This is an English translation of Emilie Du Châtelet's "Sur la liberté." This 18th century text discusses freedom of the will, determinism, and divine foreknowledge. Translated from French by Julia Jorati, with the help of Julie Roy. French edition of this text, on which this translation is based: “Sur la liberté,” in Oeuvres complètes de Voltaire, vol. 14, edited by William H. Barber, 484–502. Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 1989.

Much early modern metaphysics grew with an eye to the new science of its time, but few figures took it as seriously as Emilie du Châtelet. Happily, her oeuvre is now attracting close, renewed attention, and so the time is ripe for looking into her metaphysical foundation for empirical theory. Accordingly, I move here to do just that. I establish two conclusions. First, du Châtelet's basic metaphysics is a robust realism. Idealist strands, while they exist, are confined to (...) non-basic regimes. Second, her substance realism seems internally coherent, so her foundational project appears successful.I have two aims in this paper. Historically, I show that du Châtelet's main source of inspiration was Christian... (shrink)

For Émilie Du Châtelet, I argue, a central role of the principle of sufficient reason is to discriminate between better and worse explanations. Her principle of sufficient reason does not play this role for just any conceivable intellect: it specifically enables understanding for minds like ours. She develops this idea in terms of two criteria for the success of our explanations: “understanding how” and “understanding why.” These criteria can respectively be connected to the determinateness and contrastivity of explanations. The (...) crucial role Du Châtelet’s principle of sufficient reason plays in identifying good explanations is often overlooked in the literature, or else run together with questions about the justification and likelihood of explanations. An auxiliary goal of the article is to situate Du Châtelet’s principle of sufficient reason with respect to some of the general epistemological and metaphysical commitments of her Institutions de Physique, clarifying how it fits into the broader project of that work. (shrink)

This paper examines Du Châtelet’s and Kant’s responses to the famous vis viva controversy – Du Châtelet in her Institutions Physiques (1742) and Kant in his debut, the Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces (1746–49). The Institutions was not only a highly influential contribution to the vis viva controversy, but also a pioneering attempt to integrate Leibnizian metaphysics and Newtonian physics. The young Kant’s evident knowledge of this work has led some to speculate about his indebtedness (...) to her philosophy. My study corrects such speculations as well as misunderstandings of the Living Forces. This corrective result has implications for how to investigate Kant’s relation to the ever-evolving landscape of Leibniz exegeses. (shrink)

Leibniz endorses the world apart doctrine, according to which a substance is that which is independent of all other things except God. However, I will argue that in what appears to be a radical departure from the causal version of the world apart doctrine, Du Châtelet—whose metaphysics appears to be Leibnizian from a distance—embraces the causal connectedness of created substances. I further show that Du Châtelet’s rejection of Leibniz’s claim that a substance is causally independent of all other (...) created substances can be traced back to a more fundamental antiLeibnizian commitment on Du Châtelet’s part concerning the in-principle accessibility of natural (i.e., non-divine) sufficient reasons by finite minds and to her commitment to a causal theory of intentionality. (shrink)

There is a tension in Emilie Du Châtelet’s thought on mathematics. The objects of mathematics are ideal or fictional entities; nevertheless, mathematics is presented as indispensable for an account of the physical world. After outlining Du Châtelet’s position, and showing how she departs from Christian Wolff’s pessimism about Newtonian mathematical physics, I show that the tension in her position is only apparent. Du Châtelet has a worked-out defense of the explanatory and epistemic need for mathematical objects, consistent (...) with their metaphysical nonfundamentality. I conclude by sketching how Du Châtelet’s conception of mathematical indispensability differs interestingly from many contemporary approaches. (shrink)

In this chapter, I examine similarities and divergences between Du Châtelet and Descartes on their endorsement of the use of hypotheses in science, using the work of Condillac to locate them in his scheme of systematizers. I conclude that, while Du Châtelet is still clearly a natural philosopher, as opposed to modern scientist, her conception of hypotheses is considerably more modern than is Descartes’, a difference that finds its roots in their divergence on the nature of first principles.

