These essays focus on and explore the idea of "radicalizing" hermeneutics, which John D. Caputo first proposed in his provocative and widely read study, Radical Hermeneutics (1987). In the wake of Derrida, the essays address the confrontation of hermeneutics and postmodernism. The contributors are from various disciplines—philosophy, literature, and science—and they make exciting and original contributions to hermeneutic work. Caputo and Martinez have coauthored an introductory piece that sets out the "very idea of radical hermeneutics," which several contributors proceed (...) to work and rework in quite original ways. (shrink)

“Herr Phister as Captain Scipio” is a succinct and concentrated study by Kierkegaard on the art of acting. In spite of its brevity and by virtue of its conceptual parsimony, the work deserves closer attention, if only because it also exhibits some of the pesky problems involved in the practice of interpreting oneself. I argue that “Herr Phister as Captain Scipio” forms part of the habitual context of Kierkegaard’s thought about selfhood. To be more specific, I attempt to show not (...) only that this essay (attributed to the pseudonym Procul) is about the theory of the three stages of existence but also that the aesthetic is represented by Scipio, the ethical by Phister, and the religious by Procul himself. (shrink)

In Kierkegaard’s scheme of concepts, acts of piety and ascetic styles of living — however colorful and conspicuous their ostensible forms — do not eo ipso constitute the religious individual. There is more. According to the logic of this train of thought, no one can know who is a religious individual. To aggravate matters, this blessed ignorance pertains also to the very person who would in all sincerity arrogate such an identity. So, at least, run strains of a theory adumbrated, (...) for example, in Training in Christianity, The Concept of Anxiety and Concluding Unscientific Postscript. Dans le schème des concepts chez Kierkegaard, les actes de piété et les styles de vie ascétiques si colorées et manifestes que soient leurs formes déclarées ne constituent pas d’eux-mêmes l’individu religieux. Il y a plus. Suivant la logique de cette ligne de pensée, nul ne peut savoir qui est un individu religieux. Bien plus, cette ignorance bénie s’applique également à la personne même qui, en toute sincérité, s’arrogerait une pareille identité. C’est bien là, à tout le moins, le sens d’une théorie qui s’esquisse, par exemple, dans L’École du christianisme, Le concept d’angoisse et le Postscriptum aux miettes philosophiques. (shrink)

Durante la presencia española en el sudeste asiático se mantuvieron contactos con otros países de su entorno. Uno de ellos fue Japón. El archipiélago nipón cambió de dirigente tras la batalla de Sekigahara, estableciéndose tras ella una nueva dinastía que dirigiría al país hasta 1868, la familia Tokugawa. En los primeros años de este gobierno las relaciones con los españoles fueron cambiantes, pasando de una situación favorable a terminar rompiéndose. Es en esos primeros años se hallan Rodrigo de Vivero y (...) Sebastián Vizcaíno. Ambos personajes se entrevistaron tanto con Ieyasu como con Hidetada Tokuwaga. Vivero estuvo en Japón poco antes de que las relaciones entre ambas potencias se rompiesen; por su parte, Vizcaíno las vivió en primera persona. De sus estancias quedaron sus percepciones del país nipón recogidas en dos Relaciones manuscritas. El objetivo que aquí se persigue es analizar y exponer ordenadamente los datos extraídos de sus manuscritos acerca de las costumbres de los japoneses, su arte, su arquitectura, su estructura social, etc. desde el punto de vista de dos personajes que a diferencia de los misioneros no se involucraron en la sociedad japonesa. Palabras clave: Rodrigo de Vivero, Sebastián Vizcaíno, Japón, Tokugawa, Nueva España, Filipinas.During the Spanish presence in Southeaster Asia, contacts were maintained with other neighboring countries. One of them was Japan. The Japanese archipelago changed its leadership after the Battle of Sekigahara, establishing a new dynasty after it that would lead the country until 1868, the Tokugawa family. In the first years of this government relations with the Spanish were changing, going from a favourable situation to breaking up. It is in those early years that Rodrigo de Vivero and Sebastián Vizcaíno is found. Both characters interviewed both Ieyasu and Hidetada Tokuwaga. Vivero was in Japan shortly before relations between the two powers were broken; for his part, Vizcaíno lived that in the first person. From his stays remained his perceptions of the Japanese country collected in two manuscript Narrations. The objective pursued here is to analyze and orderly expose the data extracted from his manuscripts about the customs of the Japanese, their art, their architecture, their social structure, etc. from the point of view of two characters who, unlike the missionaries, were not involved in Japanese society. Key words: Rodrigo de Vivero, Sebastián Vizcaíno, Namban, Iberian century, Japan, Tokugawa, New Spain, Philippines. (shrink)

On Race and Racism in America offers a variety of perspectives on American Philosophy's relative blindness to issues of race.

