The Enslavement of the Human Being

Author(s):  
Miikka Ruokanen

Luther underscores sin as unbelief which cuts off the relationship between the human being and his/her Creator resulting in the imprisonment of the human by sin, death, and transcendental evil. He/she exists in the state of infirmity, incapable of changing his/her basic orientation of life. Sin is weakness, inability to be free. Paradoxically, the enslavement of sin entered humanity when the human being was deceived by an illusion of absolute freedom, independence from the Creator: “man himself wants to be God, and does not want God to be God.” Erasmus criticized Luther for using the deterministic concept of “absolute necessity.” In fact, Luther is not a determinist, but he uses a hamartiological idea of “the necessity of immutability”: the sinner necessarily must continue to be a captive of unfaith until efficient Pneumatological grace liberates him/her. Luther’s thought does not include any notion of “the necessity of coaction.” The sinner freely enjoys sinning unless changed by God. The necessity of immutability concerns the human being’s relation to the “things above oneself,” not to those “below oneself” where natural freedom of will prevails. Luther represents no theodicy, he leaves open the question about where the ultimate origin of evil will lies. God is not the cause of evil will, but he may sometimes use it as an “instrumental cause” for his good purposes. In Luther’s treatise there is no trace of a doctrine of predestination applied to individual human beings. Any notion of double predestination is impossible in Luther’s doctrine of grace.

1985 ◽  
Vol 20 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 206-242 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yoram Dinstein

The individual human being is manifestly the object of every legal system on this planet, and consequently also of international law. The ordinary subject of international law is the international corporate entity: first and foremost (though not exclusively) the State. Yet, the corporate entity is not a tangible res that exists in reality, but an abstract notion, moulded through legal manipulation by and within the ambit of a superior legal system. When the veil is pierced, one can see that behind the legal personality of the State (or any other international corporate entity) there are natural persons: flesh-and-blood human beings. In the final analysis, Westlake was indubitably right when he stated: The duties and rights of States are only the duties and rights of the men who compose them.That is to say, in actuality, the international rights and duties of States devolve on human beings, albeit indirectly and collectively. In other words, the individual human being is not merely the object of international law, but indirectly also its subject, notwithstanding the fact that, ostensibly, the subject is the international corporate entity.


This article considers the state of human beings in a post-postmodern conditions and focuses on obversion as one version of posthuman reality in polyversion, which is lusciousness. Obversion is regarded as a logical and at the same time dynamic figure of dis-identity and non-presence. Trying to find out if a real human being is written leads one to consider the relationship of real and written reality and the possibility of posthuman writing. Posthuman writing becomes apparent in tracks, traces, scars and vestiges such an @ as a signifier of becoming t@iled. The vestiges of a human being are being investigated through the appeal to an actual post-postmodern conceptions such as speculative realism, speculative posthumanism, dark ecology, etc. In the post-postmodern context concepts such as tru(s)t/h, faith and kindness as a counterweight to the excessive postmodern quotation and theorization are being examined. Thus, a human being as a post-postscript is becoming a preface at the same time. This article explores such crucial postmodern issues as iterability, signature and others in a contingent context, in which an immanence of living itself becomes a writing in the postdigitality, post-Internet and post-media extent in relation to the realization of the disaster of technical or even mechanical as human. This research realizes on a showcase of post-postmodern architecture as an immanent spatiotemporal contingency, en-vironment of a human being. It shows how a minimalistic style in post-postmodern ethics and aesthetics correlates with obversive rocking in contrast to binary opposition logic. Thus, it realizes a movement from human to posthuman as scriptor, writing a postscript, and beyond to post-posthuman as postscriptor, writing a post-postscript as a human being, writing itself in its contingent immanence.


2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-49
Author(s):  
Paul Kucharski

My aim in this essay is to advance the state of scholarly discussion on the harms of genocide. The most obvious harms inflicted by every genocide are readily evident: the physical harm inflicted upon the victims of genocide and the moral harm that the perpetrators of genocide inflict upon themselves. Instead, I will focus on a kind of harm inflicted upon those who are neither victims nor perpetrators, on those who are outside observers, so to speak. My thesis will be that when a whole community or culture is eliminated, or even deeply wounded, the world loses an avenue for insight into the human condition. My argument is as follows. In order to understand human nature, and that which promotes its flourishing, we must certainly study individual human beings. But since human beings as rational and linguistic animals are in part constituted by the communities in which they live, the study of human nature should also involve the study of communities and cultures—both those that are well ordered and those that are not. No one community or culture has expressed all that can be said about the human way of existing and flourishing. And given that the unity and wholeness of human nature can only be glimpsed in a variety of communities and cultures, then part of the harm of genocide consists in the removal of a valuable avenue for human beings to better understand themselves.