I begin by outlining Du Châtelet’s ontology of mathematical objects: she is an idealist, and mathematical objects are fictions dependent on acts of abstraction. Next, I consider how this idealism can be reconciled with her endorsement of necessary truths in mathematics, which are grounded in essences that we do not create. Finally, I discuss how mathematics and physics relate within Du Châtelet’s idealism. Because the primary objects of physics are partly grounded in the same kinds of acts as (...) yield mathematical objects, she thinks we are sometimes licensed in drawing conclusions about physical things from mathematical premises. (shrink)

I show that unlike her rationalist predecessor Leibniz, Du Châtelet is committed to epistemic causal idealism about natural causes. According to this view, it is constitutive of natural causes that they are in principle knowable by us (i.e., finite intelligent beings). Du Châtelet’s causal idealism stems at least in part from the distinctive theoretical role played by the Principle of Sufficient Reason in her system (as presented in her _Institutions de physique_), as well as her argument for the (...) Principle of Sufficient Reason. I show that far from merely explicating Leibniz’s metaphysics, Du Châtelet develops a radical and novel rationalism that is in keeping with her core commitment to science. (shrink)

I argue for two main points in historiography of physics regarding the significance of Du Châtelet's Foundations of Physics in the development of mechanics. The first is that, despite Du Châtelet calling it a textbook in the Preface, it should not be understood as 'merely' a textbook. Instead, it fits in a tradition of women involved in natural philosophy in that era using liminal publication opportunities, and to reduce some of the resistance to their publication. Even these liminal (...) opportunities were rare and mostly available to women of very high social standing and wealth, who also happened to have supportive families or spouses, and were usually associated with some other well-known male thinker. The second point is that, even if we treat Foundations as a textbook, the way in which it synthesizes and refines work by Newton, Leibniz, Descartes, and others, meets the criteria given by Kuhn for the establishment of a first paradigm, which is not complete without such a definitive statement that enables the mop-up work characteristic of normal science. I conclude that by Kuhn's own criteria, he ought to have identified Du Châtelet as a key part of establishing the first paradigm in physics. She blazed a trail for others to follow. (shrink)

There is a growing consensus that Emilie Du Châtelet’s challenging essay “On Freedom” defends compatibilism. I offer an alternative, libertarian reading of the essay. I lay out the prima facie textual evidence for such a reading. I also explain how apparently compatibilist remarks in “On Freedom” can be read as aspects of a sophisticated type of libertarianism that rejects blind or arbitrary choice. To this end, I consider the historical context of Du Châtelet’s essay, and especially the dialectic (...) between various strands of eighteenth-century libertarianism and compatibilism. (shrink)

The first part of this paper investigates the purpose, methodological approach, and fundamental thesis of Du Châtelet’s theory of simple beings. The paper shows that ‘simple beings’ in Du Châtelet is a theory concerned with the understanding of extended bodies. The second part of the paper shows that her theory of simple beings, while it has important roots in both Leibniz and Wolff, is remarkably different from theirs. Thus, contrary to a common thread in the literature, Du (...) class='Hi'>Châtelet’s theory of simple beings does not commit her to an ontology that can be equated with that of Leibniz or Wolff. Instead, her theory of simple beings is faculty-centred and draws a fundamental and novel distinction between the phenomenal realm of the senses and ‘real’ substances, which can only be grasped through the understanding. (shrink)

I examine Du Châtelet’s methodology for physics and metaphysics through the lens of her engagement with Newton’s Rules for Reasoning in Natural Philosophy. I first show that her early manuscript writings discuss and endorse these Rules. Then, I argue that her famous published account of hypotheses continues to invoke close analogues of Rules 3 and 4, despite various developments in her position. Once relevant experimental evidence and some basic constraints are met, it is legitimate to inductively generalize from observations; (...) general hypotheses can thereafter be assumed as true until contrary experiments show otherwise. I conclude by arguing that this account of induction plays an essential role in her metaphysics, both in an argument for simple substances—which has an inductive premise—and in her attempt to distinguish acceptable and unacceptable metaphysical commitments. (shrink)

In the second chapter of her <i>Institutions de Physique</i> Emilie Du Chatelet gives two cosmological arguments for the existence of God. In this chapter I focus on the first of these arguments. I argue that, while it bears some significant similarities to arguments given by John Locke and Christian Wolff, it improves on these arguments in at least two ways. First, it avoids a potential equivocation in Locke's argument; and second, it avoids Wolff's mere stipulation that whoever claims that there (...) cannot be an infinite regress of contingent beings does not understand what a sufficient reason is. I finally argue that her argument avoids a related objection, considered by David Hume, on which to explain a causal chain is merely to explain each link in the chain. (shrink)

