Comte's Positivism and the Science of Society

Philosophy ◽  
1951 ◽  
Vol 26 (99) ◽  
pp. 291-310 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. B. Acton
Keyword(s):  
Subject Matter ◽  
Sense Perception ◽  
Hypotheses Testing ◽  
The World

Positivism is the view that the only way to obtain knowledge of the world is by means of sense perception and introspection and the methods of the empirical sciences. Positivists believe that it is futile to attempt to deduce or demonstrate truths about the world from alleged self-evident premisses that are not based primarily on sense perception. They consider, on the contrary, that knowledge of things can only be advanced by framing hypotheses, testing them by observation and experiment, and reshaping them in the light of what these reveal. Thus they regard metaphysics, in so far as it is the effort to find out about the world by methods other than those employed in the empirical sciences, as a hopelessly misdirected activity. The method of hypothesis, they hold, is applicable to any field of factual enquiry, although they admit that differences of subject-matter may call for very considerable variations of emphasis. Such variations, however, important though they be, are, on their view, matters of detail, and do not detract from the essential sameness of the effective method. This method was first consciously analysed by reference to the sciences of nature, where its use has led to impressive results both in the theoretical and practical sphere.

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerhard Preyer
Keyword(s):  
Subject Matter ◽  
Diverse Range ◽  
The World ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Relationship

The study of meaning in language embraces a diverse range of problems and methods. Philosophers think through the relationship between language and the world; linguists document speakers’ knowledge of meaning; psychologists investigate the mechanisms of understanding and production. Up through the early 2000s, these investigations were generally compartmentalized: indeed, researchers often regarded both the subject matter and the methods of other disciplines with skepticism. Since then, however, there has been a sea change in the field, enabling researchers increasingly to synthesize the perspectives of philosophy, linguistics, and psychology and to energize all the fields with rich new intellectual perspectives that facilitate meaningful interchange. One illustration of the trend is the publication of Lepore and Stone’s ...

Dibdin and Jane Austen

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicola Pritchard-Pink
Keyword(s):  
Subject Matter ◽  
Jane Austen ◽  
Musical Performance ◽  
Musical Education ◽  
Young Girls ◽  
Female Performance ◽  
The World ◽  
Music Collection ◽  
Conduct Book

Jane Austen was one of Dibdin’s greatest admirers and his songs feature prominently in her music collection. Yet the Dibdin songs she owned, with their bawdy comedy, political and social satire, and martial, masculine themes, were far removed from the musical diet prescribed for young ladies of Austen’s rank by conduct writers. Indeed, they were quite different from those advocated by Dibdin himself in his tract on the musical education of young girls, the Musical Mentor (1808), which suggested songs on ‘Constancy’, ‘A Portrait of Innocence’, or ‘Vanity Reproved’ as more suitable subject matter. By highlighting the contrasts between contemporary expectations of female performance and the contents of Austen’s collection, this interlude presents domestic musical performance less as an instrument of control and more as a means by which women could express themselves and participate in the world beyond the bounds of home, family, and conduct-book femininity.

scholarly journals Myth in the Context of African Traditional Histories: Can it be Called “Applied History”?

2005 ◽  
Vol 32 ◽  
pp. 485-491 ◽  
Author(s):  
S.A. Shokpeka
Keyword(s):  
Subject Matter ◽  
Religious Life ◽  
Moral Order ◽  
Inanimate Object ◽  
Cultural Artifacts ◽  
Comprehensive Examination ◽  
The World ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Final Answer

For the reconstruction of history from oral sources, four broad types are usually distinguishable. These are myth, legend, songs, and what Phillips Stevens calls “popular history.” All of them fall under the generic heading of “folklore”—a term which is so broad in its application that it could include nearly all expressive aspects of culture. The only type that we will concern ourselves with in this study is myth. A comprehensive examination of the issue in question in the study requires a definition of the word myth; an examination of the characteristics of “applied history;” and the application of these characteristics to myth with a view to finding out any point of agreement between them, before a final answer will be given to the question whether “myth in the context of African traditional histories,” can be called applied history.The Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English defines myth as a “story handed down from olden time, containing the early beliefs of a race.” Vansina identifies myths by their subject matter and talks about them as those stories which “deal with and interpret the relations between the natural and the supernatural and are concerned with all that part of religious life that lies beyond the moral order. “ He says that they “attempt to explain the world, the culture, the society … in terms of religious causes.” McCall, for his part, refers to myths as “stories concerning the supernatural, the activities of deities, spirits and semi-divine heroes on the origin of the world, mankind and cultural artifacts and institutions which usually are said to have been achieved through the instrumentality of these sacred beings.” Afigbo, in turn, considers myths as having the “tendency to explain historical institutions and development by appeal to non-historic factors and forces”—as stories that see “the supernatural acting at times through the agency of man, at times through the agency of the lower animals and other times even through the agency of inanimate object, as the original and continuing causes of motion in a society.”

