This paper proposes a new interpretation of Gadamer’s problematic appropriation of Platonic metaphysics. It argues that Gadamer, attempting to respond to the challenge posed by Heidegger’s interpretation of Platonic metaphysics and of its role in the history of Being (Seinsgeschichte), downplayed the transcendence of Platonic Forms. Gadamer achieves a reconfiguration of this transcendence and its transposition into what I call here a plane of immanence through two hermeneutic gestures: 1) interpreting Forms in light of Greek mathematics and especially in light (...) of the structure of the sum-number; 2) introducing temporality and historicity in the Medieval doctrine of transcendentals by giving priority to the Beautiful over the Good. I contend that, Platonically speaking, this amounts to the rejection of νοήσις in favor of διάνοια, and that this raises issues concerning the problem of finitude and the potential limits of linguisticality (Sprachlichkeit). (shrink)

Cette étude cherche à rendre compte d’un trait particulier et pratiquement inobservé dans la fondation gadamérienne de l’herméneutique philosophique. Si l’on connaît bien le rôle du platonisme — et plus spécifiquement du dialogue platonicien — parmi les sources au sein desquelles Gadamer a puisé pour formuler le caractère dialogique du comprendre, on a rarement noté que la phénoménologie du dialogue sur laquelle s’appuie une telle fondation s’inscrivait en faux par rapport à son modèle sur un point bien précis : l’ironie, (...) qu’elle soit socratique ou platonicienne. Nous proposons ici que pour bien expliquer la relation trouble que la fondation dialogique de l’herméneutique gadamérienne entretient avec l’ironie socratico-platonicienne, il faille concevoir le platonisme de Gadamer à la lumière d’une certaine forme d’aristotélisation, par laquelle la philia et la phronêsis aristotéliciennes sont en quelque sorte projetées sur le modèle platonicien du dialogue. (shrink)

Among the educative games of Plato’s Cretan city, choral performances have a prominent role. This paper examines the function of play (παιδιά) in the choral education in virtue in Plato’s Laws. I reconstruct the notion of play as it is elaborated throughout this dialogue, and then show how it contributes to solving the problem of virtue acquisition in the Athenian’s account of moral education through songs and dances. I argue that play in the Laws is best understood as an imitative (...) activity that is intrinsically pleasurable, ordered by rules and patterns of repetition, and undertaken for its own sake by a player whose psychic condition is childish. Thus interpreted, we are in a better position to see why choruses must be engaged in playfully. Because the self-likening process (ὁμοίωσις) choral performances aim at requires pleasure and because pleasure normally obtains when there is a concordance between one’s character and the imitations, virtue acquisition is best secured if the imitations of virtue in choruses are performed or spectated playfully. (shrink)

This paper examines the role of love in Xenophon’s Cyropaedia. I argue that an essential aspect of Cyrus’ knowledgeable rule is a specific understanding of eros and a corresponding strategy to cope with the power of love. Specifically, I contend that by exploiting a common Greek distinction between the beloved and the lover, he articulates the view that lovers are subjects or even slaves to their beloved who deceive themselves into thinking that their attraction and the ensuing behaviors are voluntary. (...) Accordingly, Cyrus attempts to avoid falling in love and to rule as a universally beloved leader. Reflecting on the implications of this solution, I finally suggest that Xenophon wishes to show the limits of Cyrus’ solution. (shrink)

This paper addresses the question of the function of genre in Gadamer’s hermeneutics by examining his treatment of Plato’s political writings in the context of the “utopian genre.” I argue that Gadamer’s reading of Plato informs us on the hermeneutics of genre, which is otherwise undiscussed in Truth and Method. First, I reconstruct the utopian genre as Gadamer treats it in a 1983 lecture hitherto neglected. Second, I expand Gadamer’s “logic of question and answer” by drawing on the notion of (...) genre as articulated by E.D. Hirsch and show that attention to genre is not only compatible with Gadamerian hermeneutics, but also productive. Finally, I demonstrate that an application of this concept of genre to the case of Plato’s political philosophy reveals a problem in Gadamer’s interpretation, namely a certain confusion between dialogue and utopia, and propose two ways of explaining this confusion and thus of resolving the aporia. (shrink)

