Philosophy Commons^™

Avoiding The Super-Naturalistic Fallacy: Practical Reasoning And The Insightful Undergraduate, Steven Gimbel

Philosophy Faculty Publications

It has become cliche to say that today's student are moral relativists. With the twin movements of ethics across the curriculum and critical thinking across the curriculum sweeping the Academy, one might think that we are in a good place to start making inroads towards creating careful and willing discussants of contemporary moral issues out of our students. Unfortunately, the reverse is far too often true. Associated with the standard sort of introduction to ethical theory, there is a regularly arising trap that brings with it the worst of all possible results - the alienation of our very best students …

Review Of Ivo Celho, Hermeneutics And Method: The "Universal Viewpoint" In Bernard Lonergan, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Review Of Reading Karl Marx, By Rainer Ganahl, Matthew Wolf-Meyer

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

No abstract provided.

Framing Intelligibility, Identity And Selfhood: A Reconsideration Of Spatio-Temporal Models, Sally Munt

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

The relationship between intelligibility and identity over the past thirty years has largely been approached through the linguistic construct of the subject. Proposing that our subjectivities be theoretically comprehended (made intelligible) as discursive effects is now common sense. Poststructuralism, following particularly Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and Jacques Lacan, has ensured that the subject is a cardinal category of contemporary thought; in any number of disciplines, it is one of the first concepts we teach to our undergraduates. But are we best served by continuing to insist on the intellectual primacy of the subject, formulated as it has been …

Method In Theology: Rahner And Lonergan On The 'Natural-Supernatural' Distinction, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

The Mind-Body Problem: A Tuberculosis/Tobacco Example, Ibpp Editor

International Bulletin of Political Psychology

This article illustrates two conflicts between what is, perhaps, best for the mind and best for the body.

Reading Well: The Key To The Core, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Contextual Unanimity And The Units Of Selection Problem, Stuart M. Glennan

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

Sober and Lewontin’s critique of genic selectionism is based upon the principle that a unit of selection should make a context‐independent contribution to fitness. Critics have effectively shown that this principle is flawed. In this paper I show that the context independence principle is an instance of a more general principle for characterizing causes,called the contextual unanimity principle. I argue that this latter principle, while widely accepted, is erroneous. What is needed is to replace the approach to causality characterized by the contextual unanimity criterion with an approach based on the concept of causal mechanism. After sketching such an approach, …

Reconciling Arguments About The Self-Preserving Soul With Evolutionary Theory, James M. Donovan

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Advocates of a self-preserving soul must somehow integrate that soul with an organic body which is the product of an evolutionary history. Efforts to resolve this version of the sorites paradox (at what point in the gradual evolution of Homo sapiens was the step taken from the soul-less to the ensouled?) can result in conflict between the two theories. The position is taken here that, given the standard of Popperian verisimilitude, any such conflict signals a weakness in the soul-theory, and not in evolutionism.

Five soul-theories (those by Plato, Aristotle, William of Auvergne, Hume, and Heidegger) are evaluated on three …

Lateral And Vertical Structures Of Politics: Psychological Movement And Principles Of The Natural Sciences. (Work In Progress), Ibpp Editor

International Bulletin of Political Psychology

This article discusses Dr. Ji-Young Kim's theory of mind, and the political implications of it.

Bernard Lonergan On A Catholic Liberal Arts Education, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Concepts: Core Readings, By Eric Margolis And Stephen Laurance, Robert Stainton

Philosophy Publications

No abstract provided.

"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, …

Difference In Sameness: Indeterminacy In Reflective Identity, Ron Rowe

Honors Capstone Projects and Theses

No abstract provided.

Nietzsche And Visuality, Gary Shapiro

Philosophy Faculty Publications

Those who take Friedrich Nietzsche's thoughts about the arts and related matters seriously have usually stressed his significance as a critic and theorist of literature, rhetoric, or music. From a biographical point of view, Nietzsche's notoriously poor eyesight would seem to make him a bad candidate to play a similar role with regard to the visual. His optical disability can also be turned into an asset by those who have been critical of the alleged ocularcentrism of Western thought. From that perspective, the philosophical tradition has been dominated by the model of what Plato called "the noblest of the senses," …

Consciousness And The Origins Of Thought, By Norton Nelkin, Robert Stainton

Philosophy Publications

No abstract provided.

Susanne K. Langer's Philosophy Of Mind, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Probable Causes And The Distinction Between Subjective And Objective Chance, Stuart M. Glennan

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

In this paper I present both a critical appraisal of Humphreys' probabilistic theory of causality and a sketch of an alternative view of the relationship between the notions of probability and of cause. Though I do not doubt that determinism is false, I claim that the examples used to motivate Humphreys' theory typically refer to subjective rather than objective chance. Additionally, I argue on a number of grounds that Humphreys' suggestion that linear regression models be used as a canonical form for the description of causal relations is untenable. I conclude by exploring the variety of ways in which probabilistic …

The Deflation Of Belief States, Robert Stainton

Philosophy Publications

A criticism of Arthur Collins' attempt to deflate beliefs states by treating them as merely correctness-making properties of persons.

