Whilst certain verbs may appear in both the intransitive inchoative and the transitive causative constructions (The ball rolled/The man rolled the ball), others may appear in only the former (The man laughed/*The joke laughed the man). Some accounts argue that children acquire these restrictions using only (or mainly) statistical learning mechanisms such as entrenchment and pre-emption. Others have argued that verb semantics are also important. To test these competing accounts, adults (Experiment 1) and children aged 5–6 and 9–10 (Experiment 2) (...) were taught novel verbs designed to be construed — on the basis of their semantics — as either intransitive-only or alternating. In support of the latter claim, participants' grammaticality judgments revealed that even the youngest group respected these semantic constraints. Frequency (entrenchment) effects were observed for familiar, but not novel, verbs (Experiment 1). We interpret these findings in the light of a new theoretical account designed to yield effects of both verb semantics and entrenchment/pre-emption. (shrink)

Previous studies have shown that children retreat from argument‐structure overgeneralization errors (e.g., *Don’t giggle me) by inferring that frequently encountered verbs are unlikely to be grammatical in unattested constructions, and by making use of syntax‐semantics correspondences (e.g., verbs denoting internally caused actions such as giggling cannot normally be used causatively). The present study tested a new account based on a unitary learning mechanism that combines both of these processes. Seventy‐two participants (ages 5–6, 9–10, and adults) rated (...) class='Hi'>overgeneralization errors with higher (*The funny man’s joke giggled Bart) and lower (*The funny man giggled Bart) degrees of direct external causation. The errors with more‐direct causation were rated as less unacceptable than those with less‐direct causation. This finding is consistent with the new account, under which children acquire—in an incremental and probabilistic fashion—the meaning of particular constructions (e.g., transitive causative = direct external causation) and particular verbs, rejecting generalizations where the incompatibility between the two is too great. (shrink)

A paradox at the heart of language acquisition research is that, to achieve adult-like competence, children must acquire the ability to generalize verbs into non-attested structures, while avoiding utterances that are deemed ungrammatical by native speakers. For example, children must learn that, to denote the reversal of an action, un- can be added to many verbs, but not all (e.g., roll/unroll; close/*unclose). This study compared theoretical accounts of how this is done. Children aged 5–6 (N = 18), 9–10 (N = (...) 18), and adults (N = 18) rated the acceptability of un- prefixed forms of 48 verbs (and, as a control, bare forms). Across verbs, a negative correlation was observed between the acceptability of ungrammatical un- prefixed forms (e.g., *unclose) and the frequency of (a) the bare form and (b) alternative forms (e.g., open), supporting the entrenchment and pre-emption hypotheses, respectively. Independent ratings of the extent to which verbs instantiate the semantic properties characteristic of a hypothesized semantic cryptotype for un- prefixation were a significant positive predictor of acceptability, for all age groups. The relative importance of each factor differed for attested and unattested un- forms and also varied with age. The findings are interpreted in the context of a new hybrid account designed to incorporate the three factors of entrenchment, pre-emption, and verb semantics. (shrink)

Mr. Mure, the Warden of Merton, does not conceal his entire lack of sympathy with contemporary British, and particularly Oxford, philosophy. His last words are: “At present, if I had an intelligent son coming up to Oxford, I should not regret it if he turned his face away from all the three Honours Schools that include philosophy, even from Greats.” Such words are not lightly spoken by a man whose life has been bound up with philosophy and with (...) Oxford. He was University lecturer in philosophy from 1929 to 1937, and has been Warden of Merton since 1947. He has written two works on Aristotle and two on Hegel: an Introduction to Hegel and A Study of Hegel’s Logic. He obviously belongs, therefore, to a different generation and a different philosophical world from that of contemporary Oxford teachers of philosophy. Judging the latter by the standards of his own generation and tradition, he finds their work devoid of all virtue or value. (shrink)

Central to Amartya Sen's understanding and defense of political orders that promote equality is his appeal to human capabilities. However, he fails to provide a basis for their selection, weighting, and value. Moreover, the account of ethical reasoning by which he does attempt to respond to basic challenges is highly problematic. It not only conflicts with a view of human flourishing that is individualized, agent-relative, and self-directed but also offers neither justification for nor principled limitation of state imposed solutions.