This paper addresses the question of the function of genre in Gadamer’s hermeneutics by examining his treatment of Plato’s political writings in the context of the “utopian genre.” I argue that Gadamer’s reading of Plato informs us on the hermeneutics of genre, which is otherwise undiscussed in Truth and Method. First, I reconstruct the utopian genre as Gadamer treats it in a 1983 lecture hitherto neglected. Second, I expand Gadamer’s “logic of question and answer” by drawing on the notion of (...) genre as articulated by E.D. Hirsch and show that attention to genre is not only compatible with Gadamerian hermeneutics, but also productive. Finally, I demonstrate that an application of this concept of genre to the case of Plato’s political philosophy reveals a problem in Gadamer’s interpretation, namely a certain confusion between dialogue and utopia, and propose two ways of explaining this confusion and thus of resolving the aporia. (shrink)

This paper examines Gerhard Krüger's interpretation of Plato in light of Martin Heidegger's Destruktion of the Greeks and critique of Platonism. I argue that Krüger's new reading of Plato should be understood as a critique of Heidegger's understanding of Platonism, and thereby as a broader critique of Heidegger's thoughts on Western metaphysics and the history of Being (Seinsgeschichte). The force and originality of Krüger's response to Heidegger consist in the fact that Krüger's Plato anticipates Heidegger's critique of Platonism. Krüger thus (...) contends that Plato (1) does not allow the understanding of truth as correctness (Übereinstimmung) to supplant the understanding of truth as disclosedness (Unverborgenheit), (2) understands and displays philosophy's dependence upon prereflexive attunements (Stimmungen); (3) appreciates the intricate relation between Being and temporality. In sum, Krüger's Plato is not guilty of Seinsvergessenheit, and rather opens up new ways for an authentic meditation on Being and on the human way toward an understanding of Being. (shrink)

Résumé Cet article cherche à poser à nouveau l’épineuse question de l’« antimodernisme » dans la philosophie politique contemporaine. Nous proposons à cette fin d’expliquer la critique que fait le philosophe français Alain Renaut d’un des plus grands pionniers du renouveau contemporain de la philosophie politique, Leo Strauss, et d’exposer par la suite une réplique possible à cette critique, reconstituant ainsi un dialogue qui ne put véritablement avoir lieu. Nous cherchons à montrer qu’à terme, la critique de Renaut est en (...) bonne partie injuste et, conséquemment, que la posture « antimoderne » de Strauss n’est peut-être pas aussi « intenable » qu’il le laisse entendre. -/- Abstract This article aims to recover the thorny question of « antimodernism » in contemporary political philosophy. For this purpose, we propose to explain French philosopher Alain Renaut’s critique of one of the greatest pioneers of the contemporary recovery of political philosophy—Leo Strauss—and to expose a possible reply to this critique, aiming thus at the reconstitution of a dialogue that could not really have taken place. We try to show that, ultimately, Renaut’s critique is to a great extent unfair and then, that Strauss’s « antimodernist » stance is not as « untenable » as it is believed to be. (shrink)

Among the educative games of Plato’s Cretan city, choral performances have a prominent role. This paper examines the function of play (παιδιά) in the choral education in virtue in Plato’s Laws. I reconstruct the notion of play as it is elaborated throughout this dialogue, and then show how it contributes to solving the problem of virtue acquisition in the Athenian’s account of moral education through songs and dances. I argue that play in the Laws is best understood an imitative activity (...) that is intrinsically pleasurable, ordered by rules and patterns of repetition, and undertaken for its own sake by a player whose psychic condition is childish. Thus interpreted, we are in a better position to see why choruses must be engaged in playfully. Because the self-likening (ὁμοίωσις) process choral performances aim at requires pleasure and because pleasure normally obtains when there is a concordance between one’s character and the imitations, virtue acquisition is best secured if the imitations of virtue in choruses are performed playfully. (shrink)

