This paper explores the relations between self-esteem and competition. Self-esteem is a very important good and competition is a widespread phenomenon. They are commonly linked, as people often seek self-esteem through success in competition. Although competition in fact generates valuable consequences and can to some extent foster self-esteem, empirical research suggests that competition has a strong tendency to undermine self-esteem. To be sure, competition is not the source of all problematic deficits in self-esteem, and (...) it can arise for, or undercut goods other than self-esteem. But the relation between competition and access to self-esteem is still significant, and it is worth asking how we might foster a desirable distribution of the latter in the face of difficulties created by the former. That is the question addressed in this paper. The approach I propose neither recommends self-denial nor the uncritical celebration of the rat race. It charts instead a solidaristic path to support the social conditions of the self-esteem of each individual. The paper proceeds as follows. I start, in section 2, by clarifying key concepts involved in the discussion. In section 3, I identify ten mechanisms that support individuals’ self-esteem and impose limits on competition. I focus, in particular, on the challenges faced by people in their practices of work. In section 4, I outline prudential and moral arguments to justify the use of the proposed mechanisms. Section 5 concludes with remarks on the role of social criticism in the processes of change implementing the mechanisms. (shrink)

In his discussion of simple esteem—one of the moral entities meant to regulate human actions—Pufendorf invokes a juridical commonplace: the rule that, before evidence to the contrary, we should presume others to be good. This argumentative strategy is an illuminating example for understanding his method of commonplaces. The present paper has three goals: (1) to analyze how Pufendorf adopted from legal humanism the view that presumptions should be based on considerations of what comes about most easily in nature; (2) (...) to show that Pufendorf’s inclusion of ethical aspects in the juridical presumption of goodness is an application of this view of forming presumptions; (3) to argue that Pufendorf did not regard juridical and philosophical commonplaces as expressions of a particular stage of intellectual history but rather as the result of reflection about human needs and abilities. (shrink)

Gabriel Bonnot de Mably takes up the republican commonplace that the desire for esteem is what could motivate the fulfilment of duties of civic virtue. This commonplace, however, has become problematic through the discussion of the problem of human corruption in philosophers such as Blaise Pascal and Nicolas Malebranche. In this article, I will show that Mably takes this problem seriously. However, his critique of Malebranche’s solution to this problem and his critique of the economic reinterpretation of Malebranche’s concept (...) of natural order in the work of Le Mercier de la Rivière motivate his own republican defense of the moral value of the desire for esteem. What makes this defense plausible is his argument that distorted esteem derives from imagination that is distorted, not only as a result of natural factors, but in many cases rather as a result of misguided politics. If some cases of distorted esteem derive from misguided politics, Mably argues, then they can be modified by republican constitution building that modifies the imagination of citizens. (shrink)

The conviction that high self-esteem is beneficial both to the individual and to society in general has been pervasive both in academia and in popular culture. If it is indeed beneficial, it is a prime candidate for pharmacological enhancement. There is evidence to suggest, however, that the benefits of high self-esteem to the individual have been exaggerated; and that there are few - if any - social benefits. With this evidence in mind, I consider in what ways (...) high self-esteem is valuable, and suggest how enhancement could play a role in maximising its valuable aspects. (shrink)

Abstract: Teenage pregnancy has been identified as a social issue that requires attention. Given the negative impact on teenage mothers, the people who care for them, and the children they give birth to. This study examined the pattern of relationship between body image, self-esteem, socio-economic status, peer influence, and teenage pregnancy. This study employed a correlational design, and a multistage sampling procedure was utilized. Adolescents in Ibadan constitutes the population (N = 150; 12.0% below 14 years, 58.7% 14 (...) – 16 years, while 29.3% were 17 – 19 years). Participants completed standardized instruments: (Body Image Acceptance Survey α = 0.85; Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale α = 0.78; Socio-economic Status Scale α = 0.79; Peer Influence Scale α = 0.81; and Teenage Pregnancy Scale α = 0.87). The results showed that body image (r = 0.327; p<0.05), self-esteem (r = 0.376; p<0.05), socio-economic status (r = 0.306; p<0.05), and peer influence (r = 0.201, p<0.05) all had a significant relationship with teenage pregnancy. A multiple regression coefficient (R = 0.484) and multiple regression adjusted (R2 = 0.234) were obtained. Also, self-esteem recorded the most effective relative contribution to teenage pregnancy, followed by body image, parental socio-economic status, and peer influence, respectively. This emphasizes the necessity of broad and all-encompassing strategies to stop teenage pregnancy because it is unlikely that a single element will be adequate to deal with the problem successfully. (shrink)

Even in a regulated and competitive market economy the behavior of firms leaves much to be desired. Looking beyond the invisible hand of the market and the iron hand of the law, this chapter outlines and assesses arguments for the intangible hand of civil society. The central mechanisms in our model depend on the importance of social esteem and self-esteem. Such esteem depends on assessments of true intentions and dispositions for costly pro-social actions. Instrumental or (...) reputation-shaping pro-social actions matter little in the economy of esteem. What is required is a common belief that conformity to certain costly standards benefits all; and that conformity is observable and elicits social approval (and vice versa). We acknowledge and review why in the realm of competitive commercial organizations, the challenges may be considerable for the intangible hand model to take hold. Moralizing (or professionalizing) the firm’s agents, inducting the voice of affected parties in the deliberation of firms, public (if strategically delayed) disclosure of internal deliberations, and public commitments by senior leaders all offer promise in enacting an economy of esteem in the world of competitive commercial firms. (shrink)

Recently, the idea that our desire for the esteem of others could function as a regulative principle of social life has been criticized because the economy of esteem could reinforce oppressive structures due to expressions of mutual esteem within oppressing groups with deviant group norms. This article discusses this problem from a historical point of view, focusing on the moral and political writings of the eighteenth-century French materialist Paul Thiry d’Holbach. D’Holbach’s thoughts are relevant in two (...) respects: For situations of extreme power and wealth differences within oppressing groups, he shows that the economy of esteem does not work in favour of the members of these groups. This is so because the conditions of esteem and self-esteem of the members with lower hierarchical standing tend to be precarious, while the members with higher standing cannot use the flatteries of their inferiors as credible sources of esteem. D’Holbach concedes that self-esteem could be stabilized by refraining from self-reflection but argues that such a strategy comes at the price of an impaired capacity for protecting one’s natural needs. The upshot of his considerations is that our interest in esteem and self-esteem provides strong pragmatic and moral reasons for opposing oppression. (shrink)

The present article draws attention to some specific similarities between Helvétius and Bentham in their treatments of the morality of the desire for esteem. These similarities can be observed in three fields: (1) Helvétius and Bentham integrate the desire for esteem into more general accounts of how sensible interest motivates human action; (2) they analyse various everyday situations in which the desire for esteems has consequences that are detrimental for social life; and (3) they emphasize republican constitution (...) building as an instrument for making the desire for esteem virtue-supporting. (shrink)

