Every living science, especially in its early stages, is compelled to devise fresh terms, either by coining new words or by giving new meanings to old ones. Unless and until these fresh terms become absorbed in the vocabulary of everyday speech, their unfamiliarity makes them a target for the shafts of the humourist. There can be no doubt that in the late fifth century B.C. literary criticism was still a new science. We can trace its beginnings in the treatises of (...) the Sophists, many titles of which have been handed down to us. Strepsiades' lesson in metric, though of itself amusing enough, would certainly gain in topical appropriateness if enacted at a time when such investigations were not only much in the air, but were still novel. And the whole ‘Agon’ of the Frogs, the character of which is forecasted in lines 796–802, depicts in the strongest colours the contrasted views of technician and inspirationist. We should therefore naturally expect a play of such a kind, written at such a time, to be full of technical jargon, barely understood by the ‘man in the street,’ and forming the object of his half-contemptuous amusement. That is, I believe, exactly what we do find, to an extent insufficiently recognized. Professor Radermacher, in his recent edition of the Frogs, has rendered valuable service by pointing out the frequent occurrence in that play of technical terms which meet us later in Dionysius of Halicarnassus and other critics. But I believe that technical language lurks unsuspected in many other passages, though the precise meaning may often be beyond recovery. (shrink)

In Vol. XXIIL, pp. 105–8, Mr. Lockwood criticizes some of the observations which I made in pp. 7–10 of the same volume. § 271. I ‘assume’ that τοτ' δετι δεινότητα explains ύπόκρισιν κα γνα and not τ διαλελυμένον, because ‘figures of speech in general’ cannot be said to ‘produce’ τ διαλελυμένον asyndeton, which is itself one of those figures; because, conversely, τ διαλελυμένον is not equivalent to δεινότης but a means of producing δεινότης. τ διαλελυμένον must, therefore, be nominative, (...) not accusative, and Professor Rhys Roberts' rendering, ‘lending especially the effect of abruptness, in other words of energy,’ cannot be right. The Professor himself is not happy with it, and adds in a note that ‘a better sense would be obtained by placing μάλιστα τ διαλελυμένον before πόκρισιν, i.e. “the figures of speech, and especially asyndeton.”‘ My excision gives the same sense. Orth, in his translation, omits the words τοτ' στι δεινότητα, and interprets as I do. (shrink)

A fresh, daring, and genuine alternative to the traditional story of scientific progress Explaining the world around us, and the life within it, is one of the most uniquely human drives, and the most celebrated activity of science. Good explanations are what provide accurate causal accounts of the things we wonder at, but explanation's earthly origins haven't grounded it: we have used it to account for the grandest and most wondrous mysteries in the natural world. Explanations give us a sense (...) of understanding, but an explanation that feels right doesn't mean it is true. For every true explanation, there is a false one that feels just as good. A good theory's explanations, though, have a much easier path to truth. This push for good explanations elevated science from medieval alchemy to electro-chemistry, or a pre-inertial physics to the forces underlying nanoparticles. And though the attempt to explain has existed as long as we have been able to wonder, a science timeline from pre-history to the present will reveal a steep curve of theoretical discovery that explodes around 1600, primarily in the West. Ranging over neuroscience, psychology, history, and policy, Wondrous Truths answers two fundamental questions-Why did science progress in the West? And why so quickly? J.D. Trout's answers are surprising. His central idea is that Western science rose above all others because it hit upon successive theories that were approximately true through an awkward assortment of accident and luck, geography and personal idiosyncrasy. Of course, intellectual ingenuity partially accounts for this persistent drive forward. But so too does the persistence of the objects of wonder. Wondrous Truths recovers the majesty of science, and provides a startling new look at the grand sweep of its biggest ideas. (shrink)

Modern cultivation has multiplied the classic sciences into families of fissionable specialities, whose individual methods and objects tend to be communicated less and less to the man of general culture and even to the specialist fellow traveller. One established means of restoring basic communication lies in the periodic exposition by a team of sympathetic experts of the problems, historic personalities and principles of solution of each family, so that concise, accurate reference is readily available both to the serious student (...) and to the enquiring colleague who may wish to grasp a point of research, theory or jargon without having to search for it precariously in the deceptive haystack of selective text-books, monographs and learned papers. This solution, however, is prodigal of resources, material and intellectual—only anguished editors know what toil underlies the serenity of the expert encyclopedia, with its alphabetical reference, succinct scholarship and up-to-date analysis of every minute point at issue. Convinced lovers of wisdom should quail less than others, perhaps, from this herculean task. In fact, while this century has seen some new philosophic dictionaries and a fair representation of philosophic topics in general encyclopedias, no specialised philosophic encyclopedia has appeared to continue the early enterprise of Baldwin’s Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology and of Hasting’s Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics. Now within two years has come the prodigious completion of a meticulous set of four Italian volumes, which survey the whole history and scope of philosophic and cognate science, and present the reviewer with a veritable embarras des richesses. (shrink)

Background: Omalizumab, an anti-immunoglobulin E antibody, reduces exacerbations and symptoms in uncontrolled allergic asthma. The study objective was to estimate the costs and consequences of omalizumab compared to usual care from a US payer perspective. Methods: We estimated payer costs, quality-adjusted survival (QALYs), and the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) of omalizumab compared to usual care using a state-transition simulation model that included sensitivity analyses. Every 2 weeks, patients could transition between chronic asthma and exacerbation health states. The best available evidence (...) informed the clinical and cost input estimates. Five years of omalizumab treatment followed by usual care was assumed to estimate a lifetime horizon. Omalizumab responders (60.5% of treated) were modeled as a separate scenario where nonresponders reverted back to usual care after 16 weeks of active treatment. Results: The mean lifetime discounted costs and QALYs were $83 400 and 13.87 for usual care and $174 500 and 14.19 for omalizumab plus usual care resulting in $287 200/QALY (95% interval: $219 300, $557 900). The ICER was $172 300/QALY when comparing omalizumab to usual care in the responder scenario. One-way sensitivity analyses indicated that the results were sensitive to the difference in treatment-specific utilities for the chronic state, exacerbation-associated mortality, omalizumab price, exacerbation rates, and response definition. Conclusions: The results suggest that adding omalizumab to usual care improves QALYs at an increase in direct medical costs. The cost-effectiveness of omalizumab is similar to other chronic disease biologics. The value increases when omalizumab response is used to guide long-term treatment. (shrink)

