The concept of "ecological niche" is frequently employed in sociocultural anthropology, but there have been few systematic applications of it. This paper examines the utility of the concept for the analysis of social interaction and change, with special reference to complex societies. In a small agricultural valley of northern California, competition between two status groups over a scarce resource--land--has led to displacement and changing patterns of resource use. "Niche" describes the aggregate outcome of underlying processes of competition on the (...) individual level. (shrink)

Rasselas and his companions leave the 'happy valley' in search of 'the choice of life'. Johnson's philosophical tale considers such things as the nature of poetry, the stability of reason, the immortality of the soul, and the pursuit of happiness. This new edition relates the novel to Johnson's life and the political and social context.

Climate change increases the frequency and intensity of certain kinds of natural hazard events in alpine areas. This interdisciplinary study addresses the hypothetical possibility of relocating the residents of three alpine areas in Austria: the Sölk valleys, the Johnsbach valley, and the St. Lorenzen/Schwarzenbach valleys. Our particular focus is on these residents’ expectations about such relocations. We find that (1) many residents expect that in the next decades the state will provide them with a level of natural hazards protection, (...) aid, and relief that allows them to continue to live in these valleys; (2) this expectation receives some legal protection but only when it is associated with fundamental rights; and (3) the expectation is morally significant, i.e., it ought to be considered in assessing the moral rightness or justness of relocation policies. These results suggest legal changes and likely extend to many other (Austrian) alpine areas as well. (shrink)

Religiously affiliated colleges and universities typically take spiritual formation and soul care very seriously and are usually intentional about the spiritual and religious development of not only their students but of their faculty and staff as well. The religious tradition, size of the campus community, financial and other resources, along with the will of senior administrators, donors, trustees, and the general university community all determine how these interests and agendas are nurtured and developed as well as the kinds of programing (...) offered. The purpose of this article is to highlight the strategies to support and nurture spiritual formation and soul care at Santa Clara University, a Catholic and Jesuit university in the heart of Silicon Valley, with elements of this care found at most, if not all, Jesuit higher education institutions throughout the nation and world. At Santa Clara, the Ignatian Center is the primary, although not the only, home for these spiritual formation and soul care offerings and will be highlighted here. (shrink)

This chapter considers the potential of this kind of indigenous site-specific installation for thinking afresh the relation of contemporary inhabitants with the land in the Northern Plains region. 'Medicine wheel' is the name given since the late 1800s to a kind of boulder structure found in the Northern Plains of North America. Medicine wheels are often situated on knolls overlooking the prairie, and are mostly found in Alberta and Saskatchewan, and less frequently in Montana and northern Wyoming. The medicine wheel (...) of Steel a great Blood warrior was built in 1940 as a memorial. Moreover, reports from Native consultants indicate that the Big Horn medicine wheel may have been used for vision quests. Medicine wheels seem to be, in Foucault's terms, 'places outside of all places; in their resistance to interpretation according to instrumental notions, they return our gaze unto the prairies, turned denatured, overgrazed cattle pastures, and unto the once verdant river valleys, turned into flooded, mega-project water reservoirs. (shrink)

