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It seems like we care about at least two features of our credence function: gradational-accuracy (high credences in truths, low credences in falsehoods) and verisimilitude (investing higher...

Drawing on Paul Ricoeur’s “little ethics” and Chung-ying Cheng’s work on Confucian and Kantian ethics, this essay reinforces the broad outlines of a cross- cultural framework for reconciling conflicts between the good and the right, teleology and deontology, and perfectionism and liberalism so that we can recognize dynamic concerns across the grand sweep of moral life. Ricoeur and Cheng describe roughly parallel sets of relations and highlight similar dynamics among three planes of ethical life.

In response to a global population with increasingly complex issues at the end of life, a movement in the U.S. has emerged incorporating doulas into end-of-life care. These end-of-life (EOL) doulas are not just focused on the quality of life, but also the quality of death. Like birth doulas, who provide support for pregnant patients and their families, EOL doulas help alleviate physical and mental discomfort in those who are dying. In this paper, we explore the role of EOL doulas in improving the care of unrepresented patients, who lack decision-making capacity and have no surrogates or documents to guide their healthcare decisions. We argue that EOL doulas may help this traditionally underserved population experience a “good death” by answering several ethical and procedural challenges. As quasi-independent, non-medical members of the healthcare team, they provide a balancing, advocating voice on behalf of the patient, and may also help reduce inappropriate treatment, delays in care, and the overburdening of the public guardianship system. As such, attention should be given to formally defining their place within the healthcare infrastructure. Ultimately, we contend that EOL doulas are key to ensuring optimal, ethical care for unrepresented patient populations.

Lately, the public discussion around mandatory vaccination has been an intensely enliven one. On the one hand, there are those who argue for the effectiveness of vaccination and demand that all procure it in order that all be immunize and that the threat of COVID-19 be minimize. On the other hand, there are those who are troubled about getting the vaccine and claim that mandatory vaccination is an infringement on their individual Autonomy. Furthermore, there are those who refuse vaccination for faith-based reasons and thus invoke religious exemption. The paper offers a moral analysis about the conflict between Mandatory Vaccination, supposed to be for the good of the community, and individual Autonomy. It clarifies why there are no moral basis for mandatory vaccination nor for religious exemption.

Paul, Apostle relates the Good News to the wisdom of God that is understood by humans who give themselves to believe in Jesus. However, the presence of the powerful Sophists with the teaching of worldly wisdom and relying on the power of the word of wisdom (sophia logou), has obscured the true meaning of God's wisdom. This study aims to explore the influence of the Sophists in the life of the Corinthian church which caused Paul to explain the true meaning of wisdom. Knowing the background of the wisdom problem in Corinth will give you a complete picture of the wisdom of God that Paul preached. This study applies historical research methods to find out the origin and influence of the Sophists' teachings. The results show that the sophia logou owned by the Sophists has obscured the meaning of the cross of Christ which is the wisdom of God. The wisdom that Paul means in the letter to the Corinthians is the openness of one's mind to believe in the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross which has implications for congregational unity and survival in the face of problems or struggles.

The article analyzes the aesthetic views of Friedrich Hölderlin, and, first, his understanding of the categories of the Beautiful and Sublime. Particular attention is paid to the comparison of Hölderlin's views with the aesthetic teachings of Plato and Immanuel Kant, who had a great influence on the German poet. The author of the article concludes that Hölderlin sought to unite the Platonian and Kantian understanding of beauty, seeing the similarity between the concepts of Plato and Kant in the question of the source of the beautiful. The central for aesthetics of Hölderlin was the problem of combining the spheres of aesthetic and ethical, to solve which he relied on the idea of Kant about beautiful as a symbol of the moral good and the Teaching of Plato on the climbing of the soul to the Good. Hölderlin pays less attention to the theoretical development of the category of the Sublime than to the comprehension of the category of the Beautiful, however, in his writings, the Sublime is present implicitly, and Hölderlin's understanding of this category is close, on the one hand, to Platonian, bringing together the Beautiful and the Sublime, and, on the other, to Kantian understanding, which brings the Sublime together with the idea of infinity, God and the sphere of morality. The conclusions to which Hölderlin comes, are far from Platonism, and from Kantianism. The poet concludes about the central and leading role of poetry and poetic gift in the knowledge of the world, which should be aesthetic. This indicates a romantic way to interpret Hölderlin's aesthetic concepts of Plato and Kant.

