According to the ideal of tolerance, the state is supposed to be neutral or evenhanded in its dealings with religious sects and doctrines. The tolerant state does not pursue policies aimed at favoring one sect over another.

ONE of the most important and central claims in Hans-George Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics is that all understanding involves not only interpretation, but also application. Against an older tradition that divided up hermeneutics into subtilitas intelligendi, subtilitas explicandi, and subtilitas applicandi, a primary thesis of Truth and Method is that these are not three independent activities to be relegated to different sub-disciplines, but rather they are internally related. They are all moments of the single process of understanding. I want to explore (...) this integration of the moment of application into hermeneutic understanding which Gadamer calls the "rediscovery of the fundamental hermeneutic problem." For it not only takes us to the heart of what is distinctive about philosophical hermeneutics but it reveals some of the deep problems and tensions implicit in hermeneutics. First, I want to note some of the central features of what Gadamer means by philosophical hermeneutics. Then I can specify the problem that he is confronting when dealing with application. This will enable us to see what Gadamer seeks to appropriate from Aristotle, and especially from Aristotle's analysis of phronesis in book VI of the Nicomachean Ethics, in elucidating the sense in which all understanding involves application. Gadamer certainly realizes that "Aristotle is not concerned with the hermeneutical problem and certainly not with its historical dimension, but with the right estimation of the role that reason has to play in moral action", and yet Gadamer claims that "if we relate Aristotle's description of the ethical phenomenon and especially the virtue of moral knowledge to our own investigation, we find Aristotle's analysis is in fact a kind of model of the problems of hermeneutics". But Gadamer's own understanding, interpretation, and appropriation of Aristotle has much richer consequences. It is itself a model of what he means by hermeneutical understanding. It is an exemplar of effective-historical consciousness, the fusion of horizons, the positive role of temporal distance, how understanding is part of the process of the coming into being of meaning, the way in which tradition "speaks to us" and makes a "claim to truth" upon us, and what it means to say that "the interpreter dealing with a traditional text seeks to apply it to himself." Furthermore, when we see how Gadamer appropriates Aristotle's text, we gain a deeper understanding of why the Geisteswissenschaften are moral-practical disciplines in the sense in which the Ethics and the Politics are practical disciplines, and why Gadamer thinks that "hermeneutic philosophy is the heir of the older tradition of practical philosophy" whose chief task is to "justify this way of reason and defend practical and political reason against the domination of technology based on science." Gadamer's own understanding of philosophical hermeneutics can itself be interpreted as a series of footnotes and reflections on his decisive intellectual encounter with Aristotle, an encounter to which he frequently refers and which was initiated by his participation in Heidegger's seminar on the Nicomachean Ethics. (shrink)

It is frequently forgotten just how important Hegel was on the American scene during the post-Civil War period when American philosophy was in its formative stages. Stimulated initially by the immigration of German intellectuals, there were informal "Hegel Clubs" and groups such as the St. Louis and Ohio Hegelians. The first professional philosophic journal in the United States, The Journal of Speculative Philosophy, was founded by the Hegelian W. T. Harris, who later became U. S. Commissioner of Education. Although the (...) journal published articles by Dewey, Peirce, and James, one of its primary purposes was to encourage the exploration of Hegelian themes. (shrink)

I WANT TO SPEAK about three concepts that are not normally associated with each other, but which--as I hope to show--are intimately related and interwoven: metaphysics, critique, and utopia. I will be focusing on only selected aspects of these polysemic concepts, but I want to risk reclaiming an essential impulse, an animus that runs through them. Let me begin with "utopia." Leszek Kolakowski notes.

Against the background of disputes about modernity and post-modernity in philosophy, this paper probes the differences among Gadamer, Habermas, and Rorty. Focusing on the themes of praxis, phronesis, and practical discourse, it is argued that what initially appear to be hard and fast cleavages and irreconcilable differences turn out to be differences of emphasis. The common ground that emerges is adumbrated as "non-foundational pragmatic humanism". Although there are important differences among these three thinkers each of their voices contributes to a (...) coherent conversation in developing "moral-political vision". (shrink)

THE emotive theory of ethics made its first brief and rather tentative appearance in The Meaning of Meaning by Ogden and Richards in 1922. It did not gain currency, however, nor receive anything like a complete formulation until it was adopted by Logical Positivism, and in particular by A J Ayer in Language, Truth and Logic. Ayer’s account was soon superseded by that of Charles L Stevenson, whose views were finally elaborated in Ethics and Language in 1942. This, the classic (...) statement of emotivism, is one of the great works of moral philosophy of this century, worthy to be ranked with the Principia Ethica of G E Moore. (shrink)

Neonatal brain monitoring in the neonatal intensive care units (NICU) requires a continuous review of the spontaneous cortical activity, i.e., the electroencephalograph (EEG) background activity. This needs development of bedside methods for an automated assessment of the EEG background activity. In this paper, we present development of the key components of a neonatal EEG background classifier, starting from the visual background scoring to classifier design, and finally to possible bedside visualization of the classifier results. A dataset with 13,200 5-minute EEG (...) epochs (8–16 channels) from 27 infants with birth asphyxia was used for classifier training after scoring by two independent experts. We tested three classifier designs based on 98 computational features, and their performance was assessed with respect to scoring system, pre- and post-processing of labels and outputs, choice of channels, and visualization in monitor displays. The optimal solution achieved an overall classification accuracy of 97% with a range across subjects of 81–100%. We identified a set of 23 features that make the classifier highly robust to the choice of channels and missing data due to artefact rejection. Our results showed that an automated bedside classifier of EEG background is achievable, and we publish the full classifier algorithm to allow further clinical replication and validation studies. (shrink)

In Portraits of American Philosophy, eight of America’s most prominent philosophers offer autobiographical narratives that remind us that the life of a scholar is both a tale of personal struggle and an adventure in ideas.

