For much of our century, pragmatism has enjoyed a charmed life, holding the dominant point of view in American politics, law, education, and social thought in general. After suffering a brief eclipse in the post-World War II period, pragmatism has experienced a revival, especially in literary theory and such areas as poststructuralism and deconstruction. In this critique of pragmatism and neopragmatism, one of our leading intellectual historians traces the attempts of thinkers from William James to Richard Rorty to find a (...) response to the crisis of modernism. John Patrick Diggins analyzes the limitations of pragmatism from a historical perspective and dares to ask whether America's one original contribution to the world of philosophy has actually fulfilled its promise. "Diggins, an eminent historian of American intellectual life, has written a timely and impressive book charting the rich history of American pragmatism and placing William James, Charles Peirce, John Dewey, George Herbert Mead, Sidney Hook, and Richard Rorty in their times and in the light of contemporary concerns. The book also draws on an alternative set of American thinkers to explore the blind spots in the pragmatic temper."—William Connolly, _New York Times Book Review_ "An extraordinarily ambitious work of both analysis and synthesis.... Diggins's book is rewarding in its thoughtfulness and its nuanced presentation of ideas."—Daniel J. Silver, _Commentary_ "Diggins's superbly informed book comprises a comprehensive history of American pragmatic thought.... It contains expert descriptions of James, John Dewey and Charles Sanders Peirce, the first generation of American pragmatists.... Diggins is just as good on the revival of pragmatism that's taken place over the last 20 years in America.... [A] richly intelligent book."—Mark Edmundson, _Washington Post Book World_. (shrink)

The book also draws on an alternative set of American thinkers to explore the blind spots in the pragmatic temper."—William Connolly, New York Times Book Review "An extraordinarily ambitious work of both analysis and synthesis. . .

Barack Obama has called him “one of my favorite philosophers.” John McCain wrote that he is “a paragon of clarity about the costs of a good war.” Andrew Sullivan has said, “We need Niebuhr now more than ever.” For a theologian who died in 1971, Reinhold Niebuhr is maintaining a remarkably high profile in the twenty-first century. In _Why Niebuhr Now?_ acclaimed historian John Patrick Diggins tackles the complicated question of why, at a time of great (...) uncertainty about America’s proper role in the world, leading politicians and thinkers are turning to Niebuhr for answers. Diggins begins by clearly and carefully working through Niebuhr’s theology, which focuses less on God’s presence than his absence—and the ways that absence abets the all-too-human sin of pride. He then shows how that theology informed Niebuhr’s worldview, leading him to be at the same time a strong opponent of fascism and communism and a leading advocate for humility and caution in foreign policy. Turning to the present, Diggins highlights what he argues is a misuse of Niebuhr’s legacy on both the right and the left: while neoconservatives distort Niebuhr’s arguments to support their call for an endless war on terror in the name of stopping evil, many liberal interventionists conveniently ignore Niebuhr’s fundamental doubts about power. Ultimately, Niebuhr’s greatest lesson is that, while it is our duty to struggle for good, we must at the same time be wary of hubris, remembering the limits of our understanding. The final work from a distinguished writer who spent his entire career reflecting on America’s history and promise, _Why Niebuhr Now? _is a compact and perceptive book that will be the starting point for all future discussions of Niebuhr. (shrink)

