RésuméLa qualité essentielle d'un mathématicien est l'imagination; la logique ne sert qu'à mettre les démonstrations sous une forme irréfutable, elle est incapable de les suggérer. L'imagination se fonde sur une sorte d'« intuition » des objets mathématiques étudiés, mais cela n'a que très peu de contact avec ce qu'on appelle d'ordinaire l'« intuition » sensible, les objets mathématiques considérés étant le plus souvent l'aboutissement d'un long processus d'abstraction qui leur ǒte toute possibilité de représentation concrète. Cette « intuition » mathématique (...) est avant tout le résultat d'une longue familiarité avec le sujet étudié; mais en outre il peut s'opérer des « transferts » d'intuition d'une théorie dans une autre; on en donne quelques exemples qui font ressortir la fécondité de tels transferts. (shrink)

Pourquoi l'humanité dans son ensemble ne s'améliore-t-elle pas? Pourquoi le progrès moral ne suit-il pas le progrès scientifique et technique? Les prisonsŠseront-elles fermées un jour? Toutes ces questions font écho de la réalité du mal dans sa force, dans son cycle interminable : un mal appelle un autre mal. Si nous avons la conscience du mal moral – du mal relatif au bien ou contraire à un bien défini – la conscience du mal, en dehors de toute définition de bien, (...) manquerait cruellement à l'humanité. La culture de tenir le mal dans sa positivité pourra rendre possible la libération éthique de la force du mal. (shrink)

L'espere humaine est conflictuelle et gregaire, menacee de toutes parts par la montee aux extremes de la violence. Aussi se trouve-t-elle confrontee a ce probleme urgent: comment vivre ensemble sans s'entre-tuer? Le politique est l'ordre humain en charge de ce probleme, et son objectif est la paix par la justice. Dans ce bref precis didactique, Jean Baechler prouve que le seul moyen d'eviter la guerre et de resoudre des problemes communs dans un monde dangereux et imprevisible est de s'efforcer (...) a l'union politique, meme si celle-ci est bien evidemment extremement difficile a realiser. (shrink)

L’analyse des réseaux sociaux est menée dans le domaine des sciences sociales depuis les années 1930. Le premier enjeu pour réaliser ces analyses se situe dans la collecte de l’information sur la structure de ces réseaux et sur leurs activités. Avec l’avènement du Web 2.0 et des technologies du Web sémantique, plusieurs mécanismes de collecte d’information sont désormais envisageables. Cependant, très peu d’utilisateurs sont conscients des facilités d’atteinte et de manipulation de leurs traces d’activités et de leurs données personnelles de (...) plus en plus rendus publics sur les réseaux socionumériques en particulier. Dans cet article, nous étudions les différentes approches permettant l’accès aux données dans les réseaux socionumériques, en nous intéressant − dans le cas précis de Facebook − à la qualité et la quantité de l’information accessible, et par conséquent, aux risques potentiels d’atteinte et de manipulation des données personnelles des utilisateurs par des tiers. Une expérimentation menée via l’API Facebook démontre l’accessibilité à un nombre important d’informations pouvant permettre de reconstruire automatiquement le réseau réel d’un utilisateur à partir de son profil.Social networks have been an object of analysis by the social sciences since the 1930s. The first challenge in performing these analyses is to gather information on the structure of these networks and on their activities. With the advent of Web 2.0 and semantic Web technologies, several different mechanisms can be used for this. However, few users are aware of how easy it is to access and manipulate the traces left by their activities and, especially on the social networks, by their personal data, which is becoming increasingly public. In this article, we look into the different ways of accessing data on the social networks, and – on Facebook in particular – into the quality and quantity of the information available and therefore the potential risks of users finding that third parties are accessing and manipulating their personal information. An experiment conducted via API Facebook shows that a great deal of information is accessible that can be used to automatically reconstruct a user’s actual network from their profile. (shrink)

