This book is a rich blend of analyses by leading experts from various cultures and disciplines. A compact introduction to a complex field, it illustrates biotechnology's profound impact upon the environment and society. Moreover, it underscores the vital relevance of cultural values. This book empowers readers to more critically assess biotechnology's value and effectiveness within both specific cultural and global contexts.

Comparative study of religions and philosophies, in spite of its significance and urgency, has been neither fully appreciated nor developed in the study of religion or philosophy. Comparative study, historically speaking, is still young and complex in its approach. Religious Studies as an intellectual discipline has traditionally concentrated on the investigation of a single tradition, enabling a student to become an ‘expert’ in that particular tradition. The world in which we live, however, no longer allows us to be content with (...) the idea, the value, the way of thinking in our own tradition alone. In short, we no longer live in a ‘provincial’ age but in a ‘global’ age. (shrink)

For many people attracted to Eastern religions (particularly Zen Buddhism), Asia seems the source of all wisdom. As Bernard Faure examines the study of Chan/Zen from the standpoint of postmodern human sciences and literary criticism, he challenges this inversion of traditional "Orientalist" discourse: whether the Other is caricatured or idealized, ethnocentric premises marginalize important parts of Chan thought. Questioning the assumptions of "Easterners" as well, including those of the charismatic D. T. Suzuki, Faure demonstrates how both West and (...) East have come to overlook significant components of a complex and elusive tradition. Throughout the book Faure reveals surprising hidden agendas in the modern enterprise of Chan studies and in Chan itself. After describing how Jesuit missionaries brought Chan to the West, he shows how the prejudices they engendered were influenced by the sectarian constraints of Sino-Japanese discourse. He then assesses structural, hermeneutical, and performative ways of looking at Chan, analyzes the relationship of Chan and local religion, and discusses Chan concepts of temporality, language, writing, and the self. Read alone or with its companion volume, The Rhetoric of Immediacy, this work offers a critical introduction not only to Chinese and Japanese Buddhism but also to "theory" in the human sciences. (shrink)

“A mouth that speaks, many ears, and half the hands that write. These are the ac a demic ap - pa ra tus, these are the ac tive ma chines of Bildung in the Uni ver sity”, as writen by Nietz sche.. What should we do? Nietz sche gave us some an swers, in his ha bit ual form: ques tions, met a phor..

M. Lipman and P. Freire are two thinkers who support the practice of liberty. Liberty is liberty to learn to think, and to exist in communities of dialogue, questioning, and search. This is the project that leads human beings to understand themselves and recognize others. Without liberty there..

In the philosophical works of Emmanuel Levinasʼs early career, it is in a phenomenology of Eros that he claims to have uncovered the site of what he calls ʻtranscendenceʼ. This is no small claim. According to the argument of the later Totality and Infinity (1961), the history of Western philosophy is to be thought as the history of the ʻphilosophy of the sameʼ. Within this polemical generalization almost the whole of Western philosophy is characterized as a totalizing discourse which aims (...) to reduce everything to the categories of a thematizing consciousness. Conceptual structures are employed (or presupposed) in order to make diverse phenomena commensurable within a system, and according to Levinas this operation always constitutes a reduction of what is ʻotherʼ to the order of the ʻsameʼ. In agreement with a certain transcendentalism which is itself implicated in Levinasʼs critique, these structures of thought are then equated with consciousness itself; the thematizing project is one of mastery in which noemata will of necessity conform to noesis, in which the object is constituted for and by the subject. The experience of transcendence, so rare in this version of philosophyʼs history, is the experience of whatever is and truly remains other than me, recalcitrant to mastery through conceptualization and to the transcendental project of the subject to construe everything as originating from within itself. If, then, it is first of all in the erotic relation that the possibility of the experience of transcendence is said to arise, Eros can in no sense be dismissed as an unimportant or peripheral theme for Levinas, and a full investigation is warranted, especially given the current interest in Levinasʼs work, interest which is not limited to the discipline of philosophy. Furthermore, as the notion of Eros is closely associated, textually and conceptually, with what Levinas calls ʻthe feminineʼ, critical attention has been excited amongst feminist scholars of various persuasions, with claims – both positive and negative – being made for Levinasʼs significance as a resource for feminist philosophy and feminist politics. If assertions of a ʻLevinasianʼ feminism, no matter how qualified, tend to rest on the idea that Levinasʼs phenomenology of Eros, and analyses of ʻthe feminineʼ mark a break in or a new departure from a ʻmasculinistʼ tradition, this article seeks, in part, to argue to the contrary. (shrink)