Significance testing is the primary method for establishing causal relationships in psychology. Meehl [1978, 1990a, 1990b] and Faust [1984] argue that significance tests and their interpretation are subject to actuarial and psychological biases, making continued adherence to these practices irrational, and even partially responsible for the slow progress of the ‘soft’ areas of psychology. I contend that familiar standards of testing and literature review, along with recently developed meta-analytic techniques, are able to correct the proposed actuarial and psychological biases. In (...) particular, psychologists embrace a principle of robustness which states that real psychological effects are (1) reproducible by similar methods, (2) detectable by diverse means, and (3) able to survive theoretical integration. By contrast, spurious significant findings perish under the strain of persistent tests of their robustness. The resulting vindication of significance testing confers on the world a role in determining the rationality of a method, and also affords us an explanation for the fast progress of ‘hard’ areas of psychology. *I would like to thank Dick Boyd and Phil Gasper for helpful comments on the ideas presented here. (shrink)

We show that if the weak compactness of a cardinal is made indestructible by means of any preparatory forcing of a certain general type, including any forcing naively resembling the Laver preparation, then the cardinal was originally supercompact. We then apply this theorem to show that the hypothesis of supercompactness is necessary for certain proof schemata.

Priscian tells us in his dedicatory introduction that he took his material from many Latin sources—collectis etiam omnibus fere quaecunque necessaria nostrorum quoque inueniuntur artium commentariis grammaticorum. This can hardly mean that he owed everything to his predecessors. At any rate it is unlikely that he copied all his illustrative quotations from earlier grammarians. The problem is one which, for our purpose, does not need to be solved. We can make Priscian responsible for every quotation , because he had the (...) opportunity of correcting or commenting on such borrowings as he incorporated in his work. If he could acquiesce in a garbled version of a line, we must take the fact into account in appraising his value as a witness to the text of Terence. And we must assume that the Terence text of his day did not differ from the versions which he quotes. Nowhere does he hint at a discrepancy. This assumption, it will be understood, has reference only to the points of diction for which we are tolerably sure that we have Priscian's attestation, and not to minor details which did not interest him at the moment, and in which we can prove that he was far from conscientious. (shrink)

The problem of good, for all its fundamental importance, has been studied systematically only occasionally in the history of philosophy. The Greeks were concerned with it and so too are the moderns, but it was almost disregarded during the ages of faith. Apparently it is only in periods of moral transition, when there is widespread rejection of traditional standards, that people begin to ask: What, after all, is goodness? What does it mean to call something good? An Enquiry into Goodness (...) is part of the modern discussion of the problem. Its author served for a period with the British Intelligence Corps in Israel where, we are told, “his interest in ethical problems was first aroused by the irreconcilability of conflicting claims.” Professor Sparshott is an Oxford graduate, but his book is, in some respects, pleasantly uncharacteristic of the Oxford Moralist school. In controversial matters he looks for guidance not merely to the moderns, but to the ancients and even the medievals. The definition of good which he proposes is not far removed from the traditional Aristotelian–Thomist one. This is the first time that this concept, or any approximation of it, has been treated seriously by an English moralist. It is, apparently, the first time it has received extensive analysis anywhere. Scholastic textbooks seem to regard its validity as self–evident and content themselves usually with a bald assertion and a confirmatory quotation from St. Thomas. This attitude may have been excusable in the past; in the context of a Christian morality the Aristotelian concept is, I suppose, unquestionable. But it is highly unsatisfactory at present when so many moralists speak from a purely humanist standpoint. (shrink)

This collection of essays surveys the current philosophical milieu which has emerged from the three centuries’ fusion of European national traditions within the pragmatic conditions of the New World. Properly believing that a thinker reacts to his own environment, it provides an imaginative introduction to the American tyro musing on possible subjects for study. Under the comprehensive lead of Dr. Winn, a team of experienced teachers and scholars expound, analyse and evaluate the current attitudes, problems and solutions of philosophy with (...) concise lucidity and candid local feeling. Its very success in statement raises the difficulty that in stating complex, subtle problems and answers with an intelligibility which demands a minimum of technical knowledge, it may lose its hold upon the thinker already in technical operation. The two-fold aim is not easy to satisfy and it is hardly surprising that different sections deviate differently from the golden mean. (shrink)

World Perspectives is a series of short works designed to interpret changing human experience, its meaning and values to any thoughtful reader, whether of East or West, whether religious believer or nonbeliever. Its first volume is devoted appropriately to an exposition by M. Maritain of the chief ways in which, he thinks, men may validly grasp the reality of a supreme Being, God. A faithful translation of a French publication of 1953, this slim book takes Scholastic method and terminology for (...) granted in its reader and makes severe demands upon his power of metaphysical thinking. An austere economy of thought and a formality of expression are personal to its distinguished author, but these very qualities may leave his broad audience groping in a twilight of unaccustomed jargon. (shrink)

This concise handbook of quick reference “has a practical purpose, namely, to acquaint the casual reader with the meaning of the basic concepts germane to Judaism in its religious, historic and cultural aspects”. In accordance with the author’s personal selection, on the principle of particular significance to–day, some fifteen hundred key ideas, terms and personalities representing a wide range of Jewish religion, philosophy and literature are succinctly defined and sometimes explained, and enhanced with some sixty excellently chosen illustrations.

