Complete works of Maṇḍanamiśra, Indian philosopher; includes study on his work also.

Das »Richtige und das Gute« (1930), das ethische Hauptwerk W. D. Ross’, enthält eine Vielzahl wichtiger moralphilosophischer Thesen und Argumente, die bis in die Gegenwart kontrovers diskutiert werden. Im Mittelpunkt steht seine pluralistische Deontologie, der zufolge sich die richtige Handlung aus einer Abwägung der in der jeweiligen Situation relevanten und unableitbaren Prima-facie-Pflichten ergibt, von denen nur ein Teil auf die Optimierung der Handlungsfolgen bezogen ist. Diese Deontologie wurde zu einem modernen Klassiker unter den normativen ethischen Theorien. Darüber hinaus stellt Ross’ (...) These, dass moralische Intuitionen eine Quelle selbstevidenten Wissens sein können, einen wichtigen Referenzpunkt in Debatten um den erkenntnistheoretischen Fundamentalismus dar. Auch für die Handlungstheorie liefert Ross einflussreiche Argumente, wenn er die Ansicht vertritt, dass Pflichten nie ein bestimmtes Motiv des Handelnden zum Gegenstand haben können. Eine zentrale Stellung nimmt für Ross die Güterlehre ein, in welcher er von vier Grundgütern, Tugend, Wissen, Lust und Gerechtigkeit, ausgeht. Wurde Ross in den ersten Jahrzehnten des 20. Jahrhunderts im damaligen Großbritannien als ein herausragender Ethiker – einer der bedeutendsten des Jahrhunderts, auf Augenhöhe mit G.E. Moore – angesehen, wandelte sich das Meinungsbild in den folgenden Jahrzehnten unter dem Einfluss besonders des Logischen Positivismus und der Philosophie Wittgensteins. In den letzten Jahrzehnten ist jedoch wieder ein wachsendes Interesse an Ross’ Ethik festzustellen. Dabei wird »Das Richtige und das Gute« bisweilen sogar mit der »Nikomachischen Ethik«, Kants »Grundlegung« und Humes »Untersuchung über die Prinzipien der Moral« verglichen. (shrink)

In this article, we develop an approach for the moral assessment of research and development networks on the basis of the reflective equilibrium approach proposed by Rawls and Daniels. The reflective equilibrium approach aims at coherence between moral judgments, principles, and background theories. We use this approach because it takes seriously the moral judgments of the actors involved in R & D, whereas it also leaves room for critical reflection about these judgments. It is shown that two norms, namely reflective (...) learning and openness and inclusiveness, which are used in the literature on policy and technological networks, contribute to achieving a justified overlapping consensus. We apply the approach to a case study about the development of an innovative sewage treatment technology and show how in this case the two norms are or could be instrumental in achieving a justified overlapping consensus on relevant moral issues. (shrink)

Although Broad published many books in his lifetime, this volume is unique in presenting some of his most interesting unpublished writings. Divided into five clear sections, the following figures and topics are covered: Autobiography, Hegel and the nature of philosophy, Francis Bacon, Hume's philosophy of the self and belief, F. H. Bradley, The historical development of scientific thought from Pythagoras to Newton, Causation, Change and continuity, Quantitative methods, Poltergeists, Paranormal phenomena. -/- Each section is introduced and placed in context by (...) the editor, Joel Walmsley. The volume also includes an engaging and informative foreword by Simon Blackburn. It will be of great value to those studying and researching the history of twentieth-century philosophy, metaphysics, and the recent history and philosophy of science, as well as anyone interested in Broad's philosophical thought and his place in the history of philosophy. (shrink)