At Philebus 23c4-26d10 Socrates makes a division into three kinds: Unbounded (apeiron), Bound (peras), and Mix (meikton). I review problems for the main interpretations of Unbounded and Mix and review kinds of scales defined in abstract measurement theory. Then I take 23c4-26d10 speech by speech, interpreting the Unbounded as a kind containing partial scales, Bound as the kind containing the relations and quantities needed to turn partial scales into appropriate ratio scales, and Mix as the kind containing ratio scales appropriate for the good things that come to be in the world.

Celem artykułu jest próba ukazania filozoficznych podstaw pokoju wewnątrz człowieka w ujęciu Tomasza z Akwinu i Immanuela Kanta. Znaczna jego część dotyczy omówienia konfliktów, które mogą zachodzić między różnymi władzami pożądawczymi oraz między przedmiotami tychże władz. Następnie ma miejsce analiza sposobów rozwiązania możliwych konfliktów. Obaj filozofowie wskazują, że na poziomie władz konflikt może zostać rozwiązany dzięki właściwemu ich uporządkowaniu (władza wyższa kieruje władzą niższą). Konflikt na poziomie przedmiotów (ewentualnie motywów) władz zażegnuje się poprzez wybór dobra wyżej stojącego w hierarchii (ewentualnie kierowanie się wyłącznie prawem moralnym). Na tej podstawie wnioskuje się, że filozoficzne podstawy pokoju wewnątrz człowieka tkwią przede wszystkim w moralnym wymiarze jego natury.

The issue of "divine justice", which is the one of the most important doctrinal principles and a characteristic of the theological religions such Shiite and Mu'tazilite, in fact is one of the Perfect Attributes of Allah and due to its indescribable importance, it has a special place in doctrinal discussions. On the other hand, the existence of evils and calamities, poverty and deprivation, oppression and disease and moral corruption, and even the manner of punishment in the hereafter, always raises doubts in the human mind and calls into question Allah's justice. The generality of such suspicions has led Islamic thinkers to solve these problems in defense of divine justice. In this regard, the present study seeks to use the words of the fourth Shiite Imam in the divine invocations of the complete Sahifa Al_ Sajjadiyya, to achieve the theological foundations to solve some evil doubts in the realm of creation and the human world. The method of collecting materials in this research is library and the research method is "descriptive -analytical". After investigations, it became clear that from Imam Sajjad's point of view, neglecting and inclining the soul to the world and other than Allah, and consequently being caught in the trap of the devil and carnal soul, and contamination with sin and transgression, is the real evil. According to him, the divine test and punishment and return to the truth, the flourishing of talents and the appreciation of blessings are the benefits of evil and suffering. also meanings such as: the inherent richness of the Almighty, the bestowal of goodness and abundant blessings, the guidance of the servants to the good religion and the punishment of the same action in the prayers of Imam (A.S), all three types of genetic justice, legislative justice and criminal justice can be proved.

Are there moral constraints on the pursuit of the good? Our intuitions suggest that we may not use another person as a means to achieve a good outcome, even if that good outcome reduces the amount of using-as-a-means that occurs overall. These intuitions are assumed to be incompatible with consequentialism and to show the need for a deontological constraint on using others as a means. This assumption is a mistake. In this paper, I show that consequentialists can justify the same case-based intuitions that are thought to support a moral constraint on using others as a means.

Uma das grandes peculiaridades da Psicologia Analítica é o fato de ter nascido no berçário da transdisciplinaridade. Ícones de diferentes campos do conhecimento estiveram tête-à-tête com Carl Jung ao longo de toda a sua vida científica. E, conforme é contado, todos eram bem vindos ao seu escritório para uma frutífera permuta de ideias. Seguindo a boa tradição, este breve estudo pretende comparar as teorias e elaborações da escola da Psicologia Analítica e as teorias e explicações do filólogo, linguista e escritor John Ronald Reuel Tolkien acerca do curioso fenômeno dos contos de fadas e suas particularidades enquanto parte de uma realidade psíquica criativa e arcaica. Este escrito convidará o Senhor da Fantasia ao escritório de Jung em Küsnacht ou convidará Jung aos encontros dos Inklings em Oxford para um amigável e fantasioso diálogo.