This dissertation examines the influence of Cambridge Platonism and materialist philosophy on Mary Astell's early feminism. More specifically, I argue that Astell co-opts Descartes's theory of regulating the passions in his final publication, The Passions of the Soul, to articulate a comprehensive, Enlightenment and body friendly theory of feminine self-esteem that renders her feminism modern. My analysis of Astell's theory of feminine self-esteem follows both textual and contextual cues, thus allowing for a reorientation of her early feminism vis-a-vis (...) contemporary feminist theory . An entire chapter in the dissertation is devoted to Astell's use of Descartes's theory of regulating the passions to render women more substantial and inherently worthy. This rendering becomes more concrete in Astell's feminist framework as she employs the language of the social contract in her fourth publication, Reflections Upon Marriage, to depict wives as contractual slaves. I argue that her assertion concerning women's slavery is theoretically consistent when read in light of her theory of feminine self-esteem, since this theory is based on the Enlightenment principles of self-mastery, independence and self-preservation. Further, I align Astell's early feminism in a dialogic sense with the Continental "querelle des femmes," especially as presented in writings by Christine de Pizan and Agrippa. Astell, I argue, contributes to the "querelle" by framing the feminist problem she wishes to solve concerning women's equality in a robust , philosophical manner that uncannily prefigures Wollstonecraft's call for the universalization of human virtues and the reform of of women's education. (shrink)

The paper takes as its starting point John Rawls’s claim that the social bases of self-respect is perhaps the most important primary good the distribution of which is governed by his principles of justice. There has been some debate about this claim in the literature and this debate has included important clarifications regarding the concept(s) involved. However, I think this discussion hasn’t gone deep enough and this – relative – lack of depth has or at least might have important (...) implications for our theory of distributive justice. To show this, I begin with Rawls’s admittedly sketchy remarks about the significance of self-respect in his theory. After this I briefly describe the debate that followed: what emerges here is a distinction between two kinds of self-respect. While I think this distinction is in good order, I also think and subsequently argue, building on the work of Robin Dillon and Anna Bortolan, that it only scratches the surface of the complex phenomenon of self-respect. In particular, as these authors show, the self-respect complex is, in fact, a multi-layered phenomenon and the distinction as used misses its fundamental level: basal self-respect (Dillon) or self-esteem (Bortolan). In the finishing part of the paper I discuss these two proposals to show that Bortolan’s version is the better one. All this then has clear relevance for the adjoining debate in political philosophy: all those who want to give an important role to self-respect in their theory of justice have potentially focused on the wrong target so far. This, I conclude, might well give rise to a new feminist critique of liberal egalitarian justice. (shrink)

Philosophical accounts of humour standardly account for humour in terms of what happens within a person. On these internalist accounts, humour is to be understood in terms of cognition, perception, and sensation. These accounts, while valuable, are poorly-situated to engage the social functions of humour. They have difficulty engaging why we value humour, why we use it define ourselves and our friendships, and why it may be essential to our self-esteem. In opposition to these internal accounts, I offer (...) a social account of humour. This account approaches humour as a social practice. It foregrounds laughter and participation, and thereby gives an account of humour that helps to understand why we value humour, why we use it as we do, and why we use it to define our relationship to the world. (shrink)

In this essay, I will offer a general account of self-esteem which makes room for a number of psychologically possible varieties of self-esteem. Since both philosophers and social scientists are interested in the connection between self-esteem and human well-being, I will present criteria for assessing the adequacy of different kinds of self-esteem. After showing in Part I that other prominent varieties, induding the one Rawls identified as a primary human good, fail to meet these criteria, (...) I will--in Part II--present an account of the nature and development of a particular variety of self-esteem which succeeds in measuring up to them. Throughout and in summary, I will show how the analysis of self.esteem I offer promises to explain the phenomena covered by other analyses, while overcoming the limitations facing those analyses. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Pierre Gassendi (1592–1655) has not been perceived as one of the early modern philosophers who had something interesting to say about the role of the desire for esteem in social life and the moral duties connected with this desire. Nevertheless, in his Animadversiones in decimum librum Diogenis Laertii (1649) there are some scattered, but interrelated remarks about how the desire for esteem could be supportive of civic virtue. These remarks were written during the years when Jansenism (...) became a considerable intellectual force in France, and the specific strengths of Gassendi's approach to the desire for esteem can be seen when it is read against this background. In the second volume of Augustinus (1640), Cornelius Jansen comments upon Augustine's objections to the moral value of striving for esteem. Contextualizing Gassendi's remarks against the Augustinian challenge is made plausible by two circumstances: The Augustinian challenge with respect to the desire for esteem contains explicit criticism of Epicurean ethics; and Gassendi responded to Augustine's central charge that, in desiring temporal goods such as esteem, one confuses things that are useful with things that should be enjoyed. (shrink)

Some philosophers challenge the advisability of naturalizing social metaphysics by appeal to social science. They argue that social science fails to meet criteria for realist commitment, such as unity and novel predictive power, and that social science would therefore be a poor basis for naturalization. These skeptical challenges are rooted in traditions in the philosophy of science that have held the social sciences in poor esteem. Through a case study that highlights the ways in (...) which archaeology is methodologically converging on hard science, I show that the philosophical bias against social science is outmoded. I suggest that at least some of the methodological advances of archaeology and other social sciences are epistemologically significant and are relevant to the question of realism. However, I conclude with the thought that realist commitment need not be a precondition for naturalization. The paper therefore accomplishes two main things: 1) it allays objections to using social science to naturalize social metaphysics, and 2) it motivates a higher estimation of the epistemological credentials of social science as compared with more skeptical traditions. (shrink)

The consciousness of social security comes to a man when he feels that he is getting his basic rights. Human Rights are related to those rights which are related to man’s life, freedom, equality and self-esteem, are established by Indian constitution or universal declaration of human rights and implemented by Indian judiciary system. In other words, “Human rights are rights inherent to all human beings, whatever our nationality, place of residence, sex, national or ethnic origin, color, religion, language, (...) or any other status.”1 We are all equally entitled to our human rights without discrimination. But we when come the present conditions of Indian society, it is painful to say we find lots of discrimination and violations of human rights is a common problem. In this paper it is an attempt is made to describe that casteism cause social insecurity and is a form of violation of human rights. (shrink)

This article explores a historical challenge for contemporary accounts of the role that the desire of being esteemed can play in exercising social control. According to Geoffrey Brennan and Philip Pettit, the economy of esteem normally has two aspects: it is supportive of virtuous action and it occurs spontaneously. The analysis of esteem presented by the 18th‐century materialist Claude‐Adrien Helvétius challenges the intuition that these two aspects go together unproblematically. This is so because, in Helvétius's view, the (...) desire for esteem is always triggered by sensible interest. In the frequent situations where sensible interest diverges from the demands of virtue, the economy of esteem thus can be spontaneous but will not be supportive of virtue. Helvétius allows for cases of moral luck where sensible interest coincides with the demands of virtue but regards these cases as rare occurrences. This is why he believes that a functioning economy of esteem crucially depends on political constitutions—in which case the economy of esteem can be supportive of virtue but will not be spontaneous. (shrink)

