On Hatzimoysis on Sentimental Value

Despite its apparent ubiquity, philosophers have not talked much about sentimental value. One exception is Anthony Hatzimoysis (The Philosophical Quarterly 53:373–379, 2003). Those who wish to take sentimental value seriously are likely to make use of Christine Korsgaard’s ideas on two distinctions in value. In this paper I show that Hatzimoysis has misrendered Korsgaard’s insight in his discussion of sentimental value. I begin by briefly summarising Korsgaard’s idea before showing how Hatzimoysis’ treatment of it is mistaken.

Rawls and Ricoeur: Converging Notions of Empowerment to Justice

Empowerment is a key word in Catherine Audard’s new book on Rawls and a central characteristic of Rawls’ approach to justice. A very different “hermeneutic” approach to justice is presented by Paul Ricoeur, the French philosopher and theologian who, against the background of his own work, examined Rawls’ views in several publications. This essay compares the two views and defends the proposition that empowerment is the common denominator. The author suggests that Rawls would not have objected to including some of Ricoeur’s ideas in the past-principle stage of his Theory.

HISTORICAL ASPECTS OF MINDFULNESS AND SELF-ACCEPTANCE IN PSYCHOTHERAPY

We describe some of the historical conditions that made possible Kabat-Zinn’s [(1990). Full catastrophe living: Using the wisdom of your body and mind to face stress, pain, and illness. New York: Delacorte] very successful use of mindfulness in his stress management program. The ground had been prepared by the nonjudgmental acceptance of people and symptoms by Humanistic psychotherapists, and by the increasing assimilation of Buddhist ideas into Western psychology and psychotherapy. In addition the word “mindfulness,” as the translation of the Pali sati, came to refer to both the manualized practice that provides the evidence for its efficacy in the hands of Kabat-Zinn and others, and the more complex process of clear comprehension and recollection that is described in his more discursive writings, and is similar to Ellen Langer’s use of “mindfulness” in her book of that name.

Ways an actualist might be

I discuss Stalnaker’s views on modality. In particular, his views on actualism, anti-essentialism, counterpart theory, and the Barcan formulas.

Structural equations and causation: six counterexamples

Hall [(2007), Philosophical Studies, 132, 109–136] offers a critique of structural equations accounts of actual causation, and then offers a new theory of his own. In this paper, I respond to Hall’s critique, and present some counterexamples to his new theory. These counterexamples are then diagnosed.

Mother, Melancholia, and Play in Erik H. Erikson’s Childhood and Society

In an earlier article on Erik H. Erikson’s earliest writings (Capps, 2007), I focused on the relationship between the child’s melancholia and conflict with maternal authority, and drew attention to the restorative role of humor. In this article, I discuss two of the three chapters in part three, “The Growth of the Ego,” of Erikson’s first major book, Childhood and Society [Erikson, Childhood and society. New York: W. W. Norton, 1950, Childhood and society (rev. edition). New York: W. W. Norton, 1963]. I explore the same theme of the relationship of melancholia and the mother, but focus on the restorative role of play. I interpret the differences between the two cases in light of Sigmund Freud’s essay, “Mourning and Melancholia” [Freud, Mourning and melancholia. In S. Freud, General psychological theory (pp. 164–179). P. Rieff (ed.). New York: Collier Books. 1963].

Mother,Melancholia, and Art in Erik H. Erikson’s <Emphasis Type="Italic">Toys and Reasons</Emphasis>

In three earlier articles (2007a, 2007b, 2007c), I focused on the theme of the relationship of melancholia and the mother, and suggested that the melancholic self may experience humor, play, and dreams as restorative resources. In this article, I want to make a similar case, based on Erik H. Erikson’s Toys and Reasons (1977), for art (in this particular case, a painting of the Annunciation). I have made a similar case for the restorative role of art in articles on Leonard da Vinci’s Mona Lisa (Capps, Pastoral Psychology, 53, 107–137, 2004) and James McNeill Whistler’s painting of his mother (Capps, Pastoral Psychology, 2007d). In the present article, however, I focus on the special biographical circumstances in Erikson’s own development of a melancholy self and the painting he discusses in Toys and Reasons, thereby suggesting that individuals may find a particular work of art especially relevant to their own experience of melancholy. I conclude with Erikson’s testimonial at the memorial service of a colleague and friend who translated her own melancholy into her service to others.

