Ann Hartle - Rousseau: The Sentiment of Existence - Journal of the History of Philosophy 45:3 Journal of the History of Philosophy 45.3 500-501 Muse Search Journals This Journal Contents Reviewed by Ann Hartle Emory University David Gauthier. Rousseau: The Sentiment of Existence. Cambridge-New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Pp. xiv + 196. Paper, $22.99. The unity of Rousseau's thought is among the most serious challenges faced by his interpreters. How are we to reconcile the submission of the individual to (...) the general will in the Social Contract with the solitary and free individual of the state of nature in the Discourse on Inequality and the autobiographical works? One of the great merits of this book is that it does offer, as the author promises, a.. (shrink)

That moral principles underlie and constrain the activity of members of professions such as medicine and law is generally acknowledged. Whether the same can be said of the military profession is a question likely to generate considerable uncertainty. In this paper I shall show that, like other professions, the military profession is informed by a moral teleology. The source of this teleology, for the profession of arms, is manifested in the laws of war. The laws of war, in turn, reflect (...) two humanitarian principles. (shrink)

This paper offers a detailed criticism of different versions of modal scepticism proposed by Van Inwagen and Hawke, and, against these views, attempts to vindicate our reliance on thought experiments in philosophy. More than one different meaning of “ modal scepticism” will be distinguished. Focusing mainly on Hawke’s more detailed view I argue that none of these versions of modal scepticism is compelling, since sceptical conclusions depend on an untenable and, perhaps, incoherent modal epistemology. With a detailed account of modal (...) defeaters at hand I argue that Van Inwagen and Hawke’s scepticism is either groundless, or it leads to boundless and unacceptable modal scepticism. Additionally, I show that Hawke’s conception of analogical modal reasoning is problematic. Either his principle of similarity is arbitrary or it begs the question about modal scepticism. In contrast to Hawke’s restricted view of analogical modal reasoning, I present two examples of analogy-based modal justification of philosophically relevant possibility claims. My criticism of modal scepticism also shows that there is no good reason to insist on a sharp distinction between an unproblematic and a presumably dubious kind of modality. The upshot is that in absence of proper defeaters both Yablo-style conceivability and properly applied analogical reasoning are reliable guides to possibility, and also that modal justification comes in degrees. The proposed framework of defeaters of modal justification as well as the analysed examples of analogical modal reasoning trace out interesting new areas for further discussions. (shrink)

Michel de Montaigne, the inventor of the essay, has always been acknowledged as a great literary figure but has never been thought of as a philosophical original. This book treats Montaigne as a serious thinker in his own right, taking as its point of departure Montaigne's description of himself as 'an unpremeditated and accidental philosopher'. Whereas previous commentators have treated Montaigne's Essays as embodying a scepticism harking back to classical sources, Ann Hartle offers an account that reveals Montaigne's thought to (...) be dialectical, transforming sceptical doubt into wonder at the most familiar aspects of life. This major reassessment of a much admired but also much underestimated thinker will interest a wide range of historians of philosophy as well as scholars in comparative literature, French studies and the history of ideas. (shrink)

The most striking observable feature of our indeterministic quantum universe is the wide range of time, place, and scale on which the deterministic laws of classical physics hold to an excellent approximation. This essay describes how this domain of classical predictability of every day experience emerges from a quantum theory of the universe’s state and dynamics.

This book explores the tradition, impact, and contemporary relevance of two key ideas from Western Marxism: Georg Lukács's concept of reification, in which social aspects of humanity are viewed in objectified terms, and Guy Debord's concept of the spectacle, where the world is packaged and presented to consumers in uniquely mediated ways. Bringing the original, yet now often forgotten, theoretical contexts for these terms back to the fore, Johan Hartle and Samir Gandesha offer a new look at the importance of (...) Western Marxism from its early days to the present moment-and reveal why Marxist cultural critique must continue to play a vital role in any serious sociological analysis of contemporary society. (shrink)

The familiar theories of physics have the feature that the application of the theory to make predictions in specific circumstances can be done by means of an algorithm. We propose a more precise formulation of this feature—one based on the issue of whether or not the physically measurable numbers predicted by the theory are computable in the mathematical sense. Applying this formulation to one approach to a quantum theory of gravity, there are found indications that there may exist no such (...) algorithms in this case. Finally, we discuss the issue of whether the existence of an algorithm to implement a theory should be adopted as a criterion for acceptable physical theories.“Can it then be that there is... something of use for unraveling the universe to be learned from the philosophy of computer design?” —J. A. Wheeler(1). (shrink)

