tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-46928312385936568242024-03-17T20:00:04.935-07:00The Power of Language: Philosophy and Societyhttp://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.comBlogger180125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-32608762515380311372024-02-03T11:37:00.000-08:002024-02-05T13:39:03.958-08:00Some of Plato's Views on the Art of Medicine<span style="font-family: arial;">In Plato's <i>Laws </i>(Book 4, 720a-720e), he describes the differences between two types of doctors: the free-born doctor and the slave doctor. He says that both types of doctors acquire their art under the direction of their teachers or masters, by observation and practice, rather than by the study of nature. However, a free-born doctor is mostly engaged in visiting and treating the ailments of free people, and he does so by listening to their complaints, not prescribing any treatment without their consent. A slave doctor, on the other hand, is engaged in treating slaves and doesn't listen to any account of their ailments. He simply prescribes treatment based on his own experience and on what he thinks is best. He does so with the confidence and assurance of a tyrant or autocrat, then rushing off to see some other sick slaves so that his master won't be bothered by having to attend to them.</span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> In the same way, the Athenian lawgiver has a choice of two kinds of methods, persuasion or compulsion. The lawgiver has it in his power to use both methods, but he may mistakenly think that his legislation can be enacted by force alone. To ensure that those who are governed by his laws will actually obey them, the lawgiver must offer those whom he governs some kind of persuasion, just as a free-born doctor must offer his free-born patient a persuasive rather than despotic prescription.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Plato's medical analogy has several implications for our current views of biomedical ethics. It indicates the need for doctors to listen to their patients, and to fully inform them about their conditions, as well as about possible diagnostic modalities, therapeutic options, and possible side-effects of treatment. It also indicates the need for doctors to obtain informed consent from their patients for treatment, and to fully engage and coordinate with their patients in order to ensure their compliance with treatment. It also indicates that the efficacy of treatment may depend on clear and effective communication between patients and providers, as well as on coordination of care, timeliness and appropriateness of care, compassionate care, respect for patient privacy and autonomy, respect for patient dignity, collaboration between patients and providers, and other components of the patient-provider relationship.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> In Plato's <i>Republic</i>, Socrates says that the physician studies only the patient's interest, and not his own (I. 342). Socrates also says that Asclepius treated patients by means of drugs or the knife in order to enable them to go on living as usual, but would not try to prolong the lives of those with advanced disease whose existence was miserable (III. 407). Socrates agrees with Glaucon that the best physicians may be those with the widest experience in treating healthy and sick patients, but he adds that physicians who have themselves suffered from various illnesses may be even more capable of treating those illnesses (III. 408).</span></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-9954560568466291892024-02-02T18:00:00.000-08:002024-02-15T11:57:17.669-08:00Galen, on the Physician as Philosopher<span style="font-family: arial;">Claudius Galenus (Kλάυδιος Γαληνός, 129-216 CE) was a Greek physician and philosopher who was born in Pergamum (now Bergama, Turkey). He traveled widely, to Smyrna, Corinth, Crete, Cyprus, and Alexandria, before becoming physician and surgeon to the gladiators in Pergamum (from 158-161 CE) and settling in Rome (in 161-162 CE), where he eventually became court physician to the Roman emperors Marcus Aurelius (161-180 CE), Commodus (180-192 CE), and Septimius Severus (193-211 CE). He died in Sicily in 216 CE.</span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Galen combined the practice of medicine and philosophy, and he wrote an essay entitled <i>Ὅτι Ἄριστος Ἰατρός καὶ Φιλόσοφος</i> ("That the best physician is also a philosopher"). In this essay, he argues that a physician must be practiced in logic in order to discover the nature of the body, as well as to know the differences between diseases and the indications for treatment. A physician must also be practiced in ethics in order to best serve his patient's best interests, rather than his own personal interests or financial gain. A physician must therefore know all the parts of philosophy: the logical, the scientific, and the ethical. If a physician doesn't put his own wealth before his moral virtue, then he won't put his own financial gain before his patient's benefit. If a physician despises money and practices temperance, then he will possess all the other moral virtues as well, since they all go together. Galen therefore asks: What grounds are left for any doctor not to be a philosopher?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> While Galen rightly explains that the pursuit of financial gain may be a corrupting influence on a physician and on the practice of medicine, some of the obvious defects in his argument that the best physician is also a philosopher include: (1) logic doesn't necessarily yield understanding of the physical nature of the body (although it may serve to promote consistency in thinking about the physical nature of the body), (2) he doesn't recognize ignorance as a cause of wrong actions on the part of a physician, (3) greed and intemperance aren't the only possible sources of wrong actions. Other vices, such as arrogance, carelessness, indifference, and bigotry may also act as sources of wrong actions, (4) possession of one moral virtue (at one moment or in one situation) doesn't necessarily guarantee possession of all the other moral virtues (at some other time or in some other situation), and (5) philosophy includes not only "the logical, the scientific, and the ethical," but also the metaphysical, the epistemological, the aesthetic, and the political, as well as other fields or domains. </span></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-56940870319121062442023-08-01T11:23:00.006-07:002024-02-03T11:56:03.522-08:00Is God at Work in All Things?<span style="font-family: arial;">The following is a reflection I shared at the "Faith at Eight" service at church on Sunday, July 30, 2023.</span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Last Friday, July 21st, I was playing basketball, and I tripped and fell on my right hip. I had a hard fall on a concrete surface, and I broke my right hip. The next day, Saturday, July 22nd, I had right total hip replacement surgery, and I'm now walking slowly eight days post-op.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> I'd been running eight miles a day, but I'm now just getting to the point where I can walk without a cane. So my ability to do various physical activities is suddenly much more limited. I need help getting my socks and shoes on. I have to use a walker to support myself when I get out of bed in the morning. I have to be very careful not to get pressure sores on my lower back and heels during the night, since I have to lay flat on my back. I have to use ice packs on my right thigh to bring down the swelling. I still have numbness below the surgical site on my right leg.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> This experience has been life-changing for me. My physical expectations of myself have been dramatically altered. I can now better recognize how fragile in some respects my body may be, and I can better understand and appreciate the importance and preciousness of having an overall sense of physical health and well-being.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> At the same time, it's also been an opportunity to interrogate my need to feel physically independent and self-sufficient. It's been an opportunity to discard my feelings of shame and embarrassment when I have to get undressed in front of others in order to bathe or to have medical care. It's also been an opportunity to develop an even greater love and understanding and intimacy with my wife, who's been so loving, caring, patient, reassuring, and wonderful in taking care of me during my recovery.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> My feelings of being physically limited, and my uncertainty regarding the timeline and extent of my future recovery have led me to review some of the reading I did a few years ago about the concept of self-limiting beliefs, which has been a subject of research in behavioral medicine and cognitive behavioral therapy.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> I think some of my own present self-limiting beliefs include "I won't ever be able to be fully physically fit again," "I'll only be able to do low level physical training," and "I won't ever be able to do strenuous exercise again." S</span><span style="font-family: arial;">ome of my more long-standing self-limiting beliefs include "I don't have the social skills," "I don't have the technical skills," "I don't have the professional connections," "I won't be accepted," and "I'm not qualified."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Why do people so often feel they're defective or broken in one way or another? Why do people so often feel they're not strong enough or not good enough? This feeling can be reflected in many kinds of emotional, cognitive, and behavioral disorders.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Self-limiting beliefs or core limiting beliefs may be basic beliefs about ourselves that modify other beliefs. They may be foundational, in the sense that they may seem self-evident to us and may be a foundation for other beliefs. They may be longstanding and difficult to change. They may begin in childhood and continue through adulthood. They may be conscious or unconscious. They may also be ways in which we label ourselves, such as by saying "I'm not good at math" or "I'm not good at public speaking" or "I'm not good at getting to know people."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Self-limiting beliefs are beliefs that restrict our social functioning, and that prevent us from living life as freely, actively, joyfully, creatively, and lovingly as we can.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> Examples include the beliefs, "I'm not good enough," "I'm worthless," "I'm not valued," "I'm unworthy," "I'm a mistake," "I'm weird," "I'm a failure," "I have no future," "I'm unlovable," "Nobody cares about me," "Something's wrong with me," "Something's wrong with my body," "Something's wrong with the way I look," "I'm weak," "I'm defective," "I'm broken," "I have no control," "I'm not smart enough," and "I don't belong."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> One way of modifying self-limiting beliefs is by looking at the evidence for them and seeing whether there are facts that don't fully support them or that serve as counter-evidence against them. Another way of modifying self-limiting beliefs is by looking at whether they help us in our social functioning, whether they really represent who we are, and whether they truly reflect who we want to be.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> I think that for us as Christians, another way of modifying negative or self-limiting beliefs may also be to remember that even when we're undergoing misfortune, hardship, or suffering, God is with us. God hasn't forgotten us. God won't abandon us. God will be our strength and salvation. God loves us. God sees us as worthy of being loved. God will encourage us. God will comfort us. God will take care of us. God has a plan for us, and God has a purpose for us.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> That's a reason why Romans 8:28, which is included in the epistle reading for today (Romans 8:26-39), is perhaps my favorite verse of scripture. While I'm not a Greek scholar, I've been trying to better understand the meaning of the verse as it appears in Greek: </span></div><div><div><br /></div><div><span style="color: #252328; font-family: arial; text-align: justify;">Οἴδαμεν δὲ ὅτι τοῖς ἀγαπῶσιν τὸν Θεὸν πάντα συνεργεῖ εἰς ἀγαθόν, τοῖς κατὰ πρόθεσιν κλητοῖς οὖσιν.</span><span style="color: #252328; font-family: arial; font-size: large; text-align: justify;"> </span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Oidamen (we know) de hoti tois agaposin ton Theon (that to those loving God) panta sunergei eis agathon (all things work together for good), tois kata prothesin kletois ousin (to those according to [His] purpose being called). In the King James Version, this verse is translated as, "We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose." In the Revised Standard Version, it's translated as, "We know that in all things God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose." And in the New International Version, it's translated as," We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> I think it's important to note that while the Greek verb </span><span style="color: #001320; font-family: arial;">συνεργεῑν (</span><span style="color: #001320; font-family: arial;">sunergein)</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> means "to work together," God not only works for good <i>with</i> those who love him, God also works for good <i>in</i> and <i>through</i> those who love him. We each have a purpose for which we are called. And God has given us everything we need in order for us to fulfill his purpose for us. Let me repeat that: God has given us everything we need in order for us to fulfill his purpose for us. Even though we may not be aware of it, God has given us everything we need to fulfill our destiny. God has given us everything we need for victory.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> I think it's also important to note that it's for those who love God and who are called according to his purpose that all things work together for good. For all things to work together for good, we must love God and be called according to his purpose. If we love God and are called according to his purpose, then God will always be working for good for us in all things.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Another reason Romans 8:28 is meaningful to me is that we all endure hardship and suffering at one time or another, and we want to know what God's response is to that suffering.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> During the course of each liturgical year, we have many lectionary readings from Paul about the theme of suffering. Romans 8:28 tells us that even though God may not have caused our brokenness or suffering, God is at work in a broken and suffering world. God is always working for good for us, and God is always working for good in and through us. And if we love God, then we'll fulfill God's purpose for us.</span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">FOOTNOTES </span></div></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">John J. Prendergast, "Recognizing Core Limiting Beliefs," in <i>Utne Reader</i>, Dec. 10, 2019, online at </span><span style="font-family: arial;">https://www.utne.com/mind-and-body/core-limiting-beliefs-ze0z1912zhoe/</span></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-83566350570731165292023-07-13T16:21:00.005-07:002023-07-25T10:08:43.747-07:00The Story of Abraham and Isaac<div><span style="font-family: arial;">In the Book of Genesis (22:1-14), God tests Abraham by telling him to take his son Isaac to the land of Moriah, and to sacrifice him there as a burnt offering. So Abraham saddles his donkey and takes Isaac, along with two young men, to Moriah. On the third day, when he sees the place in the distance that God has shown him, he leaves the two young men behind with the donkey. He lays the wood that he has cut for the offering on Isaac, and as they are walking along, Isaac asks him where the lamb is that they will sacrifice for the offering. Abraham tells him, "God himself will provide the lamb for a burnt offering, my son."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> When they come to the place that God has shown him, Abraham builds an altar, and then places the wood on it. He binds his son Isaac, and then lays him on top of the wood. He takes out a knife to kill him, but the angel of the Lord calls to him from heaven and tells him not to lay his hand on Isaac or do anything to him. Abraham's faith in God has been proven, and he suddenly sees a ram caught in a thicket by its horns, which he takes and offers as a burnt offering instead of his son.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span><span style="font-family: arial;">Søren Kierkegaard, in his book</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span><i style="font-family: arial;">Fear and Trembling</i><span style="font-family: arial;"> (1843), describes four ways in which the story of Abraham and Isaac could have have been told differently.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (1) Abraham could have seized Isaac and thrown him to the ground, and he could have told him that it wasn't actually God's command, but only his own idolatrous desire, that he be sacrificed, so that Isaac wouldn't lose faith in God.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (2) Abraham could have been ready to sacrifice Isaac, but after God instead provided a ram to be sacrificed, he could have remembered what God had commanded him to do, and thus he could have lost his faith.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (3) He could have asked God to forgive him for his failure to protect his son, and he could have been troubled by the question of whether it had been a sin to be willing to sacrifice Isaac.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (4) He could have been ready to sacrifice Isaac, but at the last moment he could have revealed his own anguish and despair to his son, and thereafter his son, though having been spared, could have lost his faith.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> However, some other ways in which the story could have been told differently include:</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (1) Instead of beginning with "God tested Abraham," the story could have begun, "Abraham heard a voice, and he thought it was the voice of God, but the voice told him to take his son to the land of Moriah, and to offer him there as a burnt offering. Abraham truly believed he was hearing the voice of God, but he couldn't understand why God would command him to do such a thing."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (2) Instead of binding Isaac and laying him on the altar, Abraham could have asked God to forgive him for not being able to sacrifice his son, because he could have so truly believed in God's mercy that he was certain that God would forgive him.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (3) Instead of binding Isaac and laying him on the altar, Abraham could have offered his own life as a sacrifice, so that Isaac's life would be spared.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Since it's difficult to understand why a loving and merciful God would order Abraham to sacrifice his son, the story might be interpreted as signifying that we live in an absurd and meaningless world, and that the only way we can find meaning is through faith. Or the absurdity might consist in Abraham's believing that God actually wanted him to sacrifice Isaac, and in Abraham's being ready to carry this out.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> If God actually ordered Abraham to kill Isaac in order to test his faith, but God already planned to spare Isaac before Abraham could put him to death, then the story would seem to make God rather capricious, and we wouldn't really have a plausible explanation for why God acted as he did. But if we believe that a loving and merciful God wouldn't tell Abraham to kill his son, then we might not have any plausible explanation either for why the story says this is what God did.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Perhaps God's command for Abraham to sacrifice "his only son" ("only" in the sense that Isaac was Abraham's sole heir, and that Abraham, in accordance with his wife Sarah's wishes, had cast out his first-born son, Ishmael, along with Ishmael's mother, Hagar) can only be understood if we remember that in the gospels of the New Testament, God sacrifices his only Son, so that the world might be saved through him. The story of Abraham and Isaac foretells the story of Jesus, who is sacrificed to redeem the world from its sins, and who rises on the third day.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Kierkegaard explores three problems: (1) Is there a teleological suspension of the ethical? (2) Is there an absolute duty toward God? and (3) Was it ethically defensible for Abraham not to have told Sarah (his wife), Eliezer (his servant), and Isaac (his son) about his undertaking?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Regarding the first problem, Kierkegaard argues that the story of Abraham is an example of a teleological suspension of the ethical. As an act of faith, Abraham suspends his ethical obligation to his son. He is not a tragic hero, because a tragic hero is admirable for his ethical virtue and his capacity to remain within the ethical, allowing an expression of the ethical to have its <i>telos</i> in an even higher expression of the ethical. Abraham himself has a higher <i>telos</i> than the ethical, which he temporarily suspends.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Regarding the second problem, Kierkegaard argues that ethical duty is a relative duty, while duty to God is an absolute duty. The ethical is the universal, and it has nothing outside of itself that is its <i>telos</i> (goal, end, or purpose). But the paradox of faith is that faith is found in the individual, rather than the universal. The paradox of faith is also that the individual is higher than the universal. Thus, in the religious stage of existence, there is a teleological suspension of the ethical. The religious stage is higher than the ethical stage, and the ethical stage is higher than the aesthetic stage.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Regarding the third problem, Kierkegaard argues that Abraham was justified in concealing his intentions from Sarah, Eliezer, and Isaac, insofar as faith is an inwardness, while ethics is an outwardness. The paradox of faith is that inwardness is higher than outwardness. An individual determines his relation to the universal by his relation to the absolute, not his relation to the absolute by his relation to the universal.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> While the tragic hero renounces himself for the universal, the knight of faith renounces the universal for the individual.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">FOOTNOTES</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Søren Kierkegaard, <i>Fear and Trembling</i>, translated by Bruce H. Kirmmse (New York: W.W. Norton, 2022), p. 84.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 91.</span></div><div><div><article style="font-family: "Times New Roman", Palatino, "Palatino Linotype", "Century Schoolbook L", Baskerville, serif;"></article></div></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-8887807237182014472023-06-22T09:48:00.020-07:002023-08-01T12:31:42.816-07:00Erasmus's The Praise of Folly<span style="font-family: arial;">Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam (1466-1536) was a Dutch humanist scholar and theologian who was born in Rotterdam and died in Basel. He was the second illegitimate son of Roger Gerard, a priest, and Margaretha Rogerius, a physician's daughter. Because his father was a Catholic priest, his parents could not be legally married. They died from the plague in 1483, and Erasmus was educated in monastic schools. He took monastic vows in 1486, and was ordained to the Catholic priesthood in 1492. Shortly after his ordination, he was granted a temporary dispensation (later made permanent) from his monastic vows in order for him to be able to accept a post as Latin secretary to the Bishop of Cambrai, in northern France. He studied theology at the University of Paris in 1495, and he traveled widely in France, England, Italy, Germany, and Switzerland. </span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> While in England in 1499, he taught at the University of Oxford, and he met John Colet, an English Catholic priest, scholar, and educator, and Thomas More, an English lawyer, diplomat, and statesman, both of whom became close personal friends. (Thomas More later became Lord Chancellor of England, and was executed in 1535 for refusing to acknowledge King Henry VIII as supreme head of the Church of England). Erasmus earned a Doctor of Divinity degree from the University of Turin in 1506, and he was a professor of divinity at Queen's College, Cambridge from 1511-1514. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> From 1521-1529, he lived in Basel, but due to religious unrest in the city in 1529, he moved to Freiburg. While in Freiburg, he received an invitation from Queen Mary of Hungary, Regent of the Netherlands, to move to Brabant, and after having decided to accept the invitation, he preliminarily moved back to Basel in 1535. But in 1536, he died of an attack of dysentery, and was buried in Basel Münster (the city's former cathedral).<br /></span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> His writings included his annotated text of the Greek New Testament, with his Latin translation (<i>Novum Instrumentum omne</i>, 1516), his Adages (<i>Adagiorum collectanea</i>, 1500), Handbook of the Christian Soldier (<i>Enchiridion militis Christiani</i>, 1503), The Praise of Folly (<i>Stultitiae Laus</i>, 1511), The Education of a Christian Prince (<i>Institutio principis Christiani</i>, 1516), On the Immense Mercy of God (<i>De immensa misericordia dei</i>, 1524), and On Free Will (<i>De libero arbitrio diatribe sive collatio</i>, 1524). </span><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Erasmus is regarded as one of the founders of Renaissance humanism, which emphasized the study of ancient Greek and Latin grammar, rhetoric, literature, history, and philosophy as a route to better understanding of the human capacity for virtue. He criticized the pedantry of scholastic theologians, and he condemned clerical abuses and corruption within the church. He was initially sympathetic to the Reformation, but later opposed it, and he rejected religious violence and dogmatism.</span></div><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> <i>The Praise of Folly</i> was written in 1509 while he was in England, and it was published in Paris in 1511. It was written in Latin, and its title, <i>Stultitiae Laus</i> or <i>Moriae Encomium</i>, was a play on the name of Thomas More (<i>Moria</i> is the Greek word for folly), to whom it was dedicated. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Erasmus writes in a prefatory letter to Thomas More that the name "More" is as close to the Greek word for folly (<i>Moria</i>) as More himself is far from it. He describes the work as a declamation that he hopes More will accept as a memento of their friendship.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> In the text, Folly wears the costume of a jester as she delivers an oration in praise of herself. (Erasmus considers Folly to be a woman, since he considers women to be more foolish than men. Indeed, Folly says that a woman who considers herself wise is twice as foolish. But she also says that it's through folly that women strive to be attractive to men, and that this capacity for folly is precisely what attracts men to women. Thus, folly defines both men and women.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span><span style="font-family: arial;">However, the personification of folly as a female jester is of course based on the sexist assumption that women don't have the same capacity for wisdom as men, and that women are less rational beings than men. Erasmus intentionally promotes the sexist and patriarchal conception that women have less capacity for rational judgment than men, and that it is in women's natures to be governed solely by their emotions and not by their powers of reason.)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The oration is full of well-worn proverbs and is characterized by inflated, empty rhetoric. It's mocking and satirical, without any real attempt at disguise or subtlety. It's quite amusing, however.</span></div></div></div></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Folly is a goddess whose father was Plutus (the god of riches), and whose mother was Nethe (Youth). She was nursed by Methe (Drunkenness) and Apaedia (Stupidity). Among her attendants are Philautia (Self-love), Kolakia (Flattery), Lethe (Forgetfulness), and Misoponia (Laziness).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Some of what we learn from the oration is that it's foolish to be impulsive and to unthinkingly blurt out whatever comes to mind. Folly is obvious and easily recognized. It's never disguised, and it can always be seen for what it is. It can't be concealed, even by those who call themselves wise. Those who call themselves philosophers and try to conceal foolishness are actually "foolosophers."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Those who overestimate their knowledge or understanding of things may also commit acts of folly. So may those who seek to be admired for their knowledge and understanding.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> We may be careless or imprudent and yet think ourselves wise. We may take pleasure in our acts of folly, because through folly, we are relieved of, or freed from, the cares and concerns that might preoccupy us if we were wise.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Just as wisdom may be based on reason, prudence, and self-control, folly may be based on the swings of passion, impulses of desire, and vicissitudes of emotion. Folly is present everywhere throughout human society.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Engagement in foolish amusements and pastimes may bring us pleasure. Indeed, the more trivial and foolish they are, the more lighthearted we may become.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Even love and friendship may cause us to be foolish, since they may cause us to be blind to our own, and one another's, faults and shortcomings. Indeed, folly may cause us to overlook things we would otherwise be unable to ignore. Through folly, we may also be unjustifiably pleased with ourselves.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> It's human nature to be foolish and not wise, says Folly. Socrates wasn't actually stupid, since he refused to be called a wise man, reserving wisdom for divinity alone. But Socrates, for being wise, was sentenced to drink hemlock.