The article emphasizes the cultural and educational importance of H. Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy for the spiritual development of the Ukrainian society, especially in the direction of democracy and establishment of the worldview culture as a requirement for the culture of freedom. From the position of the included observer the author of the article describes some episodes of relationship in the scientist’s communities which can be defined as justice and solidary community. On the basis of the Heidegerian (...) scheme, some dangers are analyzed as demands addressed to philosophical thinking. This scheme is used by structuring of the article. The metaphoric of these dangers indicates the contextual problems which are important for producing of philosophical ideas. The experience of the Institute of Philosophy gained by solving of problems is very remarkable for the fulfillment of philosophical studies and educational practices especially by mentoring of the postgraduate students. The fact of naming the Institute after H. Skovoroda is regarded as a symbolic act with a great creative potential and energy which can be used for reviving of national traditions of philosophical thinking. The role of lyric in activating of philosophical ideas is showed. The symbiotic coexisting of the poetry, art, journalism and philosophy is one of the original features of the Skovorodian tradition caring by the well-known representatives of the Institute. All these characteristics joined with the civic culture, which was demonstrated by all generations of the Institute, allow defining it as a metaphysical place with the ability both to follow on the road of the way of light and to represent it on the landscapes of philosophical science and education. The history of the Institute, especially, in the period of its post-totalitarian transformations, gives the opportunity of taking comparison with the Institute for Social Research Frankfurt. The civic courage of the Ukrainian intellectual elites was always initiated, supported and generated by philosophers gathering in Institute of Philosophy. (shrink)

With great pleasure, I congratulate the participants of this international scientific conference: the Honorable Apostolic Nuncio in Ukraine, Archbishop Thomas Galicton, the dear Beatitude Lubomyr of Cardinal Husar, respected representatives of all Ukrainian churches and religious organizations present in this hall, and colleagues from religious scholars who come from different regions of Ukraine, and foreign participants in this conference.

Interview of Amina Khelufi, Kseniia Myroshnyk and Nataliia Reva with Natalia Viatkina.

B a c k g r o u n d. According to the genre characteristics, the article is a form of publicizing analytical conclusions from the experience of research in the field of the philosophical Chinese studies at the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine from 1991 to the present day. The material for understanding was supplied from the environment of scientific professional activity of prominent figures of Ukrainian philosophical Sinology from the H. Skovoroda Institute of (...) class='Hi'>Philosophy of the NAS of Ukraine and the A. Krymskyi Institute of Oriental Studies of the NAS of Ukraine. The scientific achievements of academic Sinologists, who are leading researchers of Chinese philosophical education, science and culture from the archaic to modern times, are highlighted. They are, namely: V. Kiktenko, V. Pyrohiv, V. Hamianin, S. Kapranov, Y. Hobova and A. Usyk. M e t h o d s. The article uses an analytical approach based on the study of historical and philosophical sources. The methodological basis of the research is the main methods of historical and philosophical science: problem-categorical analysis, socio-cultural analysis and biographical analysis. At the same time, the methods of situational and contextual analysis of scientific texts are applied. R e s u l t s. Four conditional thematic vectors of the progress of academic philosophical Sinology in modern Ukraine are classified, namely the study of: 1. the history of ancient Chinese philosophy, especially Confucianism; 2. the history of Chinese philosophy in the 19th – early 21st centuries; 3) the history of Ukrainian Sinology in the 18th – early 21st centuries; 4. the history of modern foreign Sinology. The director of the A. Krymskyi Institute of Oriental Studies of the NAS of Ukraine and the head of the Ukrainian Association of Sinologists V. Kiktenko very effectively studies all these vectors, especially the last three of them. His colleagues at the institute V. Pyrohiv, V. Hamianin and Y. Hobova mainly research the first of these vectors, and primarily the history of Confucianism. Employees of the H. Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy of the NAS of Ukraine S. Kapranov and A. Usyk are also focused scientific attention on the history of Confucianism, in particular, the second of them studies social ethics and anthropology of Confucius. C o n c l u s i o n s. As a result it was established that modern domestic philosophical academic Sinology is a qualitatively new and innovative direction of Oriental studies in independent Ukraine. This discipline was formed as a result of the two-century progress of Ukrainian Chinese studies from the era of Hetmanshina until now. V. Kiktenko and his colleagues have made a significant and already internationally recognized contribution to the study of both the classical philosophical schools of Ancient China and their ideological heirs, in particular, the leaders of the PRC and the CCP from Deng Xiaoping to Xi Jinping during these thirty years. V. Kiktenko also laid the foundations for the study both of the history of Ukrainian Chinese studies and of modern foreign, primarily Western European and North American, Sinology. (shrink)

