Metaphysics Commons^™

Changing Our Minds: Bernard Lonergan And Climate Change, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Review- Startling Strangeness: Reading Lonergan's., Randall Rosenberg

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

On The Validity Of Pascal's Wager, Antony Aumann

Faculty Works

Recent scholarship has shown that the success of Pascal’s wager rests on precarious grounds. To avoid notorious problems, it must appeal to considerations such as what probability we assign to the existence of various gods and what religion we think provides the greatest happiness in this life. Rational judgments concerning these matters are subject to change over time. Some claim that the wager therefore cannot support a steadfast commitment to God. I argue that this conclusion does not follow. By drawing upon the line of reasoning employed in getting married, I explain how unstable considerations can provide a sufficient rational …

Catholicity And Faculty Seminars, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Ignatius, Lonergan, And The Catholic University, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Review- Startling Strangeness: Reading Lonergan's Insight. By Richard M. Liddy., Michael Mcguckian

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Identifying Modular Function Via Edge Annotation In Gene Correlation Networks Using Gene Ontology Search, Kathryn Dempsey Cooper, Ishwor Thapa, Dhundy Raj Bastola, Hesham Ali

Interdisciplinary Informatics Faculty Proceedings & Presentations

Correlation networks provide a powerful tool for analyzing large sets of biological information. This method of high-throughput data modeling has important implications in uncovering novel knowledge of cellular function. Previous studies on other types of network modeling (protein-protein interaction networks, metabolomes, etc.) have demonstrated the presence of relationships between network structures and organization of cellular function. Studies with correlation network further confirm the existence of such network structure and biological function relationship. However, correlation networks are typically noisy and the identified network structures, such as clusters, must be further investigated to verify actual cellular function. This is traditionally done using …

A Novel Correlation Networks Approach For The Identification Of Gene Targets, Kathryn Dempsey Cooper, Stephen Bonasera, Dhundy Raj Bastola, Hesham Ali

Interdisciplinary Informatics Faculty Proceedings & Presentations

Correlation networks are emerging as a powerful tool for modeling temporal mechanisms within the cell. Particularly useful in examining coexpression within microarray data, studies have determined that correlation networks follow a power law degree distribution and thus manifest properties such as the existence of “hub” nodes and semicliques that potentially correspond to critical cellular structures. Difficulty lies in filtering coincidental relationships from causative structures in these large, noise-heavy networks. As such, computational expenses and algorithm availability limit accurate comparison, making it difficult to identify changes between networks. In this vein, we present our work identifying temporal relationships from microarray data …

Free Will, Genuine Alternatives And Predictability, Laura Hagen

CMC Senior Theses

Through evaluating Hilary Bok’s argument from her essay Freedom and Practical Reason, I hope to shed light on the overall question of whether we can have free will if determinism is true. In the first two chapters I will fully explain and break down Bok’s argument for genuine epistemic alternatives. In chapter three I will evaluate the success of Bok’s arguments. Specifically, I will offer a variety of intuitive examples to show that epistemic unpredictability is not enough to make our alternatives genuine. I will then use more examples to consider the relative importance of unpredictability and endorsement to …

Thinking On The Edge: Heidegger, Derrida, And The Daoist Gateway (Men), Steven Burik

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Steven Bunk Many philosophical interpretations of the Daoist classics have proceeded, or continue to proceed, to read into these works the quest for a transcendental, foundational principle, a permanent moment of rest beyond the turmoil of everchanging things. The metaphysics that may be understood to be at work in such interpretations is what Heidegger and Derrida have called philosophy as ontotheology. It is argued here that Heidegger, Derrida, and the classical Daoists are better understood not so much as metaphysical and essentialist thinkers but as advocates of a profoundly inner-worldly way of thinking. In arguing for such a different approach, …

Recognition Within The Limits Of Reason: Remarks On Pippin’S Hegel’S Practical Philosophy, David Ingram

Philosophy: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Since the publication of Charles Taylor’s Multiculturalism and the Politics of Recognition in 1989,[1] the concept of recognition has re-emerged as a central if not dominant category of moral and political philosophy.

[1] C. Taylor, “The Politics of Recognition,” in A. Gutmann (ed.), Multiculturalism: Examining the Politics of Recognition (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), pp. 25-73.

Self And Other: Continental And Classical Chinese Thought, Steven Burik

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Traditionally, metaphysical notions of self and other presuppose a dualism that underlies much of Western philosophy. This dualism is opposed by accounts of self and other in recent continental philosophy and classical Chinese philosophy, which I compare. I argue that the self is seen in continental and Chinese thought as embedded in (ethical) relations and language, and not as transcendent or prior in the metaphysical sense to them. I argue for this by focussing on three themes: self and language, self as relational and embedded in the world or contextual environment, and self and the particular other. These three themes …

The Biopolitical Unconscious: Not-All Persons Are Political, Ross G. Shields

Media and Cultural Studies Honors Projects

It is a tenet of post-structuralist theory that discursive series fail in their attempts to constitute themselves as totalities. A system can fail in two distinct ways—from Kant’s dynamic and mathematic failures of reason, to Jacques Lacan’s equation of the two failures of language with the two failures (male and female) of sex. Biopolitical theory offers the most recent account of failure and collapse, now on the geopolitical scale. Given that the biopolitical subject too is sexed, this thesis asks the question: How does biopolitics fail? Franz Kafka’s aborted novels offer a premonition to a possible answer.