G. E. Moore, unlike most prophets, is honoured only in his own country—the small world of the Aristotelian Society and the Cambridge Moral Science Club. To outsiders he is known, if at all, mainly because of his connection with his more flamboyant colleagues, Russell and Wittgenstein. Yet Moore’s influence on the intellectual life of this century is hardly calculable. Philosophy as it is now taught in the universities of the English–speaking world derives its character, largely, from his personal habits of (...) thought. He bequeathed it its most obvious and, to the layman, most irritating characteristics—the emphasis on linguistic analysis and the tendency to avoid the really important problems, the problems which determine our way of life. Contemporary English philosophy is, like Moore’s, a philosophy of common–sense. It is concerned, not so much with truth but with meaning, the meaning of those statements whose truth is guaranteed by common–sense; hence arise the method of linguistic analysis and the failure to tackle those problems which common–sense cannot answer. (shrink)

This is a welcome paperback edition of a 1960 publication, which sums up in incomparable style some forty years of mature reflection by M Gilson on the basic meaning of Christian philosophy which he accepted in the face of scepticism of its scientific consistency: ‘that way of philosophizing in which the Christian faith and the human intellect join forces in a common investigation of philosophical truth’. His own distinctive solution is calmly restated. To philosophize in faith is to seek an (...) Augustinian wisdom within a speculative theology and in a theological order of exposition, such as is classically attained in the Summa theologiae of St Thomas. (shrink)

Since the Collected Papers of C S Peirce have been published at Harvard, the constructive originality of this major American philosopher is being unravelled from the disjointed threads of his mainly logical papers. The elusive roots of his metaphysic lie in his insistence upon the empirical origin and pragmatic application in purposive action of the content of ideas and also in the attempt to deduce their supreme categories in strict logical system. Professor Thompson’s penetrating study of 1953 claims to expound (...) the essential propaedeutic to the determination of Peirce’s place in the history of thought and clearly shows that ‘quite apart from the question of influence, Peirce’s meaning at many points is most easily elucidated by comparison with Kant’. (shrink)

This essay makes the case that Livy's version of the tale of Mettius Fufetius transmits certain facts that relate to inherited ritual practices along with formulas used in early law and diplomacy. Although the author may not be fully aware of the original meaning of all he is handing down because he has simply taken materials from his sources without much critical investigation, the traditional elements are important to him because they seem to authenticate this legend about the reign of (...) Tullus Hostilius. For the moralizing historian that Livy certainly is, the treason of Mettius Fufetius and his execution at the command of the Roman king comprise the starting point of a remarkable sequence of episodes in his narrative that demonstrate the dishonorable behavior of Rome's chief rivals in Italy. The legend of Mettius Fufetius thus embodies a kind of “original sin” in the political realm, and becomes the paradigm for Rome's harsh dealing with faithless allies over the next five centuries. The essay concludes that this story typifies many Roman fabulae, insofar as they were often composed on the basis of outdated or unfamiliar idionyms, toponyms, ceremonial words and phrases, and ancient legal terms. In such fabulae characters like Tullus Hostilius and Mettius Fufetius, perhaps mere names in annals and king-lists, become the performers whose ceremonial acts turn into the foundational moments of Rome's public life. (shrink)

In the Metaphysics , Aristotle examines the various meanings of concludes that its proper and primary meaning is “that which has predicates and is not predicated of anything else.” My aim in this paper is to accept this as an account of the notion of “substance,” and to free it from confusion with other notions, and then to consider whether when it is thus freed any “problem of substance” remains. I shall illustrate from the classical treatments of the subject both (...) the confusions and the development of a clearer view because it has seemed to me that exposition and criticism of those authorities sometimes show the same obscurities as the authorities themselves. (shrink)

We investigate claims about the frequency of "know" made by philosophers. Our investigation has several overlapping aims. First, we aim to show what is required to confirm or disconfirm philosophers’ claims about the comparative frequency of different uses of philosophically interesting expressions. Second, we aim to show how using linguistic corpora as tools for investigating meaning is a productive methodology, in the sense that it yields discoveries about the use of language that philosophers would have overlooked if they remained in (...) their "armchairs of an afternoon", to use J.L. Austin’s phrase. Third, we discuss facts about the meaning of "know" that so far have been ignored in philosophy, with the aim of reorienting discussions of the relevance of ordinary language for philosophical theorizing. (shrink)

The Anvil Book series offers a set of short, paper–back monographs by specialists in history and social science upon special periods or movements of thought. Three of its opening works deal sensibly with those highly ambiguous, but aggressively sentimental terms, Rationalism, Liberalism and Conservatism which in the past three centuries have managed to impose a verbal fetish upon their shifting detail of speculative philosophy and politico–economic policy. It is no small service to the contemporary student to clearly analyse the historical (...) origins and development of each line of thought. And the method is uniformly successful in each book: approximately one hundred pages are devoted to an historico–critical analysis of each topic, followed by a ninety page selection of classic texts from its leading spirits. (shrink)

