Presentism is the view that only present things exist. So understood, presentism is primarily an ontological doctrine; it’s a view about what exists, absolutely and unrestrictedly. The view is the subject of extensive discussion in the literature on time and change, with much of it focused on the problems that presentism allegedly faces. Thus, most of the literature that frames the development of presentism has grown up either in formulating objections to the view (e.g., Sider 2001: 11–52), or in response (...) to such objections (e.g., Bigelow 1996; Markosian 2004), with exceptions to this largely coming via the ways in which presentism is motivated. This entry mirrors the structure of that literature, for the most part. Here’s the plan for what follows. We begin with a more detailed sketch of presentism, unpacking its commitments and motivations. Then, we move to consider several concerns raised for presentists. We use these to illustrate the breadth and severity of the challenges that presentism faces, as well as the range of different versions of presentism developed to help meet these challenges. (shrink)

Most land plants associate with mycorrhizal fungi that can connect roots of neighboring plants in common mycelial networks (CMNs). Recent evidence shows that CMNs transfer warning signals of pathogen and aphid attack between plants. However, we do not know how defence‐related signaling via CMNs operates or how ubiquitous it is. Nor do we know what the ecological relevance and fitness consequences are, particularly from the perspective of the mycorrhizal fungus. Here, we focus on the potential fitness benefits for mycorrhizal fungi (...) and outline hypothetical scenarios in which signal transfer via CMNs is modulated in order to acquire the most benefit for the fungus (i.e. acquisition of carbon) for minimal cost. We speculate that the signal may be quantitative and may elicit plant defence responses on different levels depending on the distance the signal is transferred. Finally, we discuss the possibility of practical applications of this phenomenon for crop protection. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to assess the relationship between involvement in three aspects of congregational life and spiritual growth. In addition, an effort is made to see if spiritual growth may, in turn, affect health. A latent variable model was developed to test the following hypotheses: individuals who attend worship services more often, attend Bible study and prayer group meetings more frequently, and individuals who receive more spiritual support from fellow church members will be more likely to report (...) they have experienced spiritual growth; people who experience more spiritual growth will be more likely to derive a deeper sense of meaning in life; and individuals who have developed a deeper sense of meaning in life will enjoy better health. Data from the U.S. Congregational Life Survey suggests that spiritual support has the stronger relationship with spiritual growth than either worship service attendance or involvement in formal church groups. The findings further reveal that greater spiritual growth is associated with a deeper sense of meaning in life and meaning, in turn, is associated with better health. (shrink)

Rights, Democracy, and Fulfillment in the Era of Identity Politics develops a critical theory of human rights and global democracy. Ingram both develops a theory of rights and applies it to a range of concrete and timely issues, such as the persistence of racism in contemporary American society; the emergence of so-called 'whiteness theory;' the failure of identity politics; the tensions between emphases on antidiscrimination and affirmative action in the Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990; the great unresolved issues (...) of workplace democracy; and the dilemmas of immigration policy for the U.S. and Europe. (shrink)

This chapter surveys the various critical theory approaches from Marx to the present in the study of poverty and underdevelopment in relationship to capitalism, democracy, and intersectionality.

The article is a comprehensive comparison of Foucault and Habermas which focuses on their distinctive styles of critical theory. The article maintains that Foucault's virtue ethical understanding of aesthetic self-realization as a form of resistance to normalizing practices provides counterpoint to Habermas's more juridical approach to institutional justice and the critique of ideology. The article contains an extensive discussion of their respective treatments of speech action, both strategic and communicative, and concludes by addressing Foucault's understanding of parrhesia as a non-discursive (...) form of truth-telling. (shrink)

This chapter explores the contributions that the Frankfurt School of critical theory has made to philosophical discussions about the meaning and injustice of poverty. Critical theorists interpret poverty to mean more than material deprivation, and they see its injustice as 2 extending beyond wrongful suffering and the threat to a human right to life to encompass psychological impoverishment and dehumanization. The chapter begins by examining critical theory’s historical roots in the Marxist critique of capitalism. The next section discusses early efforts (...) by critical theorists to extend this critique to state-administered economies (capitalist and socialist) that have succeeded in sharply reducing absolute poverty at the cost of increasing relative poverty and domination. Later efforts by critical theorists focus on the social pathologies (or impoverishment of agency) caused by bureaucratic social welfare interventions aimed at controlling poverty and underdevelopment in developed capitalist societies. In North America, critical theorists expand this analysis to include intersectional categories of gender and racial oppression and emphasize the persistence of relative poverty within the Global North. The third section examines recent efforts by critical theorists to conceptualize global capitalism in its relationship to colonialism and as a crisis-ridden, impoverished form of life that portends unsustainable and uneven development. This is followed by an examination of one critical theory approach that has proven to be especially useful for illuminating the various forms of psychological harm attendant on capitalist poverty: recognition theory. The chapter concludes with a critical look at critical theory’s sociology of poverty as a theory of progressive enlightenment and emancipation. (shrink)

