Patients’ experience of symptoms does not follow the body–mind divide that characterizes the classification of disease in the health care system. Therefore, understanding patients in their entirety rather than in parts demands a different theoretical approach. Attempts have been made to formulate such approaches but many of these, such as the biopsychosocial model, are still basically dualistic or methodologically reductionist. In primary care, patients often present with diffuse symptoms, making primary care the ideal environment for understanding patients’ undifferentiated symptoms and (...) disease patterns which could readily fit both bodily and mental categories. In this article we discuss theoretical models that have attempted to overcome this challenge: The psychosomatic approach could be called holistic in the sense of taking an anti-dualistic stance. Primary care theorists have formulated integrative views but these have not gained a foothold in primary care medicine. McWhinney introduced a new metaphor, ‘the body–mind’, and Rudebeck advocated cultivating ‘bodily empathy’. These views have much in common with both phenomenological thinking and mentalization, a psychological concept for understanding others. In the process of understanding patients there is a need for the physician to enter an intersubjectivity that aims at understanding the patient’s experiences and sensations without initially jumping to diagnostic conclusions or into a division into mental and physical phenomena. Mentalization theory could form the basis of an approach to a more comprehensive understanding of patients. The success of such an approach is, however, dependent upon structural and organizational conditions that do not counteract it. (shrink)

Two questions are central to the “rationality debate” in the philosophy of social science. First, should we acknowledge differences in basic norms of epistemic and agential rationality, or in the content of perceptual experience, as the “best explanation” of radical differences in belief and practice? Second, can genuine understanding be achieved between cultures and research traditions that so differ in their beliefs and practices? I survey a number of responses to these questions, and suggest that one of these, “dialogical optimism”, (...) while attractive, is in need of further clarification. Such clarification may be forthcoming if we attend to recent work by John McDowell. McDowell claims that perceptual experience, as our primary mode of epistemic access to the world, must be located within what Sellars termed the “space of reasons” if we are to make sense of our conception of ourselves as thinking creatures. I develop a reading of this claim in terms of a fundamental duality in human perceptual experience, and use this conception of experience to illuminate the dialogical optimist strategy in the rationality debate. (shrink)

Hans-Georg Gadamer held that the chief task of philosophy today is to defend practical reason against the encroachments of techno-scientific rationality and thereby to ground the possibility for a philosophical ethics. Although this is well-known and much discussed in the secondary literature, there is curiously sparse discussion of just what Gadamer took ethical inquiry to be. The little discussion that exists tends either to neglect Gadamer's distinction between practical reasoning and philosophical ethics, or it accuses Gadamer himself of conflating the (...) two. This paper provides a sketch of Gadamer's understanding of ethics in a way that makes clear how it differs from practical reasoning. (shrink)

This paper delineates a postmodern discourse analysis that is positioned within a semiotic theory of language. This theory of language foregrounds the performative aspects of language usage and provides the theoretical space from which to theorize the interrelationship between social organizations or structure and social agents or individuals. Our version of discourse analysis contends that social structure is enacted (production and reproduction) through the employment of various vocabularies: social structure is not something outside of, behind, or underneath these performances, and (...) we argue that social organization is not produced by external structures operating upon or causing people to adopt certain behaviours. Rather, social structure is an effect of taking up practices and reproducing and modifying them. From this perspective, individuals are constituted by being recruited into and reproducing discursive practices. Hence, by looking at the actual employment of language – its tactical, practice dimensions – one can avoid the usual binary of seeing the person as either the autonomous origin of his or her experience or the ideological pawn of social determination. This methodology calls into question how the narratives or stories that individuals recount are imbricated within relational plays of power, and concomitantly, how subjects reauthorize their own positions. We assert that the methodological challenges of research addressing social injustice cannot be reduced to either: (i) interpersonal relationships between researcher and participants, or (ii) relegated to ‘social structures’ acting upon or outside of individuals. (shrink)

