Today's industrial society is having an encounter with ecology: in April, 1976 the French government presented the National Assembly with documents on the dumping and burning of waste in the sea, as well as on the protection of nature. Electoral campaigns, discussions and demonstrations are centered about the theme of pollution and environment. In the last century the accumulation of waste had already become a problem : “ One of the most important duties of industry is to find a useful (...) employment for waste,” wrote P. L. Simmons in 1875. The advice was heeded if we may believe what J. Gottmann wrote on the matter nearly a century later: “ If our era is to be defined by its most important raw material and one that is truly proper to it, as is done for the Bronze Age or the Iron Age, we may no longer speak of a Steel or Petroleum Age, nor of an Atomic Age (which may come in the future) but of the Garbage Age.” The extraordinary demographic expansion of humanity that has gone from a population of five million in the Paleolithic Age to four billion today gives rise to a monstrous abundance of refuse resulting as much from the natural mechanisms of living as from industrial activity (factory waste) or from the present attitude haunted by the idea of obsolescence (the throw-away society of Alvin Toffler). The outline of a universe submerged in waste matter appears, similar to that evoked by Italo Calvino in Città Invisibili apropos of the town of Leonia: “The refuse of Leonia would gradually invade the world if the interminable garbage heaps were not pressed upon, beyond the last crest, by the refuse of other towns that also push mountains of refuse far away from themselves. Perhaps the entire world beyond the borders of Leonia is covered with craters of trash, each with a continually erupting metropolis in its center. The borders between foreign or enemy towns are thus contaminated bastions in which the detritus of the one and the other serves as mutual support, menacing and mixing together.” The world of Metamorphosis is approaching in which man, transformed into an insect, covered with dust and remains of food, gnaws on the cores and parings of half-rotten vegetables. Science fiction invents a remedy to fit the problem : a planet specialized in storing all the garbage unloaded by an entire galaxy. (shrink)

In 1967, Alvin Goldman proposed that 'X' knows that 'p' only if the fact that 'p' is causally connected with X's belief that 'p'. Brian Skyrms' alleged counterexample, the case of the fiend who beheads a person already deceased, has been widely accepted (by Robert Ackermann, Gilbert Harman, and Marshall Swain) as such. But it is not a counterexample. To see this, we must attend to two distinctions: between a death and being dead, and between causation and causal overdetermination. (...) The most visible objection to Goldman's analysis is then dissolved. a modified version of Skyrms' case fares no better. (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 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. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be (...) preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (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)

ABSTRACT Most university students have engaged in some form of academic dishonesty. These actions can have detrimental consequences for the student, the university, and society at large. It is important to understand factors that contribute to academic dishonesty as well as to identify potential predictors of this behavior. This study employed an experimental design with 361 undergraduate students in a laboratory setting. Deception was used during the experiment to determine the impact of peer influence, personality, and an honor code on (...) cheating behavior. Results revealed that peer influence had the largest impact on cheating behavior. In addition, personality, specifically, individuals who scored high on the openness trait were significantly more likely to cheat than those who scored lower on this trait. Implications of these findings for addressing academic dishonesty in higher education are provided. (shrink)

1. ptie. Le besoin de rédemption.--2. ptie. La rédemption religieuse.--3. ptie. La rédemption métaphysique.--4. ptie. La rédemption positiviste.--5. ptie. La rédemption individualiste.

