On Contemporary Nihilism

1945 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 170-198 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aron Gurwitsch
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Effective Means ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Social Conditions ◽  
The Unconscious ◽  
Conditioned Reflexes ◽  
The Times

At The present time, reason is not held in any too great esteem; “rationalism” is deprecated in most intellectual circles. “To believe in reason” is to be behind the times, to give evidence of a mode of thinking that is out of date, out of contact with what today is called “progress.”The “belief in reason” is now replaced by all sorts of psychological and sociological sciences: the psychology of the unconscious, of the subconscious, of behavior, of suppressed desires and conditioned reflexes. The variety of sociologies is no less disconcerting—not should we forget the sociological psychologies and the psychological sociologies. Formerly man was considered to be an animal rationale, a rational being; now he has become simply a vital being, not further qualified. Since man lives in community with his fellows, it was formerly the practice to inquire into the structure and organization which society ought to have in order to correspond to the rational and human nature of its members. But today no such question is raised; it is taken for granted that man, as a social animal, must adjust himself to his environment or suffer the consequence to his well-being and his happiness. It is no longer a question of whether one may or one should adjust oneself to certain social conditions: it is now only a question of what is the most effective means or technique of adjustment.

scholarly journals Philosophia Naturalis Rediviva: Natural Philosophy for the Twenty-First Century

Philosophies ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 38
Author(s):  
Bruce MacLennan
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Well Being ◽  
First Century ◽  
Second Person ◽  
Full Account ◽  
The Unconscious ◽  
The World ◽  
Natural Philosophers ◽  
Unconscious Mind

A revitalized practice of natural philosophy can help people to live a better life and promote a flourishing ecosystem. Such a philosophy is natural in two senses. First, it is natural by seeking to understand the whole of nature, including mental phenomena. Thus, a comprehensive natural philosophy should address the phenomena of sentience by embracing first- and second-person methods of investigation. Moreover, to expand our understanding of the world, natural philosophy should embrace a full panoply of explanations, similar to Aristotle’s four causes. Second, such a philosophy is natural by being grounded in human nature, taking full account of human capacities and limitations. Future natural philosophers should also make use of all human capacities, including emotion and intuition, as well as reason and perception, to investigate nature. Finally, since the majority of our brain’s activities are unconscious, natural philosophy should explore the unconscious mind with the aim of deepening our relation with the rest of nature and of enhancing well-being.

scholarly journals Philosophia Naturalis Renovata: Natural Philosophy for the Twenty-First Century

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce MacLennan
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Well Being ◽  
First Century ◽  
Second Person ◽  
Full Account ◽  
The Unconscious ◽  
The World ◽  
Natural Philosophers ◽  
Unconscious Mind

A revitalized practice of natural philosophy can help people to live a better life and promote a flourishing ecosystem. Such a philosophy is natural in two senses. First, it is natural by seeking to understand the whole of nature, including mental phenomena, In particular, a comprehensive natural philosophy should address the phenomena of sentience by embracing first- and second-person methods of investigation. Moreover, to expand our understanding of the world, natural philosophy should embrace a full panoply of explanations, similar to Aristotle’s four causes. Second, such a philosophy is natural by being grounded in human nature, taking full account of human capacities and limitations. Future natural philosophers should also make use of all human capacities, including emotion and intuition as well as reason and perception, to investigate nature. Finally, since the majority of our brain's activities are unconscious, natural philosophy should explore the unconscious mind with the aim of deepening our relation to the rest of nature and enhancing well-being.

