The use of cost-benefit analysis (CBA) in environmental decision-making and the contingent valuation (CV) technique as input into traditional CBA to elicit environmental values in monetary terms has stimulated an extensive debate. Critics have questioned the appropriateness of both the method and the technique. Some alternative suggestions for the elicitation of environmental values are based on a social process of deliberation. However, just like traditional economic theory, these alternative approaches may be questioned on their implicit value judgements regarding the legitimacy (...) of the social-political organisation of the process of value elicitation. Instead of making assumptions a priori, research efforts should be focused on the processes by which actual public attitudes and preferences towards the environment can best be elicited and fed into environmental or other public policy decision-making. In the study presented in this paper, support was found for both the individual WTP based approach and a participatory social deliberation approach to inform the environmental decision-making process, suggesting that a combination of both approaches is most appropriate. (shrink)

Functional analysis rescued religion from the oblivion to which positiviste would have consigned it, by taking 'society' rather than the individual act as the unit of analysis. The history of functionalism has been a record of increasing concern with such holistic units as societies and social systems. One consequence of this shift away from social action (in the Weberian sense) is that the issue of rationality has become largely redundant. Yet the problem remains: How do we account for 'contributions' to (...) the social system in terms that make sense of the perspectives of social actors? An examination of unit actions as they are understood by social actors suggests that functionalism in fact incorporated many of the tenets held by positivists, and that it makes untenable (and implicit) assumptions concerning the 'objectivity' of the scientific observer. (shrink)

Austin's ?doctrine of the infelicities?, whereby performative utterances are vulnerable to the risk of failure, has been criticized for treating such a possibility as contingent rather than as necessary (and hence revelatory of the essential nature of speech acts). This paper seeks to trace out what is at stake for one who maintains Austin's position. It examines Austin's curious hypothetical history of the development of speech acts, which is found to resemble forms of social?contract theory, and the problem with this (...) hypothetical history is shown to be that it presupposes as original the very properties that it sets out to explain. The argument is then made that Austin's technicalization of the conditions and context of speech acts displaces our attention from the deeper issue that both speech?act and contract theory are versions of a concern with making social action transparent, and both raise the perennial (and insoluble) problem of trust in human affairs. (shrink)

Professor Roy Harris criticises me for ignoring freedom of speech in order to focus on 'soft' issues, such as game theory, decision theory and chaos theory. In this response, I accept most of his arguments relating to freedom of speech, but argue that, in order to develop better systems of education, we need to pay more attention to the circumstances in which that freedom can be exercised than Harris admits.

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 history of the recovery movement began with a pushback against treatment, and the philosophies that it was founded upon still have relevant applications to contemporary social work practice. Financial aspects of service provision for people with serious mental illnesses have enabled other actors in the medical model of psychosis treatment to benefit, while disempowering and dehumanizing the consumers of those services. Since then, other movements like Psychopolitics and the Mad Movement have helped empower psychosis survivors to advocate for their (...) right to self-determination amid the epistemological pressure to identify as disabled. Social workers would like to believe that the field has moved beyond the philosophies that perpetuated institutionalization of people with serious mental illnesses. Contemporary examples, however, reveal how social services in the US maintain the status quo of sanism for psychosis survivors. (shrink)

Contemporary interpreters have entered a new debate over Aquinas’s view on the status of human beings or persons between death and resurrection. Everyone agrees that, for Aquinas, separated souls exist in the interim. The disagreement concerns what happens to human beings—Peter, Paul, and so on. According to corruptionists, Aquinas thought human beings cease to exist at death and only begin to exist again at the resurrection. According to survivalists, however, Aquinas thought human beings continue to exist in the interim, constituted (...) by their separated souls alone. In this paper I offer a new argument in favor of corruptionism based upon Aquinas’s repeated discussions of a central though so far neglected topic: the death of Christ. To the question, “Was Christ a human being during the three days of his death?” Aquinas always answered, “No.” Examining his reasons proves that corruptionism, and not survivalism, is the right interpretation of Aquinas. (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)