In What's the Matter with Liberalism? Ronald Beiner diagnoses the ills of liberalism along the three broad fronts where it is now widely challenged: its pretensions to moral neutrality; its lack of cultural standards; and its inability to deal with crime, unemployment, family breakdown, homeless‐ness, rampant consumerism, and global environmental and economic problems. But even in its minimalist classical formulation, liberalism entails a substantive moral position, and is committed to resisting the violations of rights that lead to the crises with (...) which Beiner is concerned. (shrink)

While feminist epistemologists have made important contributions to the deconstruction of the traditional representationalist model, some elements of the Cartesian legacy remain. For example, relativism continues to play a role in the underdetermination thesis used by Longino and Keller. Both argue that because scientific theories are underdetermined by evidence, theory choice must be relative to interpretive frameworks. Utilizing Davidson's philosophy of language, I offer a nonrepresentationalist alternative to suggest how relativism can be more fully avoided.

In attempting to assess the legacy of Paul Feyerabend's philosophical work, matters are complicated by the fact that there was a change in his basic orientation towards the philosophy of science around the end of the 1960s. Here I shall indicate one aspect of Feyerabend's divided legacy. My main aims are to sketch the principal themes in his (fairly extensive but little-known) 1990s output, to situate that later output insofar as it bears on the realism/antirealism debate, and (rather precipitously, perhaps) (...) to identify what I take to be the single common premise of his entire philosophical work. (shrink)

Professor Kelly has produced a most delectable collection of essays, all distinguished by great felecity of style, profound erudition in the areas covered and topics discussed, and highly thought-provoking arguments and lines of interpretation - features which do not come as a surprise to those familiar with his previous work. The book will be of considerable interest to political philosophers, historians of ideas whether or not closely concerned with Hegel, and to Hegel-scholars, probably in this order. To wit, the conspicuous (...) dualism of title and sub-title truly reflects, not merely a duality of levels and orientation which could fairly have been expected, but also, more seriously, a preponderant weighting in favour of what seems to be covered by the sub-title. Kelly’s own explanation is that he is dealing with three topics: Hegel’s development, the relationship of politics, history and philosophy in Hegel’s thought, and aspects of Hegel’s theory of the state. Of these three only the first belongs to the topic suggested by the title, and to be sure only two essays out of eight are concerned with this. There is nothing in the book about Hegel’s “eleusis” and relatively little, and little that is consequential or strikingly novel in biographical terms, about his “retreat” from this position, his growing maturity. What there is, to be sure, is full of interest and pertinent information; one may question the author on small points of detail, but one ought readily to acknowledge the value and overall validity of his interpretive glosses. The two essays belonging in this category are concerned, respectively, with “Hegel’s Lordship and Bondage” and “Social Understanding and Social Therapy in Schiller & Hegel”. The latter, replete with interesting detail on Schiller’s diagnoses of and remedies for the modern age, and comparatively reserved on Hegel’s, concludes by pointing out Hegel’s decisive rejection of “aestheticism” in favour of reason and politics. The former, cast mainly in the form of a polemic with Kojeve’s Marxistic interpretation, makes the timely and perfectly valid point that Hegel’s lordship-bondage dialectic should be understood in psychological, and not merely in socio-historical terms. Kelly argues, while stimulatingly filling in the relevant intellectual background with reference to Rousseau, Kant and Fichte, that Hegel’s topic is “Platonic in foundation” and has, essentially, to do with the simultaneous process of man’s liberation from external oppression and his enslavement by himself: the Lutheran-Kantian scenario. Of course, for Hegel this is not the end of the matter: just as it is erroneous, with Marx and commentators influenced by him, to explain lordship and bondage by proclaiming the “victory of the slave”, it is also un-Hegalian to remain rooted on the level of unreconciled internal suppression. Kelly could have been more explicit on this point. (shrink)

Professor Kelly has produced a most delectable collection of essays, all distinguished by great felecity of style, profound erudition in the areas covered and topics discussed, and highly thought-provoking arguments and lines of interpretation - features which do not come as a surprise to those familiar with his previous work. The book will be of considerable interest to political philosophers, historians of ideas whether or not closely concerned with Hegel, and to Hegel-scholars, probably in this order. To wit, the conspicuous (...) dualism of title and sub-title truly reflects, not merely a duality of levels and orientation which could fairly have been expected, but also, more seriously, a preponderant weighting in favour of what seems to be covered by the sub-title. Kelly’s own explanation is that he is dealing with three topics: Hegel’s development, the relationship of politics, history and philosophy in Hegel’s thought, and aspects of Hegel’s theory of the state. Of these three only the first belongs to the topic suggested by the title, and to be sure only two essays out of eight are concerned with this. There is nothing in the book about Hegel’s “eleusis” and relatively little, and little that is consequential or strikingly novel in biographical terms, about his “retreat” from this position, his growing maturity. What there is, to be sure, is full of interest and pertinent information; one may question the author on small points of detail, but one ought readily to acknowledge the value and overall validity of his interpretive glosses. The two essays belonging in this category are concerned, respectively, with “Hegel’s Lordship and Bondage” and “Social Understanding and Social Therapy in Schiller & Hegel”. The latter, replete with interesting detail on Schiller’s diagnoses of and remedies for the modern age, and comparatively reserved on Hegel’s, concludes by pointing out Hegel’s decisive rejection of “aestheticism” in favour of reason and politics. The former, cast mainly in the form of a polemic with Kojeve’s Marxistic interpretation, makes the timely and perfectly valid point that Hegel’s lordship-bondage dialectic should be understood in psychological, and not merely in socio-historical terms. Kelly argues, while stimulatingly filling in the relevant intellectual background with reference to Rousseau, Kant and Fichte, that Hegel’s topic is “Platonic in foundation” and has, essentially, to do with the simultaneous process of man’s liberation from external oppression and his enslavement by himself: the Lutheran-Kantian scenario. Of course, for Hegel this is not the end of the matter: just as it is erroneous, with Marx and commentators influenced by him, to explain lordship and bondage by proclaiming the “victory of the slave”, it is also un-Hegalian to remain rooted on the level of unreconciled internal suppression. Kelly could have been more explicit on this point. (shrink)