Barack Obama has called him “one of my favorite philosophers.” John McCain wrote that he is “a paragon of clarity about the costs of a good war.” Andrew Sullivan has said, “We need Niebuhr now more than ever.” For a theologian who died in 1971, Reinhold Niebuhr is maintaining a remarkably high profile in the twenty-first century. In _Why Niebuhr Now?_ acclaimed historian John Patrick Diggins tackles the complicated question of why, at a time of great (...) uncertainty about America’s proper role in the world, leading politicians and thinkers are turning to Niebuhr for answers. Diggins begins by clearly and carefully working through Niebuhr’s theology, which focuses less on God’s presence than his absence—and the ways that absence abets the all-too-human sin of pride. He then shows how that theology informed Niebuhr’s worldview, leading him to be at the same time a strong opponent of fascism and communism and a leading advocate for humility and caution in foreign policy. Turning to the present, Diggins highlights what he argues is a misuse of Niebuhr’s legacy on both the right and the left: while neoconservatives distort Niebuhr’s arguments to support their call for an endless war on terror in the name of stopping evil, many liberal interventionists conveniently ignore Niebuhr’s fundamental doubts about power. Ultimately, Niebuhr’s greatest lesson is that, while it is our duty to struggle for good, we must at the same time be wary of hubris, remembering the limits of our understanding. The final work from a distinguished writer who spent his entire career reflecting on America’s history and promise, _Why Niebuhr Now? _is a compact and perceptive book that will be the starting point for all future discussions of Niebuhr. (shrink)

In much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow. — Ecclesiastes.

In much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.—Ecclesiastes.

Diggins brings Reinhold Niebuhr into the post-structuralist dialogue, and demonstates that his writings are the more constructive about the human predicament. "[I]n Niebuhr power and morality meet in one, with a suspicious glance at the disavowal of power and the pretensions of morality.".

Diggins observes in this essay that, while Nozick and Hook shared a passion for freedom and for understanding liberty in all its complexities, the two philosophers, one a libertarian and the other a democratic socialist, occupied different worlds when it came to how they viewed property and power. Nozick believed that freedom and justice depended upon a minimal state that would be severely restricted in its exercise of power. Sidney Hook never renounced his conviction, born of his early attraction (...) to Marxism, that truly dangerous power is wielded not principally by government but by private individuals of great material wealth: by industrialists. Diggins examines the divergent views of these two seminal thinkers on such issues as human rights, private property, democracy, and judicial review. The differences are profound, yet they shared a common interest in the life of the mind and in exploring such hoary philosophical topics as free will versus determinism and the grounding of moral values. (shrink)