This paper aims to show how Heidegger and Arendt’s reappropriations of Aristotle’s thought are structured around a reinterpretation of the double definition of man as a practical being, that is, aszôon logon echonandzôon politikon. I argue that by interpreting the notions that compose and circumscribe this definition — those of life (zôê),logos, production (poiêsis), action (praxis) and contemplation (theôria), Heidegger and Arendt find the main characteristic of human beings by developing upon two distinct possibilities contained in the ambivalent Aristotelian concept (...) ofpraxis. However, they both blur the distinction between activity (energeia) and motion (kinêsis), which expose their critique oftheôriato two difficulties — one concerning the praxical character oftheôria, the other its temporality. (shrink)

What follows is an English translation of two documents pertaining to the Derrida-Gadamer encounter. The first one is the short correspondence between Jacques Derrida and Hans-Georg Gadamer that lasted from March 1977 to July 2000. The correspondence was written in German and French. The second one is the homage that Derrida wrote in honor of Gadamer in the wake of his passing in 2002. These two documents are now available in English for the first time.

Im Zentrum dieses Beitrags steht der Rückblick Hennions auf seinen eigenen intellektuellen Weg innerhalb des CSI, den er aus der Perspektive aktueller Fragestellungen reflektiert und neu bewertet. Der Autor zeigt, wie das CSI seit seiner Gründung eine Soziologie entwickelte, welche den Objekten größere Aufmerksamkeit schenkt, mit denen es sich befasste (Recht, Wissenschaft und Technik, Ökonomie, Kultur) und diskutiert Gemeinsamkeiten und Unterschiede in der damals in der STS und auf dem Gebiet der Kultur geleisteten Feldforschung, so etwa die Verwendung von Begriffen (...) wie Übersetzung und Mediation oder das unterschiedliche Verhältnis zu Bourdieus kritischer Soziologie. Im Anschluss befasst der Text sich mit dem langsamen Aufkommen pragmatistischer Ansätze in Frankreich. Gestützt auf diese Genealogie schließt er mit dem Vorschlag einer Neuformulierung der Thesen des Pragmatismus in der Soziologie ausgehend von seiner eigenen Arbeit zu Liebhabern und Attachements. This paper focuses on a reflexive return made by Hennion on his own trajectory within the CSI, in order to reread it from the perspective of present issues. The author shows how, from its very foundation the CSI developed a sociology more sensitive to the objects it deals with (law, science and technology, business, culture), and discusses convergences and differences between fieldwork then undertaken by STS and on culture: e.g. the use of terms like translation or mediation, or the different relation to Bourdieu's critical sociology. The paper then considers the slow emergence of pragmatist approaches in France. Leaning on this genealogy, the author concludes by suggesting a reformulation of such pragmatist claims in sociology from his own work on and attachments. (shrink)

This paper focuses on a reflexive return made by Hennion on his own trajectory within the CSI, in order to reread it from the perspective of present issues. The author shows how, from its very foundation the CSI developed a sociology more sensitive to the objects it deals with (law, science and technology, business, culture), and discusses convergences and differences between fieldwork then undertaken by STS and on culture: e.g. the use of terms like translation or mediation, or the different (...) relation to Bourdieu's critical sociology. The paper then considers the slow emergence of pragmatist approaches in France. Leaning on this genealogy, the author concludes by suggesting a reformulation of such pragmatist claims in sociology from his own work on and attachments. German Im Zentrum dieses Beitrags steht der Rückblick Hennions auf seinen eigenen intellektuellen Weg innerhalb des CSI, den er aus der Perspektive aktueller Fragestellungen reflektiert und neu bewertet. Der Autor zeigt, wie das CSI seit seiner Gründung eine Soziologie entwickelte, welche den Objekten größere Aufmerksamkeit schenkt, mit denen es sich befasste (Recht, Wissenschaft und Technik, Ökonomie, Kultur) und diskutiert Gemeinsamkeiten und Unterschiede in der damals in der STS und auf dem Gebiet der Kultur geleisteten Feldforschung, so etwa die Verwendung von Begriffen wie Übersetzung und Mediation oder das unterschiedliche Verhältnis zu Bourdieus kritischer Soziologie. Im Anschluss befasst der Text sich mit dem langsamen Aufkommen pragmatistischer Ansätze in Frankreich. Gestützt auf diese Genealogie schließt er mit dem Vorschlag einer Neuformulierung der Thesen des Pragmatismus in der Soziologie ausgehend von seiner eigenen Arbeit zu Liebhabern und Attachements. (shrink)