: The shepherd embodies a strange and disturbing society. Isolated, marginal, it forms a world apart and evolves in a wild space where mountains, valleys, meadows or forests make up the framework of its activity. In this non-domesticated nature the human presence is suspect. This confusing being is very often represented with an animalized, almost monstrous or deformed body which becomes a metaphor for social order. This grotesque body translates the prejudices of urbanites and elites. It fuels sexual fantasies and (...) symbolizes the disturbances of the natural and social order: freed from the laws of the city, it can try to seduce the young ladies and be insolent in front of the knights. It is a threat to the established order. But the shepherd also carries virtues. It is a model of Christian life: humility and holiness. It belongs to an original humanity, the form closest to divine creation. Two styles of representation of the shepherd therefore oppose the extremes. From texts from the end of the Middle Ages, we will see how the shepherd is an imaginary in opposition to an organized society but that his image has evolved positively until becoming the guardian of traditions and a being who lives in harmony with nature. Key words: stereotypes, shepherd, savagery, holiness, littérature, Middle Ages. Résumé: Le berger incarne une société étrange et inquiétante. Isolé, marginal, il forme un monde à part et évolue dans un espace sauvage où les montagnes, vallées, prés ou forêts composent le cadre de son activité. Dans cette nature non domestiquée la présence humaine est suspecte. Cet être déroutant est bien souvent représenté avec un corps animalisé, quasi monstrueux ou déformé qui devient une métaphore de l’ordre social. Ce corps grotesque traduit les préjugés des urbains et des élites. Il alimente les fantasmes sexuels et symbolise les dérèglements de l’ordre naturel et social : affranchi des lois de la cité, il peut tenter de séduire les demoiselles et se montrer insolent face aux chevaliers. C’est une menace contre l’ordre établi. Mais le berger est également porteur de vertus. C’est un modèle de vie chrétienne : humilité et sainteté. Il appartient à une humanité originelle, forme la plus proche de la création divine. Deux styles de représentation du berger opposent donc les extrêmes. A partir de textes de la fin du Moyen Age, nous verrons comment le berger est un imaginaire en opposition avec une société organisée mais que son image a évolué positivement jusqu’à devenir le gardien des traditions et un être qui vit en harmonie avec la nature. Mots clés : stéréotypes, berger, sauvagerie, sainteté, littérature, Moyen Age. Resumen. El pastor encarna una sociedad extraña y perturbadora. Aislado, marginal, forma un mundo aparte y evoluciona en un espacio salvaje donde montañas, valles, praderas o bosques conforman el marco de su actividad. En esta naturaleza no domesticada, la presencia humana es sospechosa. Este ser confuso a menudo se representa con un cuerpo animalizado, casi monstruoso o deformado que se convierte en una metáfora del orden social. Este cuerpo grotesco traduce los prejuicios de los urbanitas y las élites. Alimenta las fantasías sexuales y simboliza las perturbaciones del orden natural y social: liberado de las leyes de la ciudad, puede tratar de seducir a las jóvenes y ser insolente frente a los caballeros. Es una amenaza para el orden establecido. Pero el pastor también posee virtudes. Es un modelo de vida cristiana, de humildad y santidad. Pertenece a una humanidad original, la forma más cercana a la creación divina. Dos estilos de representación del pastor, por lo tanto, se oponen. A partir de los textos del final de la Edad Media, analizamos la imagen del pastor en oposición a toda sociedad organizada y la evolución positiva de su figura hasta convertirse en guardián de las tradiciones y en un ser que vive en armonía con la naturaleza. Palabras clave: estereotipos, pastor, salvajismo, santitad, literatura, Edad Media. (shrink)

Upon entering the White House in 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt faced an ailing economy in the throes of the Great Depression and rushed to transform the country through recovery programs and legislative reform. By 1934, he began to send professional photographers to the state of West Virginia to document living conditions and the effects of his New Deal programs. The photographs from the Farm Security Administration Project not only introduced “America to Americans,” exposing a continued need for government intervention, (...) but also captured powerful images of life in rural and small town America.New Deal Photographs of West Virginia, 1934-1943 presents images of the state's northern and southern coalfields, the subsistence homestead projects of Arthurdale, Eleanor, and Tygart Valley, and various communities from Charleston to Clarksburg and Parkersburg to Elkins. With over one hundred and fifty images by ten FSA photographers, including Walker Evans, Marion Post Wolcott, Arthur Rothstein, and Ben Shahn, this collection is a remarkable proclamation of hardship, hope, endurance, and, above all, community. These photographs provide a glimpse into the everyday lives of West Virginians during the Great Depression and beyond. (shrink)

Issues of reliability are claiming center-stage in the epistemology of machine learning. This paper unifies different branches in the literature and points to promising research directions, whilst also providing an accessible introduction to key concepts in statistics and machine learning – as far as they are concerned with reliability.

