Kant and Stoic Affections

Canadian Journal of Philosophy ◽

10.1017/can.2021.34 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-22

Author(s):

Melissa Merritt

Keyword(s):

Moral Psychology ◽

Human Being ◽

State Of Health ◽

Adult Human

Abstract I examine the significance of the Stoic theory of pathē (and related topics) for Kant’s moral psychology, arguing against the received view that systematic differences block the possibility of Kant’s drawing anything more than rhetoric from his Stoic sources. More particularly, I take on the chronically underexamined assumption that Kant is committed to a psychological dualism in the tradition of Plato and Aristotle, positing distinct rational and nonrational elements of human mentality. By contrast, Stoics take the mentality of an adult human being to be rational through and through, while recognising that this rationality is not normally in a state of health or excellence. I show how Kant’s account of affections—chiefly the “affects” and “passions” that he identifies as targets of a duty of apathy—draws substantive lessons from his Stoic sources, and how he accepts on his own terms the monistic principles of Stoic moral psychology.

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The normal weight of the pancreas in the adult human being: A biometric study

The Anatomical Record ◽

10.1002/ar.1090320204 ◽

1926 ◽

Vol 32 (2) ◽

pp. 119-132 ◽

Cited By ~ 19

Author(s):

John H. Schaefer

Keyword(s):

Normal Weight ◽

Human Being ◽

Adult Human

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Tyrant and Philosopher: Two Fundamental Lives in Plato’s Myth of Er

Polis The Journal for Ancient Greek Political Thought ◽

10.1163/20512996-90000195 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 29 (1) ◽

pp. 42-61 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Andy German

Keyword(s):

Political Science ◽

Moral Psychology ◽

Human Being ◽

Limit Case ◽

Moral Choice ◽

Close Inspection ◽

Internal Instability ◽

Human Excellence

What is the significance of the recurring link between tyranny and philosophy in Plato? Often, Plato’s treatment of tyranny is discussed either in the context of moral psychology—as a problem of agency, moral choice and akrasia — or political science, where it is the limit case of political decline. It is suggested, however, that a close inspection of the myth of Er and an elucidation of its neglected links, not just with the rest of the Republic but also with dialogues such as the Philebus and the Symposium, shows that Socrates’ fascination with tyrannical characters points to a deeper theme — nature, and specifically the problem of its benevolence to our purposes and its very ambiguous relation to human excellence and degradation. Philosopher and tyrant, for all the radical differences between them, both illuminate the internal instability of the human being in Plato’s thought.

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Creativity and Imagination

Mind Shift ◽

10.1093/oso/9780198801634.003.0010 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 140-154

Author(s):

John Parrington

Keyword(s):

Human Brain ◽

Social Interactions ◽

Natural World ◽

Past Experience ◽

Human Being ◽

Human Consciousness ◽

Human Culture ◽

Adult Human ◽

The Future ◽

Human Uniqueness

This chapter describes another aspect of human uniqueness—the links between consciousness, creativity, and imagination. Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky believed that human consciousness is transformed by social interactions, particularly through language, in a similar fashion to how tools have allowed us to transform the natural world. Vygotsky saw imagination as no less influenced by this social input than other aspects of consciousness. To deal with a changing environment, he argued that the human brain ‘combines and creatively reworks elements of this past experience and uses them to generate new propositions and new behaviour [making] the human being a creature oriented toward the future, creating the future and thus altering his own present’. Vygotsky thought that imagination was particularly stimulated in the developing child through the process of play. Some aspects of adult human culture have attributes in common with play, including the link with imagination.