This article explores the place of complexity science within education and educational research. The discussion begins with the suggestion that educational research has a history of adopting interpretive frames from other domains with little adaptation. Complexity science is argued to compel a different sort of positioning, one that requires accommodation and participation rather than unproblematized assimilation and application. The argument is developed by considering the following simultaneities in education (and) research: knower and knowledge; transphenomenality; transdisciplinarity; interdiscursivity; descriptive and pragmatic insights; (...) representation and presentation; affect and effect; and education and research. (shrink)

Instrumentalism as a theory of practical reasoning has been both widely held and difficult to dethrone. The theory holds that good practical reasoning need only involve determining suitable means to pre-determined ends. The theory is difficult to dethrone because critiques of it tend to specify aspects of reasoning that either do not seem practical, strictly speaking, or can be re-described as a series of episodes of means-end reasoning. Either way, instrumentalism dodges these criticisms raised against it. This paper presents a (...) phenomenological argument that cannot be so dodged. The argument is this: practical reasoning is not merely instrumental because our considering an exemplary means to some end sometimes modifies our concept of that end within one and the same episode of practical deliberation. Such modification is possible because in any exercise of reason in which we apply a concept to a particular, the exemplarity of the particular can imbue our concept with new meaning. If exemplary means can modify our practical ends in this way, then instrumentalism is false. (shrink)

The belief that we are living in a post-truth age raises a number of complex, paradoxical questions. Does it suggest, for example, that truth no longer matters? Or, that the idea of truth no longer exists? The university, of course, has long been associated with the interests of truth – not only in searching for truth, but in telling the truth. This is made evident in its emphasis on logic, rationality, deliberation, debate, reason, contemplation, reflection and academic freedom. Truth, and (...) its ensuing perspectives, perceptions, agreements and conflicts, are what makes a university what it is. As such, the university is as enmeshed in versions of truth, as it is in versions of power – which serves only to confirm the necessity for a continuous interrogation of these truths, and hence, power. In principle, academic freedom infers that both members of staff and students at universities have the right to engage in intellectual engagement and debate, without fear of censorship. In practice, however, when we take stock of academic freedom in spaces of higher education, we see growing patterns of shutting down, and closing off, rather than opening up. The interest of this article, therefore, is to consider how the university can remain discursively open to that which is new, unfamiliar and unpopular, while simultaneously, doing no harm – either to itself or its students. (shrink)

Our purpose in this article is to explore the reasons for the continued attractiveness of Simmel's thought today and to probe the contemporary affinities to his philosophical stance towards the world. Simmel anchored the ‘philosophical attitude' in the philosopher’s particularly developed disposition for Erlebnis, i.e. the unified pre-conceptual experience of each moment of reality and life, as well as in a particular mode of objectivating this experience. We provide an illustration of such an approach and its implications through Simmel's analysis (...) of ‘remoteness from oneself’ and the restlessness it entails in The Philosophy of Money. We argue that Simmel's attempt at phenomenologically unveiling the contours and depths of life moments and fragments, as well as his emphasis on constant movement, provide much reassurance to contemporary subjectivities. But his philosophical stance is also driven by a quasi-mystical yearning for the One that lies beneath and beyond the fragments. We propose an initial assessment of the main implications of such a stance by relating it to the philosophical path it opened up and by placing it in what we understand to be the new philosophical situation today. (shrink)

The essay seeks to vindicate the importance of the humanities or liberal arts deriving from their crucial contribution to the ‘humanization of humanity.’ This vindication is timely in view of the widespread curtailment of humanistic or liberal education in many institutions of higher learning. It is also timely as a pedagogical antidote to the fascination with violence in our world (which often culminates in ‘crimes against humanity’). In a first step, the paper traces the historical development of the humanities or (...) liberal arts in the West. Next, I highlight some crucial features of humanistic education: the emphasis on ethical and character formation; the fine-tuning of moral judgment; and the cultivation of a sensus communis. Another central feature is that such education offers a counterpoint to the overwhelming preoccupation today with career training and utilitarian objectives. In the words of Martha Nussbaum: it is ‘not for profit,’ but serves an intrinsic good. In this respect, humanistic pedagogy bears a close affinity to the needed education for democracy and world citizenship. (shrink)