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> And Plato, who said the state will be happy when philosophers become kings and kings become philosophers, failed to see that no state was ever more unhappy than when power fell into the hands of a pseudo-philosopher.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> Even Marcus Aurelius, if we grant that he was a relatively better emperor than others, did more damage to the state by leaving such a son as Commodus behind him than he ever prevented by his own rule.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5 </sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> And anyone who believes that anything as vague and empty as fame or glory is worth as much sweat and as many sleepless nights as it takes to be careful and persistent must be the greatest fool of all! What is wise is to profit from the folly of others.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Fools provide us with jokes, fun, and laughter. They alone speak the plain, unvarnished truth.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> They don't know any better than to tell the truth, even when their audience won't profit from hearing it. They can't conceal anything. They're swayed by flattery and easily deceived by liars. They deceive themselves, and they're easily deceived by others.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Fools include those liars and frauds who think that if they throw into the collection basket one small coin from their plunder, then all their sins will be expunged, and all their acts of perjury, deception, dishonesty, and betrayal will be paid off like a mortgage.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Fools also include those philosophers who know nothing at all but claim to know everything.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Fools also include those theologians who brand anyone who disagrees with them a heretic. They claim to be able to explain sacred mysteries, such as by what channels original sin is transmitted to Adam's descendants, and for how long Christ was fully formed in the Virgin's womb.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> They claim to know whether God could have taken on the nature of a cucumber, and whether that cucumber could have preached, performed miracles, and been nailed to the cross.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> Among all the competing schools of theology, including the Realists, Nominalists, Thomists, Albertists, Occamists, and Scotists, there's so much academic subtlety and dialectical precision regarding such matters as the difference between Christ's body as it is in heaven, as it was on the cross, and as it is in the eucharist that the apostles themselves would have been hard pressed to match wits with such theologians.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Fools also include those hypocrites who make a great show of their devotion and piety, and those scholars who, when preaching, make a great show of their learning by bringing forth their syllogisms, premises, conclusions, corollaries, hypotheses, and utterly pedantic concerns about matters that are trivial and irrelevant.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Fools also include those in the hierarchy of the church who, rather than teaching holy scripture, make frequent use of interdicts, suspensions, formal warnings, and excommunications. They interpret the patrimony of St. Peter as if it were merely fields, towns, taxes, and dominions to be defended by fire and sword.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>14</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Indeed, says Folly, Christianity has more of an affinity with folly than with wisdom. Who else but fools would give away all their belongings, ignore injuries received from others, allow themselves to be deceived, make no distinction between friend and enemy, find satisfaction in fasts and vigils, and desire self-sacrifice above anything else?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">FOOTNOTES</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Desiderius Erasmus, <i>The Praise of Folly</i>, translated by Clarence H. Miller (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1979), pp. 29-30.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 13.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., pp. 36-37.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 38.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 38.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., pp. 41-42.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 55.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 65.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 86.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 88.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 89.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., pp. 90-91.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 105.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>14</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., pp. 112-113.</span></div></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-85491615057466703272023-06-13T14:58:00.009-07:002023-07-28T10:08:34.817-07:00Susan Haack's Evidence and Inquiry<span style="font-family: arial;">Susan Haack is a British philosopher who was born in 1945 in Burnham, England. (She is a citizen of the United Kingdom, but has been a permanent U.S. resident since 1990). She studied at the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge, earning her PhD in philosophy at Cambridge in 1972, with a dissertation that later became her first book, <i>Deviant Logic</i>. She served as Fellow of New Hall, Cambridge, and later as Professor of Philosophy at the University of Warwick. Since 1990, she has been a professor of philosophy at the University of Miami, where she is currently Distinguished Professor in the Humanities, Cooper Senior Scholar in Arts and Sciences, Professor of Philosophy, and Professor of Law. </span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span> She has written on many subjects, including philosophy of logic, epistemology, metaphysics, philosophy of science, philosophical and legal pragmatism, feminism, and social philosophy.</span></span><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Her many books have included <i>Deviant Logic</i> (1974), <i>Philosophy of Logics</i> (1978), <i>Evidence and Inquiry</i> (1993), <i>Defending Science--Within Reason: Between Scientism and Cynicism</i> (2003), <i>Pragmatism, Old and New</i> (2006), <i>Putting Philosophy to Work: Inquiry and its Place in Culture</i> (2008), and <i>Evidence Matters: Science, Proof and Truth in the Law</i> (2014).</span></div></div></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span> In <i>Evidence and Inquiry</i> (1993), she offers a theory of epistemic justification that is neither foundationalist nor coherentist, but "foundherentist." She seeks to transcend what she calls the false dichotomies of foundationalism vs. coherentism, externalism vs, internalism, evidentialism vs. reliabilism, and apriorism vs. scientism.</span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> She also aims to show that satisfaction of foundherentist criteria is an indication of the truth of beliefs.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> She uses the analogy of a crossword puzzle to describe the true structure of relations of evidential support, and to indicate that beliefs can mutually support one another without being logically circular.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> Below is a brief outline of the first chapter.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Haack describes foundationalism as the theory that (1) some justified beliefs are basic (justified independently of the support of other beliefs), and (2) all other justified beliefs are derived (justified via the direct or indirect support of basic beliefs).<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span> Coherentism is the theory that a belief is justified if and only if it belongs to a coherent set of beliefs.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span> Foundationalism is a one-directional model of justification (basic beliefs are required to support derived beliefs, and never vice versa), while coherentism is not. Coherentism holds that justification is exclusively a matter of relations, while foundationalism does not.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Varieties of foundationalism include experientialist (or empirical) foundationalism, which holds that basic beliefs are justified, not by being supported by other beliefs, but by being supported by experience. The extrinsic version of empirical foundationalism holds that basic beliefs are justified by being causally connected to the state of affairs that makes them true, while the intrinsic version holds that basic beliefs are justified by their intrinsic nature and content.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Strong foundationalism, which holds that basic beliefs are decisively, conclusively, or completely justified, independently of the support of other beliefs, may be distinguished from weak foundationalism, which holds that basic beliefs are only prima facie, defeasibly, or to some degree justified, independently of the support of other beliefs.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Pure foundationalism, which holds that derived beliefs are justified wholly via the support of basic beliefs, may also be distinguished from impure foundationalism, which holds that derived beliefs are justified at least in part via the support of basic beliefs.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Haack notes that contextualism (which she describes as the theory that justification is a matter of conformity to the standards of an epistemic community) may be a third alternative theory of epistemic justification. Contextualism, like foundationalism, may posit certain basic beliefs by which all other justified beliefs are supported, but rather than seeing those beliefs as being supported in some other way than via the support of other beliefs, it may see them as not standing in need of justification at all for the epistemic community in question.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span> A weakness of contextualism, however, is that it may lead to the impression that epistemic standards are merely conventional rather than objective, which may undermine the legitimacy of the project of ratifying certain beliefs as justified.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Haack describes and evaluates some of the arguments for and against foundationalism and coherentism. According to the <b>infinite regress argument </b>for foundationalism, a belief can't be justified if it requires support via other beliefs, which then require support via other beliefs, which then require support via other beliefs, in an infinite regression. Some beliefs must be justified, independently of the support of other beliefs. But she contends that this argument makes the false assumption that the reasons for a belief must constitute a chain, rather than a pyramid or some other supporting structure.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Another argument against extrinsic foundationalism is the <b>evidentialist objection</b>, that this theory of justification seems to claim that a basic belief is justified if there's an appropriate connection between a belief-state and a state of affairs that makes it true, even when the subject has no other evidence for the belief or has evidence against it.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> An argument against coherentism is the <b>too much to ask objection</b>, that consistency is assumed to be a necessary condition of coherence, and that a subject who has inconsistent beliefs can't therefore be justified in any of their beliefs (which makes consistency seem like too demanding a requirement).</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Another argument against coherentism, however, is the <b>consistent fairy story objection</b>, which says, not that consistency is too strong a requirement for epistemic justification, but that it's too weak.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>14</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Still another argument against coherentism is what Haack calls the <b>drunken sailors argument</b>, which takes its name from an observation by C.I. Lewis that the coherentist claim that empirical beliefs can be justified by nothing other than relations of mutual support is like suggesting that two drunken sailors can support each other by leaning against each other, even when they have nothing to stand on.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>15</sup></span></span></span> According to the drunken sailors argument, justification can't depend solely on relations between beliefs, and unless there's some role for empirical testing of our beliefs, we can't have any guarantee that our beliefs are justified.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Haack describes foundherentism as the theory that (1) "a subject's experience is relevant to the justification of their beliefs, but there need be no privileged class of beliefs justified exclusively by the support of experience, independently of the support of other beliefs," and (2) "justification is not exclusively one-directional, but involves pervasive relations of mutual support."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span> Since beliefs are seen to be justified partly by experience and partly by other beliefs, justification is gradational rather than categorical.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>16</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> Foundherentism may therefore be a middle ground between foundationalism and coherentism.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Haack explains that foundherentism survives the decisive argument against coherentism, the drunken sailors argument. It also survives the evidentialist objection to extrinsic foundationalism, and "its superiority to even weak and impure forms of experientialist foundationalism is exhibited by its ability, and their inability, to accommodate the <b>up and back all the way down arguments</b>" for abandoning the one-directionality of justification. So foundherentism survives the strongest arguments against both foundationalism and coherentism.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>17</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">FOOTNOTES</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Susan Haack, "Not One of the Boys: Memoir of an Academic Misfit," <i>Against Professional Philosophy</i>, August 3, 2020, online at https://againstprofphil.org/2020/08/03/susan-haacks-not-one-of-the-boys-memoir-of-an-academic-misfit/.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Haack, <i>Evidence and Inquiry: Towards Reconstruction in Epistemology</i> (Oxford: Blackwell, 1993), p. 7.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 2.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 14.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 17.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 19.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 15.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 16.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 17.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 20.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 20.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 28.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 25.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>14</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 26.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>15</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 19.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>16</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 20.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>17</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 33.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-65746675027439522552023-06-05T10:01:00.004-07:002023-06-10T11:04:33.216-07:00Baltimore 10 Miler, 2023<div>The Baltimore 10 Miler was held June 3rd, 2023. The start and finish were at Druid Hill Park, near the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore. The weather was perfect, 68 degrees at 7 am. But the temperature quickly climbed to 75 degrees by 9 am. Fortunately, there were plenty of water stations along the course, and the sun was behind us during the second half of the race, since we were running west back toward the park.</div><div> The course was the same as in previous years, with the exception that, since there was a construction project at Lake Montebello, runners went halfway around the lake before making a U-turn and coming back along the bike lane to the entrance of the lake (and then back down 33rd Street). </div><div> I've been battling various leg injuries over the last two years, so I wasn't sure whether I'd be able to run. I even thought of calling it quits as I was trying to get warmed up at 4 or 5 am that morning. Leg stiffness has become a real problem as I get older, leading to greater susceptibility to muscle strains and other injuries.</div><div> This year's overall winners were Jeremy Ardanuy, in the men's division, who had a time of 54:05, and Meaghan Murray, in the women's division, who had a time of 1:02. Jeremy Ardanuy was also the men's winner in 2019 and 2021. Meaghan Murray was the second place finisher in 2022, and third place finisher in 2021.</div><div> I finished with a time of 1:52, 8th out of 19 men in my age group (1476th out of 2285 runners overall). Two of the eleven women in my age group had faster times. (The first place women's finisher had a time of 1:42, and she finished faster than all but three of the nineteen men. The first place men's finisher in my age group had a time of 1:27.) I was very happy with my time!</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_vVthOYL6iKS9cqe49uLNFLr90TPtCpJI6725frzGcFRjP5hJzPK9VJ4Z4-fMqoK9-nyrDTCku3V6BHTq3NOP0KUsZXMTA2P4AgNYsB_9kcr4YAHqiXW48ljUxle8RAVJRXPuLFCG9lAI5ExtgjBqn20tDY_MliRzIzHlAfstH92Urm74DGkfORW4/s4512/RacePhoto2023.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4512" data-original-width="3008" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_vVthOYL6iKS9cqe49uLNFLr90TPtCpJI6725frzGcFRjP5hJzPK9VJ4Z4-fMqoK9-nyrDTCku3V6BHTq3NOP0KUsZXMTA2P4AgNYsB_9kcr4YAHqiXW48ljUxle8RAVJRXPuLFCG9lAI5ExtgjBqn20tDY_MliRzIzHlAfstH92Urm74DGkfORW4/s320/RacePhoto2023.jpg" width="213" /></a></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-27620392405461786632023-05-18T14:13:00.003-07:002023-05-22T09:21:26.335-07:00Baseball Card Aesthetics<span style="font-family: arial;">Are baseball cards works of art? Are they aesthetic objects or are they merely pieces of cardboard with images of baseball players on them, supporting a hobby that is shared by kids and adults alike, who enjoy trading, sharing, buying, and selling them? What makes (or would make) an object such as a baseball card a work of art? How is the experience of looking at a baseball card (or holding it in your hand) changed when you view it as a work of art?</span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Baseball cards may have many aesthetic qualities (such as beauty, symmetry, evenness of layout or configuration, vibrancy or clarity of color, captivating imagery or photography, emotional appeal, and evocative portrayals of grace, prowess, and power), and they may be designed according to aesthetic conventions (e.g. a baseball card company may have a different design for its cards each year). Baseball cards may elicit an aesthetic response in the viewer, and the viewer may adopt an aesthetic attitude toward them.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Clean edges, sharp corners, unflawed surfaces, centering of the image, and excellent condition are all aesthetically appealing qualities of baseball cards.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Sports cards can be graded by such companies as Professional Sports Authenticator (PSA), Sportscard Guaranty Corporation (SGC), Beckett Grading Service (BGC), and Certified Sports Guaranty (CSG). Cards are graded from 1-10, based on such factors as centering of the image, sharpness of the corners and edges, cleanness of the surface, and overall condition. Graded cards are encased in slabs (rigid plastic containers that protect them). The grade assigned to a card is based on both objective factors (such as centering, sharpness of focus of the image, sharpness of the corners and edges, and absence of such defects as faded colors, worn or rounded corners, surface wrinkles or creases, pen or pencil marks, stains, and general wear) and subjective factors (such as overall eye appeal).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Valuable sports cards may sell for millions of dollars (e.g. a 1909 T206 Honus Wagner card sold for $7.25 million in 2022, and a 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle card sold for $12.6 million in 2022), so their monetary value may be comparable to that of prized artworks.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Some of the most valuable baseball cards in history have included the 1909 T206 Honus Wagner, the 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle, the 1914 Baltimore News Babe Ruth (which sold for $6 million in 2021), the 1933 Goudey #53 Babe Ruth (which sold for $4.2 million in 2021), and a unique 2009 Bowman Chrome Mike Trout Superfractors rookie card (which sold for $3.8 million in 2020).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcTU1PBBH7XSyJd_1SDUHuw0AqWbjUS7x29stCWBdrP0xFmmJO3-BP1HLkQqgH2lKRfQcIeydyPNHueUpbPll9mMBqyQw48phIeWgQWpHhFnjutqjBmzBzHeMXoWc9iv7fCvAsIb1vrGfRu2OkVVgkYl8RaZpWsF1F_MU6ODYULTrjeOtz1TP9YzOb/s640/IMG_3025.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcTU1PBBH7XSyJd_1SDUHuw0AqWbjUS7x29stCWBdrP0xFmmJO3-BP1HLkQqgH2lKRfQcIeydyPNHueUpbPll9mMBqyQw48phIeWgQWpHhFnjutqjBmzBzHeMXoWc9iv7fCvAsIb1vrGfRu2OkVVgkYl8RaZpWsF1F_MU6ODYULTrjeOtz1TP9YzOb/s320/IMG_3025.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">1960 Topps Willie Mays All-Star Card.</td></tr></tbody></table></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Baseball card collections may be found in museums of fine art. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC has a collection of more than 30,000 baseball cards that were donated to the museum by Jefferson R. Burdick (1900-1963), an American electrician who collected baseball cards, trading cards, postcards, posters, and other printed ephemera. The collection includes cards dating from the 1860's to 1963, among them many 1888 Old Judge Cigarettes cards, including one of Buck Ewing, many 1909-1911 T206 cards, including one of Honus Wagner, many 1933 Goudey cards, including cards of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, many 1948 Leaf cards, including cards of Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Joe DiMaggio, Stan Musial, Warren Spahn, and Phil Rizzuto, and many 1950 Bowman cards, including cards of Jackie Robinson, Yogi Berra, and Ted Williams.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKV5jZsvJJu-w6pCbchti8kSmkI2QEP7J-T2SC_bdnms0YwKbO-tGeDTSW1HG2MBFGagWAmC7pAOPDGSENlXytyqjPzUZV_UfqsNM21-AI85RuOjqnAJ_7iC9il9ksDpXZlfeareuseFy4BPMUXO3_AsW27eRJmGp5FW_2OydV4h_NidSRqcrcFFnB/s640/IMG_3036.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKV5jZsvJJu-w6pCbchti8kSmkI2QEP7J-T2SC_bdnms0YwKbO-tGeDTSW1HG2MBFGagWAmC7pAOPDGSENlXytyqjPzUZV_UfqsNM21-AI85RuOjqnAJ_7iC9il9ksDpXZlfeareuseFy4BPMUXO3_AsW27eRJmGp5FW_2OydV4h_NidSRqcrcFFnB/s320/IMG_3036.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">2002 Fleer Tradition #4 Brad Radke</td></tr></tbody></table></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQpQCx06xIBylkcxt3EPgxTMqS4zCnXQOVFBID2gI-xiVNTrGr2VPciyRqIlnciB-GBvudJoO77SdbmAxQeipAaIWU59TpMk7Y1GAtGdkutt3hezM_Ldlew4eCkSXZFvLrk5M17U-l0hemtZukCUMiEjHHDQCP8Cspg1ZOZq4fAjOZmkIvMP1KITqa/s640/IMG_3038.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQpQCx06xIBylkcxt3EPgxTMqS4zCnXQOVFBID2gI-xiVNTrGr2VPciyRqIlnciB-GBvudJoO77SdbmAxQeipAaIWU59TpMk7Y1GAtGdkutt3hezM_Ldlew4eCkSXZFvLrk5M17U-l0hemtZukCUMiEjHHDQCP8Cspg1ZOZq4fAjOZmkIvMP1KITqa/s320/IMG_3038.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">2001 Topps #665 Nomar Garciaparra</td></tr></tbody></table></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Baseball cards have design features that may be aesthetically appealing and distinctive. If they are particularly attractive or distinctive, then they may elicit the same kind of response in the viewer that a work of fine art may elicit. Although a baseball card may not be unique in the sense that a painting or sculpture may be unique (since there may be hundreds or thousands of copies of a single baseball card in circulation among buyers, sellers, and collectors), baseball cards may be considered as examples of mass art (they are mass-produced and mass-distributed). Does that make them kitsch (tacky, lowbrow, trivial, banal, or lacking in aesthetic value)? Not at all! They are certainly not lacking in aesthetic or monetary value for collectors and investors who may pay thousands of dollars for them and may seek the most perfect, highest graded, and most pristine cards they can find!</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> On the other hand, maybe baseball cards <i>are</i> a little bit kitsch! They may often be found at flea markets, sidewalk sales, antique shops, and shopping malls. They may be handed down as family heirlooms or serendipitously discovered among other forgotten items in closets and attics.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Although baseball cards are mass-produced and mass-distributed, there are an increasing number of one-of-a-kind cards. Major League Baseball (MLB) has partnered with Fanatics Collectibles, with the Major League Baseball Players Association (MLBPA), and with The Topps Company to create one-of-a-kind cards for rookies making their debuts. (Fanatics acquired the rights to make trading cards for MLB in 2021, ending MLB's 70-year partnership with Topps. Topps began producing baseball cards in 1951, and since 2010 has had an exclusive deal with MLB that will end in 2025. Fanatics also acquired Topps in 2022.)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> There is a fascinating variety of types and designs of baseball cards, from the 1909-1911 T206 tobacco cards (Piedmont, Sweet Caporal, American Beauty), to the 1915 Cracker Jack cards, to the 1922 American Caramel cards, to the 1933 Goudey gum cards, to the 1934 Gold Medal Flour cards, to the 1936 Wheaties cards, to the 1952 Topps gum cards, and so on. Indeed, there may be thousands of different types and designs of baseball cards.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> If baseball cards are artworks, then what's the difference between them and memorabilia? Vintage cards may be valuable not only for their aesthetic qualities, but also for their historical interest (when they are rare or are memorable because they belong to highly admired sets or represent highly admired players). Thus, they may be considered as both artworks and memorabilia.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Other items of baseball memorabilia include autographed baseballs, autographed bats and jerseys, autographed batting helmets, and autographed photos.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Autographs may have their own aesthetics. Ideally, they should be legible and clear, not smudged or blurry, and they should be written over a lighter part of the background so that they are easily distinguishable. Also, they shouldn't cover up a significant portion of the card or obscure the player's face or upper body. They should be written in blue or black ink (blue sharpie is usually the preferred autograph pen) so that they align with or contrast nicely with the other colors in the background.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSfo_GM64cxjaBAK7VFbB_3V9i_08Dw3HQ3ZlzGtclK2GI4ZbP8HFC1IjiilDp4JGgCVXBXmTkjzLV-Er2mJTfWybf3uuJiWeZ15tlapDttgNUFDjoJpWm2x9I5PvWhebz5Qa_UsEYib6cmw8p584PMTVH6xgpjkWvV15jeJfYxCE6AXDqd8DDEKXF/s640/IMG_3028.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSfo_GM64cxjaBAK7VFbB_3V9i_08Dw3HQ3ZlzGtclK2GI4ZbP8HFC1IjiilDp4JGgCVXBXmTkjzLV-Er2mJTfWybf3uuJiWeZ15tlapDttgNUFDjoJpWm2x9I5PvWhebz5Qa_UsEYib6cmw8p584PMTVH6xgpjkWvV15jeJfYxCE6AXDqd8DDEKXF/s320/IMG_3028.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Autographed 1988 Donruss Eddie Murray, PSA certified.</td></tr></tbody></table></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> I'm a relatively new baseball card collector. I collected cards when I was seven or eight years old, using my allowance to buy Topps baseball cards at the local five and dime store, when I was growing up in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago, but my cards got lost, and I didn't start collecting again until early 2020 (at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic), when I was living in Baltimore. Since then, I've been collecting mostly vintage cards, signed photo postcards, and autographed photos, although I'm not sure exactly how many I've accumulated.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Below is one of my favorite cards. It's an example of why I think baseball cards may be considered works of art.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyjs8ZXN3PsSAw-kkeuQ5ILhyKkUqrS8wa_8kYDKWsHXgi2RD8zwmkLYd63lDmir_8Mm7Nm1iEEznzrfGUOOQXY3lkQelfwETwS1yNqcmu4SffQwl9-SsbzrKS_qXHRd3m8Cey9EQBlAEL9XnZ6TYwl8zUXxCHe9bWaxlJMlTukNShpgdCD-dOd8Lq/s640/IMG_3017.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyjs8ZXN3PsSAw-kkeuQ5ILhyKkUqrS8wa_8kYDKWsHXgi2RD8zwmkLYd63lDmir_8Mm7Nm1iEEznzrfGUOOQXY3lkQelfwETwS1yNqcmu4SffQwl9-SsbzrKS_qXHRd3m8Cey9EQBlAEL9XnZ6TYwl8zUXxCHe9bWaxlJMlTukNShpgdCD-dOd8Lq/s320/IMG_3017.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Autographed Brace photo postcard of Joe DiMaggio, PSA certified.</td></tr></tbody></table></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Joe DiMaggio was a Hall of Fame center fielder who played for the New York Yankees. He played thirteen seasons, from 1936-1951 (he served in the U.S. Army Air Forces from 1943-1945). He had a .325 career batting average, 2214 hits, and 361 home runs. He was a thirteen-time All Star, nine-time World Series champion, three-time American League MVP, two-time American League batting champion, and he still holds the record for baseball's longest hitting streak (56 straight games in 1941). His brothers Vince and Dom were also major league center fielders.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> George Brace (1913-2002) worked as an assistant to the photographer George Burke (1874-1951). They were the official photographers for the Chicago Cubs, the Chicago White Sox, and the National Football League's Chicago Bears from 1929 to 1951. After Burke's death in 1951, Brace continued working as a photographer until he retired in 1994. He was a superb craftsman, and he photographed almost every major league player from 1929 to 1994 (over 250,000 images), including over 200 Hall of Fame players.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> This particular autographed Brace photo of Joe DiMaggio is remarkable for its composition, and for what it reveals about the grace, ease, and power of DiMaggio's swing. It's remarkably beautiful and breathtaking.