Prayer as the “Lifeline of Theology”

2016 ◽  
Vol 98 (2) ◽  
pp. 271-283
Author(s):  
Marilyn McCord Adams
Keyword(s):  
Subject Matter ◽  
Christian Communities ◽  
The World ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Partnership Models ◽  
Human Family

The thesis of this essay is that—before writing—theologians should get to know their subject matter. Prayer is the lifeline of theology, because God is the subject matter of theology and prayer is our way of being in the world with God. Developing this idea first with human family and partnership models brings out how multifaceted prayer is, and how it is a way of being in the world not only for individuals but for Christian communities. Applying these observations to the task of theology, the essay attempts to clarify the thesis by answering the charge that it makes theology perniciously subjective.

Global Distributive Justice

2018 ◽  
pp. 102-117
Author(s):  
Simon Caney
Keyword(s):  
Distributive Justice ◽  
Empirical Research ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
World Economy ◽  
Deep Understanding ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
Global Level ◽  
Global Distributive Justice ◽  
The World ◽  
The Subject

This chapter explores the relevance of facts and empirical enquiry for the normative project of enquiring what principles of distributive justice, if any, apply at the global level. Is empirical research needed for this kind of enquiry? And if so, how? Claims about global distributive justice often rest on factual assumptions. Seven different ways in which facts about national, regional and global politics (and hence empirical research into global politics) might inform accounts of global distributive justice are examined. A deep understanding of the nature of global politics and the world economy (and thus empirical research on it) is needed: to grasp the implications of principles of global distributive justice; to evaluate such principles for their attainability and political feasibility; to assess their desirability; and, first, to conceptualize the subject-matter of global distributive justice and to formulate the questions that accounts of global distributive justice need to answer.

Sex Differences in Children's Art

1982 ◽  
Vol 164 (3) ◽  
pp. 271-289 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen McNiff
Keyword(s):  
Sex Differences ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
School Adjustment ◽  
Children's Art ◽  
Artistic Activity ◽  
Psychological Differences ◽  
The World ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
Trends Over Time ◽  
The Subject

This paper examines the similarities and differences in the art of boys and girls aged six, seven, and eight. It is primarily concerned with the ways in which the subject matter of the children's art reflects sex differences in interests, introspective thought, and symbolic organization of the world. The methodology, based on the spontaneous art experience, seeks to establish that artistic activity is a viable medium through which information on the non-discursive aspects of children's thought can be obtained. Over 1800 drawings, done by 26 children, were collected. The content of the drawings was examined for its range of subject matter and for thematic trends over time. It was found that girls and boys consistently portray very different subjects. The children's art did not present stereotypic images of sex roles nor could the contrasts be specifically attributed to genetic, social, or psychological differences between the sexes, although there was some correlation with the research findings in those areas. It was concluded that girls and boys have very different expressive interests and needs which are not fully incorporated into their educational environment and which affect all areas of school adjustment.

scholarly journals Synet på natur og historie hos Grundtvig og Løgstrup

1994 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 92-106
Author(s):  
Hans Henningsen
Keyword(s):  
Sense Perception ◽  
Historical View ◽  
Self Recognition ◽  
The World ◽  
Art Forms ◽  
History Of ◽  
Different Dimensions ◽  
The Creation ◽  
The Universe ◽  
Historical Life