This paper critically examines David Berman's theological lying interpretation of Hume and identifies two types of theological lying: the denial of atheism strategy and the pious Christian strategy. It is argued that neither reading successfully establishes an atheist interpretation of Hume. Moreover, circumstantial evidence shows that Hume's position was different from that of the atheists of his time. Attributions theological lying to Hume, therefore, are unwarranted and should be rejected, even if we grant that this literary technique was used in (...) the early-modern era. Analysing other non-theistic readings of Hume is beyond the scope of this paper. However, given that Berman presents one of most elaborated atheist reinterpretations of Hume's affirmative theistic passages, the failure of Berman's analysis shows that rejecting these passages should not be the default interpretive approach, and it is reasonable to attribute to Hume a weak, indeterminate theism. (shrink)

Why do so many doctors have profound misgivings about the push to legalise euthanasia and assisted suicide? Ole Hartling uses his background as a physician, university professor and former president of the Danish Council of Ethics to introduce new elements into what can often be understood as an all too simple debate. Alive to the case that assisted dying can be driven by an unattainable yearning for control, Hartling concentrates on two fundamental questions: whether the answer to suffering (...) is to remove the sufferer, and whether self-determination in dying and death is an illusion. He draws on his own experience as a medical doctor to personalize the ethical arguments, share patients' narratives and make references to medical literature. Here is a sceptical stance towards euthanasia, one that is respectful to those who hold different opinions and well-informed about the details and nuances of different euthanasia practices. Written from a Scandinavian perspective, where respect for autonomy and high quality palliative care go hand in hand, Hartling's is a nuanced, valuable contribution to the arguments that surround a question doctors have faced since the birth of medicine. He shows us how the intentions of doing something good can sometimes lead to even greater dilemmas, opening us up to those situations where an inclination to end suffering by ending life is deeply conflicting both for the clinician and for any fellow human being. (shrink)

This is the second volume of a two volume study on ethical issues concerning death. Volume 2 is subtitled Death and Whom to Save from It. In this second volume, Kamm deals with rights, duties, and status, developing an account of when it is permissible to harm others, especially when it is permissible to kill others. There is, however, a third book that must be considered if we are to fully understand the import of Volume 2 of Morality, Mortality. This (...) third book is entitled Creation and Abortion. It was originally intended to be included in Morality, Mortality, but, on account of considerations of length, the material on abortion was published separately by Oxford University Press in 1992. Creation and Abortion was prompted by Kamm's attempt to understand and modify Judith Thomson's "A Defense of Abortion.". (shrink)

Montaigne chooses to write the Essays in French, the vulgar language, rather than in Latin, the language of the learned. He uses only the words that areheard in the streets, markets, and taverns of France. And he speaks about the body and the sexual in a manner that goes beyond the limits of propriety. The language of the Essays perfectly reflects Montaigne’s philosophical project, the re-ordering of philosophy to the lowest rather than the highest, to the ordinary rather than the (...) extraordinary. By bringing the private into the public, he frees the private from shame and creates the new, modern public space, i.e., society. The invention of the essay is the invention of society. (shrink)

Montaigne’s last words in the Essays—the words that capture his entire project—are “sociable wisdom.” Philosophy has been transformed from the “love of wisdom” to “sociable wisdom” and this transformation is, at the same time, the transformation of the human world, the production of society, a new mode of human association. What is “sociable wisdom” and how has it produced this remarkable effect?Philosophy means “the love of wisdom.” Although the term is believed to have been used first by Pythagoras, Socrates presents (...) us with the most complete picture of the life of philosophy as the love of wisdom. And Socrates is the ancient philosopher most admired by Montaigne. However, the Socrates of the Essays is.. (shrink)

Aesthetic discourse has always openly or secretly been linked to political projects. According to some main strands of aesthetic discourse modern aesthetics mirrors the structure of social and political emancipation and key elements of aesthetic discourse coincide with the political ontology of the left. Marxist and Post-Marxist critics have emphasized that the struggle for emancipation is indirectly present in the historical constitution of aesthetics as a discipline – although in a merely imaginary and displaced form. Therefore, however, it is also (...) partly of the same structure as what is normally described as “aesthetic”. Against this background aesthetic attributes (‘beauty’) can be ascribed to forms of emancipatory politics as well. (shrink)

Moral Constraints on War offers a principle-by-principle presentation of the transcultural roots of the ethics of war in an age defined by the increasingly international nature of military intervention.

