A Kantian Case for Our Obligations to the Other Animals

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine M. Korsgaard
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Kingdom Of Ends ◽  
Formula Of Humanity ◽  
Good For ◽  
As If

When we act rationally, we treat things that are good for us as if they were good absolutely. We choose to pursue them, and demand that others respect our choices, thus treating ourselves as ends in ourselves. This argument—Kant’s argument for the Formula of Humanity—establishes that there are two senses in which rationality commits us to the view that we are ends in ourselves. The demands that we make on others commit us to the view that we are ends in ourselves as autonomous lawmakers, and ground our duties to other rational beings. The demands that we make on ourselves when we choose to pursue our good commit us to the view that we are ends in ourselves as creatures who have a good, and ground our duties to other animals. The chapter also examines the difficulties this raises for Kant’s ideal of the Kingdom of Ends.

From Container to Claustrum: Projective Identification in Couples

2014 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tamara Feldman
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Health ◽  
Projective Identification ◽  
The Self ◽  
The Other ◽  
Intimate Partners ◽  
And Control ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
As If

This paper is a contribution to the growing literature on the role of projective identification in understanding couples' dynamics. Projective identification as a defence is well suited to couples, as intimate partners provide an ideal location to deposit unwanted parts of the self. This paper illustrates how projective identification functions differently depending on the psychological health of the couple. It elucidates how healthier couples use projective identification more as a form of communication, whereas disturbed couples are inclined to employ it to invade and control the other, as captured by Meltzer's concept of "intrusive identification". These different uses of projective identification affect couples' capacities to provide what Bion called "containment". In disturbed couples, partners serve as what Meltzer termed "claustrums" whereby projections are not contained, but imprisoned or entombed in the other. Applying the concept of claustrum helps illuminate common feelings these couples express, such as feeling suffocated, stifled, trapped, held hostage, or feeling as if the relationship is killing them. Finally, this paper presents treatment challenges in working with more disturbed couples.

Are People More Important than the Other Animals?

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine M. Korsgaard
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
The World ◽  
Human Good ◽  
Good For ◽  
Ultimate Purpose

This chapter criticizes the familiar idea that humans are more important than animals. After examining some reasons why we treat humans and animals differently, and showing that they do not imply the superior importance of humans, it argues that the claim of superior human importance is not so much false as (nearly) incoherent. Importance and goodness are “tethered” values: things are only important or good when they are important-to or good-for some creature. To be important or good absolutely is to be important-to or good-for all creatures. One kind of creature could be absolutely more important than others only if the fate of that kind of creature were more important to others than their own fates. Only a teleological picture of the world that made human good the ultimate purpose of the world could support the conclusion that humans are more important than the other animals.

Fellow Creatures

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine M. Korsgaard
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Moral Standing ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Good For ◽  
Treat All ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Relationship

This book argues that we are obligated to treat all sentient animals as “ends in themselves.” Drawing on a theory of the good derived from Aristotle, it offers an explanation of why animals are the sorts of beings who have a good. Drawing on a revised version of Kant’s argument for the value of humanity, it argues that rationality commits us to claiming the standing of ends in ourselves in two senses. As autonomous beings, we claim to be ends in ourselves when we claim the standing to make laws for ourselves and each other. As beings who have a good, we also claim to be ends in ourselves when we take the things that are good for us to be good absolutely and so worthy of pursuit. The first claim commits us to joining with other autonomous beings in relations of reciprocal moral lawmaking. The second claim commits us to treating the good of every sentient animal as something of absolute importance. The book also argues that human beings are not more important than, superior to, or better off than the other animals. It criticizes the “marginal cases” argument and advances a view of moral standing as attaching to the atemporal subjects of lives. It offers a non-utilitarian account of the relationship between the good and pleasure, and addresses questions about the badness of extinction and about whether we have the right to eat animals, experiment on them, make them work for us, and keep them as pets.

