. A “circle of circles”, Kreis von Kreisen, an image Hegel regularly uses throughout his corpus, has sustained a steady wonder in his commentators. Nevertheless, it has not been studied with rigor adequate to its extensive importance, which spans his philosophical career and frames his engagement with the history of philosophy and the philosophy of his time. Due attention to Hegel’s concept of circles provides a robust frame for grasping his philosophical project, idealism, and account of knowledge. The content of each of Hegel’s works is the …

Nietzsche, Foucault, Power: A Study Of Paradox And Ontology In Nietzsche, Nicholas R. Ray

Honors Thesis

This thesis investigates a paradox at the heart of Nietzsche and utilizes Foucault as an instrument to understand this dilemma. The paradox is the synthesis of Nietzsche's doctrine of perspectivism and his ontological doctrine of the will to power. Put simply his doctrine of perspectivism says there can be no ontological facts yet Nietzsche articulates the will to power as an ontological matter of fact. This thesis explores the "First Essay" of Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals to demonstrate the existence of this paradox. Further, I will conduct a Foucauldian cross-examination to further flesh out this paradox, where and why it …

On Narrative Approaches To Conspiracy Theory, John Hydrisko

Honors Theses

This thesis handles narrative approaches to conspiracy theory. It provides an overview of conspiracy theory and narrative before affirming a relationship between the two. It then introduces Fenster’s work on conspiracy narrative before engaging with the considerations therein. After discussing the tradition of visualizing narrative structure, it applies these practices to conspiracy narrative. This application allows for a discussion of recent innovations within conspiracy narrative. By using the QAnon as a case study, the paper investigates the emergence of protagonism and non-narrativism within the genre. Ultimately, this investigation suggests that contemporary conspiracy narrative is both better suited to the modern …

The Seen And The Known, The Visible And The Invisible, Jeff Wasch

Philosophy Student Work

In this project I make the argument that we never really see what we know. What I have found is that there are two fundamentally different kinds of content which make up experience. The first kind of content is the phenomenological content of experience. This content is purely passive and is constructed by our sensory organs. In short, phenomenological content constructs a perceptual field which is what is seen. The second kind of content is the semantic content of experience. This content is deployed by our conceptual and linguistic capabilities which stems from the fact that humans are fundamentally social, …

Warrant And Non-Function: A Critique Of The Sensus Divinitatis In Plantinga's Reformed Epistemology, Lukas Merrell

Theses

In recent years, there has been a surge in attempting to demonstrate how a theistic belief can be held rationality apart from classical proofs. Championed by philosophers such as Alvin Plantinga and Nicholas Wolterstorff. Reformed Epistemology attempts to defend a God-belief as properly basic, which is therefore justified and warranted apart from traditional argumentation. With this in view, he put forward a position of religious epistemology that attempts to show how a GB can be on par with other beliefs we have on a daily basis that are considered rational, even if devoid of argumentation. In this paper I focus …

American Absurdity: Reconciling Conceptions Of The Absurd In European And American Literature, Benjamin Spencer

Senior Theses

This thesis aims to examine the development of the concept of the absurd in literature across different time periods and cultural contexts. The absurd, as defined by Camus, is the gap between humanity’s desire to understand the world and the impossibility of doing so.

However, the ways in which the absurd is recognized as an aspect of existence depends heavily on the sociological contexts in which an individual lives. By analyzing the works of absurdist authors, filmmakers, and artists across time, we can track the development of these absurdist conceptions in both Europe and American literary movements.

Looking at these …

Walking As A Way Of Knowing: An Autoethnography Of Embodied Inquiry, Lauriel-Arwen Amoroso

Dissertations and Theses

The purpose of this study was to understand and describe the role of walking in my own ways of knowing and to explore how walking itself is an epistemological process by using personal narrative to examine and story my experience. I used an embodied narrative research method, known as evocative autoethnography, in which I explored my own innate ways of knowing, including intellectual, embodied, emotional, and spiritual knowledge. I collected data using field notes, reflective journaling, reviewing past writing, and artistic interpretations of experiences such as photography and poetry. I compiled my data into a series of short essays, stories, …