Dans sa précognition de toutes choses, le Créateur avait pris grand plaisir à lire les philosophes présocratiques. C'est ainsi qu'Il avait appris que, même en sa toute-puissance, Il ne disposerait que de deux modèles fondamentaux pour créer son univers. Alors Il se dit : "Je pourrais me laisser guider par la pure rationalité de Parménide, toute de clarté et de rigueur. C'est un système remarquablement simple. Une fois que j'aurais allumé la mèche du big-bang, je n'aurais plus à m'occuper de (...) rien. Qu'est-ce qui pourrait changer dans les lois que j'aurais établies? Et comment les entités que j'aurais créées pourraient-elles ne pas leur obéir? Je n'aurais plus qu'à assister au merveilleux spectacle dont j'aurais été le créateur et le régisseur. Oui, mais voilà, je connaîtrais d'avance et jusque dans ses moindres détails le spectacle qui se déroulerait ainsi devant mes yeux. Que vaut un spectacle dont la mise en scène, chaque tableau, chaque épisode sont connus du spectateur, pour finalement se confondre en l'instantanéité d'un moment? Quelle triste perspective d'un éternel ennui! Et dans ce monde parfaitement déterminé, même le serpent le plus malin ne saurait exercer son pouvoir tentateur sur ce premier couple, qui jamais ne connaîtrait la liberté de pécher. Du coup, l'autre voie qui m'est offerte paraît infiniment plus attrayante, cette voie qu'avait explorée Héraclite, voie hésitante, toute en contradiction, où être et n'être pas, c'est et ce n'est pas la même chose. Mais cette incertitude se mue en une infinité de possibles, où tout peut être, où rien n'est jamais donné d'avance. A chaque coup de dés de cet enfant toujours jeune qu'est le Temps, de nouvelles possibilités surgissent. Assister à la naissance d'un monde inachevé et toujours en gésine, voilà qui peut être captivant!" Et c'est ainsi que, se laissant guider par Héraclite, Dieu inventa la mécanique quantique, avec ce qui, en elle, dépend du hasard le plus authentique. Du coup le spectacle du monde devient fascinant et toujours inattendu. Depuis ce jour, Dieu se promène de planète en planète, de galaxie en galaxie, sûr d'y découvrir chaque fois quelque nouveauté à laquelle lui-même n'avait pas songé... (shrink)

Against the traditional view, Alvin Goldman argues that logic, probability theory, and linguistic analysis cannot by themselves delineate principles of rationality or justified belief. The mind's operations must be taken into account.

Knowledge in a Social World offers a philosophy for the information age. Alvin Goldman explores new frontiers by creating a thoroughgoing social epistemology, moving beyond the traditional focus on solitary knowers. Against the tides of postmodernism and social constructionism Goldman defends the integrity of truth and shows how to promote it by well-designed forms of social interaction. From science to education, from law to democracy, he shows why and how public institutions should seek knowledge-enhancing practices. The result is a (...) bold, timely, and systematic treatment of the philosophical foundations of an information society. (shrink)

Issu de la thèse de l'auteur soutenue en 1987, cet ouvrage a pour visée de redéfinir l'anthropologie, en dissipant le malentendu instauré par le modèle galiléen de scientificité appliqué aux sciences sociales afin d'opérer un retour à la fondation historique de la discipline dans l'epistêmê politikê des anciens Grecs. Trois voies d'accès sont parcourues : G. Dumézil, M. Heidegger et G. Guillaume. ©Electre 2018.

This article chronicles the material conditions of producing a film in the Philippine independent film scene which has experienced a marked resurgence at the turn of the century, and has been credited for having revived the ailing Filipino film industry. By way of case study, I use my own film Ang Panggagahasa kay Fe (international title: The Rapture of Fe), awarded the best feature-length digital film at the 33rd Cairo Film Festival in 2009. I co-produced, wrote and directed this film. (...) I recount the different factors that helped shape the film, from scripting to film financing, and provide further evidence of the significance of the private sector, in infusing new money and in reviving the national Filipino film industry as a whole. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to sketch a theory of justified belief. What I have in mind is an explanatory theory, one that explains in a general way why certain beliefs are counted as justified and others as unjustified. Unlike some traditional approaches, I do not try to prescribe standards for justification that differ from, or improve upon, our ordinary standards. I merely try to explicate the ordinary standards, which are, I believe, quite different from those of many classical, (...) e. g., ‘Cartesian’, accounts. (shrink)

In a 2018 referendum, the Irish electorate voted in favour of repealing Ireland's quasi-total legal ban on abortion. The referendum campaign saw important public discussions regarding gender roles in twenty-first century Ireland. While the constitutional ban on abortion was condemned by abortion rights advocates for marginalising women's agency, the legislation which replaced it has not escaped criticism either. Therefore, questions surrounding the conceptualisation of women's agency in the 2018 referendum are still relevant today. Adopting a multimodal critical discourse analysis approach, (...) this paper analyses signage from the weeks before the vote to examine the discursive construction of women's agency in the linguistic landscape of the referendum campaign. I argue that many mainstream campaign organisations – including those arguing for liberalisation of abortion laws – were complicit in the discursive diminishment of women's agency, suggesting that the campaign did not necessarily challenge prevailing ideologies of gender and agency. (shrink)

In this companion volume to Warrant: The Current Debate, Plantinga develops an original approach to the question of epistemic warrant; that is what turns true belief into knowledge. He argues that what is crucial to warrant is the proper functioning of one's cognitive faculties in the right kind of cognitive environment.