How Berkeley Corrupted His Capacity to Conceive

Berkeley’s capacity to conceive of mind-independent bodies was corrupted by his theory of representation. He thought that representation of things outside the mind depended on resemblance. Since ideas can resemble nothing than ideas, and all ideas are mind dependent, he concluded that we couldn’t form ideas of mind-independent bodies. More generally, he thought that we had no inner resembling proxies for mind-independent bodies, and so we couldn’t even form a notion of such things. Because conception is a suggestible faculty, Berkeley’s arguments actually made it the case that he himself couldn’t conceive of mind-independent bodies.

Pathologies of Desire and Duty: Freud, Ricoeur, and Castoriadis on Transforming Religious Culture

This article emphasizes an underappreciated aspect of Freud’s critique of religion taken up in the writings of Ricoeur and Castoriadis: the degree to which pathologies of desire and duty imbue our relation to shared cultural forms, i.e., narratives, ideals, and values. Both thinkers find in Freud’s anti-religious polemic a valuable attempt to address the intransigence, fanaticism, and violence that can result from an unreflected affirmation of Tradition. Alongside developing a respect and acceptance of other cultures, they argue for the need to establish a critical relation to ‘sacred’meaning structures, one that mirrors interpretive strategies within the psychoanalytic process. Ricoeur and Castoriadis critique Freud’s accentuation of neurosis while extending his thinking into personal-philosophical and social-political contexts.

Expiation,Substitution and Surrender: Levinasian Implications for Psychotherapy

This essay will build on Emmanuel Levinas’s rejection of ontology as foundational and draw out the implications for psychotherapy. We will explore Levinas’s concept of substitution (in both his more Jewish writings and his philosophical treatises) and consider its meaning in relationship to the role of a psychotherapist. Levinas understands the Other as a calling for substitution of the self and of a taking on of responsibility. We explore the notion of surrender in the work of the psychoanalyst Emmanuel Ghent and argue that his position is ultimately lacking in ethical injunction; requiring nothing of the self in relationship to the Other. It remains within the confines of the conventional, self-reflexive models that Levinas critiques. Following Levinas, we suggest that the therapist bear the burden of ethical responsibility by being exposed to the client’s ethical call and by responding out of a kenotic self-emptying.

Union and Difference: A Dialectical Structuring of St. John of the Cross’ Mysticism

This paper intends to append the frame of dialectic upon St. John of the Cross’ delineation of mysticism. Its underlying hypothesis is that the dialectical structuring of St. John’s mystical theology promises to unravel the web of relational concepts embedded within his immense writings on this unique phenomenon. It is hoped that as a consequence of this undertaking, relevant pairs of correlative opposites that figure prominently in mysticism can be elucidated and perhaps come to some form of resolution.

Bohr as a Phenomenological Realist

There is confusion among scholars of Bohr as to whether he should be categorized as an instrumentalist (see Faye 1991) or a realist (see Folse 1985). I argue that Bohr is a realist, and that the confusion is due to the fact that he holds a very special view of realism, which did not coincide with the philosophers’ views. His approach was sometimes labelled instrumentalist and other times realist, because he was an instrumentalist on the theoretical level, but a realist on the level of models. Such a realist position is what I call phenomenological realism. In this paper, and by taking Bohr’s debate with Einstein as a paradigm, I try to prove that Bohr was such a realist.

Predicativity and Structuralism in Dedekind’s Construction of the Reals

It is a commonly held view that Dedekind’s construction of the real numbers is impredicative. This naturally raises the question of whether this impredicativity is justified by some kind of Platonism about sets. But when we look more closely at Dedekind’s philosophical views, his ontology does not look Platonist at all. So how is his construction justified? There are two aspects of the solution: one is to look more closely at his methodological views, and in particular, the places in which predicativity restrictions ought to be applied; another is to take seriously his remarks about the reals as things created by the cuts, instead of considering them to be the cuts themselves. This can lead us to make finer-grained distinctions about the extent to which impredicative definitions are problematic, since we find that Dedekind’s use of impredicative definitions in analysis can be justified by his (non-Platonist) philosophical views.