This chapter proposes a critical examination of ideological tendencies at work in two main democratic theories currently at play within the critical theory tradition: the deliberative theory advanced famously by Habermas and his acolytes, and the partisan theory advanced by Mouffe and others influenced by Gramsci and Schmitt. Explaining why these theories appeal to distinctive social groups on the Left, divided mainly by education and economic status, it argues that neither theory accounts for the possibility of a Left democratic, party-based (...) politics with broad appeal. Exhibiting tendencies that weaken party-based politics, each of these theories encourages populist forms of politics that obstruct democratic, emancipatory struggle. Their linkage being an essential condition for emancipatory struggle, I conclude that structural changes in capitalism, web-based communication, education, and working conditions offer limited opportunities to revitalize Left party politics with the popular support needed to reconnect working masses with party elites as both seek solutions to their precarity under global capitalism. (shrink)

Herbert Marcuse’s essay Repressive Tolerance (RP) has been praised by the Left and vilified by the Right for its alleged promotion of censorship targeting reactionary opinions and actions. I argue that this interpretation of the text is mistaken. According to my alternative reading of the text, RP should be understood as an exercise in provocation and irony aimed at defending civil disobedience and dissent. Marcuse’s defense of dissent, however, appeals to a critique of pure tolerance that exposes the unavoidably partisan (...) practice of tolerance, which invariably favors the reigning undemocratic status quo. The choice whether to tolerate in a manner that discriminates in favor of opinions and actions that are likely to advance the democratic conditions essential to a more just and epistemically sound exercise of toleration or to discriminate in favor of those that hinder them ---a distinction, as Marcuse sees it, that corresponds to the distinction between the Left and the Right---is dictated by reason itself, whose exercise depends on toleration. Because toleration must discriminate in the absence of full reason, its fallible exercise in favor of reason and democracy must proceed cautiously, not by suppressing voices on the Right so much as selectively encouraging those on the Left. I conclude that because this equation of impartial reason with a partisan view of society is unavoidable regardless of one’s political sympathies accusing Marcuse of being elitist and hypocritical is itself hypocritical. (shrink)

Respect for human dignity and the common good in democratic regimes cannot be sustained by reason alone. Citizen faith commitments endorsing both of these values are necessary. However, negotiating in practice the relationship between civic values and religious morality is extremely challenging in a democracy. As a contribution to greater balance in these matters, Ingram argues that the capacity of religion to promote democratic reform in a way that respects fair procedures (rule of law) must extend beyond the liberal (...) principle of tolerance. It must extend to recognizing the republican principle of non-domination. Ingram provides a thorough comparative analysis of the situations in Indonesia, Lithuania, and Peru to support his argument. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the discourse theoretic account of human rights defended by Jürgen Habermas contains a fruitful tension that is obscured by its dominant tendency to identify rights with legal claims. This weakness in Habermas’s account becomes manifest when we examine how sweatshops diminish the secure enjoyment of subsistence, which Habermas himself (in recognition of the UDHR) recognizes as a human right. Discourse theories of human rights are unique in tying the legitimacy of human rights to democratic (...) deliberation and consensus. So construed, their specific meaning and force is the outcome of historical political struggle. However, unlike other legal rights, they possess universal moral validity. In this paper I argue that this tension between the legal and moral aspects of human rights can be resolved if and only if human rights are conceived as moral aspirations and not simply as legal claims. In particular, I shall argue that there are two reasons why human rights must be understood as moral aspirations that function non-juridically: First, the basic human goods to which human rights provide secure access are determinable only in relation to basic human capabilities that are progressively revealed in the course of an indefinite (fully inclusive and universal) process of collective learning; second, the institutional impediments to enjoying human rights are cultural in nature and cannot be remedied by means of legal coercion. (shrink)

Machine learning algorithms may radically improve our ability to diagnose and treat disease. For moral, legal, and scientific reasons, it is essential that doctors and patients be able to understand and explain the predictions of these models. Scalable, customisable, and ethical solutions can be achieved by working together with relevant stakeholders, including patients, data scientists, and policy makers.