The recent revival of scholarly interest in Suetonius provides a good occasion to emend a long-standing crux in Joannes Lydus' description of Suetonius' dedication of his Vitae Caesarum to his friend the praetorian prefect Septicius Clarus. The codex unicus Caseolinus has Τράγκυλλος τοίνυν τος τν Καισάων βίους ν γράμμασιν † ποτίνων † Σεπτικί, ς ν παρχος τν πραιτωριανν σπειρν πì ατο. The conjectures ποτείνων by J. D. Fuss and ποτείνων by I. Bekker do little to improve the sense, and although (...) W. Kroll's προτείνων gives the meaning required by the context , προ- would not easily have been misread as πο-. For ποτίνων read νατείνων. For parallels compare BGU ii , 613.3–4 'Ανέτινα βιβλ[ίδι]α τλαμπροτάτ [γεμόνι] in a papyrus from the reign of Antoninus Pius cited by LSJ, and several other passages, most of which I owe to the supplement to Preisigke and Kiessling's Wörterbuch der griechischen Papyrusurkunden and to Dr Francisco R. Adrados of the Diccionario Griego-Español: Sammelbuch x , 10527.5–7 ['Ανέτε]ινά σοι, κ[ύριε,]…ναφόρ[ιον… of a.d. 152–3, P. Fouad iii , 26.5–10 , 8252.5–10) Ο νέτινάσυ τ κυρί βιβλιδίου…ντίγραφον πέταξα of a.d. 157–9, P. Oslo. iii , 80.21 ο νέτιναν βιβλιδί[ου…written sometime after March 7, a.d. 161, Sammelbuch iv 7472.3 'Ανέτεινά [σοι, κύριε πίτροπε, βιβλείδιον of a.d. 164, Sammelbuch vi.3 9339.24–7 13.5–7) ο νετείναμεν τ [κρατίσ τρχιερε O]λπί Σερηνιαν βιβλιδίου…[…] ντίγραφον πετάξαμεν from a.d. 178 or a little later, P. Mich. xii 616.13–14 τ δίκαιά μου βιβλειδί νγράψασ νέτεινα Νεμεσιαν πωσ τα[]τα διαπέμψηται[τ ]πιτρόπ from ca. a.d. 182, P. Cornell 14.2–4 ο νέτει[να τ κρατίστ πιστρ]ατηγ Κλαυδί [Ξενοφντι βιβλδίο]υ from a.d. 180–92, Wilcken, Chrestomathie 461.3–5 О[ νέ]τεινα τ λαμπροτάτ [γεμόνΚ]υίντω[ι] Μαικίωι λαιτίωι βιβλιδίου…ντίγραφον [ποτάξασ] from the beginning of the third century, and Sammelbuch v , 8246.3–4 α συνηγερούμεναι λιβέλλον νέτιναν π τν παρχον ξουσίαν from a.d. 340. (shrink)

The recent revival of scholarly interest in Suetonius provides a good occasion to emend a long-standing crux in Joannes Lydus' description of Suetonius' dedication of his Vitae Caesarum to his friend the praetorian prefect Septicius Clarus. The codex unicus Caseolinus has Τράγκυλλος τοίνυν τος τν Καισάων βίους ν γράμμασιν † ποτίνων † Σεπτικί, ς ν παρχος τν πραιτωριανν σπειρν πì ατο. The conjectures ποτείνων by J. D. Fuss and ποτείνων by I. Bekker do little to improve the sense, and although (...) W. Kroll's προτείνων gives the meaning required by the context, προ- would not easily have been misread as πο-. For ποτίνων read νατείνων. For parallels compare BGU ii, 613.3–4 'Ανέτινα βιβλ[ίδι]α τλαμπροτάτ [γεμόνι] in a papyrus from the reign of Antoninus Pius cited by LSJ, and several other passages, most of which I owe to the supplement to Preisigke and Kiessling's Wörterbuch der griechischen Papyrusurkunden and to Dr Francisco R. Adrados of the Diccionario Griego-Español: Sammelbuch x, 10527.5–7 ['Ανέτε]ινά σοι, κ[ύριε,]…ναφόρ[ιον… of a.d. 152–3, P. Fouad iii, 26.5–10, 8252.5–10) Ο νέτινάσυ τ κυρί βιβλιδίου…ντίγραφον πέταξα of a.d. 157–9, P. Oslo. iii, 80.21 ο νέτιναν βιβλιδί[ου…written sometime after March 7, a.d. 161, Sammelbuch iv 7472.3 'Ανέτεινά [σοι, κύριε πίτροπε, βιβλείδιον of a.d. 164, Sammelbuch vi.3 9339.24–7 13.5–7) ο νετείναμεν τ [κρατίσ τρχιερε O]λπί Σερηνιαν βιβλιδίου…[…] ντίγραφον πετάξαμεν from a.d. 178 or a little later, P. Mich. xii 616.13–14 τ δίκαιά μου βιβλειδί νγράψασ νέτεινα Νεμεσιαν πωσ τα[]τα διαπέμψηται[τ ]πιτρόπ from ca. a.d. 182, P. Cornell 14.2–4 ο νέτει[να τ κρατίστ πιστρ]ατηγ Κλαυδί [Ξενοφντι βιβλδίο]υ from a.d. 180–92, Wilcken, Chrestomathie 461.3–5 О[ νέ]τεινα τ λαμπροτάτ [γεμόνΚ]υίντω[ι] Μαικίωι λαιτίωι βιβλιδίου…ντίγραφον [ποτάξασ] from the beginning of the third century, and Sammelbuch v, 8246.3–4 α συνηγερούμεναι λιβέλλον νέτιναν π τν παρχον ξουσίαν from a.d. 340. (shrink)

A. C. Cassio has recently pointed out that Μαρικς, the name which Eupolis applied to the demagogue Hyperbolus, is a transliteration of the Old Persian word. In fact, a Persian origin μαρικς was suspected long ago. The seventeenth-century English scholar Edward Bernard, whose notes were used by J. Alberti in his edition of Hesychius, connected μαρικς with the Modern Persian mardekeh, which literally means ‘a little man’ and has the connotation ‘a vile person’, ‘a scoundrel’. A. Meineke followed Bernard's (...) derivation of μαρικς from Persian, as did K. Latte in his recent edition of Hesychius. These references should be added to Cassio's citation of E. Maass' quotation of K. F. Geldner's opinion. (shrink)

A. C. Cassio has recently pointed out that Μαρικς, the name which Eupolis applied to the demagogue Hyperbolus, is a transliteration of the Old Persian word . In fact, a Persian origin μαρικς was suspected long ago. The seventeenth-century English scholar Edward Bernard, whose notes were used by J. Alberti in his edition of Hesychius, connected μαρικς with the Modern Persian mardekeh, which literally means ‘a little man’ and has the connotation ‘a vile person’, ‘a scoundrel’. A. Meineke followed (...) Bernard's derivation of μαρικς from Persian, as did K. Latte in his recent edition of Hesychius. These references should be added to Cassio's citation of E. Maass' quotation of K. F. Geldner's opinion. (shrink)