Learning to adapt to the new set of conditions that confound behavioral standards was made possible by the pandemic-driven change in the school system. Due to these conditions and the COVID-19 pandemic, students may experience behaviors like social media addiction and social anxiety that may affect their well-being or happiness. Thus, this study aims to investigate the effects of social media addiction and social anxiety on the happiness of tertiary students amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. The study (...) was conducted on 316 first-year college students utilizing Google forms to disseminate questionnaires. After utilizing Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale, Social Anxiety Scale, and Oxford Happiness Questionnaire, it was found that social media addiction (β = -0.30, p<.00) and social anxiety (β = -0.003, p<.00) has a significant negative effect on happiness. Therefore, the study recommended and designed a student wellness program that provides a range of recreational, healthimproving, self-esteem-boosting, and relationship-strengthening activities for students in order to mitigate the negative effects of problematic social media usage and social anxiety that negatively effect their happiness. (shrink)

This study examines social media's quantitative effect on juvenile criminality. The researcher intends to quantify how social media usage affects juvenile delinquency. The research will examine mediating elements, including peer influence, self-esteem, and antisocial content. This study may educate parents, educators, politicians, and mental health experts on adolescent social media usage hazards. This study aims to establish evidence-based social media mitigation and youth development solutions. This research employed quantitative methodologies. The target population for this study (...) will be two hundred (200) criminology students of Headstart College of Cotabato. Participants will be selected using a time-efficient random selection strategy. The findings of a power analysis will be used to calculate the sample size needed to achieve the desired level of statistical significance. The researcher will administer the survey questionnaire face-to-face after proper coordination with the College head. Respondents had enough time to complete the survey questions. The researcher and respondents will complete the questionnaire in their own time to gather and retrieve data: data quantification, categorization, and statistical description. Weighted mean and correlation were utilized to assess the association between social media use and teenage delinquency and behavior. The researcher carried out all methods using SPSS Application Guide as statistical software. The study revealed that excessive social media use is associated with negative outcomes such as mental health issues, decreased social interactions, and potential impacts on academic performance. Additionally, the level of parental monitoring and communication regarding social media usage was varied, and family conflict related to social media use was evident to some extent. There needs to be more research done to determine the mechanisms that link adolescent social media usage and behavior. Longitudinal studies may help explain what happens and why, as well as suggest any necessary countermeasures. (shrink)

Toleration is one of many responses toward diversity and difference. With the growing diversity, the theme of toleration has often taken center stage in discussions of multiculturalism and social pluralism. Nonetheless, it has not received much attention in the social work profession. Social workers often encounter situations in which they face a choice between tolerating and not tolerating. We argue that toleration is a legitimate and relevant topic in social work discourse. To make this point, first, (...) this paper discusses different conceptions of toleration. Then, it demonstrates its relevance to social work and explores a potential benefit of including the idea of toleration in social work discourse. Social work code of ethics implicitly supports toleration, or at least respect-toleration and esteem-toleration. Incorporating toleration in social work discourse may help social workers to better cope with or reduce ethical stress and disjuncture. (shrink)

Economic success in competitive systems requires resource redistribution to those who fail. Once we recognize that success in competitive endeavors depends meaningfully on the failure of others, policy implications that involve strong redistributive mechanisms should be drawn. Particular attention is paid to the role of education in fostering a sense of self-esteem necessary to counter the effects of internalized competition.

The broad range of emotional factors that affect learning on the sudden change of the learning modality in Mathematics led to this study. This study aimed to compare the level of support factors that greatly affect the students’ learning in mathematics in a blended learning approach. Sex, age, and relationship status were considered grouping variables on the individual, motivational, and social support factors towards learning mathematics in the blended learning mode of thirty education students at the tertiary level. This (...) study used a quantitative approach, particularly descriptive-comparative design. It utilized descriptive statistics such as means, standard deviations, and frequency and percent to describe the level of support factors. T-test for independent samples/ Mann Whitney U test was used to compare the level of support factors when grouped by the profile variables. Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance was used to compare the three support factors. The results revealed that the students’ level of support factors is high. Moreover, the level of support factors towards learning the subject in the blended learning mode of delivery of the students is the same regardless of their sex, age, and relationship status except in individual factors. Older students are influenced by their self-esteem or study habits more than younger students in learning mathematics in a blended approach. The students are eager to learn Mathematics in a blended learning approach because they are more motivated or are supported by their peers or their self-esteem. (shrink)

Gabriel Bonnot de Mably (1709–1785) adopts the republican commonplace that social esteem is the suitable reward for civic virtue. At the same time, he emphasizes that distorted imagination makes it difficult to discern what is good for human beings. This combination of views is puzzling because distorted imagination seems to impair the ability to recognize what deserves to be esteemed. I will argue that the coherence of Mably’s position is due to his emphasis on factors explaining distorted imagination (...) that do not derive from human nature but, rather, from external factors. One such factor is historiography. Historians’ distorted imaginations can mislead readers’ imaginations and make them ready to esteem despotic regimes and a politics of conquest. But such pathologies of the imagination can be cured through historiography that is informed by the positive experiences arising from ancient and early modern republican constitutions and the negative experiences arising from ancient and early modern despotic regimes. In Mably’s view, republican historiography is one of the factors capable of modifying the imagination of citizens and, hence, their conceptions of what deserves social esteem. (shrink)

This article argues that the reception of Augustinian ideas in Pascal and Nicole can be used to clarify what is distinctive in La Rochefoucauld’s treatment of self-relations. La Rochefoucauld does not share the Augustinian dichotomy between self-love at the price of forgetting God and love of God at the price of self-contempt that is prominent in both Pascal and Nicole. Rather, La Rochefoucauld develops a conception of an attitude towards the self that could be described as self-acceptance. As he describes (...) it, being open about one’s character faults falls short of self-esteem, if self-esteem is understood as involving a positive evaluation of one’s own character traits. However, it counterbalances these faults and can enhance the esteem in which we are held. And it offers a remedy for competing for social esteem which can be detrimental to our lives because the sincere person does not seek to be esteemed for qualities that are only pretended. At the same time, it overcomes an inflated self-image, thereby improving both social relations and the relation to the self. (shrink)

Cette recension a pour enjeu d’inviter à croiser deux lectures, celle de The Economy of Esteem. An Essay on Civil and Political Society, Oxford University Press, New York, 2004 de G. Brennan et P. Pettit et celle du livre d’O. Ihl, Le mérite et la République. Essai sur la société des émules, NRF/Gallimard, Paris, 2007. Il s’agit ici de mettre en relief l’apport du second ouvrage en indiquant sur quel point il pourrait nourrir le projet d’une reformulation de l’économie (...) de l’estime. En un premier temps, je vais rappeler les principales orientations de The Economy of Esteem avant de dégager les axes de la réflexion développée par Ihl dans Le mérite et la république. Sur cette base, j’indiquerai succinctement en quoi le travail d’O. Ihl peut contribuer au développement du projet d’une économie de l’estime. (shrink)

This article seeks to challenge existing understandings of good work. It does so through a critical exploration of recognitive and craft conceptions of work, which are among the richest and most philosophically nuanced of extant accounts. The recognitive view emphasises work’s recognitive value through the social esteem derived from making a valuable social contribution. But by making recognition foundational, it is unable to appreciate the irreducible ethical significance of the objective quality of one’s work activity. The ‘craft (...) ideal’, by contrast, promises to provide a powerful basis for understanding the importance of rich, rewarding, and morally educative activities, but is undermined by a laudable but misdirected egalitarian impulse which prevents it from being able to properly distinguish good from bad work. One underlying aim of our discussion is to provoke deeper reflection from business ethicists regarding what we might want from an account of good work. (shrink)

