Over recent decades, developments in network governance have seen governments around the world cede considerable authority and responsibility to commercial migration intermediaries for recruiting and managing temporary migrant labour. Correspondingly, a by-product of network governance has been the emergence of soft employment regulation in which voluntary codes of conduct supplement hard legal employment standards. This paper explores these developments in the context of temporary migrant workers employed in Australian horticulture. First the paper analyses the growing use of temporary migrant labour (...) in this industry. It then describes how different types of intermediaries interact with this workforce. The paper then outlines both hard and soft employment regulations, and contrasts them with actual employment conditions, questioning how a network governance approach has affected this vulnerable workforce. The paper concludes that changes in network governance of migration and employment relations have emasculated formal legal regulation, leaving market forces to operate without effective or ethical constraints at the expense of the public good. (shrink)

Over recent decades, developments in network governance have seen governments around the world cede considerable authority and responsibility to commercial migration intermediaries for recruiting and managing temporary migrant labour. Correspondingly, a by-product of network governance has been the emergence of soft employment regulation in which voluntary codes of conduct supplement hard legal employment standards. This paper explores these developments in the context of temporary migrant workers employed in Australian horticulture. First the paper analyses the growing use of temporary migrant labour (...) in this industry. It then describes how different types of intermediaries interact with this workforce. The paper then outlines both hard and soft employment regulations, and contrasts them with actual employment conditions, questioning how a network governance approach has affected this vulnerable workforce. The paper concludes that changes in network governance of migration and employment relations have emasculated formal legal regulation, leaving market forces to operate without effective or ethical constraints at the expense of the public good. (shrink)

Regional planning for improved agricultural capacity to supply produce, legumes, and whole grains has the potential to improve population health as well as the local food economy. This case study of Waterloo Region (WR), Canada, had two objectives. First, we estimate the quantity of locally grown vegetables, fruits, legumes, and whole grains needed to help meet the Region of Waterloo population’s optimal nutritional requirements currently and in 2026. Secondly, we estimate how much of these healthy food requirements for the WR (...) population could realistically be produced through local agriculture by the year 2026. Results show that a shift of approximately 10% of currently cropped hectares to the production of key nutritious foods would be both agriculturally feasible and nutritionally significant to the growing population. We supplement our findings with some agronomic considerations and community-level strategies that would inform and support such change. The methodology of this study could be applied to other regions: more such analyses would create a broader picture of the diverse qualitative and quantitative agricultural shifts that could synchronize optimal land use with dietary recommendations, thus informing coordinated policy and planning. (shrink)

‘Adam’s laburnum’, produced by accident in 1825 by Jean-Louis Adam, a nurseryman in Vitry, became a commercial success within the plant trade for its striking mix of yellow and purple flowers. After it came to the attention of members of La Société d’Horticulture de Paris, the tree gained enormous fame as a potential instance of the much sought-after ‘graft hybrid’, a hypothetical idea that by grafting one plant onto another, a mixture of the two could be produced. As I show (...) in this paper, many eminent botanists and gardeners, including Charles Darwin, both experimented with Adam’s laburnum and argued over how it might have been produced and what light, if any, it shed on the laws of heredity. Despite Jean-Louis Adam’s position and status as a nurseryman active within the Parisian plant trade, a surprising degree of doubt and scepticism was attached to his testimony on how the tree had been produced in his nursery. This doubt, I argue, helps us to trace the complex negotiations of authority that constituted debates over plant heredity in the early 19th century and that were introduced with a new generation of gardening and horticultural periodicals. (shrink)

The increasing demand for horticultural products for nutritional and economic purposes by lesser developed countries (LDC's) is well-documented. Technological demands of the LDC's producing horticultural products is also increasing. Pesticide use is an integral component of most agricultural production, yet chemicals are often supplied without supplemental information vital for their safe and efficient implementation. Illiteracy rates in developing countries are high, making pesticide education even more challenging. For women, who perform a significant share of agricultural tasks, (...) illiteracy rates are even higher than for men. The dilemma exists of how a developing country can improve its nutritional and economic situation without giving consideration to social and environmental consequences. (shrink)