To provide metaphysical grounds for the physics of her time, Du Châtelet argued for the notion of an active force. This was different from the impressed force in Newton’s second law. The former force was a property of a body, whereas the latter was an external cause. I shall study this discrepancy and argue that the interactive concept of force in Newton’s third law is consistent with Du Châtelet’s standards for an intelligible physics. Consequently, the interaction entailed by (...) the law of universal gravitation complies with Du Châtelet’s principles of human knowledge. (shrink)

El siglo XVIII está considerado como una época en la que el método de investigación newtoniano está bien establecido y su uso no se cuestiona, según autores como Kuhn. Sin embargo, como veremos, esto está muy alejado de la realidad, ya que aquí planteamos los dos objetivos siguientes: por un lado, observaremos como dentro de los propios llamados newtonianos no hay un uso uniforme del método newtoniano y que algunos de ellos incluso lo modifican en sus obras donde exponen la (...) doctrina de Newton. Por otro lado, expondremos el método de Émilie du Châtelet, quien, habiendo leído a Newton y a estos pensadores, siente rechazo hacia la metodología que proponen y se dispone a elaborar lo que se puede considerar un precedente del método hipotético-deductivo utilizado hoy día. Lo que se persigue con el presente estudio, en definitiva, es arrojar luz sobre la situación del newtonianismo del siglo XVIII y mostrar el trabajo de du Châtelet como un puente entre dos épocas en relación a la metodología. (shrink)

I argue that Émilie Du Châtelet breaks with Christian Wolff regarding the scope and epistemological content of the principle of sufficient reason, despite his influence on her basic ontology and their agreement that the principle of sufficient reason has foundational importance. These differences have decisive consequences for the ways in which Du Châtelet and Wolff conceive of science.

Du Châtelet holds that mathematical representations play an explanatory role in natural science. Moreover, she writes that things proceed in nature as they do in geometry. How should we square these assertions with Du Châtelet’s idealism about mathematical objects, on which they are ‘fictions’ dependent on acts of abstraction? The question is especially pressing because some of her important interlocutors (Wolff, Maupertuis, and Voltaire) denied that mathematics informs us about the properties of material things. After situating Du (...) class='Hi'>Châtelet in this debate, this chapter argues, first, that her account of the origins of mathematical objects is less subjectivist than it might seem. Mathematical objects are non-arbitrary, public entities. While mathematical objects are partly mind-dependent, so are material things. Mathematical objects can approximate the material. Second, it is argued that this moderate metaphysical position underlies Du Châtelet’s persistent claims that mathematics is required for certain kinds of general knowledge, including in natural science. The chapter concludes with an illustrative example: an analysis of Du Châtelet’s argument that matter is continuous. A key premise in the argument is that mathematical representations and material nature correspond. (shrink)

I investigate Du Châtelet's contribution to the concept of time and position the relevance and content of that contribution between Leibniz and Kant. I argue that Du Châtelet advances Leibniz's concept of time by explaining how we form the idea of time in our mind and how time as an ideal being relates to succession in real beings. I show that Du Châtelet, differently to Kant, recognizes the dependency of time in its constitution on succession in "real (...) things" and that her concept of time is in this respect superior to Kant's. With a detailed investigation into Du Châtelet's notion of time in its own right and without prematurely "fitting" it into a defined debate between her contemporaries, I am aiming to reveal her original contribution to an understanding of time. I locate her concept of time in a context that is explicitly philosophical in terms of an investigation into how the idea of time is formed and constituted rather than a physical debate on the nature of time as a phenomenon relating to the movement of bodies. (shrink)

British Journal for the History of Philosophy, Volume 21, Issue 1, Page 207-209, January 2013.

In her Discourse on Happiness, Émilie Du Châtelet claims that one must be susceptible to illusions to be happy. She gives almost no explanation of what illusions are or what causes them, and thus the claim appears to lack an adequate defense. I offer an account of Du Châtelet’s theory of illusion by drawing upon the previously unexamined influence of other French philosophers’ accounts of the connection between passion and illusion, including Descartes, Malebranche, and Anne-Thérèse, Marquise de Lambert. (...) According to this tradition, the passions misrepresent their objects in the imagination, and these misrepresentations can be referred to as “illusions.” Attributing this theory of passionate misrepresentation to Du Châtelet solves two puzzles about illusion that arise in the Discourse. First, it explains why she claims illusions are necessary for happiness. Second, it explains how illusions can be distinguished from cognitive errors made in other domains, like philosophy and natural science. (shrink)

Much scholarship has claimed the physics of Emilie du Châtelet’s treatise, Institutions de physique, is Newtonian. I argue against that idea. To do so, I distinguish three strands of meaning for the category ‘Newtonian science,’ and I examine her book against them. I conclude that her physics is not Newtonian in any useful or informative sense. To capture what is specific about it, we need better interpretive categories.

