ABSTRACTMost scholars agree that meaning and intelligibility are central to Heidegger’s account of Dasein and Being-in-the-world, but there is some confusion about the nature of this intelligibility. In his debate with McDowell, Dreyfus draws on phenomenologists like Heidegger to argue that there are two kinds of intelligibility: a basic, nonconceptual, practical intelligibility found in practical comportment and a conceptual, discursive intelligibility. I explore two possible ways that Dreyfus might ground this twofold account of intelligibility in Heidegger: first in the distinction (...) between the hermeneutic and apophantic “as”, and second in the presence and absence of the as-structure. I argue that neither approach succeeds because practical intelligibility is always already discursive and discursive articulation is a condition of practical comportment. (shrink)

In this paper I take issue with Heidegger's use of the concept of death as a means of disclosing human finitude. I argue that Being‐towards‐death is inadequate to the disclosure of Dasein's thrownness which is necessary for the kind of authentic historizing that Heidegger describes and furthermore leads to a reading of authenticity which is preclusive of Being‐with‐Others, I suggest that this difficulty may be alleviated through increased attention to the opposite boundary of Dasein's existence, namely its birth. Although I (...) do not pursue the project here of conducting a phenomenology of birth, I suggest some directions for proceeding with that task, and I illustrate that a greater emphasis on Dasein's beginning will increase the richness of our understanding of our Being‐with‐Others. (shrink)

This essay critically engages Dreyfus's widely read interpretation of Heidegger's Being and Time . It argues that Dreyfus's reading is rooted in two primary claims or interpretative principles. The first - the Cartesianism thesis - indicates that Heidegger's objective in Being and Time is to overturn Cartesianism. The second - the hermeneutics of suspicion thesis - claims that Division II is supposed to suspect and throw into question the results of the Division I analysis. These theses contribute to the view (...) that there are two conflicting accounts of inauthenticity that threaten the coherence of Heidegger's notion of authenticity. This view concerning authenticity is mistaken, as are the two theses that support it. The first thesis is incorrect because Heidegger's explicit aim is to investigate the question of the meaning of being not to overturn Cartesianism. The second is incorrect because the analyses of Division I describe the structures of everyday human existence in preparation for a closer examination in Division II of what makes them possible. Division II does not undercut Division I; it carries the analysis deeper. Authenticity, then, is not a negation of everydayness; it is a deepening of the self-understanding expressed in everydayness. (shrink)

The existential analytic of Being and Time is set within the frame of the Seinsfrage. This question arises for Heidegger out of his critical engagement with Husserl's phenomenology. More careful attention to Heidegger's project as a phenomenological one reveals that Dasein, the entity who asks the Seinsfrage and who always has a pre-ontological understanding of Being, is also intentional. Dasein's existentiality is an intentionality. I will argue that inauthenticity and authenticity may be fruitfully understood in terms of the phenomenological notions (...) of empty intention and intentional fulfillment, respectively. Such an approach opens up the possibility of understanding Dasein's subjectivity in a way which challenges more traditional existentialist and voluntarist interpretations. (shrink)

It has been suggested recently that Heidegger’s philosophy entails a linguistic idealism because it is committed to the thesis that meaning determines reference. I argue that a careful consideration of the relationship between meaning and signification in Heidegger’s work does not support the strong sense of determination required by this thesis. By examining Heidegger’s development of Husserl’s phenomenology, I show that discourse involves a logic that articulates meaning into significations. Further analysis of Heidegger’s phenomenological method at work shows that while (...) meaning serves as a condition of possibility of signification in the sense that all possibilities for a term’s signification are latent in the meaning of that term, meaning under-determines signification and hence reference. Key Words: discourse • language • linguistic idealism • logic • meaning • phenomenology • signification. (shrink)

The Early Heidegger’s Philosophy of Life: Facticity, Being and Language offers an interpretation of Heidegger’s concept of facticity as it is articulated in connection with the ideas of life and language in the lecture courses from 1919225. The book argues that facticity is both the source of vitality for theory and a source of deception and falsehood and therefore cannot be viewed in either positive or negative terms exclusively, but must instead be viewed as ambiguous. This essay argues that this (...) basic thesis is correct and is supported by drawing a distinction between everydayness and inauthenticity. It is also argued that the analysis of language the book offers can be useful in clearing up misunderstandings of Heidegger’s concept of discourse in Being and Time. (shrink)

Infectious Nietzsche is a collection of twelve provocative essays written by Krell during the years 1969-94. This fact accounts for the somewhat fragmentary texture of the work, but each piece adds another dimension to what Krell refers to as his interpretation of Nietzsche's "descensional" thinking, and, in this regard, they remain remarkably well coordinated.