Purpose of this article is the historical reconstruction of the studies in philosophical anthropology in Soviet Ukraine. Theoretical basis. In the philosophical tradition of independent Ukraine, there is an opinion that at the intersection of the 1960s and 1970s, there was an anthropological turn in the national philosophical thought. The authors provide a holistic and comprehensive reconstruction of philosophical understanding of man in the works of Ukrainian thinkers of the Soviet era. Originality. It has been proved that before (...) the emergence of the Institute of Philosophy of the Soviet Ukraine Academy of Sciences and the restoration of the Philosophy Department at Kyiv State University, the writings of Ukrainian philosophers in the 1920s and 1930s emphasize specifically the "ideological" factor of human existence. Based on the materials of M. Maksymovych Academic Library and the library at H. Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, there have been revealed and traced the specific features and peculiarities of the transformation of main accents in philosophical and anthropological studies of Soviet Ukrainian researchers in the post-war period. Conclusions. The studied problems developed in Soviet Ukraine in two vectors. The focus was on man as a social phenomenon and a "product of ideology" on the one hand, and, on existential aspects of a human being with its internal contradictions, understanding of its nature and the sense of existence, on the other hand. It has been established that the anthropological problems were the focus of not only scientists of the Institute of Philosophy of the Soviet Ukraine Academy of Sciences, but also of teachers of Kyiv State University. The authors grounded the thesis that, unlike the 1940-1950s, when the focus was on philosophical problems of natural science and philosophical personology, the 1960s bring forward not only philosophical and anthropological studies but also ethical and aesthetic issues, logic and scientific atheism. (shrink)

Ibrāhīm Dīnānī, Ghulām Ḥusayn - Interviews ; Islamic philosophy.

The article continues to study the topic of the uprising of the image of the Kyiv philosophical school as a prominent leading Ukrainian participant in the world philosophical process of the Cold War period in the scientific and socio-political thought of the Western block, especially in the USA, Canada and Western Germany, in the second half of the twentieth century. The history of the formation of this image by scholars of the democratic world, mainly from the Ukrainian diaspora, can be (...) conditionally divided into the following stages: 1. Scientific international interaction between the USSR and the Western bloc during the transition of the USSR from Khrushchew's "thaw" to neo-Stalinist "stagnation" (early 1960s – early 1970s); 2. Intensification of the ideological confrontation between the USSR and the Western bloc countries during transition of the USSR from said "stagnation" to Gorbachev's "perestroika" (early1970s – second half of the 1980s). In contrast to the first separate critical assessments by diaspora philosophers P. Fedenko, D. Soloviy and their colleagues of philosophy in the Ukrainian SSR in the 1950s and early 1960s, primarily articles of T. Shevcenko by the director of the Institute of Philosophy of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR D. Ostryanin (1952 – 1962), the image of the Kyiv philosophical school in the 1970s and 1980s was significantly emphasized abroad. The political aspect of this image, dominant in which became, primarily due to its popularization by the Canadian philosopher T. Zakydalsky, the figure of a prisoner of conscience V. Lisovyi, was supplemented in the same and subsequent decades by the scientific aspect. In the memoirs of the Soviet prisoner of conscience and political immigrant L. Plyushch and in the publications of scientists from the US M. H. Teeter and B. Vitvitsky the image of the said school was generally drawn on the basis of their study of the history of the mentioned institute and the directions of its work in the 1940s – 1970s. At the same time, philosophers of the Ukrainian diaspora K. Mytrovych, W. Oleksiuk, W. Shayan and some their colleagues critically assessed the Ukrainian historical and philosophical achievements of this institute in the 1950s and 1980s. (shrink)

On the life of Nund-Rishi, Nund-Rishi, Muslim saint from Jammu and Kashmir and Kashmiri poet.

Interview with Yaroslava Stratii, dedicated to the history of studies of the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy’s manuscript inheritance (17-18th century) in Kiyv and Lviv from 1968. The interview was prepared by the activists of the Student Society of Oral History of Philosophy, organized at the Department of the History of Philosophy (Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv).

The English Synopsis is after the text of the book. The book presents an original and generalizing substantive vision of the philosophy of science through the prism of a detailed analysis of the polysystem structure of scientific theories. Theories are considered, firstly, as complex specialized forms of developed scientific thinking about the realities studied by natural science, secondly, as constantly improving tools for producing new knowledge in interaction with experimental research, and thirdly, as carriers of ordered and verified knowledge. (...) Emphasis is placed on their nominal and ontic subsystems. The book develops personal and joint research of the authors (theoretical physicist and philosopher), the experience of teaching philosophy of physics at NaUKMA, philosophy of science at the Higher School of Philosophy at the H. Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine and theoretical physics at the National Technical University "Ihor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute". The research is based on a significant source base covering works of modern Western researchers in natural science and philosophy of science. For students, teachers, and scientists who are interested in the problems of modern philosophy of science and have a certain amount of scientific knowledge. It will also be useful for high school students who are eager to become scientists. (shrink)

Problems of the essence of religion, its place in the history of spiritual and cultural life of the Ukrainian people were not in the field of direct scientific interests of the famous Ukrainian philosopher, long-time director of the Institute of Philosophy by H.S. Skovoroda of NAS of Ukraine, academician Myroslav Popovych. He referred to them only when comprehending the history of culture in Ukraine, some in the analysis of the twentieth century as a bloody period (...) of world history, some in explaining the problems of being human. Thus the scientist considers religion as a component of culture, and it is a complex of material, spiritual, intellectual and emotional features of society, includes the basic rules of human existence, system of values, traditions and beliefs. The article deals with the religious factor in the life of the ancient Slavs, the role of the Bible in the formation of the religious consciousness of ancient Ukrainians, the nature and evolution of the Christian doctrine. The author analyzes Popovich's thinking about the perception of Christianity by the people's consciousness with its doctrine and rituals, about finding by Christians a balance between Eros and Thanatos, about austerity, holiness, etc. (shrink)

Socio-philosophical work in response to the philosophy of Pitirim Aleksandrovich Sorokin.

