Online research in philosophy

The sixth edition of the Manual for Research Ethics Committees is a unique compilation of legal and ethical guidance which will prove invaluable for members of research ethics committees, researchers involved in research with humans, members of the pharmaceutical industry and students of law, medicine, ethics and philosophy. Presented in a clear and authoritative form, it incorporates the key legal and ethical guidelines and specially written chapters on major topics in bioethics by leading academic authors and practitioners, pharmaceutical industry associations (...) and professional bodies. In the sixth edition there are fifteen new chapters covering key issues from participation in clinical trials to cloning, and for the first time the manual has been produced in one easy-to-search hardback volume. (shrink)

1. The classical mind.--2. The medieval mind.--3. Hobbes to Hume.--4. Kant to Wittgenstein and Sartre.

In his book Frederic Schick develops his challenge to standard decision theory. He argues that talk of the beliefs and desires of an agent is not sufficient to explain choices. To account for a given choice we need to take into consideration how the agent understands the problem, how he sees in a selective way the options open to him. The author applies his new logic to a host of common human predicaments. Why do people in choice experiments act so (...) often against expectations? Why do people cooperate in situations where textbook logic predicts that they won't? What exactly is weakness of will? What are people reporting when they say their lives have no meaning for them? This book questions the foundations of technical and philosophical decision theory and will appeal to all those who work in that field, be they philosophers, economists or psychologists. (shrink)

Science, Technology and Production in the Underdeveloped Countries: An Introduction By Charles Cooper* The uncritical notion that it would be easy to orient ...

"A wild and exuberant romp through the terrain of the monstrous . . . Oppenheimer's lucid explanations are the perfect antidotes to the sordid scenes he recreates." -American Book Review "A masterly and original study of one of the most frightening topics with which human beings have to struggle." -Literary Review "What is compelling, different and page-turning about this impressive book is that the author analyses evil through the medium of films and literature . . . Cinema buffs will find (...) it a fascinating read." -Evening Standard The notion of evil- does it exist? what forms does it take? -has always fascinated humankind. The evil underlying such atrocities as the Holocaust, Communist China's Tibetan abattoir, and the murderous ethnic cleansing undertaken by the Serbs and Croats seems beyond explanations or analysis. In this powerfully original work, Oppenheimer analyzes the phenomenon of evil in a mental behavior that emerges in particular conditions. Oppenheimer argues that evil contains specific, predictable ingredients. By understanding its nature, we can diagnose its specific manifestations in mass murder, genocide, and serial killings. Utilizing a variety of cinematic and literary genres in developing its evidence, the book considers such familiar films as The Silence of the Lambs and Brazil , and draws upon such literary works as Richard III, Oedipus the King and the Picture of Dorian Gray. Evil and the Demonic takes a bold first step, providing a framework in which to place the horrors of human existence. (shrink)

This book illustrates these three approaches, with chapters provided by some of the most important and provocative figures in the field.

Highlights of this volume from the 2004 Annual European Meeting of the Association for Symbolic Logic (ASL) include a tutorial survey of the recent highpoints of universal algebra, written by a leading expert; explorations of foundational questions; a quartet of model theory papers giving an excellent reflection of current work in model theory, from the most abstract aspect "abstract elementary classes" to issues around p-adic integration.

In the first book-length study of American philosophy at the turn of the century, Daniel J. Wilson traces the formation of philosophy as an academic discipline. Wilson shows how the rise of the natural and physical sciences at the end of the nineteenth century precipitated a "crisis of confidence" among philosophers as to the role of their discipline. Deftly tracing the ways in which philosophers sought to incorporate scientific values and methods into their outlook and to redefine philosophy itself, Wilson (...) moves between close analysis of philosophical texts and consideration of professional careers of illustrative philosophers, such as Charles Sanders Peirce, John Dewey, and Josiah Royce. The author situates the emergence of professional philosophy in the context of the professionalization of American higher education and articulates, in the case of philosophy, the structures and values of a professional discipline. One of the most important consequences of this transformation was a new emphasis on communal theories of truth. Peirce, Dewey, and Royce all developed sophisticated and important theories of community as they were engaged in reshaping and redefining the limits of philosophy. This book will be of great importance for those interested in the history of philosophy, the rise of professions, and American intellectual and educational history, and to all those seeking to understand the contemporary revival of pragmatic thought and theories of community. (shrink)

This book addresses the ethical problems in maternal-fetal medicine which impact directly on clinical practice.