The purpose of this paper is to attend to a certain attitude towards philosophy at Spellman College and to offer an account of its occurrence. This paper also offers recommendations on pedagogical methods and curricular models to attract African American students to philosophy. The author uses examples from personal experience teaching ethics seminars and articulates guiding principles for engaging students on a personal level while cultivating their interest in the discipline.

Review of Frank Schalow's "Imagination and Existence, Heidegger's Retrieval of the Kantian Ethic".

From the first moments of perusal I felt quite certain that Watts’s study, by virtue of its limpid prose and the serene self-assurance of its style, would be a reader’s delight, and so it was! Unlike so many books that merely shuffle around Kierkegaard, seeming to convey knowledge of the daedal structure of his art, Watts’ sure-footed approach avoids any form of circumlocution or sciolism. Instead, his presentation of Kierkegaard’s thought is crystalline, concise, and compelling.

From the first moments of perusal I felt quite certain that Watts’s study, by virtue of its limpid prose and the serene self-assurance of its style, would be a reader’s delight, and so it was! Unlike so many books that merely shuffle around Kierkegaard, seeming to convey knowledge of the daedal structure of his art, Watts’ sure-footed approach avoids any form of circumlocution or sciolism. Instead, his presentation of Kierkegaard’s thought is crystalline, concise, and compelling.

This book is at once a critique of modernity and postmodernism as well as an interpretation of Kierkegaard's conception of the self. The novelty of Hall's approach consists in his claim that spirit or the self is intimately connected with the first person speech act, which is represented by the Hebrew idea of dabhar. As Yahweh's word, dabhar "brings the world into existence and his fidelity sustains it". In this respect, God's primordial speech act, which is both word and deed, (...) serves as the paradigm of human existence itself. Hence, while speaking is regarded as the defining characteristic of human beings, owning and owning up to one's words--covenantal speech or reflexive integrity--alone determines what it is to be fully human. From this new point of view, Hall reads the first volume of Kierkegaard's Either/or, where Don Giovanni and Faust are featured, within the context of modern philosophy of language by using insights derived from Austin, Wittgenstein, Polanyi and Poteat. (shrink)

The eclipse riddle -- Seeing surfaces -- The disappearing act -- Spinning shadows -- Berkeley's shadow -- Para-reflections -- Para-refractions : shadowgrams and the black drop -- Goethe's colored shadows -- Filtows -- Holes in the light -- Black and blue -- Seeing in black and white -- We see in the dark -- Hearing silence.

The paper argues against Peacocke's moderate rationalism in modality. In the first part, I show, by identifying an argumentative gap in its epistemology, that Peacocke's account has not met the Integration Challenge. I then argue that we should modify the account's metaphysics of modal concepts in order to avoid implausible consequences with regards to their possession conditions. This modification generates no extra explanatory gap. Yet, once the minimal modification that avoids those implausible consequences is made, the resulting account cannot support (...) Peacocke's moderate rationalism. (shrink)

Can God create a stone too heavy for him to lift? Can time have a beginning? Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Riddles, paradoxes, conundrums--for millennia the human mind has found such knotty logical problems both perplexing and irresistible. Now Roy Sorensen offers the first narrative history of paradoxes, a fascinating and eye-opening account that extends from the ancient Greeks, through the Middle Ages, the Enlightenment, and into the twentieth century. When Augustine asked what God was doing before (...) He made the world, he was told: "Preparing hell for people who ask questions like that." A Brief History of the Paradox takes a close look at "questions like that" and the philosophers who have asked them, beginning with the folk riddles that inspired Anaximander to erect the first metaphysical system and ending with such thinkers as Lewis Carroll, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and W.V. Quine. Organized chronologically, the book is divided into twenty-four chapters, each of which pairs a philosopher with a major paradox, allowing for extended consideration and putting a human face on the strategies that have been taken toward these puzzles. Readers get to follow the minds of Zeno, Socrates, Aquinas, Ockham, Pascal, Kant, Hegel, and many other major philosophers deep inside the tangles of paradox, looking for, and sometimes finding, a way out. Filled with illuminating anecdotes and vividly written, A Brief History of the Paradox will appeal to anyone who finds trying to answer unanswerable questions a paradoxically pleasant endeavor. (shrink)

Since its original publication in 1979, The Possibility of Naturalism has been one of the most influential works in contemporary philosophy of science and social science. It is a cornerstone of the critical realist position, which is now widely seen as offering a viable alternative to move positivism and postmodernism. This revised edition includes a new foreword.