This paper describes findings of a research inquiry into the lived experience of homelessness in Peel, a suburban region located in the Greater Toronto Area in Ontario, Canada. It is based on the data from a collaborative project undertaken by members of the Faculties of Health and Education of York University with two local community organizations. The dominant theme of the narratives was that suburban homelessness is similar to being engulfed in a grotto of poverty , isolated from the rest (...) of the community and invisible to it. Once entrapped in the grotto, it is almost impossible to escape from it. There were four sub-themes: (a) falling into the grotto , (b) living/struggling in the grotto , (c) envisioning escape routes from the grotto, and (d) beauty, community and hope in the grotto . Following a discussion of the findings, researchers describe strategies to address homelessness through promotion of social justice for all. (shrink)

At the heart of Paul Ricoeur’s hermeneutic phenomenology of religion one discovers a commitment to the diversity of religious expression. This commitment is grounded in his understanding of the linguistic and temporal conditions of religious phenomena. By exploring his contribution to the debate concerning the so-called ‘theological turn’ in French phenomenology in relation to his studies of translation, this essay explores Ricoeur’s understanding of religious phenomenality where meaning is experienced as the simultaneous advance and withdrawal of an originary event in (...) the traces of its interpretations. With such an understanding of religious phenomenality, the way is opened for philosophy of religion to advance a more robust consideration of religious diversity and, therefore, to reconsider notions of universality better suited to the things themselves. (shrink)

The study reported in this paper focused on nursing students’ learning and, in particular, their integration of caring science in theory and practice. An educational model incorporating educational drama was developed for implementation in three different teaching contexts within the nursing and midwifery study programmes at a Swedish college. A central aim was to understand the dynamics of educational drama in the healthcare context and its impact on learning and teaching. Using a phenomenological approach, seventeen students and six teachers were (...) interviewed and their experience of drama as an educational method explored.The research findings illustrate the meaning of learning and teaching that is sensitive to students’ lifeworld experiences. In order to be a successful method for closing the gap between caring science theory and practice, not only the educational drama, but teaching in general, must be anchored in the lived world of the students – that is, their experiences of health and care. While embodied reflection, as a key factor in integrating theory and practice, was shown to be well supported by educational drama, it was also found that “the method” tends too readily to take over and govern teaching and learning. The findings of this study further indicate how learning in practice and embodied reflection can be supported by the inclusion of well-chosen caring science theory to cast light on caring practice dilemmas. (shrink)

Human science researchers tend to be targeted for critique on the grounds that their approach is too individualistic to take due cognisance of societal and political influences. What is accordingly advocated is that the phenomenological and so-called romantic theories should be abandoned in favour of analytic or continental theories that have as their main focus the system, the group, the society, and the various influences of the social world on the existential reality of the individual.Without trying to invalidate these social (...) science strategies, this paper attempts to show that it is not necessary to surrender phenomenology in order to understand not only the individual, but also the social world in which individuals live. It is argued that the desired goal of a less individualistic human science’s theoretical basis can still be founded in phenomenology, in that Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy, which has its origin in Husserlian phenomenology, provides us with an adequate ontology for understanding human existence more comprehensively. Merleau-Ponty’s ontological philosophy elucidates the in-between world, that structure of existence where the individual cannot be separated from her/his world context. In his exploration of the reversibility of existence, Merleau-Ponty demonstrates that there is no ontological gulf between the individual and the social world. Instead, the world is ‘in’ the individual as much as the individual is ‘in’ the world. With this phenomenological epistemology, it is argued, it is possible to generate research that is capable “of more than a frozen existence”, as Merleau-Ponty puts it. (shrink)

The principle of openness is central to human science approaches to research where the researcher becomes closely involved with the phenomenon under study. This article addresses both the practical and theoretical challenges that confront the researcher who seeks to be open. It also clarifies the meaning of the concept of openness and considers its relationship to the ideal of objectivity. Openness, it is argued, is neither an enduring state nor a trait but requires an ongoing struggle and has different forms (...) at various stages in the research process. Integral to this process is the experience of "being in the dark" which makes it especially difficult for the researcher to remain open. Various ways of managing this experience are presented. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis special issue of Social Epistemology has its origin in two symposia organised by the Contemporary Philosophy of Technology Research Group at the University of Birmingham. These we...