This book provides an innovative, critical textual and literary analysis, in light of Song dynasty (960-11279) Chinese cultural and intellectual historical trends, of the Blue Cliff Record, the seminal Chan/Zen Buddhist collection of commentaries on one hundred gongan/koan cases long celebrated for its intricate and articulate interpretative methods.

Adult humans show exceptional relational ability relative to other species. In this research, we trace the development of this ability in young children. We used a task widely used in comparative research—the relational match-to-sample task, which requires participants to notice and match the identity relation: for example, AA should match BB instead of CD. Despite the simplicity of this relation, children under 4 years of age failed to pass this test (Experiment 1), and their performance did not improve even with (...) initial feedback (Experiment 2). In Experiments 3 and 4, we found that two kinds of symbolic-linguistic experience can facilitate relational reasoning in young children. Our findings suggest that children learn to become adept analogical thinkers, and that language fosters this learning in at least two distinct ways. (shrink)

In this paper, I discuss an example from Buchanan of active voluntary euthanasia (AVE). I first refute objections to the intuitive permissibility of the killing described in the example. After explaining why the killing is intentional, I evaluate Buchanan's solution to the ‘problem of intending death’. According to Buchanan, what justifies a physician in intentionally bringing about a patient's death by AVE is a principle that embodies the values of patient self-determination and well-being. I argue that these two considerations are (...) not sufficient for justifying AVE. The motive of the physician matters, but it is his desire rather than his intention that is relevant. An ethical physician may bring about intentionally the death of his patient if in forming his intention, he began with an appropriate desire to keep the patient alive as well as a legitimate desire to prevent prolonged suffering, with the latter outweighing the former. The ethical physician also desires to respect the choice of his patient wherever possible. On my account, the physician should be guided by the virtues and goals of his profession rather than by strict ‘all-or-nothing’ principles. I defend my account by describing the advantages of my account, and dismissing possible objections. (shrink)

Foreword to Lewis Hyde and Max Gimblett, The Disappearing Ox (Port Townsend, WA: Copper Canyon Press).

Philosophical problems with the concept of wronging someone in bringing the person into existence, especially the non-identity problem, have been much discussed in connection with forms of assisted reproduction that carry risks of harms either greater than or not otherwise present in natural reproduction. In this essay, I discuss the meaning of claims of wrongful life, distinguishing them from claims of wrongful disability. Attempts to conceptualize wrongful disability in terms of either the harmed existence of the offspring, or the possibility (...) of less harmful alternatives, are found unsatisfactory. A contractualist approach that provides an account of wronging that is independent of harming is considered. Finally, I present a new approach that necessitates an account of reasons for procreation that could justify harm to the offspring. These reasons are not the kind that require or prohibit actions of certain types, but reflect what the agent sees as intrinsically valuable in acting. (shrink)

In the original publication of this article, the title of the article has been publihsed incorrectly. Now the same has been corrected and publihsed in this Correction.

