This volume focuses on the gradual emergence of modern Indian philosophy through the cross-cultural encounter between indigenous Indian and Western traditions of philosophy, during the colonial period in India, specifically in the 19th and early 20th centuries. This volume acknowledges that what we take 'Indian philosophy' or 'modern Indian philosophy' to mean today is the sub-text of a much wider, complex and varied Indian reception of the West during the colonial period. Consisting of -twelve chapters and a thematic introduction, the (...) volume addresses the role of academic philosophy in the cultural and social ferment of the colonial period in India and its impact on the development of cross-cultural philosophy, the emergence of a cosmopolitan consciousness in colonial India; as also the philosophical contribution of India to cultural globalization. The issue of colonialism and emergence of new identities in India has engaged the critical attention of scholars from diverse fields of inquiry such as history, sociology, politics, and subaltern studies. However, till today the emergence of modern Indian philosophy remains an unexplored area of inquiry. Much of the academic philosophical work of this period, despite its manifest philosophical originality and depth, stands largely ignored, not only abroad, but even in India. This neglect needs to be overcome by a re-reading of philosophical writings in English produced by scholars located in the universities of colonial India. This edited volume will facilitate further explorations into the presence of colonial tensions as they are visible in the writings of modern Indian academic philosophers like B. N. Seal, Hiralal Haldar, Rasvihary Das,, G. R. Malkani, K. C. Bhattacharyya,. G. N. Mathrani and others. (shrink)

Neuroscientists are searching for the engram within the conceptual framework established by John Locke's theory of mind. This framework was elaborated before the development of information theory, before the development of information processing machines and the science of computation, before the discovery that molecules carry hereditary information, before the discovery of the codon code and the molecular machinery for editing the messages written in this code and translating it into transcription factors that mark abstract features of organic structure such as (...) anterior and distal. The search for the engram needs to abandon Locke's conceptual framework and work within a framework informed by these developments. The engram is the medium by which information extracted from past experience is transmitted to the computations that inform future behavior. The information-conveying symbols in the engram are rapidly generated in the course of computations, which implies that they are molecules. (shrink)

The title may be understood in three ways. Firstly, the truth under study is the truth about freedom. We speak of the truth of something, in as much as we presume that there are many misconceptions about that something, and it stands in need of clarification. Thus, the many misconceptions about freedom will have to be divested, if freedom is to be rightly grasped. Secondly, in the sense that there is a truth in the core of freedom, indeed, truth is (...) the essence of freedom. If truth is to be rightly grasped, its core has to be penetrated. Thirdly, there is a deeper relation between truth and freedom. Freedom cannot be understood, much less rightly practised, if we do not comprehend the necessary relation that freedom bears to truth. This essay purports to study all three senses, not quite generally, but with special reference to Ratzinger, the German theologian-cum-phenomenologist of religion, who also happens to be the current pope Benedict XVI of the Catholic Christianity. The study proceeds in three stages. First of all, I will give the statement of the problem. Secondly, I will briefly dwell on the modern Western history of freedom. Thirdly, I will study the interface between freedom and truth, highlighting the nature of human freedom, the relation between freedom and responsibility, and the relation between freedom and the truth of human existence itself. The essay is more interpretive than evaluative, with an eye to be as close to the insightful thoughts of Ratzinger as possible. (shrink)

Recent reports published by the United Nations and the World Health Organization suggest that the brain drain of healthcare professionals from the developing to the developed world is decimating the provision of healthcare in poor countries. The migration of these key workers is driven by a combination of economic inequalities and the recruitment policies of governments in the rich world. This article assesses the impact of the healthcare brain drain and argues that wealthy countries have a moral obligation to reduce (...) the flow of healthcare workers from the developing to the developed world. (shrink)

Statisticians in medicine can disagree on appropriate methodology applicable to the design and analysis of clinical trials. So called Bayesians and frequentists both claim ethical superiority. This paper, by defining and then linking together various dichotomies, argues there is a place for both statistical camps. The choice between them depends on the phase of clinical trial, disease prevalence and severity, but supremely on the ethics underlying the particular trial. There is always a tension present between physicians primarily obligated to their (...) own patients (the weight of 'individual ethics') and ethical committees responsible for the scientific merit of the trial and its long-term implications ('collective ethics'). Individual ethics, it is proposed, favour the Bayesian approach; collective ethics, the frequentist. Though in some situations the choice appears clear-cut, there remain other where both methodologies can be appropriate. (shrink)