Results for 'Mhairi Aitken'

13 found
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  1. A Case Against Simple-Mindedness: Śrīgupta on Mental Mereology.Allison Aitken - 2023 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy (3):581-607.
    There’s a common line of reasoning which supposes that the phenomenal unity of conscious experience is grounded in a mind-like simple subject. To the contrary, Mādhyamika Buddhist philosophers like Śrīgupta (seventh–eighth century) argue that any kind of mental simple is incoherent and thus metaphysically impossible. Lacking any unifying principle, the phenomenal unity of conscious experience is instead an unfounded illusion. In this paper, I present an analysis of Śrīgupta’s "neither-one-nor-many argument" against mental simples and show how his line of reasoning (...)
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  2. Śāntarakṣita: Climbing the Ladder to the Ultimate Truth.Allison Aitken - 2023 - In Sara L. McClintock, William Edelglass & Pierre-Julien Harter (eds.), The Routledge handbook of Indian Buddhist philosophy. New York, NY: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group. pp. 463–379.
    This chapter presents an overview of the life, work, and philosophical contributions of Śāntarakṣita (c. 725–788), who is known for his synthesis of Nāgārjuna’s Madhyamaka with elements of the Dignāga-Dharmakīrti tradition of logic and epistemology. His two most important independent treatises, the Compendium of True Principles (Tattvasaṃgraha) and the Ornament of the Middle Way (Madhyamakālaṃkāra), are characterized by an emphasis on the indispensable role of rational analysis on the Buddhist path as well as serious and systematic engagement with competing Buddhist (...)
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  3. No Unity, No Problem: Madhyamaka Metaphysical Indefinitism.Allison Aitken - 2021 - Philosophers' Imprint 21 (31):1–24.
    According to Madhyamaka Buddhist philosophers, everything depends for its existence on something else. But what would a world devoid of fundamentalia look like? In this paper, I argue that the anti-foundationalist “neither-one-nor-many argument” of the Indian Mādhyamika Śrīgupta commits him to a position I call “metaphysical indefinitism.” I demonstrate how this view follows from Śrīgupta’s rejection of mereological simples and ontologically independent being, when understood in light of his account of conventional reality. Contra recent claims in the secondary literature, I (...)
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  4. Nāgārjuna and Vasubandhu on the principle of sufficient reason.Allison Aitken - 2024 - Asian Journal of Philosophy 3 (1):1-28.
    Canonical defenders of the principle of sufficient reason (PSR), such as Leibniz and Spinoza, are metaphysical foundationalists of one stripe or another. This is curious since the PSR—which says that everything has a ground, cause, or explanation—in effect, denies fundamental entities. In this paper, I explore the apparent inconsistency between metaphysical foundationalism and approaches to metaphysical system building that are driven by a commitment to the PSR. I do so by analyzing how Indian Buddhist philosophers arrive at foundationalist and anti-foundationalist (...)
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  5. An Appearance–Reality Distinction in an Unreal World.Allison Aitken - 2022 - Analysis 82 (1):114-130.
    Jan Westerhoff defends an account of thoroughgoing non-foundationalism that he calls “irrealism,” which is implicitly modeled on a Madhyamaka Buddhist view. In this paper, I begin by raising worries about the irrealist’s account of human cognition as taking place in a brain-based representational interface. Next, I pose first-order and higher-order challenges to how the irrealist—who defends a kind of global error theory—can sensibly accommodate an unlocalized appearance-reality distinction, both metaphysically and epistemologically. Finally, although Westerhoff insists that irrealism itself is not (...)
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  6. "Chomden Reldri on Dharmakīrti's Examination of Relations".Allison Aitken - 2023 - In Kurtis Schaeffer, Jue Liang & McGrath William (eds.), Histories of Tibet: Essays in Honor of Leonard W. J. van der Kuijp, Studies in Indian and Tibetan Buddhism. pp. 283–305.
    Dharmakīrti’s (c. seventh century) Examination of Relations (Sambandhaparīkṣā) is unique in the Indian Buddhist canon for its being the only extant root text devoted entirely to the topic of the ontological status of relations. But the core thesis of this treatise—that relations are only nominally real—is in prima facie tension with another claim that is central to Dharmakīrti’s epistemology: that there exists some kind of “natural relation” (svabhāvapratibandha) that reliably underwrites inferences. Understanding how Dharmakīrti can consistently rely on natural relations (...)