Persons Together

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan L. Mittleman
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Jewish Tradition ◽  
The Political ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Human Flourishing ◽  
Political Dimensions ◽  
Market Relations ◽  
The Image Of God

This chapter moves into the political and economic aspects of human nature. Given scarcity and interdependence, what sense has Judaism made of the material well-being necessary for human flourishing? What are Jewish attitudes toward prosperity, market relations, labor, and leisure? What has Judaism had to say about the political dimensions of human nature? If all humans are made in the image of God, what does that original equality imply for political order, authority, and justice? In what kinds of systems can human beings best flourish? It argues that Jewish tradition shows that we act in conformity with our nature when we elevate, improve, and sanctify it. As co-creators of the world with God, we are not just the sport of our biochemistry. We are persons who can select and choose among the traits that comprise our very own natures, cultivating some and weeding out others.

scholarly journals Family, social and cultural determinants of long-lasting insecticidal net (LLIN) use in Madagascar: secondary analysis of three qualitative studies focused on children aged 5–15 years

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ammy Fiadanana Njatosoa ◽  
Chiarella Mattern ◽  
Dolorès Pourette ◽  
Thomas Kesteman ◽  
Elliot Rakotomanana ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Effective Means ◽  
Secondary Analysis ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Malaria Prevalence ◽  
Qualitative Studies ◽  
Observation Data ◽  
Age Group ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Mosquito Net ◽  
Llin Use

Abstract Background Although it is accepted that long-lasting insecticidal net (LLIN) use is an effective means to prevent malaria, children aged 5 to 15 years do not appear to be sufficiently protected in Madagascar; the malaria prevalence is highest in this age group. The purpose of this research is to summarize recent qualitative studies describing LLIN use among the Malagasy people with a focus on children aged 5–15 years. Methods Qualitative data from three studies on malaria conducted between 2012 and 2016 in 10 districts of Madagascar were analysed. These studies cover all malaria epidemiological profiles and 10 of the 18 existing ethnic groups in Madagascar. A thematic analysis was conducted on the collected data from semi-structured interviews, direct observation data, and informal interviews. Results A total of 192 semi-structured interviews were conducted. LLINs are generally perceived positively because they protect the health and well-being of users. However, regional representations of mosquito nets may contribute to LLIN lower use by children over 5 years of age including the association between married status and LLIN use, which leads to the refusal of unmarried young men to sleep under LLINs; the custom of covering the dead with a mosquito net, which leads to fear of LLIN use; and taboos governing sleeping spaces for siblings of opposite sexes, which leads to LLIN shortages in households. Children under 5 years of age are known to be the most vulnerable age group for acquiring malaria and, therefore, are prioritized for LLIN use when there are limited supplies in households. In contrast, children over 5 years of age, who are perceived to be at less risk for malaria, often sleep without LLINs. Conclusions Perceptions, social practices and regional beliefs regarding LLINs and vulnerability to malaria contribute to the nonuse of LLINs among children over 5 years of age in Madagascar. Modifying LLIN policies to account for these factors may increase LLIN use in this age group and reduce disease burden.

Calvin's legacy for contemporary Reformed natural law

2014 ◽  
Vol 67 (4) ◽  
pp. 414-435 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer A. Herdt
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Moral Knowledge ◽  
Empirical Science ◽  
Moral Norms ◽  
Fair Dealing ◽  
Modern Natural ◽  
Moral Quality ◽  
Careful Distinction

AbstractRecent scholarship has done much to uncover a continuous tradition of distinctively Reformed natural law reflection, according to which knowledge of the natural moral law, though not saving knowledge, is universally available to humanity in its fallen state and makes a stable secular order possible. A close look at Calvin's understanding of natural law, and in particular of conscience and natural human instincts, shows that Calvin himself did not expect the natural law to serve as a source of substantive action-guiding moral norms. First, Calvin held that conscience delivers information concerning the moral quality even of individual actions. But he also thought that we often blind ourselves to the deliverances of conscience. Second, he argued that our natural instincts predispose us to civic order and fair dealing insofar as these are necessary for the natural well-being or advantage of creatures such as ourselves. But he also carefully distinguished the good of advantage from the good of justice or virtue. The modern natural lawyers eroded Calvin's careful distinction between conscience as revealing our duty as duty, and instinct as guiding us towards natural advantage. They also turned away from Calvin's insistence on the moral incapacity of unredeemed humanity. The modern natural lawyers saw their task as one of developing an empirical science of human nature to guide legislation and shape international law, bracketing questions of whether this nature was fallen and in need of redemption. When Scottish Presbyterian Reformed thinkers, such as Gershom Carmichael and John Witherspoon, tried in diverse ways to restore eroded Reformed commitments to the science of human nature, about which they were otherwise so enthusiastic, they were not particularly successful. A science which could derive moral norms from an examination of human instincts, and a conscience which could deliver universal moral knowledge, proved too attractive to decline simply because of the transcendence of God or the fallenness of humankind. Those who wished to preserve an account of natural law which remained faithful to a fully robust set of Reformed theological commitments could do so only by refusing to regard the natural law as a positive source of moral knowledge.