«Les hommes sont hommes avant d'être avocats, médecins, marchands, ou manufacturiers, et si vous en faites des hommes sensés et compétents, ils deviendront par cela même des avocats et des médecins compétents et sensés. [...] On peut être un homme de loi compétent sans avoir reçu une éducation générale; mais il appartient à l'éducation générale de donner à l'homme de loi l'esprit philosophique qui cherche des principes et les saisit, au lieu de charger sa mémoire de détails, et il en (...) va ainsi de toutes les autres professions, y compris les métiers manuels. » John Stuart Mill John Stuart Mill a été nommé en 1865 recteur honoraire de l'Université de St-Andrews. Deux ans plus tard, il y prononce un discours fameux dans lequel il expose ses idées sur l'université et sur l'éducation qu'elle doit procurer à quiconque la fréquente. C'est ce texte qui est ici pour la première fois intégralement présenté aux lecteurs francophones. Ils y mesureront à la fois la distance qui nous sépare de l'université anglaise du XIXe siècle, mais aussi l'actualité des hautes exigences qu'avait le recteur Mill à l'égard de cette institution. Mill reste en effet un réformateur social utilitariste, démocrate et égalitariste, pour qui l'éducation doit former des personnes capables non seulement de développer leurs capacités et dispositions cognitives, émotionnelles et morales de manière à devenir autonomes, mais aussi de coopérer entre eux (et elles) afin de transformer le monde [...] (Normand Baillargeon, Antoine Beaugrand-Champagne et Camille Santerre Baillargeon). (shrink)

Dans ce beau livre, superbement édité, sont reproduites pour la première fois depuis leur récente restauration (1996-1999) les peintures de l'église du monastère de Saint-Antoine, décor du XIIIe siècle qui est non seulement le plus complet et le mieux conservé d'Égypte, mais qui est aussi l'un des rares à être précisément daté. Il ne s'agit pas d'une monographie traditionnelle, mais d'un ouvrage collectif réunissant autour d'Elizabeth Bolman, maître d'œuvre de l'entreprise, une série d'auteurs venus d'horizons divers, dont les regards (...) croisés et complémentaires contribuent à la richesse et à l'intérêt du volume. (shrink)

Throughout much of this century the most prominent exegetes maintained that Aquinas’s mature moral psychology is fundamentally voluntarist, that he considers the will an independent cause of action, most conspicuously in his later works. Disagreement over the character of the will’s causal authority and the composition of the list of later works did little to unsettle their shared conviction that Aristotle’s intellectualist moral psychology was improved, indeed saved, by Aquinas’s insistence that the will can move itself, at least in some (...) fashion, apart from the influence of the intellect. See Rene Antoine Gauthier and Jean Yves Jolif, Aristote: L’éthique à Nicomaque, 2nd ed., vol. 2 (Paris: Béatrice-Nauwelaerts, 1970), p. 218; Bernard Lonergan, Grace and Freedom: Operative Grace in the Thought of St. Thomas Aquinas, ed. J.P. Burns (New York: Herder and Herder, 1971), pp. 93–97; Odom Lottin, “La Preuve de al Liberté Humaine chez Saint Thomas d’Aquin,” Recherches de Theologie Ancienne et Medievale 23 (1956): 323–30; and Klaus Riesenhuber, Die Transzendenz Der Freiheit Zum Guten: Der Wille in der Anthropologie und Metaphysik des Thomas von Aquin (Munchen: Berchmanskolleg Verlag, 1971), p. 290. (shrink)