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> So my answer to the question of whether baseball cards are works of art is that yes, they can be very original, imaginative, attractive, appealing, valuable, and in some cases very rare or unique works of art.</span></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-46846403670190863792023-05-17T11:02:00.000-07:002023-05-17T11:02:15.363-07:00Becoming Beloved Community<span style="font-family: arial;">The following is a reflection I shared with my fellow parishioners at the "Faith at Eight" service at church, on Sunday, January 17, 2021.</span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">The gospel readings from this week and last week describe the beginning of Jesus's ministry. The reading last week from Mark (1:4-11) describes the baptism of Jesus, and the reading this week from John (1:43-51) describes Jesus's calling his disciples to follow him.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> So what exactly was the purpose of Jesus's ministry? What was his mission? Why did he come to us? Why did he offer himself as a sacrifice for us?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Each of us may have our own answers to these questions. Some possible answers include:</span></div><div><b style="font-family: arial;"> </b><span style="font-family: arial;">(1)</span><b style="font-family: arial;"> </b><span style="font-family: arial;">Jesus came to fulfill the law</span><span style="font-family: arial;">. In Matthew 5:17, Jesus says, "Think not that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfill them."</span></div><div><b style="font-family: arial;"> </b><span style="font-family: arial;">(2)</span><b style="font-family: arial;"> </b><span style="font-family: arial;">Jesus came to do God's will</span><span style="font-family: arial;">. In John 6:38-40, Jesus says, "For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me...For my Father's will is that everyone who looks at the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (3) Jesus came to bring light into the world. In John 12:46, Jesus says "I have come as light into the world, that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (4) Jesus came to sacrifice himself for us, so that we might be saved from sin. John 3:17 says, "For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> There are of course many other possible answers to the question of what was the nature or purpose of Jesus's ministry. But what is the nature or purpose of our own ministry as followers of Jesus? What is our mission? We each have our own mission or purpose, our reason for being in the world. We each have a purpose to fulfill, individually as well as collectively. What then is that purpose or mission? Perhaps our purpose is to make the world a better place? Perhaps our purpose is to love and care for one another? Perhaps our purpose is simply to be the best people we can be, and thus to glorify God?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> I'd like to explore these questions in the context of the life and ministry of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., since we're celebrating his birthday tomorrow. What did Dr. King see as his lifelong mission or purpose? What did he mean when he talked about the redemptive power of love and the creation of a beloved community?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> I learned a few things about Dr. King yesterday when I was reading about his life and career as a minister and civil rights leader. He was born January 15, 1929, in Atlanta, and he died April 4, 1968 in Memphis. He was born Michael King Jr., the second of three children, to the Rev. Michael King Sr. and Alberta King. In 1934, the Rev. King Sr. traveled to the Middle East and Berlin, Germany for a meeting of the World Baptist Alliance, and when he returned, he began referring to himself as Martin Luther King Sr., and to his son as Martin Luther King Jr. The Rev. King Sr. later explained that the reason he changed his name was because he had an uncle named Martin and an uncle named Luther, but it's said to be likely that his visit to Germany had an impact on him, and that he was moved by having visited the country that was the birthplace of Lutheranism and Protestantism.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> MLK Jr.'s birth certificate was later changed to read "Martin Luther King Jr." in 1957, when he was 28 years old.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> His maternal grandfather, Adam Daniel Williams, served as pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, but after his death, Rev. King Sr., became pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> MLK Jr. studied at Morehouse College, at Crozer Theological Seminary in Upland, Pennsylvania, and then at Boston University, where he earned a PhD in theology in 1955. He became pastor of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama in 1954, and he became co-pastor with his father of Ebenezer Baptist Church in 1959. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> His father died in 1984. His mother, Alberta, was murdered by a 23-year-old man in 1974 at the Ebenezer Baptist Church during Sunday services. The man stood up, and yelled "You are serving a false god," and fatally shot Mrs. King and the Rev. Edward Boykin, who was a deacon at the church. The gunman, Marcus Wayne Chenault, later died in prison of a stroke in 1995.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> In 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a sermon entitled "The Birth of a New Nation" at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. In it, he said that the aftermath of violence is emptiness and bitterness, but the aftermath of nonviolence is reconciliation, redemption, and the creation of a beloved community.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The phrase "beloved community" came from the American philosopher Josiah Royce (1855-1916), who taught at Harvard University from 1882-1916. Royce wrote on such subjects as metaphysics, ethics, and the philosophy of religion, and he was a friend and colleague of the philosopher William James (1842-1910), who also taught at Harvard.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> While Dr. King was studying at Boston University, he attended philosophy classes at Harvard and became familiar with Royce's philosophy.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Royce described the beloved community as an ethical ideal, insofar as its realization can be taken as a standard of our moral conduct. Royce said, "Every proposed reform, every moral deed, is to be tested by whether and to what extent it contributes to the realization of the Beloved Community...When one cannot find the beloved community, one needs to take steps to create it, and if there is not evidence of the existence of such a community, then the rule is to act so as to hasten its coming."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Dr. King, although he didn't specifically define what a beloved community is, saw the creation of such a community as a goal of the civil rights movement.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The Episcopal Church has promoted Dr. King's vision of the beloved community, and in a document entitled "Becoming Beloved Community" (published in 2017), which can be found at the </span><span style="font-family: arial;">episcopalchurch.org website, it describes what such a commitment might mean for us. The document displays an image of a circular labyrinth, with four interrelated commitments listed along the circumference of the labyrinth. At the top left is "Telling the Truth." At the top right is "Proclaiming the Dream." At the bottom right is "Practicing the Way," and at the bottom left is "Repairing the Breach." So a kind of cyclical process is described.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> <b>The first commitment</b>, to tell the truth, leads to such questions as "Who are we?" and "What things have we done and left undone regarding racial justice and healing?" <b>The second commitment</b>, to proclaim the dream, leads to such questions as "How can we publicly acknowledge things done and left undone?", "What does beloved community look like?", and "What actions and commitments will promote reconciliation, justice, and healing?" <b>The third commitment</b>, to practice the way of love, leads to such questions as "How will we grow as reconcilers, healers, and justice-bearers?" and "How will we actively grow in relationship across dividing walls and seek Christ in the other?" And <b>the fourth commitment</b>, to repair the breach, leads to such questions as "What institutions and systems are broken?" and "How will we participate in repair, restoration, and healing of people, institutions, and systems?"</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The document explains that the image of the labyrinth is chosen because there's no single path for each person to follow. People may draw on their own experiences, and they may arrive at different answers for the same questions.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The document also explains that becoming beloved community represents "not so much a set of programs as a journey and a set of interrelated commitments around which Episcopalians may organize our many efforts to respond to racial injustice and grow as a community of reconcilers, justice-makers, and healers. As the Episcopal branch of the Jesus movement, we dream and work to foster beloved communities where all people may experience dignity and abundant life and see themselves and others as beloved children of God."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> So what are our responsibilities regarding the fulfillment of Dr. King's vision of the beloved community? Is the beloved community merely a utopian ideal? Do we really need such ideal models of justice in order to remedy present injustice?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> What is the utility of "ideal" versus "non-ideal" theories of racial justice?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Charles W. Mills, professor of philosophy at The Graduate Center, CUNY, has argued that so-called "ideal theory" concerning justice in a perfectly just society must be replaced by "non-ideal theory" concerning justice in an imperfect and unjust society. Mills provides many persuasive criticisms of ideal theory, including the criticism that it may divert attention from real-world problems and that we don't necessarily need to be able to envision justice in an ideal world in order to be able to correct justice in the real world.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Tommie Shelby, professor of philosophy at Harvard University, on the other hand, has argued that ideal theory and non-ideal theory may be complementary, and that ideal theory, which studies the principles of justice in a perfectly just society, may provide standards of justice for non-ideal theory, which studies the principles that should guide our responses to injustice in our own society.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The website of The King Center explains that "For Dr. King, The Beloved Community was not a lofty utopian goal to be confused with the rapturous image of the Peaceable Kingdom, in which lions and lambs coexist in idyllic harmony. Rather, The Beloved Community was for him a realistic, achievable goal that could be attained by a critical mass of people committed to and trained in the philosophy and methods of nonviolence."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The website also explains that "Dr. King's Beloved Community is a global vision, in which all people can share in the wealth of the earth. In the Beloved Community, poverty, hunger, and homelessness will be not be tolerated because international standards of human decency will not allow it. Racism and all forms of discrimination, bigotry and prejudice will be replaced by an all-inclusive spirit of sisterhood and brotherhood. In the Beloved Community, international disputes will be resolved by peaceful conflict-resolution and reconciliation of adversaries, instead of by military power. Love and trust will triumph over fear and hatred. Peace with justice will prevail over war and military conflict."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> So what steps can we as individuals, as a community, and as a society take today and in the coming year to promote the becoming of a beloved community?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">FOOTNOTES</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">DeNeen L. Brown, "The story of how Michael King Jr. became Martin Luther King Jr.," <i>The Washington Post</i>, January 15, 2019, online at </span><span style="font-family: arial;">https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2019/01/15/story-how-michael-king-jr-became-martin-luther-king-jr/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Martin Luther King Jr., "The Birth of a New Nation," April 7, 1957, in <i>The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr.</i>, Volume IV, edited by Clayborne Carson, et al., (Berkeley: University of California Press at Berkeley and Los Angeles, 2000), online at https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/king-papers/documents/birth-new-nation-sermon-delivered-dexter-avenue-baptist-church</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Josiah Royce, online at Building the Beloved Community: An Interfaith Initiative for Fair Housing, https://www.bbcfairhousing.org/about-the-initiative/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">The Episcopal Church, "Becoming Beloved Community," 2017, online at https://www.episcopalchurch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2021/01/becoming_beloved_community_summary.pdf</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Charles W. Mills, "Realizing (Though Racializing) Pogge," in <i>Thomas Pogge and His Critics</i>, edited by Alison M. Jaggar (Cambridge, Polity Press, 2010), p. 102.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Tommie Shelby, "Racial Realities and Corrective Justice: A Reply to Charles Mills," in <i>Critical Philosophy of Race</i>, Vol. 1, No. 2, 2013, pp. 155-156.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">The King Center, "The King Philosophy - Nonviolence 365," online at https://thekingcenter.org/about-tkc/the-king-philosophy/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>.</span></div><div><span face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif" style="background-color: #eeeeee; font-size: 13.2px;"><br /></span></div><div><div><br /></div></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-58900856308107970442023-04-27T13:03:00.011-07:002023-04-27T15:27:44.628-07:00Nicholas Rescher's Inquiry into the Limits of Knowledge<span style="font-family: arial;">What are the theoretical and practical limits of human knowledge? What are the reasons for our inability to know certain facts about the world? What distinguishes knowable from unknowable facts?</span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> How can we ever know whether the universe is finite or infinite? How can we ever know whether it had a beginning, and whether it will have an ending? How can we ever know how space, time, matter, and energy originated?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> How can we ever discover historical facts the evidence of which has been permanently lost?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> How can we ever really know what others are thinking and feeling? The thoughts and feelings of others are to some extent unknowable to us, in the sense that we can't think those thoughts exactly as they think them or feel those feelings exactly as they feel them. We can only say, "I know what you're thinking" or "I know what you're feeling" by means of deduction, inference, reasoning, intuition, imagination, or other means. To use a commonly cited example, we can't ever really know whether others experience the color red in the same way that we experience the color red.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Some facts (for example, the contents of a classified file or document) may be contingently (but not in principle) unknowable, because they're concealed or because public access to them is forbidden. Our personal data, such as our birthdates, computer passwords, social security numbers, etc., may be contingently unknowable to others, because we generally refuse to share such information with everyone. The details of our own bodies may be contingently unknowable to others, because they're hidden by our clothing.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> To say we know about something may not necessarily be to say that we know everything about it. We may have a relatively complete or incomplete knowledge about a certain thing. If we can't ever really know everything about it, then it may to some extent be unknowable to us, at least in its totality (given our limited cognitive resources).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Many facts may be unknowable yet trivial, and thus we may not really be interested in knowing them. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> If there are no facts about certain things, i.e. if there is "no fact of the matter" about them, then they may also be unknowable.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Nicholas Rescher (2009) explains that reasons for our not being able to know certain things include our not being smart enough to figure them out, and the unavailability of further data we would need to know about them. But we may also not be able to know about certain things because they are in principle unknowable, and this in-principle unknowability is what Rescher is concerned with, rather than unknowability due to our contingent cognitive limitations.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> He describes three kinds of necessary or demonstrable unknowability: (1) logical unknowability (which is demonstrable on the basis of the considerations of epistemic logic), (2) conceptual unknowability (which is demonstrable on the basis of the concepts involved), and (3) in-principle unknowability (which is demonstrable on the basis of the basic principles that delineate some field of inquiry or area of concern).</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> He also explains that some facts are unknowable because they depend on future contingencies. Thus, we can't know, at the present moment, precisely who will be killed in an automobile accident next year or whose life will be saved by the enactment of a certain automobile speed limit.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Some facts may also be unknowable because they're unidentifiable. Examples include claims about the existence of such unidentifiable entities as (1) something whose identity will never be known, (2) some idea that has never occurred to anyone, (3) some person whom no one remembers at all, (4) some event that no one has ever mentioned, and (5) some integer that is never individually specified.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Clearly, we may know some facts without being consciously aware that we know them. So every known fact may not be immediately identifiable. We may also be able to individuate some unknowable facts without being able to identify them or say precisely what they are. But we can't know facts that can never be specifically instantiated.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Rescher also notes that if some facts are unknowable, then we can't rightly be held to be culpably ignorant of them.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> What distinguishes answerable from unanswerable questions? Rescher argues that all scientific questions are potentially answerable (if not at present, then in the future). Even such ultimate questions as "Why is there anything rather than nothing?" and "Why are there any natural laws?" are potentially answerable. The presence of scientific questions that haven't yet been answered doesn't necessarily mean those questions can never be answered or will always remain unanswered. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Thus, he rejects the existence of insolubilia (inherently unsolvable scientific problems or inherently unanswerable scientific questions), because of the unpredictability of future scientific developments.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> He argues that we can't predict with certainty what will be the future limits of scientific knowledge.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> He also describes four main reasons for the unknowability of, or impracticability of cognitive access to, certain facts about the world: (1) developmental unpredictability (the inability to predict with certainty what will happen in the future and what will be discovered by future science), (2) verificational surdity (the inability to explain facts on the basis of general principles or to derive them from the definitions and laws of their natural domain), (3) ontological detail (the inability to know all the facts about certain things, due to their factual limitlessness and inexhaustibility), and (4) predicative vagrancy (the inability to instantiate any predicates about things that are unspecificable).</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span></div><div> He<span style="font-family: arial;"> also discusses the formal logic of unknowability, including such topics as the problem of demonstrating the existence of unknowable truths. This problem has been investigated by many philosophers, including Frederic Fitch, W.D. Hart, J.J. MacIntosh, Richard Routley, Timothy Williamson, Rescher, and others.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Timothy Williamson (2000) refers to an argument by Frederic Fitch (1963) called the Paradox of Unknowability, which says that if something is an unknown (but perhaps knowable) truth, then its being an unknown truth is itself an unknowable truth.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> An unknown truth cannot be known to be unknown.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Williamson describes strong verificationism as the theory that every truth is actually known (at some point in the past, present, or future), and weak verificationism as the theory that every truth is in principle knowable. The former is called the "omniscience principle," while the latter is called the "knowability thesis." Fitch's paradox is an argument against both kinds of verificationism.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Williamson explains that</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"></span><blockquote><span style="font-family: arial;">"As Joseph Melia (1991) points out, [Fitch's argument] does not show that if there are unanswered questions, then there are unanswerable questions. More precisely, it does not show that if for some proposition <i>p</i>, it is unknown whether <i>p</i> is true, then...it is unknowable whether <i>p</i> is true. In particular, if <i>p</i> is an unknown truth, then it is unknowable <i>that</i> <i>p</i> is an unknown truth, but it does not follow that it is unknowable <i>whether</i> <i>p</i> is an unknown truth. For that it is an unknowable truth that <i>p</i> is an unknown truth does not imply the... impossibility of a situation in which <i>p</i> is false and even known to be false, and thereby known not to be an unknown truth. Equally, ...it...does not imply the...impossibility of a situation in which <i>p</i> is shown to be true, and even known to be known to be true, and thereby known not to be an unknown truth. In situations of both kinds, it is known whether <i>p</i> is an unknown truth."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span></blockquote><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup></sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Verificationism is anti-realist in the sense that it holds that every truth (or fact) is in principle knowable and thus</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> accessible to human thought, while a realist position would hold that at least some truths (or facts) are actually unknowable and exist independently of human thought.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Helge Rückert (2004) explains that Fitch's paradox may be derived as follows:</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (1) </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α </span><span style="font-family: arial;">→ </span><span style="font-family: arial;">♢K</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α (which may be read as, "if there is a truth </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;">, then it's possible for it to be known</span><span style="font-family: arial;">")</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (2) </span><span style="font-family: arial;">ロ</span><span style="font-family: arial;">(Kα </span><span style="font-family: arial;">→ </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α) (necessarily, if a truth </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> is known, then it's a truth </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;">) </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (3) </span><span style="font-family: arial;">ロ(K(</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α </span><span style="font-family: arial;">⋀ </span><span style="font-family: arial;">β) </span><span style="font-family: arial;">→ (K</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α </span><span style="font-family: arial;">⋀ K</span><span style="font-family: arial;">β)) (necessarily, if a truth </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α </span><span style="font-family: arial;">and a truth </span><span style="font-family: arial;">β</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> are known, then </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> is known and </span><span style="font-family: arial;">β</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> is known)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (4) </span><span style="font-family: arial;">¬</span><span style="font-family: arial;">♢K(</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α </span><span style="font-family: arial;">⋀ </span><span style="font-family: arial;">¬K</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α) (it's impossible for an </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> and an unknown </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α to be known</span><span style="font-family: arial;">)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (5) (</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α </span><span style="font-family: arial;">⋀ </span><span style="font-family: arial;">¬K</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α) </span><span style="font-family: arial;">→ </span><span style="font-family: arial;">♢K(</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α </span><span style="font-family: arial;">⋀ </span><span style="font-family: arial;">¬K</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α) (if there is an </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> and an</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> un</span><span style="font-family: arial;">known </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;">, then it's possible for an </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> and an unknown </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α to be known</span><span style="font-family: arial;">)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (6) </span><span style="font-family: arial;">¬(</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α </span><span style="font-family: arial;">⋀ </span><span style="font-family: arial;">¬K</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α) (there can't be an </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> and an unknown </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;">)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> (7) </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α </span><span style="font-family: arial;">→ K</span><span style="font-family: arial;">α (if there is a truth </span><span style="font-family: arial;">α</span><span style="font-family: arial;">, then it's known)</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">So weak verificationism entails or "collapses into" strong verificationism. The relatively plausible thesis that every truth is in principle knowable collapses into the wholly implausible thesis that every truth is actually known. This is a significant problem for verificationism.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">FOOTNOTES</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Nicholas Rescher, <i>Unknowability: An Inquiry into the Limits of Knowledge</i> (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009), p. 3.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 3.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 65.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 6.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 16.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. ix.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span>Timothy Williamson, <i>Knowledge and its Limits</i> (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 270.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 289.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span>Helge </span><span style="font-family: arial;">Rückert, "A Solution to Fitch's Paradox of Knowability," in <i>Logic, Epistemology, and the Unity of Science</i>, edited by Shahid Rahman, John Symons. et al. (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2004), pp. 352-353.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">OTHER REFERENCES</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Frederic Fitch, "A Logical Analysis of Some Value Concepts," in <i>Journal of Symbolic Logic</i>, Vol. 28 (1963), pp. 135-142.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Joseph Melia, "Anti-Realism Untouched," in <i>Mind</i>, 100 (1991), pp. 341-342.</span></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-29048983034216585362023-04-19T07:58:00.001-07:002023-04-27T15:31:51.542-07:00Edith Stein, on Finite and Infinite Being<span style="font-family: arial;">Edith Stein (1891-1942) was a German Jewish philosopher who converted to Catholicism and became a Carmelite nun. She was born in Breslau, Germany (now Wroclaw, Poland), and died at Auschwitz. She studied at the University of Breslau, the University of Göttingen, and the University of Freiburg, where she completed her doctoral thesis on the phenomenology of empathy. She worked as an assistant to the philosopher Edmund Husserl at Freiburg from 1916-1918. After she read the autobiography of St. Teresa of Avila, she converted to Catholicism, and she was baptized into the Catholic Church in 1922. In 1933 she entered the Carmelite convent at Cologne, taking the religious name Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Teresia Benedicta a Cruce). In 1938, she and her sister Rosa, who had also converted, were transferred for their own safety to the Carmelite monastery in Echt, Netherlands, but after the Dutch bishops condemned Nazism in 1942, all baptized Catholics of Jewish ancestry were arrested. Edith and Rosa were sent to a concentration camp at Amersfoort, then to Westerbork, and then to Auschwitz, where they died in a gas chamber on August 9, 1942.