Angus Fletcher’s Other Literary Darwinism

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 99-108
Author(s):  
Joseph Carroll
Keyword(s):  
Literary Criticism ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Review Essay ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Psychological Effects ◽  
Literary Scholarship ◽  
Negative Judgment ◽  
Self Help ◽  
Literary Darwinism ◽  
Patent Medicine

Abstract Angus Fletcher pitches his book to general readers. Though it consists of literary criticism, it is designed as a psychological self-help manual-literature as therapy. Fletcher's thera­peutic program is presented as an alternative to the kind of literary Darwinism that iden­tifies human nature as the basis for literature. He acknowledges the existence of human nature but aims at transcending it by promoting an Aquarian ethos of harmony and un­derstanding. He has some gifts of style, but the dominant voice in his stylistic blend is that of the shill hawking a patent medicine. He presents himself as a modern sage who reveals an ancient but long-lost technique for using literature to boost happiness and well-being. Each of his 25 chapters identifies a distinct literary technique and uses popularized neuro­science to describe its supposedly beneficial psychological effects. Fletcher’s chains of rea­soning are habitually tenuous, and his exposition is littered with factual errors that betray ignorance of the books, genres, and periods he discusses. Despite its shortcomings, Fletch­er’s book has received encomiums from prestigious researchers, including the psychologist Martin Seligman and the neuroscientist Antonio Damasio. In evaluating Fletcher’s rhetor­ical style, analytic categories, Aquarian ethos, historical self-narrative, pattern of reasoning, and literary scholarship, this review essay reaches a more negative judgment about the value of his book. As an alternative to Fletcher’s book, I recommend a few evolutionary literary works for general readers.

The Virtues of Justice: Toward a Moral and Jurisprudential Psychology

2021 ◽  
pp. 0306624X2110668
Author(s):  
Christopher Williams ◽  
Bruce Arrigo
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Common Good ◽  
Crime Control ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Offender Therapy ◽  
Psychological Structure ◽  
The Common ◽  
Over Time

Within the theoretical literature on crime control and offender therapy, little has been written about the importance of virtue ethics in the experience of human justice and in the evolution of the common good. As a theory of being, the aretaic tradition extols eudemonic existence (i.e., excellence, flourishing) as a relational habit of developing character that is both practiced and embodied over time. What this implies is that virtue justice depends on a set of assumptions and predispositions—both moral and jurisprudential—whose meanings are essential to comprehending its psychological structure. This article sets out to explore several themes that our integral to our thesis on the virtues (i.e., the being) of justice. We reclaim justice’s aretaic significance, critique the common conflation of justice and law, discuss how the dominant legalistic conception of justice is rooted in a particular view of human nature, suggest how justice might be more properly grounded in natural moral sensibilities, and provide a tentative explication of the psychological character of justice as a twofold moral disposition. Given this exploratory commentary, we conclude by reflecting on how individual well-being, system-wide progress, and transformative social change are both possible and practical, in the interest of promoting the virtues of justice within the practice of crime control and offender therapy.

scholarly journals Multidimensional aspects related to shiftworkers' health and well-being

2004 ◽  
Vol 38 (suppl) ◽  
pp. 86-91 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giovanni Costa
Keyword(s):  
Family Relations ◽  
Biological Rhythms ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Individual Variability ◽  
Human Dimensions ◽  
Individual Characteristics ◽  
Social Conditions ◽  
Specific Work ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Health And Well Being