L’objectif de cet article est la réévaluation iconographique, archéologique et historique d’une paire de bandes en or (« diadèmes »), de la Collection Hélène et Antoine Stathatos, du Musée National Archéologique d’Athènes (St-342_a–b). Publiés en 1953 et exposés depuis 1957, ils furent progressivement intégrés dans la discussion interprétative concernant les vases rituels du sanctuaire de Déméter et Korè d’Éleusis. En 2010, ils furent discutés de nouveau, dans un article de la Revue Kernos, dédié à ces vases. La scène identique (...) qui orne les deux lames semble faire référence au rituel final des Mystères d’Éleusis, les plémochoès ; elle est pourtant sans parallèle dans l’art grec antique. La réévaluation du support comme du décor iconographique a mené progressivement à une mise en cause de leur authenticité. Il doit s’agir d’une œuvre produite aux temps modernes, vers 1915. (shrink)

Overview * Part I: Introduction * Philip Appleman, Darwin: On Changing the Mind * Part II: Darwin’s Life * Ernst Mayr, Who Is Darwin? * Part III: Scientific Thought: Just before Darwin * Sir Gavin de Beer, Biology before the Beagle * Thomas Robert Malthus, An Essay on the Principle of Population * William Paley, Natural Theology * Jean Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet Lamarck, Zoological Philisophy * Charles Lyell, Principles of Geology * John Herschell, The Study of Natural (...) Philosophy * William Whewell, Astronomy and General Physics Considered with Reference to Natural Theology * Alfred Russel Wallace, On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type * Part IV: Selections from Darwin’s Work * The Voyage of the Beagle * o Chapter I. St. Jago-Cape de Verd Island o Chapter XVII. Galapagos Archipelago * On the Tendency of Species to Form Varieties; and On the Perpetuation of Varieties and Species by Natural Means of Selection * o I. Extract from an unpublished Work on Species, by C. Darwin, Esq.... o II.of Letter from C. Darwin, Esq., to Prof. Asa Gray, Boston, U.S., dated Down, September 5th, 1857 * An Historical Sketch of the Progress of Opinion on the Origin of Species, previously to the : Publication of This Work The Origin of Species * o Introduction o Chapter I. Variation under Domestication o Chapter II. Variation under Nature o Chapter III. Struggle for Existence o Chapter IV. Natural Selection o Chapter VI. Difficulties on Theory o Chapter IX. On the Imperfections of the Geological Record o Chapter XIII. Mutual Affinities of Organic Beings: Morphology: Embryology: Rudimentary Organs o Chapter XIV. Recapitulation and Conclusion * The Descent of Man * o Introduction o Chapter I. The Evidence of the Descent of Man from Some Lower Form o Chapter II. On the Manner of Development of Man from Some Lower Form o Chapter III. Comparison of the Mental Powers of Man and the Lower Animals o Chapter VI. On the Affinities and Genealogy of Man o Chapter VIII. Principles of Sexual Selection o Chapter XIX. Secondary Sexual Characters of Man o Chapter XX. Secondary Sexual Characters of Man-continued o Chapter XXI. General Summary and Conclusion * Part V: Darwin’s Influence on Science * THE VICTORIAN OPPOSITION TO DARWIN * o David L. Hull, Darwin and His Critics o Adam Sedgwick, Objections to Mr. Darwin’s Theory of the Origin of Species o Sir Richard Owen, Darwin on the Origin of Species o Fleeming Jenkin, Review of the Origin of Species * VICTORIAN SUPPORTERS OF DARWIN * o Joseph Dalton Hooker, Flora Tasmaniae o Thomas Henry Huxley, On the Relations of Man to the Lowe Animals o Charles Lyell, Principles of Geology o Alfred Russel Wallace, The Debt of Science to Darwin * DARWIN AND THE SHAPING OF MODERN SCIENCE * o Scientific Method in Evolution o National Academy of Sciences, Evolution and the Nature of Science o Richard Dawkins, Explaining the Very Improbable o Lewis Thomas, On the Uncertainty of Science o Noretta Koetge, Postmodernisms and the Problem of Scientific Literary o Richard Dawkins, Science and Sensibility o The Neo-Darwinian Synthesis o Peter Bowler, The Evolutionary Synthesis o The Human Genealogy o Adam Kuper, The Chosen Primate o Ian Tattersall, Out of Africa Again... and Again? o Stephen Jay Gould, The Human Difference o Punctuated Equilibrium o Stephen Jay Gould, [On Punctuated Equilibrium] o Niles Eldredge, The Great Stasis Debate o Rethinking Taxonomy o Kevin Padian, Darwin’s Views of Classification o David L. Hull, Cladistic Analysis o Kevin Padian and Luis M. Chiappe, Cladistics in Action: