Ce livre-d'art s'articule autour de 30 citations du philosophe Emmanuel Levinas illustrées par le peintre Martin Tom Dieck.

In order to explain trauma resilience, previous research has been investigating possible risk and protective factors, both on an individual and a contextual level. In this experimental study, we examined narrative coherence and social support in relation to trauma resilience. Participants were asked to write about a turning point memory, after which they did the Maastricht Acute Stress Test, our lab analog of a traumatic event. Following, half of the participants received social support, whereas the other half did not. Afterwards, (...) all participants wrote a narrative on the traumatic event. Moment-to-moment fluctuations in psychological and physiological well-being throughout the experiment were investigated with state anxiety questionnaires and cortisol measures. Results showed that narratives of traumatic experiences were less coherent than narratives of turning point memories. However, contrary to our predictions, coherence, and, in particular, thematic coherence, related positively to anxiety levels. Possibly, particular types of thematic coherence are a non-adaptive form of coping, which reflect unfinished attempts at meaning-making and are more similar to continuous rumination than to arriving at a resolution. Furthermore, coherence at baseline could not buffer against the impact of trauma on anxiety levels in this study. Contrary to our hypotheses, social support did not have the intended beneficial effects on coherence, neither on well-being. Multiple explanations as to why our support manipulation remained ineffective are suggested. Remarkably, lower cortisol levels at baseline and after writing about the turning point memory predicted higher coherence in the trauma narratives. This may suggest that the ability to remain calm in difficult situations does relate to the ability to cope adaptively with future difficult experiences. Clinical and social implications of the present findings are discussed, and future research recommendations on the relations between narrative coherence, social support, and trauma resilience are addressed. (shrink)

The objective of this study is the delineation of a philosophical tradition linking Epicurus’ ethical philosophy to Democritus. Specifically, Warren seeks to demonstrate that there is an ethical tradition of Democriteanism, anchored in atomism. Tracing its outlines demands extensive philosophical and philological sleuthing. It is inevitable that such a project will tell only a likely story for it is beset with challenges at virtually every stage. The challenges begin with Democritus himself. His ethical fragments, extensive in number, rest on the (...) insecure foundation of Stobaeus’ anthology and a collection known as The Sayings of Democrates. Is Democrates the familiar atomist from Abdera or someone else? Further, do the ethical fragments have any foundation in Democritean atomism? Warren admits that any claim of a foundation of Democritean ethics in his physics is only a conjecture. (shrink)

The objective of this study is the delineation of a philosophical tradition linking Epicurus’ ethical philosophy to Democritus. Specifically, Warren seeks to demonstrate that there is an ethical tradition of Democriteanism, anchored in atomism. Tracing its outlines demands extensive philosophical and philological sleuthing. It is inevitable that such a project will tell only a likely story for it is beset with challenges at virtually every stage. The challenges begin with Democritus himself. His ethical fragments, extensive in number, rest on the (...) insecure foundation of Stobaeus’ anthology and a collection known as The Sayings of Democrates. Is Democrates the familiar atomist from Abdera or someone else? Further, do the ethical fragments have any foundation in Democritean atomism? Warren admits that any claim of a foundation of Democritean ethics in his physics is only a conjecture. (shrink)

In recent years, neuroscience has been a particularly prolific discipline stimulating many innovative treatment approaches in medicine. However, when it comes to the brain, new techniques of intervention do not always meet with a positive public response, in spite of promising therapeutic benefits. The reason for this caution clearly is the brain’s special importance as “organ of the mind”. As such it is widely held to be the origin of mankind’s unique position among living beings. Likewise, on the level (...) of the individual human being, the brain is considered the material substrate of those traits that in combination render each person unique. In view of this preeminent significance of the brain, it is understandable that, in general, interventions into the brain are considered a delicate issue and that new techniques of intervention are scrutinised with particular care. However, in doing so it is important not to go to the opposite extreme and shy away from promising new therapeutic approaches for debilitating disorders of the brain. With respect to the new techniques of brain intervention a broad interdisciplinary perspective is required to discern irrational fear from justified concern. Hence, the Europäische Akademie established a project group consisting, on the one hand, of experts from different fields of medicine who have got first-hand experience of applying the techniques at issue and, on the other hand, of philosophers and a legal expert. The task of this team was to review the state of the art with respect to each single technique of intervening in the brain, to indicate future developments, and to address the ethical and legal issues common to all of them. The project’s outcome is the book at hand. (shrink)

