Philosophy Commons^™

The Inner Form Of Style: On Heinrich Wölfflin’S “Tactical” Formalism, Rémi Mermet

Artl@s Bulletin

In this article, I examine the enduring relevance of Heinrich Wölfflin’s approach to style, in light of the renewed interest in it among “postformalist” art historians. By delving into the theoretical foundations of the Principles of Art History, I explore Wölfflin’s Goethean interpretation of Kantian epistemology, revealing a conception of style characterized by its dynamic and symbolic “inner form” rather than mere static formalism. This analysis not only highlights affinities with Max Weber’s thought but also uncovers a previously overlooked connection to Wilhelm von Humboldt, offering valuable insights for current discussions on style.

Dans cet article, j’étudie la pertinence …

Ghazālī’S Influence On Mullā Ṣadrā’S View Of Causal Necessity And Freewill, Sayeh Meisami

Philosophy Faculty Publications

Muḥammad Ghazālī (d. 1111) influenced some of the key metaphysical teachings of Shia Safavid philosophers, most prominently, Mullā Ṣadrā Shīrāzī (d. ca. 1636). In this paper, I argue that Mullā Ṣadrā reads Ibn Sīnā (d. 1037) through the lens of Muḥammad Ghazālī’s Sufi Ashʿarism to offer a solution to the problem of freewill in the Islamic context. In his adaptation of causal necessity from Ibn Sīnā, Mullā Ṣadrā argues that “necessity” as a concept is co-extensional with “existence” because in reality all that is the case is necessarily so. On the other hand, all things including voluntary actions and will …

Donald Griffin: A Visionary In Science And Consciousness, Brock Fenton

Animal Sentience

I share some reflections on a sabbatical with Donald Griffin a half-century ago, with fieldwork on bats and echolocating swiftlets in Australia and our discussions of animal behavior and consciousness. Griffin's influence has been vast, from recent advances in bat research, including learning, navigation, and longevity, to his enduring legacy as a pioneer in animal cognition.

Writing In Philosophy: Pedagogy And Practice, Sarah K. Donovan, Renée Smith

Philosophy and Religious Studies

Even a cursory internet search of syllabi for philosophy courses shows that the tradition of assigning papers—five-page papers, ten-page papers, fifteen-page papers—is still thriving. Yet the schedule of topics, often listed on those same syllabi, very seldom reveals any course time devoted to teaching students how to write. Perhaps the assignments themselves reveal the process of writing papers, rubrics reveal the expectations, and feedback nudges students to improve their writing. But that kind of information is not transparent in many syllabi. Even if we suppose that philosophy faculty support the idea of Writing Across the Curriculum, in practice faculty across …

Reflections On Linear B, (Part 6): Possible Origin Of The Shape And Pronunciation /Ko/ Of Sign 70, Gerald Leonard Cohen

Arts, Languages and Philosophy Faculty Research & Creative Works

This article suggests that the shape of Linear B sign 70 may derive from the Egyptian hieroglyph uatch ‘young plant, green’ and that its pronunciation /ko/ is explainable by the Greek word for green (χλωρός).

The Integration Of Environmental Concerns And Philosophy Into Business Strategies, Johann Thorne

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

My thesis focuses on how a business can better integrate environmental philosophies and principles into their business model without detracting from the business's primary objectives, specifically that of generating profit. However, this thesis also seeks to extend the business's objectives to include the environment using these environmental philosophies, arguing that the business should have some obligation to the environment in terms of morality, as well as social obligations. This is an evolution of some common ethical theories used within the business world, but I argue they do not suffice to protect the environment. Instead, I develop an ethical pluralist framework …

Two Forms Of Formalism In Contract Law, Gregory Klass

Cardozo Law Review

Formalism in contract interpretation has had many defenders and many critics. What lawmakers need, however, is an account of when formalism works and when it does not. This Article addresses that need by providing a general theory of contract exposition and differentiating between two forms of formalism in contract law. Formalities effect legal change by virtue of their form alone, thereby obviating interpretation. Examples include “as is,” the seal, and sometimes contract boilerplate. Evidentiary formalism, in distinction, limits the evidence that goes into interpretation. Plain meaning rules are an example of evidentiary formalism. This Article provides a detailed analysis of …

Epistemic Spaces And Fields: A New Framework For Social Epistemology Applied To The Internet, Zizhe Cheng

Honors Theses

This thesis introduces "Epistemic Spaces and Fields," a novel framework for social epistemology inspired by the analogies of space and fields in physics to better elucidate how epistemic environments shape epistemic practices. Part A establishes the theoretical underpinnings of epistemic spaces and fields, demonstrating how social, cultural , and power dynamics distort individuals' capacities to obtain and communicate knowledge. Part B applies this framework to the digital realm, examining how the Internet and social media reshape our epistemic contexts and introduce new challenges to critical thinking.

