The article works out the thesis that to the excessive desire of the powerful for the absolute appropriation/domination it is opposed a not less excessive and absolute desire from people in order not to be appropriated/dominated: two desires of a distinct nature which are neither the desire for the same things nor the desire for different things, but desires in which the act of desiring is different. Taking into account that each desire aims at its absolute effectiveness, each (...) one of them tries to impose itself universally becoming doubly absolute: for one side it is inclined to the absolute domination (the powerful) or to the plain liberty (the people); for the other side, tries to impose itself to the whole political body. Each desire is only sustained by its heterogeneous desire. Each one pursues its own purposes whose realization will be the ruin of all collective life. Good institutions and good laws ensure liberty as long as they are capable to prevent the powerful or the people to consummate its desire or abandon its own desire to assume the other’s. However, having inscribed the order of law in the disorder of dissent, Machiavelli discarded the idea of an institutional order as a defi nitive solution to the disorder of dissent. Consequently, no law or institution is able to defi nitively resist the risk of corruption. This requires a periodic return to the origins: the experience of the constitutive moment of the original violence which, exposing men to risks, restores the initial reputation and strength of States and institutions. -/- O artigo parte da enunciação da tese de que ao desejo desmesurado dos grandes pela apropriação/dominação absoluta opõe-se um desejo não menos desmesurado e absoluto do povo de não sê-lo: dois desejos de natureza diferente que não são nem o desejo das mesmas coisas nem desejo de coisas diferentes, mas desejos cujo ato de desejar é diferente. Considerando que cada desejo visa sua efetividade absoluta, cada um tenta se impor universalmente tornando-se duplamente absoluto: por um lado, tende à dominação total (os grandes) ou à liberdade plena (o povo); por outro, tenta se impor ao conjunto do corpo político. Cada desejo somente se sustenta do desejo que lhe é heterogêneo. Cada um persegue uma fi nalidade própria cuja realização plena será a ruína de toda vida coletiva. Boas instituições e boas leis asseguram a liberdade na medida em que forem capazes de impedir que grandes ou povo consumam seu desejo ou que abandonem seu desejo próprio para assumir o do outro. Contudo, ao inscrever a ordem da lei na desordem dos dissensos, Maquiavel descartou a ideia de uma ordem institucional como solução defi nitiva da desordem dos dissensos. Consequentemente, nenhuma lei ou instituição é capaz de resistir defi nitivamente ao risco da corrupção. Isso obriga ao retorno periódico às origens: a experiência do momento constitutivo da violência originária que, expondo os homens ao risco, restaura o prestígio e vigor iniciais de Estados e instituições. (shrink)

Ambivalence is most naturally characterized as a case of conflicting desires. In most cases, an agent’s intrinsic desires conflict contingently: there is some possible world in which both desires would be satisfied. This paper argues, though, that there are cases in which intrinsic desires necessarily conflict—i.e., the desires are not jointly satisfiable in any possible world. Desiring a challenge for its own sake is a paradigm case of such a desire. Ambivalence of this sort (...) in an agent’s desires creates special problems for the project of reducing all facts about an agent’s desires to facts about his or her preferences over options. If this reductive project fails, there is reason to suspect that the Decision Theory cannot give us a complete theory of Humean rationality. (shrink)

On Hume’s account of motivation, beliefs and desires are very different kinds of propositional attitudes. Beliefs are cognitive attitudes, desires emotive ones. An agent’s belief in a proposition captures the weight he or she assigns to this proposition in his or her cognitive representation of the world. An agent’s desire for a proposition captures the degree to which he or she prefers its truth, motivating him or her to act accordingly. Although beliefs and desires are sometimes entangled, (...) they play very different roles in rational agency. In two classic papers (Lewis 1988, 1996), David Lewis discusses several challenges to this Humean picture, but ultimately rejects them. We think that his discussion of a central anti-Humean alternative – the desire-as-belief thesis – is in need of refinnement. On this thesis, the desire for proposition p is given by the belief that p is desirable. Lewis claims that ‘[e]xcept in trivial cases, [this thesis] collapses into contradiction’(Lewis 1996, p. 308). The problem, he argues, is that the thesis is inconsistent with the purportedly plausible requirement that one’s desire for a proposition should not change upon learning that the proposition is true; call this the invariance requirement. In this paper, we revisit Lewis’s argument. We show that, if one carefully distinguishes between non-evaluative and evaluative propositions, the desire-asbelief thesis can be rendered consistent with the invariance requirement. Lewis’s conclusion holds only under certain conditions: the desire-as-belief thesis conflicts with the invariance requirement if and only if there are certain correlations between non-evaluative and evaluative propositions. But when there are such correlations, we suggest, the invariance requirement loses its plausibility. Thus Lewis’s argument against the desire-as-belief thesis appears to be valid only in cases in which it is unsound. (shrink)

I propose an account of desire that reconciles two apparently conflicting intuitions about practical agency. I do so by exploring a certain intuitive datum. The intuitive datum is that often when an agent desires P she will seem to immediately and conclusively know that there is a reason to bring P about. Desire-based theories of reasons seem uniquely placed to explain this intuitive datum. On this view, desires are the source of an agent’s practical reasons. A desire (...) for P grounds conclusive knowledge of a reason to bring P about because that desire makes it true that there is a reason to do so. However, this implies that a basic desire for P can never be in error about there being at least some reason to bring P about. We have the conflicting intuition that basic desires sometimes rationally count for nothing. The guise of the good explains this intuition about the fallibility of desires. On this view, a desire for P represents P as good in some respect. Desires and reasons are independent, so a desire might misrepresent one’s reasons. But this independence is usually taken to rule out that desires ever provide conclusive knowledge of reasons. Capturing the intuition about conclusive knowledge rules out capturing the intuition about fallibility, and vice versa. I propose an epistemological disjunctivist version of the guise of the good that reconciles fallibility with the possibility of conclusive knowledge. (shrink)

