Available for the first time in English, this critical translation draws from the original seven Latin editions and Georg Friedrich Meier's 18th-century German translation. Together with a historical and philosophical introduction, extensive glossaries and notes, the text is supported by translations of Kant's elucidations and notes, Eberhard's insertions in the 1783 German edition and texts from the writings of Meier and Wolff. For scholars of Kant, the German Enlightenment and the history of metaphysics, Alexander Baumgarten's Metaphysics is an essential, authoritative (...) resource to a significant philosophical text. (shrink)

This volume explores the metaphysics of Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten and its decisive influence on Immanuel Kant. Eleven specially written essays by leading scholars of German philosophy will boost further the growth of interest in Baumgarten as a key figure in the history of European thought.

Designed as a textbook for use in courses on natural theology and used by Immanuel Kant as the basis for his Lectures on The Philosophical Doctrine of Religion, Johan August Eberhard's Preparation for Natural Theology (1781) is now available in English for the first time. -/- With a strong focus on the various intellectual debates and historically significant texts in late renaissance and early modern theology, Preparation for Natural Theology influenced the way Kant thought about practical cognition as well as (...) moral and religious concepts. Access to Eberhard's complete text makes it possible to distinguish where in the lectures Kant is making changes to what Eberhard has written and where he is articulating his own ideas. Identifying new unexplored lines of research, this translation provides a deeper understanding of Kant's explicitly religious doctrines and his central moral writings, such as the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals and the Critique of Practical Reason. -/- Accompanied by Kant's previously untranslated handwritten notes on Eberhard's text as well as the Danzig transcripts of Kant's course on rational theology, Preparation for Natural Theology features a dual English-German / German-English glossary, a concordance and an introduction situating the book in relation to 18th-century theology and philosophy. This is an essential contribution to twenty-first century Kantian studies. (shrink)