After an eloquent and moving analysis of what he sees as the disillusion of themodern age, Lippmann posits as the central dilemma of liberalism its inability to find an appropriate substitute for the older forms of authority - church, state, class, family, law, custom - that it has denied. Lippmann attempts to find a way out of this chaos through the acceptance of a higher humanism and a way of life inspired by the ideal of "disinterestedness" in all things.In his (...) new introduction to the Transaction edition, John Patrick Diggins marks A Preface to Morals, originally published in 1929, as a critical turning point in Lippmann's intellectual career. He also provides an excellent discussion of the enduring value of this major twentieth-century work by situating it within the context of other intellectual movements. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Arthur O. Lovejoy and the Challenge of Intellectual HistoryJohn Patrick DigginsMen and ideas advance by parricide, by which the children kill, if not their fathers, at least the beliefs of their fathers, and arrive at new beliefs.Sir Isaiah Berlin1I was supposed to wind up the study of mine, and become the Lovejoy of my generation—that's the silly talk of scholarly people.Saul Bellow2To become "the Lovejoy," with the implication (...) that each generation could only have one, was the ambition of Moses Herzog in Saul Bellow's novel, written a few years after he had won the Nobel Award for literature. Herzog presents the life of a professor who has as many sexual escapades and as much personal angst as he has scholarly interests, too unfocused to be another Lovejoy. Bellow's novel is full of letters to Nietzsche, Heidegger, and other modernist minds who brought Western intellectual life to a standstill, posing a lasting question mark about the possibilities of knowledge. Bellow taught in the program of the Committee on Social Thought at [End Page 181] the University of Chicago. His colleague and close friend Allan Bloom also taught in that program. But when Bloom wrote the best seller, The Closing of the American Mind, he cited Nietzsche and Heidegger as part of the "German disease" that did so much to subvert academic thought, supposedly turning students into zombies, walking air heads responding only to vacuous visual stimuli and mind-numbing music, with Rock n' Roll blasting through a Walkman and having the effect of a "masturbational fantasy."3While Bellow's epistolary novel interrogated modernist thinkers, Bloom's popular tract of the times cited many classical thinkers as a countervoice to the modernists—Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Augustine, Aquinas, Dante, Hobbes, Kant, Lessing, Schiller, Locke, and Rousseau. Such minds also figured prominently in the works of Arthur O. Lovejoy. But the recitation of such names leaves the impression that Lovejoy concerned himself only with the main currents of European intellectual history. On the contrary, two of his most important and often neglected books are The Thirteen Pragmatisms and Reflections on Human Nature.4 There one finds profound meditations on two vital episodes in the history of ideas in America: the Enlightenment and the philosophy of pragmatism. Perry Miller, arguably America's greatest intellectual historian, skipped over the Enlightenment as he proceeded to study the Puritans and then the transcendentalists, and he never seemed to have much interest in the pragmatists.5 But what Lovejoy had to write on the Enlightenment and pragmatism is richly ironic.The pragmatists claimed to have liberated modern thought from the easy assumptions of the "Age of Reason," and today's poststructuralists charge that eighteenth-century Enlightenment thinkers deceived themselves in looking to the advent of knowledge as an answer to the presence of power. Lovejoy's books offer a different take entirely, making us aware that it is the modernist thinkers who may be deceiving themselves with the dubious promises of pragmatism and the arrogant conceits of poststructuralism and deconstruction, whose proponents claim to be the first "masters [End Page 182] of suspicion." In many of Lovejoy's works, nothing is resolved and everything is left suspended in a state of honest suspicion.Lovejoy was comfortable with contradiction, and hence more in tune with Augustine, who looked to the depths of human consciousness for spiritual knowledge, than with Aquinas, who believed evidence for God and human freedom could be found in reason alone. Nowhere is Lovejoy's affinity for the emotions of consciousness better seen than in his several essays on romanticism, both English, French, German, and even its origins in Chinese aesthetics and Confucian ethics. It was not reason and the notion of order and regulation that appealed to Lovejoy but the spontaneous promptings of nature springing forth without reflection or design. He delighted in quoting Voltaire against classicists and scholastics. "Worship God and practice justice—this is the sole religion of the Chinese literati.... O Thomas Aquinas, Scotus, Bonaventure, Francis, Dominic, Luther, Calvin, canons of Westminister, have you anything better? For four thousand years this religion, so simple and so noble, has endured in... (shrink)

Contests the validity of Marxist and poststructuralist theory in a review of the life and legacy of Abraham Lincoln.

Veblen used anthropological data as evidence to support and to develop his economic theory. He adopted many of Marx's categories and assumptions to explain the problems of modern capitalist society. Among them were class, alienation, and the essential benevolence of man. Unlike Marx, however, Veblen believed that man has to comprehend before he can act. Man can also not tolerate the disenchantment caused by a purely scientific and rational understanding of the world. Thus, man has a propensity to view the (...) world anthropomorphically, and this separates him from reality. In addition, the instinct toward workmanship which enables man to produce goods to improve his world, also generates new perceptions of and desires for ownership and status. From his study of emulation and comparison among primitive peoples, Veblen concluded that alienation results from the forces of production rather than of consumption. (shrink)

Richard Gale's slender monograph is a sometimes insightful, sometimes enervating and always personal reckoning with John Dewey's philosophy. Gale's basic thesis is that Dewey is a unificationist malgré lui, that despite being committed to empiricism and pluralism his pragmatism remains profoundly metaphysical in a non-naturalistic sense. This claim is hardly new or surprising. Thinkers as diverse as George Santayana, Richard Rorty and John Patrick Diggins, to name but a few, have also noted traces of supernaturalism and (...) monism throughout Dewey's corpus. Moreover, recent works including Victor Kestenbaum's The Grace and Severity of the Ideal (Chicago 2002), James Good's A Search for Unity and Diversity (Lexington .. (shrink)

