Preface -- The reality of God -- Status of the Gods -- Ancestors -- Human destiny and self-fulfillment -- Ozo as idealism -- Ozioko as realism -- Order -- Bibliography -- Index.

Scientific accounts of existence give chance a central role. At the smallest level, quantum theory involves uncertainty and evolution is driven by chance and necessity. These ideas do not fit easily with theology in which chance has been seen as the enemy of purpose. One option is to argue, as proponents of Intelligent Design do, that chance is not real and can be replaced by the work of a Designer. Others adhere to a deterministic theology in which God is in (...) total control. Neither of these views, it is argued, does justice to the complexity of nature or the greatness of God. The thesis of this book is that chance is neither unreal nor non-existent but an integral part of God's creation. This view is expounded, illustrated and defended by drawing on the resources of probability theory and numerous examples from the natural and social worlds. (shrink)

This book argues that a radical political gesture can be found in Søren Kierkegaard’s writings. The chapters navigate an interdisciplinary landscape by placing Kierkegaard’s passionate thought in conversation with the writings of Georg Lukács, Carl Schmitt, Walter Benjamin and Theodor Adorno. At the heart of the book’s argument is the concept of “indirect politics,” which names a negative space between methods, concepts, and intellectual acts in the work of Kierkegaard, as well as marking the dynamic relations between Kierkegaard and the (...) aforementioned thinkers. Kierkegaard’s indirect politics is a set of masks that displaces identities from one field to the next: theology masks politics; law masks theology; political theory masks philosophy; and psychology masks literary approaches to truth. As reflected in Lukács, Schmitt, Benjamin, and Adorno, this book examines how Kierkegaard’s indirect politics sets into relief three significant motifs: intellectual non-conformism, indirect communication in and through ambiguous identities, and negative dialectics. Bartholomew Ryan is currently a postdoctoral fellow (2011- ) at the Instituto de Filosofia da Nova, New University of Lisbon, Portugal. He holds degrees from Aarhus University, Denmark (PhD), University College, Dublin (MA), and Trinity College, Dublin (1999). He was visiting lecturer at the European College of Liberal Arts in Berlin (2007-2011) and Lady Margaret Hall, University of Oxford (2010), and was a guest scholar at the Søren Kierkegaard Research Centre in Copenhagen (2007 and 2005) and Hong Kierkegaard Library at St. Olaf College, Minnesota (2005). He has written extensively on Kierkegaard, and also published articles on Nietzsche, Pessoa, Joyce, Shakespeare and Schmitt. (shrink)

Exploring the links between Speculative Realism, psychoanalysis, and literary criticism, this article examines OOO’s entanglement with the ‘uncanny’. Reading OOO against three notable treatments of the concept - Sigmund Freud’s 1919 essay “The ‘Uncanny’”, Ernst Jentsch’s 1906 paper “On the Psychology of the Uncanny”, and Martin Heidegger’s discussion of uncanniness in his Introduction to Metaphysics (1953) - it argues that OOO reconfigures the ‘uncanny’ as a profoundly ontological concept premised on aesthetic enstrangement. Using E.T.A. Hoffmann’s short story “The Sandman” as (...) a case study, it assesses what the consequences of this reconfiguration are for literary criticism and, in particular, the study of the Gothic. By splicing OOO into the history and practice of Gothic scholarship, this article traces the outline of an “object-oriented uncanny”, pushing the ‘uncanny’ out of Freud’s shadow and into the “great outdoors”. (shrink)

In the current American iconoclash, certain monuments are subject to vandalism and municipal removal from their pedestals. Phrases such as “the erasure of history” and “damnatio memoriae” point to concerns that iconoclasm is an attempt to censor history or even remove certain individuals from public memory altogether. Because these phrases beckon the past, this wave of iconoclasm calls for a close examination of previous image-breaking to establish motives. Drawing first from art history, we analyze Byzantine iconoclasm and anxieties over the (...) nature of icons’ power, before contextualizing these findings within image destruction from the Paleolithic to the present day. Each comparison is suggestive of an enduring aesthetic principle: that what appears inanimate is not always inert. Next, drawing from cultural anthropology, we argue that principles of sympathetic magic are at the heart of contemporary iconoclasms, but not in the way media outlets often suggest. Instead, the fear of history’s erasure betrays a deeply rooted equivalence between the representation and the represented. In perceiving their fates as shared, sympathetic magic is seen to persist in the way humans create, interpret, and desecrate images. We conclude with the speculative realist proposition that iconoclasm can produce new, original artworks, which carries implications for the autonomy of art and its distribution between artist and artwork. (shrink)

Chapter One INTRODUCTORY DESCRIPTION OF THE GENERAL PROBLEM The title of this work is rather vague and general, and does not go very far towards making ...