The social democratic state pursued interventionism for positive political freedom, making markets adapt to the needs of a fair democratic society, with the provision of social rights. The Robbins’ Report, which inaugurated the expansion of state-funded higher education in the 1960s, held that access to higher education was a social right and that the ‘cultivation’ produced by higher education was a good in itself and the epistemic basis for a social democratic society. Despite rhetorical appeals to negative political freedom, the (...) neoliberal state is interventionist, but with interventionism to promote the economic freedom of corporations. The state adapts the market to corporate needs and seeks to force individuals to adapt to this market. The current Conservative Government is seeking to re-engineer English higher education to make it adapt more fully to enhancing the economic freedom of corporations, using audit culture and changes to the Research Councils, with the former being presented as neutral-technocratic proxies for market signals. Using Gadamer, and his Humboldtian conception of higher education, which is similar to that argued for in the Robbins Report, it is argued that such changes cause objective harm to our ‘Being’, with this inaugurating an authoritarian technocratic approach to English higher education. (shrink)

Student teachers’ experiences of professional ethics, as lived practice, need to be visualized and verbalized to support their ability to develop an ethical practice. The aim of this article is to discuss the lived experiences of professional ethics from beginning teachers’ internship, based on a phenomenological study. Some of the essential meanings are interpreted in relation to the tension between responsibility and accountability that is emerging from neoliberal influences in teacher education. Inspired by Reflective Life World Research, interviews were conducted (...) with student teachers specializing in preschool and elementary school. The empirical data was analyzed in order to determine the meanings that constitute the lived experience of professional ethics for early career teachers. By identifying the implications of professional ethics in neoliberal times, teacher educators can more easily observe and communicate the manifestations this has for teaching. Discussions and observations of professional ethics can stimulate student teachers’ learning as part of teacher education discourse. (shrink)

This essay explores the dialectics of theory and practice in terms of argumentation theory. Adapting Jonsen and Toulmin's (1988) notion of a Theory-Practice spectrum, it conceives Theory and Practice as extreme ends of a continuum and discourses as falling at various points along the continuum. Every theoritical discourse has essential practical aspects, and every practical discourse has essential theoretical aspects. Practices are theorized to varying degrees but every practice is thorized to some degree. Reflective discourse, which is discourse about practice, (...) moves to and fro along the Theory-Practice continuum. Reflective discourse involves argumentation. Practical argumentation connects theory to practice; it appeals to general warrants, which may be simple or may tap into elaborate conceptual structures, in order to establish grounds for practical judgments. A practical discipline is a relatively coherent intellectual-professional enterprise that cultivates a field of social practice by engaging within itself and with practitioners in a reflective discourse. The argumentation of a practical discipline, like ordinary practical reflection, moves to and fro along the Theory-Practice continuum but in more methodical steps informed by systematic methodological reflection on the reflective process itself. (shrink)

This essay addresses two aspects of Persson and Savulescu's case for moral enhancement: 1) the precise technological nature of ultimate harm, particularly as it applies to the ecological crisis, and 2) what is at stake in the solution they propose. My claim is that Persson and Savulescu's treatment of both issues is inadequate: the ecological crisis is a more complex phenomenon than they suppose, and more is at stake in moral enhancement than they claim. To make my case I draw (...) on the work of Hans Jonas, who presciently and insightfully dealt with related questions. Jonas’ philosophy unites bioethical, technological, and environmental concerns and so offers a useful contrast to Persson and Savulescu's proposal. If my analysis is correct then we have both practical and principled reasons to be sceptical about the prospect of moral bioenhancement, which I assume, for the sake of argument, to be feasible.1. (shrink)