I investigate the normative and conceptual account of the relationship between public recognition and dignitarian, or egalitarian, commitments. I do so through addressing the normative dispute, sparked by legal cases such as Masterpiece Cakeshop, Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission (2018) and Fulton v. City of Philadelphia (2020), as to whether there are dignitarian grounds for rejecting religious exemptions to antidiscrimination laws. I argue that there are such grounds. Specifically, I argue that, if granted, such exemptions would inflict dignitary harms against LGBTQ individuals by denying them the public recognition necessary for reliably sustaining civic self-respect. Such exemptions would deny this recognition in two distinct ways. First, such exemptions would institutionalize humiliation of LGBTQ individuals as market actors. Second, such exemptions would condition market access for LGBTQ individuals on unequal terms. Through making this argument, I hope to make three primary, and related, contributions: (1) I introduce a concept of civic self-respect; (2) I argue that the normative import of public recognition is grounded in the good of civic self-respect; and (3) I rely on this normative framework to show how religious exemptions to public accommodations laws inflict dignitary harms. My argument is relevant to both political philosophers and legal scholars grappling with questions of why public recognition matters and what it demands.

Anti-nihilist novel “The Possessed” was first conceived as a political pamphlet and therefore had a powerful satirical tendency, directed against the utilitarianism. The polemic against “ideas of avant-garde” constitutes the center of the theoretical conflict concerned the problem of the good and the esthetics. To resolve this issue, the author suggests the broad interpretation of the category of “the beautiful”, which forms after all a holistic vision of the “positive aesthetics” (V. Solovyov) presented in the monologues of Stepan Trofimovich Verkhovensky. The apotheosis in the development of this theme occurs in the pathetic hymn to the Beauty, pronounced at the «literary readings». The article puts forward an ontological interpretation of this speech. Considering beauty as an integral part of the triune idea (truth, goodness and beauty), one can come to the conclusion that the beautiful, understood as God (Dostoevsky) and the idea (Plato), is a creating, but not a created substance, and any of the good, accomplished on earth, has its cause in the eternally equal realm of harmony and only from there's derived. To confirm the original thesis, the author refers to the texts of V. Solovyov, N. Berdyaev and others. However, it's the dialogues of Plato (“Hippias Major”, “Symposium”, etc.), which stand as a theoretical ground of the interpretation and allow us to comprehend the category of the beautiful from a new perspective in its relation to the utility and the good.

EnglishNguyen Trai foi um pensador que exerceu profunda e significativa influencia na formacao cultural do povo vietnamita no seculo XV. A partir dos conceitos de “benevolencia e retidao”, oriundos do Confucionismo, do Budismo e do Taoismo, a filosofia de Nguyen Trai propoe viver certos valores culturais, tais como nacao, patriotismo e heranca criativa como guia de acao. O artigo tem por objetivo apresentar as base do pensamento filosofico de Nguyen Trai aplicando o metodo do materialismo dialetico sobre a analise dos conceitos-chave benevolencia e retidao. A partir de uma relacao interna desses conceitos, Nguyen Trai acredita ser possivel estabelecer uma conexao racional que favoreca a paz dos povos, atraves da compaixao e da tolerância, inclusive com os inimigos. Benevolencia e retidao representam a ideia de construir um pais baseado na paz. O artigo trata, tambem, de esclarecer o significado da educacao na vida das pessoas, propiciando um estilo de vida responsavel e sustentavel para a comunidade vietnamita dos dias atuais. portuguesNguyen Trai was a thinker who had a significant influence on the history of Vietnamese thought in the 15th century. Nguyen Trai's philosophical thought crystallizes the nation's traditional cultural values, patriotism, and creative inheritance of the good values of "benevolence and righteousness" of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism. The article uses the method of dialectical materialism and synthetic analysis to clarify the philosophical thought of Nguyen Trai. The paper describes that Nguyen Trai's benevolence and righteousness. That is a rational connection with the idea of people's favor and people's peace. Manifest in compassion, tolerance, and even enemies. Benevolence and righteousness are both a means and an end. Benevolence and righteousness express in the idea of building a peaceful country. Thereby, the article clarifies the meaning of life education for people, responsible lifestyle, and living for the community for today's Vietnamese generation.

