My object in this paper is to suggest a few reflections on some themes in Bentham's work which others as well as I have noted, without perhaps developing them as fully as might with advantage be done. There will be nothing like full development in the limited compass of what is said here, but what is said may at least indicate possible directions for further exploration. The greater part of the paper will be concerned with the notion of natural authority; (...) but I want to begin by taking a broader, though no doubt rather superficial, view of the role in Bentham's thinking of the concepts of ‘nature’ and ‘the natural’. (shrink)

al-Qism al-awwal. Fī ḍawābiṭ al-fikr (manṭiq) --.

The object of this article is to examine, with the work of Jeremy Bentham as the principal example, one strand in the complex pattern of European social theory during the second half of the eighteenth century. This was of course the period not only of the American and French revolutions, but of the culmination of the movements of thought constituting what we know as the Enlightenment. Like all great historical episodes, the Enlightenment was both the fulfilment of long-established processes and (...) the inauguration of new processes of which the fulfilment lay in the future. Thus the seminal ideas of seventeenth-century rationalism realized and perhaps exhausted their potentialities in the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. The ideas with which this article is concerned, however—conveniently grouped and labelled as the ideas of utilitarianism—only began to achieve systematic development in these later decades of the eighteenth century. Within that period—during the first half and more of Bentham's long life—attempts to apply those ideas to the solution of social problems met largely with failure and frustration. Yet unrealized potentialities remained, the realization of which was reserved for a time when the world of the philosophes no longer existed. The movements for social and political reform which have played so large a part in modern history since the French Revolution may be judged in widely differing ways; but whatever the verdict, these movements surely cannot be understood without due consideration of that part of their origins which lies in eighteenth-century utilitarianism. (shrink)

Marx's critique of political economy as a problem-posing framework Political economy and its critique Writing in the late, Friedrich Engels drew attention ...

On Islamic practices, doctrines and on Islamic ethics.

Like many people these days, I believe there is no general moral obligation to obey the law. I shall explain why there is no such moral obligation – and I shall clarify what I mean when I say there is no moral obligation to obey the law – as we proceed. But also like many people, I am unhappy with a position that would say there was no moral obligation to obey the law and then say no more about the (...) law's moral significance. In our thinking about law in a resonably just society, we have a strong inclination to invest law with a sort of moral halo. It does not feel right to suggest that law is a morally neutral social fact, nor to suggest that law is merely a useful social technique. In this essay, I shall try to account in part for law's moral halo. Because I share the widespread inclination to invest law with this halo, I shall not be interested in a merely historical account of how we come to see law with a halo – a pure “error theory” of law's halo, if you will. I want to justify the halo. On the other hand, the main way to justify the halo is to get clear just what law's moral significance is. It is unlikely that at the end of the process of clarification the halo will have exactly the shape or luminance that it had at the beginning. (shrink)

The Responsible Self was H. Richard Niebuhr's most important work in Christian ethics. In it he probes the most fundamental character of the moral life and it stands today as a landmark contribution to the field. The Library of Theological Ethics series focuses on what it means to think theologically and ethically. It presents a selection of important and otherwise unavailable texts in easily accessible form. Volumes in this series will enable sustained dialogue with predecessors though reflection on classic works (...) in the field. (shrink)

P. O. Bodunrin, in his 1981 essay, asks: ‘Is there an African Philosophy, and if there is, what is it?’ This question has occupied centre stage among younger African intellectuals for about a decade now. The most articulate among these intellectuals, who are themselves philosophers, are Bodunrin , Kwasi Wiredu , H. Odera Oruka , Marcien Towa and Eboussi Boulaga , and Paulin Hountondji . These philosophers among others are in dialogue with one another and currently are seen to be (...) the principal architects of a new orientation in African thought. (shrink)

Early in Peter Abelard's Dialogue between a Philosopher, a Jew, and a Christian, the philosopher and the Christian easily come to agreement about what the point of ethics is: “[T]he culmination of true ethics … is gathered together in this: that it reveal where the ultimate good is and by what road we are to arrive there.” They also agree that, since the enjoyment of this ultimate good “comprises true blessedness,” ethics “far surpasses other teachings in both usefulness and worthiness.” (...) As Abelard understood them, both fundamental elements of his twelfth-century ethical culture — Greek philosophy and Christian religion — held a common view of the nature of ethical inquiry, one that was so obvious to them that his characters do not even state it in a fully explicit way. They take for granted, as we take the ground we stand on, the premise that the most important function of ethical theory is to tell you what sort of life is most desirable, or most worth living. That is, the point of ethics is that it is good for you, that it serves your self-interest. (shrink)