The philosophical symbolism of H. Skovoroda’s works lies in wisdom, congenial work, seeing the big in the small, unveiling mysteries through the symbolic world. Skovoroda states that to be a human-being is to be a philosopher. The aim of philosophy is to reawaken the main mottos of the Age of Enlightenment (honor, dignity, freedom, justice, solidarity, morality). Creating open society in Ukraine on the basis of these mottos is the aim of the modern national state-building. The (...) aim of the article is to ascertain the influence and meaning of the philosophical and anthropological problems in the works of H. S. Skovoroda for building open society in the modern Ukraine. Methodology of the study is complex and based on the social-philosophical and historic-philosophical analysis of anthropological problems in the works by H. S. Skovoroda and its significance for finding personal freedom and building open society. The leading methodological tools are fundamental research basics of the scientific analysis – principles of objectivity, systematicity, integrity, unity of the historic and the logical, determinism, development, and interrelation. Methodology of social and symbolic representations, ethnic representations, and structural functionalism has been used. Results. As Ukraine is experiencing complex social and political processes, the philosophical works by H. S. Skovoroda acquires special importance: formation and preservation of the Ukrainian national identity, national values, morality, and culture. The society needs politically-minded citizens with clear ideas about the prospects of the state development. Researching works of Skovoroda, one can trace the development of the human spirit: an internally-devastated person devoid of life reference points is gradually adapting to the life in society, overcomes the discrepancies between the singular and the whole finding a compromise in the relations with the world around them. The fates of the people and the nation, language and the state were the key problems which H. S. Skovoroda thoroughly and passionately analyzed through the perspective of universal human values. Conclusions. The modern Ukrainian society needs people in harmony with themselves and the world who work on improving themselves and the society. Such people should be able to overcome both their own internal contradictions and the conflicts in society and the world. Putting significant hope on the human-being as the creator of the new morality, H. Skovoroda believed in the possibility of building solid foundations of the state. An internally rich person and citizen is going to contribute to harmony of the nature, the world, human relations focusing on the issues of good and love as integral attributes of the human existence. The writer considered such personalities to be able to carry peace and unity to the unstable reality full of life challenges and to oppose the alienation, absurdity, and insignificance of the human existence. (shrink)

This is the first complete, one-volume English translation of the ancient Chinese text Xunzi, one of the most extensive, sophisticated, and elegant works in the tradition of Confucian thought. Through essays, poetry, dialogues, and anecdotes, the Xunzi articulates a Confucian perspective on ethics, politics, warfare, language, psychology, human nature, ritual, and music, among other topics. Aimed at general readers and students of Chinese thought, Eric Hutton’s translation makes the full text of this important work more accessible in English than ever (...) before. Named for its purported author, the Xunzi has long been neglected compared to works such as the Analects of Confucius and the Mencius. Yet interest in the Xunzi has grown in recent decades, and the text presents a much more systematic vision of the Confucian ideal than the fragmented sayings of Confucius and Mencius. In one famous, explicit contrast to them, the Xunzi argues that human nature is bad. However, it also allows that people can become good through rituals and institutions established by earlier sages. Indeed, the main purpose of the Xunzi is to urge people to become as good as possible, both for their own sakes and for the sake of peace and order in the world. In this edition, key terms are consistently translated to aid understanding and line numbers are provided for easy reference. Other features include a concise introduction, a timeline of early Chinese history, a list of important names and terms, cross-references, brief explanatory notes, a bibliography, and an index. (shrink)

Excerpt from Essays on the Religion and Philosophy of the Hindus Called by the indulgence of this meeting to a chair, which I could have wished to have seen more worthily filled, upon so interesting an occasion as the first general meeting of a Society instituted for the important purpose of the advancement of knowledge in relation to Asia, I shall, with your permission, detain you a little from the special business of the day, while I draw your more (...) particular attention to the objects of the Institution, for the furtherance of which we are now assembled. To those countries of Asia, in which civilization may be justly considered to have had its origin, or to have attained its earliest growth, the rest of the civilized world owes a large debt of gratitude, which it cannot but be solicitous to repay; and England, as most advanced in refinement, is, for that very cause, the most beholden; and, by acquisition of dominion in the East, is bound by a yet closer tie. As Englishmen, we participate in the earnest wish, that this duty may be fulfilled, and that obligation requited; and we share in the anxious desire of contributing to such a happy result, by promoting an interchange of benefits, and returning in an improved state that which was received in a ruder form. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. (shrink)

Introduction to the Institutional Logics Perspective -- Precursors to the Institutional Logics Perspective -- Defining the Inter-institutional System -- The Emergence, Stability and Change of the Inter-institutional System -- Micro-Foundations of Institutional Logics -- The Dynamics of Organizational Practices and Identities -- The Emergence and Evolution of Field-Level Logics -- Implications for Future Research.