Experience and Knowledge. "Experience" for Dewey is without doubt the most fundamental and pervasive concept of his philosophy. One may even characterize his entire philosophic endeavor as an attempt to reconstruct the philosophic use of "experience" in order to bring it into closer contact with the multifarious concrete experiences of men, and to escape the artificial and fruitless disputes of epistemologists. By analyzing five contrasts with what Dewey sometimes called "the traditional concept of experience," Professor Smith has conveyed succinctly what (...) this reconstruction involves. Experience consists of transactions of organism-environment which are more inclusive than knowing situations; experience is not primarily subjective, subject and object are distinctions instituted within experience; experience is active and not restricted to the specious present, it involves projection into the future; it does not consist of an aggregate of independent and disconnected elements, it contains genuine connections within itself; and finally, experience is not opaque to reason, it can become funded with intelligence. (shrink)

HEIDEGGER tells us "to think is to confine yourself to a single thought that one day stands still like a star in the world's sky." This is a theme to which Heidegger keeps returning in his late writings when he searches for various "pathways" that will enable us to elicit and disclose thinking in its purity. It is the mark of genuine thinkers to possess and be possessed by a single thought that shines like a star and radiates throughout their (...) work and the pathways they pursue. Paul Weiss is such a thinker. Or to put the issue slightly differently, from his earliest work until his most recent book, there is a theme and variations that pervades all his speculative thinking. With nuanced subtlety he has persistently pursued the theme of the one and the many. Explicitly or implicitly, it is evident in everything he has written and is manifested in the entire range of his concerns whether they deal with the most speculative metaphysical and ontological issues or the most intimate aspects of human life. (shrink)

Originally published in 1968, this book traces the development of the emotive theory of ethics from its outline by Ogden and Richards in The Meaning of Meaning to the elaborate presentation by Stevenson in Ethics and Language. Attention is paid to the positive features of the ethical theory whilst the author also shows how a more adequate view can be reached through critical reflection on it.

This article examines the changes in the conception of justice after John Rawls. It explains that Rawls single-handedly revived Anglo-American political philosophy and his theory consists in an egalitarian vision of justice. It discusses criticisms on Rawls' theory of justice and identifies some alternative paths. It suggests that while Rawls' book The Law of Peoples adopted a conservative and somewhat anti-cosmopolitan stance, the doctrine of egalitarianism within national borders and minimal duties across borders may ultimately prove to be unstable under (...) examination. (shrink)

There are those who think that moral life and moral reflection today are in complete disarray. What is sometimes called "diversity" or "pluralism" is read as nothing but fragmented confusion, Babel. "Relativism," "Incommensurability," "Nihilism" are used as polemical weapons in contemporary ethical debates. After the demise of the varieties of "foundationalism," one wonders what is left of ethics as a philosophic discipline. Furthermore, most philosophers are deeply suspicious of the very idea of a "religious ethics," or that theology has any (...) role to play in the contemporary conversation about the nature and epistemological status of ethics. (shrink)

During her lifetime Hannah Arendt's provocative writings attracted a strong group of admirers who drew inspiration from them. She also provoked some sharp controversies, especially in regard to her notion of the "banality of evil," which is elaborated in her report of Eichmann's trial. But Arendt's "independent thinking" never fit easily with conventional academic philosophy and political science. Was she an occasional thinker responding to the events of her time, or can one detect a more systematic endeavor in her varied (...) writings? (shrink)

Recently there have been intensive debates concerning the new defenses of liberalism and those labeled the "communitarian" critics of liberalism. The latter argue that the conceptions of the self and human agency presupposed by defenders of liberalism are deficient. For a liberal conception of the self fails to do justice to the social-historical context in which the modern individual has emerged. Liberalism neglects the communal-historical context of political activity. The terms of this debate have reached a stage where such concepts (...) as community and communtarian are becoming increasingly vague and ambiguous. What is badly needed is a rethinking of the substantive issues that underlie these debates. In this respect, one can welcome a revival of interest in Hegel's political philosophy, for many of the issues presupposed by these current debates were thought out more carefully and thoroughly by Hegel. Smith's lucid and thoughtful book is especially timely. Smith seeks to show that the standard conception of Hegel as an antiliberal thinker is too superficial. Hegel appreciated the contributions of a liberal theory of rights and sought to expose the precise points of weakness of liberalism. Rather than being "against" liberalism, Hegel sought to incorporate the "truth" implicit in a liberal theory of rights into a more comprehensive and adequate political theory. Smith begins by adumbrating the origins of the Hegelian project. He then carefully reviews Hegel's immanent critique of the liberal theory of rights and shows how this sets the stage for Hegel's own theory of rights--a theory that gives prominence to the "right of recognition." This culminates in the Hegelian Rechtstaat, which Smith translates as "the rule of law." He completes his study by delineating Hegel's own distinctive idea of Critical Theory and what the controversial claim about the "end of history" really means. (shrink)

The author of this book has undertaken an ambitious task, namely, an attempt to formulate a new and comprehensive framework for the philosophical interpretation of science. Among other things it is his intention to move philosophy of science beyond the Popper-Lakatos-Kuhn-Feyerabend disputes over the growth of science, especially the questions of the rationality and purported incommensurability of these historical changes. These disputes had, in turn, replaced the earlier, more formal and synchronic analyses of science which had dominated the philosophy of (...) science from the days of the Vienna Circle up to about the middle 1960's. Pandit's new framework for the philosophy of science attempts to preserve the worthwhile components of both of these traditions, albeit in a quite modified way, by evolving their discussion into a higher level of organization. This latter feature invites a self-referential critique of the book, but such would be too extensive for the present review. (shrink)