Taxonomy and its Pleasures

2017 ◽  
Vol 47 (3) ◽  
pp. 429-448
Author(s):  
Anne O’Byrne

Abstract Taxonomy is our response to the proliferating variety of the natural world on the one hand, and the principle of unrelieved universality on the other. From Aristotle, through Porphyry to Linneaus, Kant and others, thinkers have struggled to develop taxonomies that could order what we know and also what we do not yet know, and this essay is a reflection on the existential desire that propels this effort. Porphyry’s tree of logic is an exhaustive account of the things we can say about the sort of beings we are; Linneaus’s system of nature reaches completion in the classification of humans; Kant discovers a way to have natural and logical forms coincide in the thought of natural purpose and purposiveness. The stakes are high. When we order the world, we order ourselves: when we enter the taxonomy, it enters us and confronts us with our judgments of kind, race and kin.

Poligrafi ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 107-127
Author(s):  
Victoria Dos Santos

This article aims to explore the affinities between contemporary Paganism and the posthuman project in how they approach the non-human natural world. On the one hand, posthumanism explores new ways of considering the notion of humans and how they are linked with the non-human world. On the other hand, Neopaganism expands this reflection to the spiritual domain through its animistic relational sensibility. Both perspectives challenge the modern paradigm where nature and humans are opposed and mutually disconnected. They instead propose a relational ontology that welcomes the “different other.” This integrated relationship between humans and the “other than human” can be understood through the semiotic Chora, a notion belonging to Julia Kristeva that addresses how the subject is not symbolically separated from the world in which it is contained.


1967 ◽  
Vol 113 (500) ◽  
pp. 779-780 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark D. Altschule

One current classification of depression divides the syndrome into psychotic and non-psychotic varieties. It is interesting that a similar classification developed over a thousand years ago out of some words of St. Paul. In his Second Epistle to the Corinthians, Ch. 7, v. 10, Paul wrote: “For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of, but the sorrow of the world worketh death.” The word sorrow used in English translations of the Bible stood for the tristitia of Latin versions (Greek λνπη); connoting sadness, sorrow, despondency, depression. Paul's distinction between the two kinds of tristitia, the one “from God” and the other “of the world”, led mediaeval theologians to enlarge on differences between the two kinds of depression.


2011 ◽  
Vol 45 ◽  
pp. 164-185
Author(s):  
Vincent Blok ◽  

In the twentieth century, the concept of the will appears in bad daylight. Martin Heideg-ger for instance criticizes the will as a movement of reducing otherness to sameness, dif-ference to identity. Since his diagnosis of the will, the releasement from a wilful manner of thinking and the exploration of the possibility of non-willing has become a prevalent issue in contemporary philosophy. This article questions whether this quietism is still possible in our times, were we are confronted with climate change and the future of mankind is fundamentally threatened. On the one hand, the human will to 'master‘ and 'exploit‘ the natural world can be seen as the root of the ecological crisis, as Heidegger observed. On the other hand, its current urgency forces us to evaluate the releasement of the will in contemporary philosophy. Because also Heidegger himself attempted to develop a proper concept of the will in the onset of the thirties, we start our inquiry with Heidegger‘s phenomenology of the will in the thirties. Although Heidegger was very critical about the concept of the will later on, we are not inclined to reject the concept of the will as he did eventually. In this article we show that Heidegger's criticism of the will is not phenomenologically motivated, and we will develop a proper post-Heideggerian concept of willing. Finally the question will be answerd whether this proper concept of willing can help us to find a solution for the ecological crisis.


2020 ◽  
pp. 16-66
Author(s):  
Daniel Layman

According to Locke, all people are free and equal. Consequently, the natural world belongs to all people in common. But each person, along with his labor, belongs only to himself. Thus, although all people share a common right to use the world, each person acquires a private right to resources he “mixes” with his labor. Before large-scale economic development, there was no problem with each person appropriating as much as he could use, because this left “enough, and as good” for others. But once money spurred development, people could efficiently use far more. Under these new conditions, there was no longer enough and as good lying in common. Consequently, although everyone got richer through economic development, the world divided into resource owners and employees working on others’ resources. All of this posed a dilemma for Locke. On the one hand, people could be required to leave the world lying in common, preserving equal standing but sacrificing well-being for all. On the other, people could be permitted to develop the world into a network of private plots, greatly increasing well-being for all but sacrificing equal standing. Locke notices the tension, but he lacks an adequate solution. He implausibly appeals to our purported consent to money and its consequences before ending the chapter, thus leaving his property problem for others to solve.


Discourse ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (5) ◽  
pp. 87-96
Author(s):  
N. K. Genidze

Introduction. The article analyses the vowel-consonant ratio as one of the most important criteria of phonetic typology in the world languages. Scientific relevance of the research is based on quantitative and qualitative analysis and comparison of grammar and phonetics in typologically, genetically and historically different languages.Methodology and sources. Certain language is determined by vocalic ratio – a concept introduced to identify the vowels-consonant relation and measured  through  vk = V/C. Thus, all the languages can be either vocalic (vk > 1.3), consonantal (vk < 0.7) or mixed (0.7 > vk > 1.3). The article concerns the ideas by Ferdinand de Saussure (Indo-European root’s structure) and Aleksander V. Isachenko (phonetic typology).Results and discussion. The author conducts a comparative analysis of phonological systems and phonetic analysis of text fragments in several languages of different families and different historical periods: Gothic, old English, old Icelandic, English, Danish, French, and Finnish. The research reveals how the language’s structure matches its vowel-consonant ratio, i. e. disclose a link between its phonetic and morphology-syntactic classifications.Conclusion. The research has proved the fact that analytic trends in phonemes, on the one hand, depend on the vowel-consonant distribution in the language and speech, and on historically determined difference between the phonemes’ function – on the other. Inevitably, too, the language’s evolution from inflectional-synthetic to analytic or agglutinative (analytic-agglutinative) type affects all language levels, including the phonetic one. Consonants are stronger and almost resistible  to  changes;  they  function  to distinguish the sense, making relative words so similar. The development of vowel system triggers the development of analytic functions, which are bound to impact the language system. Increasing number of vowels, emerging diphthongs and triphthongs are the result of analytic abilities of the language.