General meeting of the labor collective of the Department of Religious Studies at the Institute of Philosophy them G.S. Skovoroda, held on February 9, 2016, after discussing the Presidium of the NAS Ukraine No. 11 of January 20, 2016, and taking into account its substantiation, shall be adopted.

The article summarizes the book Filozofia Jezuitów na ziemiach dawnej Rzeczypospolitej w XIX wieku [The Philosophy of the Jesuit in the Terriroties of the Former Commonwealth: Poland, Lithuania, Belarus and Ukraine in the 19th Century], by Roman Darowski.

This chapter will be devoted to the itinerary of classical German thought, and especially Hegel, in Merleau-Ponty’s thought. I begin by examining Merleau-Ponty’s initial use of Hegel’s systematic and metaphysicalmetaphysics ideas in phenomenological analyses of behavior and perception. Next, I examine Merleau-Ponty’s role in controversies regarding the existentialists’ interpretation and objections to Hegel’s system. I trace his attempts to surmount antinomiesantinomy between subjectivitysubjectivity and system that emerged in the existentialist’s anthropological reading of Hegel. Here Merleau-Ponty focused on linguistics and more (...) general analyses of institution and expression. Finally, I will view the renewed role that classical German philosophy, including Schelling and Hegel, played in his final works. Still reflecting these interests, his writings and lectures engaged in a wide-ranging dialogue with contemporary aesthetics, sciencescience, and philosophy, culminating in an attempt to formulate a new ontologyontology. (shrink)

It is easy to understand why Hegel's philosophy should be little studied by English-speaking philosophers today. Those who at the beginning of the twentieth century initiated the movement we are now caught up in presented their earliest philosophical arguments as criticisms of the prevailing Anglo-Hegelian views. It may now be thought illiberal to take much interest in this perhaps excusably slaughtered royal family, and positively reactionary to hanker after the foreign dynasty from which it sometimes claimed descent. Hegel was (...) a systematic philosopher with a scope hardly to be found today, and men who, as we say, wish to keep up with their subject may well be daunted at the idea of having to understand a way of looking at philosophy which they suspect would not repay them for their trouble anyway. Furthermore, since Hegel wrote, formal logic has advanced in ways he could not have foreseen, and has, it seems to many, destroyed the whole basis of his dialectical method. At the same time, the creation of a science of sociology, it is supposed, has rendered obsolete the philosophy of history for which Hegel was at one time admired. In countries where there are Marxist intellectuals, Hegel does get discussed as the inadvertent forerunner of historical and dialectical materialism. But in England, where there is no such need or presence, there do not seem to be any very strong ideological reasons for discussing him. In what follows I shall be asking you to direct your thoughts to certain forgotten far-off things which I hope you will find historically interesting even if you do not agree with me that they give important clues for an understanding of human nature and human society. (shrink)

It is easy to understand why Hegel's philosophy should be little studied by English-speaking philosophers today. Those who at the beginning of the twentieth century initiated the movement we are now caught up in presented their earliest philosophical arguments as criticisms of the prevailing Anglo-Hegelian views. It may now be thought illiberal to take much interest in this perhaps excusably slaughtered royal family, and positively reactionary to hanker after the foreign dynasty from which it sometimes claimed descent. Hegel was (...) a systematic philosopher with a scope hardly to be found today, and men who, as we say, wish to keep up with their subject may well be daunted at the idea of having to understand a way of looking at philosophy which they suspect would not repay them for their trouble anyway. Furthermore, since Hegel wrote, formal logic has advanced in ways he could not have foreseen, and has, it seems to many, destroyed the whole basis of his dialectical method. At the same time, the creation of a science of sociology, it is supposed, has rendered obsolete the philosophy of history for which Hegel was at one time admired. In countries where there are Marxist intellectuals, Hegel does get discussed as the inadvertent forerunner of historical and dialectical materialism. But in England, where there is no such need or presence, there do not seem to be any very strong ideological reasons for discussing him. In what follows I shall be asking you to direct your thoughts to certain forgotten far-off things which I hope you will find historically interesting even if you do not agree with me that they give important clues for an understanding of human nature and human society. (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)

This article calls for moral choices and political action to escape the trap of the duality of aggression and resistance, of domination and liberation. Conflict is a permanent feature of human relationships, but violence is not only unproductive in resolving conflict, but can be rendered unnecessary by developing normative resources and institutional mechanisms for mediating conflict. Taking self-determination as a core human value and political reality in today’s globalized world, this article argues that we should reconceive realpolitik to escape the (...) trap by acknowledging the moral choices of others, and striving to be persuasive about our moral choices and political actions. Persuasion, and not violence, provides sustainable mediation of conflict. The article concludes with a brief discussion of the possibilities of mediation of the trap of resentment and retaliation in Dar Fur, Sudan, through multilayered strategies from immediate and short- to long-term action by local, regional and global actors. (shrink)