La 4e de couverture indique : "La philosophie de Teilhard a apporté de nouveaux arguments de justification pour l'éthique des droits fondamentaux, laquelle se fonde traditionnellement sur le caractère rationnel de l'homme. En effet, Teilhard établit que cette rationalité découle d'une admirable évolution biologique, qui a pu sortir l'homme de l'animalité pour l'inscrire dans l'humanité. Ainsi, l'éthique en question se justifie concrètement par le fait que l'homme incarne la figure la plus aboutie de l'évolution, qui s'est spiritualisée, faisant de l'être (...) humain la portion la plus précieuse du cosmos. Autrement dit, notre caractère rationnel, pivot de la justification classique des droits fondamentaux, émane tout d'abord d'une anthropogenèse biologique. En déroulant cette perspective, l'auteur du présent essai a mis en évidence et développé ce qu'il nomme argumentaire évolutionniste des droits de l'homme. Cet argumentaire éclaire par ailleurs la légitimité de la bioéthique et de l'écologie, tout en plaidant pour l'humanisation de la globalisation et de la gourvernance mondiale.". (shrink)

Jean Starobinski, one of Europe's foremost literary critics, examines the life that led Rousseau, who so passionately sought open, transparent communication with others, to accept and even foster obstacles that permitted him to withdraw into himself. First published in France in 1958, Jean-Jacques Rousseau remains Starobinski's most important achievement and, arguably, the most comprehensive book ever written on Rousseau. The text has been extensively revised for this edition and is published here along with seven essays on Rousseau that (...) appeared between 1962 and 1970. (shrink)

One of the strongest strands in Nancy's philosophy is an attempt to rethink community and the very idea of the social in a way that does not ground these ideas in some individual subject or subjectivity. The fundamental argument of this book is that being is always 'being with', that 'I' is not prior to 'we', that existence is essentially co-existence. He thinks this being together, not as a comfortable enclosure in a pre-existing group, but as a mutual abandonment and (...) exposure to each other, one that would preserve the 'I' and its freedom in a mode of imagining community as neither a 'society of spectacle' nor via some form of 'authenticity'. (shrink)

This major study of Hobbes's political philosophy draws on recent developments in game and decision theory to explore whether the thrust of the argument in Leviathan, that it is in the interests of the people to create a ruler with absolute power, can be shown to be cogent. Professor Hampton has written a book of vital importance to political philosophers, political and social scientists, and intellectual historians.

The last and most poignant of these essays is The Intruder, Nancys philosophical meditation on his heart transplant.

In this book it explores science and technology, makes connections between these epistemic, cultural, and political trends, and develops profound insights into the nature of our postmodernity.

Dans les sociétés démocratiques contemporaines, les individus revendiquent le droit d'aimer librement. Ils sont attachés à la réussite de leur vie sentimentale et à l'épanouissement de leur sexualité. Mais le corps épris nous permet-il d'accéder à l'existence heureuse que nous désirons? Dans ce livre, Jean-Marie Frey met au jour les ressorts de l'inquiétude suscitée par l'amour charnel. Il montre comment la pudibonderie et le libertinage expriment, chacun à leur manière, une tentative pour se rassurer. Les prudes désireux de voiler (...) les femmes et les libertins exhibant un corps morcelé dans l'imagerie pornographique, n'éprouvent-ils pas les uns et les autres une crainte devant la chair désirable? L'auteur oppose les figures du pudibond et du libertin à celle d'un amant disposé à jouer le jeu d'une passion amoureuse à la fois inquiétante et joyeuse. (shrink)

