While Wallace disagreed with Darwin that domesticates provided a great deal of useful information on wild populations,71 Darwin continued to draw on his domesticated animals and plants to inform him on the workings of his theory. Unlike Wallace, his exposure to natural populations was extremely limited after his return from the Beagle voyage. By the 1850s, he had settled into a life at Down House and was becoming more and more withdrawn from London scientific circles. He turned to his network (...) of informants, visits from colleagues such as Hooker and T. H. Huxley, subscriptions to various journals, and his own experimental studies at Down.This work on domesticates was clearly related to other natural history studies conducted by Darwin and others during the same period. For example, during the 1850s when Darwin worked on domesticates, he was also engaged in questions of geographic distribution. To study the dispersal and subsequent viability of introduced seeds, he soaked various seeds in a tub filled with seawater and counted which of the seeds floated after a given period; later he planted the seeds in the yard at Down to look for potential viability. There was no attempt at controlled, replicated experiments in these studies, or in his work with domesticates, nor should there have been. To Darwin the results of one experiment represented a potential truth of nature, and he was quick to seize upon these results as supporting evidence for his theory.I have suggested in this paper that his work on domesticates was not simply meant to provide an analogy for natural selection but rather became a research program to investigate other aspects of his natural selection theory, especially inheritance and variability; these subjects were integral parts of his theory of natural selection, but by 1859 he had not found a mechanism to account for them. The experiments brought home the difficult problems of inheritance, and Darwin specifically formulated pangenesis to account for these problems. Pangenesis was not an afterthought but an integration of several decades of thinking on inheritance. It was a unified theory to explain the complicated results he witnessed in his own experiments.Much of the Darwin scholarship has focused on Darwin's path toward the discovery of natural selection. Natural selection per se was a major interest, but not the only area of interest to Darwin. Inheritance was an area of serious concern for him both before and after he had formulated natural selection. His experimentation with domesticates was an attempt to look beyond natural selection and to concentrate on the difficult subject of inheritance. He found inheritance especially troublesome, requiring a “provisional hypothesis” to account for it. To see domesticates, as they are described in the Origin, as merely an analogy for natural selection, does not account for the importance Darwin placed on them. For him they were not man's monstrous productions, but worthy experimental subjects providing him with crucial information on inheritance. (shrink)