In this pioneering book, noted international scholars explore the limits and definitions of knowing, thinking, and communicating meaning as we move into the 21st century. Coming from disciplines as diverse as anthropology, philosophy, literature, aesthetics, and art practice, together they work towards reconceiving the boundaries between entrenched domains of knowledge to great effect.

Understanding consciousness is a truly multidisciplinary project, attracting intense interest from researchers and theorists from diverse backgrounds. Thus, we now have computational scientists, neuroscientists, and philosophers all engaged in the same effort. This book draws together the work of leading researchers around the world, providing insights from these three general perspectives. The work is highlighted by a rare look at work being conducted by Japanese researchers.

" Journal of the American Medical Association "Walton has made a successful attempt to write about medical concerns without ever leaving the layperson to ...

This book argues for a radically different approach to traditional and important problems of moral philoosphy. The book discusses three theses; the diversity of moralities and moral judgements, their normativesness, and their possible rationality.

Challenging the assumption that the concept of divine action is necessarily paradoxical, on the grounds that God is radically transcendent of finitude, or can perform only a master act of creating and sustaining the universe, Frank Kirkpatrick defends as philosophically credible the Christian conviction that God is a personal Agent who also acts in particular historical moments to further the divine intention of fostering universal community. Kirkpatrick claims that God and the world are distinct realities "together bound" in a mutual (...) relationship of reciprocal historical action. In this relationship, God both acts upon and responds to human beings in specific moments in their history. The implications of this claim for understanding the biblical narrative, the problem of evil, cosmological theories, and the realism of Christian community are pursued. (shrink)

The book will be an invaluable source for cognitive psychologists, neuroscientists, and students interested in this active and exciting area of research. This volume is the third in a series.

Using a range of examples from specific social sciences, the book both identifies the practical and theoretical procedures involved in the identification of the ...

• 1 ' Dionysus — In Excess of Metaphysics JOHN SALLIS I shall be concerned with a figure, one that is different from most, perhaps from almost all, others; ...

CHAPTER 1 THE PLACE AND FUNCTION OF LEGAL THEORY ALL systematic thinking about legal theory is linked at one end with philosophy and, at the other end, ...

The formal systems of logic have ordinarily been regarded as independent of biology, but recent developments in evolutionary theory suggest that biology and logic may be intimately interrelated. In this book, Cooper outlines a theory of rationality in which logical law emerges as an intrinsic aspect of evolutionary biology. This biological perspective on logic, though at present unorthodox, could change traditional ideas about the reasoning process. Cooper examines the connections between logic and evolutionary biology and illustrates how logical rules are (...) derived directly from evolutionary principles, and therefore have no independent status of their own. Laws of decision theory, utility theory, induction, and deduction are reinterpreted as natural consequences of evolutionary processes. Cooper's connection of logical law to evolutionary theory results in a unified foundation for an evolutionary science of reason. (shrink)

In this book, an international team of authors explore themes of depth and surface, of real and conceptual space and of human/machine interaction.

The fifth chapter contains entries for works on contemporary Judaism and human rights. The volume concludes with author, title, and subject indexes.