In this chapter, we critique a concept of resilience that has emerged from contemporary positive psychology and its application to health education. We argue that the present popularity of “resilience” as a strategy for managing mental health discourages educational institutions from providing students with the mental health services they need. Using the tools of American pragmatism, especially the work of John Dewey, we criticize the paradigm of resilience and identify several concrete reformulations of disability studies which would make concrete differences (...) in the lives of those with mental disability. (shrink)

The article provides an overview of activity of the department of logic and methodology of science of the H.S. Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy, National Academy of Science of Ukraine. This activity includes scientific research, translation of philosophical literature, organization of seminars on urgent problems of modern philosophy. Research projects, on the one hand, are based on scientific traditions formed over the years in the Institute, and on the other hand, they focus on the transformations (...) in scientific cognition and science, and build the projections for the future. It presents methodological backgrounds of the project «Semiotic analysis of cultural phenomena» (2018–2020), and outlines research tasks of the projects «Communicative transformations in modern science» (2020–2021) and «Logical, ontological and axiological dimensions of modern scientific knowledge» (2022–2024). Involvement of young scholars in research in logic, methodology and philosophy of science is the major challenge for the department. (shrink)

Presence as ordinarily understood requires spatio-temporal proximity. If however Christ’s presence in the Eucharist is understood in this way it would take a miracle to secure multiple location and an additional miracle to cover it up so that the presence of Christ where the Eucharist was celebrated made no empirical difference. And, while multiple location is logically possible, such metaphysical miracles—miracles of distinction without difference, which have no empirical import—are problematic. I propose an account of Eucharist according to which Christ (...) is indeed really and objectively present in the religiously required sense, without benefit of metaphysical miracles. According to the proposed account, which draws upon Searle’s discussion of “social ontology” in The Construction of Social Reality and The Making of the Social World, the presence of Christ in the Eucharist is an institutional fact. I argue that such an account satisfies the requirements for a real presence doctrine. (shrink)

I argue, first, that the deprived individuals whose predicaments Nussbaum cites as examples of "adaptive preference" do not in fact prefer the conditions of their lives to what we should regard as more desirable alternatives, indeed that we believe they are badly off precisely because they are not living the lives they would prefer to live if they had other options and were aware of them. Secondly, I argue that even where individuals in deprived circumstances acquire tastes for conditions that (...) we regard as bad, they are typically better off having their acquired preferences satisfied. If they are badly off it is because they cannot get what we and they, would regard as more desirable alternatives. Preference utilitarianism explains why individuals in such circumstances are badly off whether they have adapted to their deprived circumstances or not. Even if they prefer the conditions of their lives to all other available alternatives, most would prefer alternatives that are not available to them which would, on the preferentist account, make them better off. And that, on the preferentist account, is the basis for a radical critique of unjust institutions that limit people's options and prevent them from getting what they want. (shrink)

This book addresses the problem of how to make democratically-legitimate public policy on issues of contentious bioethical debate. It focuses on ethical contests about research and their legitimate resolution, while addressing questions of political legitimacy. How should states make public policy on issues where there is ethical disagreement, not only about appropriate outcomes, but even what values are at stake? What constitutes justified, democratic policy in such conflicted domains? Case studies from Canada and Australia demonstrate that two countries sharing historical (...) and institutional characteristics can reach different policy responses. This book is of interest to policymakers, bioethicists, and philosophers, and will deepen our understanding of the interactions between large-scale socio-political forces and detailed policy problems in bioethics. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be (...) preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

With the end of the cold war, issues of environment and economic development are assuming greater international salience. By the 1970s, environmental degradation was becoming pervasive, with growing global effects. Increasingly, global and emergent globalized problems are forcing environmental interdependence on the world. Transboundary threats cannot be addressed unilaterally by any single country or group of countries. The global environmental agenda is reviving the North-South debate and rejuvenating the Third World coalition in international fora. The encouragement of environmentally sustainable forms (...) of industrialization in the South requires expanded and improved international cooperation. However, the North’s greater resources and greater responsibility in causing global environmental degradation require its continuing involvement in the search for solutions, including ones applicable to newly industrializing countries. In June 1992, the largest intergovernmental conference ever held was convened in Rio de Janeiro to address these issues: the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED, or the Earth Summit). It produced a consensus action plan of about 700 pages: Agenda 21. Agenda 21 presents massive challenges for international cooperation as well as for national and private actors and scientific and technical institutions. It reflects a complex configuration of demands for institutional arrangements that support environmentally sustainable technical and socioeconomic change. One of the most consistent of the Agenda 21 themes, and one of the most intractable issues, concerns “access to technology.” This can be as straightforward as diagnosing and improving the efficiency of a production process in a small manufacturing firm, or as complex as engineering a technological revolution in which production and consumption take place with virtually no material or energy loss to the environment. The selection of entry points for action is a critical strategic problem as well as an important operational issue. In this paper I identify and describe new initiatives intended to improve the environmental performance of industry in the South, and find that they largely aim to promote incremental industrial innovation through international technology transfer and diffusion. This strategy raises many questions about how to promote effective technology transfer and diffusion. (shrink)