Polus admires orators for the tyrannical power they have. However, Socrates argues that orators and tyrants lack power worth having: the ability to satisfy one's wishes or wants (boulēseis). He distinguishes wanting from thinking best, and grants that orators and tyrants do what they think best while denying that they do what they want. His account is often thought to involve two conflicting requirements: wants must be attributable to the wanter from their own perspective (to count as their (...) class='Hi'>desires), but wants must also be directed at objects that are genuinely good (in order for failure to satisfy them to matter). We offer an account of wanting as reflective, coherent desire, which allows Socrates to satisfy both desiderata. We then explain why he thinks that orators and tyrants want to act justly, though they do greater injustices than anyone else and so frustrate their own wants more than anyone else. (shrink)

Antithetical desires displayed throughout Kierkegaard’s authorship indicate the disjunctive assumption that the individual exists either in a state of increasing autonomy, expressed negatively as striving for freedom from divine constraint, or in a state of self-annihilating submission, expressed positively in terms of kenotic unification. Proximity to the divine thereby entails forfeiture of individuality, contrary to the explicit aim of Kierkegaard’s authorial project, and aversion to materiality. This essay enunciates the conflict (I), traces the crescendo of loss that births the (...) pseudonymous authorship and ends in realized longing for death (II), and approaches a more holistic vision of psycho-spiritual development (III). (shrink)

(text in Dutch) Mediated by the so-called Dream-organ ('Traumorgan') which opera composer Richard Wagner mentions in his writings, the author engages in a fictitious dialogue with Wagner. Their dialogue focuses on a few topics related to the conference theme 'Conflict and compassion' that were of concern to Wagner in his days and which have undergone some serious changes since his death. The author discusses with Wagner the 'death of tragedy', sexuality and desire after the sexual revolution, the attractivity of musical (...) genres like film and dance music, and the role of travel. (shrink)

Conditioning can produce desires that seem to be outside of--or “alien” to--the agent. Desire-based theories of welfare claim that the satisfaction of desires creates prudential value. But the satisfaction of alien desires does not seem to create prudential value. To explain this fact, we need an account of alien desires that explains their moral status. In this paper I suggest that alien desires are desires that would be rational if the person believed something that (...) in fact she believes is false. Such desires could be produced by mental representations--or “quasi-beliefs”--with contents that conflict with the contents of one’s beliefs. The postulation of quasi-beliefs is plausible, for they explain important empirical facts about our behavior--facts that are difficult if not impossible to explain otherwise. Alien desires, I argue, involve quasi-beliefs with contents that conflict with the contents of regular beliefs. This theory provides the distinction between alien and authentic desires that desire-based theories of welfare need. (shrink)

One of the deepest and longest-lasting debates in ethics concerns a version of the Euthyphro question: are choiceworthy things choiceworthy because agents have certain attitudes toward them or are they choiceworthy independent of any agents’ attitudes? Reasons internalists, such as Bernard Williams, Michael Smith, Mark Schroeder, Sharon Street, Kate Manne, Julia Markovits, and David Sobel answer in the first way. They think that all of an agent’s normative reasons for action are grounded in facts about that agent’s pro-attitudes (e.g., her (...) desires, valuing states, normative judgments). According to the most popular brand of internalism, idealizing internalism, an agent’s reasons are grounded, not in her actual pro-attitudes, but rather in what her pro-attitudes would be in suitably idealized conditions. Idealizing internalists presuppose that, for any agent with an irrational set of attitudes, there is one uniquely rational set that that agent would have if she were to undergo the relevant idealizing process. I argue that this assumption is false and that it raises two puzzles for idealizing internalism: one about the existence of practical reasons and another about their normative weight. I argue that idealizing internalists have an adequate solution to the first puzzle but not the second. Indeed, when they try to solve the second puzzle, they confront a dilemma. This second puzzle and the associated dilemma thus constitutes a powerful, but so far unnoticed, difficulty for idealizing internalism. (shrink)

ABSTRACT: This paper understands mental attitudes such as emotions and desires to be dispositions to behavior. It also acknowledges that people are often ambivalent, i.e., that they may hold opposed attitudes towards something or someone. Yet the first position seems to entail that ambivalence is either tantamount to paralysis or a contradictory notion. I identify the problem as based on a reductive interpretation of the dispositional character of attitudes and of ambivalence. The paper instead defends a post-Davidsonian view of (...) the basic rationality of human life. By focussing on desire and emotion we can see that the mutually exclusive ways of life involved in ambivalence are manifested in the person’s conduct. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Many companies engage in dialogue with nongovernmental organizations about societal issues. The question is what a regulative ideal for such dialogues should be. In the literature on corporate social responsibility, the Habermasian notion of communicative action is often presented as a regulative ideal for stakeholder dialogue, implying that actors should aim at consensus and set strategic considerations aside. In this article, we argue that in many cases, communicative action is not a suitable regulative ideal for dialogue between companies and NGOs. (...) We contend that there is often an adversarial element in the relation between companies and NGOs, and that an orientation towards consensus can be in tension with this adversarial relation. We develop an alternative approach to stakeholder dialogue called ‘agonistic deliberation.’ In this approach, conflict and strategic considerations play a legitimate and, up to a certain point, desirable role. (shrink)

