In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Database of Classical Bibliography ed. by Dee. L. ClaymanGerald A. PressDee. L. Clayman, editor. The Database of Classical Bibliography. CD-ROM and manual. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997. Pp. xvi + 120. $85 (individual); $340-2400 (institutional).L ’Annee Philologique (APh) has long been one of the most important scholarly resources for students of the history of ancient philosophy. Even though in print form it contains errors and omissions, has (...) become of unwieldy size, and does not appear promptly enough for up-to-date research, there is no other single source of such international comprehensiveness. It is far more inclusive in many respects than The Philosopher’s Index.The Database of Classical Bibliography (DCB) is a long-term project sponsored by the N.E.H., the American Philological Association and others to make the full contents of APh accessible from a CD-ROM either from individual PCs or on a local network. Unlike the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae, the DCB CD-ROM comes with its own search software (DCB CompLex) on the disk. This software is set up both for IBM and MAC machines, installs quickly, and operates extremely well. The manual gives clear instructions both for general use and for detailed search strategies. CompLex enables the user to search DCD in many different ways; e.g., by ancient or modern authors and works, by titles, publisher, place of publication, year of publication, journal, modern language, or series name, as well as by APh volumes, years, page numbers, rubrics, and topics. It can also search by any word in a modern language (i.e., in Roman characters) or for words in a Greek index. And CompLex enables one to perform more complex searches utilizing wildcards and Boolean operators in a user-friendly form.DCB Version 2, containing Volumes 45–60 (1974–1989), fulfills the editor’s initial commitment to make a new release available each year with the addition of three to five years, since it includes four years of APh (1973–74 and 1988–89) not on Version 1. Also new in Version 2 is a French interface and manual.DCB has faults, however. It repeats mistakes that appeared in the print version of APh and contains other mistakes that did not originate in APh. Many were noted in reviews of Version 1, but this should not be surprising in a work of such magnitude as either APh or DCB. What is perhaps disturbing is that errors noted in Version 1 have not been corrected in Version 2, though it would not seem difficult to make use of the information provided by careful reviewers.Nevertheless, DCB is a terrific scholarly tool. No college or university library should be without it. [End Page 619]Gerald A. PressHunter CollegeCopyright © 1998 Journal of the History of Philosophy, Inc... (shrink)

O estudo da iconografia do livro impresso em Portugal entre os séculos XV e XVIII não prescinde do levantamento, tão extenso quanto possível, de marcas de água e contramarcas identificadoras do papel em que as obras foram estampadas. Este levantamento sistemático é tanto mais indispensável quanto são raros e avulsos os estudos portugueses neste campo da investigação histórica. O conjunto de marcas a reunir, algumas centenas de unidades, permitirá uma visão cronológica e panorâmica dos motivos iconográficos das filigranas utilizadas (...) na produção do papel das obras impressas no nosso país, revelando a sua origem e contribuindo para a investigação no âmbito histórico, artístico e económico. (shrink)

Fundamentación: la educación integral del estudiante de Medicina incluye el desarrollo de las habilidades comunicativas y lingüísticas en idioma Inglés, que le posibiliten mantenerse informado y comunicarse en medios anglófonos. La prensa escrita es un medio de información que permite que los estudiantes reflexionen, valoren, interpreten y se comuniquen. Objetivo: Contribuir al desarrollo de las habilidades lingüísticas y comunicativas con la prensa escrita en clases de inglés. Método: Se realizó un estudio pre-experimental que consistió en elaborar ejercicios a partir de (...) la utilización de artículos de la prensa escrita relacionados con medicina y salud pública, como medios de enseñanza. El estudio se realizó con 40 estudiantes del quinto año de Medicina y 15 profesionales matriculados en un curso de posgrado de la Facultad de Ciencias Médicas de Mayabeque. Resultados: La información sobre aspectos de medicina y salud pública publicados en la prensa y los hábitos de lectura de la prensa de los estudiantes del quinto año era baja antes de la intervención y después de la puesta en práctica de la experiencia mejoró significativamente. Los resultados de los cuatro cortes evaluativos muestran la eficacia de la experiencia, por cuanto el desarrollo de las habilidades se comportó de manera ascendente. Conclusiones: Este sistema de trabajo facilitó la motivación de las clases, se desarrollaron habilidades lingüísticas y comunicativas y sirvió de base para fomentar el trabajo educativo, aumentó el vocabulario general y técnico de los estudiantes. Foundation: the medical students’ integral education includes the development of linguistic and communicative abilities in the English language, in such a way, they have the possibility to be informed and communicate properly in English-speaking contexts. The printing press is a means of information which allows them to reflect, valuate interpretate and communicate properly. Objective: to contribute to the development of linguistic and communicative abilities with the printing press in the English lessons Method: it was carried out a pre-experimental study which consisted in the elaboration of exercises related to the content of medical articles taken from the printing press. The study was carried out with 40 5th year medical students and 15 health professionals registered for a post graduated course of English in the Faculty of medicine from Mayabeque. Results: the information concerning medicine and public health published in the printing press and the 5th year medical students reading habits before putting into practice the didactic experience were low. Meanwhile, it improved considerably after its implementation. The results of the four evaluative breaks show the effectiveness of the didactic experience. The development of reading abilities was increased. Conclusions: this system of work facilitated motivation during the learning activities, linguistic and communicative abilities were developed considerably; it served as a base to promote educative work, and to increase the students general and technical vocabulary. (shrink)