People are minded creatures; we have thoughts, feelings and emotions. More intriguingly, we grasp our own mental states, and conduct the business of ascribing them to ourselves and others without instruction in formal psychology. How do we do this? And what are the dimensions of our grasp of the mental realm? In this book, Alvin I. Goldman explores these questions with the tools of philosophy, developmental psychology, social psychology and cognitive neuroscience. He refines an approach called simulation theory, which (...) starts from the familiar idea that we understand others by putting ourselves in their mental shoes. Can this intuitive idea be rendered precise in a philosophically respectable manner, without allowing simulation to collapse into theorizing? Given a suitable definition, do empirical results support the notion that minds literally create surrogates of other peoples mental states in the process of mindreading? Goldman amasses a surprising array of evidence from psychology and neuroscience that supports this hypothesis. (shrink)

This paper presents a partial analysis of perceptual knowledge, an analysis that will, I hope, lay a foundation for a general theory of knowing. Like an earlier theory I proposed, the envisaged theory would seek to explicate the concept of knowledge by reference to the causal processes that produce (or sustain) belief. Unlike the earlier theory, however, it would abandon the requirement that a knower's belief that p be causally connected with the fact, or state of affairs, that p.

This is the third volume in Alvin Plantinga's trilogy on the notion of warrant, which he defines as that which distinguishes knowledge from true belief. In this volume, Plantinga examines warrant's role in theistic belief, tackling the questions of whether it is rational, reasonable, justifiable, and warranted to accept Christian belief and whether there is something epistemically unacceptable in doing so. He contends that Christian beliefs are warranted to the extent that they are formed by properly functioning cognitive faculties, (...) thus, insofar as they are warranted, Christian beliefs are knowledge if they are true. (shrink)

The growing reliance on non-governmental independent regulators in many social and economic domains, including corporate financial reporting, has brought to the fore concerns over their regulatory accountability. This study looks at one aspect of the regulatory due process-regulatory impact assessment (IA). Drawing on the analytical framework developed by Bovens (Public accountability: a framework for the analysis and assessment of accountability arrangements in the public domain. CONNEX papers, Research Group 2, Democracy and Accountability in the EU, 2006, Eur Law J 13(4): (...) 447–468, 2007), we evaluate the contribution of IA as an instrument for enhancing regulatory accountability in the context of the Financial Reporting Council, an independent regulator for the accountancy profession in the UK. The study’s findings suggest that, despite an increasing level of sophistication in the manner in which IA is used within FRC, the contribution of IA to regulatory accountability remains limited. Specifically, there are concerns as to whether IA is used to achieve a transparent and fair regulatory process or simply to maintain an image of good governance and justify policy decisions that would have been made even in the absence of IA. (shrink)

This article draws parallels between the representations of the classics of Eurasianism and their contemporaries, namely N. K. Roerich, H. I. Roerich and Y. N. Roerich, on the peculiar mid-world that is formed by Russia within and around it. It is indicated that the concept of interrelation of biogeosystems with peoples and civilizations inhabiting them, defined by the Eurasian term “developmental site”, is familiar from natural-philosophic concepts of the earlier period. In the era of the development of the ideas of (...) noospherism, it obtained natural-scientific substantiation and new interpretation not only in L. N. Gumilyov original theory of ethnogenesis, but also in representations of the Russian cosmism, which can be correlated with the scientific-philosophical, literary-artistic heritage of the Roerichs. Unlike geosophy of the Eurasians, the holistic views of Roerichs imparted a rather synthetic character to the historical science. At the same time, Y. N.Roerich distinguished geopsychology as a research instrument for cross-civilizational dialogue. One of the most remarkable episodes in implementation of the Eurasian vision by the Roerichs was their Central Asian expedition and peacekeeping activity, associated with unification of the peoples of Eurasia on the basis of broad cooperation. The article demonstrates the possibility of synthesizing Eurasian theories, spiritual-ethical teachings, and natural scientific research within the framework of integral philosophy for elaboration on the concept of sustainable development. Besides the need for international cooperation, the cultural-philosophical heritage of the Roerichs, which includes “Living Ethics or the Teaching of Life”, infeasibility of evolution of mankind detached from the planet and Cosmos also received its ontological substantiation. Such an in-depth consideration of the fate of Eurasia by the Roerichs, associated with the civilizational foundations of the crossing “Russia — Mongolia — China — India” and the leading role of Siberia in the future, allows filling the gaps in the construction of the classics of Eurasianism and utilize sociocultural potential of Eurasia to the fullest. (shrink)