The essays collected in this book discuss the contemporary pratice of corporate responsibility by applying the Christian principles of the unity of knowledge and pursuit of truth to the traditional principles of justice, human dignity and the common good, to rediscover a corporate culture that will help transform our economic system and the characteristics required to build an enduring trust in economic relationships. In this volume a select group of management theorists, theologians, legal scholars, economists and ethicists jointly strive to (...) give back to the market economy its ethical and political dimensions. They assess the quality of present day corporate social responsibility, discuss the social and environmental costs of production and argue for an agenda that can be used in modern corporations in their effort to align profitability and growth with business ethics. (shrink)

The twenty-first-century business world has witnessed a series of large-scale scandals and outright fraud. New legislation aims to help identify future cases of fraud and stop the trend, but is it enough? How can people of faith balance the requirements of their beliefs with the demands of economic life within an increasingly corrupted society? Why did so many people participate or choose to ignore downright fraud in the past and how can we start the business community on a path of (...) recovery? These essays pursue these question and many others, including the meta-ethical foundations of vocation as a necessary step for business recovery. They maintain that what is taking place in businesses today is not just the loss of will to do good, but the loss of meaning, which ultimately demands more than what traditional business ethics and corporate social responsibility can offer. Combining creative biblical interpretation, Christian moral reflection, and business expertise, this book is a thoughtful and thought-provoking look at how business leaders, professionals, and students can integrate a sense of calling into their careers and into the business world as a whole. (shrink)

This pioneering volume, for the first time, explores the extraordinary Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa and his relationship to philosophy. On the one hand, this book reveals Pessoa's serious knowledge of philosophy and playful philosophical explorations and how he has the gift of synthesizing, appropriating and subverting complex ideas into his art; and, on the other hand, the chapters shed new light on central aspects and problems of philosophy through the prism of Pessoa's diverse writings. The volume includes sixteen new essays (...) from an international group of scholars, analyzing Pessoa's multifaceted poetic work alongside philosophical themes and movements, from conceptions of time, ancient aesthetics, philosophy of language, transcendentalism, immanence, nihilism; to Islamic philosophy, Indian philosophy, philosophy of religion, neo-paganism, the philosophy of the self. The breadth of his work provides a springboard for new thinking on the aesthetic and the spiritual, the logic of value and capitalist modernity, and ecological thought and postmodernism. (shrink)

While models of business ethics increasingly recognize that ethical behavior varies cross-culturally, scant attention has been given to understanding how culture affects the ethical reasoning process that predicates individuals' ethical actions. To address this gap, this paper illustrates how culture may affect the various components of individuals' ethical reasoning by integrating findings from the cross-cultural management literature with cognitive-developmental perspective. Implications for future research and transnational organizations are discussed.

SUMMARYThis is a translation of a short text in Latin by John Toland, with an introduction and annotations. Toland's text is a conjecture on the influence of a passage from Cicero on modern printing. The translator's introduction discusses the theories mentioned by Toland, and sketches the background of the text. It discusses Toland's interest in Cicero and the context of the text's publication in 1722 by Michel Maittaire, and Toland's and Maittaire's intertwined circles of literary patronage.

Up to 1670, when the Theological-Political Treatise was published, Spinoza supported Johan De Witt’s government, against the House of Orange and the orthodox Calvinists. By 1676, while writing the...

Purpose: A cursory look at the lives of most people living in the rural areas of Ghana suggests that they are poor as compared to their counterparts living in the urban areas. The study aimed at investigating into the culture, philosophy, lifestyles and factors that have impacted negatively on the socio-economic situation that make the people living in the rural areas poor. Methodology: In order to obtain data on the causes of poverty among the rural people, the qualitative research approach (...) was used for the study in which the observation method was employed to collect information from the elderly, youth, farmers, women, men, workers, illegal miners, traders, market women, etc. in some villages on their social lifestyles and economic activities. For effective and reliable outcome, unstructured interviews, surveys and investigations were used as tools to gather data. The use of unstructured interviews and conversations enabled majority of the sampled population who could not read nor write offer useful information. Findings: The study revealed that rural poverty is on the ascendency because most of the youth who serve as the work force migrate to the urban areas in search of jobs and better living conditions while a fraction of those who remained engage in illegal mining. The effect of this illegal activities has led to the degradation of arable lands, destruction of millions of acreages of cash/food crops and river bodies making agriculture, which is the backbone of the economy, very unsustainable. The attitude of majority of Ghanaians to time and work, especially in the public sector, leaves much to be desired. As a result, a lot of man-hours is rendered unproductive due to unpunctuality, religious and cultural activities. Unique contribution to theory and Practice and Policy: The outcome re-echoes the need for a policy direction on education that focuses on skill development and hands on experience to enable school leavers enter into entrepreneurship and be self-reliant so they will not be dependent on the limited government work. It will also make people come to the realization that only few people benefit from illegal mining but the harmful effects are universal and back government effort in fighting/curbing it. Government, Municipal/District Assemblies will see the need to provide amenities that rural communities lack, initiate intervention programmes for youth employment especially, in the rural areas to curtail rural-urban migration. (shrink)

The thesis of this book is that chance is neither unreal nor non-existent but an integral part of God's creation.

