Copyright (c) 2009 Macalester College All rights reserved. http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo Recent documents in Macalester Journal of Philosophy en-us Tue, 29 Sep 2009 07:25:08 PDT 3600 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/10 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/10 Wed, 17 Oct 2007 07:55:13 PDT Elizabeth Spier http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/9 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/9 Wed, 17 Oct 2007 07:50:42 PDT In this paper I will argue that we can chart such a middle course through an exploration of Ludwig Wittgenstein's thought (particularly that advanced in On Certainty and Lectures and Conversations on Aesthetics, Psychology and Religious Belief). I will use his thesis that meaning and certainty are context dependent to investigate how meaning is produced in science and in religion. I will start with the recognition that any system of thought must take certain basic propositions as criteria for further investigation and explore how Wittgenstein defines this idea. Next I will try to establish that religion and science do, indeed, function as two different systems or language games by illustrating their differing criteria for truth. In so doing I will reference both Wittgenstein's works and that of some anthropologists of religion, whose work has explored a definition of religion through its use, which mirrors Wittgenstein's location of meaning. I will then discuss how we can pick between systems within a given context by requiring that a system stand up to the criteria of justification set up for that situation. Gesse Stark-Smith http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/7 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/7 Wed, 17 Oct 2007 07:26:33 PDT Nietzsche's philosophical endeavor can be broadly characterized by two complementary ambitions acting throughout his corpus: a relentless critique of traditional metaphysics, epistemology, and axiology; and an effort to confront the nihilistic predicament which seems to result from these negations. Nowhere are these ideas more directly relevant and their implications more dramatic than in the discipline of philosophy itself; the task of the philosopher must be transformed by these revaluations of its tools and subject matter. Accordingly, Nietzsche's writings ought to recommend a sort of thinker fitted to the pursuit of this task, but owing to his literary style there exists in his works no list of definite prescriptions for philosophical practice nor a simple portrait of such a philosopher. The aim of this paper is to interpret Nietzsche's writings and extract from them a coherent position on this question. I look mainly to his numerous and varied explorations of the pursuit of knowledge in order to seek out the considerations that shape his normative conception of the philosopher; these largely take the form of case studies of hypothetical truth-seekers. I do not intend to address Nietzsche's practice as a philosopher himself, only his prescriptions - in general it cannot be assumed that he obeys his own recommendations. It should also be noted that I attend to his descriptive claims only insofar as they relate to this topic, as this is a discussion of prescriptions and not ontology, psychology, etc., and that I limit myself to the published works. Anthony Boutelle http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/6 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/6 Wed, 17 Oct 2007 07:19:58 PDT Most theories of metaphor look at what occurs inside a metaphorical phrase and posit a shift in meaning in the metaphorical words. This includes the classic "Models and Metaphor," by Max Black, who distinguishes between the literal words of the phrase and the metaphorical words. On this view, the two interact in such a way that the meanings of the metaphorical words change. In another view, Donald Davidson takes a radical stance in his "What Metaphors Mean" to assert that the words in a metaphor mean nothing other than their original, literal meaning. Both theories suffer from problems: Black fails to explain how the metaphorical words change in meaning. Davidson, on the other hand, while succeeding in refuting most of the "other meaning" theories, only weakly suggests "use" of metaphor to explain its power. In this paper, I will clarify the two respective theories and attempt to reconcile or fuse them. We will find that Black looks to the language itself and finds a shift in meaning, while Davidson asserts that meaning stays literal, and we must instead look at what occurs between the speaker and hearer. An examination of Davidson's later theory of interpretation applied to Black's theory of metaphor will clarify Davidson's 'use' as well as allow for literal meaning to stay in metaphor. Emily Ayoob http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/5 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/5 Wed, 17 Oct 2007 07:01:37 PDT In his landmark article, "Two Dogmas of Empiricism," W.V.O. Quine pushed analytical philosophy into its post-positivist phase by rejecting two central tenets of logical empiricism. The first dogma was the distinction between