</span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Stein's many writings included <i>Zum Problem der Einfühlung</i> (1917, <i>On the Problem of Empathy</i>, 1989), <i>Potenz und Akt</i>: <i>Studien zu einer Philosophie des Seins</i> (1931, <i>Potency and Act: Studies on a Philosophy of Being</i>, 2009), <i>Endliches und ewiges Sein</i> (1949, <i>Finite and Eternal Being</i>, 2002), <i>Kreuzeswissenschaft</i> (1942, <i>The Science of the Cross</i>, 2003), and <i>Wege der Gotteserkenntnis</i> (1940, <i>Ways to Know God</i>, 1993). She was beatified by the Catholic Church in 1987, and was canonized Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross in 1988.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> In <i>Finite and Eternal Being: An Attempt at an Ascent to the Meaning of Being</i>, Stein takes as her starting point the fact of our own being. She takes our own being as given, rather than as a conclusion (as suggested by Descartes' <i>cogito</i>). She asks, "What is that being of which I am conscious?" and "What is that self which is conscious of itself?"<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> She explains that Husserl calls the self that is immediately given in conscious experience the pure ego, and that the pure ego knows itself simultaneously as an actually present existent and as an actual existent that emerges from a past and lives into the future.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> She also explains that our own being is inseparable from temporality, while pure being has no temporality. Our own being is an actually present being, a "now" between a "no longer" and a "not yet." But in pure being, there isn't a "no longer" or "not yet." Pure being is eternal, and not temporal.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Our own present actual being contains within itself the possibility of future actual being and is thus both actual and potential. In this sense, our own being is always a becoming. The becoming actual of our future being is a transition from potentiality to actuality, and the transition from potential to actual being is a transition from one mode of being to another.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Stein thus accepts St. Thomas Aquinas's distinction between act and potency as modes of being. She argues that we must distinguish between active and passive potency, and that the potency belonging to God is active potency. In God, there is no unactivated potency. God's potency is completely actualized.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> She also accepts Aquinas's view of the "first existent" as pure being and pure act. In our own being, which is finite being, we encounter a kind of received being that is the support and ground of our being.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span> This ground and support of our being is a necessary being, of which there can only be one, just as there can only be one first existent. This necessary being is also perfect and eternally immutable being. Indeed, it is being itself. Thus, the distinction between finite and infinite being is also the distinction between the temporal and the eternal, between our own being and God's being. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Existents may be divided into various genera according to their quiddity (their natures or essences or whatnesses). Essential being is the being of natures or essences when they are considered apart from their actualization.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7 </sup></span></span></span>Essential being is also a timeless (or non-temporal) being-unfolded or being-unfolding of meaning. Ideal being is a special kind of essential being, and also a special kind of (non-temporal) unfolding of ideal objects. On the other hand, real being is "an unfolding that proceeds from an essential form, from potency toward act, and within time and space."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Just as a distinction may be made between potential and actual being, a distinction may be made between potential and actual existents. But the first existent (God) is also the first being, and God's existence cannot be separated from God's being. God's being is pure being, in which there is no non-being. In the infinite and eternal, being cannot be separated from existence, but in all finite things, being and existence are different from each other.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> In response to the question of whether any distinction can be made between God's essence and God's existence, Stein explains they are in fact an undivided unity, and thus they cannot be subjected to analytical articulation.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The first being (God) is also pure act, and in this being there is no passing from potentiality to actuality. Temporal being, on the other hand, is not pure act, and it may be a progressive actualization of unfulfilled potentialities.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">FOOTNOTES</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Edith Stein, <i>Finite and Eternal Being: An Attempt at an Ascent to the Meaning of Being</i>, translated by Kurt F. Reinhardt (Washington, D.C.: ICS Publications, 2002), p. 37. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 54</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 37.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 34.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 2.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 59.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 91.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 331.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 335.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 342.</span></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-21928457701408457122023-04-09T15:04:00.008-07:002023-04-27T15:35:36.170-07:00Problems for the Supposed Maximality of Possible Worlds<span style="font-family: arial;">Alvin Plantinga (1974) defines a possible world as a possible state of affairs that is maximal or complete. Every possible world is a possible state of affairs, he says, but not every possible state of affairs is a possible world. A state of affairs <i>S</i> is maximal or complete if (and only if) for every state of affairs <i>S'</i>, <i>S</i> either includes or precludes <i>S'</i>. The actual world we live in is one of these possible worlds; it's the maximal possible state of affairs that is actual.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span></span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The reason for defining possible worlds in terms of maximality or completeness is that not every possible state of affairs is complete enough to be considered a possible world. Plantinga gives as an example the proposition that "Socrates is snubnosed." A possible state of affairs must include or preclude more than that in order to be considered a possible world.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Similarly, Robert C. Koons and Timothy K. Pickavance (2017) define a possible world as a possibility that's maximal insofar as every proposition is either true or false according to it.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> They also describe concretism and abstractionism as two contrasting views about the nature of possible worlds. While concretism is the view that possible worlds are maximal possible concrete objects, abstractionism is the view that possible worlds are maximal possible abstract objects.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Dale Jacquette (2006) explains that if a logically possible world is taken to be a maximal consistent set of propositions, then it could (theoretically) be constructed by randomly choosing one logically possible proposition and then considering an exhaustive ordering of all other logically possible propositions, and adding each one to the given set if and only if it is logically consistent with the propositions already collected, until there are none left. The propositions in a maximally consistent set of propositions would therefore collectively represent every state of affairs associated with a corresponding logically possible world.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Another conclusion, however, might be that the actual world is the only maximally consistent set of propositions, and that all other logically possible but nonactual worlds are submaximally consistent.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> But what about propositions whose truth or falsehood is indeterminate or undecidable? In the actual world we live in, there are such undecidable propositions. Is the actual world then not a possible world? How then can maximality or completeness be considered a valid criterion for some possible state of affairs to be considered a possible world? Must a possible world be maximal in the sense that every proposition is <i>decidably</i> true or false according to it, and therefore also in the sense that for every proposition there is some rational procedure that can determine in a finite number of steps the truth or falsehood of that proposition according to it?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> These questions are motivated by Gödel's first incompleteness theorem, which says, roughly, that for any consistent system <i>S</i> of formal arithmetic in which (1) the set of axioms and the rules of inference are recursively definable, and (2) every recursive relation is definable, there are undecidable arithmetical propositions of the form xF(x), where F is a recursively defined property of natural numbers.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Thus, it seems that possible worlds can't be both complete and consistent, because the actual world isn't that way. For every possible proposition expressible within a nontrivial formal system of arithmetic to be provable or disprovable, that system has to be in some way inconsistent. All consistent nontrivial formal systems of arithmetic are deductively incomplete.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Of what use then is the concept of maximality or completeness as a means of better understanding the metaphysics of modality?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Patrick Grim (1991) presents an argument similar to the Liar Paradox as a refutation of the maximality of possible worlds. He explains that if possible worlds are taken to be or to correspond to maximal consistent sets or propositions, and if the actual world, on such an account, is taken to be or to correspond to the maximal set of all truths, then we can examine the proposition <i>A</i>: The proposition <i>A</i> is not a member of the maximal set <i>M</i> of all truths. Is <i>A</i> a member of set <i>M</i> or not? If it's a member, then it must not be, and if it's not a member, then it must be.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Tony Roy (2012) also presents an argument against the maximality of possible worlds, by employing Cantor's Theorem (that the set of all subsets of a given set has a greater cardinality than the set itself):</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> "Suppose that for any proposition <i>a</i>, some sentence expresses </span><i style="font-family: arial;">a</i><span style="font-family: arial;"> and some sentence expresses not-</span><i style="font-family: arial;">a</i><span style="font-family: arial;">...Then the supposition that worlds are maximal and so include one of <i>a</i> or not-<i>a</i> for every sentence is incoherent. Consider a world </span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;">, and the set P(</span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;">) which has as members all the subsets of </span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;">. By Cantor's Theorem, there are more sets of sentences in P(</span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;">) than sentences in </span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;">. Trouble.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> ...And this generates a problem about the maximality of </span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;">. Suppose </span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;"> is maximal; then given our assumption that there are sentences to express any proposition and its negation, for any A in P(</span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;">), </span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;"> includes one or the other of,</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span><span style="background-color: #eeeeee;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><i>a</i></span><sub style="color: #222222; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;">1</sub><sub style="color: #222222; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"> </sub></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Some member of A is true; and</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span><span style="background-color: #eeeeee;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><i>a</i></span><sub style="color: #222222; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;">2 </sub></span><span style="font-family: arial;">No member of A is true.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">So </span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;"> includes at least one sentence for each member of P(</span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;">); so there are not more members in P(</span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;">) than </span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;">. This is impossible; reject the assumption; </span><i style="font-family: arial;">w</i><span style="font-family: arial;"> is not maximal.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> So given a language with adequate expressive power, the very attempt to say everything about a world is self-defeating."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">FOOTNOTES</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Alvin Plantinga, <i>The Nature of Necessity</i> (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974), pp. 44-45.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Robert C. Koons and Timothy K. Pickavance, <i>The Atlas of Reality: A Comprehensive Guide to Metaphysics</i> (Chichester: John Wiley & Sons, 2017), p. 318.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 321.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="color: #2a2a2a;"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="ecxApple-style-span" style="color: black; line-height: normal;"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="ecxApple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; line-height: 17px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-style: normal;">Dale Jacquette, "Propositions, Sets, and Worlds," in </span><i>Studia Logica</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, Vol. 82, No. 3, April 2006, pp. 338-340.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Kurt </span><span style="font-family: arial;">Gödel, "On formally undecidable propositions of <i>Principia Mathematica</i> and related systems," </span><i style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: arial;"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">[</span><span class="ecxApple-style-span" style="color: black; line-height: normal;"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">Über formal unentscheidbare S</span><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">ätze der </span><span><span class="Apple-style-span">Principia Mathematica</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;"> und verwandter Systeme," 1931] in</span><span style="font-style: normal;"> </span><span class="ecxApple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; font-style: normal; line-height: 17px;"><i>Kurt Gödel Collected Works</i>, Volume I<span class="Apple-style-span">,</span><span class="Apple-style-span"> edited by Solomon Feferman, </span><span class="Apple-style-span">et al</span><span class="Apple-style-span">. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004) p. 181.</span></span></span></span></span></span></i></div><div><i style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: arial;"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="ecxApple-style-span" style="color: black; line-height: normal;"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="ecxApple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; line-height: 17px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-style: normal;">Patrick Grim, </span>The Incomplete Universe: Totality, Knowledge, and Truth<span style="font-style: normal;"> (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991), pp. 6-8.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></i></div><div><i style="color: #2a2a2a; font-family: arial;"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="ecxApple-style-span" style="color: black; line-height: normal;"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="ecxApple-style-span"><span class="ecxApple-style-span" style="color: #2a2a2a; line-height: 17px;"><span class="Apple-style-span"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span>Tony Roy, "Modality," in </span><span>The Continuum Companion to Metaphysics</span><span style="font-style: normal;">, edited by Neil A. Manson and Robert W. Barnard (London: Continuum, 2012), pp. 51-52.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></i></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-90159512028212288842023-03-23T09:06:00.006-07:002023-04-10T06:22:07.420-07:00Medical HermeneuticsMedical hermeneutics may include the interpretation of a variety of clinical data, such as a patient's medical history, family history, social history, present complaints, clinical symptoms, clinical signs, laboratory results, and radiological results. It may also include review of a patient's previous treatment, present medications, allergies, response to treatment, and compliance with treatment.<div> It may also include the interpretation of various sociocultural aspects of the clinical encounter, such as the patient's and provider's interpretation of their own roles in the patient-provider relationship. </div><div> The provider's interpretation of their role may include a conception of their professional duties and responsibilities, as well as the patient's rights and responsibilities, the standard of care for the given clinical problem, the best way to fulfill the standard of care, and the best way to address the patient's concerns and expectations. The patient's interpretation of their role may include an expectation to be informed of the nature of their medical condition, as well as an expectation to be informed of the planned diagnostic approach, the possible burdens and side-effects of treatment, and the best course of treatment.</div><div> Since a successful outcome of the clinical encounter depends on clear and effective communication, core competencies for clinicians include communicative competence, cultural competence, interpersonal skills, professionalism, medical knowledge, practice-based learning (including evidence-based care, and consideration of recent improvements in patient care), and systems-based practice (including accessing of healthcare system resources in order to provide the best possible care).<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span><br /><div> Medical interpretation may also be a means of communicating with patients, e.g. through a medical interpreter or translator when a patient speaks a foreign language that isn't understood by the healthcare provider or has some other difficulty communicating (for example, due to speech, hearing, or cognitive disability).</div><div> Correct interpretation of clinical findings may depend on consideration of epidemiological data such as risk factors for a given disease-process in a particular patient population.</div><div> Correct interpretation of laboratory test results may also depend on awareness of their sensitivity, specificity, and predictive accuracy for the disease-process in question in the given patient group, community, or population. It may also depend on awareness of the possible causes of false-positive and false-negative test results.</div><div> Radiological interpretation may include interpretation of radiological images and reports, combined with the ability to determine the diagnostic certainty of positive or negative findings, and the ability to determine an appropriate response to uncertain or indeterminate findings.</div><div> Narrative interpretation in medicine may include interpretation of patient narratives (oral, written, and behavioral) and narrative reports, as well as illness-related and historical narratives presented by medical records, office notes, and procedure notes.</div><div> Hermeneutics is traditionally defined as the art or science of interpretation. Friedrich Schleiermacher (1838) defined it as the art of correctly understanding the meaning of another person's utterance, and he contrasted it with criticism as the art of correctly determining the truth or falsity of another person's utterance.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Hans-Georg Gadamer (1975) explains that while traditional literary and theological hermeneutics attempted to be an art or science of interpretation, the hermeneutics he proposes is not a method of interpretation or understanding, but rather an attempt to describe the conditions under which interpretation and understanding are possible. A condition of understanding a text's meaning is that in order for understanding to occur, it must have a historical background. Our understanding of a text's meaning is always influenced by our own historical situation. A text to be interpreted always speaks to a situation that's conditioned by previous opinions and interpretations.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span> The interpretation of a text therefore requires us to be aware of our preconceptions about the text and of how they may contribute to our understanding (or misunderstanding) of it. The hermeneutical experience also requires us to recognize that the nature of our understanding may change over a period of time, and that our interpretations of textual meaning are always situated within an ongoing hermeneutical tradition, to which we contribute.</div><div> Paul Ricoeur (1981) defines hermeneutics as the theory of the operations of understanding in relation to the interpretation of texts,<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span> and he defines a text as any discourse fixed by writing.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span></div><div> However, as Gadamer showed, the meaning of texts is never fixed or unchanging, and it may depend on (social, cultural, and historical) context. The meaning of a text may be changed by the way in which we "read" or experience it. Our interpretation or understanding of a text may change each time we reread or reexperience it.</div><div> Wolfgang Iser (1978) argues that every text may have "gaps" or "blanks" or "places of indeterminacy" in its meaning that the reader must try to fill in, by questioning the text and by determining its "projected" meanings, in order to fulfill the task of interpretation. What <i>isn't</i> said by the text is relevant to what <i>is</i> said. The implications of a text may be a key to understanding its meaning. Thus, the "gaps" in the text may function as a hinge or pivot of the whole text-reader relationship.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Umberto Eco (1979) explains that the interpretation of a text depends on the sharing of a code between author and reader that assigns content to the various expressions the author uses in the text. A code is a set of rules that determines how the expression of signs is to be correlated to their content. Because texts often have to be interpreted against a background of codes that may differ from those intended by the author, a distinction can be made between an "open" text that can be interpreted in a variety of ways and a "closed" text that aims for a precise response from the reader.</div><div> Stephen L. Daniel (1986) proposes that the interpretation of medical signs, symptoms, and other clinical data may be analogous to the interpretation of a literary text and may therefore be described by a hermeneutical model of clinical decision-making. The patient is the primary text, while the secondary text is provided by the healthcare provider's documentation of the clinical encounter, including the case summary, diagnosis, treatment plan, and progress notes in the patient's record.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span> From a multiplicity of possible meanings of a patient's clinical signs and symptoms, the provider must determine the true meaning so that appropriate diagnostic modalities can be employed and appropriate treatment can be provided. The hermeneutical process may therefore proceed on four levels: (1) interpretation of the patient's history and physical findings, (2) interpretation of the diagnostic data, (3) clinical decision-making regarding treatment, and (4) change in both the patient's and provider's life-worlds (including the experience of healing for the patient) as a result of the clinical encounter.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Drew Leder (1990) explains that medical hermeneutics may include the interpretation of a variety of "texts." He accepts Daniel's definition of a text as any group of signs or set of elements that constitute a whole and that take on meaning through interpretation.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span> While the "person-as-ill" may be the primary text, there may also be secondary texts, such as (1) the "experiential text" provided by the patient's experience of their own illness, (2) the "narrative text" provided by the patient's account of their symptoms and medical history, (3) the "physical text" provided by the physical findings on patient examination, and (4) the "instrumental text" provided by diagnostic technologies. All of these texts may define or shape the encounter of the patient with the provider and healthcare system. One of the tasks of the provider may then be to "read" or understand these texts in such a way that they have a coherent meaning. The patient and provider may collaborate in this activity. Careful listening, mutual dialogue, and explanation are therefore fundamental aspects of the clinical encounter.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span></div><div> It may be noted that the intertextuality or transtextuality of the clinical encounter may be defined by the fact that the primary and secondary texts described by Leder may all be in dialogue and may communicate with one another.</div><div> It may also be noted that a particular kind of understanding may be required for each of the kinds of secondary texts that Leder describes: experiential understanding, narrative understanding, physical understanding, and instrumental understanding.</div><div> Richard J. Baron (1990), however, questions "textual" interpretation as a metaphor for the clinical encounter between patient and provider. He argues that the shifting nature of the clinical "text" leads to the question of whether there is actually any text at all. The text (which is actually the patient-provider relationship) is dynamic and changing, rather than fixed and static, and it's mutually created by the participants. Thus, patients and providers shouldn't distract themselves by looking for, or trying to define, a text to be interpreted; they <i>are</i> the text.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Baron seems to assume, however, that if something is a text, then it must be fixed, and its meaning can't be uncertain or indeterminate. He acknowledges that "patients are busy interpreting themselves all the time, and any presentation to the doctor is only one frame in a very long movie,"<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span> so he recognizes that interpretations may change, just as our presuppositions about, and experiences of (clinical, social, and cultural) texts may change.</div><div> Fredrik Svenaeus (2000) also argues that it's false to assume that medical hermeneutics must be a method of textual interpretation. He says the metaphor of "reading a text" may be inadequate as a theoretical model, and that medical hermeneutics is a dialogic activity rather than one consisting of textual interpretation. He also explains that the methodology of textual interpretation may be replaced by "an ontological and phenomenological hermeneutics in which understanding is a necessary feature of the being-together of human beings in the world."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span></div><div><br /></div><div><br /><div>FOOTNOTES</div></div></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, "The Milestones Guidebook," Version 2020, online at https://www.acgme.org/globalassets/milestonesguidebook.pdf</div><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span>Friedrich Schleiermacher, <i>Hermeneutics and Criticism, and Other Writings</i>, translated and edited by Andrew Bowie (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998)</div></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span>Hans-Georg Gadamer, <i>Truth and Method</i> (New York, The Seabury Press, 1975), p. 429.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span>Paul Ricoeur, <i>Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences</i> (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), p. 43.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 145.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span>Wolfgang Iser, <i>The Art of Reading: A Theory of Aesthetic Response</i> (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978), pp. 167-169.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span>Stephen L. Daniel, "The Patient as Text: A Model of Clinical Hermeneutics," in <i>Theoretical Medicine</i>, Volume 7 (1986), p. 202.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 195.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span>Drew Leder, "Clinical Interpretation: The Hermeneutics of Medicine," in <i>Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics</i>, Volume 11, Issue 1, March 1990, p. 11.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 17.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span>Richard J. Baron, "Medical Hermeneutics: Where is the "Text" We are Interpreting?", in <i>Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics,</i> Volume 11, Issue 1, March 1990, pp. 27-28.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 27.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span>Fredrik Svenaeus, "Hermeneutics of Clinical Practice: The Question of Textuality," in <i>Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics</i>, Volume 21, 2000, p. 180.