The Place of Subjectivity

2020 ◽  
Vol 97 (3) ◽  
pp. 353-373
Author(s):  
Christoph Halbig
Keyword(s):  
Present Article ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Good Life ◽  
Prudential Value ◽  
Good For

Abstract The modern debate on the theory of prudential values is largely structured around the issue of how to accommodate the role of subjectivity: a prudentially good life (unlike, say, a morally good life) seems to be necessarily a life that is good for the person living it. The present article aims at clarifying this crucial role of subjectivity in the ontology of prudential values. It tries to show that this role, rightly understood, can be fully and satisfactorily accounted for by a strong realism in the theory of prudential value. Subjectivist intuitions that prove incompatible with such a realist framework, it is argued, can be convincingly rejected on independent grounds.

Human Flourishing Versus Desire Satisfaction

1999 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 113-142 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard J. Arneson
Keyword(s):  
Common Sense ◽  
Good Life ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Surprising Result ◽  
Human Flourishing ◽  
Prudential Value ◽  
Desire Satisfaction ◽  
Individual Good ◽  
Helping Others ◽  
Good For

What is the good for human persons? If I am trying to lead the best possible life I could lead, not the morally best life, but the life that is best for me, what exactly am I seeking?This phrasing of the question I will be pursuing may sound tendentious, so some explanation is needed. What is good for one person, we ordinarily suppose, can conflict with what is good for other persons and with what is required by morality. A prudent person seeks her own good efficiently; she selects the best available means to her good. If we call the value that a person seeks when she is being prudent “prudential value,” then an alternative rendering of the question to be addressed in this essay is “What is prudential value?” We can also say that an individual flourishes or has a life high in well-being when her life is high in prudential value. Of course, these common-sense appearances that the good for an individual, the good for other persons, and the requirements of morality often are in conflict might be deceiving. For all that I have said here, the correct theory of individual good might yield the result that sacrificing oneself for the sake of other people or for the sake of a morally worthy cause can never occur, because helping others and being moral always maximize one's own good. But this would be the surprising result of a theory, not something we should presuppose at the start of inquiry. When a friend has a baby and I express a conventional wish that the child have a good life, I mean a life that is good for the child, not a life that merely helps others or merely respects the constraints of morality. After all, a life that is altruistic and perfectly moral, we suppose, could be a life that is pure hell for the person who lives it—a succession of horrible headaches marked by no achievements or attainments of anything worthwhile and ending in agonizing death at a young age. So the question remains, what constitutes a life that is good for the person who is living it?

An Analysis of Prudential Value

Utilitas ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 334-354 ◽  
Author(s):  
STEPHEN M. CAMPBELL
Keyword(s):  
Good Life ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The Good Life ◽  
Prudential Value ◽  
Good For ◽  
The Relationship

This essay introduces and defends a new analysis of prudential value. According to this analysis, what it is for something to be good for you is for that thing to contribute to the appeal or desirability of being in your position. I argue that this proposal fits well with our ways of talking about prudential value and well-being; enables promising analyses of luck, selfishness, self-sacrifice and paternalism; preserves the relationship between prudential value and the attitudes of concern, love, pity and envy; and satisfies various other desiderata. I also highlight two ways in which the analysis is informative and can lead to progress in our substantive theorizing about the good life.

Disclosure of Scandinavian telecom companies’ corruption in Uzbekistan: The role of investigative journalists

2018 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ester Pollack ◽  
Sigurd Allern
Keyword(s):  
Public Good ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
The Past ◽  
The World ◽  
Good For ◽  
Public Sectors

Transparency International’s yearly Corruption Perceptions Index ranks Scandinavia as one of the least corrupt regions in the world. However, during the past decades, large Scandinavian corporations in the telecommunications, oil and defence industries have – in their struggle for business contracts in other countries – been involved in several large-scale bribery scandals. There has also been a growing range of corruption cases in the Swedish and Norwegian public sectors. In many of these cases, investigative journalists have played a crucial role in the disclosure of corruption, sometimes cooperating across media organisations and countries, demonstrating the importance of journalism as a public good for democracy. In this article, we explore, discuss and analyse the work of and methods used by investigative journalists in revealing large-scale corruption related to the expansion of Nordic telecom companies in Uzbekistan.