George Berkeley is known as “The Good Bishop,” a name celebrating his faith, pastoral ministry and earnest commitment to his philosophical views. To mathematicians, he is known for his agitated per...

This article uses the case of “social impact bonds” (SIBs) to explore the role of social science methods in new markets in “social investment.” Pioneered in the UK in 2010, SIBs use private capital to fund social programs with governments paying returns for successful outcomes. Central to the SIB model is the question of evaluation and the method to be used in determining program outcomes and investor returns. In the United States, the randomized controlled trial (RCT) has been the dominant method. However, this has not been without controversy. Some SIB practitioners and investors have argued that, while this may be the perfect tool, the need to grow the SIB market demands a more pragmatic approach. Drawing from a three-year study of SIBs, and informed by Science and Technology Studies (STS)-inspired work on valuation and the social life of methods, the article explores RCTs as both a valuation technology central to SIB design and the object of a micropolitics of valuation which has impeded market growth. It is the relationship between, and the politics of, evaluation and valuation that is a key lesson of the SIB experiment and an important insight for future research on “social investment” and other settings where methods are constitutive of financial value.

Scholars often puzzle over why the discussion about Torah obedience in Luke 10:25–29 does not appear to fit coherently with the story of the Good Samaritan that follows it (10:30–37). Was this an oversight on Luke’s part, a lack of editorial finesse, or did he have other aims? In this paper, I will argue that the apparent shift in logic, marked by the transformation of the lawyer’s question from ‘Who is my neighbour?’ (10:29) to ‘Who acts as a neighbour?’ (10:36), invites the lawyer to realign his interpretation of Lev 19:18 with the theology of imitatio Dei already present in Leviticus 19: The one who properly fulfills Lev 19:18 does so by imitating Yahweh. Within the context of Luke’s Gospel, moreover, Luke 10:25–37 illustrates how Luke both affirms and expands the terms of Torah obedience such that proper fulfilment of the Mosaic Law requires a disclosure of and participation in the very nature of God.

Taking seriously the reality that theological interpretation of Scripture is not a monolithic enterprise but rather a varied discussion, this paper outlines two historical contributions to the theological reading of Scripture in the Victorian Church of England. By examining the way Richard Chenevix Trench and John Keble interpret the parable of the good Samaritan, this essay shows that though both figures interpret Scripture in order to understand what it says about God, they diverge in their approach over questions of providence and ecclesial authority. The paper argues that for Trench, providence expands the scope of Scripture’s meaning but for Keble it leads to specific interpretive outcomes. Essentially, while Trench sees Scripture to be the product of divine providence, Keble sees providence to have shaped the consensus of the early Church.

The present article explores how liberalism and modern thoughts entered Iran and how they influenced political thought and institutions in contemporary Iran. It also briefly considers how Iran’s traditional religious and historical discourse addressed modernity and liberal constitutional theories that were distinct from its own. During most of the past 150 years, the traditional discourse regarded modernity and liberalism to be “the other.” Some of these thinkers rejected modernity and liberalism entirely, others attempted to discriminate between good and bad elements of modernity and liberalism, and took account of the good, while rejecting the bad. A few adopted both liberalism and modernity wholeheartedly. Each of these assessments generated new or revised strands of political thought in Iran. In the end, liberalism failed to attract sufficient support to sustain itself, but indirectly affected Iranian politics through refinements in earlier traditional and religious political discourse and by placing Iran’s governance on constitutional foundations.

