Establishing Suhrawardῑ's Ḥikmat al-Ishrāq Through Philosophical Discussion

2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 209-239
Author(s):  
Ali Babaei ◽  
Naser Forouhi
Keyword(s):  
Philosophical Discussion

The Problem of Divine Hiddenness

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael C. Rea
Keyword(s):  
Problem Of Evil ◽  
Philosophical Discussion ◽  
Detailed Characterization ◽  
The Past ◽  
Divine Hiddenness ◽  
The Problem Of Evil ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter provides a detailed characterization of the various meanings of the term “divine hiddenness,” carefully and rigorously articulates the version of the problem of divine hiddenness that has dominated contemporary philosophical discussion for the past twenty-five years, and then explains the relationship between that problem and the problem of evil.

Taking Children’s Human Rights Seriously

2020 ◽  
pp. 48-69
Author(s):  
Michael Freeman
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Children's Rights ◽  
Popular Media ◽  
Children’S Rights ◽  
Ronald Dworkin ◽  
Philosophical Discussion ◽  
Persuasive Argument ◽  
The Law ◽  
Deficit View

Despite the development of the children’s rights movement, human rights scholarship continues to overlook the rights of children. Even those like Ronald Dworkin, who proclaim the need to take rights seriously, are curiously silent, even ambivalent, when it comes to children. This inattention often forces advocates of children’s rights to the margins of human rights scholarship. In the few places where serious philosophical discussion of children’s rights does take place, the analysis intends to diminish the value of rights for children. These critics are not malevolent, and typically want what is best for children, but they do not think it can be accomplished through a children’s rights agenda. This chapter lays out a persuasive argument for a children’s rights agenda, or, for taking children’s rights seriously. Drawing from philosophy, history, literature, popular media, and of course the law, this chapter argues against the conventional deficit view underlying most arguments against the recognition of children’s rights and makes a case for the importance of children’s rights where rights are the currency in use.

Secular Living as a Context for Moral Development

2020 ◽  
pp. 612-628
Author(s):  
Phil Zuckerman ◽  
Kyle Thompson
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Moral Development ◽  
Empirical Data ◽  
The United States ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Philosophical Discussion

Despite widespread suspicion to the contrary, secular living can and does serve as an adequate, or even excellent, context for moral development. In this chapter, the authors present the contours of contemporary anti-atheist prejudice, with an emphasis on the United States. Next, they explore the empirical data showing that individual atheists and highly secularized societies, such as Sweden and Denmark, are often quite moral, which serves to counter and debunk anti-atheist prejudice. Then, the authors move to a philosophical discussion centering around secular morality itself, outlining general merits of atheistic morality specifically while simultaneously pointing out various problematic assumptions of theistic morality. Finally, the authors conclude and make recommendations for future research.

An “Orthodox” Use of the Term “Beautiful”

Philosophy ◽  
1960 ◽  
Vol 35 (133) ◽  
pp. 114-121
Author(s):  
G. P. Henderson
Keyword(s):  
Philosophical Question ◽  
Technical Term ◽  
Philosophical Discussion ◽  
Works Of Art ◽  
Ordinary Conversation ◽  
Art Critics

The word “beautiful” plays a surprisingly unimportant part in the language of sophisticated artistic appreciation; I mean in the informed criticism and comparison of specific works of art. Though in ordinary conversation it can be used naturally and easily, it does not serve readily as a technical term in expert writing or discussion. To become a technical term of this kind it would have to be definable, and definable in terms which commanded sufficient agreement: but attempts to define “beauty” and “beautiful” may well have become restrained by the popularity of philosophical discussion about the significance of these words. No philosophical question is discussed more commonly or from more firmly held opposite positions than the question whether beauty is “objective” or not. Discussion of this and related topics, however, not being the monopoly of professed philosophers but being familiar amongst artists and art critics themselves, tends to remove all shadow of technicality from the crucial terms discussed. Other terms come to serve for the “objective” features of works of art, and others again for the impressions which works of art may make upon us: “beauty” and “beautiful” tend to fall away between these two classes.

scholarly journals The Road to Modern Logic—An Interpretation

2001 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 441-484 ◽  
Author(s):  
José Ferreirós
Keyword(s):  
Order Logic ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
First Order Logic ◽  
Theoretical Point ◽  
Primary Role ◽  
Philosophical Discussion ◽  
Modern Logic ◽  
Core System ◽  
First Order ◽  
The Road

AbstractThis paper aims to outline an analysis and interpretation of the process that led to First-Order Logic and its consolidation as a core system of modern logic. We begin with an historical overview of landmarks along the road to modern logic, and proceed to a philosophical discussion casting doubt on the possibility of a purely rational justification of the actual delimitation of First-Order Logic. On this basis, we advance the thesis that a certain historical tradition was essential to the emergence of modern logic; this traditional context is analyzed as consisting in some guiding principles and, particularly, a set of exemplars (i.e., paradigmatic instances). Then, we proceed to interpret the historical course of development reviewed in section 1, which can broadly be described as a two-phased movement of expansion and then restriction of the scope of logical theory. We shall try to pinpoint ambivalencies in the process, and the main motives for subsequent changes. Among the latter, one may emphasize the spirit of modern axiomatics, the situation of foundational insecurity in the 1920s, the resulting desire to find systems well-behaved from a proof-theoretical point of view, and the metatheoretical results of the 1930s. Not surprisingly, the mathematical and, more specifically, the foundational context in which First-Order Logic matured will be seen to have played a primary role in its shaping.Mathematical logic is what logic, through twenty-five centuries and a few transformations, has become today. (Jean van Heijenoort)

