Axiological Determinants of Cognition of Law

The purpose of this article is to distinguish the value determinants of cognition of law. The article reveals that the modern understanding of the term “law” is characterized by axiological and anthropological approaches to its cognition; founds out that the human legal value has an integral-synthesizing character to all other values and, as a result, is embodied in the absolute legal value and inherent worth; establishes that the human dimension of law has become the result and, at the same time, the source of value-legal human understanding, which indicates the value of law and its axiological characteristics.

Human Dignity and Political Criticism

Many, including Marx, Rawls, and the contemporary 'Black Lives Matter' movement, embrace the ambition to secure terms of co-existence in which the worth of people's lives becomes a lived reality rather than an empty boast. This book asks whether, as some believe, the philosophical idea of human dignity can help achieve that ambition. Offering a new fourfold typology of dignity concepts, Colin Bird argues that human dignity can perform this role only if certain traditional ways of conceiving it are abandoned. Accordingly, Bird rejects the idea that human dignity refers to the inherent worth or status of individuals, and instead reinterprets it as a social relation, constituted by affects of respect and the modes of mutual attention which they generate. What emerges is a new vision of human dignity as a vital political value, and an arresting vindication of its role as an agent of critical reflection on politics.

Identity, Affirmation, and Resistance in the Exeter Riddle Collection

The Exeter riddle collection imagines voices for the Earth community. The bird riddles (6 and 7) exploit similarities between human and avian behaviors to affirm the intrinsic worth of the Earth community even when it makes humans uncomfortable. The horn riddles (12 and 76) give voice to other-than-human beings celebrating their participation in heroic culture: these riddles imagine that animal-objects find pleasure and purpose in their “work”, despite removal from their natural state. However, the wood-weapon riddles (3, 51, and 71) reveal an awareness that conscription into human service is not always in the best interest of the other-than-human. These thematic clusters suggest an interest in the inherent worth, active voice, and purpose of the non-human natural world.

Species Egalitarianism and Respect for Nature

Lucia Schwarz urges a reconsideration of the implications of species egalitarianism, which is an essential element of the position in environmental ethics that Paul Taylor calls “respect for nature.” Species egalitarianism’s claim that every living thing has equal inherent worth appears to lead to counterintuitive conclusions, such as that killing a human being is no worse than killing a dandelion. Species egalitarians have generally responded by explaining that species egalitarianism is compatible with recognizing moral differences between killing different types of living things, and that some killing is morally permissible. Schwarz raises doubts about whether this deflationary defensive strategy is philosophically justified, and suggests that taking seriously the supposedly repugnant implications of species egalitarianism may have a salutary effect on the overall debate.

PERSONAL TRAITS OF YOUNG MEN WITH SELF-INJURIOUS BEHAVIOR AND WITH SUBCLINICAL DEPRESSION

The article presents the results of empirical research studying the personal characteristics of young men with self-injurious behavior and subclinical depression. Relevance of this topic is conditioned by the frequency of self-injurious behavior. A general hypothesis of the study was the statement that there are significant differences in the intensity of personality traits in young men with subclinical depression who have a history of self-injurious behavior as opposed to young men with subclinical depression but without self-injurious behavior, and also opposed to the test audience without the symptoms of depression and self-harm. The survey sample consisted of 169 young men aged from 18 to 22 years (average age — 19.2). We applied the methods of testing, polling, subjective scaling, statistical analysis. In the group with subclinical depression and self-harm were noted low self-esteem, high levels of situational anxiety, personal anxiety, proneness to conflict, neuroticism, spontaneous aggressiveness, irritability, and emotional lability. Young men from this group demonstrated lower rates of inherent worth, self-acceptance, self-attachment, mirror self, and sociability than those with subclinical depression but without self-harm. A positive correlation was revealed between the severity of self-harm and situational aggressiveness, proneness to conflict, self-accusation, neuroticism, spontaneous aggressiveness, depression, low self-esteem; a negative correlation was found between the severity of self-harm and inherent worth, self-acceptance, self-attachment and the mirror self. There is a positive correlation between depression and cynicism, hostility, aggressiveness, anxiety, proneness to conflict, irritability, and low self-esteem, and a negative correlation between depression and sociability and openness.