Democracy in the 21st century is exhibiting some radical discontinuities in terms of its forms and institutions and needs to be rethought, if we wish to have a sustainable future. Democracy increasingly will be shaped by three realities: the demise of the nation state; the failure of representational liberal democracy; and the radical impacts of resource insufficiency and climate change. Yet if no government, however tyrannical, survives for long except by consent of the people, then that consent can serve as (...) the starting point for rethinking what is meant by “democracy.” Three terms are offered as functional categories that allow for an assessment of democratic forms and institutions: subsistence, operational and systemic. Each describes how and why the population acquiesces to governance and under what conditions. (shrink)

A POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY OF CONSERVATISM, PRUDENCE, MODERATION AND TRADITION, by Ferenc Hörcher. London and New York: Bloomsbury Academic. 2020. vi + 210pp. Hardback: $103.50; Paperback: $35.96. ISBN: 978-1-350-06718-9. Reviewed by H.G. Callaway, Department of Philosophy, Temple University. Email: HG1Callaway (at) gmail (.) com Ferenc Hörcher is Head of the Research Institute of Politics and Government of the National University of Public Service, Hungary. His new book, A POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY OF CONSERVATISM, appears in the Bloomsbury Studies in (...) the Aristotelian Tradition. Hörcher aims to understand, elucidate and develop political conservatism in the long Aristotelian-Stoic tradition, emphasizes the role of character formation for statesmanship and political actors, the constraints implied by specific cultural traditions and the details of factual context, and addresses the contemporary standing and revival of Aristotelian virtue ethics and the specifically political virtue of prudence or “practical wisdom.” The book comes recommended by Harvard University historian James Hankins, who, on the back cover, recommends it for readers “disturbed by the collapse of statesmanship in the contemporary world.” . (shrink)

Book synopsis: Aristotle's probing inquiry into some of the fundamental problems of philosophy, The Metaphysics is one of the classical Greek foundation-stones of western thought, translated from the with an introduction by Hugh Lawson-Tancred in Penguin Classics. The Metaphysics presents Aristotle's mature rejection of both the Platonic theory that what we perceive is just a pale reflection of reality and the hard-headed view that all processes are ultimately material. He argued instead that the reality or substance of things lies (...) in their concrete forms, and in so doing he probed some of the deepest questions of philosophy: What is existence? How is change possible? And are there certain things that must exist for anything else to exist at all? The seminal notions discussed in The Metaphysics - of 'substance' and associated concepts of matter and form, essence and accident, potentiality and actuality - have had a profound and enduring influence, and laid the foundations for one of the central branches of Western philosophy. Hugh Lawson-Tancred's lucid translation is accompanied by a stimulating introduction in which he highlights the central themes of one of philosophy's supreme masterpieces. Aristotle (384-22 BC) studied at the Academy of Plato for 20 years and then established his own school and research institute, 'The Lyceum'. His writings, which were of extraordinary range, profoundly affected the whole course of ancient and medieval philosophy and are still eagerly studied and debated by philosophers today. (shrink)

Democracy in the 21st century is exhibiting some radical discontinuities in terms of its forms and institutions and needs to be rethought, if we wish to have a sustainable future. Democracy increasingly will be shaped by three realities: the demise of the nation state; the failure of representational liberal democracy; and the radical impacts of resource insufficiency and climate change. Yet if no government, however tyrannical, survives for long except by consent of the people, then that consent can serve as (...) the starting point for rethinking what is meant by “democracy.” Three terms are offered as functional categories that allow for an assessment of democratic forms and institutions: subsistence, operational and systemic. Each describes how and why the population acquiesces to governance and under what conditions. (shrink)

The question posed in this paper concerns destruction: What part, if any, does destruction play in Nietzsche's life-project of critical transvaluation? Nietzsche's project, I argue, involves a total critique of Western values in the name of life, yet this does not entail total violence: the destruction of antagonistic values. Violent, destructive impulses cannot be subtracted from his thought; the question is whether they make for destruction as the goal of critique (I). Nietzsche's reflections on „critical history” are used to show (...) his awareness of a recoiling logic of self-destruction threatening any act of critical destruction. On this basis, I argue that Nietzsche seeks a „limit in the negation of the past” (II) and propose an „agonal” model of critique that incorporates such a limit: Nietzschean critique is regulated by a regime of reciprocal empowerment—disempowerment, based on the central institution of Homeric culture, the agon or contest. The agonal regime allows for the total critique of values, while arresting the logic of self-destruction through a code of limited violence; „agonal mastery” displaces destruction as the goal of critique. In support of this thesis, Nietzsche's own account of his war-praxis from Ecce Homo is examined with emphasis on the moments of limitation (III). His account of the agon in Homeric Greek culture is then examined as a model for critique that embodies his declared war-praxis (IV). In the final section (V), the agonal pathos of envy is used to explicate the dynamic of agonal critique as an alternative to total warfare and to flesh out the concept of mastery that separates the two. (shrink)