How Greek Tragedy Inspired Friedrich Nietzsche's Philosophy From "The Birth Of Tragedy" To "Ecce Homo", Marc Le Voir

Honors Capstones

Capstone submitted as a graduation requirement for the BSU Honors Program.

Metaphysics And The Charge Of Misanthropy : Ralph Waldo Emerson’S “Circles” As A Cipher For Understanding The Connection Between Robinson Jeffers And Herman Melville, Hunter Stark

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Herman Melville’s and Robinson Jeffers’s metaphysical thoughts reflect Ralph Waldo Emerson’s notion of looking towards Nature for discovery; all three writers’ observations of Nature influence how they see humanity’s place in existence. Both Melville and Jeffers observe Nature decentralizing humanity, which distinguishes their views from Emerson’s. Where Jeffers’s verse sternly voices this message, openly criticizing the anthropocentric viewpoint, Melville utilizes humor, subtly confronting the anthropocentric proponent and downplaying humanity’s power. Jeffers garners the label of misanthrope, whereas Melville’s metaphysical realm in Moby-Dick largely escapes this charge with the masking quality of his humor. Comparing both writers’ texts to an Emersonian …

Fictionalia As Modal Artifacts, Jeffrey C. Goodman

Faculty Scholarship

There is much controversy surrounding the nature of the relation between fictional individuals and possible individuals.  Some have argued that no fictional individual is a possible individual; others have argued that (some) fictional individuals just are (merely) possible individuals.  In this paper, I offer further grounds for believing the theory of fictional individuals defended by Amie Thomasson, viz., Artifactualism, by arguing that her view best allows one to make sense of this puzzling relation.  More specifically, when we realize that the view allows for an identification of merely possible individuals with fictional individuals, we see that the utility, and hence …

Manifestations As Effects, Jennifer Mckitrick

Department of Philosophy: Faculty Publications

According to a standard characterization of dispositions, when a disposition is activated by a stimulus, a manifestation of that disposition typically occurs. For example, when flammable gasoline encounters a spark in an oxygen-rich environment, the manifestation of flammability—combustion—occurs. In the dispositions/powers literature, it is common to assume that a manifestation is an effect of a disposition being activated. (I use “disposition” and “power” interchangeably). I address two questions in this chapter: Could all manifestations be effects that involve things acquiring only dispositional properties? And, is thinking of manifestations as contributions to effects preferable to thinking of them as effects? I …

Review Of Mark D. Morelli, At The Threshold Of The Halfway House: A Study Of Bernard Lonergan's Encounter With John Alexander Stewart, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Paul Redding, Or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying So Much About Meaning And Love Hegel’S Metaphysics And Kant’S Epistemic Modesty, James Kreines

CMC Faculty Publications and Research

In this interest of time, I’ll just say something directly: this is an incredible book. Reading it, thinking it through, is extremely rewarding. I haven’t read a work of philosophy that had as much impact on me since being in school myself. The book presents you with new ideas and connections and it forces you to see philosophy and its history in new ways, even if you (like me) had been quite attached to your old ways. The book got into my head. Now I find myself, in idle moments, arguing with Paul up there in my head; as if …

Method And Intellectual Conversion, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Review- Starting Strangeness: Reading Lonergan's Insight By Richard M. Liddy, Andrew Beards

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

The Catholic Intellectual Tradition, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Method In History, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Preface, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Substantial Unity And Living Things In Aristotle, Errol G. Katayama

Philosophy and Religion Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Review Of Thomas Reid’S Theory Of Perception By Ryan Nichols, Jennifer Mckitrick

Department of Philosophy: Faculty Publications

In Thomas Reid’s Theory of Perception, Ryan Nichols presents an interpretation and critique of the views of one of the most interesting thinkers of the early modern period, in particular, as the title indicates, those relating to perception. The book covers Reid’s Newtonian method, perception through touch and vision, the intentionality of perceptual states, the role of sensations in perception, perception of primary and secondary qualities, and the unity of perception via a discussion of Molyneux’s question regarding the perceptual abilities of one with recently acquired sight. Nichols’s book is somewhat challenging, more suitable to someone who is familiar …

Metaphysics Without Pre-Critical Monism: Hegel On Lower-Level Natural Kinds And The Structure Of Reality, James Kreines

CMC Faculty Publications and Research

My focus here is on what Hegel has to say about nature and natural kinds, in ‘Observing Reason’ from the Phenomenology, and also in similar material from the Logic and Encyclopedia. I intend to argue that this material suggests a surprising way of stepping beyond the fundamental debate. There can of course be no question of elaborating and defending here a complete interpretation of Hegel’s entire theoretical philosophy. I will have to restrict myself to arguing for the unlikely conclusion that there is an approach that can combine and integrate the strongest points made by both sides in …

Review- Startling Strangeness: Reading Lonergan's Insight, Charles Hefling

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

El Primer Contexto De Los Escritos Economicos De Bernard Lonergan, Richard Liddy

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.

Review- Startling Strangeness: Reading Lonergan's Insight, J. Michael Stebbins

Department of Religion Publications

No abstract provided.