This chapter contains sections titled: Names or Predicates? The Semantics of Ethnic‐Group Terms Nihilism about Ethnic‐Group Terms The Political Pragmatics of Ethnic‐Group Terms References Further Reading.

Moving beyond both realist and anti-realist accounts of mathematics, Shapiro articulates a "structuralist" approach, arguing that the subject matter of a mathematical theory is not a fixed domain of numbers that exist independent of each other, but rather is the natural structure, the pattern common to any system of objects that has an initial object and successor relation satisfying the induction principle.

It describes and explains the patient-centered model examining and evaluating qualitative and quantitative research. It comprehensively covers the evolution and the six interactive components of the patient-centered clinical method, taking the reader through the relationships between the patient and doctor and the patient and clinician. All the editors are professors in the Department of Family Medicine at the University of Western Ontario, London, Canada.

There are, broadly speaking, two ways to think about rationality, as defined in the following passage: ‘Reason’ for a long time meant the activity of understanding and assimilating the eternal ideas which were to function as goals for men. Today, on the contrary, it is not only the business but the essential work of reason to find means for the goals one adopts at any given time. To use what Horkheimer called objective reason, and what others have called expressive or (...) non–instrumental reason, is to reflect on one's goals, to attempt to determine what preferences one ought to hold. On the other hand, to use what Horkheimer called subjective reason is to ‘be concerned with means and ends, with the adequacy of procedures for purposes more or less taken for granted’, that is, to be instrumentally rational. This contrast between non-instrumental and instrumental reason is at the heart of many contemporary social and philosophical disputes. 1. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Michael Rescorla has argued that it makes sense to compute directly with numbers, and he faulted Turing for not giving an analysis of number-theoretic computability. However, in line with a later paper of his, it only makes sense to compute directly with syntactic entities, such as strings on a given alphabet. Computing with numbers goes via notation. This raises broader issues involving de re propositional attitudes towards numbers and other non-syntactic abstract entities.

Thomas Hobbes often includes powers and abilities in his descriptions of the world. Meanwhile, Hobbes’s philosophical picture of the world appears quite reductive, and he seems sometimes to say that nothing exists but bodies in motion. In more extreme versions of such a picture, there would be no room for powers. Hobbes is not an eliminativist about powers, but his view does tend toward ontological minimalism. It would be good to have an account of what Hobbes thinks powers are, and (...) how they fit into his understanding of the world. In this chapter, I investigate Hobbes’s account of the metaphysics of powers and abilities. Section 1 considers three important aspects of Hobbes’s account of powers: the connection between powers and causes; the modal aspects of powers; and the connection between powers and motions. Sections 2 and 3 then consider interpretive arguments about whether Hobbes identifies powers with underlying corporeal features. (shrink)

In the Politics of Black Joy, Lindsey Stewart develops Hurston's contributions to political theory and philosophy of race by introducing the politics of joy as a refusal of neoabolitionism, a political tradition that reduces southern Black life to tragedy or social death.

Guthrie contends that religion can best be understood as systematic anthropomorphism - the attribution of human characteristics to nonhuman things and events. Religion, he says, consists of seeing the world as human like. He offers a fascinating array of examples to show how this strategy pervades secular life and how it characterizes religious experience.

Typically, a logic consists of a formal or informal language together with a deductive system and/or a model-theoretic semantics. The language is, or corresponds to, a part of a natural language like English or Greek. The deductive system is to capture, codify, or simply record which inferences are correct for the given language, and the semantics is to capture, codify, or record the meanings, or truth-conditions, or possible truth conditions, for at least part of the language.

A step-by-step guide to develop your idea from the first spark to the finished product, with charming illustrations recalling the whimsy and imagination of childhood.

