ABSTRACTThis essay contributes to the growing project of global media ethics by addressing the pervasiveness of Edward Said’s notion of Orientalism and the continued subordination of non-Western countries, movements, and cultures in media and academic discourse. Drawing together the practices of international journalism and cross-cultural academic scholarship, and building from specific examples of the otherization of Arab and Muslim countries and populations, it universally argues the need for journalists and scholars to focus on developing antithetical knowledge about the Other, tied (...) to broader counterhegemonic projects against enduring Orientalism and imperial relationships. (shrink)

Ethics and the Good Doctor brings together existing literature and an analysis of empirical research conducted by the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues to examine the ethical nature of medical practice and explore medicine as a virtuous profession. The book is based on the idea that medical practice is an inherently moral profession, in which notions of trust, care and meaningful relationships form the foundations of being a good doctor. By taking into account the ethical dimensions of medical practice (...) that have come under greater scrutiny and pressure over recent years, this book explores how personal and professional character is understood, enacted, and experienced by medical practitioners at various stages of their career. Ethics and the Good Doctor situates and presents the empirical data in a way that is accessible to practicing doctors, medical students, and medical educators. Clear implications for policy, practice, and research are offered, ensuring this book will be of great interest to a range of stakeholders involved in medical practice, including those working in medical policy. (shrink)

The use of Big Data—however the term is defined—involves a wide array of issues and stakeholders, thereby increasing numbers of complex decisions around issues including data acquisition, use, and sharing. Big Data is becoming a significant component of practice in an ever-increasing range of disciplines; however, since it is not a coherent “discipline” itself, specific codes of conduct for Big Data users and researchers do not exist. While many institutions have created, or will create, training opportunities to prepare people to (...) work in and around Big Data, insufficient time, space, and thought have been dedicated to training these people to engage with the ethical, legal, and social issues in this new domain. Since Big Data practitioners come from, and work in, diverse contexts, neither a relevant professional code of conduct nor specific formal ethics training are likely to be readily available. This normative paper describes an approach to conceptualizing ethical reasoning and integrating it into training for Big Data use and research. Our approach is based on a published framework that emphasizes ethical reasoning rather than topical knowledge. We describe the formation of professional community norms from two key disciplines that contribute to the emergent field of Big Data: computer science and statistics. Historical analogies from these professions suggest strategies for introducing trainees and orienting practitioners both to ethical reasoning and to a code of professional conduct itself. We include two semester course syllabi to strengthen our thesis that codes of conduct can be harnessed to support the development of ethical reasoning in, and a sense of professional identity among, Big Data practitioners. (shrink)

In this theoretical essay, we respond to recent scholarship on decolonizing mathematics that asserts that so-called “Western” mathematics is inherently colonialist – that is, in service of the economic and political control of European or wealthy nations over countries of the Global South. Although generally sympathetic with that literature, we argue against some of its presumptions, in part, by distinguishing “Western” or academic mathematics from its recontextualization for schools. First, we argue that, although colonialist messages and values can be disseminated (...) as part of that recontextualization, it is not clear that academic mathematics is inherently colonialist. Then, we offer a suggestive insight into what it might mean to decolonize school mathematics through a pedagogical approach based on research on native language learning, called the “subordination of teaching to learning.” The approach uses tasks that invite learners to use their indigenous mental powers (or brilliance) through engaging in dialogic interactions with themselves and others about objects and relations among them. To illustrate the subordination of teaching to learning, we present an example of how learners use their learning powers to educate their awareness and build mathematical ideas and reasoning; thereby experiencing the joy of their intellectual efforts. (shrink)

The earlier volume in this series dealt with two religions of Indian origin, namely, Buddhism and Jainism. The Indian religious scene, however, is characterized by not only religions which originated in India but also by religions which entered India from outside India and made their home here. Thus religious life in India has been enlivened throughout its history by the presence of religions of foreign origin on its soil almost from the very time they came into existence. This volume covers (...) three such religions—Zoraoastrianism, Judaism, and Islam. In the case of Zoraostianism, even its very beginnings are intertwined with India, as Zoroastrianism reformed a preexisting religion which had strong links to the Vedic heritage of India. This relationship took on a new dimension when a Zoroastrian community, fearing persecution in Persia after its Arab conquest, sought shelter in western India and ultimately went on to produce India’s pioneering nationalist in the figure of Dadabhai Naoroji ( 1825-1917), also known as the Grand Old Man of India. Jews found refuge in south India after the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 C.E. and have remained a part of the Indian religious scene since then, some even returning to Israel after it was founded in 1948. Islam arrived in Kerala as soon as it was founded and one of the earliest mosques in the history of Islam is found in India. Islam differs from the previously mentioned religions inasmuch as it went on to gain political hegemony over parts of the country for considerable periods of time, which meant that its impact on the religious life of the subcontinent has been greater compared to the other religions. It has also meant that Islam has existed in a religiously plural environment in India for a longer period than elsewhere in the world so that not only has Islam left a mark on India, India has also left its mark on it. Indeed all the three religions covered in this volume share this dual feature, that they have profoundly influenced Indian religious life and have also in turn been profoundly influenced by their presence in India. (shrink)