How can Christian ethics make a significant contribution to health care ethics in today's Western, pluralistic society? Robin Gill examines the 'moral gaps' in secular accounts of health care ethics and the tensions within specifically theological accounts. He explores the healing stories in the Synoptic Gospels, identifying four core virtues present within them - compassion, care, faith and humility - that might bring greater depth to a purely secular interpretation of health care ethics. Each of these virtues is examined in (...) turn, using a range of topical issues including health care rationing, genetics, HIV/AIDS, withholding/withdrawing nutrition from PVS patients, and the empirical evidence which suggests a connection between religion and health. Professor Gill also argues that these four virtues are shared by other major religious and humanistic traditions and that, together with secular principles, they can enrich health care ethics even in a pluralistic society. (shrink)

This book explores recently opened avenues in logic and philosophical analysis to offer new perspectives on time-honored religious beliefs. Topics covered include the nature of divine attributes, the implications of divine benevolence and divine justice, arguments in support of theism and atheism, and religion and morality.

CHAPTER 1 THE PLACE AND FUNCTION OF LEGAL THEORY ALL systematic thinking about legal theory is linked at one end with philosophy and, at the other end, ...

The text places special emphasis on the ethical co-operation that emerged between religious traditions during the civil right-Vietnam war era.

The sequel to Volumes I and II of John Herman Randall, Jr.'s acclaimed history of modern philosophy, "The Career of Philosophy," This volume contains the ...

In Reason's Grief, George Harris takes W. B. Yeats's comment that we begin to live only when we have conceived life as tragedy as a call for a tragic ethics, something the modern West has yet to produce. He argues that we must turn away from religious understandings of tragedy and the human condition and realize that our species will occupy a very brief period of history, at some point to disappear without a trace. We must accept an ethical perspective (...) that avoids pernicious fantasies about ultimate redemption but that sees tragic loss as a permanent and pervasive aspect of our daily lives, yet finds a way to think, feel, and act with both passion and hope. Reason's Grief takes us back through the history of our thinking about value to find our way. The call is for nothing less than a paradigm shift for understanding both tragedy and ethics. (shrink)

Why should we act morally? What justification is to be found in moral demands? This lucid, pithy, and eminently readable book examines the arguments in favor of the claims of moral demands to be found in contemporary ethical theory, arguments deriving from Kant's attempt to provide a foundation for morality.

The editors, working with a team of 325 renowned authorities in the field of ethics, have revised, expanded, and updated this classic encyclopedia. Along with the addition of 150 new entries, all of the original articles have been newly peer-reviewed and revised, bibliographies have been updated throughout, and the overall design of the work has been enhanced for easier access to cross-references and other reference features. New entries include * Aristotelian Ethics * Avicenna * Bad Faith * Beneficence * Categorical (...) and Hypothetical Imperatives * Cheating * Civil Liberty * Conventions * Dirty hands * Evolution * Fiduciary Relationships * Gay ethics * Genetic Engineering * Holocaust * Journalism * Killing/Letting Die * Moral Imagination * Narrative Ethics * Political correctness * Population Ethics * Public and 0rivate Morality * Racism, concepts of * and many more. (shrink)

INTRODUCTION The following pages contain a theory of justice and a theory of law . Justice will be defined as the demand for a system of laws, ...

"There is only one single man who possesses the prerequisites permitting an authentic critique of my work: that is I myself." "What I am standing on, ...

Philips defends a middle ground between the view that there is a set of standards binding on rational beings as such (universalism) and the view that differences in morals reduce ultimately to matters of taste (skepticism). He begins with a sustained critique of universalist moral theories and some familiar approaches to concrete moral questions that presuppose them (most appeals to intuitions, respect for person's moralities, and versions of contractarianism and wide reflective equilibrium). He goes on to criticize major recent attempts (...) to develop nonuniversalist alternatives to skepticism, arguing that they rely on excessively abstract and philosophically indefensible preference satisfaction theories of the good. According to Philips's positive alternative, moral standards are justified to the extent that they support reasonably valued ways of life. He devotes considerable attention to clarifying this idea and draws conclusions from it about the role and limits of reason in ethics. Philips's theory provides us with a theoretical basis for dealing with actual moral controversies and for approaching questions of applied and professional ethics in a systematic way. (shrink)