Language was central to Hobbes's understanding of human beings and their mental abilities, and criticism of other philosophers' uses of language became a favorite critical tool for him. This paper connects Hobbes's theories about language to his criticisms of others' language, examining Hobbes's theories of propositions and truth, and how they relate to his claims that various sorts of proposition are absurd. It considers whether Hobbes in fact means anything more by 'absurd' than 'false'. And it pays particular attention to (...) Hobbes's categorization of causes of absurdity and of types of incoherent proposition, arguing that Hobbes's approach is only loosely related to later discussions of category mistakes. (shrink)

Søren Kierkegaard: Subjectivity, Irony, and the Crisis of Modernity examines the thought of Søren Kierkegaard, a unique figure, who has inspired, provoked, fascinated, and irritated people ever since he walked the streets of Copenhagen. At the end of his life, Kierkegaard said that the only model he had for his work was the Greek philosopher Socrates. This work takes this statement as its point of departure. Jon Stewart explores what Kierkegaard meant by this and to show how different aspects (...) of his writing and argumentative strategy can be traced back to Socrates. The main focus is The Concept of Irony, which is a key text at the beginning of Kierkegaard's literary career. Although it was an early work, it nevertheless played a determining role in his later development and writings. Indeed, it can be said that it laid the groundwork for much of what would appear in his later famous books such as Either/Or and Fear and Trembling. (shrink)

In Part 1 the reader is introduced to some standard systems of modal logic and encouraged through a series of exercises to become proficient in manipulating these logics. The emphasis is on possible world semantics for modal logics and the semantic emphasis is carried into the formal method, Jeffrey-style truth-trees. Standard truth-trees are extended in a simple and transparent way to take possible worlds into account. Part 2 systematically explores the applications of modal logic to philosophical issues such as truth, (...) time, processes, knowledge and belief, obligation and permission. Accessible, authoritative, and assured, Modal Logics and Philosophy requires no more background than the completion of a standard introductory logic course. It will be welcomed not only by students looking for a bridge between introductory logic texts and the high-level technical literature but as a guide to, and exploration of, work at the forefront of logic and philosophy. (shrink)

From the myths of the ancient world to the Middle Ages to Darwin and beyond, Preece captures the most telling and fascinating accounts of humankind's ...

This paper critically evaluates the effect of introducing markets into the institutional system of education and promotes the claim of a learning democracy to underpin a richer conception for developing the powers and capacities of all citizens.

Cinema Derrida charts Jacques Derrida's collaborations and appearances in film, video, and television beginning with 1983's Ghost Dance (dir. Ken McMullen, West Germany/UK) and ending with 2002's biographical documentary Derrida (dir. Dick and Ziering, USA). In the last half of his working life, Derrida embraced popular art forms and media in more ways than one: not only did he start making more media appearances after years of refusing to have his photo taken in the 1960s and 1970s, but his philosophy (...) started to draw more explicitly from visual culture and artistic endeavours. While this book offers explanations of this transition, it contends the image of "Jacques Derrida" that emerges from film and TV appearances remains spectral, constantly deferring a complete grasp of him. Tyson Stewart draws out the main tenets of spectrality from Derrida's seminal texts Of Grammatology and Specters of Marx and other writings, like Echographies of Television, in order to fill a gap in studies of Derrida and film. Throughout the book, he explains how various techniques and spectral effects such as slow motion, stillness, repetition, mise-en-abîme, direct address, and focus on body parts/bodily presence bring about a structure of spectrality wherein the past other returns to make impressions and ethical demands on the viewer. Drawing on communication theory and film and media studies, Cinema Derrida makes a major intervention in classical communication thought. (shrink)

In his Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion, Hegel treats the religions of the world under the rubric "the determinate religion." This is a part of his corpus that has traditionally been neglected since scholars have struggled to understand what philosophical work it is supposed to do. In Hegel's Interpretation of the Religions of the World, Jon Stewart argues that Hegel's rich analyses of Buddhism, Hinduism, Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Egyptian and Greek polytheism, and the Roman religion are not simply irrelevant (...) historical material, as is often thought. Instead, they play a central role in Hegel's argument for what he regards as the truth of Christianity. Hegel believes that the different conceptions of the gods in the world religions are reflections of individual peoples at specific periods in history. These conceptions might at first glance appear random and chaotic, but there is, Hegel claims, a discernible logic in them. Simultaneously, a theory of mythology, history, and philosophical anthropology, Hegel's account of the world religions goes far beyond the field of philosophy of religion. The controversial issues surrounding his treatment of the non-European religions are still very much with us today and make his account of religion an issue of continued topicality in the academic landscape of the twenty-first century. (shrink)