Unemployment is one of the greatest social problems all around the world including in modern capitalistic welfare states. Therefore its social critique is a necessary task for any critical social philosophy such as Axel Honneth's recognition approach, which understands social justice in terms of social conditions of recognition. This paper aims to develop an evaluation of unemployment and its moral weight from this perspective. I will lay out the recognition approach and present a moral evaluation (...) of unemployment as socially unjust based on the knowledge of its negative consequences for those affected. I will then discuss two objections to this conclusion, namely that a mere correlation of suffering and moral wrongness is not enough and that there are legitimate differences in the experience of recognition which could justify the existence of unemployment as deserved. In the next section, I will then refute both objections and first show that unemployment can be understood as socially unjust based on the knowledge that it is involuntary and that the unemployed are not responsible for their condition. Then I will discuss the relationship between the idea of meritocracy and unemployment to examine the assumption of unemployment as being deserved. I will finally conclude that unemployment is not a necessary side effect of meritocracy and that there are good reasons to argue for a moral and justified obligation to provide an actual access to paid work for all who want to work. However, such changes face serious obstacles and are not likely to happen under the current interpretation of meritocracy and social esteem which are one-sided and flawed. (shrink)

This article argues that the reception of Augustinian ideas in Pascal and Nicole can be used to clarify what is distinctive in La Rochefoucauld’s treatment of self-relations. La Rochefoucauld does not share the Augustinian dichotomy between self-love at the price of forgetting God and love of God at the price of self-contempt that is prominent in both Pascal and Nicole. Rather, La Rochefoucauld develops a conception of an attitude towards the self that could be described as self-acceptance. As he describes (...) it, being open about one’s character faults falls short of self-esteem, if self-esteem is understood as involving a positive evaluation of one’s own character traits. However, it counterbalances these faults and can enhance the esteem in which we are held. And it offers a remedy for competing for social esteem which can be detrimental to our lives because the sincere person does not seek to be esteemed for qualities that are only pretended. At the same time, it overcomes an inflated self-image, thereby improving both social relations and the relation to the self. (shrink)

One of the most detailed early modern discussions of the morality of esteem can be found in the work of the reformed jurist and historian Marquard Freher (1565–1614). Since the question of how much esteem others deserve is fraught with a high degree of uncertainty, Freher relied on the work of other legal humanists, who discussed questions of esteem from the perspective of arguments from the presumption of goodness. The humanist approach to the presumption of goodness integrated (...) considerations about presumed non-delinquency with considerations concerning natural needs, natural rights and natural duties grounded in natural rational capacities common to all (grown-up, healthy) human beings. It advised us to fulfill natural duties that derive from the natural need of being held in good esteem by others, and to develop socially valuable attitudes such as trust and positive emotions toward others. At the same time, this approach was responsive to considerations of prudence, both in grounding the presumption of goodness in considerations concerning causal powers and in balancing the presumption of goodness against a variety of presumptions of badness. Freher applied this understanding of the presumption of goodness to political practice in his role as an advisor to the Palatinate. (shrink)

In this volume Axel Honneth deepens and develops his highly influential theory of recognition, showing how it enables us both to rethink the concept of justice and to offer a compelling account of the relationship between social reproduction and individual identity formation. Drawing on his reassessment of Hegel’s practical philosophy, Honneth argues that our conception of social justice should be redirected from a preoccupation with the principles of distributing goods to a focus on the measures for creating symmetrical (...) relations of recognition. This theoretical reorientation has far-reaching implications for the theory of justice, as it obliges this theory to engage directly with problems concerning the organization of work and with the ideologies that stabilize relations of domination. In the final part of this volume Honneth shows how the theory of recognition provides a fruitful and illuminating way of exploring the relation between social reproduction and identity formation. Rather than seeing groups as regressive social forms that threaten the autonomy of the individual, Honneth argues that the ‘I’ is dependent on forms of social recognition embodied in groups, since neither self-respect nor self-esteem can be maintained without the supportive experience of practising shared values in the group. This important new book by one of the leading social philosophers of our time will be of great interest to students and scholars in philosophy, sociology, politics and the humanities and social sciences generally. (shrink)

Modeling social interactions based on individual behavior has always been an area of interest, but prior literature generally presumes rational behavior. Thus, such models may miss out on capturing the effects of biases humans are susceptible to. This work presents a method to model egocentric bias, the real-life tendency to emphasize one's own opinion heavily when presented with multiple opinions. We use a symmetric distribution, centered at an agent's own opinion, as opposed to the Bounded Confidence (BC) model used (...) in prior work. We consider a game of iterated interactions where an agent cooperates based on its opinion about an opponent. Our model also includes the concept of domain-based self-doubt, which varies as the interaction succeeds or not. An increase in doubt makes an agent reduce its egocentricity in subsequent interactions, thus enabling the agent to learn reactively. The agent system is modeled with factions not having a single leader, to overcome some of the issues associated with leader-follower factions. We find that agents belonging to factions perform better than individual agents. We observe that an intermediate level of egocentricity helps the agent perform at its best, which concurs with conventional wisdom that neither overconfidence nor low self-esteem brings benefits. (shrink)

Recently developed extensions of evolutionary theory are used to explain the human self as an evolved, unitary, and purposeful phenomenon. A basic mechanism that can generate life's agency and goal-directedness is combined with mechanisms that can account for awareness by and of the self, and for the social characteristics of humans. The new theory is largely consistent with major existing theories of the self, in particular theories centred on self-esteem, self-determination theory, and terror management theory. It can therefore (...) be regarded as a meta-theory that brings these theories, and related ones, within a common evolutionary framework. The theory suggests two primary dimensions of the self, the depth of awareness of the self and the social extent of the self. A revised and updated version of this paper can be found as Chapter 13 ('The human self') in my book 'The estimator theory of life and mind: how agency and consciousness can emerge', see VANTET-8 at philpapers . (shrink)

Social isolation (desocialization) implies a complete or almost complete lack of contact between an individual and society. This can be a problem for people of any age, although the symptoms may differ depending on the age group. Social isolation can include staying home for long periods of time, and lack of face-to-face communication with family, acquaintances, friends, or co-workers. Social isolation can lead to feelings of loneliness, fear of others or negative self-esteem. We cannot exist independently (...) of our relationships with others. One's own humanity is reduced when others are treated without dignity and respect. At the same time, provoking harm to another person can also affect perceptions of oneself. It turns out that a person's humanity depends on the humanity of those around him. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.35832.06405. (shrink)

In this introductory paper, I discuss the second-personal approach to ethics and the theory of recognition as two accounts of the fundamental sociality of the human form of life. The first section delineates the deep affinities between the two approaches. They both put a reciprocal social constellation front and center from which they derive the fundamental norms of moral and social life and a social conception of freedom. The second section discusses three points of contrast between the (...) two approaches: The accounts differ in that the second-personal approach opts for a narrower conception of recognition focusing on mutual moral accountability, whereas recognition theory suggests a broader conception including relations of love, respect, and esteem. Secondly, the accounts differ as to how they conceive of the interrelation of the I-thou and the I-We relationship. Finally, they differ with regard to the way they think of struggles for recognition. Whereas the second-personal approach suggests that we can understand struggles on the basis of a transcendental infrastructure of second-personal address, the theory of recognition considers norms of recognition as themselves constituted by dialectical social struggles. The paper closes with a reflection on the ways in which both approaches can help us understand the social vulnerability of the human form of life. (shrink)