The Indian film’s depiction of rape and sexual violence specifically on women, can provide a glimpse into the wider Indian cultural mores seeping into the thoughts and processes that are in play du...

'As an introduction to early modern thinking and the impact of past ideas on present lives, this book can find few equals and no superiors. Porter is a witty, humane writer with an extraordinary vocabulary and a sparkling sense of fun. Whether he is quoting from obscure medical texts or analysing scabrous diaries, dishing the dirt on long-dead bigwigs or evoking sympathy for human suffering, his grasp is masterly and his erudition appealing. I wish I could read it again for (...) the first time: you can.' Times Educational Supplement, Book of the Week In this startlingly brilliant sequel to the prize-winning ENLIGHTENMENT Roy Porter completes his lifetime's work, offering a magical, enthusiastic and charming account of the writings of some of the most attractive figures ever to write English. (shrink)

The paper compares the suitability of two different epistemologies of counterfactuals—(EC) and (W)—to elucidate modal knowledge. I argue that, while both of them explain the data on our knowledge of counterfactuals, only (W)—Williamson’s epistemology—is compatible with all counterpossibles being true. This is something on which Williamson’s counterfactual-based account of modal knowledge relies. A first problem is, therefore, that, in the absence of further, disambiguating data, Williamson’s choice of (W) is objectionably biased. A second, deeper problem is that (W) cannot satisfactorily (...) elucidate modal knowledge. Third, from a naturalistic perspective, the nature of this second problem favours (EC) against (W). (shrink)

In this book, Roy Bhaskar sets out to revindicate ontology, critiquing the reduction of being in favor of knowledge, which he calls the "epistemic fallacy".

Following on from Roy Bhaskarâe(tm)s first two books, A Realist Theory of Science and The Possibility of Naturalism, Scientific Realism and Human Emancipation, establishes the conception of social science as explanatoryâe"and thence emancipatoryâe"critique. Scientific Realism and Human Emancipation starts from an assessment of the impasse of contemporary accounts of science as stemming from an incomplete critique of positivism. It then proceeds to a systematic exposition of scientific realism in the form of transcendental realism, highlighting a conception of science as explanatory (...) of a structured, differentiated and changing world. Turning to the social domain, the book argues for a view of the social order as conditioned by, and emergent from, nature. Advocating a critical naturalism, the author shows how the transformational model of social activity together with the conception of social science as explanatory critique which it entails, resolves the divisions and dualisms besetting orthodox social and normative theory: between society and the individual, structure and agency, meaning and behavior, mind and body, reason and cause, fact and value, and theory and practice. The book then goes on to discuss the emancipatory implications of social science and sketches the nature of the depth investigation characteristically entailed. In the highly innovative third part of the book Roy Bhaskar completes his critique of positivism by developing a theory of philosophical discourse and ideology, on the basis of the transcendental realism and critical naturalism already developed, showing how positivism functions as a restrictive ideology of and for science and other social practices. (shrink)

This paper addresses the problem of sound individuation (SI) and its connection to sound ontology (SO). It is argued that the problems of SI, such as aspatiality, extreme individuation, indexical perplexity and duration puzzles are due to SO’s uncertainties. Besides, I describe the views in SO, including the wave view (WV), the property view (PV), and the event view (EV), as Casey O’Callaghan defends it. According to O’Callaghan, EV offers clear standards to individuate sounds. However, this claim is countered by (...) the consideration that any view could also defend the standards in SO, and thus, EV does not solve any of the problems mentioned above. As a way of showing the difficulties inherited by sound’s inner ontology, the problem of its linguistic representation is also addressed. The problem of SI can be developed within the frame of the philosophy of language and, specifically, regarding the discussion about mass vs count-­sortal terms. Is the term sound a mass or a count­-sortal? It is shown that, for reasons pertaining SO, the decision regarding the case of sound as a mass or count-­sortal term remains open. SI is, thus, covered from the SO to the philosophy of language. (shrink)