The earlier volume in this series dealt with two religions of Indian origin, namely, Buddhism and Jainism. The Indian religious scene, however, is characterized by not only religions which originated in India but also by religions which entered India from outside India and made their home here. Thus religious life in India has been enlivened throughout its history by the presence of religions of foreign origin on its soil almost from the very time they came into existence. This volume covers (...) three such religions—Zoraoastrianism, Judaism, and Islam. In the case of Zoraostianism, even its very beginnings are intertwined with India, as Zoroastrianism reformed a preexisting religion which had strong links to the Vedic heritage of India. This relationship took on a new dimension when a Zoroastrian community, fearing persecution in Persia after its Arab conquest, sought shelter in western India and ultimately went on to produce India’s pioneering nationalist in the figure of Dadabhai Naoroji ( 1825-1917), also known as the Grand Old Man of India. Jews found refuge in south India after the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 C.E. and have remained a part of the Indian religious scene since then, some even returning to Israel after it was founded in 1948. Islam arrived in Kerala as soon as it was founded and one of the earliest mosques in the history of Islam is found in India. Islam differs from the previously mentioned religions inasmuch as it went on to gain political hegemony over parts of the country for considerable periods of time, which meant that its impact on the religious life of the subcontinent has been greater compared to the other religions. It has also meant that Islam has existed in a religiously plural environment in India for a longer period than elsewhere in the world so that not only has Islam left a mark on India, India has also left its mark on it. Indeed all the three religions covered in this volume share this dual feature, that they have profoundly influenced Indian religious life and have also in turn been profoundly influenced by their presence in India. (shrink)

It is often assumed that engaging in a one‐on‐one dialogue with a tutor is more effective than listening to a lecture or reading a text. Although earlier experiments have not always supported this hypothesis, this may be due in part to allowing the tutors to cover different content than the noninteractive instruction. In 7 experiments, we tested the interaction hypothesis under the constraint that (a) all students covered the same content during instruction, (b) the task domain was qualitative physics, (c) (...) the instruction was in natural language as opposed to mathematical or other formal languages, and (d) the instruction conformed with a widely observed pattern in human tutoring: Graesser, Person, and Magliano's 5‐step frame. In the experiments, we compared 2 kinds of human tutoring (spoken and computer mediated) with 2 kinds of natural‐language‐based computer tutoring (Why2‐Atlas and Why2‐AutoTutor) and 3 control conditions that involved studying texts. The results depended on whether the students' preparation matched the content of the instruction. When novices (students who had not taken college physics) studied content that was written for intermediates (students who had taken college physics), then tutorial dialogue was reliably more beneficial than less interactive instruction, with large effect sizes. When novices studied material written for novices or intermediates studied material written for intermediates, then tutorial dialogue was not reliably more effective than the text‐based control conditions. (shrink)

It is often assumed that engaging in a one‐on‐one dialogue with a tutor is more effective than listening to a lecture or reading a text. Although earlier experiments have not always supported this hypothesis, this may be due in part to allowing the tutors to cover different content than the noninteractive instruction. In 7 experiments, we tested the interaction hypothesis under the constraint that (a) all students covered the same content during instruction, (b) the task domain was qualitative physics, (c) (...) the instruction was in natural language as opposed to mathematical or other formal languages, and (d) the instruction conformed with a widely observed pattern in human tutoring: Graesser, Person, and Magliano's 5‐step frame. In the experiments, we compared 2 kinds of human tutoring (spoken and computer mediated) with 2 kinds of natural‐language‐based computer tutoring (Why2‐Atlas and Why2‐AutoTutor) and 3 control conditions that involved studying texts. The results depended on whether the students' preparation matched the content of the instruction. When novices (students who had not taken college physics) studied content that was written for intermediates (students who had taken college physics), then tutorial dialogue was reliably more beneficial than less interactive instruction, with large effect sizes. When novices studied material written for novices or intermediates studied material written for intermediates, then tutorial dialogue was not reliably more effective than the text‐based control conditions. (shrink)