1988 ◽  
Vol 34 ◽  
pp. 104-114 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Osborne

In this paper I shall be considering the relationship between the shape or structure of the world and the moral position occupied by human beings, particularly with regard to man's attitude towards and use of the natural resources of the material world he inhabits.1. The shape of the worldThere are two basic spatial metaphors that we frequently use in analysing notions of value and morality: one is the scale of up and down, with high and low or top and bottom as alternative ways of referring to the same type of hierarchy; the other is the notion of a centre, the bull's eye: if we are self-centred we value ourselves more highly than other things; if we have an anthropocentric view we value humanity above other animals. Thus we usually suppose that we put whatever we value most highly (on the one set of metaphors) at ‘the centre of things’ (on the other set).


TEKNOSASTIK ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Dina Amelia

There are two most inevitable issues on national literature, in this case Indonesian literature. First is the translation and the second is the standard of world literature. Can one speak for the other as a representative? Why is this representation matter? Does translation embody the voice of the represented? Without translation Indonesian literature cannot gain its recognition in world literature, yet, translation conveys the voice of other. In the case of production, publication, or distribution of Indonesian Literature to the world, translation works can be very beneficial. The position of Indonesian literature is as a part of world literature. The concept that the Western world should be the one who represent the subaltern can be overcome as long as the subaltern performs as the active speaker. If the subaltern remains silent then it means it allows the “representation” by the Western.


Author(s):  
I. Kukhtevich

Functional autonomic disorders occupy a significant part in the practice of neurologists and professionals of other specialties as well. However, there is no generally accepted classification of such disorders. In this paper the authors tried to show that functional autonomic pathology corresponds to the concept of somatoform disorders combining syndromes manifested by visceral, borderline psychopathological, neurological symptoms that do not have an organic basis. The relevance of the problem of somatoform disorders is that on the one hand many health professionals are not familiar enough with manifestations of borderline neuropsychiatric disorders, often forming functional autonomic disorders, and on the other hand they overestimate somatoform symptoms that are similar to somatic diseases.


ARTic ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 167-176
Author(s):  
Risti Puspita Sari Hunowu

This research is aimed at studying the Hunto Sultan Amay Mosque located in Gorontalo City. Hunto Sultan Amay Mosque is the oldest mosque in the city of Gorontalo The Hunto Sultan Amay Mosque was built as proof of Sultan Amay's love for a daughter and is a representation of Islam in Gorontalo. Researchers will investigate the visual form of the Hunto Sultan Amay Mosque which was originally like an ancient mosque in the archipelago. can be seen from the shape of the roof which initially used an overlapping roof and then converted into a dome as well as mosques in the world, we can be sure the Hunto Sultan Amay Mosque uses a dome roof after the arrival of Dutch Colonial. The researcher used a qualitative method by observing the existing form in detail from the building of the mosque with an aesthetic approach, reviewing objects and selecting the selected ornament giving a classification of the shapes, so that the section became a reference for the author as research material. Based on the analysis of this thesis, the form  of the Hunto Sultan Amay mosque as well as the mosques located in the archipelago and the existence of ornaments in the Hunto Sultan Amay Mosque as a decorative structure support the grandeur of a mosque. On the other hand, Hunto Mosque ornaments reveal a teaching. The form of a teaching is manifested in the form of motives and does not depict living beings in a realist or naturalist manner. the decorative forms of the Hunto Sultan Sultan Mosque in general tend to lead to a form of flora, geometric ornaments, and ornament of calligraphy dominated by the distinctive colors of Islam, namely gold, white, red, yellow and green.


1973 ◽  
Vol 93 ◽  
pp. 74-103 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Gould

To Professor E. R. Dodds, through his edition of Euripides'Bacchaeand again inThe Greeks and the Irrational, we owe an awareness of new possibilities in our understanding of Greek literature and of the world that produced it. No small part of that awareness was due to Professor Dodds' masterly and tactful use of comparative ethnographic material to throw light on the relation between literature and social institutions in ancient Greece. It is in the hope that something of my own debt to him may be conveyed that this paper is offered here, equally in gratitude, admiration and affection.The working out of the anger of Achilles in theIliadbegins with a great scene of divine supplication in which Thetis prevails upon Zeus to change the course of things before Troy in order to restore honour to Achilles; it ends with another, human act in which Priam supplicates Achilles to abandon his vengeful treatment of the dead body of Hector and restore it for a ransom. The first half of theOdysseyhinges about another supplication scene of crucial significance, Odysseus' supplication of Arete and Alkinoos on Scherie. Aeschylus and Euripides both wrote plays called simplySuppliants, and two cases of a breach of the rights of suppliants, the cases of the coup of Kylon and that of Pausanias, the one dating from the mid-sixth century, the other from around 470 B.C. or soon after, played a dominant role in the diplomatic propaganda of the Spartans and Athenians on the eve of the Peloponnesian War.


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