Review: Garth Greenwell's Mystical Novel "Small Rain" Teaches The Art Of Living From A Hospital Bed, James K.A. Smith

University Faculty Publications and Creative Works

Book review of Garth Greenwell's book, "Small Rain"

The Role Of Disgust In Films: Disgust As An Aesthetically Appreciable Emotion That Enhances The Film’S Other Emotional Effects, Yunyi Zhu

Department of Philosophy: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The goal of this paper is to address the questions: what is the role of disgust in films, or what makes people appreciate a film’s disgusting contents, given that disgust is unpleasant to experience? The films to which I am referring are audiovisual artworks, including both TV shows and movies, that arouse the emotion of disgust and typically have contents that are gory or gross, yet despite their disgusting contents, these films have as a primary goal to present a narrative or an experience rather than merely to disgust or disturb their audiences. This includes various genres of films, from …

Motivated By Hope: Why We Strive For The Improbable, Varkey K. Titus Jr.

Department of Philosophy: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Some of the most rewarding actions we take in life are difficult. The outcomes of these actions are surrounded by uncertainty, and what relevant data is available indicates a high probability of failure. Current philosophical work proposes that hope can resolve the puzzle of how people can rationally choose to engage in difficult actions, but this work constrains hope’s motivational role to actions whose successful outcomes reside within the realm of an individual’s own agency. I expand the explanatory role of hope motivating action to include cases whose outcomes depend on some combination of factors internal and external to the …

Alfred Russel Wallace Notes 33. The Story In Evolution., Charles H. Smith

Faculty/Staff Personal Papers

Alfred Russel Wallace (1823-1913) is best known for his independent formulation of the principle of natural selection. In this work I first review my understanding of Wallace’s intellectual development on this subject, including the notion that he had no model for the evolution of higher consciousness as of his first treatment of natural selection in 1858. This leads to some conclusions about his approach to the subject, and links to parallel ideas inherent in the philosophy of Baruch de Spinoza (1632-1677).

The New Anthropocentrism: The Problem Of Water Conservation And Water Justice, Benjamin Stuart Milam

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

My objective with my thesis is to argue for and reinforce a type of anthropocentrism that is both environmentally conscious and consumable for an audience that is not necessarily well versed in philosophical literature. In the first chapter I go over philosophical frameworks, such as Anthropocentrism and Biocentrism, and why I believe they do not meet both of those criteria listed. After that I discuss New Anthropocentrism, coined by Clive Hamilton, and why I believe that a slightly modified version possesses qualities that I believe are needed for the crisis at hand. In chapter 2 I use that framework and …

Limitation For Liberty: A Commentary On Federalism And The Tenth Amendment, Riley Banker

Senior Honors Theses

The concept of Federalism is essential to the very survival of the United States. However, recent decisions by the Supreme Court have illustrated attempts by the federal government to expand its authority and undermine the balance of power created by Federalism. This thesis will explore the concept of Federalism to demonstrate how it can best be protected. First, this thesis will address the origins of Federalism. Second, it will show how the principles of Federalism are manifested within the founding documents of the United States. Finally, this thesis will analyze current events including Supreme Court cases to demonstrate a concerning …

Effect Of Epistemic Cognition And Self-Regulation On The Evaluation Of Online Information, Devin T. Foschi

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

While research has shown that epistemic cognition plays an important role in self-regulation, the way in which it does so in online contexts needs further research. The objective of this dissertation was to examine the relationship between Internet-specific epistemic cognition and Internet-specific self-regulated learning, and to use a mixed-methods approach in order to expand upon the way learners undergo the evaluation of information in online spaces beyond the traditional method of only using self-report measures and other common quantitative techniques. Using an explanatory sequential mixed-methods design, Phase 1 (N = 117) used quantitative methods to first look at the relationship …