Plato’s partition argument infers that the soul has parts from the fact that the soul experiences mental conflict. We consider an ambiguity in the concept of mental conflict. According to the first sense of conflict, a soul is in conflict when it has desires whose satisfaction is logically incompatible. According to the second sense of conflict, a soul is in conflict when it has desires which are logically incompatible even when they are unsatisfied. This raises a dilemma: if (...) the mental conflict is supposed to be the latter kind of conflict, then the partition argument is valid but is likely unsound; if it’s supposed to be the former kind, then the partition argument has true premises but is invalid. We explain this dilemma in detail and defend a dispositionalist solution to it. (shrink)

I argue that understanding the self in terms of narrative construction does not preclude the possibility of error concerning one’s own self. Identity is a projection of first and second-order desires and a product of choice in relation to desire. Self-deceit appears in this connection as a response to an identity that one has constructed through choice and/or desire but not acknowledged in one’s self-account, reflecting a conflict between desires or a motivated failure to account. This analysis is (...) applied primarily to acknowledgement of one’s sexual identity. (shrink)

The theory about human desire is one important component in early Confucian theory of humanity. It is worth our attention that Pre-Qin Confucians never put human desire at the absolute opposite position to the Heavenly Principle, as their successors do. Contrarily, they generally believe that the desire is the inseparable property of normal human nature, and making efforts to satisfy the human desire is reasonable. Only in terms of reducing the conflicts between human desire and the limited resources they advocate (...) a moderate abstinence. [key words] Pre-Qin Confucianism; the theory of human nature; human nature is good; human desire. (shrink)

Strange Fruit is an exemplary study of the question of the integration of West Indians of immigrant origin living in England in the 1980s. Through this play structured in three acts, Caryl Phillips offers the reader-viewer privileged access to the inner world of a West Indian family living in a deprived London neighborhood. At the heart of this intimate drama with tragic overtones, there is a cultural conflict between two successive generations of immigrants. Philosophical and existential issues are deftly treated (...) in a psychoanalytical perspective. (shrink)

In the face of conflict, power can be defined as ‘the ability to get one’s needs met [1].’ Power requires not just an ability to do or act by strength and force, but also requires an inherent want and need for a commodity. Yet it is self-explanatory that a desire for power isn’t temporary, but perpetual, with those whose needs are satisfied always yearning for more. This can lead to longer term conflict, suggesting the gradient of power enrooted within society, (...) is the sole perpetrator towards worldwide violence; yet is it possible to completely eradicate violence from society, when individuals, parties and states will never stop their crave for greater power? (shrink)

In Gaudium et Spes, the Catholic Church describes marital discernment as the married couple’s “common reflection and effort… [that] involves a consideration of their own good and the good of their children” and also as “an estimation of the good of the family… [that necessitates] prudent reflection and common decision.” With this description, we can say that the Catholic Church expects and desires married couples to resolve marital and family conflicts by coming together in discernment. And yet, how should (...) married couples discern? How should they exercise marital discernment? Since one cannot just go on discerning blindly without minding some rules, without following some basic steps, Ricoeur would emphasize that “discernment calls for a hermeneutics.” But how should hermeneutics be integrated into the process of marital discernment? This paper makes an attempt to integrate hermeneutics into the process of marital discernment by drawing some key principles from Paul Ricoeur’s hermeneutic phenomenology and Karol Wojtyła’s phenomenology of spousal love. In so doing, this paper considers how the dynamics of marital discernment can be rendered more balanced, and hence more effective, in attaining conflict resolution within the family. (shrink)

Bioethical discourse on organ donation and transplantation medicine covers a wide range of topics, from informed consent procedures and scarcity issues up to transplant tourism and organ trade. Over the past decades, this discourse evolved into a stream of documents of bewildering proportions, encompassing thousands of books, papers, conferences, blogs, consensus meetings, policy reports, media debates and other outlets. Beneath the manifest level of discourse, however, a more latent dimension can be discerned, revolving around issues of embodiment, the moral status (...) of the human body and the concept of bodily integrity. This publication aims to bring these “deeper” questions to the fore. What is envisioned is a “depth” ethics (the moral equivalent of a depth psychology) focussing on the tensions, conflicts and ambiguities at work in bioethical deliberations on organ transplantation, fuelling the viewpoints articulated on the more manifest levels of discourse. Organ donation reopens the question of the status of the body as something which we have, but at the same time are, and as something which constitutes a whole, while at the same time being a set of replaceable elements or parts. (shrink)

Agonism as a political theory emphasizes the ontological aspect of conflict in human political interaction. This article aims to shed light on the political practice of agonism – and in doing so on its limits – by viewing 'crisis discourse' as an agonistic political practice. As my analysis of the Dutch Socialist Party and the Freedom Party’s speech in the European Sovereign Debt Crisis shows, crisis discourse aimed to (re)create a ‘people’ and to justify radical change in economic and social (...) structures. Crisis discourse is employed to construct an 'other' that can be based on ethnic and nationalist terms and to justify retroactive application of the law and the stripping of Dutch citizens of their rights. This attention to crisis discourse as an agonistic political practice highlights an unease within agonism itself: where must the agonist accepts limits to the conflict and contestation she so values? The article starts with Chantal Mouffe's answer to this question - her insistence that legitimate conflict must always recognize the shared values of equality and liberty - and proceeds to show that Mouffe's view unnecessarily relies on a deliberative democratic desire for consensus. Other than Mouffe, I draw on Honig’s emphasis of perpetual contestation to propose that the issue of limits can be best answered by reference to the core of agonistic thought: the preservation of the struggle over political norms and processes. It is not shared values or even a shared political space that matters, but that the political space of the ‘people’ – however contested membership therein might be – remains a place that the 'other' can re-enter. (shrink)