In his book on Karl Barth Professor T. F. Torrance spoke at one point of ‘the great watershed of modern theology’. ‘There are,’ he wrote, 1 ‘two basic issues here. On the one hand, it is the very substance of the Christian faith that is at stake, and on the other hand, it is the fundamental nature of scientific method, in its critical and methodological renunciation of prior understanding, that is at stake. This is the great watershed of modern theology: (...) either we take the one way or the other – there is no third alter native… one must go either in the direction taken by Barth or in the direction taken by Bultmann.’. (shrink)

In this superb little book, written during World War II, historian, sociologist, and novelist H.G. Wells (1866-1946) contemplates the belief systems, prejudices, and institutions that have brought humankind to a dreadful impasse, where it stands at the brink of destruction - or of a new beginning. In his lucid summary of modern ideas concerning the fundamentals and ultimates of existence, Wells points out how absurd and outmoded religious beliefs, marked by intolerance, hatred, and exclusion, have poisoned human beings' relations with (...) the world and each other. These need to be replaced by a new social morality and a heightened sense of humankind's proper place in a dynamic universe. (shrink)

H. Tristram Engelhardt, Jr., Joseph Boyle, John Peppin, David Solomon; Christian Bioethics, Christian bioethics: Non-Ecumenical Studies in Medical Morality, Vol.

Branner, H.C. Humanismens krise.--Hansen, Martin A. Eneren og massen.

H. Tristram Engelhardt, Jr.; Controversies, Conflicts, and Consensus: A Concluding, Untheological Postscript, Christian bioethics: Non-Ecumenical Studies in Med.

According to familiar accounts, Rousseau held that humans are actuated by two distinct kinds of self love: amour de soi, a benign concern for one's self-preservation and well-being; and amour-propre, a malign concern to stand above other people, delighting in their despite. I argue that although amour-propre can (and often does) assume this malign form, this is not intrinsic to its character. The first and best rank among men that amour-propre directs us to claim for ourselves is that of occupying (...) 'man's estate'. This does not require, indeed it precludes, subjection of others. Amour-propre does not need suppression or circumscription if we are to live good lives; it rather requires direction to its proper end, not a delusive one. (shrink)

Edmund D. Pellegrino has played a central role in shaping the fields of bioethics and the philosophy of medicine. His writings encompass original explorations of the healing relationship, the need to place humanism in the medical curriculum, the nature of the patient’s good, and the importance of a virtue-based normative ethics for health care. In this anthology, H. Tristram Engelhardt, Jr., and Fabrice Jotterand have created a rich presentation of Pellegrino’s thought and its development. Pellegrino’s work has been dedicated to (...) showing that bioethics must be understood in the context of medical humanities, and that medical humanities, in turn, must be understood in the context of the philosophy of medicine. Arguing that bioethics should not be restricted to topics such as abortion, third-party-assisted reproduction, physician-assisted suicide, or cloning, Pellegrino has instead stressed that such issues are shaped by foundational views regarding the nature of the physician-patient relationship and the goals of medicine, which are the proper focus of the philosophy of medicine. This volume includes a preface by Dr. Pellegrino and a comprehensive Introduction by the editors. Of interest to medical ethicists as well as students, scholars, and physicians, _The Philosophy of Medicine Reborn_ offers fascinating insights into the emergence of a field and the work of one of its pioneers. “After a long period of dormancy, philosophy of medicine has blossomed with new life. The single most important physician-philosopher in that rebirth has been Edmund Pellegrino. His contributions to virtue theory, the concept of beneficence, the dispute over the internal and external sources of a morality for medicine, and the role of the Hippocratic tradition are all critical. The essays collected in this volume have changed the history of the philosophy of medicine. He shows that philosophy of medicine can be done with both passion and compassion.” —_Robert M. Veatch, Kennedy Institute of Ethics, Georgetown University_ “Edmund Pellegrino's words have helped medical students, faculty, scholars and patients address the challenges they encounter in medicine and medical practice. His personal support has also been critical for many of us in developing programs in medical ethics and philosophy of medicine in our universities. Dr. Pellegrino combines the wisdom of a great physician with those of a great philosopher to produce a body of writing that will continue to inspire us all. This volume contains some of his best and most influential work.” —_Loretta Kopelman, The Brody School of Medicine, East Carolina University_ _ _ “Edmund Pellegrino has been a leading light in the philosophy of medicine for a generation. He was instrumental in the birth of bioethics, founded one of the leading journals, and provided able leadership in organizing early activities of the profession. He has served as department chairman, dean, and university president. Most recently, he chairs the President’s Council on Bioethics. In all this, first and foremost, he has been a physician. Those who are ill and suffering make a claim upon him. To respond to this claim, Pellegrino creatively brings together the worlds of science and of the humanities. For him, that is what medicine is about, making it the most scientific of the humanities and the most humane of the sciences. Fortunately for us, Pellegrino brings these worlds together in thought, as well as in practice. In this selection from his writings, Engelhardt and Jotterand have captured the heart of Pellegrino’s project, both in depth and breadth, so we can also hear that claim of the ill and so we can see what worlds must come together if we are to respond in the appropriate way.” —_George Khushf, University of South Carolina_ “Pellegrino’s work is both a treasure and important for understanding bioethics. His work in philosophy of medicine addresses the crucial questions that are so important to understanding the practice of medicine and the ethics of health care.” —_Kevin Wildes, President, Loyola University_ _ _. (shrink)