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>OTHER SOURCES</div><div><br /></div><div>Umberto Eco, <i>The Role of the Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics of Texts</i> (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1979).</div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-84772299901928693672023-03-14T16:59:00.003-07:002023-03-15T09:36:31.425-07:00Keith DeRose, on Single Scoreboard SemanticsKeith DeRose (2004) describes a conversation in which two interlocutors disagree about whether one of them knows something. The first argues that the second doesn't know something, but the second insists that she does. Their ability to convince each other of the truth of their claims may be determined by how many "points" they score in a "language game." For agreement to be achieved however, they must to some extent share the same "conversational scoreboard," and it may be more difficult for them to agree if they each have their own personal scoreboard. If they don't share the same understanding of what it means to "know" something, then they may not be able to agree on whose claims to knowledge are true.<div> Single scoreboard semantics, according to DeRose, proposes a single scoreboard for a given conversation, on which the knowledge claims of each interlocutor can be recorded. He explains that epistemic contextualism requires that the knowledge claims of each interlocutor be evaluated according to their context. If the first interlocutor has established a higher standard for what it means to "know" something than has the second interlocutor, then the first may be correct in saying that the second doesn't actually know what she says she knows. Epistemic invariantism, on the other hand, is the position that the truth or falsity of knowledge claims doesn't depend on the epistemic standard of the context (whatever is true in a low standard context will also be true in a high standard context). </div><div> DeRose supports the contextualist position that the truth or falsity of knowledge claims varies according to the epistemic standard of the context. He notes that his use of the term "conversational scoreboard" differs from that of David Lewis (1979), insofar as Lewis uses the term to describe the mental scoreboards of each interlocutor (who may not agree on the actual score), while DeRose uses the term to describe a single scoreboard that by definition gives the right score.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span></div><div> According to Lewis, there may be constitutive as well as regulative rules regarding how a language game is played and how the score is recorded. If each interlocutor has their own mental scoreboard, then for each of them the score may be whatever their mental scoreboard says it is. But score keeping is also governed by rules, so the interlocutors may also sometimes disagree if one of them has broken the rules. On the other hand, they may also accommodate each other by allowing for some flexibility and variation in the interpretation of the rules, so that agreement can be achieved.</div><div> DeRose therefore doesn't address the question of whether it is or isn't the case that there are sometimes or always multiple personal (or mental) scoreboards in a given conversation. Presumably, the mental scoreboards of each interlocutor must agree to some extent or at least partially coincide if the interlocutors are to agree on the comparative validity of each other's knowledge claims. But to what degree must they agree? </div><div> Conversational markers of agreement, such as "Yeah," "Sure," "Uh huh," "I see," "okay," and "I suppose so," may enable interlocutors to recognize that they are in fact sharing the same or similar conversational scoreboards. Interlocutors may also employ a variety of conversational strategies (such as back channel utterances, response tokens, requests for clarification, continuers, repetitions, collaborative finishers, and nonverbal responses) in order to manage and support communication.</div><div> DeRose addresses the case in which the conversation between two interlocutors is observed or monitored by a third party who keeps their own scoreboard. In this case, it may not matter whether each interlocutor has their own personal scoreboard, as long as they agree to arbitration by the (presumably neutral, fair, and impartial) third party. Disagreement can then be resolved by a "binding arbitration" model of conversational score keeping, in which the third party decides which interlocutor's arguments are more compelling and reasonable.</div><div> DeRose also describes the case of the "exploding scoreboard," in which there's no correct conversational score and the knowledge claims of each interlocutor cannot be judged as true or false.</div><div> He also considers the case in which interlocutors disagree and there's a divergence or "gap" in the truth conditions of their relevant claims. This "gap view" may help to resolve disagreement between interlocutors when there's vagueness or uncertainty in their knowledge claims.</div><div> Would the single scoreboard versus multiple scoreboards model be subject to question if one of the interlocutors simply imposed their knowledge claims on the other by force, threat, or intimidation? Perhaps in this case there wouldn't be any social space for disagreement.</div><div> Verena Gottschling (2004) asks what happens when there's a change in epistemic standards during the course of a conversation and only one of the participants accepts the change. If only one participant agrees with the method of score keeping, then how do we evaluate the knowledge claims of the other participants? Gottschling explains that Lewis, in his article "Elusive Knowledge" (1996), says that the epistemic standards of a conversation may be lowered if one of the participants says something that's true under a lower epistemic standard and the other participants don't disagree. On the other hand, the epistemic standards of a conversation may be raised if one of the participants calls the attention of the others to some remote possibility that they must account for because of the context, such as when jurors must decide whether a defendant is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. </div><div> Gottschling criticizes the notion that conversational participants can each have their own personal scoreboard, because then our intuition that their views may actually contradict each other seems to be violated. She also criticizes the notion that there can be a single scoreboard, because then our intuition that each participant may actually have their own persisting individual standards seems to be violated. She therefore concludes that we should reexamine our intuition of contradiction, since contextualism should be understood as recognizing that a change in the content of knowledge claims by conversational participants may cause us to feel their claims contradict each other when in fact they do not.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>FOOTNOTES</div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Keith DeRose, "Single Scoreboard Semantics," in <i>Philosophical Studies</i>, Volume 119 (1-2), 2004, p. 19.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span>Verena Gottschling, "Keeping the Conversational Score: Constraints for an Optimal Contextualist Answer?", in <i>Contextualisms in Epistemology</i>, edited by Elke Brendel and Christoph Jäger (Dordrecht: Springer, 2005), p. 168.</div><div><br /></div><div>OTHER SOURCES</div><div><br /></div><div>David Lewis, "Scorekeeping in a Language Game," in <i>Journal of Philosophical Logic</i>, 8, 1979, pp. 339-359.</div><div><br /></div><div>David Lewis, "Elusive Knowledge," in <i>Australasian Journal of Philosophy</i>, 74, 1996, pp. 549-567.</div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-17385548044174137872023-03-10T09:35:00.002-08:002023-03-10T09:39:36.071-08:00Philippa Foot and Jonathan Harrison, on the Nature of Moral PrinciplesI<span style="font-family: arial;">n a dialogue between Philippa Foot and Jonathan Harrison (1954) regarding the question of "when is a principle a moral principle?", Foot seems to be rather evasive in her response to the question. She describes the following sentences as examples of what we might mean when we talk about moral principles: (1) "To me, it is a matter of moral principle," (2) "I don't know much about his moral principles," and (3) "He seems to me to be a man without moral principles."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1 </sup></span></span></span>She says that a moral principle may be a special case of a principle of conduct. It may be a principle through which we come to understand what a person feels about what is right and wrong. However, in order for a principle to be moral, it must have some kind of background that distinguishes it from other kinds of principles (although Foot doesn't say exactly what that background might be). She also suggests that if we call a principle moral, then it must have some connection with other principles that we call moral or must have some connection with modes of conduct that we call virtuous. She concludes that the comparison of a moral principle with a moral imperative is fundamentally misleading, and that we won't be able to find suitable criteria for moral principles if we try to base our inquiry on this model.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Harrison responds by saying that some principles that we may hold as obligatory may not actually be obligatory. Thus, there may be a difference between what is subjectively a moral principle and what is objectively a moral principle. We may hold a principle as a moral principle without its necessarily being universalizable (applicable to everyone). However, ultimate moral principles may be applicable to everyone, while derivative moral principles may not be. Derivative moral principles may be derived from ultimate moral principles; they are contingent and variable in a way that ultimate moral principles are not.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><br /></span><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Harrison explains that Foot's assessment of moral principles is rather circular, insofar as she doesn't address the question: "If the "background" of a moral principle consists of other moral principles, then what can we say about those other principles?"<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup> </sup></span></span></span> Moreover, if a principle can be moral only if it has a connection with other moral principles, then how can we establish that those other principles are moral?</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> He also notes that we may not always act on our moral principles. Moral principles are not laws of nature; they can be disobeyed. Nor are they rules of skill, since acting morally is not the same as acting skillfully (although moral obligations may be fulfilled skillfully or may not be fulfilled through sheer ineptitude).<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> He also claims that a hypothetical imperative can't be a moral principle, although he admits there may be hypothetical non-moral imperatives or duties (such as the duty to practice a certain skill if it will make us better at that skill). He says the difference between a hypothetical and a categorical imperative is that a hypothetical imperative is necessary as a means to some end, while a categorical imperative is not.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Contrary to his view, however, it can be argued that if I hold it as a moral principle, all things being equal, that I should perform some action that's morally advisable, even though that action may not be morally obligatory, then I may believe in a principle that's a hypothetical, but not categorical, directive. A categorical directive might take the form: if I see someone suffering, then I should try to alleviate that suffering and comfort the person who's suffering. This would be an example of a directive to perform an action that's obligatory, universally applicable, and not contingently a means to some end other than itself.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Harrison notes that actions that are based on principle may not necessarily be moral actions, and that moral actions may not necessarily be based on principle (rather than the contextual variables of a particular situation). We don't always act on our moral principles, but we must do so at least occasionally if we're going to truthfully say we hold them as principles. On the other hand, if we're lacking in conscience or false to our sense of moral duty, then we may not act on our moral principles and may not feel any remorse for doing so.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6 </sup></span></span></span>But we may also act on principles that we don't feel a moral duty to act on. Merely acting on principles doesn't necessarily make them moral principles. So our acting or not acting on a principle can't be an adequate criterion of whether we regard it as a moral principle. Nor can our feeling of obligation to follow a principle be an adequate criterion of whether we regard it as a moral principle. He therefore dismisses as a "terminological question" whether there may in fact be any adequate criteria for a moral principle.<br /><br />FOOTNOTES<br /><br /><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Philippa R. Foot and Jonathan Harrison, "Symposium: When is a Principle a Moral Principle?," in <i>Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes</i>, Vol. 28, 1954, p. 98.</span></div></div></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>. p. 110.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 125.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., pp. 112-113.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., pp. 117-118.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., pp. 127-128.</span></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-58461353517055350752023-03-09T13:51:00.001-08:002023-03-09T13:53:32.755-08:00Fragments III<p><span style="font-family: arial;">Gilbert Harman, in <i>Moral Relativism and Moral Objectivity</i> (1996),<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span> defends moral relativism (the position that moral claims are always relative to the choice of a moral framework, and that what is right according to one framework may not be right according to some other framework), while Judith Jarvis Thomson defends moral objectivism (the position that moral claims have objective truth conditions that aren't relative to moral frameworks, and that it's possible to find out about some claims whether they are objectively true or false). Harman argues that moral diversity and the apparent intractability of moral disagreements justify moral skepticism (the position that the truth conditions of moral claims are relative to moral frameworks, or that moral claims don't have objective truth conditions, or that it's not possible to determine the objective truth of moral claims), and that moral relativism is therefore also justified. Thomson, on the other hand, argues that what is morally right or wrong isn't simply a matter of what it's rational for an agent to want or of what is relative to what an agent might want, and that we can therefore reject moral relativism.</span></p><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Onora O'Neill (2003),<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2 </sup></span></span></span>distinguishes between constructivism and contractualism in ethics. While constructivism may be the theory that moral justification is provided by constructed criteria or principles, contractualism may be the theory that moral justification is provided by general agreement among individuals.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> O'Neill says it may not be possible to completely separate constructivism from contractualism, since constructive reasoning may be a way of achieving agreement, and agreement may provide a basis for constructive reasoning.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">What about constructivism vs. contractualism in epistemology? Constructivism may be the theory that knowledge is constructed, while contractualism may be the theory that knowledge is agreed upon. These two theories may be mutually compatible.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Jennifer Lackey (2008) asks, "What should we do when we disagree?" She explains that if we disagree with someone and we are (1) <i>evidential equals</i> (there's no argument or piece of evidence bearing directly on the question that one of us is aware of and the other is not), (2) <i>cognitive equals</i> (there's no cognitive capacity or incapacity that one of us possesses that the other does not), and (3) <i>epistemic peers</i> (we've fully disclosed to each other all the reasons and arguments for our own views), then the <i>nonconformist</i> response is that we can continue to maintain our own views, without revision, despite the disagreement of our epistemic peers, as long as we have justified confidence in our own views, while the <i>conformist</i> response is that we should give equal weight to the views of our epistemic peers and should therefore revise our views if our epistemic peers disagree with us. A problem for the nonconformist view is the One against Many Problem, that the more epistemic peers disagree with us, the more implausible our own views become. A problem for the conformist view, on the other hand, is the Many against One Problem, that we may initially have only a low level of justified confidence in our own views, but those views may be bolstered if they're shared by our epistemic peers. While the nonconformist view may underemphasize the epistemic importance of disagreement, the conformist view may overemphasize it. Lackey therefore explains that her <i>justificationist</i> view avoids both problems: it holds that the epistemic importance of disagreement depends on the degree of justified confidence with which the belief in question is held, combined with the presence or absence of relevant symmetry breakers between our own epistemic position and those of our epistemic peers.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup><br /></sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup><br /></sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><div>FOOTNOTES<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Gilbert Harman and Judith Jarvis Thomson, <i>Moral Relativism and Moral Objectivity</i> (Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell, 1996).</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span>Onora O'Neill, "Constructivism vs. Contractualism," in <i>Ratio</i>, Volume XVI, 4 December 2003, pp. 319-331),</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span>Jennifer Lackey, "What should we do when we disagree?", in <i>Oxford Studies in Epistemology, Volume 3</i>, edited by Tamar Szabó Gendler and John Hawthorne (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), pp. 274-293.</div></span></span></span></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-73510930608404860142023-03-08T10:54:00.011-08:002023-05-17T11:23:29.120-07:00Perspectives on ServanthoodAs a teenager I went to a school whose motto is <i>cui servire est regnare</i>, which can be roughly translated as "whom to serve is to reign." This phrase is from a prayer attributed to St. Augustine: "O God...teach us how to know you--and live, where to serve you--and reign, when to praise you--and rejoice..."<div> The phrase "whom to serve is perfect freedom" is also from a prayer attributed to St. Augustine: "Eternal God...grant us so to know you, that we may truly love you, and so to love you that we may fully serve you, whom to serve is perfect freedom."</div><div> Servanthood is an ideal promoted by a variety of religious traditions, including Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism.</div><div> In the gospels, Jesus says he came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many (Matthew 20:28, Mark 10:45). He also washes his disciples' feet as an example of his servanthood (John 13:1-17).</div><div> True servanthood may be found when we can freely choose to serve others. To serve is to help, to fulfill the needs of others, to obey, or to be useful to others. Perfect freedom may be found in serving freely. The true servant helps others to fulfill themselves as human beings. The true servant doesn't serve in order to be rewarded by others, because serving others is rewarding in itself. The true servant acts to promote the happiness, fulfillment, and well-being of others, and acts to promote peace and justice in society.</div><div> In order to truly serve others, we must have humility. We can't serve others if we put our own needs before the needs of others. Humility enables us to respond to the needs of others before responding to our own. When we know the importance of humility, we can serve others without using others to serve our own needs.</div><div> The true leader is also a servant. The true leader serves those whom they lead. True leadership is servanthood. When we freely serve others, we show our concern for them. If we love others, then we truly care about them. If we love others, then we also feel the need to serve them.</div><div> Robert K. Greenleaf (1970), a management researcher and consultant who coined the term "servant-leadership," says that a servant-leader is a servant first, whose primary motivation is to serve, rather than a leader first, whose primary motivation is to lead. The servant-leader takes care to ensure that the highest-priority needs of others are always being served.</div><div> Ken Blanchard (2001), a management consultant and leadership expert, explains that most organizations are hierarchical or pyramidal in nature. Leadership is from the top down, and new approaches to management can't emerge from those at the bottom of the hierarchy who have the closest contact with the organization's clients. A solution for this problem is servant-leadership, in which the organizational hierarchy or pyramid is inverted or turned upside down, so that employees at the ground level who have the closest contact with clients can better contribute to the organization's goals.</div><div> However, Jacquelyn Grant (1993), an American theologian, scholar, and minister, criticizes the language of servanthood as having undergirded structures of power and domination that have caused suffering for oppressed people. She says that, historically, women have been seen as servants of men, and politically disenfranchised peoples have been seen as a servant class for the wealthy and powerful. Servanthood language has camouflaged servitude and subordination, instead of promoting empowerment and liberation. She therefore prefers a language or model of Christian discipleship, in which justice is seen as an integral part of the quest for unity and community.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Theresa Corbin (2022), an American writer and editor, who converted to Islam at age 21, says that an Islamic perspective on servanthood is that we can serve God by following the example of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and serving others, whether they are our children, parents, neighbors, or other members of our community. We all have leadership roles to fulfill by serving others. Servanthood is the meaning of leadership as it was exemplified by the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Ibn 'Arabi (1165-1240), an Arab Andalusian Islamic philosopher, poet, and mystic, says that we're created by God to be servants of God, and that we should never abandon our servanthood (<i>ubûdîya</i>). The servant loves God, and God loves the servant. Servanthood is our true reality, whereby the face of God is revealed to us.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span> Through servanthood, we attain humility and recognize that we depend on God for our being.</div><div> Ernest C.H. Ng (2019), a professor of Buddhist Studies and Economics at the University of Hong Kong, explains that a Buddhist perspective on servant leadership is that the Buddha(s) and Bodhisattvas are "the embodiment of profound compassion and wisdom in their selfless mission and unrelenting effort to teach and heal all sentient beings."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span> We can become servant leaders by following their example, and by acting in accordance with the Buddha's teachings.</div><div> Robert Greenleaf (1977) also says that servant leadership may be characterized by such capabilities as listening, understanding, imagination, empathy, intuitive knowledge, foresight, awareness, perception, persuasion, action, conceptualizing, and healing.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span> </div><div> Andrey Shirin (2014), a professor of divinity and Director of Transformational Leadership at the John Leland Center for Theological Studies in Arlington, Virginia, notes that some workplace settings may be more receptive to servant leadership than others. Some leaders may have a greater desire to serve than others, and workers may vary in their receptivity to servant leadership.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6 </sup></span></span></span>He explains that the modern model of servant leadership may truncate the nature of leadership by making service the single determinative criterion aligned with Christian spirituality, and that St. Augustine viewed service as just one dimension of his leadership approach.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Mitch McCrimmon (2010), a Canadian management consultant and writer, argues that servant leadership is a bad idea, because the reality in the business sector is that all managers must serve business owners if they want to keep their jobs, and they must also serve customers. If servant leadership is the idea that traditional, autocratic, and hierarchical modes of leadership should yield to newer modes of leadership that are more inclusive and that are based on teamwork and community, then it's a true but trivial idea, and it presents nothing new or distinctive. It may also have paternalistic overtones. McCrimmon therefore argues that it's possible for managers to develop collaborative, supportive, empathetic, engaging, and empowering relationships with employees without taking on the servant model.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>FOOTNOTES</div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Jacquelyn Grant, "The Sin of Servanthood: And the Deliverance of Discipleship," in <i>A Troubling in My Soul: Womanist Perspectives on Evil and Suffering</i>, edited by Emilie M. Townes (Maryknoll, NY, Orbis Books, 1993), p. 214.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span>Theresa Corbin, "Prophet Muhammad: Leader & Servant," at <i>aboutislam.net</i>, 23 December 2022, online at https://aboutislam.net/reading-islam/about-muhammad/muhammad-pbuh-prophet-leader-servant/</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span>Stephen Hirtenstein, ""Ibn 'Arabi's Bequest" and Two Other Passages from the Kitab al-Wasâ'il by Isma'il Ibn Sawdakîn," (<i>Newsletter of the Muhyiddin Ibn Arabi Society</i>, Spring 1977), online at https://ibnarabisociety.org/ibn-arabis-bequest-stephen-hirtenstein/</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span>Ernest C.H. Ng, "Servant Leadership Beyond Servant and Leader: A Buddhist Perspective on the Theory and Practice of Servant Leadership," in <i>Servant Leadership, Social Entrepreneurship and the Will to Serve</i>, edited by Luk Bouckaert and Steven van den Heuvel, (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019, online at https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-29936-1_3#citeas</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span>Robert K. Greenleaf, "The Servant as Leader" [1970], in <i>Servant Leadership: A Journey into the Nature of Legitimate Power & Greatness</i> (New York: Paulist Press, 1977, pp. 30-49.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span>Andrey V. Shirin, "Is Servant Leadership Inherently Christian?", in J<i>ournal of Religion and Business Ethics </i>(Volume 3, Article 13, Oct 9, 2014), p. 7.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., pp. 21-24.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span>Mitch McCrimmon, "Why servant leadership is a bad idea," in <i>Management.Issues</i>, August 16, 2010, online at https://www.management-issues.com/opinion/6015/why-servant-leadership-is-a-bad-idea/</div><div><br /></div><div>OTHER REFERENCES</div><div><br /></div><div>Ken Blanchard, "Servant-Leadership Revisited," in <i>The Sixth Annual Worldwide Lessons in Leadership</i>, 2001, online at online at https://new.svdpusa.org/Portals/1/Servant-Leadership%20Revisited.pdf.</div><div><div style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 20px; width: 832px;"><div id="m_-2388771171898861283gmail-:yp" style="direction: ltr; margin: 8px 0px 0px; padding: 0px;"><div id="m_-2388771171898861283gmail-:yo" style="font-stretch: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.5; overflow: hidden;"><div style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"></div></div></div><div style="background: rgb(242, 242, 242); border-bottom-left-radius: 1px; border-bottom-right-radius: 1px; font-family: Roboto, RobotoDraft, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; width: auto;"></div></div></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-79270037426491775432023-03-01T16:23:00.000-08:002024-01-25T08:10:58.140-08:00Mystification<div>John Berger, the British art critic, novelist, and poet, says, in <i>Ways of Seeing</i> (1972), that "mystification is the process of explaining away what might otherwise seem evident."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1 </sup></span></span></span></div><div>Mystification is a process of making misplaced assumptions about the purpose or meaning of a work of art in order to somehow explain or justify it.</div><div><br /></div><div>Perhaps mystification is also a way of making the ordinary seem mysterious, and demystification is a way of making the mysterious seem ordinary. Perhaps mystification is a way of making the obvious seem obscure, and demystification is a way of making the obscure seem obvious.</div><div><br />Could mystification be a way of acknowledging that there are truths beyond our understanding (such as mysteries of faith, mysteries of nature, sacred or sacramental mysteries, or mysteries revealed by God)?</div><div> </div><div>In what ways do we mystify our own being or presence in order to maintain social distance from others?</div><div><br /></div><div>"Who am I?" --Isn't the answer to that question always a mystery?</div><div><br /></div><div>Is my way of seeing the world only interesting insofar as it's different from the way others see the world? Is difference the defining characteristic of being interesting?</div><div><br /></div><div>Is expressing yourself a matter of what you can do with language or is it a matter of what language can do with you?</div><div><br /></div><div>Wittgenstein, in the <i>Tractatus </i>(1922), says that everything that can be thought can be thought clearly, and everything that can be said can be said clearly (4.116). However, there are things that can't be said, and of which we can't speak, because we can't formulate logical propositions about them. Wittgenstein calls the inexpressible "the mystical" (6.522).