Big Ideas for Little Kids includes everything a teacher, a parent, or a college student needs to teach philosophy to elementary school children from picture books. Written in a clear and accessible style, the book explains why it is important to allow young children access to philosophy during primary-school education. Wartenberg also gives advice on how to construct a "learner-centered" classroom, in which children discuss philosophical issues with one another as they respond to open-ended questions by saying whether they agree (...) or disagree with what others have said. (shrink)

Cette étude essaye d’établir qu’il y a deux notions très différentes de « fondation » à l’œuvre dans les Recherches logiques de Husserl. Dans la IIIème Recherche, où le terme est formellement introduit, lorsqu’il se demande quels sont les contenus qui peuvent exister d’une manière autonome (indépendants) et lesquels peuvent exister uniquement en tant que moments d’autre chose (dépendants), Husserl suit ce que j’appelle un « modèle ontologique ». Selon ce modèle, le concret possède une priorité sur à l’abstrait qui (...) est fondé en lui. Dans la VIème Recherche, en revanche, Husserl s’oriente principalement sur un « modèle gnoséologique » qui voit le complexe comme fondé sur ce qui est relativement simple, étant donné que les expériences d’ordre supérieur (telles les perceptions de types d’objets plus complexes) sont « fondées sur » des expériences plus simples, bien qu’elles ne puissent pas y être réduites. L’exemple principal ici est celui des intuitions catégoriales : fondées sur les intuitions sensibles, elles n’y sont pas réductibles. Mais cette distinction entre deux sens différents du terme de « fondation » peut également nous aider à mieux comprendre de nombreuses thèses husserliennes plutôt controversées. Par exemple, elle peut nous permettre de mieux comprendre dans quelle mesure faire l’expérience d’un être humain comme un tout se fonde sur l’expérience d’un corps physique, et cela même si l’étant que nous rencontrons inclut à la fois des aspects corporels et des aspects spirituels – les deux étant vus, d’une manière essentielle, comme des moments de cette unique personne qui fait l’objet de notre expérience. (shrink)

v. 1. Editorial introduction -- v. 2. The English and Latin texts (i) -- v. 3. The English and Latin texts (ii).

In this book, T. M. Scanlon offers new answers to these questions, as they apply to the central part of morality that concerns what we owe to each other.

This paper is an exposition and evaluation of the Agustín Rayo's views about the epistemology and metaphysics of mathematics, as they are presented in his book The Construction of Logical Space.

In recent years an increasing number of psychologists have begun to explore the prevalence, causes and effects of ordinary people’s intuitions about moral realism. Many of these studies have lacked in construct validity, i.e., they have failed to measure moral realism. My aim in this paper accordingly is to motivate and guide methodological improvements. In analysis of prominent existing measures, I develop general recommendations for overcoming ten prima facie serious worries about research on folk moral realism. G1 and G2 require (...) studies’ answer choices to be as metaethically comprehensive as methodologically feasible. G3 and G4 prevent fallacious inferences from intuitions about related debates. G5 and G6 limit first-order moral and epistemic influences. G7 address studies’ instructions. And G8 and G9 suggest tests of important psychological presuppositions. (shrink)

This volume is a study of the influence of Timaeus on the development of Western cosmology in three axial periods of European culture: Late Antiquity, Middle Ages and Renaissance.

Thomas Reid is now recognized as one of the towering figures of the Enlightenment. Best known for his published writings on epistemology and moral theory, he was also an accomplished mathematician and natural philosopher, as an earlier volume of his manuscripts edited by Paul Wood for the Edinburgh Reid Edition, Thomas Reid on the Animate Creation, has shown. The Correspondence of Thomas Reid collects all of the known letters to and from Reid in a fully annotated form. (...) Letters already published by Sir William Hamilton and others have been reedited, and roughly half of the letters included appear in print for the first time. Writing in 1802, Reid's disciple and biographer Dugald Stewart doubted that Reid's correspondence &"would be generally interesting.&" This collection proves otherwise, for the letters illuminate virtually every aspect of Reid's life and career and, in some instances, provide us with invaluable evidence about activities otherwise undocumented in his manuscripts or published works. Through his correspondence we can trace Reid's relations with contemporaries such as David Hume and his colleagues at both King's College, Aberdeen, and the University of Glasgow, as well as his engagement with the most controversial philosophical, scientific, and political issues of his day. If anything, the letters assembled here serve as the starting point for understanding Reid and his place in the Enlightenment. (shrink)

Feeling good: four ways -- Finding that feeling -- The place of pleasure -- Knowing what's what -- Making things happen -- Being good -- Love and friendship -- Putting it together.