A case study of growers conception of irrigation strategies indicates that pot plant growers in Scandinavia base their management approaches on experientially based art. The study also indicates that there is a gap between experientially based art and available greenhouse technology. In order to standardize production and produce quality, both the grower’s experience and available technology should be taken into account. In order to achieve this, the present study proposes to arrange reflection on reflection in action with a group of (...) growers by means of the dialogue seminar method. The concept of reflection on reflection in action is novel to horticultural practice. Therefore, we suggest future inter- and multidisciplinary research within this domain. (shrink)

In response to the chronic overuse and misuse of pesticides in agriculture, governments in Southeast Asia have sought to improve food safety by introducing public standards of good agricultural practices (GAP). Using quantitative farm-level data from an intensive horticultural production system in northern Thailand, we test if fruit and vegetable producers who follow the public GAP standard use fewer and less hazardous pesticides than producers who do not adhere to the standard. The results show that this is not the (...) case. By drawing on qualitative data from expert interviews and an action research project with local litchi (“lychee”) producers we explain the underlying reasons for the absence of significant differences. The qualitative evidence points at poor implementation of farm auditing related to a program expansion that was too rapid, at a lack of understanding among farmers about the logic of the control points in the standard, and at a lack of alternatives given to farmers to manage their pest problems. We argue that by focusing on the testing of farm produce for pesticide residues, the public GAP program is paying too much attention to the consequences rather than the root cause of the pesticide problem; it needs to balance this by making a greater effort to change on-farm practices. (shrink)

This article provides an ethnographic analysis of the agency of women who reside in the rural areas of the Argentine Pampas, based on their promotion and production of agroecological family horticulture. The recognition of these women’s agency through care – care of their children, global care, and green care – offers a significant challenge to some metrocentric and Eurocentric feminist perspectives that claim care work can only be oppressive for women. The first of these types of care empowers women to (...) improve the nutrition of their children. It also relates to another underlying type of care, which is to provide a sufficiently robust education as to ensure their children have a better and alternative future. The second type of care has the power to socially transform the territorial space of the district’s countryside and its marginalized populations which, through care, acquire greater public and political attention. The third type of care empowers women to transform and care for the environment, and is exercised by not using pesticides in horticultural production and by disseminating knowledge on the matter. In line with discussions of postcolonial feminism (Abu-Lughod, 1986; Mahmood, 2001; Suárez Navaz, 2008), I argue that certain properties that are attributed to women relative to caregiving – by way of a dichotomous view of gender relations – fuel their agency: for these women the cultivation of vegetables is a form of agency that actively combats food, training and labor inequality. (shrink)

Australia is currently experiencing a prolonged period of water scarcity that is challenging a diverse range of water-dependent activities ranging from household gardening to horticultural production to the viability of riverine ecosystems. The political and ecological importance of water in Australia is not, however, only a recent phenomenon. For the majority of Australia’s settled history, water politics, economics, culture and engineering have reflected and embodied a dynamic relationship between Australian hydrology and Australian society. This essay examines that relationship by (...) first reviewing the work of the Australian historical geographer, Emeritus Professor J. M. Powell. For 40 years Powell has been writing about the process of natural resource appraisal and management in Australia and he has been Australia’s leading authority on the role of water in that process for most of that time. The essay then argues for an extension of Powell’s work by applying the insights provided by the scholars Karl Wittfogel, Donald Worster and Eric Swyngedouw. Their work, it is argued, suggests the possibility of a more nuanced understanding of water in Australia than that currently offered by the majority of the Australian literature, and ultimately provides some tools for thinking ourselves out of the current water crisis. (shrink)

