Philosophy Commons^™

From Linguistic Domination To Counter-Power: The Weaponisation And Reappropriation Of Language In Shakespeare's Drama, Md. Abu Bakkar

Journal of Language, Literature, and Arts

Studies of language and power in Shakespeare usually treat colonial, psychological, political, and familial domination as separate problems belonging to separate plays. This article asks what happens when the target of linguistic domination takes up, repeats, or withholds the discourse through which domination is exercised. It proposes linguistic counter-power as a comparative analytical concept: a change in who can define, command, or be believed within the dramatic world that outlasts and exceeds the speaker’s own act of resistance. The concept is distinguished from discursive resistance, linguistic agency, counter-discourse, and resignification, and is operationalised through three tests: uptake, durability, and structural …

Multiple Insights Into Affective Sentience, Jon Mallatt, Todd E. Feinberg

Animal Sentience

We discuss some of the many valuable insights into affective sentience from Birch’s The Edge of Sentience, such as its eight criteria for determining which entities have sentience (e.g., emotions) and its insights into the difficulty of testing whether an Artificial Intelligence system has attained sentience. We add our own perspectives on why the eight criteria are valid, on the difficulty of using behavioral trade-offs to determine whether an animal has sentience, and why evolutionary theory says consciousness is not an epiphenomenon.

Stepping Toward The Edge, Rony Hirschhorn, Niccolò Negro, Liad Mudrik

Animal Sentience

The Edge of Sentience asks us to shift from asking whether an entity is sentient to whether it is a sentience candidate. Candidacy then motivates a debate about proportionate precautions, which Birch argues should be settled by citizens’ panels. This raises the question of what citizens bring to such a debate: what they attribute to entities, how they treat those entities, and how these vary depending on both the attributor and the entity in question. We report survey findings bearing on each question and ask what follows for the composition of the panels entrusted with these judgments.

Could 'Real Existing Ai' Be Sentient?, Tim Crane

Animal Sentience

Jonathan Birch is rightly sceptical about the idea that today’s AI machines (e.g. LLMs) are candidates for sentience. Nonetheless, he gives three reasons for taking the future possibility of AI sentience seriously. I dispute them all. Birch fails to distinguish the very idea of an artificial mind from computational AI (what I call ‘Real Existing AI’); he does not adequately distinguish a simulation from a replica or copy; and he fails to acknowledge that the appeal to computational functionalism in this context is straightforwardly question-begging.

Artificial Sentience: From Computational Functionalism To Behaviourism?, Wanja Wiese

Animal Sentience

I critically examine Jonathan Birch’s account of how brain emulations might create artificial sentience candidates, arguing that his account risks collapsing into a behaviourist account, unless the specific computational processes realised by such emulations are carefully considered. Drawing on examples from computational neuroscience, I show that similar behaviours can arise from vastly different computational processes, thereby undermining the suggestion to focus on behaviourial profiles to determine whether a brain emulation of a sentience candidate is itself a sentience candidate.

Sacred Loss And Moral Authority: Religious Leadership And Identity Reconstruction In Post-Conflict Societies, Kimberly C. Kennedy

Interdisciplinary Journal of Leadership Studies

This paper examines how religious leaders shape narratives of identity formation and reconciliation in post-civil conflict societies where violence, defeat, or political transition produces moral injury and crises of meaning. By drawing on themes of justice, forgiveness, and accountability, religious leadership can wield moral authority to influence public perception, guide healing processes, and support transitions from active conflict to more stable forms of peace. The paper explores how religious leaders reframe narratives of defeat, particularly in cases where a community’s cause was endowed with sacred meaning, creating a crisis of faith. It argues that this work is best understood as …

The Algorithmic Narcissus: Ai Validation And The Atrophy Of The 'Athletic' Social Self, Ilham Phalosa Reswara, Anggi Mayangsari

