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)

Rapid changes in academic work environments raise ethical dilemmas in supporting students, implementing policies, and developing professional practice. New teaching technologies require academics to consider community aspects of learning and teaching and impacts on student learning in networked environments. This paper critically reflects on recent experience at a small Australian regional university adapting teaching- notably through on-line environments- to respond to student learning need diversity. Applying Shapiro’s use of the ethics of care, critique, justice and the profession to examine ethical (...) dilemmas associated with increasingly networked and on-line learning, the authors propose that an ethics of community will assist finding practical solutions to ethical dilemmas in curriculum development and delivery. This approach shifts from the individual as moral agent to ethical practice as communal processes. Considering community practices and processes can frame and critique learning and teaching approaches, policies and administration to assist students and staff develop ethical scholarship and professionalism. (shrink)

Realism as an explanatory theory of science (faded realism) is not convincing. However, neither "internal realism" nor instrumentalism are plausible. Assuming common sense realism a non-explanatory form of scientific realism (modest realism) can be defended. Modest realism has affinities with Fine's NOA. To NOA it adds a descriptive thesis about scientific progress towards truth or verisimilitude. In addition it adds a concern with purely philosophical issues which arise in reflections on the nature of science. However, there is little to say (...) about truth over and above what is conveyed by Tarski/Davidson semantics. (shrink)

In his most recent encyclical, Caritas in veritate, Pope Benedict XVI states that there is a profound connection between life issues and social justice. For example, when solidarity is undermined by abortion, it is also undermined in the relationship between the rich and poor countries of this world and between one generation and the next—with, in addition, disastrous consequences for the environment. In the encyclical, Benedict XVI states this connection but does not develop it to any great extent. In this (...) essay, the author expounds the connection, staying as close as possible to what the Holy Father himself says both in Caritas in veritate and elsewhere. National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 12.3 (Autumn 2012): 449–460. (shrink)

David Albert Jones recently proposed an analogy between adoption and gender transitioning. Jones notes that adoption grants a child a social identity that is distinct from the natal identity and suggests that a similar situation might obtain in the case of gender transitioning. According to this proposal, a biological male who wishes to be called a woman is not assuming a false identity. Adoption and gender transitioning are significantly different, however: adoptive sonship participates in natural sonship in a way that (...) is not true of the relationship between a biological woman and a man who wishes to be called a woman. Attention is given to different forms of analogy, leading to the conclusion that the use of the word woman for a biological male would be either a metaphor or a very weak analogy. In contrast, the term son as applied to an adopted boy fulfills the fundamental signification of that word. (shrink)

On a rational model of science (cf. Lakatos or Laudan), to decide on the appropriate type of explanation of a given scientific change requires a normative assessment made by reference to the model. Showing that a transition fits the model, displays it to be rational and thereby explains it. On the strong programme in the sociology of scientific knowledge (cf. Bloor and Barnes), normative assessment is irrelevant to explanation. All changes require the same type of explanation (the symmetry thesis); namely, (...) a sociological one. The symmetry thesis is false. Scientific change can be explained rationally but without extensive normative assessment using the minimal rationality model (minirät). However, explaining scientific progress as opposed to mere change, requires a maximal rationality model (maxirat) which involves normative assessment. (shrink)

On a rational model of science (cf. Lakatos or Laudan), to decide on the appropriate type of explanation of a given scientific change requires a normative assessment made by reference to the model. Showing that a transition fits the model, displays it to be rational and thereby explains it. On the strong programme in the sociology of scientific knowledge (cf. Bloor and Barnes), normative assessment is irrelevant to explanation. All changes require the same type of explanation (the symmetry thesis); namely, (...) a sociological one. The symmetry thesis is false. Scientific change can be explained rationally but without extensive normative assessment using the minimal rationality model (minirät). However, explaining scientific progress as opposed to mere change, requires a maximal rationality model (maxirat) which involves normative assessment. (shrink)

In their article “Three Kinds of Decision-Making Capacity for Refusing Medical Interventions,” Navin et al. (2022) argue that we should recognize two forms of decision-making capacity (DMC) besides...

