scholarly journals No Abiding City: Hume, Naturalism, and Toleration

Philosophy ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 84 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-94 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samuel Clark

AbstractThis paper rereads David Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion as dramatising a distinctive, naturalistic account of toleration. I have two purposes in mind: first, to complete and ground Hume's fragmentary explicit discussion of toleration; second, to unearth a potentially attractive alternative to more recent, Rawlsian approaches to toleration. To make my case, I connect Dialogues and the problem of toleration to the wider themes of naturalism, scepticism and their relation in Hume's thought, before developing a new interpretation of Dialogues part 12 as political drama. Finally, I develop the Humean theory of toleration I have discovered by comparison between Rawls's and Hume's strategies for justification of a tolerant political regime.

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 127-132
Author(s):  
Mukhlis Rahmanto ◽  
Mohammad Syifa Amin Widigdo ◽  
Rozikan .

Purpose of the study:This article aims to examine critically the roles of Muhammadiyah as one of the largest Islamic civil organizations in Indonesia in interpreting and praticing Islamic normative values, especially with regard to the empowerment of civil society after the fall of President Suharto’s New Order political regime in 1998. Methodology:This study applies qualitative approach and descriptive analysis that aims to critically describe the roles of Muhammdiyah through its department of Majelis Pemberdayaan Masyarakat (abbreviated as: MPM) in interpreting and practicing Islamic values in the relation of civil society empowerment in the post Soeharto’s New Order regime era. Data is gathered from observation, interview with the MPM leaders, and document analysis. Other previous studies which are also included as the main sources of the study are conducted by Prijono (1996) and Harmsen (2008). Main Findings and Novelty:The analysis produces some important findings: first, some of normative doctrines of Islam on the issue of society empowerment are reinterpreted. The resulted interpretation is different from classical interpretation and interpretive experiences in other Muslim world. The new interpretation focuses on Sūrah al-Māʿūn of the Qur’an (and some other related verses) and uses such interpretation as a theological ground and spirit for implementing societal empowerment visions and works. Second, the empowerment roles of Muhammadiyah through the Council (i.e. MPM) affirms the theory of civil society in Indonesia, which becomes a strategic partner of the government, whose development program fails engender social welfare and prosperity. Applications of this study: This study can be useful formanyinterdiscipliner area such civil society, civil empowerment, sociology, and Islamic Studies.


Author(s):  
Lawrence C. Becker

The Stoics notoriously held that virtue was the perfection of human-scale rational agency; that such perfection was rare but humanly possible; that it was both necessary and sufficient for happiness; that it was, in fact, the only unqualified good for human beings; and that it was an all-or-nothing achievement—there were no intermediate degrees of virtue. The mere recital of that list of Stoic doctrines has often been enough to disqualify Stoicism as a viable form of virtue ethics. This chapter, however, describes Stoic ethics as a systematic and attractive alternative to Aristotelian ethics. The implicit suggestion is that the usual caricatures of Stoicism can be erased, and that contemporary virtue ethics can benefit from working in the Stoic tradition—particularly with its naturalistic account of moral development.


2021 ◽  
pp. 95-103
Author(s):  
Dmitrii Nikolaevich Barinov

This article is dedicated to the problem of fear as a phenomenon of political power and dominance-subordination relations. The theoretical-methodological framework for the analysis of correlation between fear and political power is comprised of the works of Russian and foreign philosophers and sociologists (O. Comte, H. Spencer, T. Parsons, N. Luhmann, E. Shils, A. S. Panarin, and other.). The author examines such phenomenon as the fear of punishment, the peculiarities of occurrence of fear in the conditions of total control over citizens under despotic and democratic political regime, in the situation of destruction of the government. Characteristic is given to the fears of politicians (personal fears, fear of losing power, fear of democracy). Based on the theoretical models along with attracted historical and statistical material, it is demonstrated that fear is an inevitable side effect of any power that tends to conservation of the existing model of relations between the government and society. The article provides a new interpretation of the idea of the supporters of psychoanalysis on channeling the fears of politicians onto the population. It is underlined that in the current conditions, it is not so much the fears of the political elite, as on converting them into a governing technique. The latter conceals the true concerns of the political elite, as well as displaces the moods of discontent and social tension, turning them into fear towards the objects developed in the information field.