Thomas Mann developed one of the most subtle theories of irony during World War I, concluding that the best irony was irony against both sides of any issue. Such irony was not inconsistent with love for humanity, and even for both sides. He may well have been justified in using irony against both sides in that war. But with the rise of the Nazis, he abandoned two-sided irony and used his irony mostly against them. One the one hand, this meant (...) a better political position, but on the other hand irony was almost absent from many of his wartime essays and declarations. That may have been justified in such a time of danger, but it meant less art and subtlety in his political writings. (shrink)

Human nature -- On mental disorder -- The meaning of anxiety -- To someone considering psychotherapy -- The sinner in the saint -- Our incoherent world -- The contribution of science -- Making sense of experience -- On reason and religion -- The world of religion -- A note on the aesthetic -- Where are we headed?

Concentrating on Hegel's political philosophy, George Armstrong Kelly pursues three lines of inquiry. The first is the broad question of the connection of philosophy, politics, and history within Hegel's system of thought. Second, the author explores Hegel's relationship with his surrounding political culture and his rejection of aestheticism for the higher goal of politics. Finally, he analyzes Hegel's theory of the state, its historical and structural foundations, its demolition by a later generation, and its relevance. Professor Kelly explains how Hegel's (...) total philosophical method and system convey his apprehension of the meaning of European culture and its links with a political harmony accessible to modern times. Professor Kelly explains how Hegel's total philosophical method and system convey his apprehension of the meaning of European culture and its links with a political harmony accessible to modern times. Originally published in 1978. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)

This article argues that the key crisis that has overtaken today’s global economy is the classical capitalist crisis of over-accumulation. Reaganism and structural adjustment were efforts to overcome this crisis in the 1980s, with little success, followed by globalization in the 1990s. The Clinton administration embraced globalization as the “Grand Strategy” of the United States, its two key prongs being the accelerated integration of markets and production by transnational corporations and the creation of a multilateral system of global governance, the (...) pillars of which were the World Trade Organization, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. The goal of creating a functionally integrated global economy, however, stalled, and the multilateral system began to unravel,thanks among other things to the multiple crises created by the globalization of finance, which was the main trend of the period. In response partly to these crises, partly to increasing competition with traditionally subservient centre economies, and partly to political resistance in the South, Washington under the Bush administration has retreated from the globalist project, adopting a nationalist strategy consisting of disciplining the South through unilateralist military adventures, reverting to methods of primitive accumulation in exploiting the developing world, and making other centre economies bear the brunt of global adjustments necessitated by the crisis of over-accumulation. (shrink)

This article argues that the key crisis that has overtaken today’s global economy is the classical capitalist crisis of over-accumulation. Reaganism and structural adjustment were efforts to overcome this crisis in the 1980s, with little success, followed by globalization in the 1990s. The Clinton administration embraced globalization as the “Grand Strategy” of the United States, its two key prongs being the accelerated integration of markets and production by transnational corporations and the creation of a multilateral system of global governance, the (...) pillars of which were the World Trade Organization, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. The goal of creating a functionally integrated global economy, however, stalled, and the multilateral system began to unravel,thanks among other things to the multiple crises created by the globalization of finance, which was the main trend of the period. In response partly to these crises, partly to increasing competition with traditionally subservient centre economies, and partly to political resistance in the South, Washington under the Bush administration has retreated from the globalist project, adopting a nationalist strategy consisting of disciplining the South through unilateralist military adventures, reverting to methods of primitive accumulation in exploiting the developing world, and making other centre economies bear the brunt of global adjustments necessitated by the crisis of over-accumulation. (shrink)