Isaac Newton's Scientific Method examines Newton's argument for universal gravity and his application of it to resolve the problem of deciding between geocentric and heliocentric world systems by measuring masses of the sun and planets. William L. Harper suggests that Newton's inferences from phenomena realize an ideal of empirical success that is richer than prediction. Any theory that can achieve this rich sort of empirical success must not only be able to predict the phenomena it purports (...) to explain, but also have those phenomena accurately measure the parameters which explain them. Harper explores the ways in which Newton's method aims to turn theoretical questions into ones which can be answered empirically by measurement from phenomena, and to establish that propositions inferred from phenomena are provisionally accepted as guides to further research. This methodology, guided by its rich ideal of empirical success, supports a conception of scientific progress that does not require construing it as progress toward Laplace's ideal limit of a final theory of everything, and is not threatened by the classic argument against convergent realism. Newton's method endorses the radical theoretical transformation from his theory to Einstein's. Harper argues that it is strikingly realized in the development and application of testing frameworks for relativistic theories of gravity, and very much at work in cosmology today. (shrink)

I take Newton's arguments to inverse square centripetal forces from Kepler's harmonic and areal laws to be classic deductions from phenomena. I argue that the theorems backing up these inferences establish systematic dependencies that make the phenomena carry the objective information that the propositions inferred from them hold. A review of the data supporting Kepler's laws indicates that these phenomena are Whewellian colligations-generalizations corresponding to the selection of a best fitting curve for an open-ended body of data. I argue (...) that the information theoretic features of Newton's corrections of the Keplerian phenomena to account for perturbations introduced by universal gravitation show that these corrections do not undercut the inferences from the Keplerian phenomena. Finally, I suggest that all of Newton's impressive applications of Universal gravitation to account for motion phenomena show an attempt to deliver explanations that share these salient features of his classic deductions from phenomena. (shrink)

Isaac Newton's Scientific Method examines Newton's argument for universal gravity and his application of it to resolve the problem of deciding between geocentric and heliocentric world systems by measuring masses of the sun and planets. William L. Harper suggests that Newton's inferences from phenomena realize an ideal of empirical success that is richer than prediction. Any theory that can achieve this rich sort of empirical success must not only be able to predict the phenomena it purports (...) to explain, but also have those phenomena accurately measure the parameters which explain them. Harper explores the ways in which Newton's method aims to turn theoretical questions into ones which can be answered empirically, by measurement from phenomena, and to establish that propositions inferred from phenomena are provisionally accepted as guides to further research. This methodology, guided by its rich ideal of empirical success, supports a conception of scientific progress that does not require construing it as progress toward Laplace's ideal limit of a final theory of everything, and is not threatened by the classic argument against convergent realism. Newton's method endorses the radical theoretical transformation from his theory to Einstein's. Harper argues that it is strikingly realized in the development and application of testing frameworks for relativistic theories of gravity, and very much at work in cosmology today. (shrink)

Late in 1990, the Center for the Study of Ethics in the Professions at Illinois Institute of Technology (lIT) received a grant of more than $200,000 from the National Science Foundation to try a campus-wide approach to integrating professional ethics into its technical curriculum.! Enough has now been accomplished to draw some tentative conclusions. I am the grant's principal investigator. In this paper, I shall describe what we at lIT did, what we learned, and what others, especially philosophers, can learn (...) from us. We set out to develop an approach that others could profitably adopt. I believe that we succeeded. (shrink)

It is now well-known that Newton–Cartan theory is the correct geometrical setting for modelling the quantum Hall effect. In addition, in recent years edge modes for the Newton–Cartan quantum Hall effect have been derived. However, the existence of these edge modes has, as of yet, been derived using only orthodox methodologies involving the breaking of gauge-invariance; it would be preferable to derive the existence of such edge modes in a gauge-invariant manner. In this article, we employ recent work (...) by Donnelly and Freidel in order to accomplish exactly this task. Our results agree with known physics, but afford greater conceptual insight into the existence of these edge modes: in particular, they connect them to subtle aspects of Newton–Cartan geometry and pave the way for further applications of Newton–Cartan theory in condensed matter physics. (shrink)

Newton's methodology is significantly richer than the hypothetico-deductive model. It is informed by a richer ideal of empirical success that requires not just accurate prediction but also accurate measurement of parameters by the predicted phenomena. It accepts theory-mediated measurements and theoretical propositions as guides to research. All of these enrichments are exemplified in the classical response to Mercury's perihelion problem. Contrary to Kuhn, Newton's method endorses the radical transition from his theory to Einstein's. The richer themes of (...) class='Hi'>Newton's method are strikingly realized in a challenge to general relativity from a new problem posed by Mercury's perihelion. †To contact the author, please write to: Talbot College, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada N6A 3K7; e-mail: [email protected]. (shrink)

The insights described by Nevin & Grace may be summarized without reference to the Newtonian concepts they suggest. The metaphor to Newtonian mechanics seems dubious in three ways: (1) extensions seem to lead to paradoxes; (2) many well-known phenomena are ignored; (3) the Newtonian concepts seem difficult to reconcile with the larger framework of evolutionary theory.

