The Crucial Importance of Nancey Murphy’s Deployment of Lakatos’s Methodology for Theology and Science

Russell's paper explores the astonishing fruitfulness of Nancey Murphy’s use of Imre Lakatos’s philosophy of science in the field of “theology and science.” Murphy’s work can be used to choose between competing theologies according to the theologians’ willingness to engage with science, their ability to continue the engagement as scientific theories change, and their ability to make empirical predictions based on this engagement. Topics range from creation and cosmology, the “cosmic Christ”, and non-interventionist objective divine action in quantum mechanics and evolution. Russell has followed Murphy’s lead and used Lakatos to place theology and science into “creative mutual interaction” (CMI).     

The Earth Garden: Going Back or Going Forward to Nature?

Against the background of a short meditation on the contrasting ways in which landscape has been represented and idealized in Eastern and Western painting traditions,the article will try to show,using some striking examples,that the development of landscape painting in the last two centuries reflects the changing relationship of humanity and nature,leading in both the East and in the West to either the expression of a nostalgic longing for nature to be back as it once was,or to a gloomy expression of the vanishing of nature amidst the modern,technological world.Connecting to both the concept of "harmony," which is a key concept in Eastern aesthetics,and to some recent reflections in Western philosophy on the relationship of nature and technology,a post-nostalgic conception of nature and natural beauty is defended,in which nature and technology are no longer seen as opposing categories,but rather as poles that are intertwined in an ever-lasting process of co-evolution.It is argued that we should not so much strive to go "back to nature," but rather to go "forward to nature" and establish a new harmony between human and non-human nature and technology.The article ends with some reflections on the role artists and aestheticians may play in this transformation.     

Why Talk about Chinese Metaphysics?

Chinese philosophy in the twentieth century has often been related to some sort of cultural or other particularism or some sort of philosophical universalism. By and large, these still seem to be the terms along which academic debates are carried out. The tension is particularly manifest in notions such as “Chinese philosophy,” “Daoist cosmology,” “Neo-Confucian idealism,” or “Chinese metaphysics.” For some, “Chinese metaphysics” may be a blatant contradictio in adiecto, while others may find it a most ordinary topic to be discussed at the beginning of the twenty-first century. In this article, I set out to examine two major discourses in which talk about “metaphysics” is frequent and popular and to which talk of “Chinese metaphysics” may wish to contribute: the history of philosophy and analytic philosophy. My contention is that it is usually far from obvious what reasons are behind putting “Chinese metaphysics” on the academic agenda and to what precise purpose this is done. What my discussion seeks to highlight is the as yet often largely unarticulated dimension of the politics of comparative philosophy—of which talk about “Chinese metaphysics” may but need not be an example.     

How to Make Sense of the Claim “True Knowledge is What Constitutes Action”: A New Interpretation of Wang Yangming’s Doctrine of Unity of Knowledge and Action

No one denies the importance of applying knowledge to actions. But claiming identity (unity) of knowledge and action is quite another thing. There seem to be two problems with the claim: (1) the identity claim implies that the sole cause for one to fail to act on what one judges to be right is ignorance, but it is obviously false that the sole cause of failure in moral actions is ignorance. (2) The identity statement implies non-separation of knowledge and action. But knowledge does not necessarily lead to action. However, the identity of knowledge and action is what a famous Ming Confucian scholar, Wang Yang-ming, proposed and the concept became the central doctrine of his teaching. Though there are several major interpretations of Wang’s doctrine in contemporary literature, it is not clear to me how they deal with the above mentioned difficulties. In this article, I will discuss these interpretations of the doctrine and propose a new interpretation. My purpose is to give an interpretation of Wang’s doctrine that has the capacity of dealing with these challenges to the doctrine and also captures the essence of his teaching.     