Migrant farmworkers dominate the horticultural workforce in many parts of the Minority (developed) World. The ‘manual’ work that they do—picking and packing fruits and vegetables, and pruning vines and trees—is widely designated unskilled. In policy, media, academic, activist and everyday discourses, hired farm work is framed as something anybody can do. We interrogate this notion with empirical evidence from the Sunraysia horticultural region of Australia. The region’s grape and almond farms depend heavily on migrant workers. By-and-large, the farmers (...) and farmworkers we spoke to pushed back against the unskilled tag. They asserted that farmworkers acquire knowledge and skills over time and that experienced farmworkers are valuable—their value being brought into sharp relief against accounts of inexperienced farmworkers’ errors. Our interviewees provided rich insights into farmworkers’ engagements with crops and the intricacies of picking and pruning well. Far from being bereft of knowledge and skills, they recognised that experienced farmworkers bring benefits. They improve productivity, product quality and ultimately profits. This is especially so when open communication channels exist across the farm hierarchy, when experienced farmworkers’ insights are taken seriously by their employers. Our research is informed by organisational studies literature and scholarship on craft/making. Like factory floor workers and artisans, experienced farmworkers bring accumulated knowledge and skills to their work, gained through repeat performance. They reflect on and adjust their activities in dialogue with their materials and the environment. Experienced farmworkers demonstrate care, dexterity and judgement. They are not unskilled, and they are more than labouring bodies. (shrink)

Strengthening the abilities of smallholder farmers in developing countries, particularly women farmers, to produce for both home and the market is currently a development priority. In many contexts, ownership of assets is strongly gendered, reflecting existing gender norms and limiting women’s ability to invest in more profitable livelihood strategies such as market-oriented agriculture. Yet the intersection between women’s asset endowments and their ability to participate in and benefit from agricultural interventions receives minimal attention. This paper explores changes in gender relations (...) and women’s assets in four agricultural interventions that promoted high value agriculture with different degrees of market-orientation. Findings suggest that these dairy and horticulture projects can successfully involve women and increase production, income and the stock of household assets. In some cases, women were able to increase their control over production, income and assets; however in most cases men’s incomes increased more than women’s and the gender-asset gap did not decrease. Gender- and asset-based barriers to participation in projects as well as gender norms that limit women’s ability to accumulate and retain control over assets both contributed to the results. Comparing experiences across the four projects, especially where projects implemented adaptive measures to encourage gender-equitable outcomes, provides lessons for gender-responsive projects targeting existing and emerging value chains for high value products. Other targeted support to women farmers may also be needed to promote their acquisition of the physical assets required to expand production or enter other nodes of the value chain. (shrink)

This highly speculative paper seeks to discern where the discipline of Bioethics may be heading in the next decade or two. It is clear that the rapid pace of scientific discovery and technological innovation will not slacken, and, as a result, fresh moral issues, for which there are no precedents in currently accepted moral wisdom, will rapidly emerge. This mushrooming of ethical problems will be taking place at a time of increasing moral pluralism, when common moral values become harder to (...) establish, and powerful subgroups embrace moral dogmatism, whether religious or secular in character.Faced with such complexity and confusion, governments and industrial groups will increasingly seek guidance from bioethics "experts", through paid consultancies, advisory panels and commissioned reports on specific topics. But Bioethics itself is currently in a stage of flux: 1. Certain research areas in Bioethics have 'bolted' (in the horticultural sense), because of a rich injection of funds - notably genetics and stem cell research - while other areas are relatively under-researched. 2. Inter-disciplinarity has become de rigueur, largely under funder pressure, and, allied to this, an insistence on empirical work has created conceptual confusions. 3. There is a continuing ferment in bioethical theory, with little sign of productive co-operation between rival camps. Indeed theoretical enrichment seems to lag far behind the constant demand for relevance and 'applied ethics'.So what of the future? I detect certain trends, some to be deplored and discouraged, others to be applauded and nurtured. On my 'black list' are: the commercialisation of Bioethics; and the dumbing down of several critical disciplines in the name of relevance. On my 'white list' are: further adventures in theory; inter-disciplinarity come of age; and the future envisioned in today's young minds. (shrink)

