In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 61.1 (2000) 97-114 [Access article in PDF] Blackloism and Tradition: From Theological Certainty to Historiographical Doubt Beverley C. Southgate * Introduction "Pyrrho himself never advanced any Principle of Scepticism beyond this," complained John Tillotson at the height of the seventeenth-century "rule of faith" debates; 1 and John Sergeant, as Catholic champion and the object of his charge, must have noted the irony. (...) For Tillotson was not unreasonable in concluding that his adversary's theological arguments had the effect of increasing the very uncertainty which they were designed to combat. Sergeant's attempts to overcome scepticism in theology were actually destined to exacerbate the problem of scepticism in relation to historiography.John Sergeant (1623-1707) was an English secular priest and, more specifically, a member of that notorious faction of Catholics known as "Blackloists," followers of Thomas White (1593-1676), alias Blacklo. 2 White produced some forty works on theology, natural philosophy, and political theory; he was known as an eminent philosopher in his own day and has more recently been restored to wider interest following the publication of Hobbes's lengthy critique of his cosmological treatise De Mundo. Sergeant has remained best known for his advocacy of the Catholic position in the "rule of faith" debates, but he was also a prolific writer on philosophy and, as a late Aristotelian, took issue with such "modernists" as Descartes and Locke. 3 Sergeant was widely recognized as White's [End Page 97] intellectual disciple, and it will be convenient here to consider their thought together. 4 Both devoted much of their time and energy (in Sergeant's words) to "beating down scepticism" or, as White had earlier called it, the "contagion of Pyrrhonism"; and both would have been horrified to think that they had actually contributed to any extension of skeptical philosophy. 5Blackloist concerns with the refutation of skeptically induced uncertainty had obvious implications for their contributions to the "rule of faith" debates and to their attempted establishment of one single and certain ground of religious belief. During the latter half of the seventeenth century Protestants and Catholics expended a considerable amount of intellectual and emotional energy in advocating their respective routes to that level of religious certainty which would assure salvation. While the former expressed confidence in the reliability of the scriptures' literary record, the latter counter-claimed that they alone enjoyed a faith that was reliably grounded in an unbroken tradition deriving from Christ himself.Thomas White highlights these issues in his additions to the "corrected and enlarged" 1654 edition of William Rushworth's Dialogues, in which he laments the fragmenting effects of the Reformation. White argues that because they no longer enjoy "one rule among them all" Protestants resort to their various individual principles; and although all appeal ultimately to the authority of the Bible, they each have only their own "private conceit" by which to resolve any ambiguities in the scriptural record. The extraction of religious tenets then becomes effectively a matter of mere guesswork; the whole Bible might as well be replaced by the Koran. Something far more authoritative, White insists, is needed to overcome theological uncertainty--"this dangerous Cockatrice, Incertitude"; 6 and it is precisely such firmly based and wholly reliable authority that he and Sergeant strove to provide. [End Page 98]In this context, however, theology became intimately interrelated with historiography. Some of the difficulties attendant on the Protestant recourse to the Bible were no doubt specific to the Bible itself, but others related more generally to the validity of any historical record, and it is some of the wider historiographical implications of theological debate that I shall examine in this paper. By arguing against the skeptics and pragmatic Protestants while simultaneously insisting on their own variety of absolute theological certainty based on reliable historical tradition, the Blackloists actually contributed to the development of that form of historiographical uncertainty which culminated in what, by the end of the century, came to be known as "Historical Pyrrhonism." 7 The Scriptures: Linguistic and Literary Problems "For since the... (shrink)

What is History For? is a timely publication that examines the purpose and point of historical studies. Recent debates on the role of the humanities and the ongoing impact of poststructuralist thought on the very nature of historical enquiry, have rendered the question "what is history for?" of utmost importance. Charting the development of historical studies, Beverley Southgate examines the various uses to which history has been put. While history has often supposedly been studied "for its own sake," (...) class='Hi'>Southgate argues that this seemingly innocent approach masks an inherent conservatism and exposes the ways in which history, has, sometimes deliberately, sometimes inadvertently, been used for socio-political purposes. With traditional notions of truth and historical representation now under question, it has become vital to rethink the function of history and renegotiate its uses for the post-modern age. History in the 21st century, Southgate proposes, should adopt a morally therapeutic role that seeks to advance human happiness. This fascinating historicisation of the study of history is unique in its focus on the future of the subject as well as its past. What is History For? provides compulsive reading for the general reader and students alike. (shrink)