The role of the Ready-made Garment (RMG) sector in transforming the lives of working women in Bangladesh has been controversial. This study examines the impact of paid employment in the RMG sector on the empowerment of its female workers. The fieldwork includes semi-structured interviews with female garment workers to explore their lived experiences and views. The primary qualitative data analysis draws principally on Kabeer's (1999) three inter-related dimensions (resources, agency, and achievements) of empowerment. The main findings of the research are (...) that women with access to employment opportunities in this sector have become economically empowered and independent. The higher economic capacity gives them greater autonomy and makes them confident to make some household and strategic life choices. Increased access to public spaces and consciousness about their right to make life choices have boosted their self-esteem. The study concludes that paid employment in the RMG sector has a significant positive impact on the economic, social, and psychological empowerment of female workers in the readymade garments sector. However, some critical constraints in the sector continue to limit their potential for being further empowered. The findings offer valuable insights for practitioners and policymakers. (shrink)

As a matter of justice children are entitled to many different things. In this paper we will argue that one of these things is positive self-relations (self-confidence, self-respect, and self-esteem), and that this implies that they must not be humiliated. This allows us to criticize poverty as unjust and to conclude that it should be alleviated. We will defend this claim in three steps: (1) we will introduce and examine three types of positive self-relations (self-confidence, self-respect, and self-esteem) (...) and argue that children are entitled to all of these; (2) we will move on to examine the concept of humiliation and argue that acts of humiliating are unjust even if the victims do not experience them as humiliating; (3) finally, we will provide five arguments as to why it is humiliating for children to live in poverty. The five arguments presented in the last section are: (a) poverty is connected to other forms of injustice; (b) poverty is undeserved and represents an arbitrary feature of affected children for which they cannot be held responsible; (c) poverty is widespread among children; (d) poverty is imposed on children because they are part of a larger social group; (e) poverty is an enduring humiliation and not just an occasional incident. (shrink)

There is a kernel of truth in the claim that Western, and especially Anglo-American-Australasian, normative philosophy, including that relating to the philosophy of education, is individualistic; it tends to prize properties that are internal to a human being such as her autonomy, rationality, pleasure, desires, self-esteem, self-realization and virtues relating to, say, her intellect. One notable exception is the idea that students ought to be educated in order to be citizens, participants in a democratic and cosmopolitan order, but, compared (...) to non-Western traditions, this social element is thin. What is striking about other philosophical backgrounds in the East and the South, such as sub-Saharan reflection on the proper ends of education, is that they are typically much more communitarian, and are so in ways that differ from dominant forms of communitarianism in the West. I argue that since geographical terms such as ‘Western’, ‘African’ and the like are best construed as picking out properties that are particularly salient in a region, it is fair to conclude that individualism is Western and not African, or, more carefully, that it is much more Western than it is African, and that converse remarks go for communitarianism. What this means is that, if I am correct about a glaring contrast between philosophies of education typical in the West and in sub-Saharan Africa, and if there are, upon reflection, attractive facets of communitarianism, then countries such as the UK, the US and Australia in some real sense must become less Western in order to take them on. (shrink)

Intellectual servility is a vice opposing proper pride about one's intellectual achievements. Intellectual timidity is also a vice; it is manifested in a lack of proper concern for others’ esteem. This paper offers an account of the nature of these vices and details some of the epistemic harms that flow from them. I argue that servility, which is often the result of suffering humiliation, is a form of damaged self-esteem. It is underpinned by attitudes serving social-adjustive functions (...) and causes ingratiating behaviors. Timidity, which is habituated through self-silencing, is underpinned by negative attitudes toward the intellectual worth of the self, which serve a defensive function. Like servility, timidity is an obstacle to the acquisition and transmission of knowledge and especially knowledge about oneself. (shrink)

Although it has been given qualified approval by a number of philosophers of education, the so-called ‘therapeutic turn’ in education has been the subject of criticism by several commentators on post-compulsory and adult learning over the last few years. A key feature of this alleged development in recent educational policy is said to be the replacement of the traditional goals of knowledge and understanding with personal and social objectives concerned with enhancing and developing confidence and self-esteem in learners. (...) After offering some critical observations on these developments, I suggest that there are some educationally justifiable goals underpinning what has been described as a therapeutic turn. Whilst accepting that ‘self-esteem’ and cognate concepts cannot provide a general end or universal aim of education, the therapeutic function is more valuable and significant than is generally acknowledged. This claim is justified by an examination of the concept of ‘mindfulness’ that, it is argued, can be an immensely powerful and valuable notion, which is integrally connected with the centrally transformative and developmental nature of learning and educational activity at all levels. (shrink)

The book that the esteemed foreign reader is about to read was conceived in the mid-1990s, or in the „passionate“ times of the Bulgarian posttotalitarian transition. It was then that the dozens of facts about the lavish privileged life of the socialist nomenklatura became known, which deeply outraged the ordinary people of Bulgaria. It was this that aroused my scholarly interest in the privileges of power, in the reasons for their generation and use by political elites around the world. Thus (...) was born the idea of writing the three-volume Power and Privilege in Political History, which includes an analysis of the nature and manifestations of privilege over a period of 5,000 years – from the deepest antiquity (XXX century BC) to our modern times (XXI century). In this context, the monograph interprets in a historiological order the theoretical and methodological aspects of privileges (Volume I), their evolution over the centuries (Volume II), as well as their concrete evolution in Bulgarian political life (Volume III) from the liberation of Bulgaria from Ottoman rule (1878) to the present day. Some of the most pressing questions of the phenomenon of privilege have not escaped the author’s creative eye, such as: why did privilege appear and why has it existed for so long in different societies?; Why are privileges an inalienable attribute of power and who has the right to regulate them or not - institutions, politicians, dictators, etc.; Why, despite their contemporary legitimacy, power privileges irritate people enormously and deepen social injustice in modern states, etc.? And so on and so forth. In this sense, the author has provided answers to these questions and has also put forward some of his own views on the future of privilege in democratic societies. (shrink)

Can trust evolve on the Internet between virtual strangers? Recently, Pettit answered this question in the negative. Focusing on trust in the sense of ‘dynamic, interactive, and trusting’ reliance on other people, he distinguishes between two forms of trust: primary trust rests on the belief that the other is trustworthy, while the more subtle secondary kind of trust is premised on the belief that the other cherishes one’s esteem, and will, therefore, reply to an act of trust in kind (...) (‘trust-responsiveness’). Based on this theory Pettit argues that trust between virtual strangers is impossible: they lack all evidence about one another, which prevents the imputation of trustworthiness and renders the reliance on trust-responsiveness ridiculous. I argue that this argument is flawed, both empirically and theoretically. In several virtual communities amazing acts of trust between pure virtuals have been observed. I propose that these can be explained as follows. On the one hand, social cues, reputation, reliance on third parties, and participation in (quasi-) institutions allow imputing trustworthiness to varying degrees. On the other, precisely trust-responsiveness is also relied upon, as a necessary supplement to primary trust. In virtual markets, esteem as a fair trader is coveted while it contributes to building up one’s reputation. In task groups, a hyperactive style of action may be adopted which amounts to assuming (not: inferring) trust. Trustors expect that their virtual co-workers will reply in kind while such an approach is to be considered the most appropriate in cyberspace. In non-task groups, finally, members often display intimacies while they are confident someone else ‘out there’ will return them. This is facilitated by the one-to-many, asynchronous mode of communication within mailing lists. (shrink)