Cross-cultural studies have revealed broad quantitative associations between subsistence practice and demographic parameters for preindustrial populations. One explanation is that variationin the availability of suitable weaning foods influenced the frequency and duration of breastfeeding and thus the length of interbirth intervals and the probability of child survival (the “weaning food availability” hypothesis). We examine the available data on weaning age variation in preindustrial populations and report results of a cross-cultural test of the predictions that weaning occurred earlier in agricultural and (...) pastoral populations because dairy and cereal production increased the availability of easily digestible, nutrientrich foods appropriate for weaning. We found that, contrary to predictions, supplementation with liquid foods other than breast milk was delayed in agricultural populations relative to less agriculturally dependent ones and complementary feeding with solid foods was delayed in pastoral populations relative to those less dependent on herding. Although the duration of breastfeeding was longer in populations dependent on hunting, there was no qualitative evidence that such populations lacked foods appropriate for weaning. The patterns observed suggest that the relationships between demography and subsistence observed among preindustrial societies cannot be explained by the “weaning food availability” hypothesis. We discuss the implications for understanding the mechanisms underlying prehistoric human demography, subsistence shifts, allocation to parenting and mating effort, and the evolutionary implications of tradeoffs between diet and disease. (shrink)

The improvement of the welfare of inhabitants of arid and semi-arid lands, either through the enhancement of existing livelihoods or the promotion of alternative ones, and their potential constraints are discussed. Alternative livelihoods are discussed under regenerative and extractive themes with respect to environmental stability. Regenerative (i.e., non-extractive) livelihoods include activities like apiculture, poultry keeping, pisciculture, silkworm production, drought tolerant cash cropping, horticulture, community wildlife tourism, processing of livestock and crop products, agro-forestry for tree products, and micro-enterprises in (...) the informal sector. Examples of livelihoods that are extractive or potentially so include timber production, woodcarving, basketry, brick making, sand scooping, and charcoal making. Suggestions to improve these livelihoods in a sustainable manner are offered. (shrink)

The main economic activity of the people of Eritrea is agriculture: crop production and livestock herding. Agriculture mainly comprises mixed farming and some commercial concessions. Most agriculture is rain-fed. The main rain-fed crops are sorghum, millet and sesame, and the main irrigated crops are all horticultural crops like bananas, onions and tomatoes and cotton. The major livestock production constraints are disease, water and feed shortages and agricultural expansion especially in the river frontages. The agricultural sector employs eighty percent of (...) the working population, but its production has not managed to cover internal food demand and is forced to cover nearly 50 per cent of its annual cereal requirements through imports-commercial and food assistance. Like most African countries, Eritrea is also a victim of the problem of food insecurity. In good years the country produces only about 60 per cent of its total food needs and in poor years, it produces no more than 25 per cent. On average, once in 10 years, the country is threatened with famines. Annual crop production depends on rainfall that is variable and unevenly distributed from year to year. Therefore, the primary goal of Eritrea is to guarantee food security by introducing modern technology, irrigation, terracing, soil and water conservation, with less dependence on rainwater. Thus the Government has articulated its food policy, which stresses national ownership of grant food assistance and to achieve food security in the coming five years. The policy indeed encompasses all sectoral policies and represents the Government's engagements with regard to food security. Despite the general trends of improvement in the economy of Eritrea, it has not yet fully recovered, and thus will still continue to require variable degrees of food assistance for the coming few more years. Based on this historical and recurrent food insecurity in Eritrea, an attempt is made in this paper to assess the agriculture development and food policy in the country. Furthermore, the paper captures the available food security policy proposals of Eritrea and eventually draws conclusions. (shrink)