This article discusses Du Châtelet’s challenging claim that entertaining illusions, especially illusions of being esteemed by posterity, is conducive to happiness. It does so by taking a contextualizing approach, contrasting her views with some Epicurean aspects of the views on illusions and happiness in Bernard de Fontenelle and Julien Offray de La Mettrie. I will argue for three claims: (1) Du Châtelet’s comparison between self-related illusions and illusions in the theater is vulnerable to objections deriving from some distinctions (...) that Fontenelle’s poetics draws between the role of illusions in the theater and the role of illusions in real life. (2) Examining Fontenelle’s analysis of the detrimental effects of self-related illusions indicates several respects in which Du Châtelet has underestimated the ambivalent nature of illusions. (3) Du Châtelet’s view that illusions are akin to sensations that are favorable to us problematically generalizes La Mettrie’s insight that some acts of the imagination have a quasi-perceptual nature. (shrink)

This chapter discusses methodology in feminist history of philosophy and shows that women philosophers made interesting and original contributions to the debates concerning the cosmological argument. I set forth and examine the arguments of Mary Astell, Damaris Masham, Catherine Trotter Cockburn, Emilie Du Châtelet, and Mary Shepherd, and discuss their involvement with philosophical issues and debates surrounding the cosmological argument. I argue that their contributions are original, philosophically interesting, and result from participation in the ongoing debates and controversies about (...) the cosmological argument, causal principles, and necessary existence. (shrink)

På mange måter er dette en bok som blir utgitt alt for sent. Det er den første antologien av sitt slag, og retter fokus på kvinnelige metafysikere som virket i den tidlige moderne perioden (16. og tidlig 17. århundre). Redaktør Emily Thomas skriver i introduksjonen at til tross for at flere antologier om moderne metafysikk allerede finnes, er kvinnelige filosofer fortsatt underrepresentert og den filosofiske kanon mannsdominert. De ni filosofene som blir omtalt i totalt 13 kapitler var alle originale og (...) velkjente tenkere i sin samtid, men har blitt glemt i filosofihistoriens løp. (shrink)

Proofs of God in Early Modern Europe offers a fascinating window into early modern efforts to prove God’s existence. Assembled here are twenty-two key texts, many translated into English for the first time, which illustrate the variety of arguments that philosophers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries offered for God. These selections feature traditional proofs—such as various ontological, cosmological, and design arguments—but also introduce more exotic proofs, such as the argument from eternal truths, the argument from universal aseity, and the (...) argument ex consensu gentium. Drawn from the work of eighteen philosophers, this book includes both canonical figures (such as Descartes, Spinoza, Newton, Leibniz, Locke, and Berkeley) and noncanonical thinkers (such as Norris, Fontenelle, Voltaire, Wolff, Du Châtelet, and Maupertuis). -/- Lloyd Strickland provides fresh translations of all selections not originally written in English and updates the spelling and grammar of those that were. Each selection is prefaced by a lengthy headnote, giving a biographical account of its author, an analysis of the main argument(s), and important details about the historical context. Strickland’s introductory essay provides further context, focusing on the various reasons that led so many thinkers of early modernity to develop proofs of God’s existence. -/- Proofs of God is perfect for both students and scholars of early modern philosophy and philosophy of religion. (shrink)

If the allusive stratagems can claim to define a new type of systematicity, it is because they give access to a space where the singularity, the diagram and the metaphor may interlace, to penetrate further into the physico-mathematic intuition and the discipline of the gestures which precede and accompany ‘formalisation’. This interlacing is an operation where each component backs up the others: without the diagram, the metaphor would only be a short-lived fulguration because it would be unable to operate: without (...) the metaphor, the diagram would only be a frozen icon, unable to jump over its bold features which represent the images of an already acquired knowledge; without the subversion of the functional by the singular, nothing would come to oppose the force of habit. (shrink)