This article reconsiders the relationship between Simmel and Heidegger. Scholars commonly argue that Simmel’s work on the topic of death and mortality influenced the early Heidegger’s work on the same topic, as evidenced in Being and Time. I argue however that Simmel’s work particularly in the Lebensanschauung should be read as challenging the basic presuppositions of Heidegger on death. I then compare the two on the issue of immortality in order to show that Simmel is much closer to the subsequent (...) critics of Heidegger than he is to Heidegger himself. (shrink)

In the world of Philosophy for Children (P4C), the word “method” is found frequently in its literature and in its practitioner’s handbooks. This paper focuses on the idea of community of philosophical inquiry (CPI) as P4C’s methodological framework for educational purposes, and evaluates that framework and those purposes in light of the question, what does it mean to bring children and philosophy together, and what methodological framework, if any, is appropriate to that project? Our broader aim is to highlight a (...) problem with regards to the concept of method in P4C, and to question the consequences of that concept in the practice of philosophical dialogue with children. To better situate the concept of method within P4C (which, we think, will help to clarify some of the dialogues and debates within P4C as a philosophical field), we will identify two different historical understandings—represented by Rene Descartes and Hans Georg Gadamer—of the concept, and suggest new possibilities for understanding philosophical practice with children in light of their difference. (shrink)

Philosophy has a complicated relationship with nursing practice. Selected concepts from Hans‐Georg Gadamer's Truth and Method specifically prejudice, conversation, and language are articulated. An exemplar involving nursing practice at an outpatient clinic for women seeking pre‐ and postbreast cancer care is offered to explicate these concepts. We considered the fit of Gadamer's philosophy, particularly the concept of conversation, within a public health nursing practice context in home and community settings of the client/family and offered tentative conclusions. To extend the discussion (...) of the relationship between philosophy and nursing practice, we posed questions developed to provide deeper insight into this complicated relationship. (shrink)

This paper analyzes two main pro-vengeance Confucian arguments in light of Desmond Tutu's thinking. In the absence of just authority, Confucianism argues that carrying out blood vengeance is fulfillment of filial piety and fulfillment of moral duty for deterring crime and reforming the wrongdoer's character. Confucianism does not propose a systematic theory of blood vengeance after laws have been installed to prohibit act of revenge. As Confucian ethics focuses on virtue cultivation and advocates moral learning over punishment, it may find (...) the Tutuist approach of addressing wrongdoing compatible and complementary. In line with Tutuism, we argue that revenge is not justified because engaging in vengeance fuels negative and obsessive emotions, which undermine virtue and may lead to undesirable results, such as escalation of violence and harming of the innocent. Moreover, we defend that more conditions need to be met than the ones enunciated by the pro-vengeance standpoint to justify an act of revenge. (shrink)

Habermas' view that contemporary philosophy and social theory can learn from religious traditions calls for closer consideration. He is correct to hold that religious traditions constitute a reservoir of potentially important meanings that can be critically appropriated without emptying them of their motivating and inspirational power. However, contrary to what he implies, his theory allows for learning from religion only to a very limited degree. This is due to two core elements of his conceptual framework, both of which are key (...) features of his account of postmetaphysical thinking. The first is the requirement of ethical agnosticism; this requires philosophy and social theory to refrain from offering guidance on questions of the good life. The second is his language-immanent conception of truth in the domain of practical reason; this follows from his rejection of any source of validity beyond human communication in this domain. I make the case for a more robust account of learning from religious traditions and metaphysical worldviews, arguing that for this purpose Habermas must modify his requirement of ethical agnosticism and relinquish his language-immanent conception of truth. (shrink)

The nature of critical thinking remains controversial. Some recent accounts have lost sight of its roots in the history of philosophy. This article discusses critical thinking in its historical and social contexts, and in particular, for its educational and political significance. The writings of Plato and Aristotle are still vital in considering what makes certain kinds of thinking and certain kinds of knowledge distinctive. But neither Plato nor Aristotle theorised critical thinking in its specificity, that is, by differentiating it from (...) other kinds of thinking and by outlining its features. It was only with German Idealism, as part of the European Enlightenment, that philosophy achieved a level of self-reflection and engagement that broadened, deepened and made radical the logos of Socrates and Plato. In the encounter between Modern German and Ancient Greek philosophy we can see that there are different kinds of reason, the most politically and existentially significant of which runs through critical thinking, which we can only ever experience as critical dialogue. The logos of dialectical reason is uncompromising in its pursuit of truth and ‘the good life’, and as such, demands courage from those who pursue it. (shrink)