MODERN PROBLEMS OF FORMING THE DISCOURSE IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SECURITY

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (10) ◽  
pp. 51-59
Author(s):  
S. Kononov ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Security ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
The State ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Philosophical Discussion ◽  
Protection Measures ◽  
Leading Role ◽  
Role Of The State ◽  
The Social

The article is devoted to the analysis of the problems of a social security modern discourse formation in the framework of a philosophical discussion of the transformation processes of the formation vector of the state security policy. The task of the article, according to the author, is to present the problem of security in conditions when it ceases to be understood, as a concept associated with the idea of preserving the integrity of a state or nation, and functions as a phenomenon with the broadest possible social parameters. Using the methodology of phenomenological, hermeneutic and comparative analysis, the new areas of security research, common difference of which is social and personal orientation are analyzed. The author pays attention to the features of the methodology of works reflecting the point of view of the modern state, works related to the development of a systematic approach to security, works based on an axiological approach and concludes that, despite the expansion of security interpretations, all these approaches retain a common ideological foundation. presupposing the need to preserve the leading role of the state in the field of social security, including the security of the individual and society and the state. All these approaches are based on the policy of responding to emerging threats to the Russian state and do not reflect the needs of a comprehensive strategic goal-setting covering the sphere of socio-economic development of the social system. This circumstance, according to the author, leads to the formation of a security strategy that exists only in the name of protecting the state and does not imply feedback between the state and the social institutions that the state is going to protect, which leads to the ineffectiveness of modern protection measures and the need to find new ways to justify the need for this protection, a new definition of its content and essence

scholarly journals The limits of computation: A philosophical critique of contemporary Big Data research

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 205395171881184 ◽  
Author(s):  
Petter Törnberg ◽  
Anton Törnberg
Keyword(s):  
Big Data ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Quantitative Methods ◽  
Qualitative Change ◽  
Philosophical Discussion ◽  
Philosophical Critique ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
Social Patterns ◽  
Digital Era

This paper reviews the contemporary discussion on the epistemological and ontological effects of Big Data within social science, observing an increased focus on relationality and complexity, and a tendency to naturalize social phenomena. The epistemic limits of this emerging computational paradigm are outlined through a comparison with the discussions in the early days of digitalization, when digital technology was primarily seen through the lens of dematerialization, and as part of the larger processes of “postmodernity”. Since then, the online landscape has become increasingly centralized, and the “liquidity” of dematerialized technology has come to empower online platforms in shaping the conditions for human behavior. This contrast between the contemporary epistemological currents and the previous philosophical discussions brings to the fore contradictions within the study of digital social life: While qualitative change has become increasingly dominant, the focus has gone towards quantitative methods; while the platforms have become empowered to shape social behavior, the focus has gone from social context to naturalizing social patterns; while meaning is increasingly contested and fragmented, the role of hermeneutics has diminished; while platforms have become power hubs pursuing their interests through sophisticated data manipulation, the data they provide is increasingly trusted to hold the keys to understanding social life. These contradictions, we argue, are partially the result of a lack of philosophical discussion on the nature of social reality in the digital era; only from a firm metatheoretical perspective can we avoid forgetting the reality of the system under study as we are affected by the powerful social life of Big Data.

scholarly journals Introduction: The agents, acts and attitudes of supererogation

2015 ◽  
Vol 77 ◽  
pp. 1-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Cowley
Keyword(s):  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Technical Term ◽  
Philosophical Discussion ◽  
Clear Cut ◽  
Philosophical Debates ◽  
Technical Terms

I confess to finding the term ‘supererogation’ ugly and unpronounceable. I am also generally suspicious of technical terms in moral philosophy, since they are vulnerable to self-serving definition and counter-definition, to the point of obscuring whether there is a single phenomenon about which to disagree. It was surely not accidental that J.O. Urmson, in his classic 1958 article that launched the contemporary Anglophone debate, eschewed the technical term in favour of the more familiar concepts of saints and heroes. Since then, however, the term Supererogation has bedded down to encompass a number of more or less clear-cut philosophical debates, one of which concerns precisely the extent to which saintliness and heroism exhaust the supererogatory. And it has to be admitted that the word ‘saint’ has certain theological connotations that might be misleading in a secular philosophical discussion (in this volume, only Wynn and Drummond-Young invoke theological ideas), while the word ‘hero’ has potentially limiting associations with knights and soldiers and other forms of testosterone-driven accomplishment.

scholarly journals “If English Was Good Enough for Jesus, It’s Good Enough for Me”

Paideusis ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-34
Author(s):  
Peter Kovacs
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Foreign Language ◽  
English Language ◽  
Endangered Languages ◽  
Teaching English ◽  
World War ◽  
Philosophical Discussion ◽  
Lingua Franca ◽  
The World ◽  
Harmful Effects

Since the end of World War II, English has become the virtual lingua franca of the planet. However, this development carries significant ethical and educational questions: What are the consequences of the worldwide dominance of the English language? How has it affected and how will it affect the fortunes of other languages? What can and should we as educators to do to minimize or eliminate the harmful effects on some of the endangered languages of the world? This paper will invite educators into a philosophical discussion of the ethical complexities of teaching English as a Second or Foreign Language.

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