Scientists and historians have often presumed that the divide between biochemistry and molecular biology is fundamentally epistemological.100 The historiography of molecular biology as promulgated by Max Delbrück's phage disciples similarly emphasizes inherent differences between the archaic tradition of biochemistry and the approach of phage geneticists, the ur molecular biologists. A historical analysis of the development of both disciplines at Berkeley mitigates against accepting predestined differences, and underscores the similarities between the postwar development of biochemistry and the emergence of molecular biology (...) as a university discipline. Stanley's image of postwar biochemistry, with its focus on viruses as key experimental systems, and its preference for following macromolecular structure over metabolism pathways, traced the outline of molecular biology in 1950.Changes in the postwar political economy of research universities enabled the proliferation of disciplines such as microbiology, biochemistry, biophysics, immunology, and molecular biology in universities rather than in medical schools and agricultural colleges. These disciplines were predominantly concerned with investigating life at the subcellular level-research that during the 1930s had often entailed collaboration with physicists and chemists. The interdisciplinary efforts of the 1930s (many fostered by the Rockefeller Foundation) yielded a host of new tools and reagents that were standardized and mass-produced for laboratories after World War II. This commercial infrastructure enabled “basic” researchers in biochemistry and molecular biology in the 1950s and 1960s to become more independent from physics and chemistry (although they were practicing a physicochemical biology), as well as from the agricultural and medical schools that had previously housed or sponsored such research. In turn, the disciplines increasingly required their practitioners to have specialized graduate training, rather than admitting interlopers from the physical sciences.These general transitions toward greater autonomy for biochemistry and allied disciplines should not mask the important particularities of these developments on each campus. At the University of Caliornia at Berkeley, agriculture had provided, with medicine, significant sponsorship for biochemistry. The proximity of Lawrence and his cyclotrons supported the early development of Berkeley as a center for the biological uses of radioisotopes, particularly in studies of metabolism and photosynthesis. Stanley arrived to establish his department and virus institute before large-scale federal funding of biomedical research was in place, and he courted the state of California for substantial backing by promising both national prominence in the life sciences and virus research pertinent to agriculture and public health. Stanley's venture benefited significantly from the expansion of California's economy after World War II, and his mobilization against viral diseases resonated with the concerns of the Cold War, which fueled the state's rapid growth. The scientific prominence of contemporary developments at Caltech and Stanford invites the historical examination of the significance of postwar biochemistry and molecular biology within the political and cultural economy of the Golden State.In 1950, Stanley presented a persuasive picture of the power of biochemistry to refurbish life science at Berkeley while answering fundamental questions about life and infection. In the words of one Rockefeller Foundation officer,There seems little doubt in [my] mind that as a personality Stanley will be well able to dominate the other personalities on the Berkeley campus and will be able to drive his dream through to completion, which, incidentally, leaves Dr. Hubert [sic] Evans and the whole ineffective Life Sciences building in the somewhat peculiar position of being by-passed by much of the truly modern biochemistry and biophysics research that will be carried out at Berkeley. Furthermore, it seems likely that Dr. S's show will throw Dr. John Lawrence's Biophysics Department strongly in the shade both figuratively and literally, but should make the University of California pre-eminent not only in physics but in biochemistry as well.101Stanley, Sproul, Weaver, and this officer (William Loomis) all testified to a perceptible postwar opportunity to capitalize on public support for biological research that relied on the technologies from physics and chemistry without being captive to them, and that addressed issues of medicine and agriculture without being institutionally subservient. What is striking, given the expectation by many that Stanley would ‘be able to drive his dream through to completion,” was that in fact he did not. Biochemists who had succeeded in making their expertise valued in specialized niches were resistant to giving up their affiliations to joint Stanley's “liberated” organization. Stanley's failure was not simply due to institutional factors: researchers as well as Rockefeller Foundation officers faulted him for his lack of scientific imagination, which made it difficult for him to gain credibility in leading the field. Moreover, many biochemists did not share Stanley's commitment to viruses as the key material for the “new biochemistry.”In the end, Stanley's free-standing department did become a first-rate department of biochemistry, but only after freeing itself from Stanley's leadership and his single-minded devotion to viruses. Nonetheless, the falling-out with the Berkeley biochemists was rapidly followed by the establishment of a Department of Molecular Biology, attesting to the unabating economic and institutional possibilities for an authoritative “general biology” (or two, for that matter) to take hold. In each case, following Stanley's dream sheds light on how the possible and the real shaped the (re)formation of biochemistry and molecular biology as postwar life sciences. (shrink)