In this paper we argue the need to introduce the philosophical tradition of the examined life into the workplace in a systematic way and show how it can be done. We set out seven key philosophical areas and selected questions for managers to pose about their organisations. We conclude with a case study, which examines one of our key questions ‘What is real?’. We also provide some recommended reading for managers seeking an introduction to philosophy and to explore the seven (...) areas. (shrink)

The recent death of Peter McHugh becomes an occasion for the remembrance and recollection of the distinctive form of reflexive or analytic social inquiry, which framed his work and that of his longtime friend and collaborator, Alan Blum. Following dual appointments at York University, Toronto, Canada in 1972, Blum and McHugh’s partnership formed the basis for a community of scholars and students throughout the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. A brief review of McHugh and Blum’s works shows theoretical roots in social (...) constructivism and a deep appreciation of the linguistic turn, which in turn lead to the development of a form of social analysis that meets the stringent requirements of a reflexive sociology by repudiating any claim to a privileged exemption of theoretical speech (practice) from the hermeneutical circle of speech and language. Blum and McHugh are shown to embrace and not to evade the hermeneutical circle by a form of social inquiry that subverts the inherent possibilities available within speech and social convention to make available an encounter with the (moral) authority or form of life for that self-same speech. With each example of everyday life or conventional usage, McHugh (and Blum) move from theorizing which formulates the complexity of a particular instance of social interaction through its rules, to the question of the form of life that make that particular instance of the rules possible. It is the pursuit of transparency between speech and its roots in language that informed and continues to inform the distinctive style of social theory fostered at York-Toronto under the orchestration of McHugh and Blum. (shrink)

As educators, we tend to go about a typical day anticipating lessons, discussing pedagogical practices with colleagues, and engaging students with thoughtfully developed instruction. As attentive practitioners, we take a few minutes and reflect on the day’s proceedings and construct revised pedagogical strategies to better meet the needs of the students. However, what aspects of the pedagogical lifeworld would we think about if we decided to step back from the complexities, deadlines, and commitments that are part of the daily teaching (...) routine, and take the time to really ponder pedagogy? I believe that Gloria Dall’Alba would encourage us to pick up her book and enter into the world of education as seen through a phenomenological perspective... (shrink)

This article addresses contemporary concerns about critique through an interpretation of the “writing prophets.” This approach draws on Foucauldian genealogy and suggests that alongside Greek parrhesia, Old Testament prophecy is a key forerunner of contemporary critical discourses. Our analysis draws upon Weber’s interpretative historical sociology and Gadamerian hermeneutics but shifts the emphasis from charisma to critique, through a direct engagement with prophetic texts. In particular, prophetic discourse claims to reveal injustice and idolatry and speaks from a position of transcendence within (...) immanent historical moments. Prophets position their own era as a moment of crisis, and themselves as liminal figures, opposed to the delusion of others and “false prophets” which resonates with contemporary conceptions of “ideology.” Rather than focusing on historical individuals, we approach prophecy as a discourse, multiple and hybrid, discontinuous, and contradictory, yet constituting a distinctive precursor which informs contemporary critique. (shrink)

The opposition between learning as a process of self-cultivation and learning as a form of vocational training for the workplace is becoming ever more deeply entrenched in the twenty-first-century university. In language education in particular, the distinction between these two competing aims influences the way in which educators approach curriculum design and inevitably shapes the attitudes learners bring to the classroom. In this article, we contest what we see as the overly simplistic opposition between Bildung and Ausbildung by deploying a (...) conception of play that suspends the pragmatic demands of everyday existence. We argue that when learning activities are envisaged as a form of free-flowing, playful exploration, skills-based language training can be understood as an experience of Bildung in which the language learner creatively renegotiates their own identity through an encounter with both their own values and those of the target culture. (shrink)