This is the reading of Clausen's OCT, in which no variant for line 131 is recorded in the apparatus. No doubt the hendiadys ‘scutica et metus…erilis’ is not impossible,2 but it seems to me not to be a well chosen expression. Since the scutica belongs to the master, one is tempted to construe erilis with both nouns, not just with metus. But then the adjective must function in two different ways: ‘scutica… erilis’ is possessive, ‘his master's strap’, but ‘metus…erilis’ is (...) objective, ‘fear of his master’. And ‘metus…erilis’ in this passage receives no support from ‘erilis…metus’ at Plautus, Amphitruo 1069, which means ‘fear for my mistress’. (shrink)

This is the reading of Clausen's OCT, in which no variant for line 131 is recorded in the apparatus. No doubt the hendiadys ‘scutica et metus…erilis’ is not impossible,2 but it seems to me not to be a well chosen expression. Since the scutica belongs to the master, one is tempted to construe erilis with both nouns, not just with metus. But then the adjective must function in two different ways: ‘scutica… erilis’ is possessive, ‘his master's strap’, but ‘metus…erilis’ is (...) objective, ‘fear of his master’. And ‘metus…erilis’ in this passage receives no support from ‘erilis…metus’ at Plautus, Amphitruo 1069, which means ‘fear for my mistress’. (shrink)

nature of personality and the structure of personality are distinguished, and the thesis that mainstream personality theories in psychology debate structure but not nature is illustrated with definitions. Mainstream theories assume that person ality is an inner determinant of behavior, but according to views in psychiatry, phenomenology and radical behaviorism the nature of personality is transactional. The theory of reinforcement schedules proposes general mechanisms of transac tions, and phenomenology gives particular transactions meaning. Interactionism, which locates personality in the person and (...) the situation, contributes measurement to transactionalism but its paradigmatic status is ambiguous because it implies an internal storage system for behavior. (shrink)

This short monograph laudably presents itself as a lucid introduction for the plain man and schoolboy to the problems of language, with which contemporary British philosophers from Moore to Wittgenstein’s disciples have been preoccupied. Mr. Wilson, an experienced teacher of semantics, holds that the solution of human problems and disputes other than through force must be based upon that science of linguistic communication. If we are to be saved from excessive propaganda and demagogy, we must first understand the meaning and (...) precise verification of words. Hence he offers this introduction to the current method and findings of linguistic analysis. His survey in the pattern of function, types and mistakes moves from the analysis of words to statements and their special relation to truth through verification. This poses the question of meaning, in the familiar Humean and dogmatic disjunction of factual or purely formal statement, and leads inevitably to the crucial meaning of value and metaphysical statements. (shrink)

This is a valuable English translation of what is now almost a classic monograph within the phenomenological tradition, which analyses and evaluates the view of the Ego or soul which developed from Descartes to Husserl, and fruitfully compares the metaphysical concept with the findings of empirical psychology. The author is a specialist in Husserlian studies, using the method of phenomenological analysis in the light of the Thomist-Aristotelian metaphysic. First published in 1950, the French translation of this work was reviewed in (...) Philosophical Studies, Volume V. This present translation of the Vienna edition of 1955 is admirably presented to the English-speaking student, who is perilously isolated from the rich European current of metaphysical thinking. Fr. Koren not only fulfils the onerous task of translator with simple accuracy, but adds some helpful headings, a bibliography and index and even a five-page glossary of new meanings of terms or of new terms coined by the author. Dr. Strasser in turn is stimulated to add two new, metaphysical sections, namely on the hylomorphic explanation of unity and on the philosophical implications of behaviour. (shrink)

This is a valuable English translation of what is now almost a classic monograph within the phenomenological tradition, which analyses and evaluates the view of the Ego or soul which developed from Descartes to Husserl, and fruitfully compares the metaphysical concept with the findings of empirical psychology. The author is a specialist in Husserlian studies, using the method of phenomenological analysis in the light of the Thomist-Aristotelian metaphysic. First published in 1950, the French translation of this work was reviewed in (...) Philosophical Studies, Volume V. This present translation of the Vienna edition of 1955 is admirably presented to the English-speaking student, who is perilously isolated from the rich European current of metaphysical thinking. Fr. Koren not only fulfils the onerous task of translator with simple accuracy, but adds some helpful headings, a bibliography and index and even a five-page glossary of new meanings of terms or of new terms coined by the author. Dr. Strasser in turn is stimulated to add two new, metaphysical sections, namely on the hylomorphic explanation of unity and on the philosophical implications of behaviour. (shrink)

The present volume is one of the few recent works to devote its attention to the "early" Heidegger, yet it contributes significantly to our understanding of Heidegger's later development. "Transcendence" means crossing beyond the being to the horizon within which the being appears. The "transcendental" make-up of Dasein, which is the power of Dasein to make this crossing, is the principal theme of Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik and Vom Wesen des Grundes. "Difference" is the "ontological difference" between (...) Being and beings which is discussed again in Vom Wesen des Grundes and--since Being is not-any-being--in the analysis of the Nothing in Was ist Metaphysik? The pivotal element in Rosales' interpretation is the radical finitude of Dasein's "transcendence." For transcendental-horizonal thinking is unequipped to explain the radical concealment of Being which Dasein experiences. While providing the horizon within which things appear, transcendental-horizonal thinking does not offer an explanation for the recalcitrant hiddenness of Being. Hence Being must be experienced as a-letheia, as the original, independent process of concealing itself, and of revealing itself. And a break with the early transcendental-horizonal or Kantian, and so "subjectivistic" or "metaphysical" perspective of Sein und Zeit is necessitated. While the author owes a clear debt to Marx and Schulz, his interpretation is impressive and a contribution.--J. D. C. (shrink)