You want to see the concert, but don’t want to take a long drive (even though the concert is far away). Such *strongly conflicting desire ascriptions* are, I show, wrongly predicted incompatible by standard semantics. I then object to possible solutions, and give my own, based on *some-things-considered desire*. Considering the fun of the concert, but ignoring the drive, you want to see the concert; considering the boredom of the drive, but ignoring the concert, you don’t want to take (...) the drive. (shrink)

Decision theory and folk psychology both purport to represent the same phenomena: our belief-like and desire- and preference-like states. They also purport to do the same work with these representations: explain and predict our actions. But they do so with different sets of concepts. There's much at stake in whether one of these two sets of concepts can be accounted for with the other. Without such an account, we'd have two competing representations and systems of prediction and explanation, a dubious (...) dualism. Folk psychology structures our daily lives and has proven fruitful in the study of mind and ethics, while decision theory is pervasive in various disciplines, including the quantitative social sciences, especially economics, and philosophy. My interest is in accounting for folk psychology with decision theory -- in particular, for believe and wanting, which decision theory omits. Many have attempted this task for belief. (The Lockean Thesis says that there is such an account.) I take up the parallel task for wanting, which has received far less attention. I propose necessary and sufficient conditions, stated in terms of decision theory, for when you're truly said to want; I give an analogue of the Lockean Thesis for wanting. My account is an alternative to orthodox accounts that link wanting to preference (e.g. Stalnaker (1984), Lewis (1986)), which I argue are false. I argue further that want ascriptions are context-sensitive. My account explains this context-sensitivity, makes sense of conflicting desires, and accommodates phenomena that motivate traditional theses on which 'want' has multiple senses (e.g. all-things-considered vs. pro tanto). (shrink)

A compositional semantics for anankastic conditionals (‘If you want p, you must φ’) has been elusive. Condoravdi and Lauer (2016) decisively object to all semantics that precede their own. CL's view rests on a response to *the problem of conflicting goals*; CL use an interpretation of 'want' on which an agent's desires don't conflict with her beliefs. But a proper response requires lack of conflict with the facts. CL's view fails. Anankastic conditionals are still a mystery.

I argue that Republic presents thumos as a limited, or flawed, principle of psychic unity. My central claim is that Plato both makes this assertion about the necessary limitations of thumos, and can defend it, because he understands thumos as the pursuit of to oikeion, or one’s own. So understood, the thumoetic part divides the world into self and other and pursues the defense of the former from the latter. As a result, when confronted with a conflicting desire, the (...) thumoetic part makes sense of that desire as an irredeemable opponent. That, in turn, precludes the persuasion of desires that Plato sees as necessary for psychic harmony. (shrink)

This paper examines the significance of Epicureanism for Nietzsche’s critique of Christian monotheism and his subsequent attempt to reanimate a kind of this-worldly, affirmative religiosity of immanence. After a brief overview of the pivotal role that Epicurus’ thought plays in the death of God, I focus on Epicurus’ own residual conception of the gods and the ways in which Nietzsche strategically retrieves it and puts it use in his writing. Nietzsche juxtaposes the distant, serene, indifferent Epicurean gods with the omniscient, (...) intrusive, jealous and needy God of middle-Eastern monotheisms. One might say that they constitute a ‘halfway house’ of sorts between Christianity and Nietzsche’s new Dionysian religion of the earth. But they also figure prominently in his own conflicted desire to intervene in the aleatory course of natural history and legislate the the future of humanity: Nietzsche finds he cannot simply look down with “the mocking and aloof eyes” of an Epicurean god upon the degeneration and diminution of the human being under Christian ascetic regimes of cultivation. Ultimately, Nietzsche fails to achieve the divine temperament of the Epicurean gods (looking down from afar on human ignorance, desire and suffering with a noble pathos of distance). Forthcoming 2022. (shrink)

A neo-Aristotelian approach to self-control has dominated both philosophy and the sciences of the mind. This approach endorses three key theses: that self-control is a form of self-regulation aimed at desires that conflict with one’s evaluative judgments, that high trait self-control is continence, which is distinguished from temperance by motivational conflict, and that self-control is broad, in that such resistance can be not only direct but also indirect. There is an obvious tension between and. I argue that the equally (...) obvious resolution of this tension—allowing that self-control does not require occurrent conflicting desires but can instead be aimed at foreseeable conflicting desires—reveals a surprisingly unnoticed tension between and. To resolve this tension, we are forced to either deny that high trait self-control is continence or deny that self-control is broad. If self-control is narrow, recent empirical evidence suggests that it may not be a good candidate for a human excellence concerning self-regulation. Thus, if we want to make room for such an excellence, we may need to deny that high trait self-control is continence. However we resolve these tensions, the Aristotelian status quo regarding self-control cannot stand. (shrink)

The self-worth of political communities is often understood to be an expression of their position in a hierarchy of power; if so, then the desire for self-worth is a source of competition and conflict in international relations. In early modern German natural law theories, one finds the alternative view, according to which duties of esteem toward political communities should reflect the degree to which they fulfill the functions of civil government. The present article offers a case study, examining the views (...) concerning confederation rights and the resulting duties of esteem in diplomatic relations developed by Christoph Besold (1577–1638). Besold defends the view that confederations including dependent communities—such as the Hanseatic League—could fulfill a stabilizing political function. He also uses sixteenth-century conceptions concerning the acquisition of sovereignty rights through prescription of immemorial time. Both strands of argument lead to the conclusion that the envoys of dependent communities can have the right to be recognized as ambassadors, with all the duties of esteem that follow from this recognition. (shrink)