The technological virtual converges with our contemporary existence in a multitude of ways, which suggests a need to interrogate the question of the virtual existentially. Merleau-Ponty’s existential phenomenological account of embodiment is invaluable in this regard because the virtual is encountered from the basis of the facticity of the embodied individual – a facticity that is closely related to perception and motor intentionality. The current article argues that these characteristics of the body-subject should be taken into consideration in order to (...) develop a clearer description of the virtual. However, beyond an embodied account that relates to early technologies, Merleau-Ponty also presents through his concept of the flesh a novel avenue for the ontological investigation of the virtual. The flesh describes the intertwining of the body-subject and the world, which is suggestive of a new account of the individual’s sensibility in relation to the virtual. An original concept is suggested to describe the existential-ontological structure of the virtual: The embodied screen. The embodied screen as neologism presents an alternative conceptualisation of the coincidence of the body-subject (who understands the world spatially) with the virtual (as non-spatial). By tracing imaginative signification and embodied habitude in terms of the virtual, this article suggests certain existential implications of the virtual for contemporary being. (shrink)

The virtual has become the latest rostrum for ideological heteronormativity; it increasingly plays host to an insidious rhetoric of unjustifiably fixed and oppositional gender binaries that exhort heterosexuality as a norm. Conservative political and religious groups, as well as consumerist advertising, utilise digital technology to reinforce cast-in-stone and adversarial social perspectives for manipulative and exploitative ends. Contrastingly, the virtual may be mobilised to support and facilitate queering in contemporary societies and may positively counter such fixed ideological heteronormative categories of social (...) life. Crucial in this transformative account of the virtual is the body, which is for Merleau-Ponty the horizon of engagement with the world as a condition for perception and performativity. Queer perspectives may, in turn, overcome the oversight of Merleau-Ponty (as critically suggested by Judith Butler and Iris Marion Young) regarding the specific gendered characteristics of the body itself, and allows for an expanded embodied and queer conceptualisation of the virtual. A transformative vision of the virtual entails therefore a rethinking of our understanding of digital technology through (a) the phenomenology of the body-subject and (b) queer theory. I argue that the idea of the body as entirely discursive or performative (per queer theory) needs to be adjusted by explicating the foundational ontological characteristics of the body-subject’s encounter of the virtual. (shrink)

When allocating scarce healthcare resources, the expected benefits of alternative allocations matter. But, there are different kinds of benefits. Some are direct benefits to the recipient of the resource such as the health improvements of receiving treatment. Others are indirect benefits to third parties such as the economic gains from having a healthier workforce. This article considers whether only the direct benefits of alternative healthcare resource allocations are relevant to allocation decisions, or whether indirect benefits are relevant too. First, we (...) distinguish different conceptions of direct and indirect benefits and argue that only a recipient conception could be morally relevant. We analyze four arguments for thinking that indirect benefits should not count and argue that none is successful in showing that the indirectness of a benefit is a good reason not to count it. We conclude that direct and indirect benefits should be evaluated in the same way. (shrink)

Social networking technologies have become a ubiquitous framework for social interaction, serving to organise much of the individual’s social life. Such technological structuring affects not merely the individual’s psyche (as a psychotechnics), it also affects broader aspects of society (as a socio-technics). While social networking technologies may serve to transform society in positive ways, such technologies also have the potential to significantly encroach upon and (re) construct individual and cultural meaning in ways that must be investigated. Erich Fromm, who psychoanalytically (...) describes humans as a product of their society and the economic systems within that society, may provide insight into the influence of social networking technologies in contemporary society. He sees the relationship between the individual and society as being in a constant state of dynamic change. Utilising Fromm’s psycho-societal insight, social networking technologies are shown to conflate and confuse the relation between Thanatos and Eros – the Thanatos of a lifeless and consumerist agenda-filled mechanisation, and the Eros associated with social engagement. Thanatos and Eros are tied together via social networking technologies. This results in, firstly, social networking technologies functioning predominantly to further capitalist agendas through the monetisation of these technologies – particularly in terms of linking commodity fetishism and the foundational social drive of the individual. Secondly, social networking technologies mechanise human action according to predictable behavioural paths through the use of these technologies, especially in terms of how socialisation is possible via these technologies (shaping how platonic and romantic relationships may take place in the contemporary world). Such a mechanisation of interpersonal engagement contrasts with Erich Fromm’s assertion that interpersonal relations (vis-à-vis love) are not “mere emotion”, but rather represent an interpersonal creative capacity and interplay. Fromm’s psycho-societal insights will show how contemporary individuals may take independent and responsible rational action to establish accountable and psychologically beneficial ways of engaging with others through social networking technologies. (shrink)