The concept of katechon (“that which withholds”), essential to both the theological tradition and modern political philosophy, originates in Second Thessalonians by Paul the Apostle. This withholding force which resists the coming of the end times has often been identified with the Roman Empire (and later with the Christian imperial state), the latter seen as a protected space that enabled the spread of the Good Tidings. This mission of containment, on the one hand, endowed the state with a sacred character, but on the other, it marked the state's finitude and imperfection. By withholding time, the katechon does not remove but preserves contradictions and heterogeneity, accepting its incompleteness as the burden of its own mission. In its secularized form, the restraining state conceives of society as an antagonistic space of struggle and conflict, and the function of political power is linked to the establishment of a temporal equilibrium with historically contingent and relative forms. In conservative thought, the katechon state guards society from unifying equality and rationalization, and individuals from the illusion of perfection and moral harmony. The understanding of the state as a force that rises above the disparate elements of society and preserves it against its inherent chaos was also at the core of the Marxist concept of the state. This article, based on a wide range of authors (T. Hobbes, K. Marx, K. Schmitt, K. Leontiev, D. Agamben) will consider conservative and leftist interpretations of the state, which accept and develop the idea of katechon and its interpretations not directly connected with the concept of state power.

This human life is swayed by the formulaic rope of destiny. The rule is that what is the use of one's action is sown. If it is good, it will be good and if it is bad, it will be bad. This is what it means, 'What is ordained by the Lord cannot be undone unless experiences it.' said Bharathiar. This is what Ilango says in his own way 'Uzhvinai Urutta Vantuttum'. This is greatness that shapes the vegan ideology (Saiva Sithandha) and realizes the lesson of life. The purpose of this article is to explore and uncover how these vegan philosophical truths are subtly embedded in the song 'all towns are ours, everyone is our kin...' by the Kanniyan Pungkundranar. Every action has a reaction. So, all the epics signify that Siva devotees Ramayana anti-leader Ravana and Kandapurana anti-leader Surabathman are no exception. The author's intention is that humans should understand this. [இநத மனித வாழககை விதி எனற சூததிரக கயிறறால ஆடடுவிககபபடுகிறது. ஒருவன செயத செயலுககு இனன பயன எனறு விதிககபபடடதே விதி. அது நலவினையாய இருநதால நனமையுமாய தவினையாய இருநதால தமையுமாய வநது சேரும. இதைததான, 'பிராபத கருமஙகள அனுபவிததால ஒழிய தராது.' எனபார பாரதியார. இதையே இளஙகோ தமபாணியில ஊழவினை உறுதத வநதூடடும' எனபார. இநதப பேருணமைதான சைவ சிததாநதத தததுவமாக வடிவெடுதது வாழககைப பாடததை உணரததுகினறது. இநதச சைவ சிததாநதத தததுவ உணமைகள எபபடி நுடபமாக கணியன பூஙகுனறனாரின, 'யாதும ஊரே யாவரும கேளிர...' எனற பாடலில புதைநது கிடககினறன எனபதை ஆயவு செயது வெளிக கொணடு வருவதே இநதக கடடுரையின நோககமாகும. ஒவவொரு வினைககும எதிரவினை உணடு. ஆக, அதறகு சிவபகதரகளான இராமாயண எதிரநிலைததலைவன இராவனும கநதபுராண எதிரநிலைததலைவன சூரபதமனும கூட விதிவிலககலல எனறு அனைதது காபபியஙகளும கடடியம கூறுகினறன. இதை மனிதரகள புரிநது கொளள வேணடும எனபது கடடுரையாளரின எணணம.]

Afirmar que el hombre desde su concepción es bueno no es incorrecto ni supone estar equivocado. Tampoco sostener que el hombre nace malo representa una negación de la realidad. Sin embargo, distintas corrientes de pensamiento han vivido en una confrontación por muchos años y se debaten entre lo bueno y lo malo que el hombre es en la naturaleza y, especialmente en la vida. Si el hombre nace bueno ¿por qué se encuentra incitado al mal? Y, si el hombre nace malo ¿por qué no puede redimirse y hacer el bien? Distintos filósofos y pensadores como Rousseau, Hobbes, Maquiavelo y Freud, así como otros, defienden variadas posturas y adoptan posiciones al respecto. ¿Nace el hombre bueno o nace malo? He aquí la importancia medular de este artículo que presenta un tema controversial en la historia del quehacer de la filosofía.

O artigo apresenta um breve estudo hermenêutico-teológico da parábola do bom samaritano, narrada somente pelo evangelista Lucas (cf. Lc 10,25-37). Apresenta, de maneira sucinta, uma visão geral do Evangelho segundo Lucas, seguindo alguns passos metodológicos que ajudam na compreensão do texto bíblico. Em seguida, contextualiza a referida perícope dentro do Evangelho, apresentando um comentário que ajuda na compreensão do texto. Por fim, labora-se algumas conclusões que ajudam o leitor a refletir sobre a atualidade da parábola.

