Off-campus access
Using PhilPapers from home?
Click here to configure this browser for off-campus access.
- Mohammed A. Bamyeh (2007). Of Death and Dominion: The Existential Foundations of Governance. Northwestern University Press.Death is the opposite not of life, but of power. And as such, Mohammed Bamyeh argues in this original work, death has had a great and largely unexplored impact on the thinking of governance throughout history, right down to our day. In Of Death and Dominion Bamyeh pursues the idea that a deep concern with death is, in fact, the basis of the ideological foundations of all political systems. Concentrating on four types of political systems—polis, empire, theocracy, and modern mass society systems—Bamyeh shows how each follows a specific strategy designed to pit power against the equalizing specter of death. Each of these strategies—consolation, expansion, preparation, and repression—produces a certain style of political behavior, as well as particular psychic traumas. In making his argument, Bamyeh revisits a wide range of empirical and theoretical discussions in existentialist philosophy, psychoanalysis, comparative historical sociology, literary studies, and anthropology. By demonstrating how schemes of power are by definition also schemes for defying death—despite their claims to the contrary—his book encourages us to think of a new style of politics, one oriented toward life.Reading list | Discuss | Edit | Categorize |My bibliography
| Export citation | Scholar | At my library 
Similar books and articles
: Most of the world now accepts the idea, first proposed four decades ago, that death means "brain death." But the idea has always been open to criticism because it doesn't square with all of our intuitions about death. In fact, none of the possible definitions of death quite works. Death, perhaps surprisingly, eludes definition, and "brain death" can be accepted only as a refinement of what is in fact a fuzzy concept.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Other links: muse.jhu.edu dx.doi.org | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Other links: muse.jhu.edu dx.doi.org | Scholar | At my library | More options ... What is death? Do people survive death? What do we mean when we say that someone is "dying"? Presenting a clear and engaging discussion of the classic philosophical questions surrounding death, this book studies the great metaphysical and moral problems of death. In the first part, Feldman shows that a definition of life is necessary before death can be defined. After exploring several of the most plausible accounts of the nature of life and demonstrating their failure, he goes on to propose his own conceptual scheme for death and related concepts. In the second part, Feldman turns to ethical and value-theoretical questions about death. Addressing the ancient Epicurean ethical problem about the evil of death, he argues that death can be a great evil for those who die, even if they do not exist after death, because it may deprive them of the goods they would have enjoyed if they had continued to live. Confrontations with the Reaper concludes with a novel consequentialist theory about the morality of killing, applying it to such thorny practical issues as abortion, suicide, and euthanasia.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... This article assesses the significance of a “politics of life”, also termed biopolitics, for any theological analysis of death. By charting the manner in which modern theological approaches to death are closely related to political attempts to secure life (especially in the work of Hobbes), the piece hopes to offer a theological history of the present from which a theology of death might be re-envisioned.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... Introduction -- Life -- Death -- Challenges -- Mortal harm -- The timing puzzle -- Killing -- Suicide and euthanasia -- Abortion.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... Although Foucault's early writings were strongly influenced by the discourse of existential phenomenology, he later considered it an obstacle to a better understanding of social and political power. This essay seeks to understand some of the reasons for his shift, specifically with respect to Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty. I argue that Foucault diverges from existential phenomenology according to an alternative tendency within the Kantian inheritance they both share: one which stresses the world-disruptive rather than the unifying or world-disclosive power of transcendental imagination. Examining the role played by dreams and death in Foucault's early introduction to Binswanger's Dream and Existence allows us to situate his later analysis of the historical and political (rather than existential) meaning of death with respect to larger philosophical currents.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... The philosophy of our proposal are as follows: (1) Various ideas of life and death, including that of objecting to brain death as human death, should be guaranteed. We would like to maintain the idea of pluralism of human death; and (2) We should respect a child’s view of life and death. We should provide him/her with an opportunity to think and express their own ideas about life and death.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | More options ...
| | Scholar | More options ... Thinking about death -- Dualism vs. physicalism -- Arguments for the existence of the soul -- Descartes' argument -- Plato on the immortality of the soul -- Personal identity -- Choosing between the theories -- The nature of death -- Two surprising claims about death -- The badness of death -- Immortality -- The value of life -- Other aspects of death -- Living in the face of death -- Suicide -- Conclusion: an invitation.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... Death and Philosophy presents a wide ranging and fascinating variety of different philosophical, aesthetic and literary perspectives on death. Death raises key questions such as whether life has meaning of life in the face of death, what the meaning of "life after death" might be and whether death is part of a narrative that can be retold in different ways, and considers the various types of death, such as brain death, that challenge mind-body dualism. The essays also include explorations of Chinese, Japanese and Tibetan perspectives on death and why death in some cultures, such as in Mexico's day of the dead, is celebrated.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... There is a classic problem which confronts any attempt to assign death a value. On the assumption that death is personal annihilation, death deprives evil of a requisite subject, for no misfortune can befall something which does not exist. Recent efforts to provide a reasonable basis for counting death as a bad thing have centered on an analysis of the loss of life's goods which it brings. So long as the analysis assumes that death is a simple state, loss can be explained only by reference to a realm of possible things which exist after death. An alternative analysis of death is offered in which death is defined as a limit on life. That analysis provides a basis for evaluative judgements about death, while avoiding any commitment to post-mortem existence.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... Discussion of Mohammed A. Bamyeh, Of Death and Dominion: The Existential Foundations of Governance
 Back
All discussions
Start a new thread
|
There are no threads in this forum |
Nothing in this forum yet.