A new member of a growing class of unresolved second law paradoxes is examined.(1–7) In a sealed blackbody cavity, a spherical gravitator is suspended in a low density gas. Infalling gas suprathermally strikes the gravitator which is spherically asymmetric between its hemispheres with respect to surface trapping probability for the gas. In principle, this system can be made to perform steady-state work solely at the expense of heat from the heat bath, this in apparent violation of the second law of (...) thermodynamics. Detailed three-dimensional test particle simulations of this system support this prediction. Standard resolutions to the paradox are discussed and found to be untenable. Experiments corroborating a central physical process of the paradox are discussed briefly. The paradox is discussed in the context of the Maxwell demon. (shrink)

Open peer commentary on the article “A Moving Boundary, a Plastic Core: A Contribution to the Third Wave of Extended-Mind Research” by Timotej Prosen. Abstract: We argue that the free-energy principle (FEP) can indeed be used to articulate a conception of the boundaries of cognitive systems that meets the desiderata of third-wave extended-mind research. We point out that Markov blankets under the FEP definitionally constitute the means through which internal and external states are coupled, and so do not isolate (...) systems from their environment. We argue that the nested, multiscale boundaries of the FEP formulation are indeed plastic and open to re-negotiation. Finally, we appeal to the formulation of niche construction under the FEP to argue that the extension of cognitive boundaries in this formulation is both synchronic and diachronic. (shrink)

A person making normative judgments can do so from the perspective of a Judge or a Coach. If you're a Judge, you seek to assign responsibility. If you're a Coach, you seek to improve an agent's performance. While there is a place for being sometimes a Judge and sometimes a Coach, no one should always be a Judge. It is a small and mean person who only wags a finger and never lends a hand. The same is true for a (...) normative discipline like epistemology. A good coach gives useful advice. Advice is useful when it suggests that you modify something you can directly control. And because we are typically unable to directly control our beliefs, a good epistemological coach will have no use for a theory that tells us what an epistemologically good belief is, such as a theory of knowledge or justification. But we are capable of changing many of the ways we reason about the world. Otherwise, what's an education good for? And so a good epistemological coach needs a theory of what makes reasoning epistemically good. What sort of theory of good reasoning would a good epistemological coach employ in order to provide useful guidance for real people? We argue for a middle path between a pure reliablist theory of good reasoning and a pure pragmatic theory of good reasoning. The best theory for an epistemological coach, the theory that will yield the most effective advice, is a mongrel theory that identifies good reasoning with reasoning that achieves an adroit combination of reliabilist accuracy and pragmatic efficiency. (shrink)

Everyday surveillance work is increasingly performed by non-human algorithms. These entities can be conceptualised as machinic flâneurs that engage in distanciated flânerie: subjecting urban flows to a dispassionate, calculative and expansive gaze. This paper provides some theoretical reflections on the nascent forms of algorithmic practice materialising in two Australian cities, and some of their implications for urban relations and social justice. It looks at the idealisation – and operational black boxing – of automated watching programs, before considering their impacts on (...) notions such as ‘the right to the city’ and ‘the right to the face’. It will argue that the turn to facial recognition software for the purposes of automating urban governance reconstitutes the meanings and phenomenology of the face. In particular, the fleshly and communicative physicality of the face is reduced to a measurable object that can be identified by a virtualised referent and then consequently tracked. Moreover, the asymmetrical and faceless nature of these machinic programs of recognition unsettles conventional notions of civil inattention and bodily sovereignty, and the prioritisation given to pattern recognition renders them amenable to ideas/ideals from phrenology and physiognomy. In this way, algorithmic governance may generate not only forms of facial vulnerability and estrangement, but also facial artifice, where individuals come to develop tacit and artful ways of de-facing and re-facing in order to subvert the processes of recognition which leverage these modes of biopower. Thus, the datafication of urban governance gives rise to a dynamic biopolitics of the face. (shrink)

As Gelven points out in his Preface, this is the only section-by-section commentary on the full text of Being and Time. Being and Time is divided not only into two "divisions" of six chapters each but also into eighty-three numbered "sections". As such it provides an efficient and useful handbook for those who try to make their way through the rugged terrain of Heidegger's text, especially for the beginner. Gelven's prose is crisp and clean and uncluttered by Germanicisms. He often (...) uses uncomplicated and helpful illustrations. The interpretation stresses the importance of the analysis of "understanding" taking § 31 as "the key to Being and Time". In fact, Gelven groups §§ 25-38 as a whole under the single heading "Understanding". Such an emphasis seems entirely legitimate. He treats the historical sources of Being and Time but often leaves them undeveloped. He is content, for example, to devote a single paragraph to Dilthey whose influence upon Heidegger is so decisive, with the comment that not much is ever said about Dilthey in English philosophical literature. One also finds it a bit hard to swallow the author's argument that "Dasein" means literally "to be here" and, in sentence form: "Here I am, open to possibilities". In all, however, Gelven's work is a distinctive contribution and not a mere reworking of already familiar themes.--J. D. C. (shrink)

Dr. Fuad Nucho, a native Jordanian and presently a pastor in Yeadon, Pa., provides us with a lucid and illuminating account of the central problem of freedom in the Christian existentialism of Nicolas Berdyaev. Confident that the thought of Berdyaev, while professedly not a "System," suffers no distortion from an organized and systematized explication, Dr. Nucho orders his work around the problem of freedom conceived of as a paradox demanding resolution. He deals in turn with the nature, implications, and solution (...) of the paradox, after a brief, informative discussion of the influences on Berdyaev's thinking. Critical and evaluatory remarks are reserved for a final chapter, so as not to interrupt the progress of his argument. For Berdyaev, man is a citizen of two worlds, divided between an inclination toward material objects which enslave him, and an aspiration toward the transcendent world of divine freedom. Nature, society, and history all tend to enslave man, yet they are also the theater in which his freedom must be exercised. Man himself is conceived of essentially as a free being. Freedom for Berdyaev means creativity, where creativity is taken in the radical sense of production out of nothing. Hence the alliance of freedom with the "nothing," and so with Boehme's Ungrund. The paradox is resolved only when, first, the world of natural necessity is recognized as perfused with symbol and when, finally, the revelation of Christ is taken as the meaning of that symbolization. Such a liberation comes to historical man in metahistorical moments when he grasps the eternal meaning behind the phenomena of nature and history, that is, when he grasps the end of history and nature. Nucho concludes that Berdyaev is a religious thinker in the tradition of the early Christian Fathers—a modern parallel, in particular, to Clement of Alexandria.—J. D. C. (shrink)