The Origin of Birds and Their Flight o Evolution as Observable Fact o James L. Gould and William T. Keeton with Carol Grant Gould, How Natural Selection Operates o Peter r. Grant, Natural Selection and Darwin’s Finches o John A. Endler, Natural Selection in the Wild * Part VI: Darwinian Patterns in Social Thought * COMPETITION AND COOPERATION * o Richard Hofstadter, The Vogue of Spencer o Andrew Carnegie, The Gospel of Wealth o Peter Kropotkin, Mutual Aid o Martin A. Nowak, Robert M. May, and Karl Sigmund, The Arithmetics of Mutual Help * NATURE AND NURTURE * o Edward O. Wilson, Sociobiology: The New Synthesis o Stephen Jay Gould, Biological Potentiality vs. Biological Determination o Barbara Ehrenreich and Janet McIntosh, The New Creationism: Biology under Attack * EVOLUTION AND GENDER * o Elizabeth Cady Stanton, The Woman’s Bible o Nancy Makepeace Tanner, On Becoming Human o Evelleen Richards, Darwin and the Descent of Woman o James Eli Adams, Woman Red in Tooth and Claw * EVOLUTION AND OTHER DISCIPLINES * o Edward O. Wilson, [On Consilience] o Randolph H. Nesse and George C. Williams, Evolution and the Origin of Disease o Steven Pinker, How the Mind Works o Steve Jones, The Set within the Skull * Part VII: Darwinian Influences in Philosophy and Ethics * John Dewey, The Influence of Darwin on Philosophy * Daniel C. Dennett, Darwin’s Dangerous Idea: Natural Selection as an Algorithmic Process * Michael Ruse Darwinian Epistemology * Thomas Henry Huxley, Evolution and Ethics * Julian Huxley, Evolutionary Ethics * Michael Ruse and Edward O. Wilson, The Evolution of Ethics * Frans de Waal, Good Natured: The Origin of Right and Wrong in Humans and Other Animals * Matt Ridley, The Origins of Virtue * Part VIII: Evolutionary Theory and Religious Theory * MAINSTREAM RELIGIOUS SUPPORT FOR EVOLUTION * o Pope John Paul II, Message to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences o Central Conference of American Rabbis, On Creationism in School Textbooks o United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., Evolution and Creationsim o The Lutheran World Federation, [Statement on Evolution] o The General Convention of the Episcopal Church, Resolution on Evolutionism and Creationism o Unitariuan Universalist Association, Resolution Opposing "Scientific Creationism" * FUNDAMENTALIST CREATIONISM * o Eugene C. Scott, Antievolution and Creationism in the United States o The Scopes Trial o Thomas McIver, Orthodox Jewish Creationists o Harun Yahya, [Islamic Creationism] o Seami Srila Prabhupada, [A Hare Krishna on Darwinian Evolution] o Institute for Creation Research, Tenets of Creationism o Henry M. Morris, Scientific Creationism o Thomas J. Wheeler, Review of Morris o Richard D. Sjolund and Betty McCollister, Evolution at the Grass Roots o Richard D. Sjolund, [Creationism versus Biotechnology] o Betty McCollister, [The Politics of Creationism] o Molleen Matsumara, What Do Christians Really Believe about Evolution? o National Center for Science Education, Seven Significant Court Decisions Regarding Evolution/Creation Issues * PERSONAL INCREDULITY AND ANTIEVOLUTIONISM * o Richard Dawkins, [The Argument from Personal Incredulity] o Phillip E. Johnson, Darwin on Trial o Eugenie C. Scott, Review of Johnson o Michael Behe, Darwin’s Black Box o Robert Dorit, Review of Behe o Michael Ruse, Darwin’s New Critics on Trial * SCIENTISTS’ OPPOSITION TO CREATIONISM * o American Association for the Advancement of Science, Forced Teaching of Creationist Beliefs in Public School Science Education o American Institute of Biological Sciences, Resolution Oposing Creationism in Science Courses o National Association of Biology Teachers, Statement on Teaching Evolution o National Academy of Sciences, Frequently Asked Questions about Evolution and the Nature of Science * FUNDAMENTALIST CREATIONISM AND THE VALUE OF SATIRE * o Michael Shermer, Genesis Revisted: A Scientific Creation Story o Philip Appleman, Darwin’s Ark * Part IX: Darwin and the Literary Mind * DARWIN’S LITERARY SENSIBILITY * o Charles Darwin, Autobiography o L. Robert Stevens, Darwin’s Humane Reading o George Levine, Darwin and Pain: Why Science Made Shakespeare Nauseating o Gillian Beer, Darwin’s Plots * DARWIN’S INFLUENCE ON LITERATURE * o Lionel Stevenson, Darwin among the Poets o George Levine, Darwin among the Novelists o Joseph Wood Krutch, The Tragic Fallacy o Herbert J. Muller, Modern Tragedy o Philip Appleman, Darwin-Sightings in Recent Literature. (shrink)