Stoicism was one of the new philosophical movements of the Hellenistic period. The name derives from the porch (stoa poikilê) in the Agora at Athens decorated with mural paintings, where the members of the school congregated, and their lectures were held. Unlike ‘epicurean,’ the sense of the English adjective ‘stoical’ is not utterly misleading with regard to its philosophical origins. The Stoics did, in fact, hold that emotions like fear or envy (or impassioned sexual attachments, or passionate love of (...) anything whatsoever) either were, or arose from, false judgements and that the sage—a person who had attained moral and intellectual perfection—would not undergo them. The later Stoics of Roman Imperial times, Seneca and Epictetus, emphasise the doctrines (already central to the early Stoics' teachings) that the sage is utterly immune to misfortune and that virtue is sufficient for happiness. Our phrase ‘stoic calm’ perhaps encapsulates the general drift of these claims. It does not, however, hint at the even more radical ethical views which the Stoics defended, e.g. that only the sage is free while all others are slaves, or that all those who are morally vicious are equally so. Though it seems clear that some Stoics took a kind of perverse joy in advocating views which seem so at odds with common sense, they did not do so simply to shock. Stoic ethics achieves a certain plausibility within the context of their physical theory and psychology, and within the framework of Greek ethical theory as that was handed down to them from Plato and Aristotle. It seems that they were well aware of the mutually interdependent nature of their philosophical views, likening philosophy itself to a living animal in which logic is bones and sinews; ethics and physics, the flesh and the soul respectively (another version reverses this assignment, making ethics the.. (shrink)

It is generally held that doctors and researchers have an obligation to obtain informed consent. Over time there has been a move in relation to this obligation from a requirement to disclose information to a requirement to ensure that that information is understood. Whilst this change has been resisted, in this article I argue that both sides on this matter are mistaken. When investigating what information is needed for consent to be informed we might be trying to determine what (...) information a person would need in order to consent at all, or we might be trying to determine what information a person needs in order to make an informed choice about whether or not to consent. I argue that the obligation to ensure understanding only applies to information generated by the first type of enquiry; but that much of the information generally thought necessary in order for consent to be informed is only required if our concern is with the second type of enquiry. For this reason it is neither the case that doctors and researchers should ensure all the information they provide is understood, nor is it the case that their only obligation is to disclose it. (shrink)

I compare the discussion on exclusivism in religion to the discussion on exclusivism in general. With defenders of religious exclusivism, such as Plantinga, I argue that it is a subset of general exclusivism and is as little blameworthy as the latter is. This explains why defenders of religious exclusivism are right in assuming that the burden of proof is on the shoulders of the critics of exclusivism. Yet, this answer solves only part of the problem. It answers only the first (...) order question of whether it is legitimate to hold exclusivist truth claims in religion. It does not answer the second order question of how, in what spirit, they should be held. I argue that there are contexts in which exclusivist truth claims should be held in a humble fashion, for example contexts in which (cognitive) ambiguity reigns. If they are held in those contexts in an overconfident fashion, they are epistemically and/or morally blameworthy. Since religion is characterized by a measure of (cognitive) ambiguity, exclusivist religious truth claims should be held in a humble fashion. They are thus blameworthy if held in an overconfident fashion. Yet, if held in a modest spirit, there is nothing wrong with religious exclusivism. (shrink)

In his Encomium of Agatha Patriarch Methodius suggests that a figure appearing to the saint in her prison could be either the Apostle Peter, an angel in the guise of Peter, or Christ impersonating an angel in the guise of Peter. This article has two aims : to show that Methodius offered these alternatives because he was acutely aware of the problems arising from attempts to identify agents from their outward appearances ; and to demonstrate that Methodius could accept the (...) concepts of angelic and divine impersonation without jeopardising the real presence of the saints in dreams and visions because he held the 'Origenist' belief that exemplary human beings can be transformed into 'angels' and 'gods' and therefore concluded that saints could act as their own impersonators. (shrink)