To determine the role Latino community gardens play in community development, open space, and civic agriculture, we conducted interviews with 32 community gardeners from 20 gardens, and with staff from 11 community gardening support non-profit organizations and government agencies. We also conducted observations in the gardens, and reviewed documents written by the gardeners and staff from 13 support organizations and agencies. In addition to being sites for production of conventional and ethnic vegetables and herbs, the gardens host numerous social, educational, (...) and cultural events, including neighborhood and church gatherings, holiday parties, children’s activities, school tours, concerts, health fairs, and voter registration drives. In some cases, the gardens also serve to promote community activism. The primary concern of gardeners is to secure land tenure in the face of pressures to develop the garden sites for housing. The support organizations and agencies provide help with land tenure, as well as with advocacy, organization, and horticultural practices. Although the role of the Latino gardens in community development appears to be more important than their role in open space or agricultural production, the gardens can also be viewed as unique “participatory landscapes” that combine aspects of all three movements, as well as provide a connection between immigrants and their cultural heritage. (shrink)

Permaculture is primarily a thinking tool for designing low carbon, highly productive systems. It originated in Australia in the 1970s and was conceived by Bill Mollison and David Holmgren as a response to the devastating effects of a temperate European agriculture on the fragile soils of an ancient antipodean landscape. Like the dust bowls of the Great Plains in the USA in the 1930s, an alien agriculture has the capacity to turn a delicately balanced ecology into desert. Their initial response (...) was to design a permanent agriculture with tree crops and other perennials inhabiting all the niches from the canopy to the ground cover and below. The soil is left untilled to establish its own robust micro-ecology. Key to this is that the land must be biodiverse and stable for future generations. From perennial tree crops, permaculture has developed into an integrated system of design that encompasses everything from agriculture, horticulture, architecture, and ecology, as well as economy and legal systems for businesses and communities. (shrink)

In a very general sense, hybrid can be understood to be any organism that is the product of two (or more) organisms where each parent belongs to a different kind. For example; the offspring from two or more parent organisms, each belonging to a separate species (or genera), is called a “hybrid”. “Hybridity” refers to the phenomenal character of being a hybrid. And “hybridization ” refers to both natural and artificial processes of generating hybrids. These processes include mechanisms of selective (...) cross-breeding and cross-fertilization of parents of different species for the purpose of producing hybrid offspring. In addition to these processes, “hybridization ” also refers to natural and artificial processes of whole genome duplication that result in the doubling or trebling of the sets of chromosomes of the organism. This entry provides an overview of the impact of hybridity on agriculture. It begins with an historical sketch that traces the early horticulturalists’ and naturalists’ investigations of hybrids. This starts with the observations of Thomas Fairchild and Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon; and leads to the explanation of its mechanism by Gregor Mendel, James Watson and Francis Crick, and Ernst Mayr; and the eventual manipulation of hybrids and hybridization by Barbara McClintock. Following this, the reader is introduced to a number of key terms and concepts in use within current research as well as highlighting diverse ethical concerns that center on hybridization. Recent research that attempts to ascertain the role of hybridization in adaptive change will be introduced. This will include research on the evolution of crop species, increased biodiversity, and the use of hybrids to manipulate phenotypically desirable traits in agricultural crops. The focus of the discussion is on a particularly significant type of naturally occurring hybridization, polyploidy hybridization. Polyploids are organisms which have more than two complete genomes in each cell. This kind of hybridization is ubiquitous among crop plants. The role of polyploidy in plant evolution and the affects of polyploidy on plants and animals will be reviewed. A critical discussion of its agricultural value in the production of fertile polyploid hybrids highlights key epistemological, ontological, and ethical issues. These are illuminated with reference to the distinct processes of artificial and natural hybridization. A survey of these different kinds of hybridization includes the ethical and economic impacts of hybridity on global nutrition, the environment, and considerations of some practical implications for the agricultural industry. Tracking the role of hybrids, the process of hybridization, and the current impacts of it for agriculture requires knowledge of the history of its early conceptualization, understanding, and use. This is the topic of the following section. (shrink)