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Why Potentiality Matters

Canadian Journal of Philosophy ◽

10.1080/00455091.1987.10715920 ◽

1987 ◽

Vol 17 (4) ◽

pp. 815-829 ◽

Cited By ~ 37

Author(s):

Jim Stone

Keyword(s):

Human Fetus ◽

Human Being ◽

Human Beings ◽

Right To Life ◽

Adult Human ◽

Human Animal ◽

To Come ◽

Physical Capacities ◽

In Virtue Of

Do fetuses have a right to life in virtue of the fact that they are potential adult human beings? I take the claim that the fetus is a potential adult human being to come to this: if the fetus grows normally there will be an adult human animal that was once the fetus. Does this fact ground a claim to our care and protection? A great deal hangs on the answer to this question. The actual mental and physical capacities of a human fetus are inferior to those of adult creatures generally thought to lack a serious right to life (e.g., adult chickens), and the mere fact that a fetus belongs to our species in particular seems morally irrelevant. Consequently, a strong fetal claim to protection rises or falls with the appeal to the fetus's potentiality, for nothing else can justify it.

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Alien Experience

10.1093/oso/9780190845629.001.0001 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Maura Tumulty

Keyword(s):

Moral Psychology ◽

Philosophy Of Mind ◽

Self Control ◽

Human Being ◽

Making Sense

If I were a better human being, that person’s voice wouldn’t sound so shrill to me. Many of us may have had such thoughts. They give voice to the worrying intuition that if we were less affected by sexism and racism, or better at keeping our tempers, our fellow humans would look and sound differently to us. Alien Experience argues that we should take this sense of unease seriously. It is as philosophically significant as our unease over desires or fears that we disown. Making sense of this unease requires us to re-think the relation between experiences and standing commitments; to re-consider what we mean by self-control; and to attend to empirical questions about perception, attention, and tacit cognition. Alien Experience contests the assumption that while we may be answerable (morally, ethically, legally) for our attitudes and emotions, we are not answerable, at least not in any interesting way, for our perceptions and sensations. That assumption is threaded through debates in the philosophy of mind, moral psychology, and ethics, but it leads to a flattened view of the ways experiences are related to agency. Recognizing that we in fact can be alienated from our experiences leads us to a more nuanced view of agency, and helps us appreciate distinctive opportunities for self-improvement.

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The Importance of Being Human

The Paideia Archive: Twentieth World Congress of Philosophy ◽

10.5840/wcp20-paideia199814287 ◽

1998 ◽

pp. 24-28

Author(s):

Dan Egonsson

Keyword(s):

Human Dignity ◽

Intrinsic Value ◽

Normal Adult ◽

Human Being ◽

Moral Significance ◽

Ethical Implications ◽

Adult Human

In this paper I will defend a kind of human-centered perspective regarding ethical questions wherein the interests of humans and nonhumans alike are involved. Compared to other species, however, the idea that there is something special about being human is commonly vague. For example, it is unclear whether the thought is (1) being a human being is important in itself, or (2) it is important to be like a human being — that is, to have the capacities which a normal adult human being enjoys. I build my defense of human dignity on the claim that we regard a biological human being as a being of intrinsic importance, which is what (1) is about. However, I also consider the ethical implications of (2), which concerns the moral significance of personhood. I argue that the idea of a special intrinsic value of being a human is applicable only to cases where we deal with nonpersons. I claim that in spite of this qualification, we might defend a substantial principle of human dignity founded upon this generalization.

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Cooperation and obligation in early parent-child relationships

Behavioral and Brain Sciences ◽

10.1017/s0140525x19002474 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 43 ◽

Author(s):

Ross A. Thompson

Keyword(s):

Social Norms ◽

Moral Psychology ◽

Close Relationships ◽

Social Agency ◽

Infant Survival ◽

Peer Experiences ◽

Early Experiences ◽

Early Parent ◽

Collaborative Skills ◽

Parent Child Relationships

Abstract Tomasello's moral psychology of obligation would be developmentally deepened by greater attention to early experiences of cooperation and shared social agency between parents and infants, evolved to promote infant survival. They provide a foundation for developing understanding of the mutual obligations of close relationships that contribute (alongside peer experiences) to growing collaborative skills, fairness expectations, and fidelity to social norms.

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