In the debate on the basis of moral equality, one conclusion achieves near consensus: that we must reject all accounts that ground equality in the possession of some psychological capacity (Psychological Capacity Accounts). This widely held view crystallises around three objections. The first is the Arbitrariness Objection, which holds that the threshold at which the possession of the relevant capacities places an individual within the required range is arbitrary. The second is the Variations Objection, which holds that there is (...) rational pressure to acknowledge that variations in psychological capacities between individuals are morally relevant. The third is the No Rational Agency Objection, according to which Psychological Capacity Accounts have unpalatable implications for our treatment of humans who do not possess the relevant capacities. We develop a Psychological Capacity Account based on the capacity for a conception of the good and offer a novel defence of the account against these objections. (shrink)

This book explores the concept of Life from a range of perspectives. Divided into three parts, it first examines the concept of Life from physics to biology. It then presents insights on the concept from the perspectives of philosophy, theology, and ethics. The book concludes with chapters on the hermeneutics of Life, and pays special attention to the Biosemiotics approach to the concept. The question 'What is Life?' has been deliberated by the greatest minds throughout human history. Life as we (...) know it is not a substance or fundamental property, but a complex process. It is not an easy task to develop an unequivocal approach towards Life combining scientific, semiotic, philosophical, theological, and ethical perspectives. In its combination of these perspectives, and its wide-ranging scope, this book opens up levels and identifies issues which can serve as intersections for meaningful interdisciplinary discussions of Life in its different aspects. The book includes the four plenary lectures and selected, revised and extended papers from workshops of the 14th European Conference on Science and Theology (ECST XIV) held in Tartu, Estonia, April 2012. (shrink)

This paper argues that Epicurus held a non-reductionist view of mental states that is in the spirit of Davidson's anomalous monism. We argue for this conclusion by considering the role that normative descriptions play in the peritropē argument from "On Nature" 25. However, we also argue that Epicurus was an indeterminist. We can know that atoms swerve because we can know that we make choices that are up to us and this is incompatible with the ancestral causal determination of (...) mental states by atomic processes. Epicurus escapes the traditional criticism of indeterminist libertarians because the swerve is not meant to explain how choices may be free. The anti-reductionist stance on the mental means that nothing about atomic processes could possibly explain any particular mental event. Moreover, because of the practical and therapeutic nature of Epicurean philosophy, it is not necessary that Epicurus provide an explanation of how the swerve subserves freedom of choice. We know all that we need to know for eudaimonia when we know that some choices are up to us. (shrink)

Walter Burley is mostly known for his defense of realism against William of Ockham. The concept of time that he developed in his late literal commentary on Aristotle's Physics has even been labelled 'extremely realistic,' in contrast to William of Ockham's so-called 'extremely subjectivistic' alternative. However, as is shown in this article, when Burley's concept of time is viewed against the background of medieval theories of time, it appears that it is mainly a restatement and further elaboration of opinions (...) class='Hi'>held by Averroes. A detailed investigation of Burley's explanation of the reality, definition, and unicity of time, as well as of the relation between time and the intellective soul shows that his realism is certainly far less extreme than it has been believed. (shrink)

Paul Boghossian has argued that Externalism is incompatible with privileged self-knowledge because (i) the Externalist can cite no property to be the reference of an empty natural kind concept such as the ether; (ii) without reference there is no content; hence (iii) either we do know on the basis of introspection alone whether an apparent natural kind thought has content or not, in which case we can infer from self-knowledge and a priori knowledge of Externalism alone to the existence in (...) our environment of water, gold etc.; (iv) or we do not know, without empirical investigation, whether an apparent natural kind thought has content. An Externalist not wanting to accept either (iii) or (iv) can deny (i). All empty natural kind concepts refer to the necessarily uninstantiated property of being identical to nothing. Since they have different senses and self-knowledge is only held to extend to the existence and identity of sense, this is compatible with privileged self-knowledge, and Externalism is still true of the concepts. (shrink)

Einstein held that intuition is more important than rational inquiry as a source of discovery. Further, he explicitly and implicitly linked the heart, the sacred, devotion and intuitive knowledge. The raison d’être of universities is the advance of knowledge; however, they have primarily focused on developing student's skills in working with rational knowledge. Given the paucity of attention to virtue and our intuitive abilities this article briefly explores the philosophical meaning of intuition and the role intuition plays in scientific (...) discovery. It then turns to the ancient Greeks and Daoists for a perspective on a relationship between intuitive knowledge and virtue. A discussion ensues on how virtue and intuitive knowledge are cultivated according to the ancients. The article concludes with questions for educators on how they might reintroduce the cultivation of virtue and knowledge in secular institutions. (shrink)