2011 ◽  
Vol 44 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 3-34
Author(s):  
Mirko Jurak

In the final part of my study I shall present Shakespeare's influence on Slovene dramatists from the 1930s to the present time. In this period an almost unbelievable growth in Slovene cultural activities took place. This is also reflected in a very large number of new Slovene playwrights who have written in this time, in their international orientation in dramatic art as well as in the constantly growing number of permanent (and ad hoc) theatre companies. Communication regarding new theatrical tendencies not only in Europe but also in the United States of America and % during the past decades % also in its global dimension has become much easiers than in previous periods and this resulted also in the application of new dramatic visions in playwriting and in theatrical productions in Slovenia. These new movements include new techniques in writing, such as symbolism, futurism, expressionism, constructivism, surrealism, political drama, the theatre of the absurd and postmodernism, which have become apparent both in new literary techniques and in new forms of production. In this period Classical drama still preserved an important role in major Slovene theatres. Plays written by Greek playwrights, as well as plays written by Shakespeare, Molière, Schiller etc. still constitute a very relevant part of the repertoire in Slovene theatres. Besides, Slovene theatres have also performed many plays written by modern playwrights, as for example by Oscar Wilde, L. N. Tolstoy, I. S. Turgenev, Henrik Ibsen, August Strindberg, G. Hauptmann, G. Büchner, G. B. Shaw, A. P. Chekhov, John Galsworthy, Luigi Pirandello, Eugene O'Neill and many other contemporary playwrights. In the period after the Second World War the influence of American dramatists has been constantly growing. This variety also resulted in the fact that direct influence of Shakespeare and his plays upon Slovene dramatists became less frequent and less noticeable than it had been before. Plays written by Slovene dramatists are rarely inspired by whole scenes or passages from Shakespeare's plays, although there are also some exceptions from this rule. It is rather surprising how quickly Slovene theatres produced works written by important foreign dramatists already in the period following the First World War not to mention how quickly plays written by the best European and American playwrights have appeared on Slovene stages during the past fifty years. The connection between Shakespeare's plays and plays written by Slovene playwrights became more subtle, more sophisticated, they are often based on implied symbolic references, which have become a starting point for a new interpretation of the world, particularly if compared with the Renaissance humanistic values. The sheer number of plays written by Slovene dramatists in this period makes it difficult to ascertain that all influences from Shakespeare's plays have been noticed, although it is hoped that all major borrowings and allusion are included. Slovene dramatists and theatre directors have provided numerous adaptations of Shakespeare's plays, which sometimes present a new version of an old motif so that it may hardly be linked with Shakespeare. Slovene artists, playwrights and 4 also theatre directors, have %rewritten%, %reset% the original text and given it a new meaning and/or a new form, and in a combination of motifs and structure they have thus created a %new play%, even stand-up comedies in which the actor depends on a scenario based on Shakespeare's play(s) but every performance represents a new improvisation. Such productions are naturally closer to the commedia dell'arte type of play than to a play written by Shakespeare. I briefly mention such experimental productions in the introductory part of my study. The central part of my research deals with authors in whose works traces of Shakespeare's influence are clearly noticeable. These playwrights are: Matej Bor, Jože Javoršek, Ivan Mrak, Dominik Smole, Mirko Zupančič, Gregor Strniša, Veno Taufer, Dušan Jovanović, Vinko Möderndorfer and Evald Flisar.


Author(s):  
Charles TurnbiLL ◽  
Delbert E. Philpott

The advent of the scanning electron microscope (SCEM) has renewed interest in preparing specimens by avoiding the forces of surface tension. The present method of freeze drying by Boyde and Barger (1969) and Small and Marszalek (1969) does prevent surface tension but ice crystal formation and time required for pumping out the specimen to dryness has discouraged us. We believe an attractive alternative to freeze drying is the critical point method originated by Anderson (1951; for electron microscopy. He avoided surface tension effects during drying by first exchanging the specimen water with alcohol, amy L acetate and then with carbon dioxide. He then selected a specific temperature (36.5°C) and pressure (72 Atm.) at which carbon dioxide would pass from the liquid to the gaseous phase without the effect of surface tension This combination of temperature and, pressure is known as the "critical point" of the Liquid.


Author(s):  
P.M. Mul ◽  
B.J.M. Bormans ◽  
L. Schaap

The first Field Emission Guns (FEG) on TEM/STEM instruments were introduced by Philips in 1977. In the past decade these EM400-series microscopes have been very successful, especially in analytical electron microscopy, where the high currents in small probes are particularly suitable. In High Resolution Electron Holography, the high coherence of the FEG has made it possible to approach atomic resolution.Most of these TEM/STEM systems are based on a cold field emitter (CFE). There are, however, a number of disadvantages to CFE’s, because of their very small emission region: the maximum current is limited (a strong disadvantage for high-resolution TEM imaging) and the emission is unstable, requiring special measures to reduce the strong FEG-induced noise. Thermal field emitters (TFE), i.e. a zirconiated field emitter source operating in the thermal or Schottky mode, have been shown to be a viable and attractive alternative to CFE’s. TFE’s have larger emission regions, providing much higher maximum currents, better stability, and reduced sensitivity to vacuum conditions as well as mechanical and electrical interferences.