I argue that good communication is vital to philosophy’s project of understanding truth. I consider what good communication would involve, especially with regards to the needs of a popular philosophy magazine such as Philosophy Now. What makes a good or bad article? And how can one edit oneself for clarity? Finally I consider the difference the internet makes. and some of its implications for future philosophers.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Epistemologies and the Limitations of Philosophical Enquiry: Doctrine in Madhva VedantaChristopher BartleyEpistemologies and the Limitations of Philosophical Enquiry: Doctrine in Madhva Vedanta. By Deepak Sarma. London and New York: RoutledgeCurzon, 2005. Pp. xiii + 101.Epistemologies and the Limitations of Philosophical Enquiry: Doctrine in Madhva Vedanta, by Deepak Sarma, purports to discuss the possibility of philosophical evaluation of a tradition of thought and practice, in this case the Dvaita (...) school of Vedānta to which the author belongs, that upholds a "strict insider epistemology." (Although the work bears the subtitle "Doctrine in Madhva Vedanta," for information about beliefs and epistemology the reader would be better advised to consult Deepak Sarma's An Introduction to Madhva Vedanta [Ashgate, 2003].)The present reviewer is not privy to the "insider-outsider debate" apparently current in some centers of Religious Studies, and I state at the outset that I cannot see what all the fuss is about. If one is not a member of a private club, one probably doesn't care about what goes on within its walls. If a tradition is closed to nonmembers, successfully concealing its beliefs and practices (in the manner of some versions of Freemasonry), that's the end of the matter. If texts are really not accessible (p. 6), the activities that the philosopher can pursue are not just "severely restricted"! If what a tradition involves is public (even allowing for esoteric elements revealed only to initiates and for rituals of restricted participation), there are still "outsiders," but they are not debarred from appreciation, discussion, and critical philosophical [End Page 126] analysis of its truth claims. Albeit a middle-aged male member of the Church of England, I can understand (in the conventional sense of the term, which is the only one it has) the Dvaitin adoption of the unusual reading "atat tvam asi" (Chandogya Upanishad 6.8.7 et seq.).What is meant by "insider epistemology"? Sarma says:[T]here are two kinds of communities that uphold insider epistemologies. One is centred around experiential data and claims that outsiders can neither know nor understand what it is like to be an insider. The other simply does not permit outsiders to access root texts. Though actual communities are likely to lie somewhere between these two, or combine elements from each, this bivalent taxonomy is useful as a heuristic device [sic]. (p. 9)The Madhvas, insofar as they deny noninitiates access to some of their basic texts, belong to the second group. (Members of the first are what can politely be called eccentric.) Madhvāchārya, the founder, prohibited outsiders from reading certain texts and from learning from teachers. These restrictions on eligibility, it is claimed, "insulated his position from criticism and evaluation."Even if outsiders' views of core Madhva school doctrines are deemed irrelevant by insiders, Sarma's assertion that Madhvāchārya's views are immune to rational consideration by people who do not belong to the same tradition will astonish anyone familiar with medieval Vedāntic debates. The second chapter describes the historical context in which Madhvāchārya's "insider epistemology" was established. The problem here for the author's insistence on some particularly exigent sort of Dvaitin exclusivity is that there is nothing strikingly un-Vedāntic about that tradition's claims where eligibility for hearing and understanding Scripture (shruti) is concerned. As the author makes clear, Vedāntic theological enquiry, the systematic elucidation of the Upanishads and Brahma-sūtras in the context of dialectic between rival schools, was the preserve of males born into the higher three castes who could understand Sanskrit. This constraint is sometimes intensified by sectarianism, where cultic initiation is additional to caste-based qualification. In the latter respect, the Madhvas are comparable to Shrī Vaishnavas and sundry Shaiva cults. But none of this impeded a plethora of rational disputation! Had the Madhva school prohibited outsiders from "accessing its texts altogether," argument could never have gotten off the ground. But it certainly did. Moreover, the restrictions on eligibility or qualification (adhikara) to study Scripture amount to the claim that there are moral and intellectual preconditions for a proper understanding of some subject matter. At its most... (shrink)

EVOLUTIONARY EPISTEMOLOGY, THEORY OF RATIONALITY, AND THE SOCIOLOGY OF KNOWLEDGE by Gerard Radnitzky and W. W. Bartley, III La Salle, Ill.: Open Court, 1987. 475 pp., $39.95, $14.95 (paper).

Lawyers and the legal system have been much criticized in recent years. Despite popular perceptions, the legal system contains numerous mechanisms and rules designed to ensure fair results. This paper shows how the legal system tries to implement, in commercial transactions, the ethical principles of truthfulness and fairness. The Anglo-American development of Equity Courts is reviewed briefly. Several examples of the Law's enforcement of ethical principles are presented, in four different legal areas: Contracts, Securities, Goods, and Real Estate. The intent (...) here is to present an overview of the problem, with area-specific illustrations, rather than a comprehenisve examination of the cases in just one area. (shrink)

The paper interprets Nietzsche’s description of authentic human person.Based on the works of Nietzsche, commentaries and philosophical interpretationsof various authors, authentic human person evolves into a superman by usingthe principles of discipline and mastery of oneself. His authenticity, however,requires persistence, courage and strength to endure many forms of sufferingsand to overcome alienation brought about by his environment. Otherwise,man would become slave of his desires or alien to his own powers, talents andcapacities. Thus, Nietzsche’s thought of superman is an invitation to (...) overcomeoneself, the self that is influenced by the non-self or factors outside one self. Itis only possible by using the will to power. The will to power of man overcomesthe influences of the world’s modernization and industrialization that alienateshim to his true self, and this true self is best expressed by his will to power. Onthis note, the author suggests that the readers must use their potentials to face up to challenges of this new era. Keywords: Philosophy, language and literature, emergence, authentic human person,philosophy of the superman, authenticity, alienation, morality, descriptivedesign, Philippines. (shrink)