This article introduces Metaphilosophy's special issue on metatheories of disagreement, with the aim of promoting discussion on the nature of disagreement on a metatheoretical level. The contributions to this issue cover the following key topics related to disagreement: faultless disagreement, metaontological disagreement, metalinguistic disagreement, responses to peer disagreement in philosophy, hinge epistemology and deep disagreement, disagreement asymmetry, factual and nonfactual disagreement, and defining disagreement or verbal dispute. This introduction also provides general background on four major topics in order to contextualize (...) the contributions to the special issue: first, the problem of characterizing the subject matter of disagreements; second, the most prominent accounts of deep disagreement, disagreement asymmetry and hinges; third, the notion of faultless disagreement; and finally, the problem of offering different approaches on what disagreements are. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS 503 Possibility, Necessity, and Existence: Abbagnarw and His Predecessors. By NINO LANGIULLI. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1992. Pp. xv + 205. $44.95 (cloth). Although Nicola Abbagnano would agree in some sense with the currently fashionable claim that metaphysics is dead, Nino Langiulli's treatment of Abbagnano's thought constitutes a challenge to that claim. The aim, of Possibility, Necessity, and Existence is "to expound and elucidate historically and analytically (...) the concepts of possibility, necessity, and existence as they are refracted through the thought of the twentieth-century Italian philosopher Nicola Abbagnano." Langiulli characterizes Abbagnano as a bold and original thinker whose defense of "possibility" as the fundamental sense of being is understood by Abbagnano himself as an anti-metaphysical position. In his critical reflections, however, especially in the last chapter, Langiulli shows that Abbagnano is indeed engaged in an inquiry that can only be called metaphysical. Parts I and II are preparatory to the third part in which the concept of possibility and its relation to existence are most directly addressed. Part I provides a historical overview of four phases of the movement of Abbagnano's thought "from a positive existentialism to a radical empiricism." Abbagnano's version of existentialism is "positive" in that it sees in human finitude the very possibility of man's relationship with being. Here Abbagnano is distinguished from other existentialists such as Heidegger, Jaspers, Marcel, and Sartre. His criticisms of these positions are among the most important and interesting parts of the book. Heidegger and Jaspers both begin by apprehending human existence as a structure of possibilities but then reduce human existence to a structure of impossibilities. Christian existentialists such as Marcel really treat possibilities as potentialities to be inevitably realized. For Sartre all possibilities are equivalent, but for Abbagnano "the complete arbitrariness of choice among human possibilities does not imply freedom at all, but the impossibility of choice" (18). Here also Langiulli's comparison of Abbagnano with Quine, Sellars, and Rorty is pertinent and illuminating: Abbagnano would share Rorty's criticism of Quine and Sellars for holding on to vestiges of the old empiricism, but Abbagnano would not accept Rorty's "emptying" of philosophy itself. The influence of Abbagnano on his student Umberto Eco and on Gianni Vattimo and the differences between Abbagnano and Derrida's views of possibility are spelled out by Langiulli. In a section entitled "Dumping Philosophy and the Madness of It That Is Also Folly," Langiulli locates Abbagnano clearly and precisely within the debate over the legitimacy of reason. Abbagnano finds the basis of philosophical madness in the persistent tendency to take one aspect of human life as an absolute determinant, thus marginalizing or ignoring all others. "This privileged status has even been attributed to reason, but only when it 504 BOOK REVIEWS is absolutized or divinized as a superhuman force regulating the whole of nature, humanity included, according to necessary and necessitating laws" (39). So, for example, the order of mathematics or the techniques of verification and control employed in physics are transferred to the human world. But Abbagnano's rejection of absolutized reason is not a rejection of reason as such. He sees the current favoring of the nonrational and irrational aspects of life as a kind of folly and madness, "the vertigo of absurdity." The deliberate and crass ignorance of history and the search for novelty are also forms of madness. Part II consists of four chapters that trace the sources for Abbagnano's concept of possibility. The first of these sources is Plato's treatment of existence and possibility in the Sophist, where Abbagnano finds what he takes to be the antecedent for his own thought and for existentialism in general: the idea that possibility is both the structure and the ground of existing things. The two persistent themes of Greek metaphysics that Abbagnano is concerned to overcome are found most explicitly in Aristotle: the priority of actuality over possibility and the primacy of necessity over possibility. Kant is credited with opening the path for contemporary thought with his concept of real possibility (as distinguished from merely logical possibility). Finally, Abbagnano is indebted to Kierkegaard's criticisms of Aristotle and Hegel in the Philosophical... (shrink)