(1993). Print-culture and the advent of nationalism. State-patriotism and the problem of nationality in the popular culture of the printing press during the period of “Vormärz” in Denmark. History of European Ideas: Vol. 16, No. 4-6, pp. 467-475.

This article seeks to provide a new reading of the work of Celestin Freinet and his use of the printing press. Specifically, this article aligns Freinet’s approach to teaching and learning with a counter-reformation in pedagogical thought-an approach that places him both within and outside of the ‘progressive’ turn in education that began to emerge at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries. Freinet’s pedagogical experiment in rural France during mid-twentieth century demonstrated the way (...) that student freedom, uninhibited by overarching ideological pre-emption, and unbound from the progressive imperatives typical of reform education in either its Marxist or liberal variants, can be utilized as a way to inspire pedagogical techniques founded on alternative social, political, and anthropological postulates. Specifically, the authors demonstrate how Freinet’s use of the press helps us to think about the following: 1) a different relationship to technology and the role it could play in the conception of the common within the classroom; 2) the creation of an existential good as opposed to the private good discovered through the amassing of property and the advancement of the related notion of progress; 3) and a reaffirmation of the possibility of a genuine workers education. (shrink)

João Galrão, fundador de uma das mais importantes oficinas tipográficas na Lisboa do século XVII, possuía quatro marcas tipográficas, as quais apresentam como característica comum a presença das suas iniciais – IG. Se muitas das espécies produzidas na oficina de João Galrão ostentam, no rosto ou no cólofon, a marca do impressor, após a sua morte, a situação altera-se. António Pedroso Galrão, sobrinho e continuador do impressor João Galrão, utilizou, até meados do século XVIII, o material tipográfico da oficina de (...) seu tio, reduzindo as marcas tipográficas a uma função meramente decorativa. Curiosamente, em contrafacções estampadas na sua oficina tipográfica, não se coibiu de as utilizar, deixando a sua marca identificadora. (shrink)

Weber-Fechner Law states that the perceived intensity is proportional to the logarithm of the stimulus. Recent experiments suggest that this law also holds true for perception of numerosity. Therefore, the use of a logarithmic scale for the quantification of the perceived intensity may also depend on how the cognitive apparatus processes information. If Weber-Fechner law is the result of natural selection, then the logarithmic scale should be better, in some sense, than other biologically feasible scales. We consider the minimization of (...) the relative error as the target of natural selection and we provide a formal proof that the logarithmic scale minimizes the maximal relative error. (shrink)

Este artigo refere documentação sobre duas fábricas de papel em Portugal (séculos XVII e XIX) e reafirma a importância do estudo de marcas de água a partir de exemplos em que a sua identificação foi decisiva para datar diversos livros dos séculos XV, XVI e XVIII.