Anger is arguably one of the most important emotions in a human being’s life. An array of contemporary studies show that, far from being detrimental, anger can foster one’s self-esteem, improve their social interactions, and even benefit physical and mental health. In his Treatise of Human Nature, David Hume explicitly recognized the importance of anger. And yet, few topics have been so neglected in the Hume scholarship as his account of this passion. The following chapter aims to fill (...) the gap in the literature by showing that Hume’s analysis of anger is worth studying and strictly connected to some of the most intriguing problems in his philosophy. (shrink)

Structural injustice broadly refers to objectionable outcomes produced by generally accepted social structures for members of particular social groups. But theorists of structural injustice have said relatively little about why certain outcomes are objectionable, and many theorists suggestively connect structural injustice to a worry about oppression without explaining their precise normative concerns. I provide a normative analysis of structural injustice that addresses this gap and clarifies its connection to oppression. On this view, there are two kinds of structural (...) injustice, each grounded in a distinct moral concern. One is a freedom-based concern for how social structures harmfully constrain members of a social group, depriving them of the means to develop and exercise their capacities. The other is an equality-based concern for how social structures subordinate a social group to others in hierarchies of power, standing, and esteem. By disentangling these concerns, this account shows that our social structures contain multiple kinds of injustice that do not necessarily travel together; some social groups experience unfreedom without being subordinated to others, and indeed their unfreedom is intertwined with their dominant position over subordinated groups. Furthermore, against prevailing philosophical accounts, this analysis shows that there are good reasons to understand oppression primarily as an issue of inequality rather than an issue of unfreedom. (shrink)

According to a prominent narrative, the problem of recognition arises in the modern period in opposition to premodern notions of honor. This chapter invites us to reconsider this narrative by examining two views of honor in ancient Greek thought. I first show that Homeric honor includes contestable norms of reciprocal respect and esteem for individual virtue. I then show how Plato appropriates the Homeric view in his ethical psychology yet articulates a competing view of the nature and value of (...) honor. By showing that ancient Greek honor is more continuous with theories of recognition than has been appreciated, this chapter offers fresh perspectives on a central strand of ancient Greek ethics and its relevance to social and political thought. (shrink)

Filipino's love for the elderly is undeniable. However, despite the respect they have for the elderly, an increasing amount of elderly abandonment is rising in the Philippines. The drastic increase in statistics of abandonment will still grow over the years because aging is inevitable. The primary goal of this study is to dig deeper into the experiences, challenges, and coping mechanisms of abandoned senior citizens inside of a home for the aged to spread awareness about this certain topic. By the (...) use of Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis, the study come up with the following findings: (1) The abandoned senior citizens chose to be inside the facility because they don't want to be a burden in their original homes. (2) Faith and religious works affect their psychological well-being. (3) Physical appearance does not affect their self-esteem. (4) Social support boosts their psychological well-being as well. (5) One of the biggest reasons why abandoned senior citizens left their homes is being neglected to cause them to leave and stay in home for the aged (6) Lastly, people inside the facilities accepted the fact that death is drawing closer to them but they don't want to die yet. (shrink)

I suggest that the post-Hegelian tradition presents us with three contrasting normative models of work. According to the first model, the core norms of work are those of means-ends rationality. In this model, the modern world of work is constitutively a matter of deploying the most effective means to bring about given ends. The rational kernel of modern work, the core norm that has shaped its development, is on this view instrumental reason, and this very same normative core, in the (...) shape of advanced technology and more efficient, time-saving production, can help to liberate it. The second model, by contrast, takes the core norms of work to be internal to working activity. Rather than work gaining its normativity from something external to it, from ends to which the work is a contingent means, on this second view the core norms of work are expressions of values or meanings that are immanent to working practices themselves. The expressive model of work regards the actual world of work to be constituted historically by work-specific norms, norms which working subjects themselves have invoked and mobilised around in the course of their struggles for emancipation. According to the third model, the core norms of work have to do neither with instrumental rationality nor authentic self-expression. Rather they concern norms that relate either to individual achievement or contribution through work (in the form of esteem) or to the conditions that must in place for individuals to participate in the exchange of services by which market societies reproduce themselves (in the form of mutual respect). (shrink)

The New Age philosopher, Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925), was the most prolific and arguably the most influential philosopher of his era. He assembled a substantial library, of approximately 9,000 items, which has been preserved intact since his death. Most of Rudolf Steiner’s books are in German, his native language however there are books in other languages, including English, French, Italian, Swedish, Sanskrit and Latin. There are more books in English than in any other foreign language. Steiner esteemed English as “a universal (...) world language”. The present paper identifies 327 books in English in Rudolf Steiner’s personal library. Fifty percent of the English-language books identified are on Theosophy (n=164). Rudolf Steiner was the General Secretary of the German branch of the Theosophy Society from 1902, and he hived off his own Anthroposophy Society in 1912. The present study reveals that Steiner maintained his interest in Theosophy throughout his life as he stayed up to date with the proliferating portfolio of Theosophy publications. The publication dates of Steiner’s Theosophy collection range from 1877 to 1923. The leading exponents of Theosophy in his day are well represented in Steiner’s collection, including Annie Besant (n=61), Charles Leadbeater (n=13), William Westcott (n=13) and Helena Blavatsky (n=10). Of the other 50% of the Anglo-books identified, 20% are in the category of Religion (n=67), 10% are Social Science (n=33), 6% are Philosophy (n=21), 4% are Science (n=13), and 3% each are Anthroposophy (n=11), History (n=9) and Arts (n=9). The publication dates of Steiner’s Anglo-books span the period 1659 to 1925. This demonstrates that Steiner was acquiring Anglo-books right to the end of his life. The Steiner library throws light on the development of the thoughts of this remarkable individual and the present paper reveals Steiner’s engagement throughout his life with the world of Anglo-publishing and thought. (shrink)