Capacities, Universality And Singularity, Stuart M. Glennan

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

In this paper I criticize Cartwright's analysis of capacities and offer an alternative analysis. I argue that Cartwright's attempt to connect capacities to her condition CC fails because individuals can exercise capacities only in certain contexts. My own analysis emphasizes three features of capacities: 1) Capacities belong to individuals; 2) Capacities are typically not metaphysically fundamental properties of individuals, but can be explained by referring to structural properties of individuals; and 3) Laws are best understood as ascriptions of capacities.

Love Without Laziness: Eudaimonia, Medieval Understandings Of Acedia (Sloth), And Dante's Purgatorio Xvii-Xix, David Keck

Publications

A discussion of a person's delight in performing virtuous activities.

Pipe Dreams: Eternal Recurrence And Simulacrum And Foucault's Ekphrasis Of Magritte, Gary Shapiro

Philosophy Faculty Publications

Michel Foucault invokes Andy Warhol at the conclusion of This is Not a Pipe; this comes at the end of a chapter entitled 'Seven Seals of Affirmation,' so that the words must be read with a Nietzschean resonance (recalling Zarathustra's 'The Seven Seals'):

A day will come when, by means of similitude relayed indefinitely along the length of a series, the image itself, along with the name it bears, will lose its identity. Campbell, Campbell, Campbell, Campbell.

I propose to explore the approach to the visual here which proceeds by deploying or presupposing conceptions of similitude, simulacrum, eternal recurrence and …

Connectionism And The Philosophy Of Psychology, By T. Horgan And J. Tiensen, Robert Stainton

Philosophy Publications

No abstract provided.

The Emergence Of Alife, P.D. Quick

SWITCH

Interview with Kenneth E. Rinaldo, an artist who is on the Board of Directors of YLEM. Within this interview, many topics are covered, including artificial life, simulations, the meaning of art, spirituality, and television. The interview also goes into the personal work and life of Rinaldo, whose focus includes many of these subjects. Some of the more specific subjects include intelligence without consciousness, the combination of science and art, and Ken Rinaldo’s The Flock, an interactive A-Life sculpture.

Gnarled Defined, Rudy Rucker

SWITCH

The article is a reflection of the author’s conception of the term ‘gnarly’, extending the term’s meaning from its origins in California surfer slang. 'Gnarly' is often used in a colloquial context, however, the author believes that the term is able to be used in an academic field as it pertains to outcomes and results of equations. Discussions towards the application of the term 'gnarly' showcase how it can be used in a scientific, mathematical, and artistic context through seemingly random patterns. In order to be gnarly, things must lie and exist between the realm of orderly and chaotic often …

Wittgenstein On Freedom Of The Will, Grant Allen Marler

Institute for the Humanities Theses

This thesis is an exposition and clarification of two lectures on freedom of the will delivered by Ludwig Wittgenstein in 1939. Wittgenstein asks whether it makes sense to say that the "decision of a person was not free because it was determined by natural laws." I offer a brief explanation and defense of Wittgenstein's method of linguistic analysis, then proceed in its spirit. Associated with the words 'determined' and 'free' are certain pictures which, if misapplied, may lead us to misjudge their function. Among these are the picture of natural laws as "rails" that compel events, and that the meaning …

Individual, Group, And Paradox: Essentials Of The Social Bond, Alex Tonus

Honors Capstone Projects and Theses

No abstract provided.

Interview: Brenda Laurel, Jason Challas

SWITCH

This interview with Brenda Laurel, Virtual Reality (VR) author and thinker, discusses the applications and challenges of VR. Creating an emphatic experience using VR technology is possible, but the challenge lies in designing an environment that models the senses to stimulate emotions. VR enables experiences of different genders, but physiological differences between the sexes exist and are important to understand. However, technology used to create the environment and simulation of physical objects in VR is only in the developmental stage. Laurel believes in the importance of keeping the mind grounded in the physical body, in order to strengthen the appreciation …

What Bernard Lonergan Learned From Susanne K. Langer, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Computationalism And The Problem Of Other Minds, Stuart M. Glennan

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

In this paper I discuss Searle's claim that the computational properties of a system could never cause a system to be conscious. In the first section of the paper I argue that Searle is correct that, even if a system both behaves in a way that is characteristic of conscious agents (like ourselves) and has a computational structure similar to those agents, one cannot be certain that that system is conscious. On the other hand, I suggest that Searle's intuition that it is “empirically absurd” that such a system could be conscious is unfounded. In the second section I show …