Albert of Saxony was one of the great logicians of the Middle Ages, on a par with William Ockham and John Buridan. The Twenty-Five Disputed Questions on Logic treat of central issues in logic, both then and now, such as the nature of meaning, of universals, of truth, and of tense and modality; and the quality and quantity of propositions, the role of negation, and the relations of contradiction and equivalence between them. Dr. Fitzgerald has studied Albert's work extensively, (...) and previously edited the Twenty-Five Disputed Questions from the original manuscripts. This translation makes available for the first time in English this careful and exemplary examination of logical notions by an outstanding medieval thinker.-Stephen Read, University of St. Andrews. (shrink)

Purpose: Studies of reactive and proactive modes of inhibitory control tend to show age-related declines and are accompanied by abnormalities in the prefrontal cortex. We explored which mode of inhibitory control would be more amenable to change and accrue greater benefits following engagement in a 4-week theater acting intervention in older adults. These gains were evaluated by performance on the AX-CPT task. We hypothesized that an increase in proactive control would relate to an increase in AY errors and a decrease (...) in BX errors. In contrast, an increase in reactive control would be associated with a decrease in AY errors, no change in AY reaction time, and an increase in BX response time. Further, we posited that an increase in behavioral proactive control would accompany greater cue versus probe activity for previously identified regions in the prefrontal cortex. In contrast, an increase in behavioral reactive control would be accompanied by greater probe activation in these identified brain areas.Materials and Methods: The participants were 179 community-dwelling adults aged 60–89 years who were on average, college-educated. Participants were pseudo-randomly assigned to either an active-experiencing acting intervention condition or the active control condition ; participant assignment was subject to time of enrollment. Participants in both groups were trained by theater-actor researchers with expertise in acting interventions. In contrast to the active control participants who attended a course on theater acting, the acting-intervention group was required to consistently deploy proactive and reactive control mechanisms. Both groups met two times/week for 75-min for 4 weeks. Participant brain-behavioral performance on the AX-CPT task was evaluated prior to and after this four-week period.Results: No intervention effects were found in favor of proactive control. Behavioral evidence in favor of reactive control was weak. Brain-related benefits to reactive control was illustrated by greater probe-activation in Brodmann areas 6 and 8, relative to controls and pre-intervention.Conclusion: We found some evidence for improvements in reactive control via brain measures, attributed to engagement in the acting intervention. (shrink)

It is often assumed that engaging in a one‐on‐one dialogue with a tutor is more effective than listening to a lecture or reading a text. Although earlier experiments have not always supported this hypothesis, this may be due in part to allowing the tutors to cover different content than the noninteractive instruction. In 7 experiments, we tested the interaction hypothesis under the constraint that (a) all students covered the same content during instruction, (b) the task domain was qualitative physics, (c) (...) the instruction was in natural language as opposed to mathematical or other formal languages, and (d) the instruction conformed with a widely observed pattern in human tutoring: Graesser, Person, and Magliano's 5‐step frame. In the experiments, we compared 2 kinds of human tutoring (spoken and computer mediated) with 2 kinds of natural‐language‐based computer tutoring (Why2‐Atlas and Why2‐AutoTutor) and 3 control conditions that involved studying texts. The results depended on whether the students' preparation matched the content of the instruction. When novices (students who had not taken college physics) studied content that was written for intermediates (students who had taken college physics), then tutorial dialogue was reliably more beneficial than less interactive instruction, with large effect sizes. When novices studied material written for novices or intermediates studied material written for intermediates, then tutorial dialogue was not reliably more effective than the text‐based control conditions. (shrink)

Nanomedicine is yielding new and improved treatments and diagnostics for a range of diseases and disorders. Nanomedicine applications incorporate materials and components with nanoscale dimensions where novel physiochemical properties emerge as a result of size-dependent phenomena and high surface-to-mass ratio. Nanotherapeutics and in vivo nanodiagnostics are a subset of nanomedicine products that enter the human body. These include drugs, biological products, implantable medical devices, and combination products that are designed to function in the body in ways unachievable at larger scales. (...) Nanotherapeutics andin vivonanodiagnostics incorporate materials that are engineered at the nanoscale to express novel properties that are medicinally useful. These nanomedicine applications can also contain nanomaterials that are biologically active, producing interactions that depend on biological triggers. Examples include nanoscale formulations of insoluble drugs to improve bioavailability and pharmacokinetics, drugs encapsulated in hollow nanoparticles with the ability to target and cross cellular and tissue membranes and to release their payload at a specific time or location, imaging agents that demonstrate novel optical properties to aid in locating micrometastases, and antimicrobial and drug-eluting components or coatings of implantable medical devices such as stents. (shrink)