I take Newton’s arguments to inverse square centripetal forces from Kepler’s harmonic and areal laws to be classic deductions from phenomena. I argue that the theorems backing up these inferences establish systematic dependencies that make the phenomena carry the objective information that the propositions inferred from them hold. A review of the data supporting Kepler’s laws indicates that these phenomena are Whewellian colligations—generalizations corresponding to the selection of a best fitting curve for an open-ended body of data. I argue (...) that the information theoretic features of Newton’s corrections of the Keplerian phenomena to account for perturbations introduced by universal gravitation show that these corrections do not undercut the inferences from the Keplerian phenomena. Finally, I suggest that all of Newton’s impressive applications of Universal gravitation to account for motion phenomena show an attempt to deliver explanations that share these salient features of his classic deductions from phenomena. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Chinese Gleams of Sufī Light: Wang Tai-yü's Great Learning of the Pure and Real and Liu Chih's Displaying the Concealment of the Real Realm, with a New Translation of Jāmī's Lawā'iḥ from the Persian by William C. ChittickE. N. AndersonChinese Gleams of Sufī Light: Wang Tai-yü's Great Learning of the Pure and Real and Liu Chih's Displaying the Concealment of the Real Realm, with a New Translation (...) of Jāmī's Lawā'iḥ from the Persian by William C. Chittick. By Sachiko Murata, with a foreword by Tu Weiming. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000. Pp. xiv + 264.Contacts between China and the Near East are at least as old as civilization but have been relatively little studied. This has led to a lack of attention to Chinese Islam. Yet, Islam has been a profoundly influential force in China for centuries. In Chinese Gleams of Sufī Light, Sachiko Murata has stepped forward to bring a wider awareness to the interactions between Chinese Islam and native Chinese philosophic traditions. (Murata is also the author of The Tao of Islam [1992] and, with Islamicist William Chittick, The Vision of Islam [1994]). [End Page 257]The present book adds greatly to our understanding. It includes a translation of The Great Learning of the Pure and Real, by Wang Tai-yü (ca. 1590-ca. 1658) and facing-page versions of William Chittick's English translation of the fifteenth-century Gleams (Lawā'iḥ) by 'Abd al-Rahman Jāmī and Murata's English translation of Liu Chih's (ca. 1662-ca. 1730) Chinese version of the same work. (Here, incidentally, I follow the book in using the Wade-Giles system.) One can see, comparing the translations, howLiu recast Jāmī's work in Chinese philosophic language, paraphrased some difficult passages, summarized others, and added his own commentaries.Interestingly, Liu eliminated Jāmī's Persian poetry. Murata thinks this is because Liu wanted to focus on the hard ideas; I suspect that it was because Liu realized that Persian prosody and imagery were too far from Chinese poetry to please his audience.Both Wang and Liu belonged to what must have been a rather loose but some-how connected circle of Chinese Islamic scholars. Both, also, almost necessarily used language fairly widespread in Chinese philosophy. Terms such as "emptiness" and "transformation" had many Chinese resonances, some most un-Islamic (Neo Confucian and Buddhist, for instance).Neither Chittick nor Murata give any glosses for key philosophical terms in either source language. Their philosophical and religious provenance, Chinese or Muslim, is correspondingly unclear.What is clear is that Neo-Confucianism had a strong influence on these scholars. Haqiqa "reality" is often translated as li "principle." Pen-jan "root nature" is used for the Arabic compound "essence and attributes." These examples are discussed in the introduction (p. 19). "Annihilation" becomes "conquering" (pp. 148-149). This is strange, because "Annihilation" (fana') is a technical term in Sufism for the disappearance of the self in God; it is an Arabic term, and literally means something like. "passing away." It signifies the forgetting or loss of self, such that only contemplation of the Divine remains. It is as close to the Divine as humans can get since, in Islam, humans cannot be absorbed into Allah (as, in Buddhism, they can be absorbed into Nirvāṇa or the Buddha-nature). "Conquering" seems a rather strange way to express this in Chinese. Perhaps Chinese Muslim readers of the time had developed this specialized sense for it.There are, of course, debatable translations here to contend with (both from Persian and Arabic to Chinese and from Persian and Chinese into English), but it appears that real incommensurability is involved. It was very difficult to use the language of Chinese philosophy in the seventeenth century, influenced as it was by centuries of Neo-Confucian thought, to talk about a radically different religion characterized by an infinitely powerful and wise God, aware of all futures, close to the believer and yet cut off.The inevitable result is to wedge the Arabic and Persian philosophy, so heavily informed by Neoplatonic essentialism and other... (shrink)