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  7. The Truth about Śrīgupta’s Two Truths: Longchenpa’s 'Lower Svātantrikas' and the Making of a New Philosophical School.Allison Aitken - 2021 - Journal of South Asian Intellectual History 3 (2):185–225.
    Longchen Rabjampa (1308–64), scholar of the Tibetan Buddhist Nyingma tradition, presents a novel doxographical taxonomy of the so-called Svātantrika branch of Madhyamaka Buddhist philosophy, designating the Indian Mādhyamika Śrīgupta (c. 7th/8th century) as the exemplar of a Svātantrika sub-school which maintains that appearance and emptiness are metaphysically distinct. This paper compares Longchenpa’s characterization of this “distinct-appearance-and-emptiness” view with Śrīgupta’s own account of the two truths. I expose a significant disconnect between Longchenpa’s Śrīgupta and Śrīgupta himself and argue that the impetus (...)
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  8.  70
    Review of Jonathan Stoltz’s Illuminating the Mind: An Introduction to Buddhist Epistemology. [REVIEW]Allison Aitken - 2023 - Journal of Buddhist Philosophy 5:94–98.
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  9. Science Studies in a Liberal Arts curriculum.Sean F. Johnston & Mhairi Harvey - 2005 - In Carol Hill & Sean F. Johnston (eds.), _Below the Belt: The Founding of a Higher Education Institution_. Dumfries, UK: University of Glasgow Crichton Publications. pp. 73-86.
    On the differing practices and assumptions in the academic specialisms of environmental studies and STS.
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  10. Informing, teaching or propagandising? Combining Environmental and Science Studies for undergraduates.Sean Johnston & Mhairi Harvey - 2002 - Discourse: Learning and Teaching in Philosophical and Religious Studies 1 (2):130-140.
    This article discusses experiences in the integrated teaching of Environmental Studies and Science Studies in a generalist curriculum at a university campus in Scotland. At the University of Glasgow Crichton Campus, a mixed curriculum has been developed to combine coherently Environmental and Science Studies, perhaps the first such curriculum in the UK and equally uncommon in America. The Crichton curricum is intentionally multi-disciplinary, drawing closely on the successful nineteenth-century Scottish model exported to America. This generalist approach, emphasising broad philosophical principles, (...)
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  11. Real Film.Reid Perkins-Buzo - 2007 - Semiotics:142-158.
    Recent work by Ian Aitken and others has sought to re-establish a "Realist approach" to the documentary film in reaction to the postmodernist, pragmatist approach popular in the 1970s and 80s. The Saussurian/Lacanian orientation o f the semiotics that played a large role in the older film theory is rejected and replaced by an analytic theory of representation based on the work of Mary Hesse, Hilary Putnam and W.V.O. Quine. Although this may seem a setback vis-a-vis semiotics, it actually (...)
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  12. CONTRACT CHEATING IN ISRAEL DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC.Yovav Eshet - 2022 - European Conference on Academic Integrity and Plagiarism 2022.
    Academic integrity is an essential pillar of any educational system. It is defined as acting in a manner consistent with the values and accepted standards of ethical practices in teaching, learning, and scholarship (Fishman, 2015). Contract cheating, or ghostwriting, is currently one of the most severe violations of academic integrity. It involves students engaging a third party, usually an online essay writing service, to complete their academic works on their behalf (Draper et al., 2021). Some of these services offer pre-written (...)
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  13. Cold case: the 1994 death of British MP Stephen David Wyatt Milligan.Sally Ramage - 2016 - Criminal Law News (87):02-36.
    In the December 2015 Issue of the Police Journal Sam Poyser and Rebecca Milne addressed the subject of miscarriages of justice. Cold case investigations can address some of these wrongs. The salient points for attention are those just before his sudden death: Milligan was appointed Private Secretary to Jonathan Aitken, the then Minister of Arms in the Conservative government in 1994. The known facts are as follows: 1. Stephen David Wyatt Milligan was found deceased on Tuesday 8th February 1994 (...)
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