Conciliatory theories of disagreement require that one lower one’s confidence in a belief in the face of disagreement from an epistemic peer. One question about which people might disagree is who should qualify as an epistemic peer and who should not. But when putative epistemic peers disagree about epistemic peerhood itself, then Conciliationism makes contradictory demands and paradoxes arise.

Thomas Paine published this treatise defending the principles of freedom in 1791. He fought for independence in America, and was in France during the Revolution. He writes as a first-hand observer of political realities. He saw all government as arbitrary unless it conformed to the will of the people and argued for reforms in the British Parliament.

Cet essai présente une description de plusieurs travaux inédits de Jacques Derrida au sujet de Marx et d'Althusser datant des années 1960 et 1970. Au-delà du travail philologique, il s'agit aussi d'une étude théorique de notions telles que 'idéologie', 'fétichisme', 'reproduction', 'division du travail', 'différence sexuelle', 'domination', 'économie politique', 'matérialisme dialectique', ou 'production culturelle' — tout autant à travers les textes marxistes que dans les lectures déconstructives qu'en propose alors Derrida. Durant les années 1970, dans le cadre de son séminaire, (...) Derrida s'efforce de penser une autre économie politique, au-delà de l'économie du propre qu'il identifie aussi bien chez les économistes classiques que chez leurs critiques marxistes. Ces lectures détaillées et combattives de textes marxistes restent aujourd'hui inédites. Leur prise en compte contribue à redéfinir l'image de Derrida et de la déconstruction, en témoignant de ses discussions très avancées de Marx, d'Althusser, et de la pensée marxiste — et ce dès la fin des années 1960 et le début des années 1970, plus de 20 ans avant la publication de Spectres de Marx (1993). -/- Une version plus courte de cet article fut traduite en espagnol par Ramiro Parodi, et publiée en 2019 dans le numéro 7 de la revue Demarcaciones — numéro consacré au 25ème anniversaire de la publication de Spectres de Marx. (shrink)

This book is a fiftieth anniversary republication of Thomas Nagel's "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?", a classic in the philosophy of mind. Through its argument for the irreducible subjectivity of consciousness, it played an essential role in making the study of consciousness a central part of philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience. It also spurred the now flourishing scientific attention to the consciousness of non-human creatures: mammals, birds, fish, mollusks, and insects. The book also includes a second essay (...) offering Nagel's more recent thoughts on the most promising positive response to the mind-body problem, as posed in the original essay. (shrink)

Respect, Pluralism, and Justice is a series of essays which sketches a broadly Kantian framework for moral deliberation, and then uses it to address important social and political issues. Hill shows how Kantian theory can be developed to deal with questions about cultural diversity, punishment, political violence, responsibility for the consequences of wrongdoing, and state coercion in a pluralistic society.

Thomas Hill, a leading figure in the recent development of Kantian moral philosophy, presents a set of essays exploring the implications of basic Kantian ideas for practical issues. The first part of the book provides background in central themes in Kant's ethics; the second part discusses questions regarding human welfare; the third focuses on moral worth-the nature and grounds of moral assessment of persons as deserving esteem or blame. Hill shows moral, political, and social philosophers just how valuable moral (...) theory can be in addressing practical matters. (shrink)

Providing valid responses to a self-report survey requires cognitive effort. Subjects engaging in insufficient effort responding (IER) are unwilling to take this effort. Compared to psychologists, experimental philosophers so far seem to have paid less attention to IER. This paper is an attempt to begin to alleviate this shortcoming. First, I explain IER’s nature, prevalence and negative effects in self-report surveys in general. Second, I argue that IER might also affect experimental philosophy studies. Third, I develop recommendations as to how (...) experimental philosophers should (and should not) try to prevent IER. Fourth, I develop recommendations as to how experimental philosophers should (and should not) try to detect IER. Fifth, I sketch how experimental philosophers ought to proceed once a subject has been identified as an insufficient effort responder. And finally, I report the results of an online survey that addresses experimental philosophers’ current knowledge, consideration and assessment of IER. (shrink)