Central to philosophical practice is the application of philosophers' work by philosophical practitioners to inspire, educate, and guide their clients. For example, in Logic-Based Therapy (LBT) philosophical practitioners help their clients to find an uplifting philosophy that promotes guiding virtues that counteract unrealistic and often self-defeating conclusions derived from irrational premises. I will present the argument that Simone de Beauvoir’s existentialist ethics can be applied as an uplifting philosophy as per LBT methodology, and therefore has utility for philosophical practice. Additionally, (...) I will propose that Beauvoir’s existentialist ethics, as an uplifting philosophy, may act as an antidote for ideological obsession and ideology addiction. I will also suggest that LBT may be a suitable intervention when challenging the unrealistic conclusions derived from illogical premises in practical reasoning that contribute to ideological obsession, because it can contest irrational beliefs in a way that could mitigate the fragmentation anxiety that often arise when individuals relinquish maladaptive self-object organizations. (shrink)

In this essay I explore the notion of philosophy as a way of life as a recovery pathway for individuals in addiction recovery. My hypothesis is that philosophy as a way of life can be a compelling, and legitimate recovery pathway for individuals in addiction recovery, as one of many recovery pathways. I will focus on logic-based therapy applied in the context of addiction recovery. The aim of presenting a case study is to show how a client receiving LBT is (...) provided with techniques and a worldview that can contribute to a philosophically oriented recovery program. In the case study the client was advised to apply the moral philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche as an uplifting philosophical framework to counteract his unproductive worldview and fallacious thinking. Considering that there is an ostensibly low efficacy rate for the treatment of addiction, articulating the value of philosophy as a way of life as a recovery pathway provides a conceptual and methodological framework for the development of novel philosophically-based addiction treatment and recovery-oriented programs—thus expanding the treatment and recovery options available for those seeking recovery from addiction. (shrink)

In this essay I argue that a comprehensive understanding of addiction and its treatment should include an existential perspective. I provide a brief overview of an existential perspective of addiction and recovery, which will contextualize the remainder of the essay. I then present a case study of how the six-step philosophical practice method of Logic-Based Therapy can assist with issues that often arise in addiction treatment framed through an existential perspective.

ABSTRACT The technological virtual converges with our contemporary existence in a multitude of ways, which suggests a need to interrogate the question of the virtual existentially. Merleau-Ponty’s existential phenomenological account of embodiment is invaluable in this regard because the virtual is encountered from the basis of the facticity of the embodied individual – a facticity that is closely related to perception and motor intentionality. The current article argues that these characteristics of the body-subject should be taken into consideration in order (...) to develop a clearer description of the virtual. However, beyond an embodied account that relates to early technologies, Merleau-Ponty also presents through his concept of the flesh a novel avenue for the ontological investigation of the virtual. The flesh describes the intertwining of the body-subject and the world, which is suggestive of a new account of the individual’s sensibility in relation to the virtual. An original concept is suggested to describe the existential-ontological structure of the virtual: The embodied screen. The embodied screen as neologism presents an alternative conceptualisation of the coincidence of the body-subject (who understands the world spatially) with the virtual (as non-spatial). By tracing imaginative signification and embodied habitude in terms of the virtual, this article suggests certain existential implications of the virtual for contemporary being. (shrink)

This article explores the potential utility of the theory of Holism as developed by South African philosopher, British Commonwealth statesman and military leader, Jan Smuts, for philosophical counselling or practice. Central to the philosophical counseling process is philosophical counsellors or practitioners applying the work of philosophers to inspire, educate and guide their counselees in dealing with life problems. For example, Logic-Based Therapy, a method of philosophical counselling developed by Elliot Cohen, provides a rational framework for confronting problems of living, where (...) the counselor helps the counselee find an uplifting philosophy that promotes a guiding virtue that acts as an antidote to unrealistic and often self-defeating conclusions derived from irrational premises. We present the argument that Holism is one such uplifting philosophy which can be of utility to philosophical counselors or practitioners to help their counselees with confronting problems of living. Furthermore, we argue that Smuts’ articulation of freedom can act as a guiding virtue within this uplifting philosophy of Holism in accordance with the methodology of LBT. Smuts’ contribution to philosophy and psychology is arguably inadequately credited, and for this reason, and to the best of our knowledge, Smuts’ theory of Holism has yet to be discussed in the context of philosophical counseling or practice. Given these omissions, we begin this article with a discussion of his influence on 20th Century Anglo-American psychology. We then provide a brief historical context, and an introduction to the central argument of Smuts’ Holism, as well as a brief overview of the origins of Smut’s Holism and an introduction to his book Holism and Evolution. In the remainder of the article, we discuss several foundational concepts that underlie Smuts’ theory of Holism, as articulated and developed in his book Holism and Evolution, to substantiate our arguments. We conclude by highlighting the limitations of our article, limitations to Smuts’ model, and the challenges inherent in the use of a now largely antiquated theory, even by Smuts’ own admission nineteen years after its publication, for the purposes of contextualizing and substantiating the arguments and recommendations presented herein. (shrink)