In the current culture of regulation in higher education and, in turn, the history discipline, it is timely to problematize discipline standards in relation to student agency and creativity. This article argues that through the inclusion of a critical orientation and engaged pedagogy, historians have the opportunity to bring a more agentic dimension to the disciplinary conversation. Discipline standards privilege that arrogant historical moment in the higher education sector when certain skills development and knowledge creation becomes a hegemonic discourse. As (...) a result, there is less emphasis on creativity, agency, and individual opportunities for the demonstration of the historical imagination at work. We need to ensure that the insights gained from teaching and learning practice and research are not lost in the rush to meet discipline standards through compliance. (shrink)

Praxis, Language, Dialogue Human engagement with the world develops and evolves into increasingly social, complex, and explicit modes. This essay examines the evolution of meaningful human engagement from simple embodied activity, to language-less social praxis, and then to praxis incorporating increasingly rich forms of linguistic action, culminating in theory. Each mode of meaningful engagement creates a space in which new modes of meaning can develop. These new ways of experiencing, acting, and communicating create their own meaning contexts, which provide the (...) settings for the further evolution of humans' phenomenological, hermeneutic, and practical involvements. Each mode of meaning gives rise to its successors, allowing humans to acquire new powers to understand and manipulate their environments and each other. This increase and refinement of human power raises ethical issues that we address using the Gadamerian concept of dialogue. (shrink)

Discourse on Method part 3 offers une morale par provision, usually translated as ‘a provisional moral code’. Occasionally it has been questioned that this code is temporary and restricted to those engaged in pure inquiry. We argue that Descartes intends the moral code to be his final ethical position universally applicable. Since the moral code is ‘derived from’ the rules of method, it should have their permanence, holding for the time pure inquiry commences and when it completes the sciences. Moreover, (...) the four moral maxims replace the classical cardinal virtues. Thus they are meant to govern the lives of all persons. (shrink)

Schumpeter took a dim view of the deliberative capacities of the average voter who, he believed, could not be relied upon to make responsible judgements about distant and rather abstract matters of...

Contemporary poststructural and hermeneutical theories emphasize the prereflective opacity of the self and the consequent inarticulateness concerning the deep prereflective layers (‘prejudices’) of self-understanding. Some of such ontologically significant prejudices, some hermeneutical views hold, are inescapable and so the self cannot reflectively refuse or overcome them. This paper proposes the Hegelian notion of self-consciousness in the Phenomenology as the restless, unreflective–reflective negation of its own nothingness or contingent, open givenness as an alternative that both accepts the hermeneutical insight concerning the (...) deep prereflective layers of self-understanding and rejects the inescapability of ontologically significant ‘prejudices’. Hegelian self-consciousness is minimally reflective, even though it is intertwined with its prereflective, ritualistic basis and its historical situatedness. The paper depicts the reflective dimension of the prereflectively grounded Hegelian self by explicating the meaning of the Phenomenology’s conception of Bildung as ‘cultural participation’. The self that is continuously remade through its dialectical relation (cultural participation) to the social substance or Spirit is minimally reflective in the sense that it sees itself reflected or externalized in the world of its engagement, and because it inserts its own conception upon the world by participating in it. This reconceptualization of the dialectic between self and social substance, thus, escapes overemphasizing the prereflective layers of the self’s hermeneutical background without falling back on the Cartesian deworlded self of reflection and thought. (shrink)

An Irish surrogacy case from 2013 illustrates how negotiations of the mother’s identity in a given national and legal context are drawing on novel scientific perspectives, at a time when the use of new biotechnological possibilities is becoming more widespread and commonplace. The Roman dictum, ‘Mater Semper Certa Est’ is contested by the finding of this Irish court, in which the judge made a declaration of parentage stating that the genetic parents of twins born using a surrogate were the parents. (...) This article critically examines the normative background assumptions involved in this ruling. It will argue that the particular deployment of arguments from genetics and epigenetics in this court case produces a naturalization of the mother’s identity that is inherently reductive. A second surrogacy case is also examined, this time regarding the rights of a woman of Irish nationality to receive paid maternity leave or paid leave similar to adoptive leave after the birth of her daughter to a surrogate mother in the US state of California. This case, which was brought to the Equality Tribunal in Ireland and decided by the Court of Justice of the European Union, is used to illustrate the possible ramifications of conflicting definitions of motherhood in the legal system. In concluding, this article argues for the development and deployment of a more complex understanding of the evolving state of motherhood within the courts, in keeping with developments in the IVF industry and the various new mother-relations it makes possible. (shrink)