Southgate draws on ideas within history, philosophy, literature, psychology, and theology to explore two traditions: contentment with our situation as it is, and the aspiration to transcend it. He discusses the possibility ofescape from intellectual constraints, and advocates a positive 'duty of discontent', and its implications.

Postmodernism has significantly affected the theory and practice of history. It has induced fears about the future of historical study, but has also offered liberation from certain modernist constraints. This original and thought-provoking study looks at the context of postmodernist thought in general cultural terms as well as in relation to history. Postmodernism in History traces philosophical precursors of postmodernism and identifies the roots of current concerns. Beverley Southgate describes the core constituents of postmodernism and provides a lucid and (...) profound analysis of the current state of the debate. His main concern is to counter `pomophobia' and to assert a positive future for historical study in a postmodern world. Postmodernism in History is a valuable guide to some of the most complex questions in historical theory for students and teachers alike. (shrink)

History: what & Why? is a highly accessible introductory survey of historians' views about the nature and purpose of their subject. It offers a historical perspective and clear guide to contemporary debates about the nature and purpose of history and a discussion of the traditional model of history as an account of the past "as it was". It assesses the challenges to orthodox views and examines the impact of Marxism, feminism and post-colonialism on the study of history.

This text looks at the debates concerning the value of history but differs from many of the other books by offering perspectives from across the centuries rather than just the dense philosophical present.

In the preceding article in this section, F. LeRon Shults responds to our article preceding his, “Semiotics as a Metaphysical Framework for Christian Theology.” We respond here to his criticisms of our proposal. We discuss his concerns about the concept of “vestiges of the Trinity in creation” and argue that this does not undermine the absolute ontological difference between God and creation. We offer a clarification of our idea that the Incarnation may be understood, in terms of Peirce's taxonomy of (...) signs, as a qualisign of God's being. Finally, we discuss the idea that all symbols “break on the infinite.”. (shrink)

We provide an overview of a proposal for a new metaphysical framework within which theology and science might both find a home. Our proposal draws on the triadic semiotics and threefold system of metaphysical categories of C. S. Peirce. We summarize the key features of a semiotic model of the Trinity, based on observed parallels between Peirce's categories of Firstness, Secondness, and Thirdness and Christian thinking about, respectively, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We test and extend the semiotic model (...) by exploring how Peirce's taxonomy of signs offers a new approach to theological reflection on the Incarnation. This leads to a novel way of framing scientific questions about human evolution in semiotic terms and to a new approach to theological anthropology. Finally, we use the semiotic model of the Trinity as the basis of a trinitarian approach to the theology of creation according to which the semiotic processes that are fundamental to life and to human behavior and cognition may be understood as “vestiges of the Trinity in creation.”. (shrink)

We introduce the second part of a two-part collection of articles exploring a possible new research program in the field of science and religion. At the center of the program lies an attempt to develop a new theology of nature drawing on the philosophy of C. S. Peirce. Our overall idea is that the fundamental structure of the world is exactly that required for the emergence of meaning and truth-bearing representation. We understand the emergence of a capacity to interpret an (...) environment to be important to the emergence of life, and we see the subsequent history of biological evolution as a story of increasing capacities for meaning-making and -seeking. Theologically, we understand God to be the ground of all such meaning-making and the ultimate goal of the universe's emerging capacity for interpreting signs. Here we summarize the articles in Part 1, which focused on scientific and philosophical aspects of the research program, and introduce Part 2, which turns to the theological outworking of the project. (shrink)

