Philosophy Commons^™

Unpresentable Members: The Theology And Radical Phenomenology Of The Sexual Flesh, Justin Pearl

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Unpresentable Members begins with a wager: that a proper account of the flesh and its sexual character may not only prove philosophically fertile within its own limited domain, but may also provide insight into the theological question of the proper role and place of gender and sexual difference within communities, particularly Christian religious communities. In this regard, this dissertation has two distinct goals: one phenomenological and one theological. Phenomenologically, it offers an account of the manifestation of concrete sexual determinations not only as they objectively appear across the “body-object” (Körper, le corps) but with equal importance as …

Ethical Implications Of Population Growth And Reduction, Tiana Sepahpour

Student Theses 2015-Present

No abstract provided.

The Ethics Of Occultic Communication: An Invocation Of Joshua Gunn And Sissela Bok, James Thomas Begley Jr.

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Occultic rhetoric, according to Joshua Gunn, is a genre of discourse concerned with the study and practice of secret communications. The strategic sharing of secret messages involves a host of methods and conventions designed for the selective disclosure of hidden knowledge, thus controlling the boundaries of (and accessibility to power between) insider and outsider groups. Occultic rhetoric has its uses in everyday encounters, but the abuse of such manipulative strategies, especially by those in the academy and other positions of power and trust, calls for an ethical response. This dissertation submits occultic rhetoric to moral investigation by incorporating the works …

A New Theory Of Musical Semiosis, Matthew Stanley

Music ETDs

Musical semiotics is the study of the various ways in which musical structures become meaningful. This thesis is an attempt to create a logical, systematized, transformational theory of musical semiotics that can elucidate the various ways in which music conveys meaning. While the semiotic exploration of music is by no means novel, this thesis presents a unique, highly rigorous, and truly theoretical approach to musical semiotics that differs significantly from previous theories. By combining all aspects of the semiotic theory of Charles Sanders Peirce with the metaphor theories of George Lakoff, Mark Johnson, and Zoltan Kovecses, a theoretical apparatus is …

Its Skin Is My Skin, Bryan Page

Graduate School of Art Theses

This text examines the complexity of attempting to empathize with bodies that are vastly othered from my own. This broad yet nuanced subject crosses epistemological boundaries and complicates the dualities between both the mind and body, and between the corporeal and the virtual. My desire to better understand the conditions of another’s experience originates from a painful traumatic loss which caused me to feel isolated and incomplete. In response to this suffering, I long to emotionally connect with other beings and create artwork that attempts to bridge the qualia of individual experience.

I am interested in the capacity (or lack …

The Unfolding Argument: Why Iit And Other Causal Structure Theories Cannot Explain Consciousness, Adrian Doerig, Aaron Schurger, Kathryn Hess, Michael H. Herzog

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

How can we explain consciousness? This question has become a vibrant topic of neuroscience research in recent decades. A large body of empirical results has been accumulated, and many theories have been proposed. Certain theories suggest that consciousness should be explained in terms of brain functions, such as accessing information in a global workspace, applying higher order to lower order representations, or predictive coding. These functions could be realized by a variety of patterns of brain connectivity. Other theories, such as Information Integration Theory (IIT) and Recurrent Processing Theory (RPT), identify causal structure with consciousness. For example, according to …

A Rhetorical Analysis Of Opening Statements In Trial: Reconsidering The Classical Canon Of Invention, Andrew Chandler

Undergraduate Theses

This analysis of 21 opening statements probes at current persuasive practices employed by trial attorneys through the lens of mainstream legal advice and an expanded definition of rhetorical invention – one which includes both discovery and creation. An evaluation of such practice reveals the utility, and furthermore the duty of the advocate, to draw upon an expanded realm of available arguments.

The Singular Voice Of Being [Table Of Contents], Andrew Lazella

Philosophy & Theory

The Singular Voice of Being reconsiders John Duns Scotus’s well-covered theory of the univocity of being in light of his less explored discussions of ultimate difference. Ultimate difference is a notion introduced by Aristotle and known by the Aristotelian tradition, but one that, the book argues, Scotus radically retrofits to buttress his doctrine of univocity. Ultimate difference for Aristotle meant the last difference in a line of specific differences whereby all the preceding differences would be united into a single substance rather than remain a heapish multiplicity. LaZella argues that Scotus both broadens and deepens the term such that, in …

An Introduction To Transformative Inquiry: Understanding Compelling And Significant Relationships For Personal And Societal Transformation, Mark L. Mccaslin, Kelly A. Kilrea