The group of Dialectical Theology (also known as Neo-Orthodoxy) included some of the most well-known theologians of the 20th century – Karl Barth, Rudolf Bultmann, Friedrich Gogarten, Eduard Thurneysen, Georg Merz und Emil Brunner. In the summer of 1922 they founded the journal Zwischen den Zeiten, which launched Dialectical Theology as the most influential avant-garde movement in Protestantism during the Weimar Republic. Due to internal strife and theological disagreements, the group began to lose strength in the early 1930s and eventually (...) split up and ceased publishing Zwischen den Zeiten in 1933. The individual members later became fierce critics of each other’s theological works. Gogarten and Barth became arch enemies during the so-called “church struggle” (Kirchenkampf), and Bultmann and Barth became each other’s nemesis in the Federal Republic of Germany.In this article I examine the rise and fall of this movement. I argue that the concept “generation” was central to the early self-understanding and selfjustification of the group. It allowed the group to forge an alliance and oppose an antagonistic group of influential theologians. The claim to speak up for a young generation of theologians and pastors – in opposition to an older, liberal generation – became the rallying cry for Dialectical Theology. Further, I argue that conferences, not only the theological writings, played a central, constitutive role in establishing the group as a theological movement. It was at conferences that the members of Dialectical Theology could challenge the older generation and assert their own theological stance. Instead of merely concentrating on the published theological writings of each of the members, I thus argue that one must additionally focus on the applied concepts and the role of conferences to understand the history of Dialectical Theology. It is only when we include these additional contexts that we understand how Dialectical Theology was able to be launched and sustained as a theological movement despite the irreconcilable differences amongst the members. (shrink)

Science naively presupposes the intelligibility of the universe, necessary laws, and a universal truth. The author reflects on these presuppositions to arrive at a demonstration of God's existence. In a vigorous and exclamatory style, he condemns the alternative views of idealism, phenomenology, and philosophies of science which cannot rationally justify their faith in a universal truth. The only rational basis for these presuppositions is a theistic God--the "Vérité mesurante" and "Pensée fondatrice" of scientific reason.--A. B. D.

In Intellectual Life in the Ḥijāz before Wahhabism, Naser Dumairieh argues that, as a result of changing global conditions facilitating the movement of scholars and texts, the seventeenth-century Ḥijāz was one of the most important intellectual centers of the Islamic world, acting as a hub between its different parts. Positioning Ibrāhīm al-Kūrānī as representative of the intellectual activities of the pre-Wahhabism Ḥijāz, Dumairieh argues that his coherent philosophical system represents a synthesis of several major post-classical traditions of Islamic thought, namely (...) kalām and Akbarian appropriations of Avicennian metaphysics. Al-Kūrānī's work is the culmination of the philosophized Akbarian tradition; with his reconciliation of Ibn ʻArabī's ideas with Ashʻarī theology, Ibn ʻArabī's ideas became Islamic theology. (shrink)

The old, historical concept of ‘disinterestedness’ has dominated the tradition of aesthetics for almost two centuries. In environmental aesthetics, a rather recent branch of aesthetics, some scholars such as Arnold Berleant have criticized disinterestedness, claiming that it is not a satisfactory criterion since it views the environment as an artwork. As an alternative, Berleant proposes a theory of the ‘aesthetics of engagement’. I claim that although his main intention is to introduce a comprehensive perception of nature, ‘appreciating nature as nature’, (...) into the aesthetics of nature, Berleant misinterprets ‘disinterestedness’ and overlooks the fact that it can still be maintained within environmental aesthetics. Disinterestedness can guide our judgements with the notions of non-instrumentality, transparent self, and impartiality. In this sense, I argue that the proper opposite of engagement is not disinterestedness but a dominant concept of aesthetics left over from the eighteenth century, the ‘picturesque’, in contrast to holistic accounts of the philosophers who look for an immersion-of-self-in-a-bigger-Self, disinterestedness provides being devoid-of-any-empirical-self and disinterestedness is not anthropocentric, but anthropogenic, human-generated, which accepts the ‘otherness’ of nature and opens the way for respect and care in environmental ethics. (shrink)