Nietzsche is often regarded as a paradigmatically anti-theoretical philosopher. Bernard Williams has said that Nietzsche is so far from being a theorist that his text “is booby-trapped not only against recovering theory from it, but, in many cases, against any systematic exegesis that assimilates it to theory.” Many would apply this view especially to Nietzsche’s moral philosophy. They would say that even when he is making positive normative claims, as against just criticizing existing morality, his claims have neither the content (...) nor the organization characteristic of moral theory. (shrink)

The word “emotion” has named a psychological category and a subject for systematic enquiry only since the 19th century. Before then, relevant mental states were categorised variously as “appetites,” “passions,” “affections,” or “sentiments.” The word “emotion” has existed in English since the 17th century, originating as a translation of the French émotion, meaning a physical disturbance. It came into much wider use in 18th-century English, often to refer to mental experiences, becoming a fully fledged theoretical term in the following century, (...) especially through the influence of two Scottish philosopher-physicians, Thomas Brown and Charles Bell. This article relates this intellectual and semantic history to contemporary debates about the usefulness and meaning of “emotion” as a scientific term. (shrink)

For early modern metaphysician Anne Conway, the world comprises creatures. In some sense, Conway is a monist about creatures: all creatures are one. Yet, as Jessica Gordon-Roth has astutely pointed out, that monism can be understood in very different ways. One might read Conway as an ‘existence pluralist’: creatures are all composed of the same type of substance, but many substances exist. Alternatively, one might read Conway as an ‘existence monist’: there is only one created substance. Gordon-Roth has done the (...) scholarship a great favor by illuminating these issues in Conway. However, this article takes issue with Gordon-Roth's further view that Conway ‘oscillates’ between the extremes of existence pluralism and monism. In its place, I argue we should read Conway as a priority monist: the whole of creation is ontologically prior to its parts. (shrink)

Nanay (2017) argues for unconscious mental imagery, inter alia based on the assumption that successful performance in imagery tasks requires the manipulation of mental imagery. I challenge this assumption with the help of results presented in Shepard and Metzler (1971), Zeman et al. (2010), and Keogh and Pearson (2018). The studies suggest that imagery tasks can be successfully performed by means of cognitive/propositional strategies which do not rely on imagery.

Thomas Aquinas produced a voluminous body of work on moral theory, and much of that work is on virtue, particularly the status and value of the virtues as principles of virtuous acts, and the way in which a moral life can be organized around them schematically. Thomas Osborne presents Aquinas's account of virtue in its historical, philosophical and theological contexts, to show the reader what Aquinas himself wished to teach about virtue. His discussion makes the complexities of Aquinas's (...) moral thought accessible to readers despite the differences between Thomas's texts themselves, and the distance between our background assumptions and his. The book will be valuable for scholars and students in ethics, medieval philosophy, and theology. (shrink)

This book is available either individually, or as part of the specially-priced Arguments of the Philosphers Collection.

This book offers an interpretation of the rise of secular historical thought in nineteenth-century Europe. Instead of characterizing 'historicism' and 'secularization' as fundamental breaks with Europe's religious heritage, they are presented as complex cultural permutations with much continuity; for inherited theological patterns of interpreting experience determined to a large degree the conditions, possibilities, and limitations of the forms of historical imagination realizable by nineteenth-century secular intellectuals. This point is made by examining the thought of the German theologian W. M. L. (...) de Wette and that of the Swiss-German historian Jacob Burckhardt. Burckhardt's meeting with de Wette and his subsequent decision to study history over theology are interpreted as revealing moments in nineteenth-century intellectual history. By examining their encounter, its larger historical context, and the thought of both men, the book demonstrates the centrality of theological concerns and forms of knowledge in the emergence of modern, secular historical consciousness. (shrink)

According to the recent Perceptual Confidence view, perceptual experiences possess not only a representational content, but also a degree of confidence in that content. The motivations for this view are partly phenomenological and partly epistemic. We discuss both the phenomenological and epistemic motivations for the view, and the resulting account of the interface between perceptual experiences and degrees of belief. We conclude that, in their present state of development, orthodox accounts of perceptual experience are still to be favoured over the (...) perceptual confidence view. (shrink)

Thomas V. Morris introduces philosophical theology, examining God's goodness, power and knowledge; God's relationship to creation and time; and God's Incarnation and Trinity. A Contours of Christian Philosophy book. 180 pages, paper.