Ethics in the West too often equates morality with universal moral principles, thus imposing lifestyles and moral criteria that do not respect differences and local histories. Even Christianity proposes ethics that is based on eternal, absolute and universal truths or principles, independent of sociocultural and historical contexts. The problem is that these universal moral laws become a means of social control to exclude those who are different: non-Christian religions, nonwhite races, non-Western cultures, and poor and marginalized social classes everywhere. To (...) these can be added minorities marginalized because of sexual orientation, physical handicaps, and women of all sectors and cultures. Another kind of ethics is urgent. For these reasons, Christians in Latin America and other parts are seeking innovative ways of envisioning ethics from their marginalized and discriminated social locations in order to find another possible ethics, an ethics that is not universal and not based on eternal truths or principles, but rather is contextual and historical and that takes into account real-life realities. Only an ethics that does this will be liberative. Important steps toward this other possible ethics have been taken by the theology of liberation by developing a contextual and intercultural morality. (shrink)

Ontological nihilism is the radical-sounding thesis that there is nothing at all. This chapter first discusses how the most plausible forms of this thesis aim to be slightly less radical than they sound and what they will have to do in order to succeed in their less radical ambitions. In particular, they will have to paraphrase sentences of best science into ontologically innocent counterparts. The chapter then points out the defects in two less plausible strategies, before going on to argue (...) that strategies that look more promising, including one based on Quine's predicate-functor language, face the same defects. (shrink)

Tracing the history of American sociology since the Civil War, the authors of this important volume explain the field′s diversity, its lack of unifying paradigms, its broad, eclectic research agenda and its general weakness as an institutional force in either academia or the policy arena. They highlight the equivocal and often contradictory missions that sociologists prescribe for themselves and the variable nature of human, financial and intellectual resources available to the profession.

My aim in this chapter is to push back against the tendency to emphasize Mill’s break from Bentham rather than his debt to him. Mill made important advances on Bentham’s views, but I believe there remains a shared core to their thinking—over and above their commitment to the principle of utility itself—that has been underappreciated. Essentially, I believe that the structure of Mill’s utilitarian thought owes a great debt to Bentham even if he filled in that structure with a richer (...) conception of human nature and developed it in more liberal directions. This commonality is revealed, in particular, in Mill’s own institutional designs and practical reform proposals in Considerations on Representative Government and related writings. If this is right, then the tendency of interpreters to highlight their differences rather than their similarities has been to the detriment of both Mill and Bentham scholarship, and so to our understanding of the rise of liberal utilitarianism. (shrink)

An entertaining history of the idea of nothing - including absences, omissions, and shadows - from the Ancient Greeks through the 20th century How can nothing cause something? The absence of something might seem to indicate a null or a void, an emptiness as ineffectual as a shadow. In fact, 'nothing' is one of the most powerful ideas the human mind has ever conceived. This short and entertaining book by Roy Sorensen is a lively tour of the history and philosophy (...) of nothing, explaining how various thinkers throughout history have conceived and grappled with the mysterious power of absence -- and how these ideas about shadows, gaps, and holes have in turned played a very positive role in the development of some of humankind's most important ideas. Filled with Sorensen's characteristically entertaining mix of anecdotes, puzzles, curiosities, and philosophical speculation, the book is ordered chronologically, starting with the Taoists, the Buddhists, and the ancient Greeks, moving forward to the middle ages and the early modern period, then up to the existentialists and present day philosophy. The result is a diverting tour through the history of human thought as seen from a novel and unusual perspective. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain (...) in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

The problem of religious disagreement between epistemic peers is a potential threat to the epistemic justification of one’s theistic belief. In this paper, I develop a response to this problem which draws on the central epistemological thesis of skeptical theism concerning our inability to make proper judgements about God’s reasons for permitting evil. I suggest that this thesis may extend over to our judgements about God’s reasons for self-revealing, and that when it does so, it can enable theists to remain (...) steadfast amid disagreement with epistemic peers who hold a contrary theistic belief (i.e., atheistic belief). For if we’re unable to make proper judgements about God’s reasons for self-revealing, then for all we know, God has some reason for not revealing Himself to our apparent epistemic peer. Thus, their epistemic credentials needn’t provide reason to reduce one’s confidence to such a degree as to no longer uphold one’s theistic belief. (shrink)

Raymond Turner first provides a logical framework for specification and the design of specification languages, then uses this framework to introduce and study ...