Regardless of unpredictable and contingent geopolitical events such as last year’s surprising rejection of the European Constitution in France and the Netherlands, this coming year will certainly witness a large surge in patriotism. The Winter Olympics in February, and the World Cup in the summer, both promise to whip national sentiments into a fever pitch. One other thing is certain, though: journals of philosophy and ethics will continue to debate the virtues of cosmopolitanism, as this number of Ethical Perspectives does (...) through its contributions below.Why is this? Why do philosophers and academics hold on to this idea of cosmopolitanism, an idea utterly lacking in the convictions of the general public? Is it perhaps because the first cosmopolitans were in fact philosophers? The first to identify himself as a cosmopolitan was Diogenes the Cynic, and Plato’s dialogues paint many of the Sophists in cosmopolitan hues. Although people generally support the idea of internationalism as far as it promotes trade, travel, and football tournaments, once it begins to meddle in internal affairs, as it does with outsourcing and transnational constitutions, they tend to fall back upon the patria. They killed Socrates for corrupting the youth of Athens, not the youth of the world.Whether it is the service and manufacturing industries of Asia and India ‘stealing’ American jobs, or widespread fears of Brussels’ legendary bureaucrats, the non-academic public consistently turns from its tepid embrace of cosmopolitanism to patriotism whenever threatened. Are we too quick to label this as self-interest or even selfishness? Or is there something else at work in the debate between cosmopolitanism and patriotism? Some approaches to cosmopolitanism are certainly guilty of an absolute removal of difference, of wishing away the nation state, of replacing it with an international body based on purely universal principles, and of wiping away the competencies of nations on many levels. The call for the world state can come across as an appeal for an anodyne and internationalist homogeneity based on a clinical morality that, for all its sensitivity, runs roughshod over the well-engrained cultural, legal, and social beliefs of many peoples.Clearly, this is what many Europeans fear, and to a large degree, Americans as well in their dislike for the International Court of Justice. Even the economic hegemony of outsourcing removes national power, and replaces it with pure economic rationality.Our contributors below do not advocate these reductions, although some may point to them. Key to each contribution below is sensitivity to the world as it is, to its need for difference even in the face of an ever-increasing globalisation that sometimes is connected with cosmopolitanism. Yet, every proponent of cosmopolitanism must sketch how it is possible in practice. Of course, an obvious problem is how to dwell consequently as a cosmopolitan. Not many contemporary cosmopolitans would be prepared to follow Diogenes’ commitment to rootlessness: living in exile after having been included in a forgery conviction aimed at his father, the ascetic Diogenes called a barrel his home. Such was his drive to live a levelled life that he cast away his only bowl upon seeing a poor peasant boy drinking from cupped hands. Today’s cosmopolitan leads a much more prosaic life, and hence the problem with cosmopolitanism begins as something mundane. Does not a cosmopolitan still pay national taxes? Does not a cosmopolitan still need a national passport and second country visas? But, the questions quickly turn ontological: how can one shed oneself of one’s nationality, of one’s belonging, as if it is just an accident of one’s own constitution, instead of as an important property of one’s own constitution? In other words, belonging is important: a citizen of the world still values citizenship. Clearly, the absolute cosmopolitan reduction is an absurdity: one is always rooted, in some sense. Even cosmopolitanism is rooted in a specific Western mindset, and is no self-evident preference of human existence.As Rudi Visker’s contribution so clearly shows through an investigation of the narcissism of minor differences, these questions revolve around the question of confrontation with alterity. What I am, in no small way plays off what I am not. I cannot be everything, if I am something. Freud’s analysis of minor differences reveals that members of a group identify with that group on the basis these minor differences. What is self-evident to a particular culture marks that culture off from another culture, a culture that by definition does not share the same set of the self-evident. To be a foreigner, as any ex-patriot can attest, is to stand outside of the self-evident, whether this means interpreting gestures, understanding commercial practices, or, as Freud would have it, staying on the correct side of national taboos. There is thus a dialectic of inner and outer, a dialectic which refuses a reduction of one to the other. As Visker puts it, recognising the stranger within oneself is quite different than recognising the stranger outside of oneself, and to confuse these as being the same is not only to misunderstand the very issue at stake, it is also a dangerous trivialisation of difference.But clearly, there is something viable and laudable in the idea of cosmopolitanism, since it stresses the universal moral community of humanity. Cosmopolitanism is an attempt to see all human subjects as subject to the same moral law. Indeed, the sort of federation to which cosmopolitanism leads, at least in a modified Kantian expression as Bert van Roermund tells us, even gives us good grounds to recognise the legitimacy and moral equivalence of states. Importantly, the international legal order does not draw its power from any supranational force, but from the choice of independent national actors to recognise it. Hence, this cosmopolitan order depends on nationhood, and good standing within this order depends on the degree to which a country decides to participate. Again, the universal here depends on well-rooted particularity, a particularity able to choose for the universal.What do we do, then, with outlaw nations, those nations that are hostile to the choice for the universal? Through a clear reading of Hegel, Paul Cobben proposes that the metric for a state’s legality is the measure to which it permits the moral freedom of its citizens to bloom. A free person requires a free legal order; only in such can a person obtain the full measure of human rights due. States that do not permit this blooming are illegitimate; they contradict the nature of the human person, and citizens dwelling under the yoke of these have the right to ask for outside assistance in removing this illegitimate power above them. However, for this plea to be met, two conditions must obtain: the oppressed people must have the wherewithal to form a political order after the removal of the illegitimate state, and the action must be grounded in the principles and support of a legal community, which in essence would be a world federation of states. In fact, it is morally incumbent upon all legal states to aim at such a world federation, upon pain of contradiction.Our duty to others does not end with the politically oppressed; the economically oppressed also lay a moral claim upon us. So, as Toon Vandevelde asks in his contribution, what about the global poor? The poor are hungry and in need of shelter and a future, but to address these issues at the level of rights is in a way heartless: what good does it do to legislate that everyone has the right to food, when this right can never be called upon, or enforced, in any meaningful sense? Moreover, approaches that demand non-prioritised generosity not only ignore the fundamental economic fact of scarcity, they also run the risk of creating the moral hazard of dependence on charity. The true cosmopolitan approach is the recognition of our common humanity and of our concomitant duty to help others as far as this help does not endanger us. This duty is compounded by the marginalisation of the poor through globalisation, a globalisation that they did not ask for. The extent of our help is indeterminate, but its direction is clear: it must aim to integrate those poor who wish it within our international systems, and so to ease their own transitions from poverty.Both Gil Anidjar and Maria Bonnafous-Boucher continue this theme of economy, but each from a highly specific viewpoint. Indeed, their contributions are perhaps somewhat darker, delving into an aspect of the unspoken underneath the choice for the universal. Anidjar begins with the relation between religion and economy within the interplay of Judaism and Christianity, whereas Bonnafous-Boucher focuses on the development of political economy through a Foucaultian lens. Although highly distinct contributions, both share the insight that the economy is now the central theme of our power structures, and that economy, isolated from questions of morality or justice, must likewise play a decisive role within the structure of cosmopolitanism, or, at minimum, the political unity of peoples. For, national government long ago ceded to a promiscuous mix of governance, and religion to economy. This nexus enthrones governance as an economic rationale stripped of all other trappings, and inscribes any possible cosmopolitanism within a framework of an aggressive capitalism, a kind of economic theology, a kind of hegemony in which state boundaries are essentially liquefied. Capital, after all, knows no boundaries. (shrink)