Excellence in sport performance is normally taken to be a matter of superior performance of physical movements or quantitative outcomes of movements. This paper considers whether a wider conception can be afforded by certain kinds of nature based sport. The interplay between technical skill and aesthetic experience in nature based sports is explored, and the extent to which it contributes to a distinction between different sport-based approaches to natural environments. The potential for aesthetic appreciation of environmental engagement is found to (...) be strongly dependent on whether or not environmental engagement is exploited for the end of producing a quantifiable result or enhancing technical skill. It is also argued that an existential rather than spectatorial attitude to aesthetic experience is offered by specifically nature oriented sport. Aesthetic experience achieved in this way is therefore neither passive nor detached, but extends Berleant's concept of participatory environmental aesthetics and underpins both an alternate (wide) conception of excellence in sport activity and a richer experience of aesthetic engagement than more objectivised standpoints. (shrink)

Previous discussions on the value of sport in remote locations have concentrated on 1) environmental and process concerns, with the rejection of competition and goal-directed or use oriented activity, or 2) the value of risk and dangerous sport for self-affirmation. It is argued that the value of risk in remote sport is in self-knowledge rather than self-affirmation and that risk in remote sport, while enhancing certain kinds of experience, is not necessary. The value of remote sport is in offering the (...) opportunity for experience that enhances the participants’ knowledge both of self and of the environment with which they interact. (shrink)

Two prevalent assumptions in the philosophy of sport literature are that all sports are games and that all games are contests, meant to determine who is the better at the skills definitive of the sport. If these are correct, it would follow that all sports are contests and that a range of sporting activities, including nature sports, are not in fact sports at all. This paper first confronts the notion that sport and games must seek to resolve skill superiority through (...) consideration of sport activities that have no such aim. The reduction of sport to game is also shown to be untenable and due to misunderstanding the point of sport activities, specifically, why people engage in them. This leads to reconsideration of the dominance of an instrumental conception of sport and the pursuit of excellence as anthropomaximising efficiency. The Norwegian tradition of frilutsliv is explored as a counterpoint to both conventional and nature sport. (shrink)

This paper is an examination of the concept of recognition and its connection with identity and respect. This is related to the question of how women are or are not adequately recognised or respected for their achievements in sport and whether eliminating sex segregation in sport is a solution. This will require an analysis of the concept of excellence in sport, as well as the relationship between fairness and inclusion in an activity that is fundamentally about bodily movement. I argue (...) that attempts to address the problem of women’s recognition in sport need to do so in ways that neither eliminate sport as a fairness regulated system for developing individual excellence in bodily movement nor that prevent women’s achievement of sporting excellence, with the regard that belongs to them. Doing this requires us to decide whether sport is about champions or about individual excellence. (shrink)

This paper responds to Kevin Krein’s claim in that the particular value of nature sports over traditional ones is that they offer intensity of sport experience in dynamic interaction between an athlete and natural features. He denies that this intensity is derived from competitive conflict of individuals and denies that nature sport derives its value from internal conflict within the athlete who carries out the activity. This paper responds directly to Krein by analysing ‘intensity’ in sport in terms of the (...) relationship between attention and reflection and the interaction between self and environment. I reply directly to Krein’s rejection of self-competition as based on a mischaracterisation of internal struggle and argue that the weighing of incompatible desires does not involve a fragmented self. I argue that the unique intensity to which Krein refers is strongly comparable to the Kantian conception of the sublime and explore how sublime experience fits Krein’s account and outline some serious problems that such an ideal of experience poses for nature sport. (shrink)