O texto situa em seu contexto as Conferências Públicas e apresenta o seu papel no projeto de Instrução Pública e Organização do Ensino, proposto por Jean Antoine Nicolas de Caritat, marquês de Condorcet , que deu origem ao decreto sobre Instrução Pública aprovado na Assembléia Nacional da França Revolucionária em 1792. Ao final, caberá uma breve comparação entre os objetivos das Conferências Públicas dispostos por Condorcet com o recente programa Escola da Família, do governo do Estado de São Paulo, (...) para evidenciar o contraste entre duas políticas liberais para a educação. The essay places in context the Public conferences and presented his paper on the design of Public Instruction and Education Organization, proposed by Jean Antoine Nicolas de Caritat, Marquis de Condorcet , which led to the decree on Public Instruction approved National Assembly of Revolutionary France in 1792. In the end, it will be a brief comparison between the objectives of Public Conferences arranged by Condorcet at the recent Family School program, the state government of St. Paul, to highlight the contrast between two liberal policies for education. (shrink)

In 1641 Descartes published, in the very first edition of his Meditations, six sets of objections to that work written by prominent contemporaries, plus his own replies to the objections. In the fourth set of those objections the Augustinian and Jansenist, Antoine Arnauld, wrote, “The first thing that I find remarkable is that our distinguished author has laid down as the basis for his entire philosophy exactly the same principle as that laid down by St. Augustine.” With these words (...) Arnauld set off the longest-standing and one of the most persistent controversies in Cartesian scholarship: What exactly is the nature and extent of Augustine’s influence on Descartes? (shrink)

The Oxford Handbook of Descartes and Cartesianism comprises fifty specially written chapters on Rene Descartes and Cartesianism, the dominant paradigm for philosophy and science in the seventeenth century, written by an international group of leading scholars of early modern philosophy. The first part focuses on the various aspects of Descartes's biography and philosophy, with chapters on his epistemology, method, metaphysics, physics, mathematics, moral philosophy, political thought, medical thought, and aesthetics. The chapters of the second part are devoted to the defense, (...) development and modification of Descartes's ideas by later generations of Cartesian philosophers in France, the Netherlands, Italy, and elsewhere. The third and final part considers the opposition to Cartesian philosophy by other philosophers, as well as by civil, ecclesiastic, and academic authorities. This handbook provides an extensive overview of Cartesianism - its doctrines, its legacies and its fortunes - in the period based on the latest research. (shrink)