People hope that their efforts will count towards the fulfilment of a fundamental duty, a just struggle, or a hopeful development. While such an affirmation will hearten them, conversely a negation will mean injury or humiliation.This is perhaps the reason why in each community, certain projects become idealised, and take the form of new dreams at every turn. These dreams give people courage and self-confidence.Where this sort of justifying project traditionally had an explicitly religious character, in latter days they often (...) stand under the sign of economic progress, or of one or another hope-giving technological development.Once a project has acquired this inspirational character in a community, it will face very little criticism and will in political addresses, or academic statements of intent often be treated with staggering solemnity. If ethicists do not wish to portray reality as more rosy than it is, they must take the critique of ideology seriously.This at least seems to be the conviction of Lars Reuter, who believes that the discourse in which biotechnology appears as a most promising science may be shown as a contemporary example of a platform used for giving meaning.Helder De Schutter's contribution places us squarely in the debate over the possibilities and limits of multicultural society.In her acticle, Yvonne Denier seeks and accurate definition of public health. She is aware of the cultural determinations of this concept, but makes plain that there are sufficient objective elements to define health in a balaced way.Professional ethics needs no intrduction. In Asa Kasher's place, we learn more about the various criteria which, in according to the author a proper professional ethics must meet. (shrink)

In his paper, Thom Brooks explores the relationship between equality and democracy in terms of minimal competency, demonstrating how minimal competency is justified and why it is inegalitarian in interesting ways.Joseph Okumu then traces Williams’ journey into the world of morality from his reflections on the self or personal identity, assuming that his positive views on morality are ultimately traceable to his notion of personal identity.Next, Serge Pukas looks at three aspects of Waldron's defence of the natural duty of justice (...) account: , arguing that Waldron conflates the natural duty of justice with the duty not to harm, leaves alone the special allegiance objection, and fails in his distinction between the insiders and outsiders – if the natural duty of justice account is not supplemented with the fairness theory.Paul Moyaert argues that idealization can throw a new light upon Freud’s theory of sublimation and that courtly love can be seen as an illustration of this. Giving a short overview of Freud’s approach, Moyaert draws attention to some elements that help us to describe the direct link between idealization and sublimation, suggesting that the double movement of the instincts is what art and religion knows as ‘exaltation.’Uzochukwu Jude Njoku elucidates the theological and philosophical backgrounds of the ethics of solidarity in the thoughts of Pope John Paul II by expounding the basic hermeneutical conditions for its reappraisal in social ethics and contemporary debates, bring Paul Ricoeur on as a dialogue partner. (shrink)