The Qualitative Report

Transformative inquiry is a theoretical model designed to facilitate the inquiry of important and meaningful relationships that transform and potentiate us. Creswell (2007) described the essential elements of a research agenda: the axiological, ontological, epistemological, methodological, and rhetorical. Each carries with it assumptions that hold implications for practice and research. Transformative inquiry addresses all of these elements through considerations given to deep ecology, transdisciplinarity, integral meta-theory, heuristic research, and eudaimonistic philosophy, respectively. Transformative inquiry is an approach to understanding and fostering the full range of deep and meaningful relationships from the personal to the political, and beyond. It is a …

A Critical Analysis Of The Metaphysics Of Limit And Unlimited In Plato's Philebus, Ashley Lascano

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

This paper examines several key passages within Plato’s Philebus and analyses the underlying metaphysics that exists at the heart of the dialogue. Plato implements the metaphysics in the dialogue by utilizing the terminology of “the limit” and “the unlimited”. This paper examines the Pythagorean origins of the limit and unlimited and depicts how Plato has adapted the terms from their original intent. The Philebus is examined to show the metaphysical importance of the limit and unlimited. The dialogue displays an example of the metaphysics of the limit and the unlimited through the debate between pleasure and intelligence, which is a …

Moments As They Pass, Jesus Armenta

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

This is a creative project titled “Moments as They Pass.” It’s an anthology of poetry with over 106 original pieces, spanning over 135 pages. These pieces all center on the thematic elements of existential philosophy and its intersection with beauty, time, and concept of self. Each poem will explore a particular facet of existentialism. The anthology will be broken up into chapters that reflect each concept accordingly. There is a dialogue that occurs within each piece that will encourage readers to reflect on their own lives and how they navigate their own search for meaning. Ultimately, this creative …

Wangheng Chen’S Chinese Environmental Aesthetics, Arnold Berleant

Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive)

No abstract provided.

Two Arguments For Extending Legal Personhood To Nature, Hailey Walley

Honors Theses

This thesis will articulate new sorts of arguments under a legal philosophy framework that I believe can be used to protect the environment, but which also have a chance at convincing a wide range of citizens and politicians. The conclusion for which I will argue is that the United States should extend legal personhood to Nature. I will first provide detailed analyses of two countries that have already extended rights to nature, Ecuador and Bolivia. I will then proceed to compare the two cases and discuss what aspects of their models can and cannot be applied to the United States, …

The Role Of Stoic Philosophy In Military Leadership And Values, Elliot Witscher

Young Historians Conference

Military leaders have historically relied on different justifications for violence and war, including philosophy. A perennial favorite of the military has been stoic philosophy, often based on the teachings and work of Epictetus. However, a careful examination of the actions of three well known military leaders, Marcus Aurelius, Frederick the Great, and the modern United States military, show that philosophical beliefs, no matter how firmly held, rarely translate into military actions or policy. Many leaders claim to value stoic teachings, however these internal and personal worldview is hard to scale into a specific type of action on the battlefield or …

Talking Weather From Ge-Rede To Ge-Stell, Babette Babich

Articles and Chapters in Academic Book Collections

Talking about the weather was until recently a clicM expression for time wasting, idle chatter, what Heidegger calls Gerede. Today's talk of global warming seems altogether different. Yet Heidegger's analysis of Ge-Stell also permits a complex reading of the mobilization of popular opinion, totalized as he knew this to have been in his own political era. Here it is useful to take up the question of its current totalization along with a reflection on today's "climatic regimes," as Bruno Latour has recently spoken of these. For his part, Peter Sloterdijk uses the language of atmoterrorism, and although his analysis draws …

Quaker Virtue Ethics: Religious Life Without Creeds, Dave Nagaji

Senior Theses

Beliefs are conventionally understood to guide people’s actions. Put another way, the actions which people take are understood to be products of what they believe. However, these claims are challenged by the fact that many Quakers hold that they do not have a creed. This feature of Quakerism creates a tension with the theory that actions must follow from beliefs. That tension prompts a question: How can Quakers make ethical decisions in a clear and decisive manner when they lack a creed? The answer to such a question is significant for two reasons. First, it provides insights into the specific …