Supervenience And Non-Naturalism, Michael Hogan

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Supervenience presents a problem for the moral non-naturalist. Supervenience states that one’s moral properties cannot differ without one’s natural properties differing. It, therefore, states a necessary connection between moral and natural properties. Moral properties for the moral non-naturalist are sui generis, which means they are not reducible to natural properties, but also they are utterly different in kind than natural properties and any other kind of property. How can these properties be necessarily connected? This requires an explanation. The challenge to the moral non-naturalist is to provide such an explanation. McPherson (2012) presents an explanatory challenge to the non-naturalist …

Demystifying Research Paradigms: Navigating Ontology, Epistemology, And Axiology In Research, Lynette Pretorius

The Qualitative Report

A sound understanding of research paradigms is crucial for developing coherent and philosophically grounded research designs, particularly in the humanities and social sciences. This paper offers an accessible overview of the most common research paradigms: positivism, post-positivism, constructivism, social constructionism, interpretivism, pragmatism, and critical realism. These paradigms differ in their approaches to ontology (the nature of reality), epistemology (the nature of knowledge), and axiology (the role of values in research). The paper also discusses the methodological and ethical implications of these paradigms. Reflexivity and ethical responsibility are emphasised, where researchers must account for how their own biases and values influence …

The Land Of Fairies Of J. R. R. Tolkien: Faërie As The “Middle Earth” Between The World Of Senses And The World Of Ideas, Diego Klautau

Journal of Tolkien Research

This article delves into J. R. R. Tolkien's essay "On Fairy-Stories" with the aim of outlining a giving hermeneutics for the metaphor of "Faërie," the Elfland, in dialogue with the philosophical tradition of Ancient Greece – specially with Plato's "Republic" and Aristotle's "De Anima" and "Poetics", and also the medieval reference of Aquinas’ “Summa Theologica”. The historical context of early 20th-century England and J. R. R. Tolkien's biography assure that he belonged to a Catholic religious and philosophical tradition that claimed the so-called realistic philosophy as the foundation for understanding the world. From this theoretical-methodological approach, one finds a dual …

Cognitive Ethology, Animals And Society, And The American Sociological Association, Arnold Arluke

Animal Sentience

Griffin’s The Question of Animal Awareness (1976) and Animal Minds (2001) enabled and emboldened other disciplines to expand their research to include non-human animals. The creation of a dedicated section on human-animal relationships in sociology’s national professional organization is but one example.

Human-Machine Relations And Relational Autonomy, Hendrik Kempt, Camilla Colombo, Saskia K. Nagel

Human-Machine Communication

The ever-growing use of interactive technologies and digitization processes in decisionmaking contexts raises key challenges to the conceptualization of autonomy. Starting from the shortcomings of individualistic models, we argue that relational accounts of autonomy provide a more adequate characterization of human beings as socially embedded and integrated. By introducing a decision-theoretic framework, and further theoretical elaboration, we suggest a substantial account of relational autonomy incorporating machines and technologies within the significant relations entertained by agents. Besides optimizing decision-making performances, human-machine interactions could genuinely support and enhance individual autonomy, by fostering human connections, expanding the individual’s social context with additional perspectives, …

Four Notions Of Autonomy. Pitfalls Of Conceptual Pluralism In Contemporary Debates, Roman Wagner, Bert Heinrichs

Human-Machine Communication

The concept of autonomy is indispensable in the history of Western thought. At least that’s how it seems to us nowadays. However, the notion has not always had the outstanding significance that we ascribe to it today and its exact meaning has also changed considerably over time. In this paper, we want to shed light on different understandings of autonomy and clearly distinguish them from each other. Our main aim is to contribute to conceptual clarity in (interdisciplinary) discourses and to point out possible pitfalls of conceptual pluralism.