In my presentation I argue for the utility of a philosophical counseling method, called logic-based therapy (LBT), in the treatment of addicted populations. In the context of addiction treatment LBT could be also classified as a philosophical psychotherapy. Philosophical psychotherapy can be understood as an umbrella term for interventions designed to treat mental health disorders, with theoretical foundations that are philosophical. Philosophical psychotherapy would be distinct from philosophical counseling, as the latter does not directly treat mental health disorders. I suggest (...) that LBT has utility beyond philosophical counseling and is a viable intervention in the treatment of certain mental health disorders, like substance use disorders. I provide a brief overview of LBT and then discuss a LBT case study with a client suffering diagnosed with a substance use disorder. In the case study the client was advised to apply the moral philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche as an uplifting philosophical framework to counteract his unproductive worldview and fallacious thinking. Considering that there is an ostensibly low efficacy rate for the treatment of addiction, articulating the value of philosophical psychotherapies in the context of addiction treatment can assist in the development of novel philosophically-based addiction treatment and recovery-oriented programs––thus expanding the treatment and recovery options available for those seeking recovery from addiction. (shrink)

This presentation explores the historical and ongoing relationship between Pierre Hadot's concept of philosophy as a way of life (PWL) and modern psychotherapy. Hadot noted that many ancient philosophical schools, such as the Epicureans, Skeptics, and Stoics, viewed philosophy as “the art of living,” focusing on practical exercises to transform one’s way of being. Scholars like Martha Nussbaum and Michel Foucault have also highlighted ancient philosophy’s therapeutic practices, known as "therapeia tēs psuchēs," or “cure of the soul.” For the purpose (...) of this presentation, I will primarily focus on Hadot’s (1995, 2002) view of ancient philosophy being a PWL and its therapeutic agenda, as well as Martha Nussbaum’s (1994) argument, presented in her book "The Therapy of Desire: Theory and Practice in Hellenistic Ethics," that ancient philosophy principally constitutes a form of therapy, as well as the position offered by Michel Foucault (1988), who suggested that we ought conceptualize Socrates along with Hellenistic and Roman thought in the context of self-care or ‘care of the self.’ This presentation is divided into three parts. After the introduction, the second part examines Hadot’s notion of ‘spiritual exercises.’ The third part surveys the view of philosophy as a distinct form of therapy or "therapeia," as a thread that runs through ancient, classical and modern philosophy (the aim is not to be comprehensive but merely to highlight the continuity). The conclusion, and final part, explores how the meta-philosophy of PWL, when applied as a meta-therapeutic and a meta-paradigmatic framework, can inform contemporary psychotherapy, as part of an interdisciplinary approach, which as I will suggest may be beneficial to both the emerging field of PWL and psychotherapy theory and practice—in addressing perennial issues of human suffering and how to live the good life. (shrink)

In “The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy and Science of Addiction” Robert West highlights a pervasive challenge for more conceptual clarity and consensus within the field of addiction studies. In an attempt to address the challenge I provide the conceptual building blocks or architectonic of a metatheory of addiction, referred to as the Integrated Metatheoretical Model of Addiction (IMMA). The IMMA is not a general theory of addiction, but rather an exploratory attempt at providing the architectonic of an metaparadigmatic heuristic, that (...) may potentially provide the conceptual scaffolding needed for developing a general theory of addiction. (shrink)