A Theology Of Failure [Table Of Contents], Marika Rose

Religion

“This is the best work I have ever read on Žižek in relation to theology, maybe the best such work possible. Rose’s prose style is clear and engaging, and her project significantly advances our understanding of Christian apophaticism, of Žižek’s project, and of the potential future stakes of theology for a secular world.”— Adam Kotsko, author of Neoliberalism’s Demons: On the Political Theology of Late Capital

Everyone agrees that theology has failed; but the question of how to respond to this failure is contested. Against both radical orthodoxy and deconstructive theology, Rose proposes that Christian identity is constituted by, not …

Posthuman And Alien Breeding: The Implications Of Cybersex In Octavia Butler’S Dawn 2019., Elizabeth Rutkowski

Master's Theses

Speculative science fiction affords new ways for authors to represent social problems of the modern day in an apocalyptic manner. Authors such as Octavia Butler use science fiction to analyze social injustices revolving around race, gender, and sexuality. Throughout her novel Dawn, Butler uses the posthuman to represent minority groups in the late twentieth century. The posthuman represents those who have moved from humanity towards a new opportunity that is mixed with the potential for struggle. 1 As demonstrated through Butler’s work posthumanism blurs the lines between binaries such as male / female, straight / gay, and consensual / nonconsensual …

The Contradiction Of Representation In Levinas's Command Of The Other And The Possibility Of Responding Through The Dialogicality Of The Self, Robert Claflin

Undergraduate Honors Theses

Emmanuel Levinas views the phenomenological tradition as being predicated on an asymmetrical relationship between the self and the other in which the self possesses the power to dominate and represent the other. This leads to the reduction of the other to the same. Instead, he wants to flip this relationship in favor of the other by showing how the very qualities of alterity and infinity enable the other to resist the self’s attempts at representation. Furthermore, he conceives of an ethics in which the self is compelled to listen to the other’s command and respond accordingly. The inherent issue in …

"I Don't Want To Have A Weird Relationship With You, So I'M Trying": Relational Turning Points And Trajectories Of Ex-Lds Children And Their Active Lds Parents, Jared Worwood

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Ex-LDS individuals face a unique and often turbulent time in their relationship with their parent if the individual decides to leave the LDS Church. To explore this phenomena, we investigated the turning points and relational trajectories of ex-LDS children and their interactions with their active LDS parent. Thirty emerging adult children were interviewed using the retrospective interviewing technique (RIT). Through turning point analysis, we identified 14 turning points: (1) Discussions of values and beliefs, (2) decrease in church participation, (3) moving out, (4) physical proximity, (5) critical family events, (6) parent realizations, (7) sibling events, (8) romantic life events, (9) …

A Dane's Philosophical Attack And A Monk's Ladder: Comparing Kierkegaard's Philosophical Fragment And St. John Climacus' Ladder Of Divine Ascent, Chasen David Robbins

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Soren Kierkegaard's Philosophical Fragments and Concluding Unscientific Postscript have been extremely impactful in 20th century Western theological and philosophical thought. In a similar manner, St. John Klimakos, from whom Kierkegaard derives the pseudonym Johannes Climacus, who wrote The Ladder of Divine Ascent, is one of the most "studied, copied, and translated" books in Eastern Christendom. Johannes Climacus, the pseudonym for the two Kierkegaard works above, is a theological/philosophical opponent to Hegelian thought. St. John Klimakos, a real person, is a 6th century monk who hopes to assist monks on their journey to God with a manual about the thirty …

Ethical Problems With Plastic In The Ocean, Brennan Cotter

Senior Theses

In the year 2018 this paper argues that plastic use and waste is destroying our oceans and that we should address the problem by fully adopting the principle and practices of sustainability. The first section outlines the advent of our plastic disposable culture. The second section gives evidence of how plastic waste is negatively affecting marine life. The third section draws from literature in environmental philosophy to develop the concept of sustainability, and the concluding section outlines several steps we can take as individuals and nations to practice sustainability.