Jurnal Psikologi Sosial

Artificial intelligence systems designed around continuous affirmation and minimal friction are becoming increasingly prominent as social and relational partners in everyday life. This article examines how sustained interaction with such frictionless AI systems may reshape the developmental conditions under which social selfhood forms and is maintained. Drawing on Cooley's (1902) looking glass self, Kohut's (1971) concept of optimal frustration, and the developmental literature on social competence, the article argues that frictionless AI may distort the social mirror through which identity forms, remove the manageable frustration that appears necessary for psychological growth, weaken empathic capacity, and erode the social stakes that …

Grief As A Constitutive Shadow Of Queer Joy: Reclaiming Negativity And The Ethics Of Staying For Education Research, Akira Sawata

Journal of Queer and Trans Studies in Education

In education scholarship, authors have increasingly called to center queer joy to disrupt the conventional deficit model that normally accompanies queer communities. However, in this paper, I argue that an exclusive emphasis on joy may risk instituting and normalizing a happiness duty that marginalizes negative affects and subjects. I propose queer grief not as an opposite, but as a constitutive shadow of joy. Drawing on theories of queer, trans, and crip negativity and the studies on loss, grief, and mourning, I critique the imperative to mobilize affect solely for future utility and teleological meaning. I contend that such mobilization-driven …

Birch On Fetal Sentience, Claudia Passos-Ferreira

Animal Sentience

Birch proposes that human fetuses be recognized as sentience candidates from 12 weeks, on the grounds that midbrain-centered theories fall within the zone of reasonable disagreement among theories of consciousness. I raise a methodological and a policy problem for his view. Methodologically, whether the midbrain-centered view belongs within the zone is disputed, so there is no consensus about the consensus.  Furthermore, the evidence Birch discusses for 12 weeks does not actually estimate the onset of sentience; the proposed threshold tracks anatomical rather than functional onset. On policy, the US Supreme Court’s Dobbs ruling shows that fetal sentience is difficult to …

Moral Ecology In Shakespeare's Tragedies: Nature, Animals, And Conscience As Ethical Agents In Hamlet, Macbeth, And King Lear, Md. Abu Bakkar

Journal of Language, Literature, and Arts

Shakespeare's tragedies repeatedly dramatize a universe in which moral transgression produces consequences that extend beyond individual psychology to affect society, nature, and the non-human world. This study examines how Hamlet, Macbeth, and King Lear construct a system of moral ecology, understood as a framework of ethical causality in which human actions generate interconnected consequences across psychological, social, and natural orders. Using qualitative close reading informed by moral criticism, ecocriticism, animal studies, and early modern cosmology, the study analyzes selected passages representing natural disturbance, animal imagery, and conscience as forms of ethical response. The findings show that the three …

The Lived Liturgical Experience Of Non-Catholic Participants In The Roman Catholic Mass: Tactical Ecumenism In Overlapping Ritual Systems, Sarah Kathleen Johnson

Journal of Global Catholicism

In religiously diverse social contexts, liturgical practices anchored in one reli-

gious tradition often gather diverse communities. In such contexts, it is wise to

assume that people who are not Catholic may be present at any Roman Cath-

olic Mass. This article explores the lived liturgical experience of non-Catholic

Christians who participate routinely in the Roman Catholic Mass through a

mixed-methods study of a religiously diverse treble vocal ensemble that sings

weekly at Mass on a Catholic university campus. It describes how Catholic and

non-Catholic Christian singers interpret practices surrounding the eucharistic

meal in contrasting ways: non-Catholic Christians experience the …

Negotiating Plurality: Korean Catholic Funerals As Lived Religion, Jieun Han

Journal of Global Catholicism

This article examines Korean Catholic funeral rites through the lenses of ritual

guidebooks and lived religion, arguing that Catholic funerary practice in Korea

has emerged through sustained engagement with Confucian and Buddhist tradi-

tions as well as modern nationalism. Focusing on Catholic manuals such as the

Sangjang yesik [Rites for Mourning and Funerals] and related texts, it traces how

officially sanctioned liturgical forms coexist with, accommodate, and reinterpret

indigenous ritual logics surrounding mourning, burial, ancestor veneration, and

care for the dead. Rather than viewing Korean Catholic funerals as a simple

localization of Roman rites, the article conceptualizes them as a …

Editor's Introduction, Brent H. Otto S.J.

