The Intimate Universal

The Intimate Universal
Author: William Desmond
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 521
Release: 2016-11-29
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 023154300X

William Desmond sees religion, art, philosophy, and politics as essential and distinctive modes of human practice, manifestations of an intimate universality that illuminates individual and social being. They are also surprisingly permeable phenomena, and by observing their relations, Desmond captures notes of a clandestine conversation that transforms ontology.

Moral Universalism and Pluralism

Moral Universalism and Pluralism
Author: Melissa S. Williams
Publisher: NYU Press
Total Pages: 288
Release: 2008-10-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0814777201

Moral universalism, or the idea that some system of ethics applies to all people regardless of race, color, nationality, religion, or culture, must have a plurality over which to range — a plurality of diverse persons, nations, jurisdictions, or localities over which morality asserts a universal authority. The contributors to Moral Universalism and Pluralism, the latest volume in the NOMOS series, investigate the idea that, far from denying the existence of such pluralities, moral universalism presupposes it. At the same time, the search for universally valid principles of morality is deeply challenged by diversity. The fact of pluralism presses us to explore how universalist principles interact with ethical, political, and social particularisms. These important essays refuse the answer that particularisms should simply be made to conform to universal principles, as if morality were a mold into which the diverse matter of human society and culture could be pressed. Rather, the authors bring philosophical, legal and political perspectives to bear on the core questions: Which forms of pluralism are conceptually compatible with moral universalism, and which ones can be accommodated in a politically stable way? Can pluralism generate innovations in understandings of moral duty? How is convergence on the validity of legal and moral authority possible in circumstances of pluralism? As the contributors to the book demonstrate in a wide variety of ways, these normative, conceptual, and political questions deeply intertwine. Contributors: Kenneth Baynes, William A. Galston, Barbara Herman, F. M. Kamm, Benedict Kingsbury, Frank I. Michelman, William E. Scheuerman, Gopal Sreenivasan, Daniel Weinstock, and Robin West.

Rethinking Jewish Philosophy

Rethinking Jewish Philosophy
Author: Aaron W. Hughes
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 191
Release: 2014-04
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0199356815

Rather than assume that the terms "philosophy" and "Judaism" simply belong together, Aaron W. Hughes explores the juxtaposition and the creative tension that ensues from their cohabitation. He examines the historical, cultural, intellectual, and religious filiations between Judaism and philosophy.

The Quest for a Universal Theory of Life

The Quest for a Universal Theory of Life
Author: Carol E. Cleland
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 261
Release: 2019-09-12
Genre: Science
ISBN: 052187324X

Explores fundamental philosophical and scientific questions about the nature of life, particularly in relation to the search for extraterrestrial life.

Insurgent Universality

Insurgent Universality
Author: Massimiliano Tomba
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 305
Release: 2019
Genre: History
ISBN: 0190883081

Scholars commonly take the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen of 1789, written during the French Revolution, as the starting point for the modern conception of human rights. According to the Declaration, the rights of man are held to be universal, at all times and all places. But as recent crises around migrants and refugees have made obvious, this idea, sacred as it might be among human rights advocates, is exhausted. This book suggests that we need to think of a different idea of universality that exceeds the juridical universialism of the Declaration. Insurgent Universality investigates alternative trajectories of modernity that have been repressed, hindered, and forgotten. Investigating radical upheavals, Tomba excavates an alternative idea of universality that is based on popular political practices that disrupt and reject the existing political and economic order. The book shows how this tradition builds bridges between European and non-European political and social experiments.

Herder: Philosophical Writings

Herder: Philosophical Writings
Author: Johann Gottfried Herder
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 488
Release: 2002-09-05
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9780521794091

Publisher Description

A Universal Philosophy of Confidence-Informed Social Motivation

A Universal Philosophy of Confidence-Informed Social Motivation
Author: Roger Wood
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 176
Release: 2020-04-23
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1527549828

Humans are natural philosophizers who are constantly forming interpretations and expectations based upon their perceptions and prior experiences, including their familiarity with particular people and activities, and the social contexts within which these are situated. As human individuals, we all have an innate sense of philosophy in common. As individuals, the majority of us may be described as natural philosophers in that we are naturally philosophical about our lifeworld experiences and our need to interpret these as a basis for informing our understanding. This book introduces a novel theory which encompasses the Philosophy of Confidence-Informed Social Motivation (PCISM) and Philopsychlical Hermeneutics. The theory asserts that human individuals and groups function at optimum philosophical and psychological levels when their confidence, motivation, familiarity and expectation levels are at their peak. Confidence and motivation influence each other and work together as a dynamic combination of philosophical interpretations and psychological reactions which result in reciprocal interpretive feedback. Within the term philopsychlical, confidence, motivation, familiarity and expectation are presented as universal informants and influences upon human behaviour within all social contexts. PCISM is in the early stages of its evolution: however, the key tenets are discussed and presented here in such a way that they may be applied across all domains of human knowledge, behaviour and endeavour as a means of enhancing our further understanding of the universal economics of human behaviour.

Philosophical Theory and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Philosophical Theory and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Author: William Sweet
Publisher: University of Ottawa Press
Total Pages: 250
Release: 2003-05-26
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0776616722

Philosophical Theory and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights examines the relations and interrelations among theoretical and practical analyses of human rights. Edited by William Sweet, this volume draws on the works of philosophers, political theorists and those involved in the implementation of human rights. The essays, although diverse in method and approach, collectively argue that the language of rights and corresponding legal and political instruments have an important place in contemporary social political philosophy.

The Problem of Universals in Early Modern Philosophy

The Problem of Universals in Early Modern Philosophy
Author: Stefano Di Bella
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 369
Release: 2017-06-29
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0190608056

The ancient topic of universals was central to scholastic philosophy, which raised the question of whether universals exist as Platonic forms, as instantiated Aristotelian forms, as concepts abstracted from singular things, or as words that have universal signification. It might be thought that this question lost its importance after the decline of scholasticism in the modern period. However, the fourteen contributions contained in The Problem of Univerals in Early Modern Philosophy indicate that the issue of universals retained its vitality in modern philosophy. Modern philosophers in fact were interested in 3 sets of issues concerning universals: (i) issues concerning the ontological status of universals, (ii) issues concerning the psychology of the formation of universal concepts or terms, and (iii) issues concerning the value and use of universal concepts or terms in the acquisition of knowledge. Chapters in this volume consider the various forms of "Platonism," "conceptualism" and "nominalism" (and distinctive combinations thereof) that emerged from the consideration of such issues in the work of modern philosophers. Furthermore, this volume covers not only the canonical modern figures, namely, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume and Kant, but also more neglected figures such as Pierre Gassendi, Pierre-Sylvain Regis, Nicolas Malebranche, Henry More, Ralph Cudworth and John Norris.