1978 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 348-354 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wayne C. Thompson

In August 1914 Kurt Riezler accompanied Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg to the Supreme Headquarters in Koblenz and Luxembourg. His duties were not clearly defined and included a variety of things: He worked on war aims, parliamentary speeches, revolutionary movements, and domestic political questions. He helped interpret the chancellor's policies to the press, establish guidelines for censorship, and write anonymous articles supporting Bethmann Hollweg's policies. He could be called Bethmann Hollweg's assistant for political warfare.Unlike most Germans Riezler sensed from the beginning that a German victory was not assured. On August 14, 1914, in his first diary entry after the outbreak of war, he noted that although “everybody was apparently happy to be able for once to dedicate himself unreservedly to a great cause, … no one doubts or appears to consider even for an instant what a gamble war is, especially this war.” Riezler also realized that the “ideas of 1914” would not retain their strength forever. “Just as the storm frightens the vermin out of the air—when it becomes quieter again, everything crawls out of its refuge—and emerges again in the state as well as in individual human beings.” This realization protected Riezler from the naive belief that Germany could bear a long war without an obvious effort to achieve a negotiated peace, without a new European order which at most allowed Germany indirect control, and without domestic political concessions to the German masses.


Author(s):  
Daniel J. Hemel

This chapter suggests a human rights–based justification for national basic income schemes, contrasting it with justifications based on welfarist principles or notions of entitlement to a share of the global commons. Starting from the premise that a state is a collective enterprise that generates a surplus, it contends that any human being who is an “obedient” member of that state has a right to some share of the surplus. That right—which arises from the relationship between the individual and the state, and is independent of need—could justify the entitlement to a basic income. Such income should be provided in cash, not in kind, because the latter risks depriving the individual of the enjoyment of his share of the surplus—in effect, forcing him to forfeit or transfer it to others if he does not use the public goods or services provided by the state.


2020 ◽  
pp. 104-127
Author(s):  
Adam Pryor

In light of contemporary accounts of the Anthropocene, this chapter re-figures the relationship between human being and nature, such that nature is not the dialectical antithesis to human being and our reflexivity with nature is not easily marginalized. It proposes a simple definition for this relationship: human beings are planetary creatures in deep time. This definition indicates how the Anthropocene disorients us both in terms of the spatial (i.e., planetary) and temporal (i.e., deep time) boundedness of our subjectivity. Building on supporting ideas—‘planetarity’ and a ‘Sapiezoic’ eon—that help us imagine the implications of the Anthropocene’s disorientation of our subjectivity, this chapter articulates the potential symbolic power of the Anthropocene to imagine human beings as intra-active agents.


1995 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 98-108 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vicki L. Lee

This paper considers the question “What is a psychological unit?”. The ubiquity of units in daily life and in science is considered. The assumption that the individual human being or animal is the psychological unit is examined and rejected. The units represented by the data collected in operant laboratories are interpreted as a subset of the well-defined changes that individual human beings or animals can bring about. The departure of this interpretation from the traditional interpretation in terms of the behaviour of the organism is acknowledged. The paper concludes by noting the relation of the present interpretation of operant research to the problem of identifying psychological units.


2012 ◽  
Vol 174-177 ◽  
pp. 3083-3086
Author(s):  
Jun Sun

Since human beings are living in the dynamic environment which requires multi-perceptional experiences, multiple perceptions prevail in every aspect of people’s life. In this article, the writer is concerned with the problems revealed in the design of public space environment, and the important role non-visual perceptional experience plays in the relationship between human being and environment. In the procession of their design, it is necessary for the designers to pay attention to the users' requirements on the non-visual perceptional experience. Making use of several cases of major city public spaces as example, the writer conducted careful survey into the current situation of the actual practice of non-visual perception experience and validates its essential function.