Citizenship education in established democracies is challenged by declining youth participation in democracy. Youth disenchantment and disengagement in democracy is primarily evident in formal political behaviour, especially through voting, declining membership of political parties, assisting at elections, contacting politicians, and the like. If citizenship education is to play a major role in addressing these concerns it will need to review the impact it is making on young people in schools. This paper reviews a major national project on youth participation in (...) democracy in Australia set in the context of a national citizenship education programme. The Youth Electoral Study found that citizenship education in Australian schools has at best been marginally successful and substantially more is required to raise levels of democratic engagement. The paper explores many opportunities available to education systems and schools to address these issues through reconceptualising aspects of the formal and the informal curriculum. (shrink)

This article is divided in three parts in order to investigate on the authorial and creative philosophical production in the Brazilian academic environment. In the first part, we show the challenge to authorial production in philosophy in Brazil, starting from the example of recent initiatives in the philosophy of religion. In the second part, by means of an analogy with music, we intend to argue that the plead for a greater promotion of authorial philosophy in Brazil does not mean to (...) devaluate the work with history of philosophy, which seems to be the predominant approach in academic philosophy in our country. The third part addresses the challenges to the formation of philosophical authorship, based on the triplet student-professor-knowledge, and acknowledging objective and subjective aspects of learning. (shrink)

In this article I expound some of the main criticisms by David Hume and Immanuel Kant against the legitimacy of natural theology, the philosophical activity of presenting arguments for or against the existence of God. The aim is not to contribute to the scholarship in history of philosophy, but as a starting point for describing the main lines of Richard Swinburne’s approach to natural theology in terms of inductive probabilistic arguments. His proposal has been part of a current philosophical movement (...) of re-establishing the argumentative debate on the existence and nature of God, an area that has been growing in quantity and quality since the 1970’s. (shrink)

The fact that Oswald T. Avery (1877-1955) did not become a Nobel Laureate for his discovery of DNA as the genetic material has frequently been cited as a prime example of a mistake made in the awarding of the Nobel Prizes. The late Nobel Laureate Arne Tiselius explained the oversight away by saying that Avery "was an old man when he made his discovery" (Litell 1967)—although Avery was actually younger than several others who won the Nobel Prize around the same (...) time. Later, in somewhat of a contradiction, Tiselius said that Avery was the most deserving scientist not to have received the Nobel Prize for his work (Judson 2003).The opening of the Nobel archives 50 years after Avery's name was cited gives insights into .. (shrink)

This article intends to show that Plantinga’s criticism against Bayesianism as an account of what is involved in rationality does not apply to all forms of Bayesianism. Swinburne’s version, based on a logical theory of probability, is an example of Bayesianism not hit by Plantinga’s criticism. In addition, the article argues that the problem of dwindling probabilities – pointed out by Plantinga in Warranted Christian Belief (2000) – vanishes in a Bayesian approach. So, even if it is not a sufficient (...) account of rationality, Bayesianism helps to understand important elements of inductive reasoning, especially those relative to cumulative cases. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe understanding of a wide array of practices related to fraud, bribery, corruption, and more widely, illicit practices have been capturing the attention of practitioners and management researchers worldwide. A substantial portion of the extant research has used university students to measure their actual or intended cheating behaviours and often studies have tested for variations across countries and cultures. We highlight some major concerns in this stream of inquiry and discuss both the definition and some inconclusive results in prior studies, (...) namely those deriving from differences in cheating behaviour across different cultural contexts. We suggest the need to examine intentionality, and further advance that intentionality may assume a reactive or a proactive essence. Depending on the social and formal contexts of different countries, both reactive and proactive intentions lead to distinct moral concerns, which we name in this work omorality or immorality. (shrink)

Since the last several years of the life of King Hassan II, Morocco slowly moved from authoritarian rule to a managed democracy. As a result of this gradual political liberalization, religious groups as well as secular ones formed political parties. Islamists have already won seats in the parliament and they are expected to gain nearly half the number of seats in the coming elections. Equally significant is the increased presence of human rights and non-government organizations and the emergence of independent (...) and party-affiliated newspapers and other media outlets. In this article, I focus on the prospects of seeing a free press emerging in Morocco given the pressures exerted by official and non-official authorities. I argue that government interventions stifle freedom of expression and weaken civil society. This study focuses exclusively on Moroccan Arabic and French language print media. (shrink)

Background: Evidence indicates that the processing of facial stimuli may be influenced by incidental factors, and these influences are particularly powerful when facial expressions are ambiguous, such as neutral faces. However, limited research investigated whether emotional contextual information presented in a preceding and unrelated experiment could be pervasively carried over to another experiment to modulate neutral face processing.Objective: The present study aims to investigate whether an emotional text presented in a first experiment could generate negative emotion toward neutral faces in (...) a second experiment unrelated to the previous experiment.Methods: Ninety-nine students were randomly assigned to read and evaluate a negative text or a neutral text in the first experiment. In the subsequent second experiment, the participants performed the following two tasks: an attentional task in which neutral faces were presented as distractors and a task involving the emotional judgment of neutral faces.Results: The results show that compared to the neutral context, in the negative context, the participants rated more faces as negative. No significant result was found in the attentional task.Conclusion: Our study demonstrates that incidental emotional information available in a previous experiment can increase participants’ propensity to interpret neutral faces as more negative when emotional information is directly evaluated. Therefore, the present study adds important evidence to the literature suggesting that our behavior and actions are modulated by previous information in an incidental or low perceived way similar to what occurs in everyday life, thereby modulating our judgments and emotions. (shrink)