Japanese-English Translation: Critical Consciousness In Crisis, By Miki Kiyoshi, December 1928 (Excerpt Of §1); Published In Kaizō, January 1929; Translated By Christopher Southward, November 2024: 「危機における理論的意識」、三木清著；1928年12月著作；『改造』1929年1月号発行； 2024年11月南方クリストファー訳, Christopher Southward

Comparative Literature Faculty and Student Scholarship

Critical Consciousness in Crisis, by Miki Kiyoshi, December 1928 (Excerpt of §1) Published in Kaizō, January 1929; Translated by Christopher Southward, November 2024

「危機における理論的意識」、三木清著；1928年12月著作；『改造』1929年1月号発行；2024年11月南方クリストファー訳

A Phenomenology Of Human Place, Michael D. Moga

Budhi: A Journal of Ideas and Culture

A Phenomenology of Human Place

Manipulation Of The Past, Andrew T. Heggie

The Cardinal Edge

In recent years this nation has been undergoing a public debate about its past. This debate ranges from academic projects such as the New York Times’s 1619 Project to the Florida Department of Education’s recent judgments regarding a new AP African American Studies Course. Through watching these debates, I was led to the following questions: What is the past? How or why can it be changed? And what is its relevance to politics and education? For This I turned to Augustine’s Confessions (1961) and post-war German Philosophy, specifically the works of Theodor Adorno and Hannah Arendt. For this project, Augustine’s …

Objective Bat Phenomenology, Thomas Nagel

Animal Sentience

Our discussions prompted Donald Griffin to campaign for the recognition of animal consciousness as a subject for scientific investigation. Ristau shows how much has since been discovered about the experiences of bats and other creatures, by Griffin and others, in spite of the limits to full knowledge imposed by our biological differences. But Ristau seriously misrepresents me as holding that we can know nothing about what it is like to be a bat, whereas these results are precisely of the kind I envisioned in proposing an “objective phenomenology.”

Sex, Tech, And Faith: Ethics For A Digital Age, Kate Ott

University Faculty Publications and Creative Works

Review of Sex, Tech, and Faith: Ethics for a Digital Age by Kate Ott. Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith (Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation), Vol. 76, No. 3 (December 2024), pp. 230-231.

Birth Privilege As White Privilege, Jennifer Scuro Phd

Philosophy: Faculty Publications

In The Pregnancy ≠ Childbearing Project: A Phenomenology of Miscarriage (2017), I argued the need to ‘disentangle the plot’ of pregnancy as it has a naturalised and uncritical access to heteronormative gender privilege. In this paper, with the premise that, ‘whiteness is property,’ as argued by Cheryl Harris in 1993, I extend this work to how birthing is only a story for the white entitled few, and as an entitlement, is tied to the making and preserving of the ‘nuclear family’ and ‘family values.’ As this history of birth privilege as white privilege is also a trauma history, I include …

When To Save The Baby: A Fundamental Conditions Approach, S. Matthew Liao, Jordan Liebman, Corine Astroth

Pace Law Review

Parents and physicians often grapple with the agonizing decision of whether to continue life-sustaining treatment for critically ill infants. In this paper, we introduce a novel framework called the Fundamental Conditions Approach (FCA) to guide these difficult choices. Building on S. Matthew Liao’s work, the FCA evaluates whether an infant possesses or can develop the fundamental capacities necessary for engaging in basic activities that constitute a good life. These capacities include the ability to think, respond to facts, develop interpersonal relationships, and interact with one’ environment. We argue that if an infant lacks nearly all of these fundamental capacities and …

Coping With And Surviving Domestic Violence Among African American Women In A Rural Community, Kimberly Evonne Wimbush

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Domestic violence (DV) or intimate partner violence is a widespread public health problem in the United States that knows no boundaries. Previous researchers have found that in the United States, African American women experience more severe effects from DV than women in other ethnic groups. The purpose of this generic qualitative study was to identify the coping strategies used by African American women who have survived DV living in rural areas where there are limited professional resources. Premises from the superwoman schema and adult resilience theory guided this research. Semistructured audio-recorded interviews, conducted via Zoom and face-to-face, were used to …

Participatory Ethical Regulations: Risk Challenges Of Artificial Intelligence Era And Construction Of Governance Logic, Chenggang Zhang, Lu Pan

Bulletin of Chinese Academy of Sciences (Chinese Version)

Participatory ethical norms emphasize the involvement of diverse stakeholders, aiming to construct a more comprehensive and balanced ethical governance framework. The rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI) technology is leading society through unprecedented transformations, significantly impacting ethical perspectives, social governance models, and the symbiotic relationship between humans and technology. The participatory ethical norms, characterized by multi-stakeholder participation, interactivity, and openness, represent a crucial pathway for addressing the challenges posed by the rapid development of AI technology. Constructing an AI governance framework based on participatory ethical norms provides solutions for the sustainable, fair, and transparent development of AI from multiple aspects …