Although the chinampa agriculture in Mexico City is considered an historical sustainable farming system,there have been few studies on its current status. This paper assesses the relationship between agroecological factors and socioeconomic strategies by analyzing urban forces, regional employment, and environmental concerns. Despite ecological deterioration caused by the urban expansion of Mexico City, the economic viability of this agricultural system is still based on the efficient use of farming technologies and resources management strategies that tend to maintain levels of productivity (...) in horticulture and floriculture. The chinampa agriculture generates high income and employment for families and other local residents. This agroecosystem depends on the relationship between the economic priorities and agricultural criteria of farmers. We suggest that urban development, economic growth, and resource management in the chinampa region of Mexico City coincide with ecosystem processes, biological human needs, agronomic productivity, economic viability, and sociocultural values. By evaluating these factors, we provide some useful insights on the importance of this traditional agriculture within a sustainable development context. (shrink)

One of France's colonial enterprises in the eighteenth century was to acclimatize nutmeg, native to the Maluku islands, in the French colony of Isle de France (today's Mauritius). Exploring the acclimatization of nutmeg as a practice, this paper reveals the practical challenges of transferring knowledge between Indo-Pacific islands in the second half of the eighteenth century. This essay will look at the process through which knowledge was created – including ruptures and fractures – as opposed to looking at the mere (...) circulation of knowledge. I argue that nutmeg cultivation on Isle de France was a complex process of creolizing expertise originating from the local populations of the plants’ native islands with the horticultural knowledge of colonists, settlers, labourers and slaves living on Isle de France. In this respect, creolization describes a process of knowledge production rather than a form of knowledge. Once on Isle de France, nutmeg took root in climate and soil conditions which were different from those of its native South East Asian islands. It was cultivated by slaves and colonists who lacked prior experience with the cultivation of this particular spice. Experienced horticulturalists experimented with their own traditions. While they relied on old assumptions, they also came to question them. By examining cultivation as an applied practice, this paper argues that the creolization of knowledge was a critical aspect in French colonial botany. (shrink)

The scientific life in mid-seventeenth-century Europe was characterised by numerous academies of sciences and scientific associations whose aim was to propagate the development of the sciences, art and literature. Some have called it “the new Age of Academies all over Europe”. These institutions brought together not only educated professionals but also a large number of amateur scientists. They called for the deliberate abandonment of verbal dispute in favour of visual demonstration/experimentation, and for the creation of paid scientific professionals who would (...) devote their full time to the enterprise. These scientists conducted numerous experiments, the results of which were demonstrated at academic sessions. Franciszek Bieliński became Grand Marshal of the Crown in 1742. During the many years of his public service, he aimed to improve the well-being of Warsaw inhabitants, especially by paving the streets and creating a modern sewerage system. In the light of recent scholarly studies, Franciszek Bieliński is perceived as a figure of very wide horizons, striving to join the Parisian academic scientific discourse in order to transfer knowledge and technology to Poland. Bieliński exchanged letters with the eminent member and three-time president of the Paris Academy of Sciences, Henri Louis Duhamel du Monceau, who among numerous other projects tested new methods of horticulture, agriculture and forestry. The article aims to discuss the scientific research undertaken by Bieliński in regards to technology transfer in the area of agriculture, on the basis of unanalysed documents. Recently found correspondence shows that Grand Marshal Bieliński was involved in experimental research supervised by Duhamel du Monceau, under the aegis of the Paris Academy of Sciences. It pertained to modern agricultural crops and the application of new technologies. The agricultural experiments that Bieliński carried out on his private lands in Otwock over many years focused on improving and increasing agricultural production in accordance with the instructions given by Duhamel du Monceau. An interesting research finding was the detailed description of one of the earliest transfers of advanced technology in the field of agricultural machinery. Reports of the work conducted in Poland, which were sent to Duhamel du Monceau, proved to be so useful and important that the latter mentioned these in the proceedings of the Paris Academy of Sciences. (shrink)