This paper considers the importance of play as a conventional space for hypothetical self-expression and self-trial, its importance for determination of identity, and for development of self-possibilities. Expanding such possibilities in play enables challenging of socially entrenched assumptions concerning possible and appropriate identities. Discussion is extended to the contexts of gender performance (drag) and sport-play. It is argued that play proceeds on the basis of a fundamental pretence of reality that must be taken seriously by its participants; this discussion includes (...) considerations of serious and ironical play, “playing-at”, and travesty. (shrink)

In a recent paper, Kevin Krein argues that the notion of self-competition is misplaced in adventure sports and of only limited application altogether, for two main reasons: (i) the need for a consistent and repeatable measure of performance; and (ii) the requirement of multiple competitors. Moreover, where an individual is engaged in a sport in which the primary feature with which they are engaged is a natural one, Krein argues that the more accurate description of their activity is not 'competition', (...) but an attempt at harmonious interaction. I raise a number of problems against both criteria and argue that traditional and adventure sports do both involve self-competition on at least two levels: bettering one's previous performance and resisting the desire to quit. I argue that self-reflexive competition is not so much with one's self (which is philosophically absurd), but within one's self, between conflicting motivations and desires. I explore what is involved in self-reflexive competition, particularly at a phenomenological, self-constituting level, and raise the question of whether it is appropriate for activity in wilder natural environments. (shrink)

In Sons of Anarchy, the male members of the MC are only one part of the story, as the Charming women play equally pivotal roles in the action. This chapter takes a look at the women to see how they wield their power, what they do with it, and how it is limited by the world in which they operate. The stories told on Sons of Anarchy are familiar to us. The character's lives ebb and flow with hopes and fears, (...) gains and losses, friendship and enmity, love and resentments, and regrets and triumphs that we can identify with. We ride alongside the characters as they strive for the ideals that make life worth living, such as friendship, love, and happiness, though none of the characters seems to have achieved these ideals perfectly in their lives. (shrink)

“What are you prepared to do to win?” This is a question that any serious competitor will at one time or another have to consider. The answer that one is inclined to make, I shall argue, is revealing of the deeper character of the individual participant in sport as both physical competitor and moral person. To that end, I examine one of the classic responses to the question, gamesmanship, which can be characterised as an attempt to win one game by (...) playing another. I contend that gamesmanship is a deliberate strategy of competition that has certain paradoxical outcomes; while it may produce an enhanced competitive environment that calls forth superior performances from participants, its more aggravated manifestations are in the long term athletically self-destructive for those who rely on them as a competitive device, and argue the presence of more profound underlying moral failings as well. (shrink)

This paper refines a number of theoretical distinctions relevant to deceptive play, in particular the difference between merely misleading actions and types of simulation commonly considered beyond the pale, such as diving. To do so, I rely on work in the philosophy of language about conversational convention and implicature, the distinction between lying and misleading, and their relation to concepts of seduction and bullshit. The paper works through a number of possible solutions to the question of what is wrong with (...) simulation and its difference from strategic fouling, including the argument that games and their rules operate like contracts. I conclude that the wrongness lies in the injustice of unfair advantage gained through actions that silence opposition by resort to unanswerable play. (shrink)

The current popularity of the mapping trope, particularly in discussions of postmodernism, might give rise to the impression that the AAA has expanded its sphere of marketability: all those readers lost in the wilderness of Western civilization need a good map to find their way to meaning and, with any luck, to history. Berman dons the cap of cartographer-chauffeur and steers us with great skill on a breathtaking tour through the landscape of the German novel from 1848 to 1947. We (...) are undoubtedly in better hands with Berman than with Allstate. While his impressive study begins, modestly enough, with the assertion that “literature has its geography,”. (shrink)

From the very first scene of The Good Place, monumental duplicity is at work. Everything is contrived and everyone is lying, both to themselves and to one another. The Good Place raises the issue of how to determine whether a person is ethical or not. Both Eleanor and Tahani struggle with significant feelings of inadequacy, compelling them to commit ethical infractions to land them in “The Good Place”. Although Tahani and Eleanor come from divergent social stations, they share a common (...) legacy of familial abuse that deeply affected their sense of self‐worth, causing them to relentlessly exploit and abuse others in their attempts to gain a positive self‐image. The Good Place reminds that in our lives we are constantly confronted by ethical dilemmas that challenge us to make choices, and all we have for guidance are flawed, often conflicting ideals that we pick up along the way. (shrink)