Journal of Global Catholicism

No abstract provided.

Ai-Supported Analysis Of Jury Deliberation Impact Factors, Jennifer Siciliani Phd

Generative AI Teaching Activities

Students conduct a controlled, two-run generative AI jury simulation to examine how a single socio-legal variable affects simulated jury deliberation. They compare and manually code the AI-generated outcomes against peer-reviewed human jury research to evaluate the model’s accuracy, limitations, and potential biases.

Allyship And Affect: Qualitative Investigations Into Social Transformation, Michael Lucinda Jane Greer

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Allies have faced several critiques in feminist philosophy. Some have argued that they lack the requisite political interests to be motivated to dismantle the social structures from which they stand to benefit. Others have argued that the epistemic limitations resulting from their social privilege are insurmountable. Yet others have argued that allyship is too individualistic a concept, preferring a more collectivist concept like solidarity. However, there remain privileged individuals who understand themselves as complicit in perpetuating oppressive forms of life, and who wish to transform themselves and work in coalition across difference to dismantle structural oppression. How ought these individuals …

Panopticism And Pan-Oticism: Sound-Power From Foucault To Deleuze, Eric Dillenberger

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

From Muzak to long range acoustic devices (LRADs), the contemporary proliferation of sonic technologies for governing moods, behaviors, and potentialities complicates the virtual absence of sound within Michel Foucault's primarily visual modality of disciplinary power in Discipline and Punish, exemplified by his central conceptual model of the panopticon. This thesis develops the corollary concept of pan-oticism to theorize the transformation of sound-power and its political function within administered sonic ecologies from Foucault's disciplinary societies to Gilles Deleuze's societies of control. Within the enclosed spaces constitutive of disciplinary societies, sound-power remains subordinated to Foucault's visual logic of panopticism, extending …

Pendidikan Sebagai Pengasingan: Politik Kolonial Terhadap Keluarga Singamangaraja Pasca-1907, Uli Kozok

Paradigma: Jurnal Kajian Budaya

This article examines the post-1907 trajectories of the family of Singamangaraja following the death of Ompu Pulo Batu and the final military campaign of the Dutch colonial state in the Batak lands. It traces how the colonial government integrated his widows and children into the colonial order through internment, Christianisation, exile, and education in Java. Drawing on colonial archives, contemporary newspapers, and mission reports, the article reconstructs the life trajectories of the five surviving sons of Singamangaraja and situates them within the framework of colonial strategies of conquest and stabilisation. The study shows that these policies combined elements of protection, …

Shaping Disease: Colonial Stigma And The Politics Of Health In Banyuwangi, The Early Twentieth Century, Rifa'i Shodiq Fathoni, Skriptyan Noor Hidayatullah Syuhri, Vini’Matu Hikmah, Ardhita Zahra Namira

Paradigma: Jurnal Kajian Budaya

This article examines the colonial stigma attached to Banyuwangi as an “unhealthy region” in the early 20th century, a label used to justify massive exploitation of its natural resources. Using a historical method, this research analyzes how this stigma not only served as a tool for colonial legitimation but also causatively created conditions that triggered ecological disasters and a public health crisis in a previously isolated area. Through an analysis of primary sources such as colonial reports, health journals, and newspapers, this article traces how large-scale plantation exploitation, enabled by the stigma, led to deforestation, uncontrolled labor migration, and poor …

Universalism And Exclusion: Immigrants Through The Lens Of French Law And Media, George Mikhael Taliak, Abellia Anggi Wardani