The View of Nature and History in Grundtvig and LøgstrupBy Hans HenningsenGrundtvig’s and K.E. Løgstrup’s thoughts move in two different dimensions, but with the same intention of demonstrating that it was not the capacity of man to create culture that first gave significance to the world. But where Grundtvig speaks about history, Løgstrup speaks about »phenomena«, »nature«, and »universe«.While Grundtvig was largely unaffected by Kant, the latter - with his concepts of the selfexistent subject and the idea of the faculty of cognition as productive - became a challenge to Løgstrup. Kant heralds an era whose relationship with the universe is characterized as a »marginal existence«. Our culture became an emancipatory culture which was all to the good, but the era lost its sense of the .pre-cultural. structures in which life is »encased«.The era has also emancipated itself from Grundtvig’s historical view. But a history on the premisses of relativism is no history. Or, in Løgstrup’s words, there is no other history than the history of what is essential in life. Therefore, in reality, Løgstrup’s phenomenological and philosophical endeavours become a defence of history. Grundtvig’s view of nature was determined by his radical prioritization of history. He prefers to view nature as part of the historical life of man, which again determines his use of nature images. In Grundtvig there is no religious interpretation of any experience or perception of nature in spite of the fact that everything in the Creation is to be understood as images of the eternal.In Løgstrup there is no such cautions attitude towards nature. Here nature and sense perception are liberating, but as is the case with Grundtvig, nature is seen as the foundation of man’s life, as immediate experience.Grundtvig’s radical prioritization of history colours his view of art. The Creation itself is the greatest work of art; part of it is the upbringing through which all history must be the object of the individual’s own experience. Among the art forms, poetry ranks highest, with the song above all other forms, while Grundtvig only uses disparaging words about painting and sculpture because these art forms are wordless and preclude changes. Løgstrup, however, attaches much greater importance to sense perception and self-recognition through art.These contrasts may be regarded as what Løgstrup calls uniting opposites; it must be remembered, however, that such disparities cannot be harmonized so as to disappear, but are uniting precisely by virtue of the tension that exists between them. The actual existence of the contrasts does not preclude the possibility that in a wider sense the two views may be contained within the same framework and express a common intention.

scholarly journals Słownictwo dotyczące świata fauny i flory w Symbolice wiosennej Stefanii Ulanowskiej

2021 ◽  
pp. 60-72
Author(s):  
Małgorzata Andrejczyk
Keyword(s):  
Rural Communities ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
Reconstructed Image ◽  
Linguistic Knowledge ◽  
Mental Processes ◽  
The World ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Selection Of

The object of interest in this sketch is an analysis of the vocabulary indicating selected elements of the world of fauna and fl ora in Symbolika wiosenna (Spring symbolism) by Stefania Ulanowska (Kraków 1884). The collected language material is characterised by wealth and complexity of the subject matter. The indicated vocabulary has not been characterised yet. This paper employs elements of the cognitivist description of language. The selection of this method enables depiction of the relation between linguistic knowledge and encyclopaedic knowledge. Language becomes an indispensible element of mental processes of the perception of the world (Tokarski 1995; Miodunka 1980). The analysis of the excerpted material clearly shows that the discussed spring symbolism usually invokes, contrary to the prototype, the semantic fi eld related to ‘śmierć’ (death) rather than ‘życie’ (life). The reconstructed image of the folk idea of spring largely deviates from the ideas established in the consciousness of language users in general, which is confi rmed by the discussed examples. It presents unit connotations that are individualised and present in the consciousness of members of small rural communities of those times. Keywords: Stefania Ulanowska – vocabulary of fauna and flora

scholarly journals ‎ Sudan’s accession to the World Trade Organization and its impact on the proceeds of tax and customs revenues (Field study): انضمام السودان لمنظمة التجارة العالمية وأثره على حصيلة الإيرادات الضريبية والجمركية (دراسة ميدانية)

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Abdelsalam Awad Khair Elseed
Keyword(s):  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
The State ◽  
Hypotheses Testing ◽  
The World ◽  
Control Procedures ◽  
Descriptive Approach ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Correct Implementation ◽  
Public Revenues

The study aimed to recognize the extent of Sudan government interest with increasing its public revenues through its quest to join world trade organization, to study the relationship between join world trade organization and increasing the tax and customs revenues for the state. The study adopted descriptive approach to analyze study’s data and hypotheses testing. The study found several results, among which is that, join world trade organization impacts on tax and customs revenues through tax facilities and customs’ reductions which provided by joining the organization, implementing principles of cancels customs tariff according to world trade organization requirements impacts public revenues of the state. The study recommended many recommendations, among which is that, Sudanese government should do more efforts towards complete obligation of implementing World trade organization’s guidance, increasing custom’s control procedures to ensure correct implementation for world trade organization’s articles that concern customs performance.

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