The first edition, published by Acumen in 2000, became a prescribed textbook on modal logic courses. The second edition has been fully revised in response to readers' suggestions, including two new chapters on conditional logic, which was not covered in the first edition. "Modal Logics and Philosophy" is a fully comprehensive introduction to modal logics and their application suitable for course use. Unlike most modal logic textbooks, which are both forbidding mathematically and short on philosophical discussion, "Modal Logics and Philosophy" (...) places its emphasis firmly on showing how useful modal logic can be as a tool for formal philosophical analysis. In part 1 of the book, the reader is introduced to some standard systems of modal logic and encouraged through a series of exercises to become proficient in manipulating these logics. The emphasis is on possible world semantics for modal logics and the semantic emphasis is carried into the formal method, Jeffrey-style truth-trees. Standard truth-trees are extended in a simple and transparent way to take possible worlds into account. Part 2 systematically explores the applications of modal logic to philosophical issues such as truth, time, processes, knowledge and belief, obligation and permission. (shrink)

This book is a creative, original argument about the variety of forms of expression across the history of philosophy.

In recent years interest in the thought of Kierkegaard has grown dramatically, and with it the body of secondary literature has expanded so quickly that it has become impossible for even the most conscientious scholar to keep pace. The problem of the explosion of secondary literature is made more acute by the fact that much of what is written about Kierkegaard appears in languages that most Kierkegaard scholars do not know. Kierkegaard has become a global phenomenon, and new research traditions (...) have emerged in different languages, countries, and regions. The present volume is dedicated to trying to help to resolve these two problems in Kierkegaard studies. Its purpose is, first, to provide book reviews of some of the leading monographic studies in the Kierkegaard secondary literature so as to assist the community of scholars to become familiar with the works that they have not read for themselves. The aim is thus to offer students and scholars of Kierkegaard a comprehensive survey of works that have played a more or less significant role in the research. Second, the present volume also tries to make accessible many works in the Kierkegaard secondary literature that are written in different languages and thus to give a glimpse into various and lesser-known research traditions. The six tomes of the present volume present reviews of works written in Catalan, Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, Galician, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Slovak, Spanish, and Swedish. (shrink)

This book is a concise introduction to Maori philosophy, covering the symbolic systems and worldviews of the indigenous people of Aotearoa, New Zealand. This book addresses core philosophical issues including Maori notions of the self, the world, epistemology, the form in which Maori philosophy is conveyed, and whether or not Maori philosophy has a teleological agenda. The book introduces key texts, thinkers and themes and includes pedagogical features including: - A Maori-to-English glossary; - Accessible English translations of primary source material; (...) - Teaching notes, and reflections on how the studied material engages with contemporary debates - End-of-chapter discussion questions that can be used in teaching - Comprehensive bibliographies and guided suggestions for further reading. Maori Philosophy is an ideal text for students studying World Philosophies, or anyone who wishes to use indigenous philosophies or methodologies in their own research and scholarship. (shrink)

Despite the evidence showing the promise of HIV treatment as prevention (TasP) in reducing HIV incidence, a variety of ethical questions surrounding the implementation and “scaling up” of TasP have been articulated by a variety of stakeholders including scientists, community activists and government officials. Given the high profile and potential promise of TasP in combatting the global HIV epidemic, an explicit and transparent research priority-setting process is critical to inform ongoing ethical discussions pertaining to TasP.

Traces the development of recursive functions from their origins in the late nineteenth century to the mid-1930s, with particular emphasis on the work and influence of Kurt Gödel.