1970 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 113-116
Author(s):  
Amimah Fatima Asif

Quality healthcare delivery is the bedrock to exponentially accelerate the development of a country. Unfortunately, in Pakistan healthcare has been neglected since a long time, with the common man bearing the brunt of this acute situation. There are critical challenges in health care, with paucity of trained human resource and deficit of regulated infrastructure and service delivery being the predominant dilemmas. Primary and secondary healthcare are in an unseemly state, to say the least. Maternal and child health care, accident, and emergency departments and mental health are among the most undermined and forsaken areas of healthcare, primarily in the far flung Gilgit Baltistan region of Pakistan. The only way forward is if the political regime, administration and the medical personnel work in concurrence to revise the health infrastructure of the country.


Author(s):  
Necati Polat

This book explores the transformation of Turkey’s political regime from 2002 under the AKP rule. Turkey has been through a series of major political shifts historically, roughly from the mid-19th century. The book details the most recent change, locating it in its broader historical setting. Beginning with the AKP rule from late 2002, supported by a wide informal coalition that included liberals, it describes how the ‘former’ Islamists gradually acquired full power between 2007 and 2011. It then chronicles the subsequent phase, looking at politics and rights under the amorphous new order. This highly accessible assessment of the change in question places it in the larger context of political modernisation in the country over the past 150 or so years, covering all of the main issues in contemporary Turkish politics: the religious and secular divide, the Kurds, the military, foreign policy orientation, the state of human rights, the effective concentration of powers in the government and a rule by policy, rather than law, initiated by Erdogan’s increasingly authoritarian populism. The discussion at once situates Turkey in the broader milieu of the Arab Spring, especially in terms of Islamist politics and Muslim piety in the public sphere, with some emphasis on ‘Islamo-nationalism’ (Millî Görüş) as a local Islamist variety. Effortlessly blending history, politics, law, social theory and philosophy in making sense of the change, the book uses the concept of mimesis to show that continuity is a key element in Turkish politics, despite the series of radical breaks that have occurred.


Moreana ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 55 (Number 209) (1) ◽  
pp. 24-60
Author(s):  
Russ Leo

Nicolas Gueudeville's 1715 French translation of Utopia is often dismissed as a “belle infidèle,” an elegant but unfaithful work of translation. Gueudeville does indeed expand the text to nearly twice its original length. But he presents Utopia as a contribution to emergent debates on tolerance, natural religion, and political anthropology, directly addressing the concerns of many early advocates of the ideas we associate with Enlightenment. In this sense, it is not as much an “unfaithful” presentation of More's project as it is an attempt to introduce Utopia to eighteenth-century francophone audiences—readers for whom theses on political economy and natural religion were much more salient than More's own preoccupations with rhetoric and English law. This paper introduces Gueudeville and his oeuvre, paying particular attention to his revisions to Louis-Armand de Lom d'Arce, Baron de Lahontan's 1703 Nouveaux Voyages dans l'Amérique Septentrionale. Published in 1705, Gueudeville's “revised, corrected, & augmented” version of Lahontan's Voyages foregrounds the rational and natural religion of the Huron as well as their constitutive aversion to property, to concepts of “mine” and “yours.” Gueudeville's revised version of Lahontan's Voyages purports to be an anthropological investigation as well as a study of New World political economy; it looks forward, moreover, to his edition of Utopia, framing More's work as a comparable study of political economy and anthropology. Gueudeville, in other words, renders More's Utopia legible to Enlightenment audiences, depicting Utopia not in terms of impossibility and irony but rather as a study of natural religion and attendant forms of political, devotional, and economic life. Gueudeville's edition of Utopia even proved controversial due, in part, to his insistence on the rationality as well as the possibility of Utopia.


2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-54
Author(s):  
Clyde Forsberg Jr.

In the history of American popular religion, the Latter-day Saints, or Mormons, have undergone a series of paradigmatic shifts in order to join the Christian mainstream, abandoning such controversial core doctrines and institutions as polygamy and the political kingdom of God. Mormon historians have played an important role in this metamorphosis, employing a version (if not perversion) of the Church-Sect Dichotomy to change the past in order to control the future, arguing, in effect, that founder Joseph Smith Jr’s erstwhile magical beliefs and practices gave way to a more “mature” and bible-based self-understanding which is then said to best describe the religion that he founded in 1830. However, an “esoteric approach” as Faivre and Hanegraaff understand the term has much to offer the study of Mormonism as an old, new religion and the basis for a more even methodological playing field and new interpretation of Mormonism as equally magical (Masonic) and biblical (Evangelical) despite appearances. This article will focus on early Mormonism’s fascination with and employment of ciphers, or “the coded word,” essential to such foundation texts as the Book of Mormon and “Book of Abraham,” as well as the somewhat contradictory, albeit colonial understanding of African character and destiny in these two hermetic works of divine inspiration and social commentary in the Latter-day Saint canonical tradition.


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