2018 ◽  
Vol 74 (296) ◽  
pp. 847-866
Author(s):  
Volney José Berkenbrock

Na tradição do pensamento ocidental, as diversas ciências que lidam com o ser humano – da filosofia à psicologia, da teologia à medicina – são herdeiras de um conceito dualista: matéria-espírito; corpo-alma; físico-psíquico. O modo de pensar yorubano, que chegou ao Brasil pelos escravos, e sobreviveu, sobretudo na religião do Candomblé, tem um conceito diverso deste dualista. O ser humano é multidimensional e constitui-se a partir da relação harmônica entre as diversas dimensões. Quais são estas dimensões e como elas concorrem para a composição de um conceito de ser humano serão o objeto das considerações desta contribuição.Abstract: In the tradition of Western thought, the various sciences that deal with human beings - from philosophy to psychology, from theology to medicine - are heirs of a dualistic concept: matter-spirit; body-soul; physical-psychic. The thinking of yoruba-people, who arrived in Brazil by slaves, and survived, especially in religion Candomble, have a different concept of this dualistic. The human being is multidimensional and is constituted by the relationship of various dimensions. What are these dimensions and how they contribute to the composition of a concept of human being will be the object of consideration of this contribution.Keywords: Human being. Candomblé. Religious anthropology. 


2006 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Giuseppe Dalla Torre

Dopo essersi rilevato il fenomeno della rinascita del fatto religioso nell’odierna società secolarizzata, grazie anche al massiccio fenomeno immigratorio, si descrive l’impatto del pluralismo etnico-religioso sulle tradizionali realtà degli ordinamenti giuridici statali; impatto reso ancora più problematico per l’ascesa di nuovi poteri, in particolare quello tecnico-scientifico, insofferenti ad una eteroregolamentazione non solo sul piano etico, ma anche sul piano giuridico. Si mette quindi in evidenza una crescente ambiguità che investe la biogiuridica: da un lato la nuova esigenza di riconoscere il rivendicato “diritto alla diversità” da parte delle diverse formazioni etnico-religiose; dall’altro l’esigenza di una regolamentazione giuridica uniforme a garanzia dell’ordinata convivenza attorno ad una scala valoriale che abbia nella “vita” il bene centrale ed ultimo da salvaguardare. Tra le conclusioni cui si giunge è innanzitutto quella per cui la pacifica convivenza in una società multietnica e multireligiosa può essere assicurata, nel rispetto delle diverse tradizioni e culture, attraverso il ricorso a moderati e saggi riconoscimenti di spazio al diritto personale all’interno degli ordinamenti statali, ma nei limiti rigorosi posti dalle esigenze di tutela della dignità umana. Ciò tocca anche la questione dei “nuovi poteri” che, nel contesto di una società globalizzata, impongono una rielaborazione dell’idea di diritto che, partendo dal quadro di un sistema di fonti che tende sempre più ad essere organizzato non secondo gerarchia ma secondo competenza, si ispiri al principio del riconoscimento dell’essere umano nella sua dignità, indipendentemente dall’appartenenza etnico-religiosa. Infine si mette in evidenza l’inaccettabilità di un “diritto debole”, solo procedimentale, perché sostanziale negazione della funzione stessa del diritto, che è quella di prevenire e/o dirimere i conflitti tra interessi in gioco e, quindi, i contrasti tra le parti della società, difendendo nel rapporto i soggetti più deboli; così come si mette in evidenza che il prezioso bene della laicità dello Stato non è – come invece spesso si ritiene – salvaguardato da un “diritto debole”, ma solo da un diritto giusto. ---------- After being noticed the phenomenon of the rebirth of the religious fact in today’s secularized society, it is described also the impact of the ethnic-religious pluralism on the traditional realities of the government juridical arrangements; impact made even more problematic for the ascent of new powers, particularly that technical-scientific, impatient to an heteroregulation not only on the ethical plan, but also on the juridical plan. It is put therefore in evidence an increasing ambiguity that invests the biojuridical: from one side the new demand to recognize the vindicated “law to difference” from different ethnic-religious formations; from the other the demand of a uniform juridical regulation to guarantee of the orderly cohabitation around to a scale of value that has in “life” central and ultimate good to safeguard. Between the conclusions which the author comes it is, first of all, that for which the peaceful cohabitation in a multiethnic and multireligious society can be assured, in the respect of the different traditions and cultures, through the recourse to moderate and wise recognition of space to the personal law into the government arrangements, but in the rigorous limits set by the demands of guardianship of human dignity. This also touches the matter of new powers that, in the contest of globalization, impose a new elaboration of the idea of law that, departing from the picture of a system of sources that extends more and more to not be organized according to hierarchy but according to competence, inspire to the principle of the recognition of the human being in its dignity, independently from the ethnic-religious affiliation. Finally it is put in evidence the unacceptability of a “weak law”, just procedural, as substantial negation of the law function itself, which is that to prevent and/or to settle the conflicts between affairs at stake and, therefore, contrasts between the parts of the society, defending in the relationship the weakest subjects; as it is evidenced that the precious good of laity of the State is not - like instead it is often considered - safeguarded by a weak law, but only by a correct law.


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