analytic and synthetic statements; the second was reductionism, or the belief that to each synthetic sentence there corresponds a set of experiences that will confirm or disconfirm it. But in both "Two Dogmas" and Word and Object, Quine stretches analytical philosophy to its limits. The problem is, ironically, his adherence to two separate dogmas. The first stems from Quine's empiricism: he insists that there is nothing more to meaning than the empirical method of discovering it. The second has been taken as the defining characteristic of analytical philosophy;2 it is the belief that a philosophical account of thought can only be attained through an account of language - the famed "linguistic turn." I will argue that a philosophical account of language can only be attained given an account of thought,3 and that the philosophies of Kant and Davidson can help us construct such an account. Greg Taylor http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/4 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/4 Wed, 17 Oct 2007 06:52:48 PDT In this paper, I hope to i. briefly explain Nyaya dualist ontology and identify the implications involved in accepting this view, ii. provide a comparison of Nyaya dualism to Cartesian dualism, and iii. provide an analysis of Nyaya dualism vis-à-vis some contemporary non-dualist theories of mind, in an attempt to gauge the viability of Nyaya Dualism as a theory of mind. I will briefly identify the context and history of this school in Indian Philosophy and will attempt to describe how this paper approaches and interprets Nyaya thinking. Anirudh Seth http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/3 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/3 Wed, 17 Oct 2007 06:44:49 PDT This paper will define human enhancement and coercion in the context of this discussion; explain separately how Bioconservatives and Transhumanists use the concept of coercion; and demonstrate how coercion is used improperly as a critique of enhancement. Jess Hasken http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/2 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/2 Wed, 17 Oct 2007 06:41:06 PDT In Section I, I analyze the first formulation of Kant's Categorical Imperative and the version of the moral self that this theory entails. In Section II, I demonstrate that Kant's ethical theory dismisses as non-moral an agent who derives her sense of self from her particular context. I explain how the societal oppression of actual persons who understand their moral selves in this way leads feminists to reject Kant's theory and to call for an alternative theory; I outline two criteria that such a theory must meet. Then, in Section III, I consider a feminist alternative to universalist ethical theory, the ethics of care of Joan Tronto. I argue that care ethics entails a relational moral self, and posing two objections to this version of the self, I prove it to be an insufficient model for the feminist project at hand. In Section IV, I consider a second alternative moral theory, narrative ethics, analyzing the deliberative framework put forth by Margaret Urban Walker. Next, in Section V, I argue that the narrative moral self is captured by Walker's concept of the moral persona. This narrative moral self is relational, yet uses certain skills, such as analytic or reasoning skills, in moral decision-making. Finally, in Section VI I argue that narrative theory is the most useful tool for feminists who seek to define the moral person in terms of her concrete relationships to others, and I answer several objections to narrative theory. Carly Martin http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/1 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol16/iss1/1 Wed, 17 Oct 2007 06:33:06 PDT http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol15/iss1/6 http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/philo/vol15/iss1/6 Tue, 06 Jun 2006 12:36:03 PDT Evolutionary ethics is a discipline that has formed around the belief that human-kind's conception of morality was developed through the evolutionary process of natural selection. Various mechanisms concern-ing the evolution of morality have been proposed within the theory of natural selection, and I believe that many authors in the field focus too narrowly on one or a few of them in their efforts to model the origins of morality. In this paper I hope to present a broader review of many potential evolutionary mechanisms and the evidence supporting them, in an effort to show that they are not mutually exclusive and may have all played a role in the formation of components of the complex moral system that exists today. Many writers in the field of evolutionary ethics tend to focus too narrowly on either the biological mechanisms through which morality is proposed to have evolved, or else on the philosophical ramifications that an acceptance of evolutionary ethics would have for our current conception of morality. As I feel that both aspects are equally important for the proper understanding and application of evolutionary ethics I hope to give equal and detailed attention to both the biological theory and the resultant philosophical implications. Sam Rayner