Some models anticipate that liberalized agricultural trade will lead to increased crop diversity, while other models make the opposite claim. These positions were explored in southwestern British Columbia, Canada where, between 1992 and 1998, government subsidies and other measures designed to protect horticultural farmers were lifted, exposing these farmers to foreign competition. Public hearings on the future of agriculture provided an opportunity to tap the knowledge and experience of people affected by this transition. Analysis of transcripts from these hearings, (...) which was confirmed by industry data, shows that trade liberalization has led to the loss of the local fruit and vegetable processing industry. Stakeholders saw the loss as a major factor affecting the choice of crops grown locally. To test this assertion, crop diversity data were analyzed, differentiating crops grown for the processing industry from those grown for the fresh market. Results show that crop diversity increased for processing crops but not for fresh crops. Farmers who used to produce commodities for the fruit and vegetable processing industry seem to have been forced to find new crops to cope with the decline in the processing industry. Here then is a case where the effects of trade were indirect (they were mediated by another variable: the loss of the processing industry) and variable (they differed for the two groups of crops). This may have significant environmental implications as scientific research shows that diverse agro-ecosystems are better able to withstand pest outbreaks and require less agri-chemicals than simple systems. (shrink)

John Darling; Education as Horticulture: some growth theorists and their critics, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 16, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 173.

Imagination is important for many things in science: solving problems, interpreting data, designing studies, etc. Philosophers of imagination typically account for the productive role played by imagination in science by focusing on how imagination is constrained, e.g., by using self-imposed rules to infer logically, or model events accurately. But the constraints offered by these philosophers either constrain too much, or not enough, and they can never account for uses of imagination that are needed to break today’s constraints in order to (...) make progress tomorrow. Thus, epistemology of imagination needs to make room for an element of epistemological anarchy. (shrink)

A doctrine of intelligent design through evolution is not going to find many friends. It is destined to encounter opposition on all sides. Among scientists the backlog of evolution will have little patience for intelligent design. Among religiousists, many who form intelligent design have their doubts about evolution. In the general public s mind there is a diametrical opposition between evolution and intelligent design: one excludes the other. This book will argue that this view of the matter is not correct, (...) and that in actuality one can regard evolution itself as a pathway to intelligent design. We would do well to go beyond The Origin of Species and taking as our guide such works as W. Wentworth Thomson s On Growth and Form acknowledging that evolutionary adaptation can result in solutions of a sort that intelligence could readily ratify. Accordingly, what the present book seeks is a naturalization of Intelligent Design that sees such design as itself the result of natural and evolutionary processes.". (shrink)

We study the preservation of certain properties under products of classes of finite structures. In particular, we examine indivisibility, definable self-similarity, the amalgamation property, and the disjoint n-amalgamation property. We explore how each of these properties interacts with the lexicographic product, full product, and free superposition of classes of structures. Additionally, we consider the classes of theories which admit configurations indexed by these products. In particular, we show that, under mild assumptions, the products considered in this article (...) do not yield new classes of theories. (shrink)

This paper criticises the view that, according to Marx, “productive forces” determine “relations of production” and that the growth of the former basically determines the course of history. The particular version of this account discussed is that to be found in G.A. Cohen’s Karl Marx's Theory of History: A Defence. The main part of this criticism in:-volves a presentation of what, it is suggested, was in fact Marx's conception of "productive forces", "relations of production" and their relations, and an identification (...) of class-struggle as the primary factor at least for the historically significant periods with which Marx was concerned. (shrink)

Louis Althusser argued that Marx initiated a transformation of philosophy, a new way of doing philosophy. This book follows that provocation to examine the way in which central Marxist concepts and problems from primitive accumulation to real abstraction animate and inform philosophers from Theodor Adorno to Paolo Virno. While also examining the way in which reading Marx casts new light on such philosophers as Spinoza. At the centre of this transformation is the production of subjectivity, the manner in which relations (...) of production produces ways of thinking and living. (shrink)

There has been much discussion of so-called teleosemantic approaches to the naturalization of content. Such discussion, though, has been largely confined to simple, innate mental states with contents such as ?There is a fly here.? Even assuming we can solve the issues that crop up at this stage, an account of the content of human mental states will not get too far without an account of productivity: the ability to entertain indefinitely many thoughts. The best-known teleosemantic theory, Millikan's biosemantics, offers (...) an account of productivity in thought. This paper raises a basic worry about this account: that the use of mapping functions in the theory is unacceptable from a naturalistic point of view. (shrink)