A partir de textos clásicos de la filosofía política se problematiza las formas de habitar/ocupar el Estado por parte de los agentes técnicos encargados de la intervención social. Conceptualmente el Estado es colocado tanto del lado de lo bueno como de lo malo de las cosas, de ahí que se vincule la intervención social dirigida tanto a la integración social como a la subordinación. Una vez conscientes de esta discusión cabe la pregunta sobre cuánta confianza le pueden tener al Estado y a la función que les demanda cumplir y qué razones tienen para una “buena” práctica. El eje de la argumentación se apoya en el sugerente libro de Abad y Cantarelli (2010) Habitar el Estado como puntapié para contraponer a Hobbes y Hegel, y sus argumentos a favor del Estado, con la mirada marxista del Estado como esfera de dominación y las posibilidades de superarlo.

Fifty-five years ago, Norman Good and colleagues authored a paper that fundamentally advanced wet biochemistry [Good, N. E., Winget, G. D., Winter, W., Connolly, T. N., Izawa, S., and Singh, R. M. M. (1966) Hydrogen ion buffers for biological research. Biochemistry 5, 467-477] and in doing so has amassed more than 2500 citations. They laid out the properties required for useful, biochemically relevant hydrogen-ion buffers and then synthesized and tested 10 of them. Soon after, these buffers became commercially available. Since then, most of us never gave them a second thought. We just use them. Here, I discuss some of the background regarding the genesis of "Good's buffers", make a few (disparaging) observations about the non-Good's buffer, Tris, and suggest that we synthesize new buffers by combining the ideas of Good et al. with results from the past 60 years of protein chemistry.

Aristotelianism is often considered to be a version of naturalism. As a result, non-naturalism is often considered to be incompatible with Aristotelianism. In this paper, I will show that the Aristotelian can actually accept much of what the non-naturalist wants to say. I will show that the Aristotelian can accept a non-natural account of the good, need not be concerned by G. E. Moore’s Open Question Argument and that, as long as we carefully consider and define our terms, they can accept much of non-naturalism in abstract. This then paves the way for the possibility of a non-natural natural law and should go some way to challenging the prevailing orthodoxy that Aristotelianism is a version of naturalism. I do not go so far as to label Aristotelianism a form of non-naturalism as there are some important areas of disagreement. Instead, I think that Aristotelianism should count as its own label and that it will resist any attempts to label it a form of naturalism, non-naturalism or, indeed, supernaturalism.

The purpose of the paper is to investigate into the ethical significance of friendship, beginning with its origins in ancient Greek philosophy. The first part is dedicated to an interpretation of Plato’s understanding of friendship as a way towards the good. The second part focuses on how Aristotle takes up the thread after Plato and elaborates on the potential of friendship to enhance the good between virtuous people. In the final parts, the paper uncovers Friedrich Nietzsche’s posthumous thoughts on “an ethics of friendship”, which he traces back to ancient Greek philosophy, and it offers a concluding critical commentary on three modern thinkers, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Hannah Arendt and Alasdair MacIntyre, who reflect, each in their own way, on the human good in an on-going dialogue with the ancient Greek philosophy of friendship.

The paper argues for a version of the Guise of the Good thesis, namely the claim that if someone acts as the result of practical reasoning, then she takes her premises to jointly provide a sufficie...

The present article provides a taxonomic analysis of bimodal logics of normative ideality and normative awfulness, two notions whose meaning is here explained in terms of the moral values pursued by a given community. Furthermore, the article addresses the traditional problem of a reduction among deontic concepts: we explore the possibility of defining other relevant normative notions, such as obligation, explicit permission and Hohfeldian relations, in terms of ideality and awfulness. Some proposals in this respect, which have been formulated in the literature over the years, are here improved and discussed with reference to the various logics that we will introduce.