Ernst Mayr (1980) provided an influential picture of the nature of the Modern Evolutionary Synthesis and of the debate and changes occurring prior to its completion. Mayr intended his account to be applicable to comparable cases. Sociobiology should be evaluated both as a comparable case, an attempt to produce a synthesis which undergoes development of the sort Mayr described, and as an extension of the Modern Synthesis itself. Examination of what the explanatory goals and development of the New Sociobiological Synthesis (...) would be, if it is to achieve a fruitful synthesis which fits Mayr's account, undermines Richard Lewontin's critique of sociobiology. Although Lewontin speaks for many in viewing sociobiology as the latest historical manifestation of social Darwinism, genetic determinism, biological reductionism, and vulgar adaptationism, sociobiology's effort to produce a synthesis does not entail commitment to those positions. (shrink)

Wilderness valued as mere resource for human?interest satisfaction is challenged in favor of wilderness as a productive source, in which humans have roots, but which also yields wild neighbors and aliens with intrinsic value. Wild value is storied achievement in an evolutionary ecosystem, with instrumental and intrinsic, organismic and systemic values intermeshed. Survival value is reconsidered in this light. Changing cultural appreciations of values in wilderness can transform and relativize our judgments about appropriate conduct there. A final valued element in (...) wildness is its idiographic historical particularity, and most surprising is the emergence of a novel morality when humans learn to let values go wild. (shrink)

This study examines the use of a video news release in a specific story. Press coverage and editorial criticism in the case showed that journalists do not articulate sufficiently how the news owners' sway, through institutional controls, can lead to a hegemony of expedient action in the newsroom. Critical self-reflection by news workers will better enable journalists to ethically deliberate news choices that balance their responsibilities to owners, peers, and the public.

Many Christians treat marriage as a covenant. An influential group of contemporary Christians argues that covenant marriage provides a response to what they regard as the social ills of high divorce rates and the ‘breakdown’ of the traditional family. These Christians often look to John Calvin's marriage theology for inspiration because he linked treating marriage as a covenant to regarding marriage as sacred and indissoluble. In this article I cast doubt on the wisdom of treating marriage as a covenant. I (...) develop a critical genealogy that shows Calvin's marriage theology oppressed women by reinforcing their subordination to men and trapping women in abusive marriages. I then argue that recent social science suggests covenant marriage functions similarly among contemporary Christians. I consider whether a non-oppressive form of covenant marriage can be developed, before suggesting that we cannot yet know whether covenant marriage is salvageable. (shrink)

Chaïm Perelman resuscitated the rhetorical tradition by developing an elegant and detailed theory of argumentation. Rejecting the single-minded Cartesian focus on rational truth, Perelman recovered the ancient wisdom that we can argue reasonably about matters that admit only of probability. From this one would conclude that Perelman's argumentation theory is inalterably opposed to natural law, and therefore that I would have done better to have written an article titled "Perelman's Theory of Argumentation as a Rejection of Natural Law."However, my thesis (...) is precisely that Perelman's theory of argumentation connects to the natural law tradition in interesting and productive ways. Perelman referred to natural law in. (shrink)

When Donna Rice, who was brought into the public limelight as a companion to ex-presidentiaI candidate Gary Hart, appeared at a university ethics seminar, her statement, and the subsequent coverage, raised three troubling questions for journalists: the nature of academic inquiry, journalistic practices, and the right of people to define themselves.

A set of constraints forces trade-offs which prevent us from achieving the best possible definitions of the ‘level’ and ‘unit’ of natural selection. This set consists in decisions concerning conflicting pre-analytic intuitions in problematic cases, the relative roles of various conceptual resources in the definitions, which facts need to be accounted for using the definitions, how the relation between selection and evolution orients the definitions, and the relation between the level and unit concepts. Systematic reconstruction and evaluation of leading analyses (...) along these dimensions favors a new functional analysis over Williams’ consequentialist analysis, Sober’s causal analysis, and Dawkins’ teleological analysis. (shrink)

On the scale of decades and centuries, ongoingscience is reconfigured into human history that must be interpreted. So I concluded two decades back: "Progressively reforming and developing theories are erected over observations.... This leads at a larger scale to progressively reforming and developing narrative models.... The story is ever reforming" (pp. 338 — 39). I faced the future with hopes and fears about the escalating powers of science for good and evil, finding it simultaneously powerless for the meaningful guidance of (...) life, the classical province of religion. So now„having turned the millennium, what's new in the story? If I had to give a sound-bite answer (as we now must do with the media), my reply would be: increasing concern about human uniqueness and human respon-. (shrink)