Is inheritable genetic modification the new dividing line in gene therapy? The editors of this searching investigation, representing clinical medicine, public health and biomedical ethics, have established a distinguished team of scientists and scholars to address the issues from the perspectives of biological and social science, law and ethics, including an intriguing Foreword from Peter Singer. Their purpose is to consider how society might deal with the ethical concerns raised by inheritable genetic modification, and to re-examine prevailing views about whether (...) these procedures will ever be ethically and socially justifiable. The book also provides background to define the field, and discusses the biological and technological potential for inheritable genetic modification, its limitations, and its connection with gene therapy, cloning, and other reproductive interventions. For scientists, bioethicists, clinicians, counsellors and public commentators, this is an essential contribution to one of the critical debates in current genetics. (shrink)

In this book Hundert proposes a new, unified view of the mind, one that integrates the insights of philosophers, psychologists, and neuroscientists. Through a detailed discussion of major theories from these and related disciplines, he gradually reveals links between what were previously unconnected approaches to human thought and experience.

This is the second of two volumes of essays in commemoration of Alan Turing.

Business ethics is currently a significant and widely debated global issue, and one that no business can afford to ignore. In this book, the authors bring together a diverse range of views on the subject, arising from an international conference on business ethics.Chapters on highly topical issues such as GM foods, child labor and bribery will make this an important tool for many businesses.

The belief that science shows an accumulation of a body of objective knowledge has been widely challenged by philosophers and historians in the latter half of this century. In this treatise, Dr. Jardine defends this belief with a careful appreciation of the complexities involved, drawing on many controversial issues concerning truth in science, interpretation of past theories, and grounds of scientific method.

Out of the Margin is the first book to consider feminist concerns across the whole domain of economics. In recent years there has been a tremendous increase in interest on the relation between gender and economics. Feminists have found much of concern in the way the economics has written women out of its history, built its theories around masculinist values, failed to take proper account of women and their work when measuring the economy and ignored most of the policy issues (...) that press most heavily upon women. This book is a firm rejection of this marginalized position. Including contributions from leading feminist economists from the US and Europe, the book offers a richness of new insights in addressing the absence of women, both as subject and object, in the history of economic thought. Out of the Margin also explores the philosophical roots of rational economic man, power relations and conflicts within the family, the limitations of relying on secondary data, the need for new data and research, the policy implications of neo-classical economic models and the need for fundamental research in policy making. With its range and depth of coverage, this is not only an excellent introduction to the field but also indispensible for anyone looking for an in-depth analysis of gender and economics. (shrink)

"Each animal in its own psychological setting . . / 1 Gerard Piel Scientific American, New York TC Schneirla was more interested in questions than in ...

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Frontiers of Combining Systems, FroCoS 2002, held in Santa Margherita Ligure, Italy, in April 2002.The 14 revised full papers presented together with 3 invited papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 35 submissions. Among the topics covered are combination of logics, combination of constraint solving techniques, combination of decision procedures, combination problems in verification, modular problems of theorem proving, and the integration of decision procedures and other solving processes (...) into constraint programming and deduction systems. (shrink)

This volume collects four published articles by the late Tamara Horowitz and two unpublished papers on decision theory: "Making Rational Decisions When Preferences Cycle" and the monograph-length "The Backtracking Fallacy." An introduction is provided by editor Joseph Camp. Horowitz preferred to recognize the diversity of rationality, both practical and theoretical rationality. She resisted the temptation to accept simple theories of rationality that are quick to characterize ordinary reasoning as fallacious. This broadly humanist approach to philosophy is exemplified by the articles (...) in this collection. As just one example, in "The Backtracking Fallacy," she argues that there are policies for decision-making a person may adopt if the person prefers to do so, but need not adopt. A person who employs such a policy no longer can regard standard expected utility theory as exceptionless, thereby sacrificing theoretical simplicity. But it is a mistake, Horowitz argues, to preserve theoretical simplicity by falsifying the decision making methods real people really use. (shrink)

In this landmark collection of original essays, outstanding feminist critics in Britain, France, and the United States present new perspectives on feminism and ...