This Introduction has three sections, on "logical fatalism," "theological fatalism," and the problem of future contingents, respectively. In the first two sections, we focus on the crucial idea of "dependence" and the role it plays it fatalistic arguments. Arguably, the primary response to the problems of logical and theological fatalism invokes the claim that the relevant past truths or divine beliefs depend on what we do, and therefore needn't be held fixed when evaluating what we can do. We call the (...) sort of dependence needed for this response to be successful "dependence with a capital 'd'": Dependence. We consider different accounts of Dependence, especially the account implicit in the so-called "Ockhamist" response to the fatalistic arguments. Finally, we present the problem of future contingents: what could "ground" truths about the undetermined future? On the other hand, how could all such propositions fail to be true? (shrink)

Linear logic, introduced by Girard, is a refinement of classical logic with a natural, intrinsic accounting of resources. This accounting is made possible by removing the ‘structural’ rules of contraction and weakening, adding a modal operator and adding finer versions of the propositional connectives. Linear logic has fundamental logical interest and applications to computer science, particularly to Petri nets, concurrency, storage allocation, garbage collection and the control structure of logic programs. In addition, there is a direct correspondence between polynomial-time computation (...) and proof normalization in a bounded form of linear logic. In this paper we show that unlike most other propositional logics, full propositional linear logic is undecidable. Further, we prove that without the modal storage operator, which indicates unboundedness of resources, the decision problem becomes PSPACE-complete. We also establish membership in NP for the multiplicative fragment, NP-completeness for the multiplicative fragment extended with unrestricted weakening, and undecidability for fragments of noncommutative propositional linear logic. (shrink)

In this paper we critically evaluate Trenton Merricks’s recent attempt to provide a “new” way of defending compatibilism about divine foreknowledge and human freedom. We take issue with Merricks’s claim that his approach is fundamentally different from Ockhamism. We also seek to highlight the implausibility of Merricks’s rejection of the assumption of the fixity of the past, and we also develop a critique of the Merricks’s crucial notion of “dependence.”.

Saccadic chronostasis refers to the subjective temporal lengthening of the first visual stimulus perceived after an eye movement. It has been quantified using a duration discrimination task. Most models of human duration discrimination hypothesise an internal clock. These models could explain chronostasis as a transient increase in internal clock speed due to arousal following a saccade, leading to temporal overestimation. Two experiments are described which addressed this hypothesis by parametrically varying the duration of the stimuli that are being judged. Changes (...) in internal clock speed predict chronostasis effects proportional to stimulus duration. No evidence for proportionality was found. Two further experiments assessed the appropriateness of the control conditions employed. Results indicated that the chronostasis effect is constant across a wide range of stimulus durations and does not reflect the pattern of visual stimulation experienced during a saccade, suggesting that arousal is not critical. Instead, alternative processes, such as one affecting the onset of timing are implicated. Further research is required to select between these alternatives. (shrink)

Can the rights of the disabled be justified by John Locke's theory of natural rights? Does an "ethics of caring" offer a better framework for considering these rights? When can we end a human life? With Anita Silvers, Patrick Sullivan, and John Loughney.

This paper examines heterogeneous impacts of gendered household headship and control of resources on food security in rural Tanzania. Analysis with minimal attention to heterogeneity in gender considerations indicates no differences in household food security between male and female-headed households. But with a more differentiated household headship variable and accounting for gendered differences in resource ownership, the results differ markedly. Using more gender-disaggregated variables, our results show significant differences between female-headed and male-headed households. In these results we find support for (...) the claim that gender norms in the study villages often restrict women’s access to resources, resulting in more vulnerable female-headed households. Female-headed households with no male adults present are particularly vulnerable. The study also points to specific opportunities for enhanced food security with attention to female and joint ownership of livestock. These results represent a hopeful sign that efforts to enhance female livestock ownership could be a useful strategy to address lower levels of food consumption in these Tanzanian villages. (shrink)

This paper has three parts. You are to do all three parts. Read the instructions for each part carefully. Each part is worth 100 marks. The total value is 300 marks.