Paradigma: Jurnal Kajian Budaya

This research examines France’s Immigration Law LOI n°2024-42 du 26 janvier 2024 and its representation in three mainstream media outlets across the ideological spectrum: Le Figaro (right), CCFD-Terre Solidaire (left), and France Info (center). Using Critical Discourse Analysis (Fairclough, 1995) and Maurice Halbwachs’s theory of collective memory, the study explores how legal and media discourses construct symbolic and administrative boundaries of national citizenship. Findings reveal that integration is framed not as civic inclusion, but as the internalization of a singular national identity and memory. Media reinforce this framework through divergent but convergent discursive strategies. At the macro level, the law …

Transmutation Of Psychological Phenomena (Academic Burnout And Fomo) Into Cyanotype Art Creation, Zulfan Ali Mujtaba, Adi Kuntoro

Paradigma: Jurnal Kajian Budaya

The pressure of hustle culture and the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) in the digital era have triggered an escalation of academic burnout among students, demanding alternative psychological recovery interventions beyond verbal clinical approaches. This research aims to explore the creation of alternative Cyanotype photography as a medium for catharsis and resistance against toxic productivity. Utilizing a Practice-Based Research methodology with an autoethnographic approach, data were extracted from the researcher's subjective experiences and transmuted into a visual artifact titled "Metamorfosis yang Lelah". The cultural studies approach and wabi-sabi aesthetics are specifically applied to analyze visual elements in the Prussian Blue …

From Mandala To Palace: The Transformation Of Kidung Artati Into Ranggasutrasna Version Of Serat Kidungan From The Surakarta, Agung Kriswanto, I Made Suparta

Paradigma: Jurnal Kajian Budaya

This article examines the transformation of Kidung Artati from the Merapi–Merbabu milieu into the version preserved in Serat Kidungan compiled by Ranggasutrasna in the Surakarta court. The study aims to trace the process of textual transmission and ideological transformation that occurred when a kidung originating in an ascetic milieu was incorporated into a later courtly literary context. The sources used in this research consist of Kidung Artati and Kidung Rumeksa Ing Wengi from the Merapi–Merbabu manuscripts, as well as the Ranggasutrasna version of Serat Kidungan. The method applied is textual criticism and comparative textual analysis in order to identify …

Fashion, Lifestyle, And Symbolic Capital: Identity And Resistance In Eka Kurniawan’S Beauty Is A Wound, Dewi Meyrasyawati, Cysakaren Diva Pratiwi, Nisar Ul-Haq

Paradigma: Jurnal Kajian Budaya

This study examines how fashion culture and lifestyle, understood as modes of self presentation, social performance, and everyday practice, operate as tools of identity construction and resistance in Eka Kurniawan’s Beauty Is a Wound. The objective is to reveal how beauty, personal choices, and public perception function as symbolic capital in negotiating gendered power relations, class hierarchies, and political constraints. Using close textual analysis, the research explores how female characters, particularly Dewi Ayu, mobilize appearance, behavior, and life decisions to challenge dominant ideologies and redefine their roles in society. The findings show that fashion culture in the novel extends beyond …

Pengantar Dari Editor Paradigma: Jurnal Kajian Budaya Vol. 16 No. 2 (2026), Rahayu Surtiati

Paradigma: Jurnal Kajian Budaya

No abstract provided.

Metaphors And Socio-Cultural Values In China's Press Statement Translation, Adinda Natassa Valentine Hutabarat

Paradigma: Jurnal Kajian Budaya

In real practice, political text translations are in line with a country’s main foreign policies. Thus, an in-depth understanding on communicative strategies employed in translating political texts, e.g. press statements, is essential. The paper analyses the translation of press statements from the Source Text (Mandarin Chinese) into the Target Texts (English and Indonesian). To elaborate, this study uses van Dijk’s Political Discourse Analysis at the macro (contexts) and micro (texts) levels. By considering Newmark’s equivalent translation concept, as well as metaphor and annotated translations, the analysis reveals that the translation from China’s perspective uses metaphors and China’s socio-cultural values within …