How to defend a small state is an important issue in politics and military affairs. Three important philosophical texts, the Han Fei Zi 韓非子, Plato’s Republic, and the Mencius, discuss this issue. In this article, I will analyze the three accounts offered in these texts, and compare and contrast them. We will see that the Han Fei Zi, a text in the “realist” tradition, offers a typically realist yet rather interesting account of how to save a small state from stronger enemies. Plato’s Republic, too, offers an amoral solution of the defense issue, in spite of its celebration of justice and the Good. The Mencius, a classical Confucian text that is often said to emphasize the power of virtue (humaneness in particular), does have a normative dimension, but it also takes political reality into account. In fact, it is even more realistic than the first two texts on international interventions in some aspects, partly because, paradoxically, it pays attention to the moral dimension of human affairs. After elaborating and comparing these three accounts, I shall argue that a synthesis may offer a realism-based normative theory of the just defense of a small state.

It is commonly held that, given multiple medically permissible ways of proceeding, each with a different impact on the patient's future, it is extremely important, and part of respecting patient autonomy, that patients not be under substantial pressure to defer to their physicians' presumed authority. Some, however, worry that the focus on patient autonomy can be detrimental and that, at least in cases where it is hard to grasp what it is really like to live with certain outcomes without any first-hand or second-hand experience, it is best if patient choice is firmly directed, or at least effectively nudged, by the recommendation of an experienced medical professional. The idea seems to be that, since physicians cannot get their patients to promptly assimilate a large amount of information and experience, physicians must, if they are to really help their patients make good decisions in hard cases, exert non-argumentative influence on them. But this neglects an interesting possibility, namely the possibility of influencing patients by providing them with evidence regarding what decisions have proved most satisfactory for patients with their profile. Approximations of patient profile tests are already employed in medical practice. But the potential of the profile-test approach in medical practice (and research) has been obscured by ongoing debate that neglects the significance of the approach with respect to the apparent dilemma faced by patients who need to make informed, autonomous decisions but cannot be expected to fully assimilate, in short order, the knowledge and experience of their physicians.

The article reconstructs an antique understanding of the genesis of value being and the meaning of the concept of the “Good”. The author proposes his own versions of interpretation of the Good based on the dialogue “The Republic”. The result is the demonstration of similarity and difference of understanding of the Good in the philosophy of Plato, Aristotle and the Stoics. The paper also shows the relationship of the founding value being of the Good with practical goal-setting andtruth. It issuggested that the general tendency in the philosophy of antiquity was the hypostasis of the Good and its deindividualization.

Cet article propose un itinéraire de réflexion sur les fondements de l’éthique théologique en articulant trois contributions de Karl Barth à ce domaine : la définition de l’éthique comme l’impératif de l’indicatif qu’est la dogmatique, voire l’inséparabilité entre éthique et dogmatique qui place l’éthique à l’écoute de la révélation ; l’articulation d’un nexus christologique entre les catégories d’obéissance et de liberté comme « autodétermination déterminée » ; le débat sur l’Évangile et la Loi, comme révélation de l’histoire de la grâce à partir de laquelle se déploie la grammaire d’une existence chrétienne. Cet itinéraire est entrecoupé par trois passages bibliques qui sont alignés sur les contributions de Barth : la vocation d’Abraham ; l’agonie de Jésus à Gethsémani ; la question posée à Jésus sur le bien qu’il faut faire pour entrer dans la vie éternelle. Nous suggérons que cet itinéraire biblique et barthien souligne qu’une éthique théologiquement construite conflue vers la christologie.

Robert Adams defends a platonic account of goodness, understood as excellence, claiming that there exists a platonic good that all other good things must resemble, identifying the Good with God. Mark Murphy agrees, but argues that this platonic account is in need of Aristotelian supplementation, as resemblance must take into account a thing’s kind-membership. While this article will accept something like Murphy’s account of goodness (but without claiming the platonic good is God), it will further develop its details and support. Without relying on theistic premises, I show that the metaphysical status of an individual’s goodness consists in resemblance with the platonic good. As for the distinct question of what that goodness holds in virtue of, I conclude it holds in virtue of exactly: the thing’s own properties, those properties being such as to satisfy its kind-based standards (K-standards), and those K-standards resembling the platonic good. I then develop an account of how K-standards resemble the platonic good: The K-standards resemble it firstly with respect to requiring activities, as the platonic good will be posited to be active, and must resemble it secondly also at the level of what teleology those activities are directed towards. I also motivate the need for a third respect of resemblance, to be developed in future work. The article ends with a discussion of the nature of the platonic good.