The self-worth of political communities is often understood to be an expression of their position in a hierarchy of power; if so, then the desire for self-worth is a source of competition and conflict in international relations. In early modern German natural law theories, one finds the alternative view, according to which duties of esteem toward political communities should reflect the degree to which they fulfill the functions of civil government. The present article offers a case study, examining the views (...) concerning confederation rights and the resulting duties of esteem in diplomatic relations developed by Christoph Besold (1577–1638). Besold defends the view that confederations including dependent communities—such as the Hanseatic League—could fulfill a stabilizing political function. He also uses sixteenth-century conceptions concerning the acquisition of sovereignty rights through prescription of immemorial time. Both strands of argument lead to the conclusion that the envoys of dependent communities can have the right to be recognized as ambassadors, with all the duties of esteem that follow from this recognition. (shrink)

The badness of having conflicting emotions is a familiar theme in academic ethics, clinical psychology, and commercial self-help, where emotional harmony is often put forward as an ideal. Many philosophers give emotional harmony pride of place in their theories of practical reason.1 Here we offer a defense of a particular species of emotional conflict, namely, ambivalence. We articulate an conception of ambivalence, on which ambivalence is unresolved inconsistent desire (§1) and present a case of appropriate ambivalence (§2), before considering (...) two alternative defenses of emotional conflict (§3). We then argue that inconsistent desires can be fitting (§4) and that it can be reasonable not to resolve inconsistent desires (§5), before considering an objection (§6) and concluding the discussion (§7). (shrink)

The psychological mechanism of decision-making has traditionally been modeled with the help of belief-desire psychology: the agent has some desires (or other pro-attitudes) and some background beliefs and deciding between two possible actions is a matter of comparing the probability of the satisfaction of these desires given the background beliefs in the case of the performance of each action. There is a wealth of recent empirical findings about how we actually make decisions that seems to be in conflict (...) with this picture. My aim is to outline an alternative model that is consistent with these empirical findings. This alternative model emphasizes the role imagination plays in our decisions: when we decide between two possible actions, we imagine ourselves in the situation that we imagine to be the outcome of these two actions and then compare these two imaginings. (shrink)

This inquiry is addressed to two questions: (1) what if any logical relations might exist between the concepts of desire and action (as they and the distinctions to which they commit us are ensconced in ordinary parlance), and (2) what if any causal or significant non-causal (i.e., material) relations might ever exist between instances of desire and action? -/- It is held that any credible move to deal with such questions must initially, and at some length, specify the employment conditions (...) for the terms 'want' and 'desire'. This is accomplished in the first two chapters wherein a set of premises is generated for the argument of the inquiry which is presented in full and concluded in the third and final chapter. Premises generated devolve from treatment of the following major topics: (a) the grammar of 'want' and 'desire', (b) the ontological status of wants, (c) first-person and third-person want ascriptions, (d) the sorts of things which may be desired (desiderabilia), (e) wants and lacks, (f) wants and wishes, (g) the 'conflicts' of desires and reason and desire, (h) four major candidates for logical relations between wants and acts, (i) the issue of causation, and (j) the placement of Desire in an adequate ontology of persons. -/- It is argued that every major candidate for a logical relation between wants and acts (or our warrant for believing that such a connection exists) breaks down upon analysis; that little warrant exists for construing wants as causes of acts; that wants and acts are related in significant non-logical and non-causal (i.e., material) respects; and that any fully adequate theory of human action must undertake ontology, placing the category of Desire squarely in the foreground. This project represents neither a general theory of desire nor a general theory of human action. It is rather conceived as a propaedeutic to any such inquiry. It is essentially revisionist in intent, setting out on the one hand to challenge existing claims about wants and acts and, on the other hand, proposing a more satisfactory approach to the issue. In no sense is it suggested that recent Anglo-American contributions are without merit. It is rather argued that they are often inadequate contributions vis-a-vis the larger requirements for an adequate theory of human action. (shrink)

Spinoza's political thought has been subject to a significant revival of interest in recent years. As a response to difficult times, students and scholars have returned to this founding figure of modern philosophy as a means to help reinterpret and rethink the political present. Spinoza's Authority Volume II makes a significant contribution to this ongoing reception and utilization of Spinoza's 1670s Theologico-Political and Political treatises. By taking the concept of authority as an original framework, this books asks: How is authority (...) related to law, memory, and conflict in Spinoza's political thought? What are the social, historical and representational processes that produce authority and resistance? And what are the conditions of effective resistance? Spinoza's Authority Volume II features a roster of internationally established theorists of Spinoza's work, and covers key elements of Spinoza's political philosophy. (shrink)

It is sometimes thought that the normative justification for responding to large-scale violations of human rights via the judicial appararatus of trial and punishment is undermined by the desirability of reconciliation between conflicting parties as part of the process of conflict resolution. I take there to be philosophical, as well as practical and psychological issues involved here: on some conceptions of punishment and reconciliation, the attitudes that they involve conflict with one another on rational grounds. But I shall argue (...) that there is a conception of political reconciliation available which does not involve forgiveness and this forms of reconciliation may be the best we can hope for in many conflicts. Reconciliation is nevertheless likely to require the expression of what Darrell Moellendorf has called 'political regret' and the denunciatory role aspect of punishment makes it particularly well-suited to this role. (shrink)

Intuitively, it seems that certain basic desires, or urges, are rationally impotent, i.e., that they provide no reasons for action (a famous example is Warren Quinn's story of a man who has a brute urge to turn on every radio he sees). This intuition seems to conflict with the internalist, or Humean subjectivist, claim that our desires give us reasons. But Harry Frankfurt's well-known subjectivist account, with its distinction between first- order and higher-order desires and its concepts (...) of identification and commitment, may be able to accommodate this intuition. Regan Lance Reitsma has argued that to do so, it needs to be supplemented with a concept of "personal ideals", which demand that we give no normative weight to certain inclinations. I argue that Reitsma's account depends on the unexplained assumption that some kinds of desire have special standing, and thus cannot improve on the explanation of the rational impotence of urges already available to Frankfurt. (shrink)