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On the Significance of William James to a Contemporary Doctrine of Evolutionary Psychology

Academic popularizers of the new field of evolutionary psychology make notable appeals to William James to bolster their doctrine. In particular, they cite James’ remark that humans have all the “impulses” animals do and many more besides to shore up their claim that people’s “instincts” account for their flexibility. This essay argues that these scholars misinterpret James on the instincts. Consciousness (which they find inscrutable) explains cognitive flexibility for James. The evolutionary psychologists’ appeal to James is, therefore, unwarranted and, given the conditions relevant to the public and professional audiences they address, also ineffective as a rhetorical tool for enlisting new recruits.

Triangulation,Untranslatability, and Reconciliation

Donald Davidson used triangulation to do everything from explicate psychological and semantic externalism, to attack relativism and skepticism, to propose conditions necessary for thought and talk. At one point Davidson tried to bring order to these remarks by identifying three kinds of triangulation, each operative in a different situation. Here I take seriously Davidson’s talk of triangular situations and extend it. I start by describing Davidson’s situations. Next I establish the surprising result that considerations from one situation entail the possibility that at any one time one language is partially untranslatable into another. Because the possibility is time-indexed, it need not conflict with Davidson’s own argument against the possibility of untranslatability. I derive the result, not to indict Davidson, but to propose a new kind of triangulation, the reconciliation of untranslatability, which I investigate. Insofar as triangulation is central to Davidson’s views, getting a handle on his various triangular situations is key to getting a handle on his contributions to philosophy. Insofar as those contributions have enriched our understanding of how language, thought, and reality interrelate, extending Davidson’s model promises to extend our understanding too.

A Defence of Weighted Lotteries in Life Saving Cases

The three most common responses to Taurek’s ‘numbers problem’ are saving the greater number, equal chance lotteries and weighted lotteries. Weighted lotteries have perhaps received the least support, having been criticized by Scanlon What We Owe to Each Other (1998) and Hirose ‘Fairness in Life and Death Cases’ (2007). This article considers these objections in turn, and argues that they do not succeed in refuting the fairness of a weighted lottery, which remains a potential solution to cases of conflict. Moreover, it shows how these responses actually lead to a new argument for weighted lotteries, appealing to fairness and Pareto-optimality.

Kant and Wittgenstein: Common Sense,Therapy, and the Critical Philosophy

Kant’s reputation for making absolutist claims about universal and necessary conditions for the possibility of experience are put here in the broader context of his goals for the Critical philosophy. It is shown that within that context, Kant’s claims can be seen as considerably more innocuous than they are traditionally regarded, underscoring his deep respect for “common sense” and sharing surprisingly similar goals with Wittgenstein in terms of what philosophy can, and at least as importantly cannot, provide.

Whistler’s <Emphasis Type="Italic">Mother</Emphasis>: Devotional Center of Male Melancholic Religion

In previous writings, I have argued that the 3-to-5-year-old boy’s emotional separation from his mother is the key experience in his development of a melancholic orientation to life (Capps, Men, religion, and melancholia: James, Otto, Jung, and Erikson, 1997) and that men’s religious proclivities (based on honor, hope, and humor) reflect this emotional separation (Capps, Male melancholia: Guilt, separation, and repressed rage, 2001). In an earlier article published in Pastoral Psychology (Capps, Leonardo’s Mona Lisa: Iconic center of male melancholic religion, 2004), I argued that Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa is the iconic center of the male melancholic religion, that it displaces the Virgin Mother Mary of traditional Christianity in this regard, and that the painting aids in the difficult task of transforming melancholia into the mourning of the lost maternal object. In this article, I argue that James McNeill Whistler’s painting of his mother plays a similar role in male melancholic religion, but with an important variation: I use Ernst Troeltsch’s classic church-sect typology to show that Leonardo’s Mona Lisa is the iconic center of the churchly form of male melancholic religion, while Whistler’s mother is the devotional center of its sectarian form.