Plato is accused by some of being a totalitarian, “top-down” thinker, a claim that is linked not just to his politics but to his philosophical proclivities more generally. This essay will argue that Plato’s method and metaphysics collectively provide a few avenues for questioning this outcome. I think Plato’s Socratic-style provides resistance to a hegemonic and carapaced metaphysics, and moreover I would argue that there is a greater coherence between Plato’s method and his positive teaching than is allowed for by some. Through an engagement with central Platonic doctrines, namely his account of philosophical dialogue, the transcendental Good, as well as participation, and recollection, it is argued that Plato’s relational metaphysics does not fit seamlessly into an “ideological” or “naïve” rendering of intellectual intuition, an exclusionary dualism of material and spiritual substance, or an uncritical evocation of “innate ideas,” and, moreover, that it allows for a greater plurality of perspectives, all ordered towards a deeper realism and unity within the Good Beyond Being.

The following text is a review of Wittgenstein and the Creativity of Language, edited by Sebastian Sunday Grève and Jakub Mácha (Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. ISBN 978-1-137-47253-3. xxi + 314 pages). Wittgenstein and the Creativity of Language is a collection of eleven essays investigating the creative potential of language within Wittgensteinian philosophy language. The essays are grouped into five sections, and cover a whole range of issues including language creativity, conceptions of art, ethics, metaphysics, but also Wittgenstein’s comments on Gödel’s proof, and Alfred Loos’s influence on Wittgenstein.

This article offers a reading of the “transcendental” character of Alain Badiou’s and Giorgio Agamben’s ontologies. While neither Badiou nor Agamben are “transcendental” philosophers in the Kantian sense, this article argues that their respective projects of ontology both recover aspects of the “classical” conception of the transcendentals. Not unlike how pre-modern philosophers conceived of oneness, truth and goodness as transcendental properties of all things, both Badiou’s and Agamben’s ontologies present various structures which can be universally predicated of all being. However, as opposed to the essentialist or even theological tendencies of traditional metaphysics, Badiou’s and Agamben’s ontologies are committedly “inessential” and atheistic at their very core. By replacing the divine names of the one, the true and the good in traditional metaphysics with a new yet quasi-classical transcendental notion of “the void” as a universal predicate of all beings, Badiou’s and Agamben’s works may be regarded as projects that go beyond both the pre-Kantian “theological” and the post-Kantian “subjective” conceptions of transcendental philosophy, thereby marking a new development in the history of western metaphysics.

It is a peaceful point, when we seek to understand the bases of the philosophy of Augustine of Hippo, his debt to Neoplatonism. Decisive to his understanding of the relationship between unity and multiplicity, as well as for the problem of the evil in its connection with the existence of a first Principle (the Good), Neoplatonism makes up a large part of the central works of the hyponense such as: Confessionum libri tredecim, De ordine and De uera religione. Thus, the objective of this work consists in to expose some elements that affiliate, although maintaining what is specific, the Augustinian thought to the Neoplatonic henology, in particular, of Plotinus, taking as a central point the notion of absolute freedom that defines the Plotinian One, in its process of unfolding (proodos) at hypostatic levels, as the founding principle of all real (multiple) without, however, being reduced to any specific reality. I start from the conviction that this aspect is indispensable for the understanding of Augustinian metaphysics.

In the Ethics, Spinoza famously wrote, “we do not seek or desire anything, because we judge it to be good; on the contrary, we judge a thing to be good because we endeavor it, will it, seek it and ...

The guise of the good doctrine is the view that whatever we desire, we desire it under the guise of the good, i.e. it appears good to us in some way. In this paper I first clarify the role that the...

The paper shows textual and non-textual evidence that Henry Sidgwick endorses a version of the guise of the good doctrine and a version of the guise of the reasons view. He also rejects the guise o...

The guise of the good is the claim that whatever I desire or intentionally do is seen by me as good in some respect. Historical scholarship has so far predominantly focused on ancient and medieval ...

In the first edition of the Essay, Locke argued that we pursue whatever course of action we judge to be the best option available to us at the time. In other words, we always act under the guise of...