Ambivalence is often presented through cases of defeated ambivalence and multivalence, in which opposed attitudes suggest mutual isolation and defeat each other. Properly understood, however, ambivalence implies the existence of poles that are conflictually yet rationally interlinked and are open to non-defeated joint conduct. This paper considers cases that range from indecisiveness and easy adoption of conflicting attitudes, to tragically conflicted deliberation and to cases of shifting between self-deceptively serious attitudes. Analyzing such cases as variants of defeated ambivalence, I (...) argue that the phenomena of defeated ambivalence are marginal to ambivalence even though they are by the same token exemplary of it. The poles in such cases are connected as opposing attitudes in such a way that the attitudes and the opposition are both undermined. The article focuses on two forms of vague multivalence, one of which is taken from Heidegger’s analysis of curiosity. (shrink)

The role that the desire for self‐worth plays in international relations has become a prominent topic in contemporary political theory. Contemporary accounts are based on the notion of national self‐worth as a function of status; therefore, the desire for national self‐worth is seen as a source of anxiety and conflict over status. By contrast, according to Christian Wolff, there exists a duty to take care that both one's own and other political communities deserve to be esteemed. In his view, this (...) duty is grounded in the duty of self‐perfection because the qualities for which communities deserve to be esteemed are those that promote the self‐perfection of individuals. From this perspective, he argues that duties of esteem toward political communities should not be seen as an outcome of power relations but rather as an outcome of the fulfillment of functions of the law of peoples. Wolff's line of argument draws attention to the possibility that anger over a violation of the desire for honor could be mistaken for an expression of specific culture‐specific sensitivities, while what really may be expressed is a diverging interpretation of the implications of dependence in international relations. (shrink)

This article examines the ambivalence in the concept of libidinal economy, which we identify in the philosophies of Jean-François Lyotard and Samo Tomšič; they both offer radically different conceptions of libidinal economy. Although emerging from very contrasting perspectives, both theories consider the relationship between desire, the unconscious, and the capitalist economy. After defining these two approaches, we compare them, while marking differences, similarities, influences, and sociopolitical presumptions. Also, we propose a few indicative concepts, which should help to contextualize the identity (...) of the concept of libidinal economy. After critically discussing both theories, we suggest three paradoxes in Lyotard’s approach as well as some weaknesses in Tomšič’s project. It turns out that the concept of libidinal economy is a productive theoretical tool to explore the relationship between philosophy and psychoanalysis, as well as the split in the materialist tradition. Based on that, we claim that the ambivalence of the concept of libidinal economy is a part of much more complex philosophical-historical conflict. (shrink)

There is a prima facie conflict between the values of love and autonomy. How can we bind ourselves to a person and still enjoy the fruits of self-determination? This chapter argues that the solution to this conflict lies in recognizing that love is the basis of autonomy: one must love a person in order to truly appreciate their autonomy. To make this case, this chapter defends a minimalist account of love, according to which love is an agreeable sensation that is (...) experienced when considering the existence of another person. On this view, the lover does not desire anything from the beloved but works to attend to their presence. Love, then, puts us in a position to appreciate the beloved in their particular way of being. By accepting the presence of the beloved we gain a sense of their autonomy. The roots of this account of love are found in the writings of Damaris Cudworth Masham. This chapter draws on the work of Kieran Setiya, David Velleman, and Kyla Ebels-Duggan to elaborate on and defend Masham’s views. (shrink)

Local opposition to infrastructure projects implementing renewable energy (RE) such as wind farms is often strong even if state-wide support for RE is strikingly high. The slogan “Not In My BackYard” (NIMBY) has become synonymous for this kind of protest. This paper revisits the question of what is wrong with NIMBYs about RE projects and how to best address them. I will argue that local opponents to wind farm (and other RE) developments do not necessarily fail to contribute their fair (...) share to producing a desirable public good (clean energy). In fact, with landscape concerns being at the heart of much protest, the question of fair burden distribution becomes sidelined: landscape impacts cannot be distributed nor compensated for. Protests may be attempts to express a true conflict of (incommensurable) values. Understanding them as such will help us better address NIMBY concerns and overcome such opposition through ensuring procedural justice. (shrink)

War as intense armed conflict between states, governments, societies, or para groups, such as mercenaries, insurgents, etc is not old fashion but continues to be the vibrant and violet of society (ies). Many literatures relating to the war, Just war and just war theories pay attention mainly at the conflicts as a main cause of war but pass by about the cause of conflicts leading to the war. The objective of this paper is thus, to assess sources of conflicts leading (...) to the war, and come up with recommendation to narrow situations provoking conflicts leading to the war. Research approach employed was qualitative to qualify ideas and opinions of scholars, who conducted researches on war, just war and just war theories; books, journals and internet sources dedicated to the cause and consequences of war and sources concerned with the Jus Ad Bellum, Jus in Bello and Jus post Bellum have been reviewed. It was found that ambitions of humans to realize their unlimited natural rights, such as economic rights, political rights and extreme desire to un equitable utilization of such rights cause a war of “all against all”. The study recommends that authority better to avoid or reduce extent of conflict among humans, and humans to learn limit their unlimited natural rights for the sake of peace and security of the business. Key words: war, Just war theories, Jus Ad Bellum, Jus in Bello, Jus post bellum. -/- . (shrink)