1 Introduction1 In the 1980s, hermeneutics was often incorporated into deconstructionism and literary theory. Rather than focus on authorial intentions, the nature of writing itself including codes used to construct meaning, socio-economic contexts and inequalities of power,2 Gadamer introduced a different perspective; the interplay between effects of history on a reader’s understanding and the tradition(s) handed down in writing. This interplay in which a reader’s prejudices are called into question and modified by the text in a fusion of understanding and (...) topic revitalized the study of the printed word. Gadamer’s turn to language for understanding the meaning of Being also appealed to the post-modern antipathy toward modernity and metaphysics.3 If the truth and validity of interpretations are limited to communities of language, then our mode of being in history cannot but be historical. This point of view rendered Gadamer’s phenomenological hermeneutics vulnerable to the critique of moral and epistemological relativism. However, Gadamer’s theory of interpretation also stems from re-examination of the beginning of knowledge in the Pre-Socratics and Plato, and on this basis, is receptive to another dimension of inquiry than that which was trending in North America. -/- At the East-West Center, University of Hawai’i at Manoa in 1982, Chung-ying Cheng for the first time introduced onto-hermeneutics to an audience of esteemed philosophers including Li Zehou, Ren Jiyu, Feng Youlan, and Zhang Liwen.4 In contrast to schools of deconstruction and literary theory that had disengaged the interpreter from trans-historical sources of meaning and truth, Cheng explained that interpreters exist within a cosmological order inextricable from responsibility to harmonize Heaven and Earth in creative acts of interpretation. By integrating Chinese cosmology into hermeneutics through ontology, he tacitly challenged philosophers in the West to re-examine assumptions about humanity’s place in nature and by implication, Gadamer’s recovery of the beginnings of knowledge in Western philosophy. -/- Cheng’s Neo-Confucianism is inspired by the method and goals of Thomé H. Fang. The following words by Fang seem to prefigure, although in an indistinct and bundled way, aspects of Cheng’s philosophy including a Mencian theory of human nature, comprehensive observation, and creativity: “In the very process of living in concord with creative Nature, Man is charged with an ideal to be fully realized in the light of the principle of comprehensive harmony.”5 Like Fang, Cheng reinvigorates Chinese culture and language, but not solely in order to vindicate the insights of Neo-Confucianism. He has studied Western thought, from pragmatism and the analytic school to German idealism and phenomenology, to unlock and clarify philosophical concepts within the Yijing tradition and thereby render them intelligible to Anglophones. The result has been an awakening of Western scholars to the moral and cultural consequences of decoupling their thought from metaphysical foundations that are neither dogmatic nor doctrinal. -/- Not unlike the dialectic of Gadamer’s dialogue form, onto-generative hermeneutics integrates contrary positions on the same topic in order to blend both sides into a world philosophy, or as Cheng says, a “totalizing or integrative theory,”6 not to be confused with a theoretical rewording of a theory. On the contrary, the universal scope and relevance of hermeneutics stems from personal experience. Just as Gadamer, in response to faction and strife, immersed himself in Plato during the war years, and developed a method with which to harmonize opposites, so too, according to On-cho Ng, was Cheng moved by faction, strife and political persecution to develop a path toward unity.7 Gadamer taught at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, and Cheng at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa among other institutions in North America. They facilitated trans-continental educational and cultural ties. Similar experiences yield similar insights irrespective of differences of time and place. Hence, authors in this issue who reside in Europe, China and North America, delineate the differences between Gadamer and Cheng, yet also, in light of Cheng’s onto-generative method and cosmology, develop integrative theories. Due to the page-budget restriction of the publisher, certain articles of this special theme will be subsequently published in the next issue. -/- 2 Integrative Theory This special issue of The Journal of Chinese Philosophy confirms a dimension of hermeneutics that Cheng has both motivated and inspired. The contributors do not abide by the conviction that since thought is mediated by language, interpretations cannot transcend culture. On the contrary, their research exemplifies the fruits of trans-historical onto-dialogical hermeneutics within limits defined by their field inquiry, organized into Parts I and II, around three themes: language, the philosophy of history and ethics. -/- Andrew Fuyarchuk introduces the theme of ontology in relation to Gadamer’s turn to language. Fuyarchuk argues that Chung-ying Cheng’s criticism of Gadamer’s hermeneutics is informed by Heidegger’s concept of Dasein and thereby overlooks how Gadamer’s Platonic-Pythagorean problem of the division between the One and Many is harmonized in the event of language, which in turn positions Gadamer in proximity to the presupposed grounds of receptivity in Cheng’s onto-generative hermeneutics. Lauren Pfister’s contributing article addresses the year 2000 meeting between Cheng and Gadamer in Heidelberg and expands the transhistorical grounds of meaning in Gadamer to matters of theology. Pfister’s summary of the written Chinese record of their conversation indicates that Cheng does not address the role of Christian philosophy and hence, the role of the inner word in Gadamer’s hermeneutics. This is important not only for detecting changes in Cheng’s philosophical development, but also for modifying his hermeneutics along the lines of a living conversation, possibilities explored by Pfister in a sequel to the article submitted to this issue. Nevertheless, by raising the issue of how Gadamer’s turn to language for understanding the meaning of Being extends possibilities in Cheng’s thought, Pfister anticipates the article by Katarina Gajdosova. She returns to the roots of Chinese thought during the Warring States period and broadens the meaning of names in recently excavated texts. Contrary to the conventions about how to understand terms, she appeals to both Heidegger’s ontology and Cheng’s notion of receptivity and creativity to reinterpret naming in relation to cosmology. Along the same lines, insofar as the event of Being is lingual, Jay Goulding captures its emergent structure in an evolving community of scholars and scholarship. He recalls his philosophical journey toward Cheng’s philosophy that begins in conversations with Gadamer at McMaster University in Hamilton, leads to Heidegger and Asian thought, expands into turning points with teachers and colleagues from various backgrounds that by increments contributed to Goulding’s formulation of “Daoist phenomenology.” -/- Although differing traditions guide their inquiries and research, Cheng and Gadamer recall the wisdom of the past to ameliorate the fragmentation in contemporary life. This leads them to re-examine the origins of philosophy; historical roots and thus sources of creative re-interpretations East and West whose affinities are developed in contributions by Hyun Höchsmann and Friederike Assandri. Höchsmann assesses convergences and divergences in the origins of Chinese and Western philosophy (Confucius and Socrates, the Yijing and Pre-Socratics) that culminates in pairing Gadamer’s understanding of paideia in the context of Plato’s political cosmology in the Timaeus with moral and social cultivation in The Western Inscription. She delineates the limits of this comparison which in turn justifies introducing Vattimo’s notion of locality. Assandri’s comparative analysis moves between India and China, Buddhism and Tang Daoism. Based on Gadamer’s argument that writing detaches concepts from their cultural moorings, she defines and applies three levels of understanding in onto-generative hermeneutics to Buddhist terms that were assimilated into the Benji Jing and in so doing clarifies essential dimensions of Daoism. -/- Contributions by Stephen Palmquist and Nicholas Brasovan position Cheng in relation to Kant and Gadamer by way of Aristotle’s ethics respectively. On the one hand, Palmquist plots Cheng’s evolving criticism of Kant’s moral philosophy and draws on crucial dimensions of Gadamer’s hermeneutics to reposition that criticism in a constructive relation to Kant’s emphasis on the philosophical conditions of morality while also indicating how religious dimensions of his thought answer Cheng’s concerns for lived moral action. For Palmquist, Gadamer enables a constructive criticism of Cheng. On the other hand, Brasovan compares Cheng’s Yijing-based account of moral deliberation with Gadamer’s Aristotelian-based ethics and reasons that in contrast to Cheng, Gadamer’s hermeneutical consciousness is disengaged from practical knowledge. For Brasovan, Cheng is a constructive critic of Gadamer. Palmquist and Brasovan’s divergent angles on Gadamer and Cheng map onto a dialectic of contrast and complementarity that constitutes the inner logic of Cheng’s philosophy. In other words, Gadamer and Cheng ought to be read alongside one another for the sake of removing discrepancies and contradictions, which constitutes the organic structure of their thinking. -/- 3 Our Mode of Being in History Is Not Historical The conversations between Cheng and Gadamer in this issue of The Journal of Chinese Philosophy pivot on language, philosophy of history and ethics within a comparative framework of analysis, but also explore the grounds that make the comparisons possible. Those grounds are informed by Chinese cosmology, and function to wrest Gadamer from the shadow of Heideggerian facticity and reposition him within the range of Cheng’s ideas about our place in nature that is embedded in his question about how mind emerges from inorganic matter.8 -/- For Gadamer scholars of Heidegger, human finitude, our ownmost individuating death ensures that hermeneutics is always open to the other as other, always on the way toward understanding the meaning of Being. To arrest the process in a concept of “the Absolute” cannot but represent someone’s point of view, and thereby render hermeneutics indistinguishable from ideology. However, insofar as finitude is defined by them in terms of an onto-theological concept of immorality, finitude is a metaphysical concept consistent with epistemologies and confuse beings with the meaning of Being. As a result, the celebrated political value of hermeneutics to always be on the way toward an understanding of the meaning of Being admits subtle variations on the same worldview that are insufficiently self-critical. -/- Gadamer scholars of Heidegger are right. A transformation in ethos and opening to the meaning of Being depends on awareness of finitude. Yet this awareness does not yield openness to more of the same, i.e., discourse structurally incapable of coming to unity but instead, for both Gadamer and Cheng, openness to a distinctly different ontological dimension of reality. As Sandra Wawrytko and So-Seong Park indicate,9 this ontological dimension is prefigured in the experience of being-as-a-whole or the totality of all possible relations in both Chinese totemic shamanistic rituals,10 and Greek Dionysian festivals.11 Through these religious experiences human ethos and therefore consciousness is expanded and elevated from being centered on one’s ownmost concerns toward an affinity with all sentient beings from insects and plants to animals. The channel for this affinity is an auditory disposition and hence, the emotions, compassion, and feeling response. -/- The capacity for an auditory disposition, or as Gadamer calls it, listening consciousness to respond to the inter-relationality and therefore inherent balance of nature is developed through music, song and dance of the religious rituals and festivals. They facilitate the unity of mind with nature. This use of music, that transforms ordinary consciousness, explains Cheng’s emphasis on the receptivity of feeling response in comprehensive observation, and Gadamer’s emphasis on openness to the other in attunement. However, an auditory disposition characteristic of pre-literate oral cultures that reveals the “All” need not rely on religion. As theorists about the evolution of language have explained,12 modern languages preserve their pre-historical past in music or prosody. That is to say, the song and dance that revealed the totality of inter-related beings to an ethos of comprehensive observation and attunement toward beings in classical civilizations is retained in the back-and-forth movement or rhythm of the dialogue form. Our mode of being in history is a mode of being in nature – through the music of language. -/- While alerting the reader to the limits of a nominalist interpretation, Gadamer expresses the inner law of the nature as follows: “in perishing there is always becoming, and in becoming there is always perishing.”13 Considered in process, opposites generate and blend into each other. This law of nature applies to everything.14 Hence, in a manner comparable to Pfister’s concluding insights, onto-dialogical hermeneutics is not only open to discrete events of otherness but moreover, to the moving structure of reality expressed, as Gajdosova suggests, in the existential moment of naming. Considered as interplay of tension and resolution with a life of its own, the dialectic of a dialogue is self-similar to the way in which an organism grows (by instinct). There is, therefore, a sense in which the art of interpretation extends the human mind into the eternal cycles of nature such that we participate in the articulation of the inner telos/homeostasis toward which all beings strive and importantly for Gadamer scholars of Heidegger, within the material limits of energy to which our embodied minds are self-evidently subject. In mortality there is always immortality. (shrink)