The steep rise in diagnosed depression in the United States was enabled by the use of simplistic checklists of diagnostic criteria as codified in the authoritative Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, which underwent a fundamental change in 1980 and has been revised several times since. The DSM criteria for depression disregard the traditional distinction between the sadness incident to human life and habitual, excessive melancholy. However, tradition—in particular the satiric tradition, to which Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy belongs—not only reminds us that (...) sadness has many shapes, but by the same token cautions against the fallacies of codification as such. (shrink)

Philosophical arguments stemming from the public health ethics arena suggest that public health interventions ought to be subject to normative inquiry that considers relational values, including concepts such as solidarity, reciprocity and health equity. As yet, however, the extent to which ‘public’ values influence the ‘autonomous’ decisions of the public remains largely unexplored. Drawing on interviews with 50 men in Vancouver, Canada, this study employs a critical discourse analysis to examine participants’ decisions and motivations to voluntarily access HIV testing and/or (...) to accept a routine HIV test offer. Within a sub-set of interviews, a transactional discourse emerged in which the decision to test features an arrangement of ‘giving and receiving’. Discourses related to notions of solidarity emphasize considerations of justice and positions testing as a ‘public’ act. Lastly, ‘individualistic’ discourses focused on individual-level considerations, with less concern for the broader public ‘good’. These findings underscore how normative dimensions pertaining to men’s decisions to test are dialectically interrelated with the broader social and structural influences on individual and collective health-related behaviour, thereby suggesting a need to advance an explicit empirical-normative research agenda related to population and public health intervention research. (shrink)

This chapter begins with narration of episode 31 of Dungeons Dragons Part 2, where the player Chris Lovasz, or Sips, decides he is going to passive‐aggressively grief the rest of his party. In frustration, they methodically kill, threaten, and chase away any quest‐givers that approach them. The chapter looks at early adventure games based on DD, asking why they avoid many aspects of the game, especially those that involve role‐playing and moral decisions by players. It then discusses how gamers now (...) discover DD, and why this is important in changing their understanding of the game. The chapter addresses the question: why Pierre Levy's ideas about the digital age, virtual communities, and collective intelligence are so important for understanding how, and why this has happened. It concludes with discussion of the effects that this has on DD players. (shrink)

A classicist, philosopher, and poet, Poul Martin Møller was an important figure in the Danish Golden Age. The traumatic event of the death of his wife led him to think more profoundly about the question of the immortality of the soul. In 1837 he published his most important philosophical treatise, "Thoughts on the Possibility of Proofs of Human Immortality," presented here in English for the first time. It was read and commented upon by the leading figures of the Golden Age, (...) such as Søren Kierkegaard. It proved to be the last important work that Møller wrote before his death in March of 1838 at the age of 43. (shrink)

The Ape that Understood the Universe is the story of the strangest animal in the world: the human animal. It opens with a question: How would an alien scientist view our species? What would it make of our sex differences, our sexual behavior, our child-rearing patterns, our moral codes, our religions, our languages, and science? The book tackles these issues by drawing on ideas from two major schools of thought: evolutionary psychology and cultural evolutionary theory. The guiding assumption is that (...) humans are animals, and that like all animals, we evolved to pass on our genes. At some point, however, we also evolved the capacity for culture - and from that moment, culture began evolving in its own right. This transformed us from a mere ape into an ape capable of reshaping the planet, travelling to other worlds, and understanding the vast universe of which we're but a tiny, fleeting fragment. (shrink)

Students of Kierkegaard are familiar with his dogged polemic against Hegelianism, his critique of Friedrich von Schlegel's Romantic irony, and his visit to Schelling's lectures in Berlin. However, these are only a few well-known examples of a deep relationship that Kierkegaard had with German culture. In Faust, Romantic Irony, and System, Jon Stewart maps out the many ways in which German thinkers and writers inspired and influenced the Danish philosopher. Kierkegaard's famous criticisms of the Hegelians, Schlegel, and Schelling has (...) led many to view him as anti-German. As Stewart shows, however, he offered high praise for other German thinkers, including Johann Georg Hamann, Gotthold Lessing, and Friedrich Adolf Trendelenburg. Stewart traces the many points of contact between Kierkegaard and a range of German thinkers, and ultimately he argues convincingly that were it not for the influence of German culture, Kierkegaard would have been a very different, and less lasting, philosopher. (shrink)