How can a system of criminal punishment be justified? In particular can it be justified if the moral demand that we respect each other as autonomous moral agents is taken seriously? Traditional attempts to justify punishment as a deterrent or as retribution fail, but Duff suggests that punishment can be understood as a communicative attempt to bring a wrong-doer to repent her crime. This account is supported by discussions of moral blame, of penance, of the nature of the law's demands, (...) and of the proper meaning and purpose of the criminal process of trial and verdict: it deals both with the ideals that should inform a system of criminal law and the extent to which those ideals are actualised in existing institutions and practices. The conclusion is pessimistic: punishment cannot be justified within our legal system; and this gap between the ideal and the actual presents us with serious moral dilemmas. (shrink)

It is a common complaint against moral philosophers that their abstract theorising bears little relation to the practical problems of everyday life. Professor Braithwaite believes that this criticism need not be inevitable. With the help of the Theory of Games he shows how arbitration is possible between two neighbours, a jazz trumpeter and a classical pianist, whose performances are a source of mutual discord. The solution of the problem in the lecture is geometrical, and is based on the formal analogy (...) between the logic of the situation and the geometry of a parabola. But an appendix provides the alternative algebraic treatment of a general two-person collaboration situation. (shrink)

The endeavour to locate value in moral progress faces various substantive as well as more formal challenges. This paper focuses on challenges of the latter kind. After some preliminaries, Section 3 introduces two general kinds of “evaluative moral progress-claims”, and outlines a possible novel analysis of a descriptive notion of moral progress. While Section 4 discusses certain logical features of betterness in light of recent work in value theory which are pertinent to the notion of moral progress, Sections 5 and (...) 6 outline the ambiguous character of “making moral progress”. (shrink)

Aesthetics in philosophy of mathematics is too narrowly construed. Beauty is not the only feature in mathematics that is arguably aesthetic. While not the highest aesthetic value, being interesting is a sine qua non for publishability. Of the many ways to be interesting, being explanatory has recently been discussed. The motivational power of what is interesting is important for both directing research and stimulating education. The scientific satisfaction of curiosity and the artistic desire for beautiful results are complementary but both (...) aesthetic. (shrink)

This essay explores some of the dogmatic challenges involved in developing a distinctively evangelical account of the doctrine of theosis, that is, humanity’s participation in the life of God. After offering some preliminary clarifications regarding the terminology of theosis, the paper sketches in broad strokes how an account of theosis might take shape within the structures of evangelical theology. David Bebbington’s famous evangelical quadrilateral— biblicism, crucicentrism, conversionism, and activism—serves as the basic framework (Bebbington 1989: 1-19). It will be argued that (...) evangelical theology can accommodate a version of theosis within this structure, but that evangelicals’ understanding of these categories may require some ‘flexing’ in order to make room for a more Christocentric and participatory conceptualization of redemption, one that culminates in the beatific vision of the redeemed when ‘God will be all in all’ (1 Cor 15:28). The final section of the paper points to a pair of important figures who may serve as resources for an evangelical retrieval of theosis. (shrink)

Much speculation on the sources of Duhem's historical interests fails to account for the major shifts in these interests: neither his belief in the continuous development of physics nor his Catholicism, when his Church was encouraging the study of generally Aristotelian scholastic thought, led to any interest in mediaeval science before 1904. Equally, his own claim that he was merely testing his views on the nature of physical theory is easily squared only with earlier work with no trace of mediaeval (...) science. Behind this discontinuity lies a major crisis. Though not a positivist, Duhem had based all his work on assumptions acceptable to positivists. One of these, the sterility of the Middle Ages, was refuted by his chance discovery of evidence of genuine mediaeval science in the autumn of 1903, but that left the doctrine of scholastic sterility intact. (shrink)

This concise, lively introduction to ancient Greek philosophy will help beginning students of both classical studies and philosophy get their bearings within an important yet complex array of names, schools, and ideas. The book illuminates the key period from the sixth to the third century BC, looking at the ideas that engaged the Greeks, in particular those of the Presocratics, the Sophists, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and the earliest Hellenistic philosophers. After chronologically mapping the main figures and their interconnections, _Introducing Greek (...) Philosophy_ focuses on themes especially relevant to philosophy today, including the origins of the universe and its mathematical structures; divine creation versus evolution and natural law; probability theory and the criteria for truth; political debates on democracy, citizen rights, and state obligations; and finally ethics, happiness, and the best way to live. (shrink)