This is the first book to offer the best essays, articles, and speeches on ethics and intelligence that demonstrate the complex moral dilemmas in intelligence collection, analysis, and operations. Some are recently declassified and never before published, and all are written by authors whose backgrounds are as varied as their insights, including Robert M. Gates, former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency; John P. Langan, the Joseph Cardinal Bernardin Professor of Catholic Social Thought at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics, Georgetown (...) University; and Loch K. Johnson, Regents Professor of Political Science at the University of Georgia and recipient of the Owens Award for contributions to the understanding of U.S. intelligence activities. Creating the foundation for the study of ethics and intelligence by filling in the gap between warfare and philosophy, this is a valuable collection of literature for building an ethical code that is not dependent on any specific agency, department, or country. (shrink)

A construção de modelos artificiais capazes de tomar decisões geralmente é contrastada à fraca estrutura de comportamento ético capaz de compreender o uso de inteligência artificial para a escolha moral. Neste artigo, discutimos o papel da ética de Hans Jonas e da filosofia crítica de Andrew Feenberg na determinação de princípios para uma ética destes modelos, indo na direção oposta às pesquisas e publicações recentes na área. Analisando o caso específico trazido em Boot et al., à luz de ambos (...) filósofos, podemos demonstrar como os avanços na técnica carecem da necessária crítica filosófica e estudo da nova ética na era da tecnologia. (shrink)

In this essay I explore the relationship of sport to art. I do not intend to argue that sport is one of the arts. I will rather argue that sport and art have a commonality, in that both are alienated philosophy. This is to propose – in an argument that has its roots in Hegel's aesthetics – that sport and art may both be interpreted as a way of reflecting upon metaphysical and normative issues, albeit in media that are alien (...) to philosophy's conceptual language. The medium of art is the manipulation of sensuous materials, such as stone, paint, or sound. The medium of sport is the pursuit of a physical challenge, at which the athlete may fail. I will develop this argument by borrowing from the philosophy of art of Arthur C. Danto. In particular, I will suggest that a parallel to his concept of ‘artworld’ can be seen in a ‘sportworld’. As the artworld is an ‘atmosphere of theory’ and a ‘knowledge of history’ through which an event is interpreted and thereby constituted as art, so a sportworld is the atmosphere of theory through which an event is constituted as sport. I will argue that much of the existing discussion of the relationship between sport and art is grounded in an ill-conceived aesthetics. In order to be appreciated and appropriately interpreted, sport must be understood within a modernist aesthetics and hermeneutics. As such, the core issue of an aesthetics of sport is not that of beauty, but rather of the meaning of the sport, and what I shall call the capacity of sport to ‘speak as a world’ – to bring to consciousness through play the taken-for-granted cultural conditions through which our social lives are constituted, and within which metaphysical and normative problems are articulated. I will propose that the hermeneutics of music provides a useful model for the interpretation of sport. (shrink)

Generalizing on some arguments due to Arthur Prior and Dmitry Mirimanoff, we provide some further limitative results on what can be thought.

The paper proposes two ideas: (1) The wilderness preservation movement has failed to identify key elements involved in situations of environmental conflict. (2) The same movement seems unaware of its location within a tradition which is both elitist and Puritan. Holmes Rolston's recent work on the apparent conflict between feeding people and saving nature appears to exemplify the two points. With respect to point (1), Rolston's treatment fails to address the institutional and structural features which set the agenda for individual (...) human lives. The human ecology of environmental destruction cannot ignore the role of corporate actors such as banks, national governments, transnational corporations, trade unions and so on. These agents interact with each other in various ways and also have an internal structure – perhaps akin to Arthur Koestler's conception of the holarchy - which enables people working within them to avoid taking responsibility for policies that have damaging environmental consequences. As far as thesis (2) is concerned, Rolston's work shares common features with Arne Naess's deep ecology and Aldo Leopold's land ethic. All of these writers draw, perhaps unconsciously, on a tradition of sporting elitism associated with the Great White Hunter. One variety of this tradition combines elitism with a form of Puritanism. (shrink)