中国古代关于"家"的哲学论纲

Unlike traditional Western philosophy, which places no special emphasis on the importance of family structure, traditional Chinese philosophy represented by Confucianism is a set of theories that give family a primary position. With family as the foundation, a complete framework of “human body → two genders → family and clan” is formed. Therefore, family in Chinese philosophy is existent, gender-interactive and diachronic. It should also be noted that family also plays a fundamental role in Chinese theories on cosmology, religion, and many other subjects. In other words, Chinese culture as a whole is imprinted with reflections on family. Nowadays, as the value of family becomes less prominent, re-examining ancient Chinese philosophy will undoubtedly bear theoretical significance. Meanwhile, traditional Chinese philosophy can also offer an ideological framework for the re-construction of family values in the contemporary world. __________ Translated by Zhang Shaoqian from Zhexue yanjiu 哲学研究 (Philosophical Researches), 2008, (1): 56–63     

以有机哲学的视角看中国传统心理治疗思想

西方现代心理治疗的体系与方法逐渐暴露出一些问题,西方传统文化中的机械唯物论和二元对立的逻辑是其误区所在。怀特海的有机哲学思想在一定意义上为缓解或消除这些问题提供了哲学的指导,而蕴涵在中国传统文化中的心理诊疗思想为西方乃至世界心理治疗的发展能够提供有益的启示和补充。     

THE BEAUTIFUL AND THE SUBLIME IN NATURAL SCIENCE

The various aesthetic phenomena found repeatedly in the scientific enterprise stem from the role of God as artist. If the Creator is an artist, how and why natural scientists study the divine art work can be understood using theological aesthetics and the philosophy of art. The aesthetic phenomena considered here are as follows. First, science reveals beauty and the sublime in natural phenomena. Second, science discovers beauty and the sublime in the theories that are developed to explain natural phenomena. Third, the search for beauty often guides scientists in their work. Fourth, where beauty is perceived, feelings of the sublime often also follow upon further contemplation. This linkage of beauty in science with truth and the sublime runs counter to most aesthetic theory since Kant. Scholarship in theological aesthetics has recently argued that the modern and postmodern elevation of the sublime over beauty is merely a preference that reveals a bias against transcendence—against God. If doing and understanding science can show this sundering of the sublime from the beautiful to be in error, science also gives evidence of transcendence.     

Lessons from Wittgenstein: Elucidating folk psychology

To the extent that psychologists are concerned to do more than collect raw data for possible interpretation, they cannot avoid interrogating the philosophical assumptions which inform their work. This paper argues that there is a vital need for conceptual clarification of many of the central topics studied by today's sciences of the mind. Yet, rather than offering a comprehensive survey of these, this paper focuses on one illustrative, high profile case: the way in which our everyday understanding of reasons for action has been wrongly categorized in terms of ‘theory of mind’ abilities. Focusing on this example I show how it is possible to elucidate topics in the philosophy of psychology by relinquishing certain powerful explanatory temptations and by attending more closely to our everyday practices and activities.     

Research ethics and the principle of Justice as Fairness – A restatement

In my recent article, I addressed the question of whether a potential categorical exclusion of decisionally impaired patients from non-therapeutic medical research would be inaccordance with the Principle of Justice as Fairness. I came to the conclusion that a categorical exclusion of decisionally impaired persons from relevant research projects may collide with Rawls’s understanding of Justice as Fairness. Derek Bell has criticized my paper by denying that it is legitimate to apply Rawls to this bioethical problem. In my restatement I try to show that an extrapolation of John Rawls’s thought to such bioethical cases is possible, because Rawls himself has written that his orientation towards decisionally non-impaired persons is an idealized situation that allows extrapolations. In a second part I try to show that Bell hasroughly misunderstood my concept of “presumed consent” which I make a prerequisite for the legitimisation of research on decisionally impaired persons. In using advance consent as a proposal for resolving the problem, Bell has indirectly confirmed my approach because he is using a similar construct of consent, which operates with similar hypotheses and probabilities of error. I see here no categorical difference between Bell’s conclusion and my discussion. Thus, Bell’s reply does not represent a refutation of my thoughts, but rather it is a para phrased confirmation of my central theses. I conclude by showing the relevance of Rawls, pointing out that the discussion between Bell and me illustrates how Rawls’s concept of reflective equilibrium is an appropriate approach to finding a solution to this bioethical problem. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.