My concern in what follows is to give a comparative report on some important lectures held at the Hegel-Kongreß 1981 in Stuttgart. In discussing the views of Quine, Hacking, Davidson, Putnam and Habermas I want to confront them with some details of Rorty's recent critique of our philosophical tradition. At last I try to give a tentative answer whether there is an end or a turning-point for current analytical philosophy.

The idea of the spherical world, poised in space, and encircled at different distances by the celestial bodies, was introduced by the early Greek cosmologists. With some modifications, it is still our Western world-picture. It differs fundamentally from that of other cultures, which all accept, in one version or another, the idea of a flat earth with the dome of the celestial vault above it. The Greek conception, however, entails the problem of falling. How to account for the earth's stability? (...) Why is it that the earth does not fall? This anxious question has already bothered the Presocratics. Aristotle provided the solution that was satisfying for many hundred of years. Falling, according to Aristotle, is not the problem, but the answer, as the earth, consisting of the heaviest of the elements, finds its natural place in the centre of the spherical universe. For the same reason the earth itself, according to Aristotle, has to be spherical. Thus, his main line of argumentation was what we now would call 'metaphysical'. Recently, some scholars have argued that the early Greek idea of a spherical earth was developed as a protoscientifie hypothesis, based on empirical reasoning and observation. In this article, we show this to be an example of the 'anachronistic fallacy' that seriously obscures our understanding of the ancient Greek philosophers. Aristotle's conception held for two millennia, until the work of Copernicus, Kepler, and Thomas Digges overthrew it. Consequently, Newton had to cope with the fear of falling again — a fear that still haunts our modern world-picture and that was brilliantly articulated by Blaise Pascal, in his Pensées. (shrink)

Looking at the library of Vilém Flusser, which is preserved in the Flusser-Archive in Berlin, we notice not only the wide interest of Flusser’s in all possible fields of knowledge but also the different stations in his nomadic life. The library is simultaneously an image of his intellectual journey and, especially considering his Brazilian period, a representation of Flusser’s friendships. When we search for connections between them, his books give us a notion about Flusser’s early contacts, before his return to (...) Europe, to German, Italian and Spanish intellectuals, and most of them are connected to his great interlocutor Vincente Ferreira da Silva. But we find also an obvious relation to the lesser-known Portuguese thinkers such as Eudoro de Sousa, as well as Flusser’s acquaintance with authors like Agostinho da Silva and Delfim Santos who held great significance for the dialog between Portugal and Brazil in the 1950s. (shrink)

This volume examines emotions and emotional well-being from a rich variety of theological, philosophical and scientific and therapeutic perspectives. To experience emotion is a part of being human; but what are emotions? How can theology, philosophy and the natural sciences unpack the nature and content of emotions? This volume is based on contributions to the 15th European Conference on Science and Theology held in Assisi, Italy. It brings together contributions from scholars of various academic backgrounds from around the world, (...) whose individual insights are made all the richer by their juxtaposition with those from experts in other fields, leading to a unique exchange of ideas. (shrink)

My concern in what follows is to give a comparative report on some important lectures held at the Hegel-Kongreß 1981 in Stuttgart. In discussing the views of Quine, Hacking, Davidson, Putnam and Habermas I want to confront them with some details of Rorty's recent critique of our philosophical tradition. At last I try to give a tentative answer whether there is an end or a turning-point for current analytical philosophy.