Philosophers of action tend to take for granted the concept of basic actions – actions that are done at will, or directly – as opposed to others that are performed in other ways. This concept does foundational work in action theory; many theorists, especially causalists, take part of their task to be showing that normal, complex actions necessarily stem from basic ones somehow. The case for the concept of basic actions is driven by a family of observations and a cluster (...) of closely related anti-infinite regress arguments. I review this case in the work of Arthur Danto, Donald Davidson, and Jennifer Hornsby – three of the most important developers of the concept – and find it lacking. I conclude by sketching the possibility of non-foundationalist action theory. (shrink)

James Frederick Ferrier was born in Edinburgh on June 16th, 1808. He was educated privately and at the Royal High School, Edinburgh. After spending two sessions at Edinburgh University, he entered Magdalen College, Oxford, where he graduated in 1831. Returning to Edinburgh, he qualified as an advocate in 1832, but devoted himself to philosophical studies, largely as a result of his close friendship with Sir William Hamilton. In 1838-9, he published An Introduction to the Philosophy of Consciousness in Blackwood's Magazine. (...) This was followed by a number of interesting articles and reviews, chiefly on sense-perception. In 1844, Ferrier deputised for SirWilliam Hamilton in the Chair of Logic and Metaphysics at Edinburgh, and, in the following year, he became Professor of Moral Philosophy and Politica Economy in St Andrews. In 1854, he published The Institutes of Metaphysics. He died in 1864, leaving behind him a valuable course of Lectures on Greek Philosophy, which was published posthumously. (shrink)

A review of Arthur Ripstein, Force and Freedom: Kant's Legal and Political Philosophy (Harvard University Press, 2009).

James Frederick Ferrier was born in Edinburgh on June 16th, 1808. He was educated privately and at the Royal High School, Edinburgh. After spending two sessions at Edinburgh University, he entered Magdalen College, Oxford, where he graduated in 1831. Returning to Edinburgh, he qualified as an advocate in 1832, but devoted himself to philosophical studies, largely as a result of his close friendship with Sir William Hamilton. In 1838-9, he published An Introduction to the Philosophy of Consciousness in Blackwood's Magazine. (...) This was followed by a number of interesting articles and reviews, chiefly on sense-perception. In 1844, Ferrier deputised for SirWilliam Hamilton in the Chair of Logic and Metaphysics at Edinburgh, and, in the following year, he became Professor of Moral Philosophy and Politica Economy in St Andrews. In 1854, he published The Institutes of Metaphysics. He died in 1864, leaving behind him a valuable course of Lectures on Greek Philosophy, which was published posthumously. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to explore the role that modernism in the arts might have in articulating the uselessness and incomprehensibility of physical and mental suffering. It is argued that the experience of illness is frequently resistant to interpretation, and as such, it will be suggested, to conventional forms of artistic expression and communication. Conventional narratives, and other beautiful or conventionally expressive aesthetic structures, that presuppose the possibility and desirability of an harmonious and meaningful resolution to conflicts and (...) tensions, may fundamentally misrepresent the patient
s experience. By drawing on the work of Emmanuel Levinas (on useless suffering) and the aesthetic theories of Nietzsche and T. W. Adorno, it will be argued first that a faith in the possibility of harmonious resolution of suffering is misplaced and does violence to the experience of suffering. Second, it will be argued that the expression of suffering lies not in finding words, images or sounds that communicate the experience of that suffering to others, but rather in the persistent and radical disruption of any illusion of meaning and coherence that might be imposed upon the experience, so that the very possibility of communication is also disrupted. (shrink)