The purpose of this article is to analyse the mathematical practices leading to Rafael Bombelli’s L’algebra (1572). The context for the analysis is the Italian algebra practiced by abbacus masters and Renaissance mathematicians of the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries. We will focus here on the semiotic aspects of algebraic practices and on the organisation of knowledge. Our purpose is to show how symbols that stand for underdetermined meanings combine with shifting principles of organisation to change the character of algebra.

This book examines the intricate dynamics of when individuals adhere to laws, taking into account the context in which laws attempt to shape human behavior. While existing literature touches upon various reasons why people comply with laws, the book focuses on a critical question which has been missing from the discussion: when do people obey laws? By treating law as a form of social communication, it develops an integrated framework to answer this question. It explores how social, psychological, and institutional (...) conditions shape compliance decisions of individuals. What does a law signify? When does the compulsion to obey arise? When do individuals comply out of a fear for legal sanctions or social repercussions? Why do some laws have high symbolic values and others fail despite harsh punishments? The book unveils the contextual intricacies that underlie obedience to law. It challenges conventional wisdom and offers a fresh perspective on the power and limitations of law in shaping human behavior. For scholars and academics seeking a deeper understanding of legal compliance and role of law in shaping behaviors, this book will be an indispensable resource. (shrink)

Written by leading theorists and empirical researchers, this book presents new ways of addressing the old question: Why did religion first emerge and then continue to evolve in all human societies? The authors of the book--each with a different background across the social sciences and humanities -- assimilate conceptual leads and empirical findings from anthropology, evolutionary biology, evolutionary sociology, neurology, primate behavioral studies, explanations of human interaction and group dynamics, and a wide range of religious scholarship to construct a deeper (...) and more powerful explanation of the origins and subsequent evolutionary development of religions than can be currently found in what is now vast literature. While explaining religion has been a central question in many disciplines for a long time, this book draws upon a much wider array of literatures to develop a robust and cross-disciplinary analysis of religion. The book remains true to its subtitle by emphasizing an array of both biological and sociocultural forms of selection dynamics that are fundamental to explaining religion as a universal institution in human societies. In addition to Darwinian selection, which can explain the biology and neurology of religion, the book outlines a set of four additional types of sociocultural natural selection that can explain fill out the explanation of why religion first emerged as an institutional system in human societies, and why it has continued to evolve over the last 200,000 years of societal evolution. These sociocultural forms of natural selection are labeled by the names of the early sociologists who first emphasized them; and these can be seen as a necessary supplement to the type of natural selection theorized by Charles Darwin. Explanations of religion that remain in the shadow cast by Darwin's great insights will, it is argued, remain narrow and incomplete when explaining a robust sociocultural phenomena like religion. (shrink)

Sociology is experiencing what can only be described as hyperdifferentiation of theories - there are now many approaches competing for attention in the intellectual arena. From this perspective, we should see a weeding out of theories to a small number, but this is not likely to occur because each of the many theoretical perspectives has a resource base of adherents. As a result, theories in sociology do not compete head on with each other as much as they coexist. This seminal (...) reference work was brought together with an eye to capturing the diversity of theoretical activity in sociology - specifically the forefront of theory. Contributors describe what they themselves are doing right now rather than what others have done in the past. The goal of this volume is to allow prominent theorists working in a variety of traditions - who wouldn't usually come together - to review their work. The chapters in this volume represent a mix of theoretical orientations and strategies, but these these theories are diverse and represent the prominent theoretical discussions in sociology today. Some areas included are: Section I: Theoretical Methodologies and Strategies Section II: The Cultural Turn in Sociological Theorizing Section III: Theorizing Interaction Processes Section IV: Theorizing from the Systemic and Macrolevel Section V: New Directions in Evolutionary Theorizing Section VI: Theorizing on Power, Conflict, and Change SectionVII: Theorizing from Assumptions of Rationality This handbook will be of interest to those wanting a broad spectrum and overview of late 20th - early 21st century sociological theory. (shrink)

The human spark -- Catch a fire -- The idea of you -- The idea of I -- Forbidden ideas -- Artful ideas -- Vast ideas -- Tight ideas -- Recurring ideas -- Future ideas.