We trace the history of the Modern Evolutionary Synthesis, and of genetic Darwinism generally, with a view to showing why, even in its current versions, it can no longer serve as a general framework for evolutionary theory. The main reason is empirical. Genetical Darwinism cannot accommodate the role of development (and of genes in development) in many evolutionary processes. We go on to discuss two conceptual issues: whether natural selection can be the “creative factor” in a new, more general framework (...) for evolutionary theorizing; and whether in such a framework organisms must be conceived as self-organizing systems embedded in self-organizing ecological systems. (shrink)

Thisness Presentism outlines and defends a novel version of presentism, the view that only present entities exist and what is present really changes. Presentism is a view of time that captures a real and objective difference between what is past, present, and future, and which offers a model of reality that is dynamic and mutable, rather than static and immutable. The book advances a new defence of presentism by developing a novel ontology of thisness, combining insights about the nature of (...) essence, the metaphysics of propositions, and the relationship between true propositions and the elements of reality that make them true, alongside insights about time itself. It shows how, by accepting an ontology of thisness, presentists can respond to a number of pressing challenges to presentism, including claims that presentism cannot account for true propositions about the past, and that it is inconsistent with the reality of temporal passage and the openness of the future. This is one of the only book-length defences of presentism. It will be of interest to students and scholars working on the debate about presentism in the philosophy of time, as well as those interested in the metaphysics of propositions and truth-making, more generally. (shrink)

Presentists, who believe that only present objects exist, face a problem concerning truths about the past. Presentists should (but cannot) locate truth-makers for truths about the past. What can presentists say in response? We identify two rival factions ‘upstanding’ and ‘nefarious’ presentists. Upstanding presentists aim to meet the challenge, positing presently existing truth-makers for truths about the past; nefarious presentists aim to shirk their responsibilities, using the language of truth-maker theory but without paying any ontological price. We argue that presentists (...) should be nefarious presentists. (shrink)

Using the evolution of the stickleback family of subarctic fish as a touchstone, we explore the effect of new discoveries about regulatory genetics, developmental plasticity, and epigenetic inheritance on the conceptual foundations of the Modern Evolutionary Synthesis. Identifying the creativity of natural selection as the hallmark of the Modern Synthesis, we show that since its inception its adherents have pursued a variety of research projects that at first seemed to conflict with its principles, but were accommodated. We situate challenges coming (...) from developmental biology in a dialectic between innovation and tradition, suggesting on the basis of past episodes that even if developmental plasticity and epigenetic inheritance are aligned with its principles the Modern Synthesis will be significantly affected. (shrink)

The essays in this book discuss the originally proposed Baldwin effect, how it was modified over time, and its possible contribution to contemporary empirical...

Recently, some have attempted to reformulate debates in first-order metaphysics, particularly in the metaphysics of time and modality, for reasons due to Williamson. In this paper, we focus on the ways in which the likes of Cameron, Correia and Rosenkranz, Deasy, Ingram, Tallant, Viebahn, inter alia, have initiated and responded to attempts to capture the core of presentism using a formal, logical machinery. We argue that such attempts are doomed to fail because there is no theoretical core to presentism. (...) There is no single view or family of views that is presentism. (shrink)

Presentists believe that only present things exist. But opponents insist this view has unacceptable implications: if only present things exist, we can’t express singular propositions about the past, since the obvious propositional constituents don’t exist, nor can we account for temporal passage, or the openness of the future. According to such opponents, and in spite of the apparent ‘common sense’ status of the view, presentism should be rejected on the basis of these unacceptable implications. In this paper, I present and (...) defend a version of presentism that avoids the unacceptable implications. The basic strategy I employ is familiar—I postulate presently existing entities to serve as surrogates for non-present entities—but some of the details of my proposal are more novel, and their application to these problems is certainly novel. One overarching thesis of this paper is that Thisness Presentism is preferable to other versions of presentism since it solves important problems facing standard iterations of the view. And I assume that this is a good positive reason in favour of the underlying thisness ontology. (shrink)

Presentists, who believe that only present objects exist, should accept a thisness ontology, since it can do considerable work in defence of presentism. In this paper, I propose a version of presentism that involves thisnesses of past and present entities and I argue this view solves important problems facing standard versions of presentism.