يغتر بنو آدم بما يسوقه الله إليهم من حلمٍ وعفو عن سوء صنيعهم وجُرم ما اقترفت أيديهم...يغترون بحلم الله...يغرهم جهلهم..ويدفعهم طيشهم إلى إعلان الحرب على الوجود كله حتى على الله ذاته، وجهوا إلى إرادته سبحانه سهام حرابهم، وسوء مكرهم..ولعنات خداعهم..قتلوا الإنسان صنع الله...حاربوا الله باسم الله...أضاعوا الدين..كل الدين باسم الدين...قتلوا العدل فى محرابه عاكفًا يصلى لربه باسم العدالة..هتكوا عرض الإنسانية ثم جلسوا يمصون دمائها بأيديهم الآثمة..ويكأنهم لم يقدموا لها سوءًا..ويكأنهم بقتلها أحسنوا إليها صنيعًا.. يالسوء ماقدمت الإنسانية لبنى الإنسان، يالسوء ما (...) خلفوا ربهم بعد ميثاقه الأول والأشهر، فكانوا النموذج الأسوأ للخلافة، والصورة المضادة تمامًا لطبيعة المستخلف وجوهر إرادته، فما تركوا حرابًا ولا ظلمًا ولا إثمًا إلا اقترفوه، وما تركوا جراحًا ملتاثة بلعينهم إلا وأوسعوها جرحًا وأوغروها نزقًا وأعمقوها حزنًا فكانت تلك هى مكتسباتهم ، فى حين كانت إرادة السماء رحمات الأرض وأمنها وسلامها...ولكنهم..ويالذل ما قدموا للإنسانية، أجهزوا عليها صريعة، فطالت سهام قتلهم وحرابهم السماء ذاتها، تلك التى امتدت إليهم بحنوها وعطفها، فلم تسلم من ثورتهم وقتلهم وظلماتهم، فكانوا بحق هم الثائرون ضد الله... (shrink)

Collingwood’s ‘art-proper’ definition has been controversial. Wollheim argues that his Theory of Imagination assumes that the nature of the artwork exists solely in the mind, committing him to the Ideal Theory. Consequently, when Collingwood states that the audience is essential for the artist and the artwork, he is being inconsistent. In contrast, Ridley claims that Collingwood’s Expression Theory saves him from Wollheim’s accusations; hence he is consistent and does not support the Ideal Theory. I demonstrate that Collingwood both adheres to (...) the Ideal Theory and is consistent in his art theory. I show that imagination is the sufficient condition of art and expression is the process of art’s coming into existence. I argue that Collingwood is consistent in his theory because the audience and the externalization of the work are needed for an appreciation and understanding of the artwork as either good or bad, as either a work of a corrupt consciousness or not. Hence, an account of the role of externalization is a contribution to the epistemology, not the ontology, of art. (shrink)

An appropriate kind of curved Hilbert space is developed in such a manner that it admits operators of $\mathcal{C}$ - and $\mathfrak{D}$ -differentiation, which are the analogues of the familiar covariant and D-differentiation available in a manifold. These tools are then employed to shed light on the space-time structure of Quantum Mechanics, from the points of view of the Feynman ‘path integral’ and of canonical quantisation. (The latter contains, as a special case, quantisation in arbitrary curvilinear coordinates when space is (...) flat.) The influence of curvature is emphasised throughout, with an illustration provided by the Aharonov-Bohm effect. (shrink)

A brief statement of medieval linguistic analysis as found chiefly in the works of Thomas Aquinas. A thin survey of contemporary analysis is offered in order to contrast the purported acceptance of analysis as the end of philosophy with Thomas' use of analysis as method. Unfortunately, most of the constructive work in language analysis during the past ten years is not considered. The brevity of the text precludes persuasive treatment; yet the book succeeds in its expressed purpose of sketching some (...) chief differences between the medieval and contemporary approaches in the hope that the confrontation of these currents will bring to the fore the analytic work of Aquinas himself.--D. P. B. (shrink)

Classical treatise on Advaita Ontology; critical edition with commentary and supercommentaries.