What Documents Cannot Do: Revisiting Michael Polanyi And The Tacit Knowledge Dilemma, C. Sean Burns

Information Science Faculty Publications

Our culture is dominated by digital documents in ways that are easy to overlook. These documents have changed our worldviews about science and have raised our expectations of them as tools for knowledge justification. This article explores the complexities surrounding the digital document by revisiting Michael Polanyi’s theory of tacit knowledge—the idea that “we can know more than we can tell.” The theory presents to us a dilemma: if we can know more than we can tell, then this means that the communication of science via the document as a primary form of telling will always be incomplete. This dilemma …

A Glitch In The Matrix, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of A Glitch in the Matrix (2021), directed by Rodney Ascher.

Motivation And The Primacy Of Perception : Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology Of Knowledge, Peter Antich

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenological notion of motivation advances a compelling alternative to the empiricist and rationalist assumptions that underpin modern epistemology.

Arguing that knowledge is ultimately founded in perceptual experience, Peter Antich interprets and defends Merleau-Ponty’s thinking on motivation as the key to establishing a new form of epistemic grounding. Upending the classical dichotomy between reason and natural causality, justification and explanation, Antich shows how this epistemic ground enables Merleau-Ponty to offer a radically new account of knowledge and its relation to perception. In so doing, Antich demonstrates how and why Merleau-Ponty remains a vital resource for today’s epistemologists.

A Defense Of Locke’S Moral Epistemology, Jamie J. Hardy

Philosophy Faculty Publications and Presentations

In An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, John Locke provides an empirical account of all of our ideas, including our moral ideas. However, Locke’s account of moral epistemology is difficult to understand leading to mistaken objections to his moral epistemological theory. In this paper, I offer what I believe to be the correct account of Locke’s moral epistemology. This account of his moral epistemology resolves the objections that morality is not demonstrable, that Locke’s account fails to demonstrate the normativity of statements, and that Locke has not provided us with the means to determine the correctness of the moral rules.

It's Funny 'Cause It's True: The Lighthearted Philosophers’ Society’S Introduction To Philosophy Through Humor, Jennifer Marra Henrigillis, Steven Gimbel

Open Educational Resources

It's Funny 'Cause It's True is an introductory text in philosophy exploring logic, metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, and aesthetics through questions in the philosophy of humor. Subfields receive a substantive introduction with interactive essays written to be accessible to undergraduates.

The Economic And Philosophic Manuscripts Of Data, Sage D. Young

CMC Senior Theses

Society is filled with words and images that elucidate the positive force radiating from technology entities. I push back against this imprecise and inaccurate narrative by breaking down the illusions created by surveillance capitalism. I argue that there exists a unique relationship between an individual and their environment in creating value, especially in the form of data. This relationship tears down the smokescreens prompted up by the surveillance state because it demonstrates the costs of technology and surveillance capitalism. I found that how data is created and made monetarily valuable has significant, adverse repercussions on the capability to flourish as …

On The Wrongs Of Fake News, Samuel Fiske

CMC Senior Theses

While fake news has become a hot political issue in the past years, it presents novel and apolitical philosophical problems that are often neglected. This paper explores the epistemic and moral wrong of fake news, drawing on work from Immanuel Kant, Seana Shiffrin, and Miranda Fricker to explain exactly why fake news is so problematic. I argue that creating and sharing fake news violates Kant’s Categorical Imperative because it cannot be willed into a universal law and because it fails to respect rational agents as ends in themselves. I also argue that fake news presents distinct epistemic harms as it …

Ecological And Holistic Analysis Of The Epistemic Value Of Law Libraries, Paul D. Callister, Dana Neacsu

Law Faculty Publications

We examine the libraries' roles within the "epistemic foundation of society.” Our analysis is in response to the omission of Yale Law Dean Gerken of the role of libraries in her recent article about legal education's new focus and to remarks by AALS President Vicki Jackson that suggest an uncertain role for libraries. We have adapted holistic ecological media theory, as developed by Ronald Deibert, to reject a technologically deterministic view of libraries as having no future. We have considered the role of law libraries in the social epistemology or cognitive authority of the legal community, the role of law …