Contemporary feminist theory is at an impasse: the project of reformulating concepts of self and social identity is thwarted by an association between identity and oppression and victimhood. In Sacrificial Logics, Allison Weir proposes a way out of this impasse through a concept of identity which depends on accepting difference. Weir argues that the equation of identity with repression and domination links "relational" feminists like Nancy Chodorow, who equate self-identity with the repression of connection to others, and poststructuralist feminists like (...) Judith Butler, who view any identity as a repression of nonidentity and difference. Through readings of Chodorow, Butler, Jessica Benjamin, Luce Irigaray, Jacqueline Rose and Julia Kristeva, Weir analyzes the relation of theories of self-identity to theories of women's identity, social identity, the identity of meaning in language and feminist solidarity. Drawing particularly on the work of Julia Kristeva, she argues for a reformulation of self-identity as a capacity to participate in a social world, and sketches a model of a self-identity which depends on a capacity to accept nonidentity, difference and connections to others. (shrink)

THE STRUCTURALISTIC ENDEAVOUR. THE WORLD AS MUSICAL SCORE The recent decades of this century have witnessed unusually rapid and far- reaching changes in the ...

In this second edition, George Graham maintains the strengths, structure, and overall features of the first, but expands its scope, deepens the detail, and ...

The chapters of this book deal primarily with the meaning and use of these two concepts in the context of gender relations (past and present), but also draw ...

This volume features the complete text of all regular papers, posters, and summaries of symposia presented at the 16th annual meeting of the Cognitive Science ...

The essays in this volume illuminate a central topic in ethical theory: moral dilemmas. Some contemporary philosophers dispute the traditional view that a true moral dilemma -- a situation in which a person has two irreconcilable moral duties -- cannot exist. This collection provides the historical background to the ongoing debate with selections from Kant, Mill, Bradley, and Ross. The best recent work on the question is represented in essays by Donagan, Foot, Hare, Marcus, Nagel, van Fraassen, Williams, and (...) others. (shrink)

Classics of Philosophy, 2/e, is the most comprehensive anthology of writings in Western philosophy in print. Spanning 2500 years of thought, it is ideal for introduction to philosophy and history of philosophy courses that are structured chronologically. More than seventy works by forty-two philosophers as well as fragments from the Pre-Socratics are included, offering students and general readers alike an extensive and economical collection of the major works of the Western tradition. This anthology contains the most important writings from Thales (...) to Rawls; seventeen of these are complete works, while the others are judiciously abridged so that little of value to the student is lost. Unabridged works include such classics as Plato's The Apology, Descartes's Meditations on First Philosophy, Leibniz's The Monadology, Hume's An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Kant's Foundation for the Metaphysic of Morals, Mill's Utilitarianism, Russell's A Free Man's Worship, Sartre's Existentialism and Humanism, and Rawls's "Justice as Fairness." A lucid introduction, including a brief biographical sketch, accompanies each of the featured philosophers. Classics of Philosophy, 2/e, provides an extensive view of the most significant stages of growth in Western philosophy, including its birth with the Pre-Socratics as well as its contemporary developments. The second edition includes new selections by Augustine, Berkeley, Hume, Wollstonecraft, Nagel, and Foot. (shrink)

The Snake and the Fox offers students a new and exciting way to look at and understand logic. Mary Haight uses graphics to tell the story of how logic works, and why it works the way it does. This introductory text uses easy to understand language for the student who has no prior understanding of logic or philosophy. The author includes some discussion on the philosophical theory underlying the logic: not just how to do it, but why it takes the (...) form it does. The Snake and the Fox is user-friendly, interactive, uses questions with answers, and has graphics which will easily guide any student coming to logic for the first time. (shrink)