This study aims to discover marketing professionals'' perceptions on ethical problems and current level of ethics in Greece, as well as, on the policy instruments used by companies to help employees make decisions in a more ethical fashion, using a qualitative research design. Specifically, it reports the results of a series of in-depth interviews conducted with Greek marketing professional employed by multinationals in Greece. A number of topics examining ethical problems, ethical standards, corporate policy instruments and corporate cultureserved as a (...) basis for discussion. While the occasionally contrasting opinions revealed in part the perplexity of marketing ethics, respondents also arrived at points of convergence. All recognized government as playing the most prominent role in issues of public concern, legislation and overall ethical standards. Moreover, all marketers identified multinational and other foreign firms as a positive influence to the level of ethics, due to the introduction of policy instruments and control mechanisms. Finally, they also accepted the need for better informed customers and a strong organizational culture. Several recommendations are offered for consideration by marketing professionals interested in promoting ethical business conduct. (shrink)

This article presents a new argument concerning the relation between Kant’s theory of race and aspects of the critical philosophy. It argues that Kant’s treatment of the problem of the systematic unity of nature and knowledge in the Critique of Pure Reason and the Critique of the Power of Judgment can be traced back a methodological problem in the natural history of the period – that of the possibility of a natural system of nature. Kant’s transformation of the methodological problem (...) from natural history into a set of philosophical problems proceeds by way of the working out of his own problem in natural history – the problem of the natural history of the human races – and specifically the problem of the unity in diversity of the human species, in response to which he develops a theory of race. This theory of race is, further, the first developed model of the use of teleological judgment in Kant’s work. The article thus argues that Kant’s philosophical position on the sy... (shrink)

Review of the books: Jerry A. Fodor. Concepts: Where Cognitive Science went wrong. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1998, 174 pp., ISBN 0-19-823636-0. Geoffrey C. Bowker and Susan Leigh Star. Sorting things out: Classification and its consequences. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 1999, 377 pp., ISBN 0-262-02461-6.

In dieser Arbeit geht es zunächst um eine Auslegung der aristotelischen Affekttheorie, so wie sie hauptsächlich im 2. Buch der Rhetorik ausgeführt wird unter Berücksichtigung der einschlägigen Passagen aus der Nikomachischen Ethik und aus De Anima. Es zeigt sich, dass Affekte für Aristoteles nicht etwa unserem Verstand gegenüberstehen, sondern, dass sie selbst Anteil an der Vernunft haben, indem sie auf einem Erkenntnisakt beruhen. Ziel dieser Untersuchung ist aber auch zu zeigen, dass der Stoiker Poseidonios, trotz seiner Absicht sich der platonisch-aristotelischen (...) Seelen- und Affekttheorie anzuschließen, mit seiner Theorie das Konzept eines Gegensatzes von Vernunft und Affekt verteidigt hat und somit in Wirklichkeit nicht als Anhänger der platonisch-aristotelischen Philosophie betrachtet werden kann. Für Poseidonios besteht, anders als bei Aristoteles, eine radikale Trennung zwischen Sinnlichkeit und Vernunft, zwischen Emotionslos-Rationalem und Geistfrei-Irrationalem. (shrink)

Un medioevo esplicitamente finto, ricostruito in studio e rappresentato in modo quasi brechtiano.

The emerging area of philosophy of birth is invaluable, first, to diagnose fallacious assumptions about the relation between the womb and reason, and, ultimately, to challenge potentially damaging narratives with major impact on birth care. With its analysis of eighteenth-century epistemic and medical discussions about the role of the uterus in women's reasoning, this article supports two arguments: first, that women's “flawed thinking” was a premise drawn by many modern intellectual men, one that was presented as based upon empirical evidence; (...) and second, that the pervasive construction of the uterus as an element that renders women wild, uncontrollable, and irrational continues to influence contemporary obstetrics, even as today's medicine and science consider themselves to be free of any such prejudices.This article shows the role that Giacomo Casanova played in debunking these prejudices and presents his short manuscript on the issue as an important contribution to the literature of the Enlightenment, with its argument against women's supposed “natural” inferiority and for the idea that differences in education were to blame for women's subordinate position in society.Detailed analysis of the “thinking uterus” debate illuminates the different ways in which various arguments from/by the “anti-uterine” lobby were used to justify the subordination of women: sometimes emphasizing the connection between the uterus and thought and sometimes negating it, but always concluding that women's inferiority is to be found in some known or yet-to-be-discovered anatomical, and mainly sexual, deficiency or problem. (shrink)