In his paper, Thom Brooks explores the relationship between equality and democracy in terms of minimal competency, demonstrating how minimal competency is justified and why it is inegalitarian in interesting ways.Joseph Okumu then traces Williams’ journey into the world of morality from his reflections on the self or personal identity, assuming that his positive views on morality are ultimately traceable to his notion of personal identity.Next, Serge Pukas looks at three aspects of Waldron's defence of the natural duty of justice (...) account:, arguing that Waldron conflates the natural duty of justice with the duty not to harm, leaves alone the special allegiance objection, and fails in his distinction between the insiders and outsiders – if the natural duty of justice account is not supplemented with the fairness theory.Paul Moyaert argues that idealization can throw a new light upon Freud’s theory of sublimation and that courtly love can be seen as an illustration of this. Giving a short overview of Freud’s approach, Moyaert draws attention to some elements that help us to describe the direct link between idealization and sublimation, suggesting that the double movement of the instincts is what art and religion knows as ‘exaltation.’Uzochukwu Jude Njoku elucidates the theological and philosophical backgrounds of the ethics of solidarity in the thoughts of Pope John Paul II by expounding the basic hermeneutical conditions for its reappraisal in social ethics and contemporary debates, bring Paul Ricoeur on as a dialogue partner. (shrink)

This issue of Ethical Perspectives is strongly illuminated by two themes: moral impulse and critical citizenship. Of course, these themes are related – without a critical faculty, the moral impulse is not possible, and impulse, conversely, can be seen as leading toward critique. This is no vicious circle, nor mere tautology – rather, they are both moments of the truly autonomous individual, where the autonomy of the individual is not seen as isolation, but rather as an individual responsibility to and (...) within a society. Hence, a moral impulse fuelled by the individual critic is not enough; criticism must be framed within critical citizenship.Since our schizophrenic age fears for desensitivity, a fear best expressed in our age’s various flavours of political correctness, while it actively or at least tacitly posits this very desensitivity in its canonization of a purely formal ‘freedom to,’ a canonization best exhibited in the extreme examples of reality television, these intertwined themes are of extreme importance, and thus deserve close explication and discussion.I will let the pieces below provide this discussion, but permit me at least to set the table. As Michael Hauskeller so clearly argues in these pages, moral disgust is the moral impulse towards formal ethics, in the sense that it is the initial and immediate moral reaction that normatively colours our comportment with the outside world. I may know or think I know that something is wrong, or right, without giving this impulse a reason. This is not the ethical certitude of Bradley, but it is close in that both Bradley and Hauskeller would argue that the initial feeling need not be explained away, but rather deserves due respect. Moral disgust can clearly be misplaced, and clearly it can fail to withstand ethical scrutiny, but as impulse, it shakes us out of mere consciousness and moves us toward some sort of normativity. In this sense, it is always morally relevant.Lisa Bortolotti joins this discussion by arguing that no moral justification exists for reserving rights to humans. The moral impulse must be widened. At first, her approach comes across as opting for the typical agenda of preference-satisfaction utilitarianism: she wishes to extend the realm of rights in the name of safeguarding the power of reason and autonomy of individuals, who, she argues, are not always human. But then she offers something atypical in this debate: the very safeguarding of the power of reason and autonomy also applies to those who are often seen as marginal humans and thus excluded from in other strands of preference utilitarianism.Co-authors T. Brian Mooney and Samantha Minett apply the question of moral disgust to the question of life-science art, a new form of expression that merges biotechnology with the aesthetic. Like most forms of art that have emerged in recent generations, life-science art sees its task in the questioning of assumptions, which, of course, is a break from past ideas of aesthetics. Mooney and Minett turn their attention to this nascent field and ask: are there good grounds to translate our putative moral disgust at the fanciful and aesthetic use of biotechnology, such as pigs with wings and glowing rabbits? Turning first to utilitarianism and then to Thomastic virtue ethics, they argue clearly: yes, there are.Christian Arnsperger then kicks off our second related theme by posing a simple but profound question: why do English speakers refer to anti-globalism, whereas French speakers refer to alter-mondalism ? This French viewpoint would seem to call for critical global citizens who do not shirk from the increasing interconnectivity of our world, but who also do not take its current form as the inevitable development of immutable laws. Instead, such critical citizenry is called to see the current capitalist framework as an ideology, and as such, as liable to change, a change that citizens themselves can effect.Moving from theory to practice, Andrew Fiala rounds off this issue by giving us an example of critical citizenry, which he sees in just war pacifism. He argues that citizens must not capitulate to political or military authority in judging the justness of war, either regarding ad bellum judgements, or in bello actions. Moreover, seemingly just ad bellum decisions also deserve close scrutiny, largely because once the fog of war descends, in bello actions quickly eclipse justice. For this reason, he argues, a critical citizen should anticipate war crimes and thus be strongly reluctant to authorize war – an authorization that, in democratic societies, ultimately lies in the hands of the citizens themselves through the electoral process.Thus, this number quite clearly furthers the mission of Ethical Perspectives, which is to promote the international dialogue between fundamental and applied ethics. Providing articles written on three separate continents and addressing three of the most characteristic aspects of our age on top of a background well painted by their companion theoretical pieces, our authors once again invite you to take stock of where our world finds itself today. And then, to take action. (shrink)