Rhetoric and argumentation: the unity of the field

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michel Meyer
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Classic Problem ◽  
False Dilemma ◽  
The Difference ◽  
As If

Rhetoric has always been torn between the rhetoric of figures and the rhetoric of conflicts or arguments, as if rhetoric were exclusively one or the other. This is a false dilemma. Both types of rhetoric hinge on the same structure. A common formula is provided in Chapter 3 which unifies rhetoric stricto sensu and rhetoric as argumentation as two distinct but related strategies adopted according to the level of problematicity of the questions at stake, thereby giving unity to the field called “Rhetoric.” Highly problematic questions require arguments to justify their answers; non-divisive ones can be treated rhetorically through their answers as if they were self-evident. Another classic problem is how to understand the difference between logic and rhetoric. The difference between the two is due to the presence of questions explicitly answered in the premises in logic and only suggested (or remaining indeterminate) in rhetoric.

Ergative, antipassive and other verb derivational morphemes in Gaahmg

2014 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy M. Stirtz
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Case Marking ◽  
Derivational Morphemes ◽  
As If

AbstractGaahmg has ergative traces in a predominately nominative-accusative system. Clauses with object focus demonstrate ergative case marking on postverbal noun and pronoun agents, and an ergative morpheme is also bound to verbs. Other evidence for ergativity is that the ergative morpheme is morphologically and syntactically distinct from the passive morpheme. Ergative morphemes and constructions in Gaahmg are similar to those of other Nilo-Saharan languages, including Luwo, Päri, and Shilluk. The Gaahmg antipassive also resembles that of other Nilo-Saharan languages. Yet, unlike other languages with ergativity and antipassives, Gaahmg readily combines the antipassive with ergative, passive, and causative morphemes in the same verb form. The Gaahmg antipassive occurs in nominative-accusative structures, as well as in object-focus clauses with ergative-absolutive structures. Further, the antipassive co-occurs with the passive, as if both the nominative-accusative and ergative-absolutive structures are simultaneously present in the same clause, and the language is currently shifting from one structure to the other.

The Value Gap

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Toni Rønnow-Rasmussen
Keyword(s):  
Moral Dilemmas ◽  
The Other ◽  
Value Conflicts ◽  
Central Idea ◽  
Good For ◽  
Nuanced Understanding

Evaluations about what is good (period) and what is good for someone shape much of ethics. The two value notions ‘good’ and ‘good for’ mark the deep-rooted divide between the impersonally and personally valuable—the value divide on which The Value Gap centres. Past and contemporary philosophers have argued it is a mistake to believe that these two value notions give rise to unresolvable value conflicts. This book argues that they are wrong. Part I considers two views to that effect, which share the idea that one of the two value notions is either flawed or at best conceptually dependent on the other notion. The views disagree, however, about whether it is good or good-for that is the flawed concept. These approaches deny the central idea of this work, namely that goodness and goodness-for are independent value notions that cannot be fully understood in terms of one another. Part II provides an analysis of impersonal and personal goodness in terms of a fitting-attitude analysis. By elaborating a more nuanced understanding of the analysis’ key elements—reasons and pro- and con-attitudes—the book challenges a common idea, namely that our beliefs about practical and moral dilemmas can be dismissed as being conceptually confused. The gap between favouring what is good and what is good for someone appears insurmountable.

When Do Politicians Lie?

2012 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Armstrong-Taylor
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Simple Observation ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
As If

Abstract When do politicians lie? A politician who admits to wrongdoing will likely suffer some loss of popularity, but probably not as great as if he denied wrong doing and was subsequently discovered to have lied. This simple observation has a number of implications. For example, a politician in a marginal seat may have little choice but to risk lying as admitting will lose him too much popularity to survive. On the other hand, a politician in a relatively safe seat might survive the loss from admitting, but not from lying and being caught. Therefore we might predict the likelihood that a politician admits to a scandal to be positively related (over some range at least) to the security of his seat. This paper tests this prediction, and some others, with data from House bank scandal of 1991-92.