The economics of search is a prominent component of economic theory, and it has a richness and elegance that underpins a host of practical applications. In this book Brian and John McCall present a comprehensive overview of the economic theory of search, from the classical model of job search formulated 40 years ago to the recent developments in equilibrium models of search. The book gives decision-theoretic foundations to seemingly slippery issues in labour market theory, estimation theory and economic dynamics (...) in general, and surveys the entire field of the economics of search, including its history, theory, and econometric applications. Theoretical models of the economics of search are covered as well as estimation methods used in search theory and topics covered include job search, turnover, unemployment, liquidity, house selling, real options and auctions. The mathematical methods used in search theory such as dynamic programming are reviewed as well as structural estimation methods and econometric methods for duration models. The authors also explore the classic sequential search model and its extensions in addition to recent advances in equilibrium search theory. (shrink)

Written by a distinguished international team of contributors, this volume explores Shakespeare's vivid depictions of moral deliberation and individual choice in light of Renaissance debates about ethics. Examining the intellectual context of Shakespeare's plays, the essays illuminate Shakespeare's engagement with the most pressing moral questions of his time, considering the competing claims of politics, Christian ethics and classical moral philosophy, as well as new perspectives on controversial topics such as conscience, prayer, revenge and suicide. Looking at Shakespeare's responses to emerging (...) schools of thought such as Calvinism and Epicureanism, and assessing comparisons between Shakespeare and his French contemporary Montaigne, the collection addresses questions such as: when does laughter become cruel? How does style reflect moral perspective? Does shame lead to self-awareness? This book is of great interest to scholars and students of Shakespeare studies, Renaissance studies and the history of ethics. (shrink)

Economic profits differ from accounting profits. Accounting profits are usually defined as revenues minus costs, and those costs as fixed and variable. Economic profits enlist a third cost, opportunity costs. While these costs are difficult to determine with mathematical precision, they are nonetheless significant, especially for decision making in business. They reflect social costs and benefits, tensions between individual and corporate interests, and all internal and external considerations which enter into decision making in business. It is precisely within opportunity cost (...) decision making that Primeaux and Stieber situate business ethics. (shrink)

The authors propose a model for business ethics which arises directly from business practice. This model is based on a behavioral definition of the economic theory of profit maximization and situates business ethics within opportunity costs. Within that context, they argue that good business and good ethics are synonymous, that ethics is at the heart and center of business, that profits and ethics are intrinsically related.

Rather than eliciting behavioral expectations of individuals for an appreciation of organizational ethics, we are focusing on the organization itself and the manner in which distinctive organizational structures assume their own respective behavioral expectations. The hierarchical organizational structure emphasizes obedience while the participative organizational structure emphasizes cooperation. Imposing the ethical virtues of one organizational structure onto another leads to conflict, and that conflict is reflective of a basic injustice which is (indirectly) organizational in cause but (directly) personal in effect. This (...) more conceptual argument is readily identified in the difficulties encountered by pastoral ministers in Catholic hospitals, especially by women chaplains. (shrink)

How do we determine value? What are the ethical implications of valuing goods and services with respect to economic profit maximization? To answer those questions, Primeaux and Stieber move their discussion of the ethical principles inherent to economic profit maximization from production to distribution, from internal costs to external pricing and consumer demand.

Can the rights of the disabled be justified by John Locke's theory of natural rights? Does an "ethics of caring" offer a better framework for considering these rights? When can we end a human life? With Anita Silvers, Patrick Sullivan, and John Loughney.

The excellent quality and depth of the various essays make [the book] an invaluable resource....It is likely to become essential reading in its field.—CHOICE.

We propose a notion of a sub-model for each agent at each state in the Heifetz et al. model of interactive unawareness. Presuming that each agent is fully cognizant of his sub-model causes no difficulty and fully describes his knowledge and his beliefs about the knowledge and awareness of others. We use sub-models to motivate the HMS conditions on possibility correspondences.