This article ventures a reappraisal of Huxley's role in the Darwinian debates. First, the views on life-history held by Huxley before 1859 are identified. Next, the disharmony between these views and the view put forward by Darwin in the Origin of species is discussed. Huxley's defence of the Origin is then reviewed in an effort to show that, despite his fervour on Darwin's behalf, his advocacy of the case for natural selection was not particularly compelling, and that his own scientific (...) work took no revolutionary new direction after 1859. (shrink)

This essay is an attempt to link aspects of Kierkegaard’s experimental writings with new contemporary ecological perspectives which—in the act of interpenetration—are fusing philosophy, science, literature, anthropology, political thought, new economic perspectives, and visual and sound media, in order to open up new ways to live and flourish on a damaged planet—in our “age of disintegration.” I present Kierkegaard’s diagnosis of his time as “the age of disintegration” (from 1848) as something that can be connected to the contemporary socio-political conditions (...) in late modernity, and to the new epoch on the horizon which we are now experiencing. I interpret Kierkegaard’s expression “out into the middle of life” as the kernel of Kierkegaard’s authorship of interruption and unsettling. I argue it can be implicitly included in aspects of ecological perspectives offered by innovative writers today. (shrink)

This third book in a series of successful introductory textbooks by Craig Bartholomew and Michael Goheen builds on their previous projects, The Drama of Scripture and Living at the Crossroads, to offer a comprehensive narrative of philosophical thought from a distinctly Christian perspective. After exploring the interaction among Scripture, worldview, theology, and philosophy, the authors tell the story of philosophy from ancient Greece through postmodern times, positioning the philosophers in their historical contexts and providing Christian critique along the way. (...) The authors emphasize the Reformed philosophical tradition without neglecting other historical trajectories and show how philosophical thought relates to contemporary life. (shrink)

The certainties which once underpinned Christian belief have crumbled in a world where science sets the standard for what is true. A rational case for belief must therefore be constructed out of uncertainties. Probability theory provides the tools for measuring and combining uncertainties and is thus the key to progress. This book examines four much debated topics where the logic of uncertain inference can be brought to bear. These are: miracles, the paranormal, God's existence, and the Bible. Given the great (...) diversity of evidence, it is not surprising that opposite conclusions have been drawn by supposedly rational people. An assessment of the state of argument from a probabilistic perspective is overdue. In this book Professor Bartholomew examines and refutes some of the more extravagent claims, evaluates the weight of some of the quantitive evidence, and provides an answer to the fundamental question: is it rational to be a Christian? (shrink)

Excerpt from The Idea of Personality Not since the French Revolution have the masses of men had such a passionate trust in the power of ideas as they have today. Such ideas as society, state, person, are no longer the exclusive concern of the few favored experts in philosophy and political theory. Such other ideas as authority, responsibility, conscience, right, and freedom, have become more than the mere blunted foils of friendly, academic discussion. This democratization of ideas has been, on (...) the whole, a healthy stimulant. No one who recalls the riotous confusion of thought in the nineteenth century will regret a situation that seems to promise a period of redefinition. One does not have to be an obscurantist to regret the uncontrolled and, often uncritical way, in which the findings of physical science were applied in the fields of ethics, religion, politics, sociology, economics, and history. We should have been warned that speculation was moving too rapidly. The careful scientist rarely makes a sweeping and definite conclusion. More rarely still does he make a universal application of deductions, reached in his own sphere of investigation, to all branches of knowledge. If the philosophy of life, built upon the recent biological and sociological premises, has been unsatisfactory, this has been due to an apparent unwillingness to take the time required to distinguish what is of permanent value from what is simply the exaggeration of controversy, in the anxiety to establish a theory. It is conceivable that men should wish, under the impulse of fresh evidence, to re-examine their notions of God, the nature of human progress, society, and free-will; but it is not conceivable that conclusions, reached so rapidly and with so little discrimination between fact and hypothesis, should he always accurate and should really reflect life's problems and complexities. We need to be redeemed from our own overweening confidence. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. (shrink)

Do miracles happen? Is the Bible true? What about the paranormal? Does God exist? People ask these questions but there are no agreed answers. At the rational level, uncertainty is inevitable. But is there enough evidence for a rational person to commit themselves to Christianity? This book provides an answer.

ABSTRACT This article aims to broaden the scope of Critical Theory beyond the Anglo-American and European sphere by addressing the work of Stefan Gandler. Gandler, who has long advocated for the importance of Mexican philosophers, has also utilized their work to criticize the current iteration of Critical Theory in its second and third generations. Finding them far removed from the first, he considers the work of thinkers like Bolívar Echeverría to be the tradition’s true heirs. By attending to his critique, (...) this article examines rethinking the history of Critical Theory as such and expand its scope. (shrink)