Interpretation without hermeneutics: A plea against ecumenism

I have been much helped by Axel Bühler writings on hermeneutics (in particular by his unpublished Conference sull'ermeneutica) and would like to thank him and Donald Davidson for comments.     

Minding the gap between positivism and hermeneutics in psychoanalytic research

Two quite different cultures are to be found within psychoanalysis, one more clinical in orientation, more focused on meaning and interpretation, and relying primarily on the traditional case study method, the other more research-oriented, focused on cause-and-effect relationships, and relying primarily on methods borrowed from the natural and social sciences. The history of this divide is reviewed and arguments, pro and con, about the potential contributions of specific types of empirical investigation are discussed. Increasingly, it seems, criticisms concerning the scientific status of psychoanalysis are being responded to by empirical research. This has contributed to a growing recognition within the scientific community of the credibility of aspects of psychoanalytic theories and of the effectiveness of psychodynamic treatment. However, some segments of the psychoanalytic community are concerned that this increase in the quantity and quality of empirical research on psychoanalytic concepts risks creating an empirical one-sidedness, while other segments are concerned that not engaging in systematic empirical research can lead to intellectual isolation, fragmentation, stagnation, and orthodoxy. To counter this polarizing tendency, a recommendation is made for methodological pluralism. Adopting this stance could contribute to an enriched understanding of the clinical process and to the development of new research methodologies to investigate complex psychodynamic hypotheses, thus bridging the gap between the two psychoanalytic cultures, as well as the gap between research and clinical practice.     

孔子新诠——对《论语》作为一个哲学解释学文本的解读

Communicating with Confucius based on our own hermeneutical context, and reading the Analects as a text of philosophical hermeneutics, it can be concluded that as an epochal thinker, the contribution of Confucius’ thought is that it initiated a humanistic moral ideal with cultural upbringing as its core. Based on this consciousness of humanistic moral ideal, Confucius thought and dealt positively with the human existential plight and social political problems that he faced during his own time, and his thought is more creative than conservative. Translated by Mi Li from Guanzi Xuekan 맜子学刊 (Guanzi Jouranl), 2006, (1): 69–74     

The hyperreality of clinical ethics: A unitary theory and hermeneutics

Medical ethics nowadays is dominated by a conception of ethics as the application of moral theories and principles. This conception is criticized for its depreciation of the internal morality of medical practice and its narrow view of external morality. This view reflects both a lack of interest in the empirical realities of medicine and a neglect of the socio-cultural value-contexts of medical ethical issues, including the creative development of a broader philosophical framework for a practicable medical ethics. Several alternative approaches and conceptions have been proposed. The unified clinical ethics theory, developed by Graber and Thomasma, is an interesting attempt to synthesize these alternative approaches. It correctly identifies as the crucial problem the present disconnectedness of medical ethics from theoretical philosophy as well as the practice of medicine. In this paper, however, it is argued that the unitary theory should take more serious attention to the hermeneutic character of medicine as well as ethics. This implies that the unitary theory must in fact transform itself into aninterpretive clinical ethics theory. The theoretical characteristics and practical consequences of an interpretive theory of medical ethics are discussed in the present paper.     

A new approach to explain aggression

Two separate experiments are reported. They show the methodological difficulties and subsequent conceptual complications in Berkowitz's modified frustration-aggression theory and Zillman's theory of aggression. There was a marginally significant difference in the verbal measure of aggression favouring subjects aroused by frustration over subjects aroused by exercise, but not on the behavioral measure of aggression. Exp. II was conducted to test an alternative hypothesis, deduced from Fraisse's theory of emotion, which states that subjects respond more aggressively when confronted with unexpected than with expected annoyance. All six measures of aggression confirmed the hypothesis. The results of these two experiments indicate conceptual and methodological difficulties inherent in Berkowitz's modified frustration-aggression theory and Zillman's theory of aggression; they also suggest that Fraisse's theory of emotion presents a better model of aggression.     

A new approach to pastoral counseling

Pastoral Psychology -     

Probability: A new logico-semantical approach

This approach does not define a probability measure by syntactical structures. It reveals a link between modal logic and mathematical probability theory. This is shown (1) by adding an operator (and two further connectives and constants) to a system of lower predicate calculus and (2) regarding the models of that extended system. These models are models of the modal systemS ₅ (without the Barcan formula), where a usual probability measure is defined on their set of possible worlds. Mathematical probability models can be seen as models ofS ₅.     

A new approach to manipulation arguments

There are several argumentative strategies for advancing the thesis that moral responsibility is incompatible with causal determinism. One prominent such strategy is to argue that agents who meet compatibilist conditions for moral responsibility can nevertheless be subject to responsibility-undermining manipulation. In this paper, I argue that incompatibilists advancing manipulation arguments against compatibilism have been shouldering an unnecessarily heavy dialectical burden. Traditional manipulation arguments present cases in which manipulated agents meet all compatibilist conditions for moral responsibility, but are (allegedly) not responsible for their behavior. I argue, however, that incompatibilists can make do with the more modest (and harder to resist) claim that the manipulation in question is mitigating with respect to moral responsibility. The focus solely on whether a manipulated agent is or is not morally responsible has, I believe, masked the full force of manipulation-style arguments against compatibilism. Here, I aim to unveil their real power.