Along with Husserl's Ideas and Heidegger's Being and Time, Being Given is one of the classic works of phenomenology in the twentieth century. Through readings of Kant, Husserl, Heidegger, Derrida, and twentieth-century French phenomenology (e.g., Merleau-Ponty, Levinas, and Henry), it ventures a bold and decisive reappraisal of phenomenology and its possibilities. Its author's most original work to date, the book pushes phenomenology to its limits in an attempt to redefine and recover the phenomenological ideal, which the author argues has never (...) been realized in any of the historical phenomenologies. Against Husserl's reduction to consciousness and Heidegger's reduction to Dasein, the author proposes a third reduction to givenness, wherein phenomena appear unconditionally and show themselves from themselves at their own initiative. Being Given is the clearest, most systematic response to questions that have occupied its author for the better part of two decades. The book articulates a powerful set of concepts that should provoke new research in philosophy, religion, and art, as well as at the intersection of these disciplines. Some of the significant issues it treats include the phenomenological definition of the phenomenon, the redefinition of the gift in terms not of economy but of givenness, the nature of saturated phenomena, and the question “Who comes after the subject?” Throughout his consideration of these issues, the author carefully notes their significance for the increasingly popular fields of religious studies and philosophy of religion. Being Given is therefore indispensable reading for anyone interested in the question of the relation between the phenomenological and the theological in Marion and emergent French phenomenology. (shrink)

A 62-year-old female with Huntington’s disease presented after a suicide attempt. Her advance directive stated that she did not want intubation or resuscitation, which her family acknowledged and supported. Despite these directives, she was resuscitated in the emergency department and continued to state that she would attempt suicide again. Her suicidality in the face of a chronic and advancing illness, and her prolonged consistency in her desire to take her own life, left careproviders wondering how to provide ethical, respectful care (...) to this patient. Tension between the ethical principles of autonomy and beneficence is central in this case. The patient’s narrative demonstrated that her suicide was an autonomous decision, free from coercion or disordered thinking from mental illness. Beneficence then would seem to necessitate care aligned with the patient’s desire to end her life, which created ethical uneasiness for her family and careproviders. The case highlights several end-of-life ethical considerations that have received much recent attention. With ongoing discussions about the legalization of aid in dying across the country, caregivers are challenged to understand what beneficence means in people with terminal illnesses who want a say in their death. This case also highlights the profound moral distress of families and careproviders that arises in such ethically challenging scenarios. (shrink)

In 2016, the Colorado legislature passed an amendment to Colorado’s medical proxy law that established a process for the appointment of a physician to act as proxy decision maker of last resort for an unrepresented patient (Colorado HB 16-1101: Medical Decisions For Unrepresented Patients). The legislative process brought together a diverse set of stakeholders, not all of whom supported the legislation. Following passage of the statutory amendment, the Colorado Collaborative for Unrepresented Patients (CCUP), a group of advocates responsible for initiating (...) the legislative process, coordinated a unique effort to engage these stakeholders in the creation of a set of voluntary guidelines to assist facilities and individual careproviders in the implementation of policies and procedures enabled by the statute. This article delineates the questions and concerns of stakeholders, describes how those issues were addressed within the guidelines, and proposes additional opportunities for research to assess the impact of the legislation in Colorado. (shrink)

La philosophie ne se réduit pas à la pure réflexion ni à la quête d'une sagesse intemporelle. Elle est aussi invention ou création de concepts. Elle s'expose volontiers à traverser le cours des sciences, à inscrire son histoire dans le contrepoint de leurs développements. Quand il se veut ainsi passeur de savoirs, le philosophe expérimente des concepts qui filtrent des interprétations, établissent des relations inattendues, modifient des approches trop abstraites : le temps, l'infini, la matière, le cosmos. L'enquête astrophysique ou (...) les recherches sur le cerveau offrent autant d'occasions de mises en perspective propices à la pédagogie que d'invitations à reconstituer le tissu des idées qui fondent la culture et les idéaux de nos sociétés. Même s'il analyse parfois des méthodes et des paradigmes scientifiques, ce livre ne relève pas de la philosophie des sciences telle que l'Université en définit la discipline. Il entend surtout questionner les conceptions scientifiques du monde qui justifient, transforment ou bouleversent nos croyances, nos comportements et aussi nos décisions. Il témoigne que les seuls savoirs qui vaillent sont toujours déconcertants. (shrink)