The claim of this paper is to present Spinoza’s view on self-esteem and positive reciprocity, which replaces the human being in a monistic psycho-dynamical affective framework, instead of a dualistic pedestal above nature. Without naturalising the human being in an eliminative materialistic view as many recent neuro-scientific conceptions of the mind do, Spinoza finds an important entry point in a panpsychist and holistic perspective, presenting the complexity of the human being, which is not reducible to the psycho-physiological conditions of (...) life. From a panpsychist point of view, qualities and values emerge from the world, in a situation similar to what could be seen in animism, or early childhood psychology, where the original distance between the mind and the exterior thing is reduced ad minima, and both can even interrelate in a confusing manner. Human reality is nevertheless a social reality, it supposes a basis for shared competencies, that we will present as grounded on the one hand of the sustaining character of the essence of the animal-man as will-to-power. Negatively speaking we all share same asocial tendencies and affects. This aspect is not only negative but it is also a will to develop and master the environment, because values have an onto-metaphysical immanent dimension in nature, not because there is an individual bottom-up will to survive, but rather a will to live in harmony with the surrounding world. On the other hand, we shall see that Spinoza understood and described perfectly the power of the mind over the power of the affects, as a co-constituting dimension, which is alienating natural dependencies, leaving an inner space for the objectification of ethical values, not related to mere compensation mechanisms. (shrink)

Pride is a fundamental element in Hume's description of human nature. An important part of the secondary literature on Hume is devoted to this passion. However, no one, as far as I am aware, takes seriously the fact that pride often appears in pairs with vanity. In Book 2 of the Treatise, pride is defined as the passion one feels when society recognizes his connection to a ‘cause’, composed by a ‘subject’ and a (positive) ‘quality’. Conversely, no definition of vanity (...) is provided. Despite Hume's fluctuating vocabulary, I hold that a conceptual difference between pride and vanity exists. To support this claim, I analyse the common features of these two passions, showing that both pride and vanity (a) are indirect passions, (b) are self-regarding passions, and (c) have the same structure. Supported by textual evidence, I then claim that vanity is a desire of reputation, a desire to feel pride, when pride is not (yet) in place, because its cause is only imaginary and not real. Nonetheless, I underscore that, at times, ‘vanity’ means simply pride and call for greater attention on this ongoing oscillation. In conclusion, I explore the implications of this account of vanity for social interactions in Hume's philosophy, which illustrates its intrinsic ambivalence. (shrink)

We can distinguish two concepts of respect for persons: appraisal respect , an attitude based on a positive appraisal of a person's moral character, and recognition respect , the practice of treating persons with consideration based on the belief that they deserve such treatment. After engaging in an extended analysis of these concepts, I examine two "truisms" about them. We justifiably believe of some persons that they have good character and thus deserve our esteem . Frequently it pays to (...) be disrespectful; e.g., insulting those who insult us may put them in their place. By using empirical results from social and personality psychology and techniques from decision theory in addition to conceptual considerations, I argue that, surprisingly, the above two "truisms" are false. Extensive psychological evidence indicates that most persons are indeterminate---overall neither good nor bad nor intermediate---and that our information about specific persons almost never distinguishes those who are indeterminate from those who are not. The strategy of habitually avoiding disrespectful behavior maximizes long-term expected utility. In sum, we have good pragmatic reason to treat persons respectfully, but we have good epistemic reason to avoid esteeming or despising them. (shrink)