Legalism and Humankind

1992 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 190-208
Author(s):  
Frank I. Michelman
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
The Other ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Moral Theories ◽  
Human Good ◽  
Good For ◽  
Normative Argument

Prescriptive political and moral theories contain ideas about what human beings are like and about what, correspondingly, is good for them. Conceptions of human “nature” and corresponding human good enter into normative argument by way of support and justification. Of course, it is logically open for the ratiocinative traffic to run the other way. Strongly held convictions about the rightness or wrongness, goodness or badness, of certain social institutions or practices may help condition and shape one's responses to one or another set of propositions about what people are like and what, in consequence, they have reason to value.

Interpersonal Attraction in a Role-Played Interaction

1973 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 627-634 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael J. Gatton ◽  
Don A. Nelson
Keyword(s):  
Interpersonal Attraction ◽  
Eye Contact ◽  
Role Playing ◽  
The Other ◽  
Behavioral Correlates ◽  
Response Latencies ◽  
Similarity Attraction ◽  
Paper And Pencil ◽  
High Attraction ◽  
As If

To look at the usefulness of a neutral task in studying 2-person interactions, to ascertain some behavioral correlates of experimentally manipulated attraction, to investigate the generality of the similarity-attraction hypothesis, and to examine the behavioral relevance of scores on a commonly used paper-and-pencil attraction scale, Ss interacted with confederates posing as Ss. Each S was given the impression that C had similar or dissimilar attitudes and twice S performed an incomplete sentences task administered by C. On one set of trials, S was instructed to act as if he liked C, and on the other set as if he did not. Measured behaviors were eye contact, interview length, number of words used, smiles, and both S's and C's response latencies. In the high-attraction role-playing condition, more smiles and a higher percentage of eye contact occurred than in the low-attraction role-playing condition. But no differences in the other behaviors were noted, only very mild support was obtained for the similarity-attraction hypothesis, and none of the measures were related to scores on the paper-and-pencil index of interpersonal attraction.

scholarly journals Between health and pleasure

2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 182
Author(s):  
Hélène Jawhara Piñer
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Iberian Peninsula ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Healthy Food ◽  
The Other ◽  
Late Middle Ages ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Good For ◽  
Medical Treatises ◽  
Medical Recommendations

Between pleasure and health, why should we have to choose? Though this combination did not mainly concern the culinary tradition of the Christian Middle Ages, on the other hand, it fits fully into an Arabic tradition of both East and West of the said period. In the late Middle Ages under Islamic domination, doctors, agronomists or botanists, offer –through multiple medical treatises on food or agriculture–, culinary recipes good for health. Thus, for Ibn Rush, Ibn Rāzī, Avicenne or Maimonides –as for many others scholars–, foodstuffs play a key role in its benefits for health. In this way, cookbooks occupy pride of place in this alliance between health and cooking. Therefore, the culinary recipes of half a dozen cookbooks of the Muslim Middle East dating back to the 10th-14th centuries, suggest this combination: listen to your body, take pleasure when you eat, do it according to your health and eat in a measured way. Cookbooks of the Iberian Peninsula written in Arabic in the Dar al-Islam testify to the transmission –from the Muslim Middle East– of the medico-culinary tradition based on humoral theory and culinary practices. This paper will focus on the place occupied by dietetic in the first known cookbook of the Iberian Peninsula: the Kitāb al-ṭabīẖ [The cookbook]. Its anonymous author quote Galen and Hippocrates that, therefore, inscribes the Kitāb al-ṭabīẖ in the influence of the Greek dietetic tradition. Furthermore, the knowledge of the anonymous author concerning medicine, dietetic, and cuisine is undeniable. Through half a thousand recipes, I will first present a reflection on this source commonly named “The Cookbook”, and then underscore the proportion of dishes containing medical recommendations. Then I will offer an approach to frequently used foodstuffs in the recipes where health seems to take precedence over the pleasure of eating the dish. Curing the illness, avoiding it, take pleasure, what is the goal of the culinary recipes? Thus, the aim is to identify both the most common dietetics recommendations and the disease that seem the most important to avoid. Finally, I will provide a glimpse of one of the most characteristic culinary recipes of this alliance health/pleasure that can offer the Andalusian cookbook. A brief reflection can be conducted on the current phenomenon that shows the willingness to return to healthy food which recommendations can be found in the cookbooks dating from the Middle Ages.

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