</div><div><br /></div><div>The mystifying may be the puzzling, perplexing, bewildering, or confusing. Some examples of how it may be expressed include the sentences: "I'm mystified by their decision to promote him," "His carelessness really mystifies me," and "Her nonchalance was truly mystifying."</div><div><br /></div><div>Mystification of language may be produced by the use of circumlocution, elaborate metaphors, idiosyncratic or unusual terminology, technical jargon, neologisms, indefinable terms, and deliberately vague or ambiguous expressions.</div><div><br /></div><div>Demystifying or demythicizing an utterance, text, or discourse may take the form of deconstructing its mystifying or mythicizing aspects, explaining how it functions as a mystery or myth.</div><div><br /></div><div>Abraham Joshua Heschel, the Polish-American rabbi, theologian, philosopher, and civil rights activist, says in <i>Between God and Man: An Interpretation of Judaism</i> (1959) that </div><div><blockquote>"mystery...is a dimension of all existence and may be experienced everywhere and at all times. In using the term mystery we do not mean any particular esoteric quality that may be revealed to the initiated, but the essential mystery of being as being, the nature of being as God's creation out of nothing, and therefore something which stands beyond the scope of human comprehension. We do not come upon it only at the climax of thinking or in observing strange, extraordinary facts but in the startling fact that there are facts at all: being, the universe, the unfolding of time...Everything holds the great secret. For it is the inescapable situation of all being to be involved in the infinite mystery...The world is something <i>we apprehend but cannot comprehend</i>."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2 </sup></span></span></span></blockquote><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup></sup></span></span></span></div><div>Heschel also says that there are three basic approaches or attitudes toward the mystery of God. The fatalist attitude is that the world is controlled by an inscrutable, blind, and irrational power that is without justice or purpose, and thus there is no meaning to be understood within the mystery. The positivist attitude is that the mystery doesn't actually exist; whatever we regard as mystery is merely that which we haven't yet explained and which we'll be able to explain at some point in the future. And the biblical attitude is that whatever is unknown to us is known by God, and whatever is concealed from us is apparent to God.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span></div><div><br /></div><div>According to Heschel, the sense of wonder, awe, and reverence in response to the presence of God leads us to an act of worship in which we acknowledge that God surpasses and transcends all mysteries. Our faith in God is expressed through the act of worship. Faith leads us think of the world in terms of God and to attempt to live in accord with what's relevant to God.</div><div><br /><br />FOOTNOTES<br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>John Berger, et al., <i>Ways of Seeing</i> (London: British Broadcasting Corporation and Penguin Books, 1972), pp. 15-16.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span>Abraham J. Heschel, <i>Between God and Man: An Interpretation of Judaism</i>, edited by Fritz A. Rothschild (London: Collier Macmillan, 1959), p. 45.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., pp. 50-51.</div><div><br /></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-44605690346851061372023-02-15T15:25:00.005-08:002023-03-07T20:37:23.492-08:00Black OntologySome questions to be considered by black ontology include: What is (or are) the meaning(s) of being black and black being? In what ways is black being implicit or explicit, real or unreal, particular or universal? How might a phenomenological ontology of being black or blackness proceed?<div> Some other questions to be considered by black ontology include: In what ways is black being defined by its possibilities for being or non-being? What distinguishes a first-person understanding of black being (by black beings themselves) from second- or third-person understandings? Is the peoplehood of black people erased by referring to them as "black beings" rather than "black people"? To the extent that black people can determine for themselves what it means to be defined by categories of race, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, etc., from where does this freedom for self-definition come and on what does it depend?</div><div> What are the basic constituents (if any) of black being? Does black being have any ontological building blocks or foundational elements? To what extent is it a dependent kind of being (dependent on racial categories, and dependent on the black-white binary)? How is it manifested socially and culturally? To what extent is it characterized by collective agency and collective intentionality? </div><div> Do such questions arise from an essentialist notion of the being of black people?</div><div> The meaning of being black may be determined by the given historical, social, and cultural situation. Being black in America today means something different from being black in China today. Being black in America in 1863 meant something different from what it meant to be black in America in 1963. Being black in black social spaces means something different from being black in white social spaces.</div><div> Black ontology is a racial, social, and cultural ontology. David Miguel Gray (2017) explains that races are social kinds, rather than natural kinds, and that they are in part or in whole products of human actions or human decision-making processes. Investigations of racial categories are therefore social and historical investigations, quite unlike the investigations of the natural sciences.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Black ontology recognizes that black people have often been objectified by white people, who have seen them as objects to be used, exploited, eradicated, or manipulated. Black ontology may therefore examine the meaning of the "black body" as transmogrified into a subhuman object by white consciousness.</div><div> But isn't the personhood of black people erased when they are referred to as "black bodies"? Isn't it dehumanizing to refer to black people as "black bodies," as if they were things or objects (even if that's how they're seen by white supremacists)?</div><div> Black ontologies may develop new concepts of black identity. They may form a chorus of voices against injustice and oppression, and they may express, articulate, or proclaim resistant subjectivities.</div><div> Black ontology may also investigate the role of black social and cultural signifying practices, such as art, music, dance, fashion, religion, and language, in constituting black being.</div><div> Perhaps what is needed at the present moment is neither an evasion (or rejection) of ontology nor an ontology of flight or escape, but rather an ontology of struggle and resistance.</div><div> Ontology may involve not only a study of what is (or what there is) or what it is to be (the meaning of being), but also a study of the categorical structure of reality (the fundamental categories of being). Metaontology may involve a study of the methods of ontology, and of what we are doing when we ask such ontological questions as "What are we asking when we ask "What <i>is</i> or <i>is not</i>?"").</div><div> Just as there may be logics as well as logic, epistemologies as well as epistemology, knowledges as well as knowledge, so there may be ontologies as well as ontology.</div><div> Aren't we all ontologists insofar as we're concerned with defining who we are, and with defining our own being?</div><div> Instead of affirming that philosophy (or even our own way of doing philosophy) has some privileged position over us and can subject us to ontological investigation (or that philosophy itself supposes that it can subject us to ontological investigation), why don't we engage in a philosophy that arises from our own being and that is radically constructed or deconstructed by our own being?</div><div> Black feminist or afro-feminist ontology is an ontology centered on the experiences of black women or women of color. It may examine such questions as "What is the impact of repressive and hierarchical social structures on black women? What is the impact of gendered power relations? What is the impact of social conceptions of the female body, regarding such issues as reproduction, maternity, body image, and sexuality?</div><div> Ismália De Sousa (2021) explains that while black feminist thought centers on the lived experiences of black women, it can be deployed to better understand the experiences of people and groups at the intersection of multiple axes of connection. The ontology of black feminist thought centers on the lived experiences of black women in order to better understand unbalanced social structures of power. It also examines lived experiences as sources of knowledge development, and it creates the space for subaltern voices to be heard in dialogical daily practices.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Emilie M. Townes (1993) describes womanist ontology as "a radical concern for is-ness in the context of African American life."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span> She explains that "its primary concern is concrete existence (lived life) and the impetus for a coherent and unified relationship between body, soul, and creation. In this sense, it is consonant with African cosmology that understands all of life as sacred."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4 </sup></span></span></span>Womanist ontology is also an ontology of wholeness that rejects dualisms such as self-other, mind-body, theory-practice, and individual-community. It's a relational ontology that calls us to moral responsibility and accountability.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Liz Stanley and Sue Wise (2008) explain that feminist ontology "rejects binary and oppositional notions of 'the self' and its relationships to 'the body' and 'mind' and 'emotions'; it also rejects a notion of 'self and Other' that the self supposedly defines itself against and in opposition to."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span> They say that</div><div><blockquote>"The feminist approach to the construction of self, in contrast, sees 'self' as relationally and interactionally composed, its construction being historically, culturally, and contextually specific and also subtly changing in different interactional circumstances. Thus, an alternative feminist way of understanding the dualisms of masculinist ontology--of self and other, individual and collectivity--is to treat these not as oppositions but cooperative endeavors for constructing selves--both selves--through collective relational systems of action and interaction."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span></blockquote></div><div> Moreover,</div><div><blockquote>"The ontologies of the oppressed rest on forbidden emotions and thoughts--such as loves which are supposed not to dare to speak their name but do, and white masks of apparent acquiescence on actually rebellious black faces. That is, fundamental here are actual or suspected subversions, as subversion is named and categorized within dominant ideological practices. But the ontologies of the oppressed are not merely negatively inscribed as Other, a counterpoint to dominant group ontologies and experiences. Central to the political projects of oppressed groups is the construction of an everyday life, a mundane reality often hidden from oppressors, and with it an ontological system for explaining and thus also defining and constructing the very being of members of such groups."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span></blockquote></div><div> Pamela L. Caughie, Emily Datskou, and Rebecca Parker (2018) also argue that gender ontologies are relational and intersectional. They explain that one of the challenges for such ontologies is to find ways to leave gender variance and nonconformity dynamic but still findable.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Calvin Warren (2018) says that the question of black <strike>being</strike> is a proper metaphysical question, because "metaphysics can <i>never</i> provide freedom or humanity for blacks, since it is the objectification, domination, and extermination of blacks that keep the metaphysical world intact."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span> Being is therefore written under erasure, since black <strike>being</strike> exists in concealment and blacks are treated as objects. "Black thinking," says Warren, "must then return to the question of Being and the relation between this question and the antiblack violence sustaining the world."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Warren (2022) also says that the "Karen call" (a call typically made by a white middle-aged woman who weaponizes her white privilege by calling for police to come and engage in surveillance of black people who are going about their normal daily activities, thus subjecting them to possible harassment and unlawful arrest) is a persistent social phenomenon that "performs ontological labor--a guarding and surveillance of Being--requiring a vigilant policing of ontological boundaries and a marshaling of violence (state sanctioned) to prevent black encroachment."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12 </sup></span></span></span>The Karen call is a response to a supposed ontological emergency (actually a fraudulent, pseudo-, or non-emergency), in which black people are seen as not having the right to be in a certain place. Warren says that rather than dismissing the Karen call as an abuse of modern technology in which a cell phone is used to activate a system of surveillance, we should see it as the unfolding and appropriation of Being as a racial privilege. The preservation of such privilege, and the maintenance of its racial exclusivity, requires vigilance and surveillance.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Ron Scapp (2013), in an essay describing how the killing of Trayvon Martin might be considered an ontological problem, says that at the core of this tragic event is the fundamental issue of what it actually means for an African American male "to be" in the United States, and that "there is, in fact, no proper or legitimate place for a person of color <i>to be</i>."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>14</sup></span></span></span></div><div> George Yancy (2022) calls attention to the tragic deaths of George Floyd (2020), Ahmaud Arbery (2020), Philando Castile (2016), Eric Garner (2014) Tamir Rice (2014), Trayvon Martin (2012), Amadou Diallo (1999), Emmett Till (1955), and others who were deemed "ontologically criminal, subhuman, and ungrievable" by those who murdered them. They were perceived as "threats"and "criminals" within a distorted white imaginary and pervasive anti-black-male social ontology.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>15</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Fred Moten (2008) explains that one way of investigating the lived experience of African Americans is to consider what it means to be seen as dangerous, and what it means to be regarded as an inevitably disordering or deformational force, while at the same time being absolutely indispensable to normative order and form.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>16</sup></span></span></span> He says that</div><div></div><blockquote><div>"the problem of the inadequacy of any ontology to blackness, to that mode of being for which escape or apposition and not the objectifying encounter with otherness is the prime modality, must be understood in its relation to the inadequacy of calculation to being in general...blackness needs to be understood as operating at the nexus of the social and the ontological, the historical and the essential...What is inadequate to blackness is already given ontologies. The lived experience of blackness is, among other things, a constant demand for an ontology of disorder, an ontology of dehiscence, a para-ontology...That ontology will have had to have operated as a general critique of calculation."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>17</sup></span></span></span></div><div></div></blockquote><div> Marquis Bey (2022) also rejects ontological blackness and ontological gender as inconsistent with the abolitionist gender radicality that underlies black trans feminism. Bey says these ontological categories tend toward a reification by which race and gender are treated as if they were fixed and existed objectively, independent of historical contingency and subjective intentions.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>18</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Victor Anderson (1995) also regards ontological blackness as a tendency toward racial reification. He uses the term "ontological blackness" to connote categorical and essentialist languages depicting black life and experience. He prefers to use bell hooks's term "postmodern blackness," which he says recognizes the importance of race as an effective category in identity formation, but also recognizes that black identities are continually being reconstituted, as African Americans inhabit diverse social spaces and communities of moral discourse.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>19</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Charles W. Mills (1998) explains that some characteristics of race as a politically constructed categorization are that (1) it's essentially <i>relational</i> rather than monadic, (2) it's <i>dynamic</i> rather than static, (3) it's only <i>contingently</i> tied to a person's physical appearance, (4) it's usually <i>vertically</i> defined, in terms of hierarchy and subordination, (5) it may vary both <i>temporally</i> in a given system and <i>geographically</i> through entry into a different system, (6) it's <i>unreal</i> in a biological sense, (7) it's <i>real</i> in a sociohistorical or political sense, (8) it has to be <i>maintained</i> through constant boundary policing, and (9) historically the most important <i>global racial system</i> has been that of white domination over nonwhite people.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>20</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Mills therefore says that in response to the "dark ontologies" of white supremacy (and of slavery, colonialism, and racial segregation), which have reinforced white domination over nonwhite people, revisionist ontologies can be undertaken in one or both of two ways: (1) by recognizing the metaphysical infrastructure of dark ontologies, and (2) by eradicating the substantive conditions of black subordination.</div><div> Axelle Karera (2022) explores the use in contemporary black studies of the concept of "paraontology," which was originated by the philosopher Nahum Chandler. She describes paraontology as "a radical disruption in the hegemonic and purist logic of ontology," saying that it's a method of reading that conceals, retreats, or shelters itself from classical ontology, and that therefore offers us "the possibility of considering blackness beyond (though always with and against) the violence of its constitution."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>21</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Farai Chipato and David Chandler (2022) describe the "Black Horizon" of social and political thought as a perspective that, rather than leading toward a plurality of ontologies, deconstructs or destabilizes the very notion of ontology. They say that "the fugitive inclinations of the Black Horizon suggest lines of flight away from concrete ontological positions towards being as a poetics...It is an aesthetic method rather than an ontologizing practice, a creative becoming that cannot provide a new foundation for thought, but remains suspended in a creative, opaque uncertainty."<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>22</sup></span></span></span></div><div> </div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup></sup></span></span></span><div><br /></div><div>FOOTNOTES</div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>David Miguel Gray, "Racial Ontology: A Guide for the Perplexed. Part IIIB: Sociohistorical Theories of Race," video for WiPhi Open Access Philosophy, 2017, online at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcuabrV0Cok</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span>Ismalia De Sousa, "Centering Black feminist thought in nursing praxis," in <i>Nursing Inquiry</i>, Volume 29, Issue 1, Nov. 24, 2021, online at https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nin.12473</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span>Emilie M. Townes, "To Be Called Beloved: Womanist Ontology in PostModern Refraction," in <i>The Annual Society of Christian Ethics</i>, Vol. 13 (1993), p. 94.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 94.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 114.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span>Liz Stanley and Sue Wise, "Feminist Epistemology and Ontology: Recent Debates in Feminist Social Theory," 2008, p. 348 online at https://ijsw.tiss.edu/collect/ijsw/index/assoc/HASH67b2/08dbd2b6.dir/doc.pdf</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 348.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 355.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span>Pamela L. Caughie, Emily Datskou, and Rebecca Parker, "Storm Clouds on the Horizon: Feminist Ontologies and the Problem of Gender, in <i>Feminist Modernist Studies</i> (1,3: 230-242), 2018.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span>Calvin Warren, <i>Ontological Terror: Blackness, Nihilism, and Emancipation</i> (Durham: Duke University Press, 2018), p. 6.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 7.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span>Calvin Warren, "The Karen Call: Emergency, Destiny, and Surveillance," in <i>Critical Philosophy of Race</i>, Volume 10, Issue 2, 2022, p. 141.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 148.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>14</sup></span></span></span>Ron Scapp, "Postscript: Being in One's Place: Race, Ontology and the Killing of Trayvon Martin," in <i>NAES</i> (National Association for Ethic Studies)<i> FORum Pamphlet Series</i>, Volume 1, Article 1, 2013, p. 5.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>15</sup></span></span></span>George Yancy, "Introduction: Speaking <i>Behind</i> and <i>To</i> the Veil," in <i>Black Men from behind the Veil: Ontological Interrogations</i>, edited by George Yancy (Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2022), p. 2.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>16</sup></span></span></span>Fred Moten, "The Case of Blackness," in <i>Criticism</i>, Spring 2008, Vol. 50, No. 2, p. 180.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>17</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 187.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>18</sup></span></span></span>Marquis Bey, <i>Black Trans Feminism</i> (Durham: Duke University Press, 2022), p. 13.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>19</sup></span></span></span>Victor Anderson, <i>Beyond Ontological Blackness: An Essay on African American Religious and Cultural Criticism</i> (London: Bloomsbury, 1995), p. 11.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>20</sup></span></span></span>Charles W. Mills, <i>Blackness Visible: Essays on Philosophy and Race</i> (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998), pp. 76-77.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>21</sup></span></span></span>Axelle Karera, "Paraontology: Interruption, Inheritance, or a Debt One Often Regrets," in <i>Critical Philosophy of Race</i>, Volume 10, Issue 2, 2022, pp. 159-161.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>22</sup></span></span></span>Farai Chipato and David Chandler, "The Black Horizon: Alterity and Ontology in the Anthropocene," in <i>Global Society</i> (Routledge, August 10, 2022), p. 13, online at https://westminsterresearch.westminster.ac.uk/download/0d3820337d2853d67931f13d88da3f5d71525602c55afa774c98cb40e9b3f81d/1997762/The%20Black%20Horizon%20Alterity%20and%20Ontology%20in%20the%20Anthropocene.pdf</div><div> </div></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-41312716608022933472023-02-08T17:25:00.004-08:002023-03-02T17:02:44.743-08:00Jean-Luc Marion's Phenomenology of Givenness<div><span style="font-family: arial;">Jean-Luc Marion is a French philosopher and theologian who was born in 1946 in Meudon, Hauts-de-Seine. He has taught at the University of Poitiers, the University Paris X - Nanterre, the Institut Catholique de Paris, the University of Paris IV (Sorbonne), and the University of Chicago. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> His books include <i>Dieu sans l'être</i> (1982, <i>God Without Being</i>, 1991), <i>Réduction et donation: recherches sur Husserl, Heidegger et la phénoménologie</i> (1989, <i>Reduction and Givenness: Investigations of Husserl, Heidegger and Phenomenology</i> (1998), <i>Étant donné: Essai d'une phénoménologie de la donation</i> (1997, <i>Being Given: Toward a Phenomenology of Givenness</i>, 2002), <i>The Reason of the Gift</i> (2011), <i>Certitudes négatives</i> (2009, <i>Negative Certainties</i>, 2015), and <i>Givenness and Revelation</i> (<i>Gifford Lectures</i>, 2016). </span></div><span style="font-family: arial;"><i> Being Given: Toward a Phenomenology of Givenness</i> looks at the question of whether givenness is available to us and how a phenomenology of givenness can be formulated. It also looks at the question of what are the consequences--after the reduction of the phenomenon to the object by the I<i> </i>in Husserl, and after the reduction of the phenomenon to being by <i>Dasein</i> in Heidegger--of a third phenomenological reduction, the reduction of the phenomenon to the given in it or to givenness.</span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Wilfrid Sellars, in his influential essay "Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind" (1956), argues that many things, such as sensory data, material objects, universals, and even givenness itself, have been said to be "given," but that the sensing of sense data doesn't imply the existence of non-inferential knowledge upon which inferential knowledge can be based, because it involves the sensing of particulars rather than the non-inferential knowledge of matters of fact. He therefore calls the theory that there are matters of fact that are "given," in the sense that they can not only be known non-inferentially, but also presuppose no other knowledge of particular facts or general truths, the Myth of the Given. He explains that sensing isn't knowing, and that the existence of sensory data doesn't logically imply the existence of non-inferential knowledge. He therefore argues against a foundationalist theory of knowledge, which holds that there are basic facts that are "given" and that can serve as a foundation for empirical knowledge.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> John McDowell, in his essay "Avoiding the Myth of the Given" (2008), explains that there may be knowledgable perceptual judgments that have rational intelligibility in light of the subject's experience (such as when I can identify a bird's species from the way it looks), and that these kinds of judgments may provide noninferential knowledge (of the kind of bird I'm looking at). We should reject the idea that the conceptual contents we put together in discursive activity are self-standing building-blocks, but we should be aware that the unity of intuitional contents may be given, and it may not be a result of our putting them together. Intuitional contents may then be able to be analyzed into significances or discursive capacities. Thus, there may be at least two ways in which intuitions can enable knowledgeable judgments: (1) by enabling judgments that have content going beyond the content of those intuitions, and (2) by representing a potential for discursive activity that's already present in the content of those intuitions.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Willard Van Ormond Quine, in his well-known essay "Two Dogmas of Empiricism" (1953), argues that modern empiricism has been conditioned by two dogmas: (1) the dogma that there's a distinction between analytic and synthetic truths, and (2) the dogma that every meaningful statement is reducible to some logical construct upon terms that refer to immediate experience (reductionism). He says that both dogmas are ill-founded, because it may be difficult to separate analytic statements from synthetic ones, which can also make it difficult to determine whether meaningful statements are reducible to constructs based on immediate experience. He therefore rejects both kinds of foundationalism.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> How then does Jean-Luc Marion respond to Sellars and other critics of the given who've equated the given with the nonconceptual or nondiscursive contents of intuition that are (mistakenly) assumed to provide the foundation for empirical knowledge? Does givenness have the same meaning for Marion as it has for Sellars? Does it mean the same thing in phenomenology as it does in epistemology?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Gail Soffer (2003) explains that Husserl's concept of givenness as immanence doesn't at all correspond to Sellars's concept of givenness as immediacy. She says that "For Sellars, the point is to found empirical knowledge, to identify the noninferential bases for inferences. By contrast, for Husserl the category of the given serves to thematize the subjective elements of experience (the immanent) and show how what is taken by us to be knowledge presupposes and emerges out of these subjective elements."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Jeffrey L. Kosky (2012) also explains that "Marion has always contended that givenness is not a matter of some thing, being, or object given, nor does it appear in some form of empiricism; givenness is rather a mode of phenomenality, a question of the how or manner of phenomena."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Husserl, in his <i>Ideas: General Introduction to Pure Phenomenology</i> (1913) describes phenomenological reduction as a process of defining the pure essence of a phenomenon by bracketing empirical data away from consideration. This process includes the suspension of empirical subjectivity, so that pure consciousness may be defined in its essential and absolute being. Bracketing leaves pure consciousness, pure phenomena, and the pure ego as the residue of phenomenological reduction.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Husserl explains that the opposition between immanence and transcendence is accompanied by a fundamental difference in the mode of being given.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> The difference between immanent and transcendent perception reflects a difference in the way phenomena are given or presented to consciousness. Some phenomena are perceived immanently, while others are perceived transcendently. Immanently perceived phenomena appear from within the ego's own stream of consciousness, but transcendently perceived phenomena appear from outside the ego's own stream of consciousness. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The difference between immanent and transcendent perception also reflects the difference between being as experience and being as thing.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> Things as they exist in themselves cannot be perceived immanently; they can only be perceived transcendently. Immanently perceived objects have an absolute being, insofar as their being is logically necessary and is proved by the being of consciousness itself, but transcendently perceived objects have a merely phenomenal being, insofar as their being is not logically necessary and is not proved by the being of consciousness itself.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> Only through phenomenological reduction can we find the absolute givenness that owes nothing to transcendence.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Marion begins by explaining that the meaning of the phrase "being given" may depend on whether the emphasis is placed on the word "being" or the word "given," and on whether the word "being" is used as a noun or as an (auxiliary) adverb. Since the phrase may be somewhat tautological if "being" is used as a noun, Marion chooses to use it as an adverb, in which case, "being" posits the fact of the "given."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> What does it mean phenomenologically for phenomena to give themselves? Marion says that the principle set up by givenness is precisely that nothing precedes the phenomenon.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> Givenness is the phenomenality of the phenomenon. The phenomenon finds in givenness not merely an entry into phenomenality, but the entire mode of its phenomenality.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> If the objection is raised that givenness must presuppose both a giver of the given and a givee to whom it's given (who comes after the subject, and </span><span style="font-family: arial;">whom Marion calls "the gifted"</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">), then we find, to the contrary, that not only does the bracketing of the giver and givee not invalidate the givenness of the gift, it characterizes it intrinsically.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8 </sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">In the reduction of the gift to givenness, there can actually be a threefold bracketing: of the giver, the givee, and the gift. The reduced gift is purely immanent and is intrinsically, rather than </span><span style="font-family: arial;">extrinsically, characterized by givenness.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Phenomena not only manifest themselves, but also give themselves to perceiving subjects or givees. They manifest themselves insofar as they give themselves, and inasmuch as they give themselves.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10 </sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">But they become absolutely given only to the degree they have been phenomenologically reduced. The more reduction, the more givenness.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11 </sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Reducing givenness therefore means freeing givenness from the limits from any other authority, including that of intuition.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> The given gives itself, and whatever gives itself, also shows itself.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> Indeed, the phenomenon shows itself only insofar as it gives itself.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>14 </sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Thus, there are degrees of givenness, and degrees of phenomenality.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="font-size: 13.3333px;"> </span>The fold of the given is the gift given insofar as it gives itself in the progress of its own event.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span><span style="font-family: arial;">Givenness opens as the fold of the given, unfolding itself as it articulates the gift in terms of its givenness.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>15</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> To the question of whether there could be some phenomena or quasi-phenomena that are irreducible to any givenness, Marion answers that since nothing arises in consciousness that isn't given, a non-givenness or negative givenness couldn't be given to us to perceive or apprehend.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Husserl's "principle of all principles" is that "every primordial intuition is a source of authority for knowledge, and whatever presents itself in intuition in primordial form is to be accepted as it gives itself out to be, though only within the limits in which it presents itself."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>16 </sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Marion notes that three characteristics of this principle are (1) that it guarantees intuition its brute actuality without yet grounding it in reason, (2) that it suggests there are limits or boundaries to intuition, and (3) that it claims that intuition presents whatever appears to it by giving it to us. Givenness presents itself to us within a certain horizon of consciousness, but in order for every phenomenon to be inscribed therein, that horizon must be delimited. Thus, "the two finitudes of the horizon and the I come together in the finitude of intuition itself. Phenomena are characterized by the finitude of givenness in them."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>17</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Inversely to the phenomenon that is limited in its givenness, however, a "saturated phenomenon" may be saturated with intuition and givenness. It may therefore be paradoxical, insofar as it not only suspends the phenomenon's subjection to the I, but also inverts it, so that instead of the I being able to constitute it, the I experiences itself as constituted by it.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>18</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"> The saturated phenomenon is exceeded by, or has a surplus of, the intuition and givenness that saturate it, and thus it may evoke astonishment or amazement. Marion denies, however, that this is in any way to be understood as a "theological" case of phenomenality.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>19</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> He describes four types of saturated phenomena: (1) the event (which may be saturated insofar as it may not be limited to a particular moment, place, or individual, but may overflow those singularities), (2) the idol (which may be saturated insofar as its beauty or splendor may overflow intuition and invite our gaze again and again), (3) the flesh (which may be saturated insofar as it may be the identity of whatever touches and what is touched, whatever feels and what is felt, and whatever sees and what is seen), and (4) the icon (which may be saturated insofar as it may be free from all reference to the <i>I</i> and may exert its own gaze rather than be gazed upon). The icon may gather within it all four modes of saturation.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Marion also says that "the phenomenon of revelation not only falls into the category of saturation (paradox in general), but [also] concentrates the four types of saturated phenomena and is given at once as historic event, idol, flesh, and icon (face)."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>20 </sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">He does then embark on a mode of theology by arguing that the manifestation of Jesus Christ, as described in the New Testament, is an example of the phenomenon of revelation. He says that the phenomenon of Christ gives itself intuitively as an event that submits to its eventfulness, in the same sense that Christ submits to the Father. As an absolute phenomenon, it saturates every possible horizon into which relation would introduce it.</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>21</sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">FOOTNOTES</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Gail Soffer, "Revisiting the Myth: Husserl and Sellars on the Given," in <i>The Review of Metaphysics</i>, Vol. 57, No. 2 (Dec 2003), p. 310.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span>Jeffrey L. Kosky, "The Reason of the Gift," in <i>Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews</i>, April 15, 2012, online at https://ndpr.nd.edu/reviews/e-reason-of-the-gift/</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span>Edmund Husserl, <i>Ideas: General Introduction to Pure Phenomenology</i>, translated by W.R. Boyce Gibson (London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1931), p. 134.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 133.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span>Jean-Luc Marion, <i>Being Given: Toward a Phenomenology of Givenness</i>, translated by Jeffrey L. Kosky (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002), p. 18.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 120.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 5.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 85.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>. p. 115.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 248.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 16.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 17.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span><i style="font-family: arial;">Ibid</i><span style="font-family: arial;">., p. 69.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>14</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 173.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>15</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 65.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>16 </sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Husserl, </span><i style="font-family: arial;">Ideas</i><span style="font-family: arial;">, p. 92.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>17</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;">Marion, <i>Being Given</i>, p. 197.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>18</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 216.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>19</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 218.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>20</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>., p. 235.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>21</sup></span></span></span><span style="font-family: arial;"><i>Ibid</i>. pp. 236-238.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">OTHER REFERENCES</span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">John McDowell, "Avoiding the Myth of the Given," in <i>John McDowell: Experience, Norm, and Nature</i>, edited by Jakob Lindgard (Wiley Blackwell, 2008), online at https://cpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/voices.uchicago.edu/dist/f/106/files/2010/09/mcdowell-Avoiding-the-Myth-of-the-Given1.pdf</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Willard V.O. Quine, "Two Dogmas of Empiricism," in <i>Philosophical Review</i> 60 (1):20-43 (1951), online at http://fs2.american.edu/dfagel/www/Class%20Readings/Quine/TwoDogmasofEmpiricism.htm</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Wilfrid Sellars, "Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind," in <i>Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science, Volume I: The Foundations of Science and the Concepts of Psychology and Psychoanalysis</i>, edited by Herbert Feigl and Michael Scriven (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1956) pp. 253-329. online at http://www.ditext.com/sellars/epm.html</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><br /></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-1027749408279549072023-02-02T08:15:00.010-08:002023-06-02T16:48:46.349-07:00Jean-Luc Nancy's Being Singular Plural<span style="font-family: arial;">Jean-Luc Nancy (1940-2021) was a French philosopher who was born in Caudéran (Gironde) and died in Strasbourg. As a boy, he attended the Lycée Charles de Gaulle in Baden-Baden, Germany, where his father, who was a military engineer, served as a member of the French occupying forces in post-war Germany. In 1951, the family returned to France, and Jean-Luc attended school in Bergerac and then in Toulouse and Paris. In 1973, he completed his doctoral dissertation on Kant under the supervision of Paul Ricoeur, and he earned a doctoral degree in philosophy from the University of Paris (Sorbonne). In 1987, he earned a docteur d'état (doctor of state) degree from the University of Toulouse. His doctoral thesis was on the concept of freedom in the work of Kant, Schelling, and Heidegger, and it was published as <i>L'expérience de la liberté</i> (<i>The Experience of Freedom</i>) in 1988. </span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Nancy taught at the Lycée Bartholdi in Colmar from 1964 to 1968, and he then became an assistant at the Institute of Philosophy at the University of Strasbourg. From 1973 to 2002, he taught as professor of philosophy at the University of Strasbourg. He was also the Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel Chair and professor of philosophy at The European Graduate School. He underwent a heart transplant in 1991 and later developed lymphoma as a result of immunosuppressive therapy. His essay <i>L’intrus</i> (2000, <i>The Intruder</i>, 2002) was a reflection on his experience as a heart transplant survivor, and it inspired a film of the same name, directed by Claire Denis in 2004. </span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Nancy had a very close longtime friendship with the philosopher and literary critic Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe (1940-2007), whom he met in 1967, and with whom he co-authored several books and essays. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> His many books included <i>Le titre de la lettre: Une lecture de Lacan</i> (co-authored with Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, <i>The Title of the Letter: A Reading of Lacan</i>, 1972), <i>L’absolu littéraire: Théorie de la littérature du romantisme allemand</i> (co-authored with Lacoue-Labarthe, 1978, <i>The Literary Absolute: The Theory of Literature in German Romanticism</i>, 1978), <i>La communauté désoeuvrée</i> (1983, <i>The Inoperative Community</i>, 1991), <i>Le sens du monde</i> (1993, <i>The Sense of the World</i>, 1998), <i>Être singulier pluriel</i> (1996, <i>Being Singular Plural</i>, 2000), <i>Déclosion: Déconstruction du christianisme, Volume 1</i> (2005, <i>Dis-Enclosure: The Deconstruction of Christianity</i>, 2008), <i>L’Adoration: Déconstruction du christianisme, volume 2</i> (2010, <i>Adoration: The Deconstruction of Christianity, </i>2012), <i>La Communauté désavouée</i> (2014, <i>The Disavowed Community</i>, 2016), and <i>Sexistence</i> (2017, <i>Sexistence</i>, 2021).<br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> <i>Être singulier pluriel</i> (<i>Being Singular Plural</i>) considers the question, "What is the meaning of Being?" by starting from Heidegger's claim that Being is constituted by being-with. Nancy looks at how being-with constitutes Being, and how the original singularity of Being is not "one," but rather a plurality of modes of being-with.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Heidegger, in <i>Sein und Zeit</i> (1927, <i>Being and Time</i>, 1962), says that Being is always the being of a being, and that <i>Dasein</i> (being-there) is the kind of being that belongs to human beings. <i>Dasein</i> is essentially constituted by <i>Mitsein</i> (being-with). <i>Mit-anderen-sein</i> (being with others) and <i>Mit-einander-sein</i> (being-with-one-another) also belong to the being of <i>Dasein</i>. <i>Alleinsein </i>(being alone) is a deficient mode of <i>Mitsein</i> (being-with) and wouldn't be possible unless there were being-with.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span> Being-with is an essential constituent of being-in-the-world (<i>In-der-Welt-sein</i>), and only through understanding our own being-with can we come to understand our own being-in-the-world.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Nancy thus considers how the meaning of Being is put into play as being-with. All being is determined in its Being as being-with-one-another, he says.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span> If Being is being-with, then it is the "with" that constitutes Being.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3 </sup></span></span></span>Being as being-with is Being whose essence is "with."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span> The "with" of Being, of the singular and plural, is the essence (and also co-essence) of Being. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Nancy's project is therefore to extend the existential analytic of </span><i style="font-family: arial;">Mitsein</i><span style="font-family: arial;"> (being-with) begun by Heidegger, by introducing a co-existential analytic, in order to show that the co-essentiality of being-with is also the co-originarity of meaning, which can only take place through a sharing of being-with.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Some key concepts in his analytic include</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><b> Meaning</b> (<b>Le sens</b>), which, according to Nancy, isn't something we can lose, because we ourselves are meaning--not in the sense that we're the content of meaning, but in the sense that we're the element in which meaning is produced and circulates.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span> "Meaning is its own communication or its own circulation," he says.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span> If we ask then, as Heidegger did, "What is the meaning of Being?", we must keep in mind that if Being is being-with, then the meaning of Being is to found in this "with," and our understanding of ourselves is to be found though our relations with others. Meaning is the sharing of Being with others.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7 </sup></span></span></span>We can find "the meaning of Being not only as the meaning of "with,"" but also as "the "with" of meaning."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><b> The creation of the world</b> (<b>La création du monde</b>) is not the creation of something from nothing. It's the space where meaning begins, and where presence explodes in the original multiplicity of its division.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span> It's the origin of each presence as originally shared. Thus, it signifies the death of God insofar as God is seen as the creator, first cause, or prime mover.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10 </sup></span></span></span>The world comes into being wherever presence is shared in its multiplicity. Since presence can only exist as co-presence, creation also means existence and co-existence. Whatever exists co-exists, and "the co-implication of existing is the sharing of the world."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><b> The origin</b> (<b>L'origine</b>) is not that from which the world comes, but rather the coming of each presence into the world, each time singular.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span> If the world is its own origin, then it occurs at each moment, each time we share the meaning of being-with. It forestalls direct access to itself by concealing itself in its multiplicity, but we have access to its truth as often as we are in one another's presence.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13 </sup></span></span></span>It's also irreducibly plural, and it's "the indefinitely unfolding and variously multiplied <b>intimacy</b> of the world."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>14</sup></span></span></span> Indeed, the world has no other origin than this singular multiplicity of origins.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><b> Intimacy (Intimité)</b> is a relation in which Being coincides with Being. It's a relation to ourselves, rather than a relation to others. It's also a co-existence of origins in which our own being-with (<i>étre-avec</i>) is a being-many (<i>être-à-plusieurs</i>). It's a relation in which we see in our own existence the originary coexistence of others. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><b> Being singular plural</b> (<b>Être singulier pluriel</b>) is Being as being-with or being-with-one-another. It's therefore plurally singular and singularly plural.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>15 </sup></span></span></span>The terms "Being," "singular," and "plural" can be rearranged in any order, and none of them precedes or grounds the other. Each of them designates the co-essence of the others.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>16</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span style="font-family: arial;"><sup><br /></sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></sup></span></span></span><b>Community</b> (<b>Communauté</b>) is constituted by the "with" of our being-with. It's our being-with (<i>étre-avec</i>) or being-together (<i>être-ensemble</i>). It's also our co-appearing (<i>comparution</i>) with one another. It's also our having-in-common something or being-in-common in some way. But it's not a matter of being "one," because our being-with is both singular and plural.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> In his essay, <i>Eulogy for the Mêlée </i>(2000), Nancy asks "What is a community?", and he answers, "What we have in common is also what distinguishes and differentiates us. What I have in common with another Frenchman is the fact of not being the same Frenchman as him, and the fact that our "Frenchness" is never, nowhere, in no essence, in no figure, brought to completion.".<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>17</sup></span></span></span> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> In his book <i>The Inoperative Community </i>(2001), Nancy also says that when we think we have lost our sense of community, our community may not actually have taken place. We ourselves may be lost, rather than our community. "Community is always what takes place through others and for others."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>18</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><b> Critique</b> (<b>La Critique</b>) may be social, political, aesthetic, or philosophical. It may also be revolutionary or reformist, but it presupposes the possibility of unveiling the intelligibility of the real.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>19 </sup></span></span></span>It's an activity whose theory and practice, according to Nancy, must be supported not by an ontology of the Other and the Same, but by an ontology of being-with-one-another.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>20</sup></span></span></span> "The subject of ontology first of all entails the critical examination of the conditions</span><span style="font-family: arial;"> of critique."</span><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>21 </sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Thus, the study of those conditions is what constitutes "first philosophy."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><b> First Philosophy</b> (<b>Philosophie Première</b>) is a way of thinking about the meaning of Being without presupposing anything. "The most formal and fundamental requirement [of ontology]," says Nancy, "is that "Being" cannot be assumed to be the simple singular that the name seems to indicate. Its being singular is plural."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>22 </sup></span></span></span>Thus, the singular plural essence of Being is the foundation of first philosophy.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><b> Language</b> (<b>Le langage</b>) is the exposing of plural singularity. It's not inside the world, but is the outside of the world in the world.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>23</sup></span></span></span> In it, being is exposed as meaning, that is, as the originary sharing according to which beings relate to one another.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>24</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><b> Touch</b> (<b>Le Toucher</b>) is the contact that human beings have with one another. But contact is beyond connection or separation. Contiguity or proximity may occur between a singular being and another, but not continuity, in the sense that contiguity or proximity reveal the separation that opens up. "All of being is in touch with all of being," says Nancy, "but the law of touching is separation.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>25</sup></span></span></span> A touch of meaning brings singularity into play, but it also brings into play the plurality of other touches of meaning. Touching is both singular and plural, and thus it takes place as being-with.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> In his book<i> Noli me tangere: On the raising of the Body </i>(2008), Nancy refers to what Jesus said to Mary Magdalene after he had risen from the dead, "Touch me not." But Nancy says that in a certain sense, nothing and no one is untouchable in Christianity. Even the body and blood of Christ are given to be eaten and drunk. In a certain sense, then, Christianity is a "religion of touch, of the sensible, of presence that is immediate to the body and heart."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>26</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><b> The deconstruction of Christianity</b> (<b>La déconstruction du Christianisme</b>) reveals that the commandment to "love your neighbor as yourself" privileges love for oneself as a model for loving others. We're told to love others by imitating the love we have for ourselves. But this kind of love is not some possible kind of relation, says Nancy, because it designates the relation of one to another as the infinite relation of the same to the same as originarily other than itself.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Nancy also says that the "Self" is not a relation of a "me" to itself (""Soi" n'est pas in rapport d'un "moi" à soi-meme"<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>27</sup></span></span></span>). The Self is more originary than "me" and "you."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>28</sup></span></span></span> It's primarily the "as such" of Being in general. "Prior to "me" and "you," "the "Self" is like a "we" that is neither a collective subject nor "intersubjectivity," but rather...the plural fold of the origin."<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>29</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> He also explains that "we" always expresses a plurality. But even if it's not articulated as such, "we" is the condition for the possibility of every "I." Thus, "From the very start, the structure of the "Self," even considered as a kind of unique and solitary "self," is the structure of the "with.""<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>30</sup></span></span></span> </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div></div></div></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup><br /></sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><div>FOOTNOTES</div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Martin Heidegger, <i>Being and Time</i>, translated by Joan Stambaugh (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996), p. 113.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span>Jean-Luc Nancy, <i>Being Singular Plural</i>, translated by Robert D. Richardson and Anne E. O'Byrne (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000), p. 32.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 30.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 33.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., pp. 1-2.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 2.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 2.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid.</i>, p. 37</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 3.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>10</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 15.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>11</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 29.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>12</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 12.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>13</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 13</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>14</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 12.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>15</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 28.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>16</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 37.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>17</sup></span></span></span>Jean-Luc Nancy, "Eulogy for the Mêlée," in <i>Being Singular Plural</i>, p. 154.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>18</sup></span></span></span>Nancy, <i>The Inoperative Community</i>, translated by Peter Connor, Lisa Garbus, Michael Holland, and Simona Sawhney (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1991), p. 15.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>19</sup></span></span></span><i>Being Singular Plural</i>, p. 54.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>20</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 53</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>21</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 57.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>22</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 56.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>23</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 108.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>24</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 84.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>25</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 5.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>26</sup></span></span></span>Jean-Luc Nancy, <i>Noli me tangere: On the raising of the Body</i>, translated by Sarah Clift, Pascale-Anne Brault, and Michael Naas (New York: Fordham University Press, 2008), p. 14.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>27</sup></span></span></span>Nancy, <i>Être singulier pluriel</i> (Paris: Éditions Galilée, 1996), p. 118.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>28</sup></span></span></span>Nancy, <i>Being SIngular Plural</i>, p. 94.