Are the characteristics and relationships among spatio-temporal entities "real" or are they simply conventional terms that note similarities among things in the world but lack any reality of their own? Or if they are real, what sort of reality do they have? Do we live in a world of causes and effects, or is this relation a useful contrivance for our convenience? What is the nature of this "I" that we invoke when referring to ourselves? Is it body? Mind? Both? (...) Neither? And once its nature is understood, what can be said of the choices it makes? Are they really ours, freely made by an independent will? Or is each choice determined more by the internal makeup of the "I" we happen to be and the social/environmental circumstances in which this "I" finds itself, rather than by any act of will? But if each of us "could not have chosen otherwise" than we have, are we no better than the machines we construct? Then again, maybe some of our more advanced machines should be considered conscious entities? Introduction to Metaphysics: The Fundamental Questions presents these and other intriguing questions, many of which have challenged philosophers from antiquity to the present in their efforts to speculate on the nature of what is real. Often filled with twists and turns, dark corners and hidden recesses, this journey of discovery is an exciting excursion into the depths of human understanding. As guides for this intellectual journey editor Andrew Schoedinger has chosen an impressive array of creative and thought-provoking philosophers: Peter Abelard, Aristotle, Renford Bambrough, George Berkeley, Joseph Butler, Rudolf Carnap, Roderick Chisholm, R.G. Collingwood, Arthur Danto, Donald Davidson, Rene Descartes, C.J. Ducasse, Alvin I. Goldman, Keith Gunderson, David Hume, John Locke, Alasdair MacIntyre, A.I. Melden, John Stuart Mill, D.F. Pears, Hilary Putnam, Anthony Quinton, Bertrand Russell, Michael Scriven, Sydney Shoemaker, P. F. Strawson, Richard Taylor, and others. This volume is a unique invitation to join a distinguished group of theorists as they tackle tough questions concerning the existence of universals, the nature of causation, understanding personal identity, the tangled web of free will, and the challenges posed by the advent of artificial intelligence. (shrink)

pt. 1. lecture 1. Meet the beast ; lecture 2. Medieval formulations ; lecture 3. The Reformation, the apocalypse revived ; lecture 4. Prophecy and science I, Francis Bacon ; lecture 5. John Milton and freedom of the press ; lecture 6. New Heaven, new earth, modern democracy ; lecture 7. Andrew Marvell, poet of the Republic ; lecture 9. The universe as matter, the universe as spirit -- pt. 2. lecture 10. The hope of Israel, the origins of (...) toleration ; lecture 11. Anti-Antichrist, the limits of prophecy ; lecture 12. Prophecy and Science II, prophecy and progress ; lecture 13. The apocalypse and the American Revolution ; lecture 14. Antichrist and the post-apocalyptic age, cold war ideology ; lecture 15. Antichrist and the post-apocalyptic age, Martin Luther King, Jr. ; lecture 16. Antichrist and the post-apocalyptic age, belief against politics. (shrink)

Arthur Danto, in Transfiguration of the Commonplace, poses the important, but easily neglected question, as to whether art is the sort of thing of which there can be a philosophy (1981, 54). If it...

Modern epistemology is reluctant to presume the objectivity of a mental event. Because a valid theory of knowledge is subjected to objective standards of rationality, the invocation of a transcendent ground of existence termed ‘god’ is deemed extra‐systematic. This reference lacks warrant because it fails to satisfy the impartial criteria methodologically basic to contemporary paradigms of knowledge. Still the biochemist Arthur Peacocke (1924–2006) claimed defensible public truth for an ultimate reality based on the ‘supremely’ rational nature of existence; it (...) is the further contention of this paper that there are intelligible patterns to the universe whose discovery is incapable of ‘objective’ explanation. By failing to meet these criteria, however, they do not fall into irrationality, still less do they disqualify or exclude themselves from public consideration; quite the opposite. There are perhaps depths to human experience then, including science, to which an existentialist epistemology is appropriate. In this connection the philosophy of Karl Jaspers (1883–1969) provides a compelling account of the transition of scientific research into aesthetics and theological discourse. (shrink)

One of the many reasons for the sustainability of the Arthurian legend in popular culture would seem to involve its educational aspects: most particularly, the educational narrative that describes the relationship between Merlin and Arthur. However much the other elements of the legend suffer alterations through their many retellings, generally the story of Arthur's instruction under Merlin remains unchanged. The reason for this involves the sort of master Merlin is. From his earliest manifestations to present-day representations, Merlin remains (...) a pedagogical hybrid. In one respect, his instruction of Arthur and his motivations for this instruction call to mind the classical conventions of the mentor: conventions... (shrink)

The self, the ‘I think’, my existence as an intelligence, the thinking subject, apperception, the person—all of these and the relationships between them form the subject matter of Arthur Melnick’s brilliant new book on Kant. Indeed, every one of these notions is brought into play by the end of the very first paragraph of the preface. This is a difficult book, primarily suited to the specialist, yet its difficulty only rarely lies in unclarity or confusion. The theory of the (...) self that it outlines and explores is as subtle, intricate and forcefully argued for as it is original, stimulating and highly controversial. (shrink)