The modern philosophical act, as it appears in the Essays of Montaigne, reorders the world by radically altering the relationship between the mind and the world. Montaigne replaces the premodern philosophical act of contemplation with the modern philosophical act of judgment. While contemplation is the natural end or natural completion and perfection of the mind, judgment is the freedom of the mind from nature. Contemplation is the receptive attitude of the mind toward the world; judgment is the attitude of mastery. (...) Contemplation is the ordering of the human to the divine, while judgment reorders man to man himself. This reordering entails a revaluation of all things in relation to man as man. Judgment eliminates the classical distinction between actions that are good in themselves and actions that are for the sake of production, thereby undermining the hierarchy of leisure and work, the foundation of classical civilization. The liberal order is the new form of human association, which replaces the old order. (shrink)

This volume includes selected essays by invited contributors on the social philosophy and the philosophy of science of the Hungarian-British polymath Michael Polanyi. These essays cover topics in Polanyi’s social-political philosophy, as well as social themes in his epistemology and philosophy of science. Additionally, some essays focus on Polanyian themes in contemporary philosophy (including epistemology, philosophy of science, and science policy).

Empirical examinations about cross-cultural variability of intuitions, the well-known publication of Stich and his colleagues criticiz-ing thought-experiments and intuitions in philosophical debates, is still a challenge that faces analytical philosophers, as any systematic investigation of the methodology of philosophy must give answers to these basic questions: What is intuition? What role should intuitions play in philosophy? I present and examine the sceptical argument of experimental philosophers, and claim that experimental philosophers misunderstand the role of evidence in philosophy. My argument will (...) utilize Goldman’s view, according to which intuitions give reliable evidence about a person’s concepts, and this knowledge is valuable for further philosophical research as well. I will argue that the sceptical conclusions of experimental philosophers are harmless against this conception of philosophy, because even from a naturalist perspective certain kind of intuitive judgments about our concepts can be warranted, and this grants the specific epistemic status of intuitions. Of course, the reliability of introspection can be challenged. However, denying self-knowledge about my internal mental states is disputable – as I will show – both from a philosophical and a scientific point of view. (shrink)