In this paper, we defend Lucretian Presentism. Although the view faces many objections and has proven unpopular with presentists, we rehabilitate Lucretianism and argue that none of the objections stick.

Social movements are using education to generate critical consciousness regarding the social and environmental unsustainability of the current food system, and advocate for agroecological production. In this article, we explore results from a cross-case analysis of six social movements that are using education as a strategy to advance food sovereignty. We conducted participatory research with diverse rural and urban social movements in the United States, Brazil, Cuba, Bolivia, and Mexico, which are each educating for food sovereignty. We synthesize insights from (...) critical food systems education and the political ecology of education in analyzing these cases. We compare the thematic similarities and difference between these movements’ education initiatives in terms of their emergence, initial goals, expansion and institutionalization, relationship to the state, theoretical inspirations, pedagogical approach, educational topics, approach to student research, and outcomes. Among these thematic areas, we find that student-centered research on competing forms of production is an integral way to advance critical consciousness about the food system and the political potential of agroecological alternatives. However, what counts, as success in these programs, is highly case-dependent. For engaged scholars committed to advancing education for food sovereignty, it is essential to reflect upon the lessons learned and challenges faced by these movements. (shrink)

In his magnum opus, Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns, the distinguished philosopher Jurgen Habermas presented his ideas as a whole, providing the first major defense of his philosophy. David Ingram here summarizes the themes of Habermas's masterwork, placing them in the context of the philosopher's other work, relating them to poststructuralism, hermeneutics, and Neo-Aristotelianism, and surveying what other critics have said about Habermas. "Ingram's exposition of Habermas is impressive for its erudition and its faithful adherence to the major (...) contours of Habermas's work."—James Farganis, _Contemporary Sociology_ "A valuable contribution to the understanding of an important, but difficult, thinker."—_Ethics_ "The book is indispensable to an understanding of both Habermas and the contemporary human condition."—Scott Warren, _Social Science Quarterly _ "Ingram has done sociologists, philosophers, and political scientists a great service by demystifying Habermas's more recent theory of communicative action."—R. George Kirkpatrick, _American Journal of Sociology_ "Likely to be and to remain the leading study on Habermas's Theory of Communicative Action. What McCarthy did for Habermas's earlier writings, Ingram accomplishes for his more recent work."—Fred R. Dallmayr, University of Notre Dame. (shrink)

Presentists face a familiar problem. If only present objects exist, then what 'makes true' our true claims about the past? According to Ross Cameron, the 'truth-makers' for past and future tensed propositions are presently instantiated Temporal Distributional Properties. We present an argument against Cameron's view. There are two ways that we might understand the term 'distribute' as it appears. On one reading, the resulting properties are not up to the task of playing the truth-maker role; on the other, the properties (...) are incompatible with presentism. (shrink)

Presentism and Eternalism are competing views about the ontological and temporal structure of the world, introduced and demarcated by their answers to questions about what exists and whether what exists changes. The goal of this chapter is to give the reader a clear understanding of Presentism and Eternalism, and a sense of some considerations used to critically assess the views by briefly rehearsing some of the main philosophical problems facing them.

Ross Cameron proposes to reconcile presentism and truth-maker theory by invoking temporal distributional properties, instantiated by present entities, as the truth-makers for truths about the past. This chapter argues that Cameron's proposal fails because objects can change which temporal distributional properties they instantiate and this entails that the truth-values of truths about the past can change in an objectionable way.

The Darwinian concept of natural selection was conceived within a set of Newtonian background assumptions about systems dynamics. Mendelian genetics at first did not sit well with the gradualist assumptions of the Darwinian theory. Eventually, however, Mendelism and Darwinism were fused by reformulating natural selection in statistical terms. This reflected a shift to a more probabilistic set of background assumptions based upon Boltzmannian systems dynamics. Recent developments in molecular genetics and paleontology have put pressure on Darwinism once again. Current work (...) on self-organizing systems may provide a stimulus not only for increased problem solving within the Darwinian tradition, especially with respect to origins of life, developmental genetics, phylogenetic pattern, and energy-flow ecology, but for deeper understanding of the very phenomenon of natural selection itself. Since self-organizational phenomena depend deeply on stochastic processes, self-organizational systems dynamics advance the probability revolution. In our view, natural selection is an emergent phenomenon of physical and chemical selection. These developments suggest that natural selection may be grounded in physical law more deeply than is allowed by advocates of the autonomy of biology, while still making it possible to deny, with autonomists, that evolutionary explanations can be modeled in terms of a deductive relationship between laws and cases. We explore the relationship between, chance, self-organization, and selection as sources of order in biological systems in order to make these points. (shrink)