Whereas civil discourse is usually thought to be about defusing conflict, this essay argues it may be fruitfully thought of as fighting honorably for what we believe. Thus agonistic honor, which conceives of rightness in terms of fair and respectful contest for status, will be an especially important virtue in contexts—from classrooms to courtrooms to pluralistic democracies in general—where conflict is inevitable and desirable. To motivate this claim, I take a Hobbesian approach. I begin with a rational reconstruction of honor (...) patterned after Hobbes’ rational reconstruction of justice, and imagine honor-equivalents of “rational” individuals in a “state of nature.” I then describe a multi-stage process that culminates in honorable contests among a natural aristocracy. The lessons from this exercise apply to the question of civil discourse: while the "standard model" of civil discourse aims at resolving disagreement by downplaying rivalry and ego, the more realistic agonistic model harnesses these factors to make our civil debates more culturally sustainable. (shrink)

I address here the question what sense to make of the idea that there can be thought prior to language. I begin by juxtaposing two familiar and influential philosophical views, one associated with the work of Paul Grice, the other associated with the work of Donald Davidson. Grice and Davidson share a broad, rationalist perspective on language and thought, but they endorse conflicting theses on the relation between them. Whereas, for Grice, thought of an especially complex sort is a (...) precondition of linguistic meaning, for Davidson, there can be no genuine thought without language. I argue that both views present us with unpalatable alternatives concerning our understanding of the natural origins of objective thought and meaningful language. Drawing on what I take to be key insights from Grice and Davidson, I then lay out some broad desiderata for an intermediate position. I finally turn to a certain form of nonlinguistic communication of the sort of which both prelinguistic children and languageless animals are capable, viz., expressive communication. I propose that a proper appreciation of the character and function of expressive communication can help us trace the outlines of the desired intermediate position. (shrink)

In his article Banicki proposes a universal model for all forms of philosophical therapy. He is guided by works of Martha Nussbaum, who in turn makes recourse to Aristotle. As compared to Nussbaum’s approach, Banicki’s model is more medical and less based on ethical argument. He mentions Foucault’s vision to apply the same theoretical analysis for the ailments of the body and the soul and to use the same kind of approach in treating and curing them. In his interpretation of (...) philosophical therapy, there are, however, some controversial issues, to which we would like to call attention: -/- Is restoring health by a philosophical method of treatment – health understood as a person’s ability to reach his/her vital goals – a convincing explication of philosophical therapy in general? In order to answer this question, it may be useful to look at Plato. It is not only Platonism (and especially Neo-platonism since Plotinus) that questions the idea that therapy is necessarily connected with „vital goals“. Buddhist and Gnostic philosophies are questioning „the vital“ in general. The immense effort in the history of philosophy to liberate the mind from the body casts doubt on the project to explain philosophical therapy solely in analogy to medical therapy. -/- According to Banicki a therapeutic philosophy has to identify the diseases it attempts at curing. There are, however, reasons for associating the term therapy with suffering/risk rather than disease. If a therapy aims at reducing the fear of death, as for example many classical philosophical therapies do, then there is no disease to be cured. A model based on chances and risks also has the advantage that the Buddhist and Stoic reinterpretation of desires/emotions as “diseases” can be dropped in contemporary philosophical therapy. -/- Banicki mentions the comparison of therapies as one of the primary goals of modelling. Methods should be verified by a statistical correlation between method and therapeutic success and/or by a theory which justifies the method. Some forms of therapies, however, avoid theory-specific terms and concepts in favor of an unprejudiced interpretation of the patient’s statements. Others share the (Nietzschean) aspiration to explore and change measures of value. If the therapeutic process is seen as a unique phenomenon, then there can be no theory and no statistics with co-occurrences. -/- According to Banicki philosophical therapy has to describe techniques which qualify as genuinely philosophical. Techniques like maieutics and hermeneutics, however, are antique philosophical “inventions”, which were later adopted by psychotherapy. If meditation is accepted as a therapeutic tool – as it was in ancient times – then there is not only a methodical but also an emotional relation to religion. If finally, the Socratic search for a good life is seen as one of the characteristics of philosophical therapy, then delimitation even turns into a criterion for non-philosophical therapies. The search for a good life requires an interdisciplinary approach. -/- For the concretization of the formal structure, we suggest a typology of therapies, which is based on chances and risks. Such a typology has the advantage, that it can model conflicting (and even opposing) forms of therapies. The variety of therapeutic goals and methods is a consequence of the historical development towards conceptual freedom. (shrink)

Today's conflicts between religions are grounded largely in historical injustices and grievances but partly in serious conceptual disagreements. This essay agrees with Miroslav Volf that a nontritheistic Christian account of the Trinity is highly desirable. Three traditional models of the Trinity are examined. In their pure, unmixed form, two of them should logically be acceptable to Jews, Muslims, and strict monotheists who regard Christianity as inherently tritheistic, despite lip service to one God. In the social model, three distinct self-aware subjects (...) are unified by being in perfect harmony with each other. Despite Volf's best defense of this, to conceive of three gods, this is how one would go about it. In the psychological model, one divine subject has three psychological capacities—memory, understanding, and will. In the functional model, one subject relates to the world in three different ways—as creator, redeemer, and companion. These two are genuinely monotheistic. Finally, a monotheistic account of the unity of Jesus with God is proposed for consideration. (shrink)