U ovome radu istražujem Polanyijeve glavne argumente za akademsku slobodu. Akademska i politička sloboda međusobno su blisko povezane: ako država preuzme kontrolu nad znanošću, to dovodi do kolapsa same slobode u cijelome društvu. Njegovi argumenti protiv totalitarizma oslanjaju se na njegovu anti-pozitivističku filozofiju znanosti. On definira totalitarizam kao poricanje akademske slobode koje se temelji na pragmatičkom poimanju znanosti i instrumentalističkim interpretacijama moralnih vrijednosti. Polanyijeva ideja znanosti je duhovni, idealistički opis zajednice slobodnih intelektualaca koji su strastveno posvećeni potrazi za istinom i (...) imaju autonomnu zajednicu s vlastitim pravilima i autonomnim upravljanjem. Potraga za istinom radi nje same je bitan cilj znanosti, koji se može postići jedino ako znanost ostane slobodna od političkih, ideoloških i ekonomskih utejcaja. Tvrdim da Polanyijevi uvidi mogu biti relevantni i danas, kada znanost može postati instrument profitno orijentiranih praktičnih potreba umjesto potrage za istinom samom i kada se humanistika često smatra nepotrebnom.In the present essay I investigate Polanyi’s main arguments for academic freedom. Academic and political freedom are closely related to each other: if state takes control over science, it will lead to the collapse of freedom itself in the whole society. His arguments against totalitarianism rely on his anti-positivist philosophy of science. He diagnoses totalitarianism as a denial of academic freedom which is based on a pragmatist view of science and instrumentalist interpretation of moral values. Polanyi’s idea of science is a spiritual, idealistic description of a community of free intellectuals who are passionately committed to seeking the truth and have an autonomous community with its own rules and autonomous direction. Seeking the truth for its own sake is the essential goal of science, which can be accomplished only if it remains free from political, ideological and economical influences. I will argue that Polanyi’s insights can still be relevant today, when science can become an instrument of profit-oriented practical needs instead of seeking the truth itself, and the humanities are often considered unnecessary.Dans cet essai, j’examine les principaux arguments de Polany pour la liberté académique. La liberté académique et politique sont étroitement liées : si l’Etat prend le contrôle de la science, cela conduira à l’effondrement de la liberté elle-même dans toute la société. Ses arguments contre le totalitarisme reposent sur sa philosophie anti-positiviste de la science. Il diagnostique le totalitarisme comme un refus de la liberté académique fondé sur une conception pragmatique de la science et une interprétation instrumentaliste des valeurs morales. L’idée de la science de Polany est une description spirituelle, idéaliste, d’une communauté d’intellectuels libres, passionnément dédiés à la recherche de la vérité, et qui ont une communauté avec ses propres règles et une direction autonome. La recherche de la vérité pour elle-même est l’objectif essentiel de la science, ce qui peut être accompli uniquement si elle demeure libre des influences politiques, idéologiques et économiques. J’affirme que les visions de Polany peuvent toujours être pertinentes aujourd’hui, alors que la science peut devenir un instrument des besoins pratiques orientés vers le profit au lieu de chercher la vérité elle-même, et alors que les sciences humaines sont souvent considérées comme inutiles.Im präsenten Artikel gehe ich Polanyis Hauptargumentation für akademische Freiheit auf den Grund. Die akademische und politische Freiheit sind miteinander nahe verwandt: Unterzieht der Staat die Wissenschaft seiner Kontrolle, endet dies im Kollaps der Freiheit selbst in der gesamten Gesellschaft. Polanyis Begründung gegen den Totalitarismus stützt sich auf dessen antipositivistische Philosophie der Wissenschaft. Er diagnostiziert den Totalitarismus als Versagung der akademischen Freiheit, die auf dem pragmatischen Blickpunkt der Wissenschaft als auch der instrumentalistischen Interpretation der Moralwerte basiert. Polanyis Wissenschaftsvorstellung ist eine spirituelle, idealistische Schilderung einer Gemeinschaft freier Intellektueller, die sich der Suche nach Wahrheit glutvoll gewogen zeigt und über eine autonome Community mit eigenen Regeln sowie autonomer Verwaltung verfügt. Die Erkundung der Wahrheit um ihrer selbst willen repräsentiert das essenzielle Vorhaben der Wissenschaft, welches sich allein unter Bewahrung ihrer Independenz von politischen, ideologischen bzw. wirtschaftlichen Einflüssen zuwege bringen lässt. Ich halte dafür, Polanyis Einblicke hätten auch heutzutage Relevanzpotenzial, zu der Zeit, wenn sich die Wissenschaft auf ein Werkzeug des profitorientierten praktischen Begehrens reduzieren könnte, anstatt nach der Wahrheit selbst zu fahnden, und die Geisteswissenschaften gehäuft als entbehrlich abgestempelt werden. (shrink)

This book addresses the complex relationship between the values of liberal democracy and the values associated with scientific research. The chapters explore how these values mutually reinforce or conflict with one another, in both historical and contemporary contexts. -/- The contributors utilize various approaches to address this timely subject, including historical studies, philosophical analysis, and sociological case studies. The chapters cover a range of topics including academic freedom and autonomy, public control of science, the relationship between scientific pluralism and deliberative (...) democracy, lay-expert relations in a democracy, and the threat of populism and autocracy to scientific inquiry. Taken together the essays demonstrate how democratic values and the epistemic and non-epistemic values associated with science are interconnected. (shrink)

Montaigne’s _Essays_ are rightfully studied as giving birth to the literary form of that name. Ann Hartle’s _Montaigne and the Origins of Modern Philosophy_ argues that the essay is actually the perfect expression of Montaigne as what he called "a new figure: an unpremeditated and accidental philosopher." Unpremeditated philosophy is philosophy made sociable—brought down from the heavens to the street, where it might be engaged in by a wider audience. In the same philosophical act, Montaigne both transforms philosophy and invents (...) "society," a distinctly modern form of association. Through this transformation, a new, modern character emerges: the individual, who is neither master nor slave and who possesses the new virtues of integrity and generosity. In Montaigne’s radically new philosophical project, Hartle finds intimations of both modern epistemology and modern political philosophy. (shrink)