The July 1998 announcement of Peter Singer's appointment to the chair of bio ethics at Princeton University's Center for Human Values as the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics raised a very loud controversy, largely due to Singer's favourable opinion of infanticide.The present paper is not the forum in which to recount this well publicized and often overly emotional conflict. Indeed, sustained critical discussion of the issues at hand was often found lacking in this debate. Generally the debate included on (...) the anti-Singer side people who had read little of his works, or who had perhaps merely heard his views second hand. The student newspaper of Princeton, the Daily Princetonian, documented many instances of this kind of opposition.On the other hand, his supporters tended to reply with accusations of quotations taken out of context and calls for academic freedom. This present paper is not interested in this debate, but rather concerns itself with the way in which Singer views the distinction between the human being and the person. It is this distinction which grounds his position on infanticide, and thus it is to this that we must turn.In this paper I take issue with Singer's use of the distinction between the person and the human. In so doing, I first explain Singer's basic position on personhood and sentience, and the relative value of organisms named under these two terms. With this discussion in hand, I then lay stress on a simple and repeated dictum of Singer's: the newborn infant up to the age of one month is not a person.This leads us to the position that the only possible ground for the selective infanticide of disabled infants is that newborn infants, healthy or not, are not persons, primarily because they lack self-consciousness. Then I investigate his ideas of personhood and self-consciousness as abstractions. Finally, in conclusion, I offer some observations drawn from Jonathan Swift. (shrink)

The so-called war on terror has recently revived interest in the just-war tradition . George Weigel has played an important role in this renaissance, and his recent article on JWT has occasioned a new debate concerning its merits. At the heart of this debate is the nature of violence. Weigel holds that the JWT is not based on a presumption against violence, whereas his critics argue that it is. After critically summarizing Weigel’s position, I counter his divorcing of the JWT (...) from the presumption against violence. By looking closely at the terms used in the debate concerning this presumption, I show that violence, in the scholastic tradition that nurtured the JWT, is understood as disordered force. As disordered, violence is contrary to reason, and thus also to justice . If just war aims at order, it itself may not be disordered. Thus, I argue that the JWT is best described as a two-fold presumption against violence: a just war is waged to counter violence, and a just war may not itself use violence. Consequently, since the JWT, grasped as a presumption against violence, concludes the link between justice and ordered force as the link between end and means, it avoids abstract ethical intentionalism: the proper end of the just war, as opposed to a mere intention, dictates the means that it has at its disposal. (shrink)