The literature regarding social and environmental sustainability of business focuses primarily on rationales for adopting sustainability strategies and operational practices in support of that goal. In contrast, we examine sustainability from a perspective that has received far less research attention—attitudes that inform managerial decision-making. We develop a conceptual model that identifies six elemental categories of attitudes that can be held independently or aggregated to yield a meta-attitude representing the legitimacy of sustainability. Our model distinguishes among three types of internally (...) held attitudes and externally perceived subjective norms: pragmatic, moral, and cognitive. We propose a refinement of Ajzen's (In: Kuhl J, Beckmann J (eds) Action control: from cognition to behavior, 1985; Organ Behav Hum Decis Process 50:179-211, 1991) Theory of planned behavior (TPB) that incorporates these sub-categories of personal attitudes and subjective norms. Practical implications are discussed including how organizations considering adopting sustainability programs might use the model as a conceptual tool to help achieve and assess program success. (shrink)

Belgium and the Netherlands are the first countries in the world that have legalized euthanasia and assisted suicide. Since September 23, 2002, Belgian physicians can perform an act of euthanasia without at the same time performing a criminal act. In the Netherlands, the act on euthanasia went into force already on April 1, 2002. This special issue of Ethical Perspectives on ‘Euthanasia in the Low Countries’ offers a forum for critical dialogue on the different aspects of this new legal situation (...) in Belgium and the Netherlands.First, the legal situation will be introduced. In his contribution, Herman Nys makes a careful comparison of both laws. In spite of the fact that Belgium and the Netherlands are the first countries in the world that legalized euthanasia, the differences between the Belgian and Dutch law are fundamental. As Nys indicates, the scope of the Dutch law is more specified since it explicitly includes physician-assisted suicide while it remains unclear whether the Belgian act is also applicable in cases of assisted suicide. There are also fundamental differences regarding the persons regulated by the law, the health condition of the patient, the obligations of the physician with respect to the request and the health status of the patient, and the notification procedure.However, not only are there fundamental differences between Belgium and the Netherlands on the level of the law. Also the public debate and the values underlying the the debate show dissimilarities. In the Netherlands this debate took more than twenty years and the subsequent law on euthanasia reflected an existing medical practice. In Belgium, on the contrary, the parliament came to vote on the euthanasia law after only half a decade of debate. In our contribution , we identify the right to autonomy understood as ‘self-possession’ as the central value in the Belgian debate. Guy Widdershoven asserts that the moral basis of euthanasia in the Netherlands is different. He argues that the Dutch debate — and by now Dutch practice — cannot be reduced to the "principlist canon of autonomy and beneficence". Instead, the values of responsibility, deliberation and care are claimed to be central to Dutch euthanasia practice.In his contribution, Daniel Sulmasy offers an exhaustive analysis of the notion of dignity that constantly arises in the debate on euthanasia. For Christian churches and Catholic healthcare institutions, the recent legalization of euthanasia and assisted suicide is at least challenging. Jan Jans describes the way in which the main Christian churches in Belgium and the Netherlands engaged in the debate and reacted to the eventual legalization. Chris Gastmans presents the view of the Flemish Association of Catholic Healthcare Institutions.Law-making with respect to euthanasia is one thing. Bringing the law into practice is somewhat different. The question arises to what extent the new legal situation will bear upon the medical practice. Particularly, the responses of physicians are difficult to assess in advance. Physicians face the dilemma to report or not to report. They can take up their responsibility and report their practices of euthanasia, thereby exposing themselves to critical examination and possibly criminal prosecution. On the other hand, the physician can opt for safety and decide not to report his involvement in one of his patients’ euthanasia. In the latter case, the introduction of new legislation would have missed the mark. To this day, the only available data with regard to physicians’ reactions to an established legal framework wherein euthanasia is legalized come from the Netherlands. In his contribution, Albert Klijn presents the reactions of Dutch physicians to the new legal situation in their country and, particularly, the performance of their duty to report cases of euthanasia. Since the vote on the law in 2000 and the establishment of ‘regional review committees for termination of life on request and assisted suicide’ in 2001, the reports of euthanasia have declined. Klijn considers two possible explanations. On the one hand, there is insecurity about how the newly established regional review committees will evaluate physician' reports. On the other hand, the increased investment in research on palliative care and the availability of palliative sedation are held responsible for the drop in reported cases.This very interesting suggestion by Klijn needs further clarification. Therefore, the meaning of palliative care and the possibility of palliative sedation are elaborated in the contribution of Bert Broeckaert and Rien Janssens.With this special issue on ‘Euthanasia in the Low Countries’ we hope to have answered the numerous requests for further information on the Belgian and Dutch situation. Data, clarification and critical review may shed more light on the development of a practice, which some still consider as non-medical behaviour. This issue may therefore also function as a catalyst for further medical, ethical and legal debate. (shrink)