Wisdom, Not Veritism, Shane Ryan

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In this response to Pritchard's "In Defence of Veritism", I defend the view that it is wisdom rather than truth that is fundamental in epistemology. Given that recent philosophical discussions of the nature of wisdom may be unfamiliar to some epistemologists, a brief overview of these discussions is provided and that which is relevant for the subsequent discussion in this piece is highlighted. I explain that scholars working on the topic tend to accept that wisdom comprises at least one familiar epistemic standing and that, unlike other epistemic goods, wisdom is thought to be tied to a narrowly specified content. …

Non-Indian Reservations, Joshua Matthew Rosenau

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This thesis is a skeptical treatment of the logical distinctions presumed to exist between “Indian” and “non-Indian” people. Despite representing 99 percent of the U.S. population, “non-Indians” represent a legal identity which has no explicit definition. The basis for the U.S. Supreme Court’s decisions regarding non-Indians and Indians rests not on any objective, empirical or logical criterion or proof, but rather on the “assumption of a ‘guardian-ward’ status. This thesis investigates this assumption, and recommends that we suspend judgment on whether the difference between “Indians” and “non-Indians” can be determined either by logical argument or by legal assumption.

Automating Autism: Disability, Discourse, And Artificial Intelligence, Os Keyes

The Journal of Sociotechnical Critique

As Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems shift to interact with new domains and populations, so does AI ethics: a relatively nascent subdiscipline that frequently concerns itself with questions of “fairness” and “accountability.” This fairness-centred approach has been criticized for (amongst other things) lacking the ability to address discursive, rather than distributional, injustices. In this paper I simultaneously validate these concerns, and work to correct the relative silence of both conventional and critical AI ethicists around disability, by exploring the narratives deployed by AI researchers in discussing and designing systems around autism. Demonstrating that these narratives frequently perpetuate a dangerously dehumanizing model …

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 …

Building Bridges: Epistemic Violence And Mother–Daughter Pedagogies From The U.S.–Mexico Border, Tanya J. Gaxiola Serrano, Elvia Serrano

Journal of Critical Scholarship on Higher Education and Student Affairs

Living in the U.S.–Mexico borderlands, residents have intimately learned about the impact of the militarized policing of the physical border on their lives. While not often discussed, the policing transcends the border institution and targets the ways of knowing of People and Immigrants of Color. This essay features pláticas between two Mexican women educators from the border, la frontera, to challenge epistemic violence on the lives of U.S. Chicanas/Latinas. Intergenerational pedagogies of a mother–daughter dyad from the Tijuana–San Diego region serve as exemplars of the survival and resistance found in the borderlands. The narratives highlight their unique experiences, one as …

Medieval Thinking In The 21st Century: Crystal Balls, Black Swans, And Darwin's Finches In The Time Of Corona, George Conesa

The International Journal of Ecopsychology (IJE)

Twenty years into the 21st Century, a sizable swath of the world populace thinks, makes decisions, and defines itself in a conflicted and contradictory chimera. Millions of individuals make use of cutting-edge technologies while simultaneously throwing salt over their shoulders and consulting with the local ‘healer’ about any number of illnesses--to caricaturize, a sort of medieval-thinker-tech-savvy orientation. It is here affirmed that the practical consequences of this agentic amalgamation, modes of thinking, and “being in the world” are counterproductive at best and self-defeating at worst, resulting in much uncertainty and leading to, for example, mixed messages in public health …

Skeptical Buddhism As Provenance And Project, James Mark Shields

Faculty Contributions to Books

The past century and a half has seen various attempts in both Asia and the West to reform or re-conceptualize Buddhism by adding a simple, often provocative, qualifier. This paper examines some of the links between “secular,” “critical,” “sceptical,” and “radical” Buddhism in order to ascertain possibilities in thinking Buddhism anew as a 21st-century “project” with philosophical, ethical, and political resonance. In particular, I am motivated by the question of whether “sceptical” Buddhism can coexist with Buddhist praxis, conceived as an engaged response to the suffering of sentient beings in a globalized and neoliberal industrial capitalist world order. Let …