The thesis of this article is that there has never been any ground for the controversy between the doctrine of free will and determinism, that it is based upon a misapprehension, that the two assertions are entirely consistent, that one of them strictly implies the other, that they have been opposed only because of our natural want of the analytical imagination. In so saying I do not tamper with the meaning of either phrase. That would be unpardonable. I mean free (...) will in the natural and usual sense, in the fullest, the most absolute sense in which for the purposes of the personal and moral life the term is ever employed. I mean it as implying responsibility, merit and demerit, guilt and desert. I mean it as implying, after an act has been performed, that one " could have done otherwise " than one did. I mean it as conveying these things also, not in any subtly modified sense but in exactly the sense in which we conceive them in life and in law and in ethics. These two doctrines have been opposed because we have not realised that free will can be analysed without being destroyed, and that determinism is merely a feature of the analysis of it. And if we are tempted to take refuge in the thought of an "ultimate ", an "innermost" liberty that eludes the analysis, then we have implied a deterministic basis and constitution for this liberty as well. For such a basis and constitution lie in the idea of liberty. -/- The thesis is not, like that of Green or Bradley, that the contending opinions are reconciled if we adopt a certain metaphysic of the ego, as that it is timeless, and identifies itself with a desire by a " timeless act". This is to say that the two are irreconcilable, as they are popularly supposed to be, except by a theory that delivers us from the conflict by taking us out of time. Our view on the contrary is that from the natural and temporal point of view itself there never was any need of a reconciliation but only of a comprehension of the meaning of terms. (The metaphysical nature of the self and its identity through time is a problem for all who confront memory, anticipation, etc.; it has no peculiar difficulties arising from the present problem.) -/- I am not maintaining that determinism is true; only that it is true insofar as we have free will. That we are free in willing is, broadly speaking, a fact of experience. That broad fact is more assured than any philosophical analysis. It is therefore surer than the deterministic analysis of it, entirely adequate as that in the end appears to be. But it is not here affirmed that there are no small exceptions, no slight undetermined swervings, no ingredient of absolute chance. All that is here said is that such absence of determination, if and so far as it exists, is no gain to freedom, but sheer loss of it; no advantage to the moral life, but blank subtraction from it. -- When I speak below of "the indeterminist" I mean the libertarian indeterminist, that is, him who believes in free will and holds that it involves indetermination. (shrink)

Ecological Psychology and Enactivism both challenge representationist cognitive science, but the two approaches have only begun to engage in dialogue. Further conceptual clarification is required in which differences are as important as common ground. This paper enters the dialogue by focusing on important differences. After a brief account of the parallel histories of Ecological Psychology and Enactivism, we cover incompatibility between them regarding their theories of sensation and perception. First, we show how and why in ecological theory perception is, crucially, (...) not based on sensation. We elucidate this idea by examining the biological roots of work in the two fields, concentrating on Gibson and Varela and Maturana. We expound an ecological critique of any sensation-based approach to perception by detailing two topics: classic retinal image theories and perception in single-celled organisms. The second main point emphasizes the importance of the idea of organism-environment mutuality and its difference from structural coupling of sensations and motor behavior. We point out how ecological - phenomenological methods of inquiry grow out of mutualism and compare Gibson’s idea of visual kinesthesis to Merleau-Ponty’s idea of the lived body. Third, we conclude that Ecological Psychology and varieties of Enactivism are laying down different paths to pursue related goals. Thus, convergence of Ecological Psychology and Enactivism is not possible given their conflicting assumptions, but cross-fertilization is possible and desirable. (shrink)

I begin by describing the hideous nature of sexuality, that which makes sexual desire and activity morally suspicious, or at least what we have been told about the moral foulness of sex by, in particular, Immanuel Kant, but also by some of his predecessors and by some contemporary philosophers.2 A problem arises because acting on sexual desire, given this Kantian account of sex, apparently conflicts with the Categorical Imperative. I then propose a typology of possible solutions to this sex problem (...) and critically discuss recent philosophical ethics of sex that fall into the typology's various categories. (shrink)

Uncertainty, insufficient information or information of poor quality, limited cognitive capacity and time, along with value conflicts and ethical considerations, are all aspects thatmake risk managementand riskcommunication difficult. This paper provides a review of different risk concepts and describes how these influence risk management, communication and planning in relation to forest ecosystem services. Based on the review and results of empirical studies, we suggest that personal assessment of risk is decisive in the management of forest ecosystem services. The results are (...) used together with a reviewof different principles of the distribution of risk to propose an approach to risk communication that is effective aswell as ethically sound. Knowledge of heuristics and mutual information on both beliefs and desires are important in the proposed risk communication approach. Such knowledge provides an opportunity for relevant information exchange, so that gaps in personal knowledge maps can be filled in and effective risk communication can be promoted. (shrink)

In a given polity, interactions between the Governed and the Governing Strata are symbiotic. The Governed desire, and indeed need, infrastructure services organized. If such basic foundations are not provided, the economic activity so deeply cherished by both groups cannot be realized. The Governing Strata cannot function without the Governed. After all, without the Governed, there will not be a polity; hence nothing to govern. Regardless of the politico-economic system in effect, this co-dependence is inevitable, inescapable, indenturing both groups to (...) each other. This is the case, regardless of the designation, functions, or the style of the governance system. It matters not if the designation or philosophy of the said governance is a variation of pluralism or authoritarianism by a minority. (shrink)

Many pragmatist and non-representational approaches to cognition, such as the enactivist, have focused on the relations between actions, affectivity, and habits from an intersubjective perspective. For those adopting such approaches, all these aspects are inextricably connected; however, many questions remain open regarding the dynamics by which they unfold and shape each other over time. This paper addresses a specific topic that has not received much attention: the impact on future behavior of not fulfilling possibilities for social interaction even though their (...) fulfillment is desirable within a given context. Inspired by Gibson’s theory of affordances and Dewey’s account of habits, these situations will be characterized as events where an agent does not act upon an inviting affordance for social interaction due to a conflict which he or she experiences between given concerns, needs, and social norms. This conflict leads to a sense of unfulfillment that may eventually bring about a crisis and revision of habits. Through specific examples, this work presents the potential impact of the connection between affordances, habits, and affectivity on everyday situations. It therefore represents an exploration of the common ground between pragmatism and enactivism and an attempt to contribute to a process-based approach to social interaction. (shrink)