Entendendo “pensamento pós-metafísico” no sentido da crítica moderna e positivista à metafísica como forma de conhecimento, o artigo apresenta a filosofia analítica da religião como uma resposta à tese de que a linguagem religiosa não tem sentido porque não se refere a nenhum dado empiricamente verificável ou falseável. Em primeiro lugar, é apresentada a resposta não-realista ao desafio pós-metafísico, especialmente a de D. Z. Phillips, baseada nas ideias de Wittgenstein. Nessa proposta, o sentido da linguagem religiosa não está na referência (...) a uma realidade transcendente, mas ao uso que ela tem como guia existencial e ético. Em seguida, é exposta a resposta realista à crítica antimetafísica, usando-se elementos das ideias de alguns dos principais autores da filosofia analítica da religião: Alvin Plantinga, William Alston e Richard Swinburne. Além de sustentarem o significado referencial real da linguagem religiosa, eles argumentam que a metafísica é não só defensável cognitivamente, mas também condição importante para o raciocínio científico.Taking ‘post-metaphysical thought’ in the sense of the modern and positivistic criticism to metaphysics as a form of knowledge, the article presents analytic philosophy of religion as a response to the thesis that religious language has no meaning since it does not refer to any empirically verifiable or falsifiable data. Firstly, it is presented the non-realist reply to the post-metaphysical challenge. The main non-realist author introduced is D. Z. Phillips, who based his ideas on Wittgenstein’s philosophy. According to this proposal, the meaning of religious language is not given by reference to a transcendent reality, but to its use as an ethical and existential guide. Next, it is expounded the realist position to the antimetaphysical criticism, using ideas by some of the leading authors in the analytic philosophy of religion: Alvin Plantinga, William Alston and Richard Swinburne. Apart from holding that religious language has a real referential meaning, they argue that metaphysics is not only cognitively defensible, but also an important condition for scientific reasoning. (shrink)

Michel Onfray e André Comte-Sponville são os dois mais famosos representantes do ateísmo filosófico francês contemporâneo, que continua uma tradição iniciada no século XVIII de negação irreligiosa da noção monoteísta de Deus. Embora compartilhando várias ideias, como o naturalismo e, obviamente, a rejeição do monoteísmo, suas propostas têm diferenças importantes. Onfray imputa à religião a maioria dos males enfrentados pela humanidade, recusando-se a fazer qualquer concessão à tradição religiosa monoteísta, e propondo uma filosofia libertária de tipo hedonista e materialista. Comte-Sponville (...) vê aspectos positivos na religião no tocante à manutenção da unidade social e propõe uma espiritualidade mística ateia. O artigo faz uma breve apresentação de suas teses e formula críticas a ambas as propostas. Onfray está muito mais preocupado em convencer de uma proposta política do que em argumentar filosoficamente em favor de uma tese e Comte-Sponville não parece perceber as consequências auto-refutadoras do naturalismo, que também torna muito problemática a própria noção de moralidade. Palavras-chave: Michel Onfray; Comte-Sponville; ateísmo; neoateísmo; naturalismo.Michel Onfray and André Comte-Sponville are the most famous representatives of philosophical contemporary French atheism, which is a continuation of a tradition begun in the 18 th Century of irreligious denying of the monotheistic notion of God. Although sharing many ideas, like naturalism and, obviously, the rejection of the monotheistic conception of God, their proposals show important distinctions. Onfray blames on religion most of evils faced by humanity, refusing to make any concession to monotheism, and proposing a libertarian, hedonistic, materialistic philosophy. Comte-Sponville sees positive aspects in religion regarding the keeping of social unity, and puts forward an atheistic spirituality. The article makes a brief presentation of both theses and formulates criticisms to each of them. Onfray is much more concerned with convincing of a political proposal than with arguing in favour of his thesis philosophically, and Comte-Sponville does not seem to notice the self-defeating consequences of naturalism, which also makes very problematic the very notion of morality. Keywords: Michel Onfray; Comte-Sponville; atheism; neoatheism; naturalism. (shrink)