This monograph links moral theory and legal reasoning in the context of attempts to choose (or, more accurately, influence) human traits before birth. An analytical framework, developed in the first few chapters, is used to critique the regulatory approaches adopted in seventeen countries (the then 15 member states of the EU, Canada and the US). This analytic framework is developed by applying the tenets of Alan Gewirth’s Principle of Generic Consistency to the multivariable epistemic uncertainties evoked by practical ethical problems. (...) The result is an interdisciplinary text seeking to bridge the theoretical gap between abstract moral theory, modern scientific developments and the law. It thereby addresses the moral and legal issues raised by techniques and technologies such as abortion, preimplantation genetic diagnosis and germ-line gene therapy. (shrink)

This collection of essays by philosophers, political theorists, and social critics ranges over two millennia--from the ideas of Plato and Aristotle to those of contemporary thinkers such as John Rawls and Robert Nozick. It examines the nature of justice, its importance in human life, and its place among the other virtues. The scope of the collection gives a clear picture of the differences and continuities that have marked the debate: Plato's emphasis on the ideal of "sticking to one's task" contrasts (...) with the modern emphasis on individual rights, while the account of justice as part of the law of nature offered by Aristotle and Cicero contrasts with Hume's analysis of justice as an artificial virtue. Alan Ryan's introductory essay emphasizes the stringency of justice--showing how its demands can conflict with considerations of the general welfare. The book concludes with a discussion of Marx's view that justice is perhaps merely a concession to a world of scarcity and selfishness created by capitalist necessities. An excellent guide to interpretations of one of the central values of political life and thought, this book will interest students and scholars of political theory and philosophy. (shrink)

Group Rationality in Scientific Research.

This text provides an introduction to some of the major challenges facing anyone concerned with standards of behaviour in organizations. It starts from a consideration of the resources provided by philosophical ethics and moves on to consider the challenges inherent in working in a competitive business environment.

Major Philosophers of Jewish Prayer in the Twentieth Century addresses the troubling questions posed by the modern Jewish worshiper, including such obstacles to prayer as the inability to concentrate on the words and meanings of formal liturgy, the paucity of emotional involvement, the lack of theological conviction, the anthropomorphic and particularly the masculine emphasis of prayer nomenclature, and other matters. In assessing these difficultites, Cohen brings to the reader the writings on prayer of some seminal 20th century Jewish theologians. These (...) include Herman Cohen, Franz Rosenzweig, Avraham Yitzhak, Hoakohen Kook, Mordecai M. Kaplan, R. Arele, Aaron Rote, Elie Munk, Abraham J. Heschel, Jakob J. Petuchowski, Eugene B. Borowitz, and Lawrence A. Hoffman. (shrink)

The Cognitive Neuroscience of Vision begins by introducing the reader to the anatomy of the eye and visual cortex and then proceeds to discuss image and...

This comprehensive, historically organized introduction to philosophy communicates the richness of the discipline and provides the student with a working knowledge of the development of Western philosophy. New co-author James Fieser has brought this classic text up-to-date both chronologically and stylistically while preserving the thoughtful, conceptual characteristics that have made it so successful. The text covers all periods of philosophy, lists philosophers alphabetically and chronologically on the end-papers, and features an exceptional glossary of key concepts.

This book addresses the question "What is Philosophy?" by gathering together responses from philosophers working in a variety of areas.

The past twenty years have seen an explosion of work by feminist philosophers and several surveys of this work have documented the richness of the many different ways of doing feminist philosophy. But this major new anthology is the first broad and inclusive selection of the most important work in this field.There are many unanswered questions about the future of feminist philosophy. Which of the many varieties of feminist philosophy will last, and which will fade away? What kinds of accommodations (...) will be possible with mainstream non-feminist philosophy? Which will separate themselves and flourish on their own? To what extent will feminists change the topics philosophers address? To what extent will they change the very way in which philosophy is done?However these questions are answered, it is clear that feminist philosophy is having and will continue to have a major impact on the discipline of philosophy. This volume is the first to allow the scholar, the student, and other interested readers to sample this diverse literature and to ponder these questions for themselves.Organized around nine traditional “types” of feminist philosophy, Feminism and Philosophy is an imaginatively edited volume that will stimulate readers to explore many new pathways to understanding. It marks a defining moment in feminist philosophy, and it will be an essential text for philosophers and for feminist theorists in many other fields. (shrink)