Truths depend upon what there is. So say many. A significant subset of that group say more; they say that the best way—perhaps the only way—to make sense of the claim that truth depends upon what there is, is to adopt a form of truth-maker theory. Truth-maker theorists claim that truths require ground; what’s true must depend upon what there is. Typically, truth-maker theory isn’t seen as a theory about the nature of truth. Rather, it’s seen as a theory about (...) what truths must do. Truths must depend. Relatedly, the claim that truths require ‘truth-makers’, that is, some putative ontological grounds, is used as a methodological tool in metaphysics. Put somewhat crudely, fix on what truths there are and locate the truth-makers—if necessary, add to your ontology until you satisfy this demand for truth-makers. Truth-making is thus at once both narrow and broad. It’s narrow insofar as it’s not a theory (it’s not a claim) about the nature of truth, and yet it’s broad insofar as it enables us to determine our ontological commitments. We take this to be a two-part orthodoxy about truth-making. We reject the orthodoxy on both counts. (shrink)

"This is a marvelous resource for anyone interested in better understanding the difficult and voluminous work of jurgen Habermas.

World Crisis and Underdevelopment examines the impact of poverty and other global crises in generating forms of structural coercion that cause agential and societal underdevelopment. It draws from discourse ethics and recognition theory in criticizing injustices and pathologies associated with underdevelopment. Its scope is comprehensive, encompassing discussions about development science, philosophical anthropology, global migration, global capitalism and economic markets, human rights, international legal institutions, democratic politics and legitimation, world religions and secularization, and moral philosophy in its many varieties.

Book Symposium on Andrew Feenberg’s Between Reason and Experience: Essays in Technology and Modernity Content Type Journal Article Pages 203-226 DOI 10.1007/s13347-011-0017-8 Authors Inmaculada de Melo-Martín, Division of Medical Ethics, Weill Cornell Medical College, New York, NY 10065, USA David B. Ingram, Loyola University Chicago, 6525 North Sheridan Road, Chicago, IL 60626, USA Sally Wyatt, e-Humanities Group, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) & Maastricht University, Cruquiusweg 31, 1019 AT Amsterdam, The Netherlands Yoko Arisaka, Forschungsinstitut für (...) Philosophie Hannover, Gerberstrasse 26, 30169 Hannover, Germany Andrew Feenberg, School of Communication, Simon Fraser University at Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street, Vancouver, BC V6B 5K3, Canada Journal Philosophy & Technology Online ISSN 2210-5441 Print ISSN 2210-5433 Journal Volume Volume 24 Journal Issue Volume 24, Number 2. (shrink)

Barresi & Moore provide an impressive account of how the coordination of first and third person information about the self and other could produce an account of intentional relations. They are less explicit as to how the child comes to understand the basic epistemic relation between experience and knowledge, that is, how informational access causes belief. We suggest one route.

This book taps the best American thinkers to answer the essential American question: How do we sustain our experiment in government of, by, and for the people? Authored by an extraordinary and politically diverse roster of public officials, scholars, and educators, these chapters describe our nation's civic education problem, assess its causes, offer an agenda for reform, and explain the high stakes at risk if we fail.

Schools of Faith represents a diversity of essays from scholars in several continents. The contributors, all leading theologians and ethicists, offer reflections on historical and contemporary themes which are significant for wider debates in theological education and church life in today's world. The range of contributor and content provides a fitting tribute to the work of Iain R. Torrance over many years. Amid the numerous subjects discussed, the authors focus on liturgy, textual criticism, public theology, the ethics of war, Christian (...) doctrine, divine action, ecumenism, inter-faith dialogue, spiritual formation, the office of the minister, and the interface between religion and literature. The multi-faceted nature of this collection signifies its importance for historical, systematic and practical theology. (shrink)