Tianxia and renlei mingyun gongtongti are two Chinese concepts that are of significance for reflecting on ‘China and Global Development.’ Both present a revival of cosmopolitanism in China, while a...

The ethics of social consequences is a means of satisficing non-utilitarian consequentialism that can be used to approach disaster issues. The primary values in the ethics of social consequences are humanity, human dignity and moral rights, and these are developed and realized to achieve positive social consequences. The secondary values found in the ethics of social consequences include justice, responsibility, moral duty and tolerance. Their role and purpose is given by their ability to help achieve and realize moral good. Fair (...) treatment within moral issues stems from applying primary as well as secondary values. The nature of these values cannot be determined exclusively in ordinary circumstances. However, in extraordinary circumstances, not all the requirements relating to the value structure of the ethics of social consequences need be considered in its entirety. In extraordinary circumstances, values are prioritised and realized. Primary values are realized prior to secondary ones. When prioritizing primary values, the realization of positive social consequences, or at least minimizing the negative social consequences, takes priority over other primary values. In disaster bioethics especially, it is often necessary to find a way to minimize the negative social consequences; thus, actions where positive social consequences are prevalent are preferred. (shrink)

There is a direct relationship between epistemology and one's attitude toward those with whom one disagrees. Those who think that the truth is difficult to ascertain can be expected, other things equal, to tend to tolerate (in the sense of sympathizing with) those with whom they disagree, as the blameless victims of an opaque reality. Those who think that the truth is easy to ascertain can be expected, other things equal, to tend to be intolerant (in the sense of being (...) unsympathetic) toward those with whom they disagree, who perversely refuse to acknowledge what should be clear to any well-intentioned inquirer. However, these tendencies toward tolerant or intolerant attitudes can be offset by other factors; and they do not, in any case, necessarily dictate whether one will favor tolerant or intolerant policies regarding those toward whom one feels tolerant or intolerant. The complex relationship between epistemology, tolerant or intolerant attitudes, and tolerant or intolerant policies is evident in the thought of prominent early-modern Protestant theologians who, under the pressure of rampant and violent religious disagreement, theorized tolerance. (shrink)

Many different views on the problem of “war” and “peace” were substantively explored for several millennia. From our point of view, the theoretical and empirical basis of “war” and “peace” was made up principally from research in three areas: Religion, ethics, philosophy and psychology, as comprehension of the normative-evaluative categories of good and evil; Philosophy, political science, sociology and jurisprudence, in the theories of international relations; History, fiction as well as documentary, memoir, reference, technical literature on the subject of “war” (...) and “peace.” For such a significant amount of time, there was a wealth of factual and theoretical material accumulated in each of the three areas of research, which highlights the problem of “war” and “peace” in all variety of its meanings. To understand the scope of coverage and a range of research on the problem of “war” and “peace,” as well as the level of achievements in this field, let us briefly examine the history of “war” and “peace” in each of these three areas, proposed by us. (shrink)