The debate between instrumentalist and technological determinist positions on the nature of technology characterised the early history of the philosophy of technology. In recent years however technological determinism has ceased to be viewed as a credible philosophical position within the field. This paper uses Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology to reconsider the technological determinist outlook in phenomenological terms as an experiential response to the encounter with the phenomenon of modern technology. Recasting the instrumentalist-determinist debate in a phenomenological manner enables one to reconcile the (...) apparent dualism of the instrumentalist and determinist positions through Merleau-Ponty’s ontology of the flesh. This ontology has recently been used to ground accounts of virtual embodiment. We argue that in addition to explaining away the classical form of technological determinism, it can also phenomenologically ground a novel understanding of technological determinism. Namely, a technological determinism of virtual embodiment. (shrink)

This article outlines an integrally informed model for addictionon treatment and recover that is being pioneered and developed at Tabankulu Secondary Addiction Recovery Center in Cape Town, South Africa. Tabankulu is the world’s first inpatient Addictionon treatment center to implement an integrally informed treatment model. The Integrated Recovery model is a comprehensive, balanced, multi-phased, and multi-disciplinary approach to the treatment of and recovery from addiction. Its philosophy is derived from integrang a 12 Step abstinence-based methodology, mindfulness-based interventions, positive psychology, and (...) Integral Theory. The case is made that addictionon treatment facilities, therapists working with this population, and recovering addicts will become more proficient, effective, and consequently have higher success rates by becoming integrally informed. (shrink)

Daniel O’Shiel recently identified four categories of virtuality, which he terms “real virtualities”, that are perpetually present in human perception. These virtual horizons (Self, World, Others, and Values) continuously structure our experience without themselves being directly experienced. This essay argues that O’Shiel’s four categories of the virtual correspond strongly to the concept of the Fourfold found in the writings of the later Heidegger, and that Heidegger’s Fourfold can be fruitfully understood as a phenomenological framework of the virtual.

ABSTRACT In previous work I explored how Integral Theory can be applied as a metatheoretical and transdisciplinary framework, in an attempt to arrive at an integrally informed metatheory of addiction. There was an overemphasis on Integral Methodological Pluralism in that thread of research, without clarifying the ontological pluralism of addiction as a multiple object enacted by various methodologies. To arrive at a comprehensive integral metatheory and integral ontology of addiction, I believe it is necessary to include the conception of Integral (...) Pluralism and Integral Enactment Theory as posited by Sean Esbjörn-Hargens. Integral Enactment Theory highlights the phenomenon of addiction as a multiple and dynamic object arising along a continuum of ontological complexity; it adeptly points out how etiological models “co-arise” in relation to methodology (methodological pluralism) to enact a particular reality of addiction (ontological pluralism) while being mediated by the worldview of the subject (epistemological pluralism) applying the method. This article briefly explores the significance of including Integral Pluralism and Integral Enactment Theory in the quest of an integral metatheory and integral ontology of addiction. (shrink)

This article explores the utility of Nietzsche’s ethical thought for philosophical counselling. Central to the philosophical counseling process is philosophical counsellors applying the work of philosophers to inspire, educate, and guide their counselees in dealing with life problems. For example, Logic-Based Therapy (LBT), a method of philosophical counselling developed by Elliot Cohen, provides a rational framework for confronting problems of living, where the counselor helps the counselee find an uplifting philosophy that promotes a guiding virtue that acts as an antidote (...) to unrealistic and often self-defeating conclusions derived from irrational premises. I present the argument that Nietzsche’s moral philosophy, and more specifically his analysis of suffering, is one such uplifting philosophy which can be of utility to philosophical counselors to help their counselees with confronting problems of living. According to Bernard Reginster, suffering forms the bedrock of Nietzsche's life-affirming concept of the will to power. Nietzsche’s notion of the will to power radically alters our conception and significance of suffering – and that the will to power is best understood as man’s desire for the activity of overcoming resistance. Nietzsche's analysis implies that the fundamental human impulse is not to avoid suffering, but instead to will nothing less than suffering itself. To find meaning in suffering is tantamount to affirming life itself. (shrink)

Health policy is only one part of social policy. Although spending administered by the health sector constitutes a sizeable fraction of total state spending in most countries, other sectors such as education and transportation also represent major portions of national budgets. Additionally, though health is one important aspect of economic and social activity, people pursue many other goals in their social and economic lives. Similarly, direct benefits—those that are immediate results of health policy choices—are only a small portion of the (...) overall impact of health policy. This chapter considers what weight health policy should give to its “spill-over effects,” namely non-health and indirect benefits. (shrink)