The impact of shift and night work on health shows a high inter- and intra-individual variability, both in terms of kind of troubles and temporal occurrence, related to various intervening factors dealing with individual characteristics, lifestyles, work demands, company organisation, family relations and social conditions. The way we define "health" and "well-being" can significantly influence appraisals, outcomes and interventions. As the goal is the optimisation of shiftworkers' health, it is necessary to go beyond the health protection and to act for health promotion. In this perspective, not only people related to medical sciences, but many other actors (ergonomists, psychologists, sociologists, educators, legislators), as well as shiftworkers themselves. Many models have been proposed aimed at describing the intervening variables mediating and/or moderating the effects; they try to define the interactions and the pathways connecting risk factors and outcomes through several human dimensions, which refer to physiology, psychology, pathology, sociology, ergonomics, economics, politics, and ethics. So, different criteria can be used to evaluate shiftworkers' health and well-being, starting from biological rhythms and ending in severe health disorders, passing through psychological strain, job dissatisfaction, family perturbation and social dis-adaptation, both in the short- and long-term. Consequently, it appears rather arbitrary to focus the problem of shiftworkers' health and tolerance only on specific aspects (e.g. individual characteristics), but a systemic approach appears more appropriate, able to match as many variables as possible, and aimed at defining which factors are the most relevant for those specific work and social conditions. This can support a more effective and profitable (for individuals, companies, and society) adoption of preventive and compensative measures, that must refer more to "countervalues" rather than to "counterweights".

scholarly journals Semantics of pre-war names of lviv villas

2020 ◽  
Vol 69 ◽  
pp. 53-63
Author(s):  
Kseniya Borodin ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Key Words ◽  
Religious Affiliation ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Present Stage ◽  
Dwelling House ◽  
The Times ◽  
The City ◽  
Coats Of Arms ◽  
House Building ◽  
External Characteristics

Background: The names of houses in Lviv, including villas, are still an unexplored niche in Lviv studies. The issue of semantics of pre-war names of Lviv villas is important at the present stage of the development of the onomastic research. It gives the clue of a good house name to modern naming and house-building companies. Purpose: The author put forward the task to acquaint readers with the Lviv’s named villas (ХІХ–the beginning of ХХ century), to describe the specification of naming features and name functions in diachronic cut and to define semantic groups of villa`s names. They appeared in the times when in naming there was no real practical need and became a manifestation of home essence, a mediator in communication between the owner, the host and a passerby, a potential guest. The name of the house emphasized its individuality, charm, created an emotional personal component of the city text. It was associated with its owners and gave an idea of the level of well-being, education, national composition and religious affiliation of the inhabitants. Results: Lviv`s villas were named mostly in Polish by its owners, architects or citizens. Their purposes were to nominate, distinguish (address function), inform, separate from the others, express oneself as an author, as well as to advertise. The nominative field of Lviv`s house names is represented by women’s names and their shorten forms, words with positive associations, sometimes with several meanings, family coats of arms, external characteristics and location of the house. Key words: name semantic, nominating field, dwelling house, villa, L’viv.

scholarly journals Policing Environmental Injustice

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrea Brock ◽  
Nathan Stephens-Griffin
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Justice ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Open Space ◽  
The State ◽  
Social Conditions ◽  
Environmental Injustice ◽  
Equal Distribution ◽  
Nature And Society

Environmental justice (EJ) activists have long worked with abolitionists in their communities, critiquing the ways policing, prisons, and pollution are entangled and racially constituted (Braz and Gilmore 2006). Yet, much EJ scholarship reflects a liberal Western focus on a more equal distribution of harms, rather than challenging the underlying systems of exploitation these harms rest upon (Álvarez and Coolsaet 2020). This article argues that policing facilitates environmentally unjust developments that are inherently harmful to nature and society. Policing helps enforce a social order rooted in the ‘securing’ of property, hierarchy, and human-nature exploitation. Examining the colonial continuities of policing, we argue that EJ must challenge the assumed necessity of policing, overcome the mythology of the state as ‘arbiter of justice’, and work to create social conditions in which policing is unnecessary. This will help open space to question other related harmful hegemonic principles. Policing drives environmental injustice, so EJ must embrace abolition.

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