The full range of Bentham's engagement with Blackstone's view of law is beyond the scope of a single article. Yet it is important to recognize at the outset, even in a more restricted enquiry into the matter, that the engagement, begun when Bentham, not quite sixteen years of age, started to attend Blackstone's Oxford lectures, was indeed a lifelong affair. Whatever Bentham had in mind when, at the age of eighty, in 1828, he began to write a work entitled ‘A (...) familar view of Blackstone: or say Blackstone familiarized’, the manuscripts at least suffice to prove that ‘Our Author’ was still in the forefront of his mind at that octogenarian but still indefatigably active stage of his career. Every aspect of Bentham's multifarious intellectual activity over the intervening decades had been touched in some measure by his response to Blackstone's ideas. It still seems true to say what was said a dozen years ago: It would be an exaggeration to say that Bentham elaborated his own conception of law by way of a constant and conscious dialectic with the views of Blackstone. But it would be an exaggeration for which the evidence would afford some excuse. (shrink)

Philosopher Peter Sjöstedt-H’s Noumenautics traverses the mindscape of metaphysics, nihilism and psychedelic phenomenology. It navigates through subjects such as the sentience of cells, the constrictions of consciousness, the metaphysics of might, the magic of mushrooms, the narcotics of Nietzsche, and the neologism of neo-nihilism – the last of which may itself cause flashbacks. -/- Tracing the fall of western morality through Kant, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, the book descends deeper still into a metaphysics further upheld by Henri Bergson and Alfred North (...) Whitehead. This collection of essays and notes provides a most idea-provoking, educational, and original piece of literature for the thoughtful lay-reader and specialist alike. -/- Contents: I. Philosophy and Psychedelic Phenomenology II. Myco-Metaphysics: a Philosopher on Magic Mushrooms III. Psychedelics and Empiricism IV. Bergson and Psychedelic Consciousness V. Vertexes of Sentience: Whitehead and Psychedelic Phenomenology VI. Antichrist Psychonaut: Nietzsche and Psychedelics VII. Neo-Nihilism: the Philosophy of Power VIII. The Teutonic Shift from Christian Morality: Kant – Schopenhauer – Nietzsche IX. Schopenhauer and the Mind X. The Will to Power. (shrink)

Sayings of Sayyid Ḥusain Aḥmad Madnī, 1878-1957, Indian Muslim religious leader.

The decision to procreate—to have, raise, and nurture biological children—is almost never subject to moral scrutiny. In fact, most societies implicitly embrace and advance procreation, a view known as pronatalism: procreation is morally desirable, psychologically “normal,” and generally seen as a laudable life choice. Those who cannot procreate are understood to have suffered a severe loss, and having or desiring to have children is considered an important developmental marker of increasing maturity and progression toward adulthood.However, we argue that prospective parents (...) have a defeasible moral obligation to prioritize adoption over procreation as a means of satisfying their desire to become parents. This.. (shrink)