A Consideration Of Deontological Approaches To Theodicy, Gregory Zaloom

Philosophy

Responses to the problem of evil have traditionally been formulated in terms of a consequentialist moral system: the basic strategy has been to claim that evils in the world (like human suffering) are justified by greater goods that they bring about (or greater goods to which they are concomitant). Recently several philosophers have challenged the effectiveness of this strategy, arguing that theodicy would be better served by a strategy that appeals primarily to deontological considerations: perhaps, for example, God has obligations or duties whose fulfillment requires him to permit the human suffering that we observe. This paper explores two distinct …

Potentials, Actuals, And The Logical Problem Of Evil, Stephen Thomas Irby

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

J.L. Schellenberg has recently formulated a new logical problem of evil that is claimed to avoid Alvin Plantinga’s Free Will Defence. I begin my argument against this new formulation by analyzing the grounding for some of God’s maximal perfections. God’s maximal moral perfection, for example, is grounded in virtuous potentialities that are disposed to the actualization of virtuous actions. From this account, I argue that Schellenberg’s logical problem of evil fails due to one of the following two reasons. First, some good actualizations of good potentialities require evil but compose the best worlds. Second, both (1) good actualizations that require …

The Need For Autonomy Promoting Sex Education, Mackenzie R. Darling

Philosophy

This thesis examines the current state of sex education in the United States and

how our society is failing students by not providing them with the knowledge and tools needed to be fully autonomous and healthy sexual beings. By exploring what it means to be a holistically healthy sexual being, and what is meant by ‘sexual health’ in general, a criterion for a good sex education can be established. This criterion enables a critique of America’s two primary sex education programs in use: Abstinence-Only Sex Education and Comprehensive Sex Education. After fully examining what comprises each, as well as their …

Perceiving Live Improvisation In The Performing Arts, Aili W. Bresnahan

Books and Book Chapters by University of Dayton Faculty

This chapter will explore the ways that live improvisational performances by professional-level actors, musicians, and dancers, take place at both cognitive and sub-cognitive levels in ways that are relevant for understanding perception and appreciation of the performing arts. First, evidence from cognitive science will be used to show that improvising, as in a dance or a music jam session or a scene in theatre, may involve physical responses that occur before we are conscious of the event to which we are responding. Second, this chapter will demonstrate how understanding these cognitive processes can help us to pinpoint why live improvisational …

Villains, Morality, And Redemption: A Content Analysis Of Children’S Movies, Iqra Ishaq

Senior Honors Projects

Research on children’s movies has yielded important findings on messaging about gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality, (dis)ability, mental illness, aging, and even death. All of this research has recognized the important role children’s movies play in children’s upbringing and informal education. Not only do children’s movies reflect the commonly-held values of the time, but they impart these values to their audience. Children, as the target audience of these movies, are extremely susceptible to absorbing these values and messages.

My research examines what messages children’s movies impart about villains. It includes a content-analysis of 80 full-length animated movies released by Disney, DreamWorks, …

Justice According To Reinhold Niebuhr And Gustavo Gutiérrez, Rebecca L. Miller

Honors Theses

Reinhold Niebuhr and Gustavo Gutiérrez were two influential theologians. Niebuhr was a Protestant neo-orthodox theologian and Gutiérrez was a Catholic liberation theologian. Both tackled the theological topics of justice and reformation. Niebuhr and Gutiérrez came to similar conclusions on these topics although they shared no explicit connections. Despite this, these two thinkers are not widely compared in scholarship. There is an academic tradition of treating Catholicism and Protestantism separately. This tradition could explain why the similarities between the two are overlooked. This essay explores the beliefs of Niebuhr and Gutiérrez on justice and reformation to demonstrate the similarities and argue …

Virtual Existence And Its Ambiguities: How Postphenomenology Of Technology Clarifies Our Situation In A Digital World., David Karlo King Ii

Honors Theses

For many contemporary western societies, digital technology has become a pervasive aspect of the day-to-day lives of many individuals, and a large philosophical conversation has resulted around how the use of such technologies changes our lives. Postphenomenology, a relatively recent philosophical development, offers a distinct approach to discussing technology from a practical, situated orientation. While this approach has roots in phenomenologists like Martin Heidegger and Maurice Merleau-Ponty, it attempts a more contingent and empirical project that more thoroughly discusses the existential implications of human/technology relationships. In this paper, I trace the roots of postphenomenology in the works of Heidegger and …

An Evaluation Of A Biometric Enabled Credit Card For Providing High Authenticity Identity Proofing During The Transaction Authentication Process, Laura F. Poe

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Credit card fraud has continued to grow despite efforts to protect financial data from data breaches of financial institutions. Data breaches of financial transactional records over the past decade have impacted millions of U.S. consumers, resulting in decreased consumer confidence in security. Banking institutions losing money due to fraud are forced to raise interest rates and increase fees to their cardholders. The costs of fraud are passed to the banking institution’s customers to offset the losses. The requisite to detect and eliminate fraud before it occurs is mutually beneficial to both the banking institution and cardholders. Credit card companies continue …