An inescapable feature of human growth is the toll in lives, including non-human ones, that occurs through the imperfect management of the institutions and technologies we develop. The histories of colonial and economic expansion, along with those of transportation, communications and political institutions, to name a few areas in man's recent growth, are replete with examples of violence, destruction and chapters of human suffering: part of the price for growing complexity. Since the increasing ability to engage in violence can be (...) considered a manifestation of this human growth, then it becomes equally important to examine the phenomena of violence alongside other phenomena of human growth. (shrink)

Hermeneutic rationality arises from the idea that experience is a cumulative process, in which differences are not eliminated but preserved. The universality which derives from this process is an “intensional universality”, which follows a law of direct proportionality between extension and intension: the more an educated individual enriches her experiences, the more she is able to universalize her understanding of others. Experience is then inevitably open and never closed, that is, free for other experiences. If we use the word “domain” (...) to describe the condition of a closed and predetermined system or ontology, the entities of which are pre-assumed, we can therefore call this open universality a “universality without domain”.This description of hermeneutical experience leads to a question about its logical and ontological presuppositions. In the second part of the paper I refer to a particular practice which is central for hermeneutical theory in order to show how I understand these presuppositions: the practice of translation. In translation we experience the impossibility of rendering completely the sense of the source language in a target language, that is, we experience a difference which cannot be suppressed. I compare this experience to the discovery of the incommensurable magnitudes in ancient Greek mathematics, a discovery that shook Parmenidean and Pythagorean ontology: in my opinion, philosophical hermeneutics more or less implicitly develops the consequences of this incredible discovery, which marks the passage to a differential, comparative and integrative rationality and ontology. (shrink)

In contemporary philosophy and psychology there is an ongoing debate around the concept of theory of mind. Theory of mind concerns our ability to understand another person. The two approaches that dominate the debate are “Theory Theory” (TT) and “Simulation Theory” (ST). This paper explores the connection between theory of mind and hermeneutics. Although both speak of the nature of understanding, and the way we gain and organize our knowledge of others, certain aspects of Schleiermacher’s hermeneutics reflect a theory approach, (...) long before TT itself was developed. In contrast, Dilthey’s hermeneutics reflects a simulation approach. In contrast to both of these approaches, I propose a contextual theory, as a parallel to Gadamer’s work in hermeneutics, and as a view that offers the basis for an important critique of both TT and ST. (shrink)

The paper presents an innovative approach to teaching philosophy, which the authors name as a comicsophy approach to teaching philosophy. Such creative application of comics in the teaching of philosophy fully corresponds to the skandalonic and dialogical character of philosophy itself. The methodical value of using comics in philosophy teaching is manifested exactly in comics’ distinctly skandalonic character. The skandalon is a methodical process that seeks to provoke students' curiosity by questioning something that otherwise seemed unquestionable, self-evident, to present it (...) in a new light, in order to make it the subject of critical questioning and reflection. Given the visuality of the comics, its fun and root in popular culture, it is an excellent motivational tool for philosophical reflection and understanding of reality, philosophical issues, ideas and concepts in teaching philosophy. By introducing comics as recognizable products of pop culture close to students' reading interest and experience in teaching philosophy, it is easier for them to connect what they learn in school with real life, ie to apply what they have learned in everyday life situations. Comics can be used as a source of information, a form of learning new content, as well as a basis for encouraging dialog and discussion in the classroom. Also, students can individually or in pairs/groups create comics on specific philosophical topics, thus developing creative, critical and collaborative thinking. The paper presents specific criteria for evaluating comics on philosophical issues that students create in philosophy classes. (shrink)