Justice is Beauty? Exploring Nicholas Wolterstorff’s Aesthetics and Philosophy

This article will attempt to draw from the deep wells of Nicholas Wolterstorff’s understanding of justice and beauty, respectively, so as to find possible linkages between the two that might be helpful in our quest to understanding this important theme. In order to do this successfully, this article, first, invites readers into Wolterstorff’s understanding of justice based on inherent worth. Hereafter, in a similar fashion, the article explores, as a second theme, Wolterstorff’s understanding of beauty as related to the so-called grand narrative of art. Regarding both themes, I follow a basic structure: outlining the problem; offering critiquing, and exploring possible alternatives. It is hoped that this article will finally, and by way of conclusion, resolve some of this tension between justice and beauty, by examining three specific ways in which Wolterstorff has attempted to link these two themes.

Can Suicide Preserve One’s Dignity? Kant and Kantians on the Moral Response to Cognitive Loss

Kantian defenders of suicide for the soon-to-be demented claim that killing oneself would protect rather than violate a person’s inherent worth. The loss of cognitive functions reduces someone to a lower moral status, so they believe that suicide is a way of preserving or preventing the loss of dignity. I argue that they misinterpret Kant’s examples and fail to appreciate the reasons behind his absolute prohibition on suicide. Although Kant says that one may have to sacrifice one’s life to fulfill a moral duty, suicide is not morally equivalent to self-sacrifice because it involves treating oneself merely as a means. Furthermore, people facing the onset of dementia would not protect their dignity by killing themselves while they are still rational and would not avoid a demeaning existence.

Reformed Aesthetics and Disability Ethics: The Potential Contribution of Nicholas Wolterstorff

Nicholas Wolterstorff has presented an account of justice that has important implications for disability. He does not ground rights in intellectual capacities. Instead, rights are justly owed by virtue of the inherent worth bestowed by God to humanity, thereby protecting those with severe intellectual disabilities. Wolterstorff’s aesthetics, I claim, offer a vision for how these rights are rendered. By describing art as a social practice wherein justice can be rendered, and by describing justice as essential to Christian liturgy, Wolterstorff allows liturgy to be a site where justice can and ought to be rendered to the disabled. Liturgy then becomes a social practice where one can learn to see those with disabilities differently, not as inherently ugly but as beloved by God and owed certain goods by right.

Tom Regan’s Philosophy of Animal Rights: Subjects-of-a-Life in the Context of Discussions of Intrinsic and Inherent Worth

Modern animal rights debates began in the 1970s, mainly as part of the budding field of applied ethics in Anglo-American philosophy. In just a short time, these animal rights discourses received international academic respect, especially through analytically trained philosophers. Central for this development was the analysis that rights language can be principally used species neutrally. This paper’s contribution is to examine the central terms of Tom Regan’s still widely discussed theory for their actuality and usefulness. Hence strengthening these arguments for modern animal rights theory as a serious approach in (inter)national ethical and legal disputes. Translated from German by Gary Steiner, Bucknell University

King Daniel Ganaway

This essay explores the nexus between King Daniel Ganaway's religiosity and his goal of creating photographic images demonstrating the inherent worth and spirit of both inanimate objects and human beings. He aimed at a sympathetic interpretation and presentation of every subject. His methods alligned him with the Pictorialist School of 1920s photographers although he never formally affiliated with any group. Pictorialists sought to exploit the balance and beauty found in presenting light, shadow, and darkness as aesthetically stimulating and worthy of being considered part of the fine arts. No doubt Ganaway's upbringing and continued adult commitment to Christianity sustained him against the odds as this self-taught photographer won the coveted Wanamaker Prize in 1921 over nine hundred competitors.