We introduce a two-part collection of articles (Part 2 to appear in the September 2010 issue) exploring a possible new research program in the field of science and religion. At the center of the program lies an attempt to develop a new theology of nature drawing on the philosophy of C. S. Peirce. Our overall idea is that the fundamental structure of the world is exactly that required for the emergence of meaning and truth-bearing representation. We understand the emergence of (...) a capacity to interpret an environment to be important to the emergence of life, and we see the subsequent history of biological evolution as a story of increasing capacities for meaning making and meaning seeking. Theologically, we understand God to be the ground of all such meaning making and the ultimate goal of the universe's emerging capacity for interpreting signs. Here we explain our reasons for seeking a new metaphysical framework in which science and theology may each find a home. We survey the contributions to the two-part collection, and we suggest that the interdisciplinary collaboration from which these have arisen may serve as a methodological model for the field of science and religion. (shrink)

It is increasingly agreed that ethics has a place in undergraduate medical education. There is, however, debate about how it should be taught, and by whom. We present our experience of teaching ethics in a general practice module over six years. During this period there has been a shift from a teacher-centred to a student-centred approach in which students choose ethical issues to explore within a framework provided. The issues raised are discussed with examples, and the future directions of our (...) ethics teaching outlined. (shrink)

We draw on Short’s work on Peirce’s theory of signs to propose a new general definition of interpretation. Short argues that Peirce’s semiotics rests on his naturalised teleology. Our proposal extends Short’s work by modifying his definition of interpretation so as to make it more generally applicable to putatively interpretative processes in biological systems. We use our definition as the basis of an account of different kinds of misinterpretation and we discuss some questions raised by the definition by reference to (...) parallel problems in the field of teleosemantics. We propose that interpretative responses fulfilling the criteria of our definition may be made by relatively simple molecular entities and we suggest two specific empirical applications of the definition to experimental work in the field of origin of life research. Our wider aim is to suggest that a well formulated naturalistic definition of interpretation will allow a re-evaluation of the role of semiotic phenomena in biological systems, including the generation of empirically testable hypotheses. (shrink)

Kalevi Kull and colleagues recently proposed eight theses as a conceptual basis for the field of biosemiotics. We use these theses as a framework for discussing important current areas of debate in biosemiotics with particular reference to the articles collected in this issue of Zygon.

An adequate theory of rights ought to forbid the harming of animals to promote trivial interests of humans, as is often done in the animal-user industries. But what should the rights view say about situations in which harming some animals is necessary to prevent intolerable injustices to other animals? I develop an account of respectful treatment on which, under certain conditions, it’s justified to intentionally harm some individuals to prevent serious harm to others. This can be compatible with recognizing the (...) inherent value of the ones who are harmed. My theory has important implications for contemporary moral issues in nonhuman animal ethics, such as the development of cultured meat and animal research. (shrink)

Value capture occurs when an agent’s values are rich and subtle; they enter a social environment that presents simplified — typically quantified — versions of those values; and those simplified articulations come to dominate their practical reasoning. Examples include becoming motivated by FitBit’s step counts, Twitter Likes and Re-tweets, citation rates, ranked lists of best schools, and Grade Point Averages. We are vulnerable to value capture because of the competitive advantage that such crisp and clear expressions of value have in (...) our private reasoning and our public justification. There is, however, a price. In value capture, we take a central component of our autonomy — our ongoing deliberation over the exact articulation of our values — and we outsource it. And the metrics to which we outsource usually engineered for the interests of some external force, like a large-scale institution’s interest in cross-contextual comprehensibility and quick aggregability. That outsourcing cuts off one of the key benefits to personal deliberation. In value capture, we no longer adjust our values and their articulations in light of own rich experience of the world. Our values should often be carefully tailored to our particular selves or our small-scale communities, but in value capture, we buy our values off the rack. In some cases – like decreasing CO2 emissions – the costs of non-tailored values are outweighed by the benefit of precise collective coordination. In other cases, like in our aesthetic lives, they are not. This suggests that we should want different values suited to different scales. We should want value federalism. Some values are perhaps best pursued at the largest-scale level, others at smaller scales. The problem occurs when we exhibit an excess preference for the largest-scale values – when we consistently let the universal metrics swamp our quieter interests. (shrink)