The Varieties Of Precaution: Which Risks, Whose Attitudes?, Tomasz Żuradzki

Animal Sentience

The Edge of Sentience offers an ambitious and timely institutional framework for proportionate precaution under uncertainty about sentience. Its systematic treatment of empirical and theoretical uncertainty across diverse cases is a major contribution. Focusing on the problem of identifying and weighing different risks when designing proportionate precautions, this commentary suggests three areas in which Birch’s framework could be developed further: a more domain-sensitive justification of the priority given to avoiding under-attribution; a clearer distinction among competing forms of risk aversion and their divergent policy implications; and a fuller explanation of how the framework generates different recommendations across cases.

Winnie's Feminism: A Tribute To Mama Dr. Winnie Madikizela-Mandela As A Radical Feminist From 1986-2018, Anna Lefatshe Moagi

Wagadu: A Journal of Transnational Women's & Gender Studies

Growing up in South Africa and having read several “tell-all” biographies by influential women have made this researcher aware of the struggles of women to be recognised and valued within their social environments. The many names that come to mind, when speaking of women’s voices that challenged their position in our society, belong to those of struggle veterans such as Adelaide Tambo, Ruth First, Lilian Ngoyi, Albertina Sisulu, Thandi Modise, Baleka Mbethe, Leymah Gbowee, Ruth Mompati, Charlotte Maxeke, Joice Majuru, Thuli Madontsela and Winnie Madikizela-Mandela. Their as women leaders roles remain undervalued (Shekhawat 2015). These phenomenal influential women and many …

Theology Of The People As Modernity’S Alternative: A Review Essay, William J. Collinge

The Journal of Social Encounters

In Modernity’s Alternative, Rocco Buttiglione presents the Argentinian theology of the people as an alternative to modernity as it has developed in Europe and North America. After an introduction, the first main part of this review essay discusses Buttiglione’s account of the development of the theology of the people and the major figures in it and how the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe marks the beginning of an alternative modernity. The second section considers Buttiglione’s parallel between Christian Platonists’ inculturation of Christian faith into Greek culture and Guadalupe’s inculturation of Christian faith into Mesoamerican culture. The third section …

What, Exactly, Is Surveillance Pricing?, Kaylina Stroud

McNair Summer Research Program

Surveillance pricing is a method of price discrimination in which firms use personal data to set individualized prices. While this practice is often criticized on grounds of privacy, unfairness, or exploitation, these objections do not fully explain what is morally objectionable about surveillance pricing. This paper examines surveillance pricing through the lenses of price discrimination, market competition, efficiency, exploitation, and deception. I argue that surveillance pricing is not inherently unethical merely because it results in different consumers paying different prices for the same product. Nor is it necessarily objectionable when it promotes mutually beneficial exchanges and efficient market outcomes. The …

The Person As Foundation Of Responsibility: The Insufficiency Of Rights-Based Human Development Approaches, Jaclyn Berg

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Building on the plethora of research that demonstrates the way rights language has been more useful for those with wealth and power to further expand capitalist markets, this text extends that criticism to human development programs and institutions. While they claim to be directed towards addressing global issues of poverty and hunger as well as climate crises, they continue to treat the symptoms without accurately diagnosing the disease. Approaches to development that rely on rights without questioning the way rights have been influenced by neoliberal capitalists or without questioning the capitalist global economic system will never be able to achieve …

Dialogic Communication Ethics As A Hopeful Response To Artificial Intelligence, Kristen Haldeman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Within the past five years, a new technology has dominated modern culture: artificial intelligence. With a multiplicity of ways to respond to this new environment, this dissertation situates a response to artificial intelligence by combining the media ecology and communication ethics perspectives. Media ecology explores historical roots and biases of technology to learn about their influence of humanity. A dialogic communication ethics seeks to find an opening for hope to emerge. Hope, grounded in the works of Jacques Ellul and the Christian tradition, offers a new rhetorical perspective by shifting focus away from technology and to our neighbor.