The theme of this collection of articles by Jonathan Turner is that sociology can be a true science, and it can develop abstract laws explaining the operative dynamics of the social universe. Rather that blindly worshipping sociology's masters, however, Turner attempts to reinvent sociology as a science that learns the valuable lessons of classical theory and then moves on.

The history of contemporary metaphysics shows there are two schools of thought. One for whom the analysis of categories assumes primarily an epistemological character and on the other hand some believe that the field to be investigated is rather to be approached in primarily ontological terms. Strawson's conception of descriptive metaphysics is a clear example of this approach.

In ‘A New Route to the Necessity of Origin’, Rohbraugh and deRosset offer an argument for the Necessity of Origin appealing neither to Suffciency of Origin nor to a branching-times model of necessity. What is doing the crucial work in their argument is instead the thesis they name ‘Locality of Prevention’. In this response, we object that their argument is question-begging by showing, first, that the locality of prevention thesis is not strong enough to satisfactorily derive from it the intended (...) conclusion, and, second, that the argument is not sound unless the Necessity of Origin is operating as an implicit premiss. (shrink)

This book introduces Christian ethics from a theological perspective. Philip Turner, widely recognized as a leading expert in the field, explores the intersection of moral theology and ecclesiology, arguing that the focus of Christian ethics should not be personal holiness or social reform but the common life of the church. A theology of moral thought and practice must take its cues from the notion that human beings, upon salvation, are redeemed and called into a life oriented around the community (...) of the church. This book distills a senior scholar's life work and will be valued by students of Christian ethics, theology, and ecclesiology. (shrink)

There is an apparent tension between two familiar platitudes about the meaning of life: (i) that 'meaning' in this context means 'value', and (ii) that such meaning might be ineffable. I suggest a way of trying to bring these two claims together by focusing on an ideal of a meaningful life that fuses both the axiological and semantic senses of 'significant'. This in turn allows for the possibility that the full significance of a life might be ineffable not because its (...) axiological significance is ineffable, but because its semantic significance is ineffable in virtue of the signification relation itself being unsignifiable. I then explore to what degree this claim about signification can be adequately defended. (shrink)

Cet essai est une tentative pour penser autrement I liberté en ses actes. Une de ses originalités est de procéder par changements d'échelle, c'est un microscope philosophique. Sous la grande idée de liberté, il cerne d'imperceptibles appuis qui la font tenir debout. L'enjeu est donc de taille. Son développement prend la forme d'un parcours progressif par étapes, traversant des conceptions très différentes de la liberté et des domaines d'application divers. Il épouse ainsi les contours d'une mise en variation du concept (...) d'appui, au point que celui-ci pourra être identifié chez certains philosophes alors qu'il y passait auparavant inaperçu. Il s'agit aussi de montrer de quels problèmes ce concept tire sa nécessité. Ces problèmes sont tout autant théoriques que pratiques, spirituels que corporels, tout autant moraux que politiques. Bien plus, en justifiant pourquoi un appui, n'est pas un soutien, cet essai donne une certaine allure à la liberté : celle de la spirale, de l'hélice. Il montre que, sous de nouvelles manières d'agir ou de penser, peuvent pousser des spirales de la liberté"--Page 4 of cover. (shrink)

This book provides a new understanding of art education, connecting art, necessity, and pedagogy. Plenty has been written about art education, but its potential contribution to inner autonomy and existential emancipation due to the re-articulation of time and space in art has not been adequately explored in a pedagogic context. This book explores art as an affective continuum--not a plaything of culture, but rather a mode of alignment of the existential Eros with our ontological truth.