We typically think we have free will. But how could we have free will, if for anything we do, it was already true in the distant past that we would do that thing? Or how could we have free will, if God already knows in advance all the details of our lives? Such issues raise the specter of "fatalism". This book collects sixteen previously published articles on fatalism, truths about the future, and the relationship between divine foreknowledge and human freedom, (...) and includes a substantial new introductory essay and bibliography. Many of the pieces collected here build bridges between discussions of human freedom and recent developments in other areas of metaphysics, such as philosophy of time and the nature of metaphysical "dependence". Ideal for courses in free will, metaphysics, and philosophy of religion, Freedom, Fatalism, and Foreknowledge will encourage important new directions in thinking about free will, time, and truth. (shrink)

After an eloquent and moving analysis of what he sees as the disillusion of themodern age, Lippmann posits as the central dilemma of liberalism its inability to find an appropriate substitute for the older forms of authority-- church, state, class, family, law, custom--that it has denied. Lippmann attempts to find a way out of this chaos through the acceptance of a higher humanism and a way of life inspired by the ideal of "disinterestedness" in all things. In his new introduction (...) to the Transaction edition, John Patrick Diggins marks "A Preface "to "Morals, "originally published in 1929, as a critical turning point in Lippmann's intellectual career. He also provides an excellent discussion of the enduring value of this major twentieth-century work by situating it within the context of other intellectual movements. (shrink)

The past 15 years have witnessed an increasing interest in the comparative study of language and music as cognitive systems. This book presents an interdisciplinary study of language and music, exploring the following core areas - structural comparisons, evolution, learning and processing, and neuroscience.

Climate negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change have so far failed to achieve a robust international agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Game theory has been used to investigate possible climate negotiation solutions and strategies for accomplishing them. Negotiations have been primarily modelled as public goods games such as the Prisoner’s Dilemma, though coordination games or games of conflict have also been used. Many of these models have solutions, in the form of equilibria, corresponding to possible (...) positive outcomes—that is, agreements with the requisite emissions reduction commitments. Other work on large-scale social dilemmas suggests that it should be possible to resolve the climate problem. It therefore seems that equilibrium selection may be a barrier to successful negotiations. Here we use an N-player bargaining game in an agent-based model with learning dynamics to examine the past failures of and future prospects for a robust international climate agreement. The model suggests reasons why the desirable solutions identified in previous game-theoretic models have not yet been accomplished in practice and what mechanisms might be used to achieve these solutions. (shrink)

In his recent essay in the Philosophical Review, “Truth and Freedom,” Trenton Merricks contends (among other things) that the basic argument for the incompatibility of God's foreknowledge and human freedom is question-begging. He relies on a “truism” to the effect that truth depends on the world and not the other way around. The present essay argues that mere invocation of this truism does not establish that the basic argument for incompatibilism is question-begging. Further, it seeks to clarify important elements of (...) the debate, including the fixity-of-the-past premise in the incompatibilist's argument and the Ockhamist response. It sketches some potential links between the issues here and recent work on ontological dependence, and it connects the issues raised by Merricks to important work that has appeared in (among other places) the Philosophical Review. (shrink)

The present essay takes up matters discussed by Robert Pasnau in his response to our previous criticism of his account of Aquinas's view of when a foetus acquires a human soul. We are mainly concerned with metaphysical and biological issues and argue that the kind of organization required for ensoulment is that sufficient for the full development of a human being, and that this is present from conception. We contend that in his criticisms of our account Pasnau fails clearly to (...) distinguish first, between a passive potentiality and an active capacity; second, between having a power intrinsically and being an instrumental agent of that which has it intrinsically; third, between per accidens and per se causal series; and fourth, between sense cognition and conceptual thought. We conclude that philosophy and embryology support the position that human beings exist from the point of conception. (shrink)