The old medieval problem of the temporal relationship between an eternal God and an eternal or timed world remains an issue that animates debates about the nature of God in contemporary philosophy of religion. The Islamic debate pitted the philosophers, in particular Ibn Sīnā [Avicenna], who held that an eternal God produced an eternal world that was merely logically posterior to him, against some theologians, such as al-Ghazālī (Alghazel) who insisted on the scriptural doctrine of creatio ex nihilo and (...) refuted the possibility of an eternal world. The conflict continued with each side ceding some aspects and rejecting others until the Safavid period in which one finds the divisions between philosophy and theology irrevocably breaking down. I shall discuss the positions of three key philosophers of early modern Iran who all defended the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo from a philosophical perspective and came up with some novel approaches to the old problem of the temporal relationship between God and creation. /// O presente artigo parte da constatação de que o velho problema dos pensadores medievais acerca do relacionamento temporal entre um Deus que é eterno e um mundo que ora se entende como eterno ora como localizado no tempo permanece ainda hoje um dos assuntos que animam os debates relativos à natureza de Deus na fdosofia da religião contemporânea. Constata-se, antes de mais, que o debate que se verificou no seio do Islão começou por levantar os filósofos, particularmente Ibn Sīnā [Avicenna], o qual defendia que um Deus eterno produziu um mundo eterno que apenas do ponto de vista lógico lhe era posterior, contra os teólogos, tais como al-Ghazātī [Alghazel], o qual insistia na doutrina baseada na Escritura da creatio ex nihilo e refutava a possibilidade de um mundo eterno. O conflito continuou com cada uma das partes cedendo alguns aspectos e rejeitando outros até à emergência do período dos Safavidas durante o qual se verifica o rompimento das divisões entre Filosofia e Teologia. Assim, o autor do artigo propõe-se analisar as posições de três filósofos fundamentais do início da era moderna no Irão, pensadores esses que defendiam a doutrína da creatio ex nihilo numa perspectiva filosófica e, ao mesmo tempo, foram capazes de avançar com algumas abordagens novas ao velho problema da relação temporal entre Deus e a criação. (shrink)

In this article I present an alternative philosophy of science based on ideas drawn from the study of complex adaptive systems. As a result of the spectacular expansion in scientific disciplines, the number of scientists and scientific institutions in the twentieth century, I believe science can be characterised as a complex system. I want to interpret the processes of science through which scientists themselves determine what counts as good science. This characterisation of science as a complex system can give (...) an answer to the question why the sciences are so successful in solving growing numbers of problems and correcting their own mistakes. I utilise components of complexity theory to explain and interpret science as a complex system. I first explain the concept of complexity in ordinary language. The explanation of science as a complex system starts with a definition of the basic rules that guide the behaviour of science as a complex system. Next, I show how various sciences result through the implementation of these rules in the study of a specific aspect of reality. The explanation of the growth of science through evolutionary adaptation and learning forms the core of the article. (shrink)

This is the first complete English translation of the Jami al-hikmatayn, written in Persian, the final, and crowning, work of the great poet, philosopher, and Ismaili missionary Nasir-i Khusraw (1004-1077). Twin Wisdoms Reconciled was written at the request of the emir of Badakhshan 'Abu al-Ma'ali 'Ali ibn Asad' who was perplexed by the questions in a long philosophical ode written a century earlier by Abu al-Haytham Jurjani, an obscure Ismaili author. The ode consists of a series of some 90 questions (...) on a wide range of subjects, from logic and metaphysics to medicine, cosmology, and physics, as well as esoteric Ismaili doctrine. Nasir-i Khusraw's text takes the form of a commentary on certain astutely selected lines. Twin Wisdoms Reconciled represents yet another example of the author's lifelong endeavour to transform Persian philosophical prose into a deft and nuanced instrument of expression. The work has not been as extensively studied as Nasir-i Khusraw's other major theological and philosophical treatises, all written in his final exile in Badakhshan, in part perhaps because of its textual difficulties. Twin Wisdoms Reconciled survives in a single manuscript of dubious accuracy in the Aya Sofya collection, Suleymaniyye Library, Istanbul. The present translation is based on the critical edition of the text produced by Henry Corbin and Mohammed Mo'in in 1953, but with frequent reference to the unique original manuscript. Twin Wisdoms Reconciled represents an endeavour to reconcile two apparently opposed forms of knowledge: the knowledge accorded by revelation and exegesis and the knowledge gained by reason. Seeing that "the bazaar of wisdom" stands empty because of the mutual incomprehension of traditional theologians and Aristotelian philosophers, Nasir-i Khusraw stepped boldly forward to reinvigorate that desolate marketplace. His final work, written in 1070, is thus a testimony as well as an exposition of his mature thought. (shrink)

Is Utilitarianism Bad for Women? Philosophers and policy-makers concerned with the ethics, economics, and politics of development argue that the phenomenon of ‘adaptive preference’ makes preference-utilitarian measures of well-being untenable. Poor women in the Global South, they suggest, adapt to deprivation and oppression and may come to prefer states of affairs that are not conducive to flourishing. This critique, however, assumes a questionable understanding of preference utilitarianism and, more fundamentally, of the concept of preference that figures in such accounts. If (...) well-being is understood as preference-satisfaction it is easy to see why poor women in the Global South are badly off: even if they do not desire more favorable conditions they nevertheless prefer them, and that preference is not satisfied. Preferentism provides a rationale for improving economic conditions and dismantling the unjust institutions that prevent them from climbing higher on their preference-rankings. Utilitarianism, therefore, insofar as utility is understood as preference satisfaction, is good for women. (shrink)

The second in the series from the Philosophy of Science Institute at St. John's University, this volume contains four essays by guest lecturers at the Institute, and provides "a summary introduction to the leading Thomistic philosophies of science in vogue today among those who believe that the philosophy of nature has an autonomy of its own, and is not applied metaphysics." The papers include an essay on Maritain's philosophy of science; a discussion of the Bohr (...) atom; and examinations of scientific method, and the subject-matter of the philosophy of nature.--B. J. H. (shrink)