The word τερθρεία, which L. and S.8 derived from τερατεία and translated ‘the use of claptraps’, is perhaps best known from its occurrence in Isocrates , but the new edition has spread the net more widely, citing Philo, Philodemus, Proclus, Galen, Dion. Hal., and giving its meaning as ‘the use of extreme subtlety, hair-splitting, formal pedantry’. This agrees better with the gloss / κενοσπονδία attributed to Orus of Miletus in Et. Mag. 753. 4. Aristotle, Demosthenes, and Plutarch each use τερθρεύομαι (...) once. In the Helen Isocrates, condemning the futile ingenuity of the Sophists in writing encomia on such unworthy objects as salt and humble-bees, holds that such tours de force are immoral, as tending to deceive, representing a literary form of the vice περιεργία. Τερθρεία, then, should take its place, as a recognized term for the idle over-elaboration of a banausic theme, in the vocabulary of Greek literary criticism. It does not, however, appear in Rhys Roberts's ‘Glossary of Greek Rhetoric’ appended to his edition of D.H.'s On Literary Composition. No doubt this is because τερθρεία does not occur in this or any other of D.H.'s Scripta Rhetorica. But D.H. himself uses the word in Antiq. Rom. . Similarly J. F. Lockwood does not discuss the term in his lists in C.Q. xxxi and xxxii, where he collects words which are used metaphorically by D.H. in literary criticism. The metaphor in τερθρεία is certainly not obvious; but the literary sense must have involved some transference of meaning, for it is not to be expected that the word τερθρεία sprang, in full panoply of critical significance, from the brain of the Muse of Rhetoric; and it is part of the purpose of this paper to point the way to an explanation, or at least to set forth some known facts about the word and its possible congeners. (shrink)

There is one nautical term which has been neglected by those who have written about the Greek ship—for the very good reason that it had ceased to be used literally by the time our records, literary and epigraphic, begin. This is a pity, since the silence of experts has resulted in an absurdity, or at least obscurity, appearing in the dictionaries. An unattested original meaning ‘under-rower’ has been universally assumed for the word ujnjpenjs . This assumption not merely requires proof (...) but is in sore need of explanation. What is an ‘under-rower’? And why did the term pass out of use in that sense? (shrink)

This study is concerned in general with the relationship in Husserl’s thought between logic, phenomenology, and ontology, although the issue is addressed primarily by means of a study of the Logical Investigations. This limitation is justified, Grünewald contends, because the Investigations is a seminal work for Husserl and because Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology appears as the consequence of his own critical reflections upon the problems found in his early, pre-transcendental phenomenology, especially that of the first edition of the Investigations. According (...) to Grünewald, then, reflection upon these problems and the changes motivated by them in the second edition of the Investigations discloses the motives for the transition to a transcendental phenomenology and provides a way for phenomenologists and non-phenomenologists alike to address the general issue. (shrink)

Markovic draws upon the Zagreb school of Marx-interpretation, as well as on the data of the historical development of socialism in Yugoslavia in his attempt to develop a critical social theory. He constantly opposes the use of Marxian theory as an ideological orthodoxy simply legitimating political practice. And he points out how Marxian social thought may be a means of critically comprehending social processes, as well as a self-critical theory developing in relation to the historical data at whose evaluation (...) it is directed. Markovic insists that critical social theory must take as its subject matter a range of data comprised of contemporary phenomena, the history of such phenomena, and the human evaluations and aspirations which the historical situation engenders. This points up the importance of a theory of man for a critical social theory. Only an adequate theory of man enables social theory to comprehend and evaluate the goals arising from specific social processes. Markovic outlines elements of such a theory of man, as discoverable in Marx. With these guiding ideas, he examines specific themes such as economics and human values, technology, politics as a professional institution, and revolution. Markovic’s examinations valuably illustrate a balanced Marxian approach to social questions. It is argued, for example, that technological innovations must be analyzed in relation both to the concrete economic processes of given societies, and to the human needs operative in those societies. Markovic draws upon the Yugoslav experience to show the concrete nature of such an analysis. The viability of the professional political institution is discussed, with reference to specific productive relations in societies, and the political possibilities thereof. And in the context of a distinction between political and social revolution, he writes with sensitivity and discernment on the concept of revolution in Marx. Problematically, the precise status of a theory of man in a social theory of the Marxian variety remains unanswered herein. But the work stands as highly useful to those interested in non-ideological developments of Marxian social theory.—M.J.D. (shrink)

After Being and Time itself, A Letter on Humanism is perhaps Heidegger’s most important work. It is a comparatively clear statement of the "later Heidegger" which focuses on the possibility of a "humanism" and the meaning of "ethics" for the thinking-committed-to-being. It is also Heidegger’s own retrieval of Being and Time twenty years later, giving a decisive self-interpretation of the main lines of this so-called "early work." Cousineau aims at providing the reader with a "handy, scholarly tool" for interpreting the (...) Letter. He does this in three ways. 1) He provides a running commentary on selected but important passages from the Letter, with a generous use of the original German followed by a translation or paraphrase. 2) He takes a great deal of pain with Heidegger’s German and does not hesitate to call the only currently available translation of the Letter in English "deplorable", a judgment this translation frequently merits. 3) Finally, he presents us with an extensive annotated bibliography of works in seven languages which has the unusual feature of being coded by the letters A, B, and C which he defines as follows: anti-humanism, i.e., the interpretation of the relation between Being and Dasein advanced by the author sees Heidegger as devaluing man’s essence; metahumanism, the relationship is seen as unrealistic and mythical, and man’s essence is absent; authentic humanism, the interpretor [[sic]] sees in Heidegger’s view a representation of man’s true possibility for being human. Cousineau wisely reserves a category "D" for those whose position does not accommodate itself to these classifications. There are 95 entries in this bibliography which ranges over most of the important literature.—J.D.C. (shrink)