Features of threatening cues and the associated context influence the perceived imminence of threat and the defensive responses evoked. To provide additional knowledge about how the directionality of a threat (i.e. directed-towards or away from the viewer) might impact defensive responses in humans, participants were shown pictures of a man carrying a gun (threat) or nonlethal object (neutral) directed-away from or towards the participant. Cardiac and electrodermal responses were collected. Compared to neutral images, threatening images depicting a gun directed-towards the (...) participant induced sustained bradycardia and an increased electrodermal response, interpreted as immobility under attack. This defensive immobility reaction is evoked by high perceived threat and inescapable situations and indicates intense action preparation. Pictures of guns directed-away from the participant induced shorter bradycardia and no significant modulation of the electrodermal response compared to neutral pictures, which might be consistent with the perception of a less threatening situation. The results show that the directionality of threat stimuli is a key factor that prompts different patterns of defensive responses. (shrink)

This article updates “The State of the Question in the Study of Plato” (Southern Journal of Philosophy, 1996) based on research covering the years from 1995–2015. Its three major parts examine: (1) how the mid‐twentieth‐century consensus has fared, (2) whether the new trends identified in that article have continued, and (3) identify trends either new or missed in the original article. On the whole, it shows the continuing decline of dogmatic and nondramatic Plato interpretation and the expansion and ramification of (...) the more literary, dramatic, and nondogmatic “new Platonism.” What was a growing insurgency twenty years ago can now be described as a, if not the, dominant approach. (shrink)

Gerald A. Press - Virtue in the Cave: Moral Inquiry in Plato's Meno - Journal of the History of Philosophy 40:4 Journal of the History of Philosophy 40.4 535-536 Book Review Virtue in the Cave: Moral Inquiry in Plato's Roslyn Weiss. Virtue in the Cave: Moral Inquiry in Plato's Meno. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001. Pp. x + 229. Cloth, $39.95. Few monographs have been written on the Meno in English; and much of what is written takes (...) a piecemeal approach, emphasizing the dilemma about the impossibility of learning what one doesn't know, the slave boy sequence, knowledge as recollection, concepts of teaching and learning, or right opinion which is sometimes taken as being asserted by Socrates or Plato. Weiss's book has a lot to recommend it. It is the first monographic study on this dialogue in English since Sternfeld and Zyskind's in 1978. Like Weiss's earlier Socrates Dissatisfied ,.. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Editorial AnnouncementGerald A. PressIt is my pleasure to announce that Jan Wojcik of Auburn University is the new Book Review Editor of the Journal of the History of History of Philosophy. All correspondence concerning book reviews should be directed to Professor Wojcik in Alabama effective immediately. The mailing address is: Prof. Jan Wojcik, Journal of the History of Philosophy, Department of Philosophy, Auburn University, AL 36849–5210. E-mail: [email protected] thank (...) the former Book Review Editor, Manfred Kuehn, for hi service to the Journal.Copyright © 2001 Journal of the History of Philosophy, Inc... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Editorial AnnouncementGerald A. PressIt is my pleasure to announce that Jan Wojcik of Auburn University is the new Book Review Editor of the Journal of the History of Philosophy. All correspondence concerning book reviews should be directed to Professor Wojcik in Alabama effective immediately. The mailing address is: Prof. Jan Wojcik, Journal of the History of Philosophy, Department of Philosophy, Auburn University, AL 36849-5210. E-mail: [email protected] thank the former (...) Book Review Editor, Manfred Kuehn, for his service to this Journal.Copyright © 2000 Journal of the History of Philosophy, Inc.... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Editorial AnnouncementGerald A. PressIt is my pleasure to announce that Jan Wojcik of Auburn University is the new Book Review Editor of the Journal of the History of Philosophy. All correspondence concerning book reviews should be directed to Professor Wojcik in Alabama effective immediately. The mailing address is: Prof. Jan Wojcik, Journal of the History of Philosophy, Department of Philosophy, Auburn University, AL 36849-5210. E-mail: [email protected] thank the former (...) Book Review Editor, Manfred Kuehn, for his service to this Journal.Copyright © 2000 Journal of the History of Philosophy, Inc.... (shrink)