Born in 1799 in Moscow, Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin - who has been called the “founder of poetic and literary language in Russian” (Belinski, Turgenev), “the first of the Russians” (Dos-toyevski), “the first Russian artist-poet” (Belinski), “the original model for Russian identity” (Grigoriev), “an extremely rare and perhaps unique phenomenon of the Russian spirit” (Gogol), “the sun of the Russian intellectual conception of the world” (Dostoyevsky) - could trace his roots back to African ancestors. His mother, Nadine Hanibal, was the granddaughter (...) of “The Negro of Peter the Great,” Abraham Petrovich Hanibal, who at the beginning of the eighteenth century fell victim to the black slave trade with the Ottoman Empire. (shrink)

In the third book in the trilogy that includes Reduction and Givenness and Being Given. Marion renews his argument for a phenomenology of givenness, with penetrating analyses of the phenomena of event, idol, flesh, and icon. Turning explicitly to hermeneutical dimensions of the debate, Marion masterfully draws together issues emerging from his close reading of Descartes and Pascal, Husserl and Heidegger, Levinas and Henry. Concluding with a revised version of his response to Derrida, In the Name: How to Avoid Speaking (...) of It, Marion powerfully re-articulates the theological possibilities of phenomenology. (shrink)

Climate change harmfully affects social and natural systems. These outcomes adversely affect the human and natural systems, resulting in adopting related-response measures whose implementation yields similar outcomes, especially when poorly designed. Climate-related projects, actions, and policies cause harmful environmental impacts, even though the United Nations Convention on Climate Change and its subsequent instruments urge parties, when dealing with climate change, to employ methods that preserve the quality of the environment. Few studies have established the effects of these environmentally, economically, culturally, (...) and socially unsound mechanisms on public participation, although research usually proves that ecological and environmental citizenship can enhance climate action. The study also highlights gaps in the common understanding of public participation in climate action. This reflection analyses the relationships between public participation and climate response measures and concludes that uncertainty related to response measures could affect the perception of climate action by the public. The reflection, therefore, shows that many international environmental law legal instruments, policies, and scholarships attempt to address the issue. (shrink)

"Christian philosophy" is commonly regarded as an oxymoron, philosophy being thought incompatible with the assumptions and conclusions required by religious faith. According to this way of thinking, philosophy and theology must forever remain distinct. In From Theology to Theological Thinking, Jean-Yves Lacoste takes a different approach. Stepping back from contemporary philosophical concerns, Lacoste--a leading figure in the philosophy of religion--looks at the relationship between philosophy and theology from the standpoint of the history of ideas. He notes in particular that (...) theology and philosophy were not considered separate realms until the high Middle Ages, this distinction being a hallmark of the modern era that is coming to an end. Lacoste argues that the intellectual task before us now is to work in the frontier region between or beyond these domains, work he identifies as "the task of thinking." With this argument, Lacoste resets our understanding of Western Christian thought, contending that a new way of thinking that is at once philosophical and theological will be the lasting discourse of Christianity. (shrink)

Jean Piaget was one of the most salient and inspirational figures in psychological and educational research this century. He was prolific, authoring or editing over eighty books and numerous journal papers which have spawned a huge and fertile continuation of his research over the decades. A major component of any course on children's psychological development and a research tradition that is expanding, scholars need access to the original texts rather than relying on secondhand accounts. Jean Piaget: Selected Works (...) is a chance to acquire key original texts, most of which have been previously unavailable for several years. (shrink)

This challenging and provocative book argues against much contemporary orthodoxy in philosophy and the social sciences by showing why objectivity in the domain of ethics is really no different from the objectivity of scientific knowledge. Many philosophers and social scientists have challenged the idea that we act for objectively authoritative reasons. Jean Hampton takes up the challenge by undermining two central assumptions of this contemporary orthodoxy: that one can understand instrumental reasons without appeal to objective authority, and that the (...) adoption of the scientific world view requires no such appeal. In the course of the book Jean Hampton examines moral realism, the general nature of reason and norms, internalism and externalism, instrumental reasoning, and the expected utility model of practical reasoning. The book is sure to prove to be a seminal work in the theory of rationality that will be read by a broad swathe of philosophers and social scientists. (shrink)