</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>29</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 94</div><div><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>30</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>, p. 96.</div></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup><br /></sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div></div></div></div></div><div><div><div><br /></div></div></div></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-43151297580093867462023-01-24T12:16:00.008-08:002023-02-02T14:46:28.055-08:00Shouldn't Professional Sports Teams Employ Sports Ethicists?<span style="font-family: arial;">During the AFC divisional playoff game on January 21, 2023 between the Kansas City Chiefs and Jacksonville Jaguars, quarterback Patrick Mahomes sprained his right ankle in the first quarter and was sidelined for the rest of the first half. When he returned to the game in the second half, he was still limping, and was obviously limited by his injury, but he eventually led Kansas City to a 27-20 victory. Should coach Andy Reid have allowed Mahomes to stay in the game? Was Reid more concerned with winning the game than with protecting his quarterback from further injury? Should Mahomes have insisted on staying in the game, when his backup, Chad Henne, had been effective in leading the team on a 98-yard touchdown drive in the second quarter? Was it inspiring and admirable for Mahomes to insist on staying in the game or was it merely a foolish gamble that risked worsening his injury and keeping him out of the AFC championship game? (It was later revealed that he had a high ankle sprain and would be able to play against the Cincinnati Bengals for the AFC championship the following week)</span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Such questions, many of them ethical in one way or another, are encountered every day in professional sports. Shouldn't professional sports teams employ professional ethicists to advise them how to respond to such questions?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> There are so many examples of bad behavior by professional athletes--taunting, bullying, trash talking, showboating, excessive celebrating, etc.--why wouldn't the employment of professional ethicists by sports teams be helpful in promoting better sportsmanship? Why hasn't the employment of philosophical ethicists been more seriously considered by professional sports leagues in order to improve responses to the many ethical issues in sports? Why wouldn't consultation with sports ethicists be helpful in promoting more ethical conduct by league management, team management, players, and fans?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Why should we as sports fans have to accept bad behavior by professional athletes as an inevitable aspect of athletic competition? It's not! </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Is bad behavior among professional athletes a racial or cultural issue? It shouldn't be, but black NFL players are more likely to be suspended than white players,<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span> and Latino MLB players are more likely to be suspended for using performance enhancing drugs (PEDs) than white or African-American players (this may partly be due to the fact that PEDs are much more available to baseball players in some countries in Latin America<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span>). There may be other factors, but racial profiling and implicit bias also need to be considered as factors in what gets labeled as "bad behavior" and what disciplinary punishment is administered. An example is that NFL referees are far more likely to penalize black players for excessively celebrating than they are to penalize white players.<span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Is bad behavior a matter of educational disparities among professional athletes? It shouldn't be. Most professional athletes have a college education or college degree. (Black athletes may, however, be more commonly subjected to bad behavior by fans, such as racist taunts and verbal abuse).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Why aren't academic philosophy programs more interested in training philosophers as sports ethicists? Although many university programs offer (or have offered) undergraduate courses in the ethics of sport, including (to name just a few) UNC, Duke, George Mason, Georgia, Penn State, Arizona State, Ohio University, Colorado, Texas, Texas State, Rice, Santa Clara, SUNY, Alabama, and Kansas, how many of their graduate students actually go on to specialize in sports ethics? Why haven't more philosophers written about issues in sports ethics? Why hasn't philosophy become more engaged with professional sports, and why hasn't it been more interested in having some impact on professional sports, given that sports constitute one of the most important spheres of American society and culture?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> On the other hand, there are a significant number of philosophers who do specialize in the philosophy of sport, including (to name just a few) Heather Reid (Exedra Mediterranean Center), Emily Ryall (University of Gloucestershire), Jan Boxill (UNC), Shawn Klein (Arizona State), John William Devine (Swansea University), Francisco Javier Lopez Frias (Penn State), Michael McNamee (Swansea), William J. Morgan (University of British Columbia), Cesar Torres (SUNY Brockport), Jeffrey Fry (Ball State), Douglas Hochstettler (James Madison), Leon Culbertson (Edge Hill), Tim Elcombe (Wilfrid Laurier University), Dale Murray (Wisconsin-Platteville), Grant Farred (Cornell), Erin Tarver (Emory), Jason Holt (Acadia), R. Scott Kretchmar (Penn State), Drew Hyland (Trinity College), David Papineau (Kings College London), David Cruise Malloy (University of Regina), Angela Schneider (Western), Pam Sailors (Missouri State), Sarah Teetzel (Manitoba), Mizuho Takemura (Nihon Fukushi), Irena Martinkova (Charles University in Prague), Leslie Howe (Saskatchewan), and Robert Simon (1941-2018, Hamilton College).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Academic journals concerned with sports ethics include <i>Sport, Ethics and Philosophy</i>, and <i>Journal of the Philosophy of Sport</i>.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Professional societies concerned with the philosophy of sport include the British Philosophy of Sport Association, the International Association for the Philosophy of Sport, and the European Association for the Philosophy of Sport.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Some examples of cases in which the advice of trained ethicists might be useful for professional sports teams include:</span></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-family: arial;">responding to patterns of unsportsmanlike conduct by athletes (In the NFL, some examples of unsportsmanlike conduct include unnecessary roughness, making a horse-collar tackle, grabbing an opponent's face mask, making an illegal crackback block, tackling an opponent who has signaled a fair catch, lowering one's head to make helmet contact with an opponent, roughing the passer, roughing the kicker, taunting, throwing a punch at an opponent, kicking an opponent, and shoving, pushing, or hitting a referee.)</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">responding to cheating, substance abuse, and use of PEDs</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">responding to off-the-court or off-the-field issues of personal misconduct (such as DUI, domestic violence, sexual harassment, and sexual assault)</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">responding to issues involving gamesmanship (such as trash talking, intentionally annoying or distracting an opponent, faking being fouled in order to draw a penalty on the other team, and intentionally slowing down or disrupting the flow of a game)</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">responding to racial, gender, or sexual discrimination (e.g. in the hiring and promotion of players, coaches, league officials, and team management personnel)</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">responding to issues involving the inclusion of transgender athletes in women's sports</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">responding to issues involving the safety of athletes and fans (such as the use of protective equipment, concussion protocols, protection of injured athletes from further injury, protection of athletes from sexual abuse or harassment by coaches or trainers, providing security for locker room and training facilities, providing protective barriers for fans, etc.)</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">responding to intentional "tanking" by teams involving the removal or trading away of key players from team lineups in order to lose more games and obtain higher draft picks</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">responding to misconduct by fans (such as disorderly conduct, intoxication, fighting, throwing objects at players or onto the field, taunting players, taunting other fans, and using profane or abusive language)</span></li></ul></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Professional ethicists could be useful advisers or co-workers in the management of many of these problems, and could help to promote social responsibility and ethical integrity in professional sports.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">FOOTNOTES</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Benjamin D. Rosenberg, "The NFL Has a Race-Related Suspension Problem," in <i>Psychology Today</i>, July 14, 2020, online at https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/head-games/202007/the-nfl-has-race-related-suspension-problem</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span>James Wagner, "The Dominican Republic Loves Baseball, but Steroid Problems Run Deep," in <i>The New York Times</i>, Nov. 4, 2022, online at https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/04/sports/baseball/jenrry-mejia-dominican-republic-steroids.html</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span>Dwayne Bray, "NFL referees penalize Black players for celebrating far more than White players," in <i>Andscape</i>, November 17, 2022, online at https://andscape.com/features/nfl-referees-penalize-black-players-for-celebrating-far-more-than-white-players/</span></div><div><br /></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-5807999871593491082023-01-18T12:47:00.001-08:002023-02-11T08:29:56.757-08:00Apophatic Eternalism in Theology<span style="font-family: arial;">Eternalism in theology may explore the eternal nature of God or ultimate reality, and it may hold that there are eternal truths or realities in God and/or eternal essences or principles in the universe. It may be distinguished from eternalism in the philosophy of time (which is opposed to presentism, and which holds that not only present objects, but also past and future objects exist).</span><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Apophatic or negative eternalism in theology may be a branch of apophatic or negative theology that attempts to better understand the eternal nature of God's existence by understanding what it is not (just as apophatic or negative theology attempts to better understand God by understanding what God is not).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Negative theology may attempt to formulate true propositions about who or what God is by formulating propositions about who or what God is not. On the other hand, negative theology may also hold that since God transcends our understanding, we can never fully establish the truth of any propositions about God. Thus, any real knowledge or adequate understanding of who or what God is may be impossible.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Negative theology may also hold that since we can't fully understand who or what God is, we can't predicate any positive attributes or properties of God. We can only predicate negative attributes or properties (or say what God is not).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Similarly, one kind of apophatic eternalism in theology may attempt to better understand the concept of eternal life by understanding what it is not. By making negative statements about eternal life and what it is not, apophatic eternalism may attempt to arrive at a cataphatic or positive understanding of what eternal life is and what it consists of.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> In the Christian faith, this may mean that one way of understanding the meaning of a "resurrected life" or "resurrection life" may be to try to understand what it is not (an earthly life as lived before, a life without redemption from sin, a life without hope or understanding, a life without spiritual transformation).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Another kind of apophatic eternalism in theology may attempt to to clarify the sense in which God's existence is eternal, by clarifying the sense in which it is not (eternally changing or unchanging, eternally present in all things or in only some things, for example).</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"> Apophatic eternalism may be motivated by uncertainty, doubt, or skepticism about the existence of God, by perplexity, puzzlement, or suspension of judgment about the concept of eternal life, or by the perception that we need to reexamine the meaning of statements about attaining eternal life and becoming one with God in eternity. It may therefore also be motivated by the perception that we need to clarify the meaning, use, and purpose of religious language about such concepts. The meaning of the term "eternal life" may be ineffable and indefinable (because the nature of that life may not be totally clear to us during our present lives), and just as we may differ in our understanding of what we mean by the word "God," so we may also differ in our understanding of what we mean by terms such as "eternal life," "the afterlife," "life after death," and "life beyond death."</span></div><div><br /></div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-5258616660591940712023-01-10T13:17:00.004-08:002023-01-11T13:31:36.397-08:00Some Defects of Moral Particularism<div>Moral particularism may be described as the position that our moral thinking should be guided by the morally relevant features of particular cases or situations, rather than by general principles of conduct. The particularist can always find exceptions to moral principles or can find cases in which those principles may be inapplicable, misleading, or insufficient. The particularist therefore contends that our moral judgments are always context-dependent, and that the rightness or wrongness of our moral judgments depends on the relevant features of each particular case or situation, rather than the application of moral principles to that particular case or situation. </div><div> Pekka Vӓyrynen (2011) describes three kinds of particularism: (1) the position that there are no true or valid moral principles, (2) the position that there's no good evidence for their existence, and (3) the position that our moral thinking in no way depends on their existence.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span> He explains that a prominent argument for particularism is the argument from "holism," that a moral reason to perform an action in a particular context may not be a reason to perform that action in another context, while the argument from "atomism" may say to the contrary that a moral reason to perform an action in a particular context may also be a reason to perform that action in another context.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Jonathan Dancy (2004) distinguishes between holism and atomism by saying that holism is the claim that a moral reason in one case may be no reason at all (or even a contrary reason) in another case, while "full atomism" is the claim that a moral reason in one case must remain a reason, and must retain the same reason-giving polarity, in every other case. He distinguishes between "full atomism" and "cluster atomism" (the claim that features occur in clusters, and that if all the features in one case are relevantly similar to the features in another case, then any feature that is a reason in one will be a reason in the other.) However, he notes that an argument against cluster atomism is that the polarity of features in a cluster could be affected by changes in the polarity of features in a relevantly similar cluster. A weaker form of atomism would merely claim that if two cases are relevantly similar, then whatever features are reasons in one case will also be reasons in the other.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Dancy also distinguishes between theoretical reasons and practical reasons, and between reasons for belief and reasons for action. He explains that the kind of holism he advocates is intended to hold for both sides of each distinction.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span> </div><div> Michael Ridge and Sean McKeever (2016) explain that the particularist argument from holism has been rejected by generalists who question the sustainability of the distinction between the particular features of a situation that count as reasons and the contextual factors (defeaters, enablers, etc.) that impact whether they do indeed count as reasons. The context-sensitivity of reasons depends on this distinction in order to explain why some particular feature of a situation that counts as a reason in one context may not count as a reason in another context.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Ridge and McKeever also explain that generalists have rejected the argument from holism on the grounds that it may not be able to explain how reasons, enablers, defeaters, intensifiers/attenuators, etc. actually combine or interact with one another.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Even if we grant that moral principles may not always be generalizable, there are other arguments to be made against particularism, however.</div><div> In Act 1, Scene 3 of <i>Hamlet</i>, Polonius gives his son Laertes the following advice, as Laertes prepares to leave for France:</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Give thy thoughts no tongue.</i></div><div><i>Nor any unproportion'd thought his act.</i></div><div><i>Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.</i></div><div><i>Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,</i></div><div><i>Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;</i></div><div><i>But do not dull thy palm with entertainment</i></div><div><i>Of each new-hatch’d, unfledged comrade. Beware</i></div><div><i>Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in,</i></div><div><i>Bear’t that the opposed may beware of thee.</i></div><div><i>Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice;</i></div><div><i>Take each man’s censure, but reserve thy judgment.</i></div><div><i>Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,</i></div><div><i>But not express’d in fancy; rich, not gaudy;</i></div><div><i>For the apparel oft proclaims the man,</i></div><div><i>And they in France of the best rank and station</i></div><div><i>Are of a most select and generous chief in that.</i></div><div><i>Neither a borrower nor a lender be;</i></div><div><i>For loan oft loses both itself and friend,</i></div><div><i>And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.</i></div><div><i>This above all: to thine own self be true,</i></div><div><i>And it must follow, as the night the day,</i></div><div><i>Thou canst not then be false to any man.</i></div><div><br /></div><div> While we might question the generalizability of any or all of these principles, the possibility that they might convey some moral wisdom would seem to be denied by particularism. Indeed, particularism doesn't seem to allow for moral instruction from any general principles of fairness, honesty, loyalty, prudence, humility, and so on. However, further examination of the extent to which such principles actually promote virtuous conduct might provide some evidence for their validity.</div><div> On the other hand, a particularist virtue ethics (virtue ethical particularism) may seek to understand the way in which moral virtues may be expressed by judgments that depend on the relevant features of each particular case or situation. In such an ethics, the rightness or wrongness of actions may depend on the degree to which those actions express moral virtues rather than the degree to which they conform to general principles of conduct.</div><div> Another defect of particularism, however, is that it doesn't seem to allow for the fact that some principles may accommodate contextual variability and may not necessarily be rigid and inflexible. Some principles may appropriately yield or defer to other principles of wider application or higher priority.</div><div> Another defect of particularism is that it doesn't seem to allow for the possibility of moral learning and experience, and for the generalizability of what has been learned from previous relevant cases. Vӓyrynen (2011) explains that particularists may reply that discovering the morally relevant features of a particular case may enable us to learn what kinds of features may be relevant in subsequent cases. However, it's still difficult to see how this can happen without grasping some generally applicable principles.<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span></div><div> </div><div><div></div><div><br /></div><div>FOOTNOTES</div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Pekka Vӓyrynen, "Moral Particularism," in <i>The Continuum Companion to Ethics</i>, edited by Christian Miller (New York: Continuum, 2011), p. 251.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 253.</div></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span>Jonathan Dancy, <i>Ethics Without Principles</i> (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2004), p. 94.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 74.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span>Michael Ridge and Sean McKeever, "Moral Particularism and Moral Generalism," in <i>Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy</i> (2016), online at https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-particularism-generalism/.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span>Vӓyrynen, p. 258.</div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4692831238593656824.post-72250609197028823462022-12-12T16:05:00.012-08:002023-04-16T09:15:13.592-07:00Pascal's PenseésBlaise Pascal was a French mathematician, physicist, and religious philosopher who was born in 1623 in Clermont (now Clermont-Ferrand) and died in 1662 in Paris (at the age of 39, probably of tuberculosis and stomach cancer). His father Étienne (1588-1651) was a government official, and his mother Antoinette (1596-1626) was the daughter of a merchant in Clermont. She died when Blaise was three years old. He had two sisters, Gilberte (1620-1687) and Jacqueline (1625-1661). He was educated by his father, and at a young age he distinguished himself as a mathematician. In 1651, his father Étienne died, and his sister Jacqueline entered the Jansenist convent at Port-Royal. Jansenism was a theological movement named after the Dutch Catholic Bishop of Ypres in Flanders, Cornelis Jansen (in Latin, <i>Cornelius Jansenius</i>, 1585-1638), whose writings emphasized the importance of original sin, the necessity of divine grace, and the predestination of some, but not everyone, to be chosen for salvation. It was declared a heresy by Pope Innocent X in 1653. In 1654, Blaise had an intense religious experience that caused him to convert to Jansenism, and he joined his sister Jacqueline at Port-Royal. His subsequent writings included the <i>Lettres Provinciales</i> (<i>Provincial Letters</i>, 1656-57), which attacked the teachings of the Jesuits and defended Jansenism, and the <i>Penseés </i>(<i>Thoughts</i>, 1670), which were fragments of a projected defense of Christianity.<div> The <i>Penseés</i> are a series of aphorisms or reflections, varying in length from a single sentence to more than twenty paragraphs, and numbering 923 in all. They are divided into thirteen sections, on such topics as "The Misery of Man without God," "Morality and Doctrine," and "The Fundamentals of the Christian Religion," with an appended fourteenth section of "Polemical Fragments," addressing the controversy between the Jesuits and the Jansenists.</div><div> Pascal attacks those philosophers who teach the goodness of human nature, and who see the highest good as the good to be found within ourselves, thereby placing us on an equal level with God. He argues that human nature has been corrupted by original sin. We're all born into sin, and we're obligated to resist or overcome it. He therefore condemns self-love (<i>amour-propre</i>), insofar as it reflects self-will rather than divine will, and insofar as it reflects love of self rather than love of God. He says that we can be blinded by self-love and by the instinct to place ourselves on an equal level with God (492). Indeed, we're so full of faults and imperfections that it's difficult to understand how we can feel such love for ourselves, given that we don't often feel the same kind of love for others (100).</div><div> Since we're often blinded by self-love and self-will, the nature of God is largely hidden from us. Just as God may be infinitely knowing, God may be infinitely incomprehensible to us. The fact that there are many other religions besides Christianity is also a sign that God's nature may be hidden from us. If God's nature were apparent and manifest, then there might be only one religion that humanity would feel called to follow (585).</div><div> However, Pascal also says that God is within us. The kingdom of God is within us, just as the universal good (<i>le bien universel</i>) is within us (485). But the universal good is to be found within us only insofar as God is to be found within us. Thus, "Happiness is neither without us nor within us. It is in God, both without us and within us" (465).<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span> Jesus Christ the Redeemer can be found within us, and can be found within all persons (785).</div><div> Pascal affirms the centrality of Christ to our knowledge of God. "Not only do we know God by Jesus Christ alone, but we know ourselves only by Jesus Christ...Apart from Jesus Christ, we do not know what is our life, nor our death, nor God, nor ourselves" (547).<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span> "It is not only impossible but useless to know God without Jesus Christ" ("<i>Il n'est seulement impossible, mais inutile de connaître Dieu sans Jesus-Christ</i>,<i>" </i>548).<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Reason (<i>la raison</i>) and feeling (<i>le sentiment</i>) may be seen as competing impulses in human nature. Reason may act methodically and deliberately, while feeling may act quickly and spontaneously (252). Faith is to be found in feeling, since reason ultimately can't prove the truths of faith and religion. "If we must not act except on certainty," says Pascal, then "we ought not to act on religion, for it is not certain.. But...there is more certainty in religion than there is as to whether we may see tomorrow" (234).<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span> We should therefore avoid both the extreme of depending on reason alone and the extreme of depending on intuition or feeling alone (253). </div><div> Faith is a gift from God, rather than a gift from reasoning (279). However, faith isn't contrary to reason, and it doesn't call us to disobey reason. Indeed, "Reason commands us far more imperiously than a master, for in disobeying the one we are unfortunate, but in disobeying the other we are fools," (345).<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span> Having faith doesn't mean being blind to reason or to the evidence of sensory experience. Faith tells us what we can't confirm by sensory experience, but it doesn't contradict what we can confirm by sensory experience (265).</div><div> Reason tells us when we should submit to feeling. Indeed, reason tells us that there are an infinity of things that surpass our understanding, and that there are matters that can only be resolved by faith or feeling. "Reason would never submit if it did not judge that there are occasions on which it ought to submit. It is then right for it to submit when it judges that it ought to submit" (270).<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span> Thus, "There is nothing so conformable to reason as this disavowal of reason" (272),<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span> and "All our reasoning [therefore] reduces itself to yielding to feeling" (274).<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span></div><div> Pascal also argues that it is the heart and not the faculty of reasoning (<i>raisonnement</i>) that experiences God. "This, then, is faith, God felt by the heart, not by reason" (278).<span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span> The heart has its own reasons for feeling, which can't be known solely by the intellect (277, 283). Thus, we can know truth not only by reason, but also by the heart (282). The heart can provide access to truth, just as reason can provide access to truth.</div><div> Pascal argues that even if we can't prove that God exists, we can still choose whether to believe or disbelieve in God's existence by weighing the potential gains or losses to be obtained from making either of these two choices. This is known as Pascal's wager--the decision to affirm or deny the existence of God (233). Practically speaking, we can't merely sit on the fence and be skeptical or agnostic. We have to make a choice, and Pascal's argument for affirming the existence of God is that we have much more to gain by believing than by disbelieving in God's existence.</div><div><br /></div><div>FOOTNOTES</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup><br /></sup></span></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>1</sup></span></span></span>Blaise Pascal, <i>Pascal's Penseés</i>, translated by W.F. Trotter (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1958), p. 111.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>2</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 126.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>3</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 126.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>4</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 59.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>5</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 82.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>6</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 67.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>7</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 67.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>8</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibi</i>d., p. 67.</div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><span face=""arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif"><sup>9</sup></span></span></span><i>Ibid</i>., p. 68.</div>http://philosophyreaders.blogspot.com/http://www.blogger.com/profile/05058287747921096519noreply@blogger.com0