ArgumentSeveral Yiddish medical publications of various profiles appeared in independent Poland until 1939. These print media were associated with OZE and TOZ organizational structures and aimed to promote modern concepts of health and healthcare among the Jewish population in its native tongue. Some of these magazines offered space for direct consultations, which took the form of a correspondence corner. Questions sent in by readers ranged from apparently neutral topics, such as a healthy diet or hygiene, to controversial matters tormenting individuals (...) in provincial milieus. The correspondence gives us an insight into popular ways of thinking about health and disease and indicates issues of high importance for a society in the process of modernization. The present paper discusses the questions and answers as they appeared in the Yiddish medical press (particularly in theFolksgezuntandDer Doktor), and presents the most crucial aspects of Jewish life they shed light on, including the historical and cultural background. (shrink)

Recent controversy surrounding the Surfactant Positive Airway Pressure and Pulse Oximetry Trial and the Office for Human Resource Protection’s judgment that its informed consent procedures were inadequate has unmasked considerable confusion about OHRP’s definition of research risks. The controversy concerns application of that definition to trials comparing multiple treatments within the existing standard of care. Some have argued that it is impossible for such trials to pose research risks on the grounds that all risks associated with a standard-of-care treatment should (...) instead be considered risks of treatment. However, analysis of OHRP’s definition demonstrates that some risks in such trials can be research risks. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to provide a critical examination of two aspects of culture and biomedicine that have helped to shape the meaning and practice of genetic testing for breast cancer. These are: the cultural construction of fear of breast cancer, which has been fuelled in part by the predominance of a ‘risk’ paradigm in contemporary biomedicine. The increasing elaboration and delineation of risk factors and risk numbers are in part intended to help women to contend with their (...) fear of breast cancer. However, because there is no known cure or foolproof prevention for breast cancer, risk designations bring with them recommendations for vigilant surveillance strategies and screening guidelines. We argue that these in effect exacerbate women’s fears of breast cancer itself. The volatile combination of discourses of fear, risk and surveillance have significant ethical and social consequences for women’s lives and well-being. Genetic testing decisions are made within this context; if nurses understand this context they can play an important role in helping women to cope with the anxiety and fear of breast cancer risk. (shrink)

An extensive scholarly literature, written in the past century holds that in ancient Greek and Roman thought history is understood as circular and repetitive - a consequence of their anti-temporal metaphysics - in contrast with Judaeo-Christian thought, which sees history as linear and unique - a consequence of their messianic and hence radically temporal theology. Gerald Press presents a more general view - that the Graeco-Roman and Judaeo-Christian cultures were fundamentally alien and opposed cultural forces and that, therefore, Christianity's (...) victory over paganism included the replacement or supersession of one intellectual world by another - and then shows that, contrary to this view, there was substantial continuity between "pagan" and Christian ideas of history in antiquity, rather than a striking opposition between cyclic and linear patterns. He finds that the foundation of the Christian view of history as goal-directed lies in the rhetorical rather than the theological motives of early Christian writers. (shrink)

An extensive scholarly literature, written in the past century holds that in ancient Greek and Roman thought history is understood as circular and repetitive - a consequence of their anti-temporal metaphysics - in contrast with Judaeo-Christian thought, which sees history as linear and unique - a consequence of their messianic and hence radically temporal theology. Gerald Press presents a more general view - that the Graeco-Roman and Judaeo-Christian cultures were fundamentally alien and opposed cultural forces and that, therefore, Christianity's (...) victory over paganism included the replacement or supersession of one intellectual world by another - and then shows that, contrary to this view, there was substantial continuity between "pagan" and Christian ideas of history in antiquity, rather than a striking opposition between cyclic and linear patterns. He finds that the foundation of the Christian view of history as goal-directed lies in the rhetorical rather than the theological motives of early Christian writers. (shrink)

An extensive scholarly literature, written in the past century holds that in ancient Greek and Roman thought history is understood as circular and repetitive - a consequence of their anti-temporal metaphysics - in contrast with Judaeo-Christian thought, which sees history as linear and unique - a consequence of their messianic and hence radically temporal theology. Gerald Press presents a more general view - that the Graeco-Roman and Judaeo-Christian cultures were fundamentally alien and opposed cultural forces and that, therefore, Christianity's (...) victory over paganism included the replacement or supersession of one intellectual world by another - and then shows that, contrary to this view, there was substantial continuity between "pagan" and Christian ideas of history in antiquity, rather than a striking opposition between cyclic and linear patterns. He finds that the foundation of the Christian view of history as goal-directed lies in the rhetorical rather than the theological motives of early Christian writers. (shrink)