Miss Stambaugh's new translation of Identität und Differenz is a welcome addition to the growing body of English translations of Heidegger. The special merit of Miss Stambaugh's work is that the translator was a student of Heidegger's and was able to prepare this translation in consultation with him. Her work should be particularly well received in view of the very poor quality of the previous translation of the same work, published for some reason under the title Essays in Metaphysics. The (...) "Introduction" is well done but regrettably short as the work stands in need of further explication. There certainly is room for an expanded introduction, as the lectures--even in both languages--barely fill their 146 pages. Miss Stambaugh's linguistic decisions are usually sound. For example, faced with the Heideggerian ambiguity of "Er-eignis," she simply combines the dual meanings into "the event of appropriation," which is as much as one can do with this critically important word in Heidegger's vocabulary.--J. D. C. (shrink)

Erickson has written an exceptionally interesting book which belongs to the growing body of literature seeking to find the common points of philosophic concern that exist between phenomenology and analytic philosophy--to "swim the Channel" as it is put. He thinks primarily in the analytic tradition, but, from a purely quantitative point of view, most of this study is devoted to the analysis of Heidegger's thought. The most frequent analytic references are to Wittgenstein. In the first chapter, he seeks to find (...) some linguistic basis for raising the question of the meaning of Being--and not just of 'Being' and he engages in a lengthy discussion of the possible kinds of participal [[sic]] uses 'Being' might have in Heidegger's celebrated "question of Being." In the second chapter, he argues strongly for the possibility of an extra-linguistic meaning, a possibility uniformly neglected by the analytic "monoscopic" tradition. In Chapter three, he finds a common basis for phenomenology and for the analytic tradition in the "transcendental turn" that contemporary philosophy has taken. He rightly points out that for both phenomenology and analysis it is in language that, as Heidegger says, "things first come into being and are." This is an extremely important observation and fundamental to any bridge-building of these two traditions. The last chapter discusses the fact that Dasein understands itself in terms of its world: self-reflection is mediated by things. Among other things he argues in favor of Heidegger's views on the "ready-to-hand."--The most serious objection one can raise against this book is its character as a book: it has no really apparent beginning, middle and end. It originated in four previously published articles and it is doubtful that Erickson has succeeded in welding them together into a unity. The four chapters considered separately however are insightful and suggestive.--J. D. C. (shrink)

With the exception of three articles, all of the pieces collected here by Ballard and Scott appeared in the Winter, 1970 issue of The Southern Journal of Philosophy commemorating Heidegger’s 80th birthday. The opening essay by Poeggeler, "Heidegger Today," masterfully reviews the state of Heideggerian scholarship, sketching the direction which Heidegger’s interpretations have taken, and outlining his own unitary view of Heidegger’s development. This is followed by an interesting essay from the Heidegger critic Karl Löwith who, after some revealing personal (...) recollections about Heidegger, takes up the question of the relationship of Dasein, which stands out from and transcends nature, with the natural world, a question Heidegger himself omits. There is also a close exposition by Joseph Kockelmans of the all-important "Time and Being" lecture of 1962 and of its relationship to Being and Time. Hans-Georg Gadamer contributes a philosophical essay—not a piece of Heideggerian scholarship—on the nature of "empty" time, i.e., the temporal project which we hope to "fill up," and of the "transition" into fulfillment. Editor Scott gives an account of Dasein in Being and Time by an analogy with Leibniz’s monad as a self-originating, purposeful unit of activity. Theodore Kisiel differentiates the mathematical a priori, described by Heidegger as the root conception of modern science, from Heidegger’s own "hermeneutical" a priori. There are three studies of language: Volmann-Schluck discusses language and myth, while John Sallis studies how language and the reversal are intertwined in Heidegger’s thinking; Don Ihde differentiates "existential" phenomenology as a phenomenology of perception from "hermeneutic" phenomenology as a phenomenology of meaning, signification, and language. In addition to essays by A. V. Schoenborn, F. J. Smith, and Edward Ballard, there is also a concluding contribution by Jean Beaufret who offers a portrait of Heidegger "as seen from France."—J.D.C. (shrink)

Bucher reads Heidegger’s thought as a contribution to the "problem of the concept". Heidegger says in Being and Time that the meaning of Being must be "conceived in a way of its own, essentially contrasting with the concepts in which entities acquire their determinate signification." Heidegger’s thought is construed, therefore, not as an attack upon all conceptualization but as an attempt to renew the conceptual terms in which we think upon Being. The focus of Bucher’s analysis is Heidegger’s critique of (...) Western metaphysics which he interprets as Heidegger’s critique of the traditional mode of conceptualization. Since it is clear that Heidegger himself does not consciously formulate his problem in this way, Bucher claims that he is dealing with the unthought implications of Heidegger’s work, rather than with his explicit expressions. This accords with Heidegger’s own counsel that we look for what is still unthought in a philosopher’s thought. The heart of the book is the last three chapters in which a "search for a new understanding of the concept" is undertaken, and in which Bucher argues that Heidegger’s repudiation of metaphysics constitutes an implicit, formally negative mode of conceptualizing a post-metaphysical understanding of Being. This contradicts the letter of Heidegger’s thought, Bucher concedes, but is in keeping with Heidegger’s own approach towards the great thinkers. Bucher’s proposal is quite interesting and is perhaps a sign of a new movement among philosophers to appropriate for philosophy Heidegger’s own critique of philosophy.—J. D. C. (shrink)