Ross Poole displays the social content of the various conceptions of morality at work in contemporary society, and casts a strikingly fresh light on such fundamental problems as the place of reason in ethics, moral objectivity and the distinction between duty and virtue. The book provides a critical account of the moral theories of a number of major philosophers, including Kant, Marx, Nietzsche, Habermas, Rawls, Gewirth and MacIntyre. It also presents a systematic critique of three of the most significant responses (...) to modernity: liberalism, nationalism and nihilism. It takes seriously the suggestion that men and women are subject to different conceptions of morality, and places the issue of gender at the centre of moral philosophy. (shrink)

This is a comprehensive and practical guide to the ethical issues raised by different kinds of medical research, and is the first such book to be written with the needs of the researcher in mind. Clearly structured and written in a plain and accessible style, the book covers every significant ethical issue likely to be faced by researchers and research ethics committees. The author outlines and clarifies official guidelines, gives practical advice on how to adhere to these, and suggests procedures (...) in areas where official recommendations are vague or absent. This invaluable handbook will help researchers identify and address the ethical issues at an early stage in the design of their studies, to avoid unnecessary delay and to safeguard the wellbeing of patients and healthy volunteers. It will also be extremely useful to members of research ethics committees. (shrink)

INTRODUCTION: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND COMPUTERS AS THEMES IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF TECHNOLOGY Philosophical interest in computers and information technology ...

An Introduction to Business Ethics explores the issues of individual and corporate responsibility in business, and integrates many contemporary and classic ...

Letters to Doubting Thomas is an exchange of letters between two characters on the existence of God; it provides a cumulative case for Theism (the belief that God exists). Chapter by chapter, theism is compared with Naturalism (roughly, the view that there is no God and that ultimate reality is physical reality), concluding that Theism (on balance) provides a better explanation of the world and human life than does Naturalism.

Making the Human Mind is an attack on the widespread assumption that the mind has parts, that the interaction between these parts accounts for some of the most characteristic human behavior, the sorts of irrational behavior displayed in self-deception and weakness of will. The implications of this attack are considerable: Sharpe contests a realism about the mind, the belief that there is an inventory which an all-seeing deity could compile containing answers to all the questions we ask about people, whether (...) they are deceitful or in love, or what their motivation is. With this goes the hermeneutic approach to the understanding of human behavior. These forms of understanding are markedly different from that suggested by the scientific model and favored by those who partition the mind. (shrink)

The title of this book was inspired by a passage in Charles Sherrington's Man on his Nature.

At a time when the political left have watched the apparent decline of socialism, and with it the cynical rejection of political hope, the question of how to rethink political transformation has become a pressing question. In Transformations Drucilla Cornell offers us a unique conception of recollective imagination which allows us to preserve and re-articulate the tradition of critical social theory. Cornell argues that psychoanalysis must play a role in social theory because we need to understand the connection between our (...) constitution as gendered subjects and social, political and legal transformation. We cannot avoid the question of how the subject is constituted if we are to provide a new conception of radical change. A remarkable work combining the insights of recent feminist and critical theory with the concerns for social change. (shrink)

The text is organized around central problems in philosophy and the diverse approaches that philosophers have taken toward those problems.

Includes established theories and cutting-edge developments. Presents the work of an international group of experts. Presents the nature, origin, implications, and future course of major unresolved issues in the area.

In this book, the author is attempting to make sense, as a philosopher, of the ideas of rationality put forward by economists, sociologists, and political theorists. The book intervenes in intense current debates within and among several disciplines. Its concern is with the true nature of social actors and the proper character of social science. Its arguments are the more challenging for being presented in simple, incisive, and lucid prose.