scholarly journals Testing the Semantic Homogeneity Constraint

2014 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 161-191 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tore Nesset ◽  
Anastasia Makarova
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Language Change ◽  
Historical Linguistics ◽  
Semantic Factor ◽  
Homogeneous Domains ◽  
General Linguistics ◽  
Shed Light

Although it has been widely assumed in historical linguistics that semantics plays a crucial role in analogical change, it is difficult to pinpoint the contribution of the semantic factor, since meaning and form work closely together in bringing about language change. The purpose of the present article is to shed light on the issue by means of two case studies from Russian, which enable us to isolate the role of semantics. The hypothesis we test is that analogical change is restricted to semantically homogeneous domains. We call this the Semantic Homogeneity Constraint. Two phenomena from Russian conjugation are explored: suffix shift and NU-drop. Although they seem parallel, analogical change occurs in the former, but not in the latter. It is argued that this is because the verbs involved in suffix shift constitute a semantically homogeneous domain, within which analogical change can take place. By contrast, NU-verbs are semantically diverse, and these semantic differences create boundaries which block analogical change. The findings have implications both for Russian and general linguistics. While suffix shift and NU-drop are well-known phenomena in Russian conjugation, they have not been juxtaposed and compared before. Our comparison provides new insights about the differences and similarities of the two phenomena. From the perspective of historical linguistics, the present article contributes to the theory of analogy, insofar as we provide empirical evidence for the Semantic Homogeneity Constraint, which places restrictions on semantic domains where analogical change can take place.

Eudaimonism

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark LeBar
Keyword(s):  
Crucial Role ◽  
Good Life ◽  
Ethical Theories ◽  
Living Well ◽  
Moral Perfection ◽  
Essential Questions ◽  
Good For

The concept of eudaimonia plays a crucial role in understanding virtue on some quite influential virtue ethical theories. It can be understood as happiness, as a property of lives. It is on many influential accounts the focus of virtue and the standard for excellence in living and acting. This chapter grapples with some essential questions in fleshing out this relation: What, beyond merely not dying, does living consist in? What counts as living well? How does eudaimonia give point or focus to virtue? Who is living a good life good for? Can eudaimonism get us beyond an unacceptable egoism? Among the major concerns addressed is that eudaimonia really points more to moral perfection than to happiness. The chapter concludes by taking up a number of objections to allowing the role for eudaimonia that it has traditionally played in virtue ethical theories.

Epitaxial YBa2Cu3O7-8 films : Crucial role of growth-induced linear defects in microwave properties

2001 ◽  
Vol 11 (PR11) ◽  
pp. Pr11-47-Pr11-52
Author(s):  
V. M. Pan ◽  
V. S. Flis ◽  
V. A. Komashko ◽  
O. G. Plys ◽  
C. G. Tretiatchenko ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Crucial Role ◽  
Microwave Properties ◽  
Linear Defects

THE G77@50 AND THE STRUGGLE FOR A DECOLONIAL FUTURE

2016 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
Siphamandla Zondi
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Introductory Article ◽  
Colonial Legacies ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Good For

 This introductory article outlines the importance of the subject discussed in this edition of UNISA’s Latin American Report, the Group of 77+ China. It seeks to locate this discussion at the centre of the search for an alternative world to one that remains haunted by colonial legacies and new imperial designs. It makes the point that the G77 is born into an evolving pursuit of a dream for a world in which former colonies realise fully their aspirations for a future that is good for all. It shows that the G77 has played a crucial role in this, while it also poses questions about the Group’s ability to implement what it works so hard to reach consensus on.

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