Ambiguity in the athlete’s perception and description of pain that opens the door to a series of reinterpretations of athletic experience and events that argue the development of an increasingly inauthentic relation to self and others on the part of those who consume performance as third parties (spectators) and ultimately those who produce it first hand (athletes). The insertion of the spectator into the sport situation as a consumer of the athlete’s activity and the preference given to spectator interpretation shift (...) control of meaning away from the athlete and encourage a demand for athlete suffering in aid of the spectator’s own need for meaning. Through discussions of the function of narrative in sport spectacle, the witnessing role of spectators, and the phenomenon of vicarious substitution, I discuss the representation of the athlete as a character ideal and moral exemplar. At a more developed level of external interpretation, the athlete (or team) becomes the champion of the spectator, the role model or focal point of civic pride whose victory asserts the ascendence of my team and town over yours; and finally, the athlete or team is the intentional object of fan identification: my team is me. I conclude that the existential commitment of the spectator as devoted fan is an inauthentic one. (shrink)

“He's [the Red King's] dreaming now,” said Tweedledee: “and what do you think he's dreaming about?”Alice said, “Nobody can guess that.”“Why, about you!” Tweedledee exclaimed, clapping his hands triumphantly. “And if he left off dreaming about you, where do you suppose you'd be?”“Where I am now, of course,” said Alice.“Not you!” Tweedledee retorted contemptuously. “You'd be nowhere. Why, you're only a sort of thing in his dream!”“If that there King was to wake,” added Tweedledum, “you'd go out—bang!—just like a candle.”“I (...) shouldn't!” Alice exclaimed indignantly. “Besides, if I'm only a sort of thing in his dream, what are you, I should like to know?”“Ditto,” said Tweedledum.“Ditto, ditto!” cried Tweedledee.He shouted this so loud that Alice couldn't help saying “Hush! You'll be waking him, I'm afraid, if you make so much noise.”“Well, it's no use your talking about waking him,” said Tweedledum, “when you're only one of the things in his dream. You know very well you're not real.”“I am real!” said Alice, and began to cry.“You won't make yourself a bit realler by crying,” Tweedledee remarked: “there's nothing to cry about.”“If I wasn't real,” Alice said—half laughing through her tears, it all seemed so ridiculous —“I shouldn't be able to cry.”“I hope you don't suppose those are real tears?” Tweedledum interrupted in a tone of great contempt.—Through the Looking Glass. (shrink)

Ambiguity in the athlete’s perception and description of pain that opens the door to a series of reinterpretations of athletic experience and events that argue the development of an increasingly inauthentic relation to self and others on the part of those who consume performance as third parties (spectators) and ultimately those who produce it first hand (athletes). The insertion of the spectator into the sport situation as a consumer of the athlete’s activity and the preference given to spectator interpretation shift (...) control of meaning away from the athlete and encourage a demand for athlete suffering in aid of the spectator’s own need for meaning. Through discussions of the function of narrative in sport spectacle, the witnessing role of spectators, and the phenomenon of vicarious substitution, I discuss the representation of the athlete as a character ideal and moral exemplar. At a more developed level of external interpretation, the athlete (or team) becomes the champion of the spectator, the role model or focal point of civic pride whose victory asserts the ascendence of my team and town over yours; and finally, the athlete or team is the intentional object of fan identification: my team is me. I conclude that the existential commitment of the spectator as devoted fan is an inauthentic one. (shrink)

I argue that athletes should neither be taken as role models nor present themselves as such. Indeed, they should resist any attempt to take them as such on the grounds that seeing athletes (or other celebrities) as role models abrogates the existential and ethical responsibilities of both parties. Whether one takes on the role of being a model to others or whether one chooses to model one’s own behaviour on that of another, except in respect of the development of technical (...) skill, one engages in bad faith and fails to act in an existentially ethical way. To this end, I consider the inclination to influence and admiration, as well as self-respect, agency, motivation, and envy. I argue that while celebrity sportspersons and similar others do not have duties that others do not have just by virtue of their notoriety alone, they may have situational responsibilities commensurate with their social reach. More importantly, however, since social influence is not a transformation of inert matter, there are also responsibilities belonging to their audiences, those who merely observe and those who choose to imitate. (shrink)