This book is an introduction, entirely by example, to the possibilities of using computer models as tools in phosophical research in general and in philosophical logic in particular. Topics include chaos, fractals, and the semantics of paradox; epistemic dynamics; fractal images of formal systems; the evolution of generosity; real-valued game theory; and computation and undecidability in the spatialized Prisoner's Dilemma.

We work with a large spatialized array of individuals in an environment of drifting food sources and predators. The behavior of each individual is generated by its simple neural net; individuals are capable of making one of two sounds and are capable of responding to sounds from their immediate neighbors by opening their mouths or hiding. An individual whose mouth is open in the presence of food is “fed” and gains points; an individual who fails to hide when a predator (...) is present is “hurt” by losing points. Opening mouths, hiding, and making sounds each exact an energy cost. There is no direct evolutionary gain for acts of cooperation or “successful communication” per se. In such an environment we start with a spatialized array of neural nets with randomized weights. Using standard learning algorithms, our individuals “train up” on the behavior of successful neighbors at regular intervals. Given that simple setup, will a community of neural nets evolve a simple language for signaling the presence of food and predators? With important qualifications, the answer is “yes.” In a simple spatial environment, pursuing individualistic gains and using partial training on successful neighbors, randomized neural nets can learn to communicate. (shrink)

This article shows how Plato’sParmenidesexplores the relationship between place and the geometric forms that are inscribed in it, independently of sensation, becoming and causality. The analysis concurs with essential points of what is said in theTimaeusaboutkhôra, this receptacle deprived of any intrinsic qualities, on which every sensitive reality is drawn.

L’étude des troubles de la voix et de la parole est sortie du cadre de la recherche clinique. Par l’observation des dysfonctionnements, les chercheurs non cliniciens confrontent les résultats de leur recherche établis sur des corpus de parole « normale » à des situations de dysfonctionnement. Le défi est immense car le cadre « pathologique » induit une variation considérable dans ses manifestations de surface. Toute généralisation à une population clinique particulière nécessite l’observation d’un grand nombre de patients du fait (...) de la très forte variation interindividuelle. Il est donc important de capitaliser et mutualiser les enregistrements existants. Or pour être utilisables, ces enregistrements doivent répondre à de fortes exigences. Le maillon faible reste la normalisation et la structuration des données sur les locuteurs et leurs productions langagières. Concrètement, si les données sonores sont souvent accessibles, elles ne présentent au final aucun intérêt si les liens entre les enregistrements et les caractéristiques cliniques du locuteur sont rompus ou erronés. L’objectif de ce travail est de présenter différentes actions de terrain et de proposer des recommandations pour la structuration des données sonores, physiologiques et cliniques dans le cas de corpus de parole issue de patients atteints de troubles de la voix et de la parole. (shrink)

What do we mean when we say we want to put children at the centre of policy? What are the moral justifications for this approach? Has it become harder for us to understand this concept, when in practice paid work has been at the centre? In part confusion arises because the unpaid work of caring for children is invisible until it is marketized. In turn, the underlying problem is that we have forgotten our traditions of egalitarianism and adopted a powerful (...) mindset that is proving to be paralyzing. Exploring New Zealand family policies such as paid parental leave, early childhood education, child tax credits suggests that there is much room for improvement if the needs of children are to come first. But first and foremost we must have a very different, child-centric, colour-blind, non-judgmental change of heart. (shrink)

I argue that the coincidence of statue and matter is a special case of a common linguistic phenomenon: the use of partitive terms to individuate uses of non-count nouns (NCNs). By marking partitives and NCNs, we can easily account for the intuition that a statue and its matter are identical.