This paper explores ludonarrative dissonance as it occurs in sport, primarily as the conflict experienced by participants between dominant narratives and self-generated interpretations of embodied experience. Taking self-narrative as a social rather than isolated production, the interaction with three basic categories of dominant narrative is explored: transformative, representing a spectrum from revelatory to distorting, bullying and colonising. These forms of dominant narrative prescribe interpretations of the player’s experience of play and of self that displace their own, with the end result (...) of dissonance and self-alienation. (shrink)

In this biography of William James, Robert D. Richardson claims that he seeks ". . . to understand his life through his work, not the other way around" (xiii). This he does not do. Rather, where Richardson does excel is in biographical narrative or in his own words, in the aim "to present James' life [rather] than to analyze or explain it" (xiii).Richardson covers fascinating biographical territory familiar to readers of this journal. He provides an excellent narrative description of James's (...) relation to his father Henry James, Sr. He helpfully accounts for the latter's influence on William as well as their intellectual differences. Richardson's descriptions of the warm relationship between William and his brother .. (shrink)

The paper argues that authentic human selfhood requires the adequate integration of bodily awareness into the self-conception of self, and that a highly significant contributor to this process is athletic activity (sports). The role of athletics in self-integration is examined from phenomenological and moral-political standpoints, and it is argued that, although athletic activity's inherent goal of realizing ontological unity through embodied intentionality is ideally suited to this task, the organization of sport too frequently thwarts this purpose, either through exclusion of (...) potential athletes or exploitation of committed participants. (shrink)

Ask any Civil War historian about the cost of the Civil War and they will recite a host of well-known assessments, from military casualties and government expenditures to various measures of direct and indirect costs. But those numbers are not likely to include an appraisal of the humanitarian crisis and suffering caused by the wartime destruction of slavery. Peace-time emancipation in other regions and in other societies certainly presented dangers and difficulties for the formerly enslaved, but wartime emancipation chained the (...) new opportunities and possibilities for freedom to war’s violence, civil chaos, destruction and deprivation. The resulting health crisis, including illness, injury, and trauma, had immediate and lasting consequences for black civilians and soldiers. Although historians are more accustomed to thinking of enslaved people as the beneficiaries of this war, rather than its victims, we cannot assess the cost of this war until we answer two important questions: first, what price did enslaved people have to pay because their freedom was achieved through warfare rather than a peacetime process; and secondly, in this war in which so many Americans paid such a high cost, to what extent did racism inflate the cost paid by people of African descent? In answering these questions, we reconsider this specific war, but we must also tie the U.S. Civil War to a larger scholarship on how wars impact civilians, create refugee populations, and accelerate harsh treatment of people regarded as racial, religious, or ethnic outsiders. We are reminded that war is not an equal-opportunity killer. (shrink)

Fusion validity assessments employ structural equation models to investigate whether an existing scale functions in accordance with theory. Fusion validity parallels criterion validity by depending on correlations with non-scale variables but differs from criterion validity because it requires at least one theorized effect of the scale, and because both the scale and scaled-items are included in the model. Fusion validity, like construct validity, will be most informative if the scale is embedded in as full a substantive context as theory permits. (...) Appropriate scale functioning in a comprehensive theoretical context greatly enhances a scale’s validity. Inappropriate scale functioning questions the scale but the scale’s theoretical embedding encourages detailed diagnostic investigations potentially challenging specific items, the procedure used to calculate scale values, or aspects of the theory, but also possibly recommends incorporating additional items into the scale. The scaled items should have survived prior content and methodological assessments but the items may or may not reflect a common factor because items having diverse causal backgrounds can sometimes fuse to form a unidimensional entity. Though items reflecting a common cause can be assessed for fusion validity, we illustrate fusion validity in the more challenging context of a scale comprised of diverse items and embedded in a complicated theory. Specifically we consider the Leadership scale from the Alberta Context Tool with care aides working in Canadian long-term care homes. (shrink)

The U.S. Civil War chained slave emancipation to war's violence, destruction and deprivation. The resulting health crisis, including illness, injury, and trauma, had immediate and lasting consequences. This essay explores the impact of ideas about race on the U.S. military's health care provisions and treatment of former slaves, both civilians and soldiers.