Liberal vs Radical Feminism Revisited

ABSTRACT This essay considers the movement away from a feminism based upon liberal political principles, such as John Stuart Mill espoused, and towards a radical feminism which seeks to build upon more recent explorations of psychology, biology and sexuality. It argues that some of these moves are philosophically suspect and that liberal feminism can accommodate the more substantial elements in these radical lines of thought.     

The Radical Cartesianism of Robert Desgabets and the Scholastic Heritage

Robert Desgabets (1610–1678) has been described as a ‘radical Cartesian’. Drawing conclusions from Descartes's thought that Descartes himself had failed to see, Desgabets treated Cartesianism as a work in progress that awaited further enrichment and development. But, as scholars have recognized, Desgabets's writings also betray a significant indebtedness to scholastic tradition. In presenting his philosophy, Desgabets often appeals to traditional notions, breathing new life into scholastic concepts and ideas. This paper investigates what we are to make of the scholastic vestiges in Desgabets's thought. It argues that Desgabets's relation to scholastic tradition is more complicated than Desgabets himself wants us to believe, or than his modern commentators have recognized. Scholastic echoes in Desgabets cannot be taken at face value. Sometimes, they reflect basic points of agreement with scholastic theories. But just as often, scholastic formulae in Desgabets are vehicles for expressing philosophical views that go way beyond anything to be found in his predecessors.     

《庆祝五台山申遗成功——中国千名书家写经书法大展作品集》首发座谈会在京隆重举行

2011年3月26日,《庆祝五台山申遗成功——中国千名书家写经书法大展作品集》首发座谈会,在北京全国政协礼堂隆重举行。活动开幕前,全国政协原副主席赵南起来到活动现场,饶有兴致地观看了中国千名书家写经书法大展的有关资料,听取了活动负责人的汇报。     

做知恩善报的穆斯林

《古兰经》说:"我确已把智慧赏赐鲁格曼,[我说]:‘你当感谢真主。感谢的人,只为自己而感谢,辜负的人,须知真主确是无求的,确是可颂的。’"(31:12)经文告诉我们,真主赐予鲁格曼贤哲的智慧中,就有感恩一项,而且,要知道感恩对自己有好处;而不知道感恩的人,则对自己有伤害,会导致贫穷和声誉受损。《古兰经》还反复告诉我们这样的道理:"感谢者,只为自己的利益而感谢;辜负者[须知]我的主确是无求的、确是尊荣的。’"(27:40)经文中说此话的人是苏莱曼圣人,他同样告诉我们感恩能带来利益和荣耀。     

申遗成功后的五台山旅游业发展

五台山是属于全人类的宝贵遗产。作为世界文化景观遗产的价值体现在佛教圣地、艺术宝库、清凉胜境等方面。申遗成功后,五台山旅游发展要注意处理好遗产保护与利用的关系、宗教文化与旅游的关系,要建设完善的五台山旅游服务体系,科学开发五台山客源市场。为建设和谐五台山,仍须推进管理体制改革,探索旅游资源一体化的管理模式,转变产业发展方式,加强对旅游活动的管理,加强对本地居民的教育,关注他们的生存与发展。     

Liberal Egalitarianism and Workfare

abstract In this paper we ask whether liberal egalitarians can endorse workfare policies that require that welfare recipients should work in return for their welfare benefits. In particular, we focus on the fairness‐based case for workfare, which holds that people should be responsible for their own welfare since they would otherwise impose unfair costs on others. Two versions of the fairness‐based case are considered. The first defends workfare on the grounds that it would form part of an unemployment insurance scheme that individuals would endorse under certain hypothetical conditions that are salient for the purposes of determining just public policy. The second appeals to the notion of reciprocity in order to justify the requirement that people work for their benefits. We cast doubt on both of these arguments for workfare. Neither argument shows that the unconditional provision of welfare benefits is unjust; hence, the fairness case for workfare is inconclusive.     

Liberal Exclusions and Foundationalism

Certain versions of liberalism exclude from public political discussions the reasons some citizens regard as most fundamental, reasons having to do with their deepest religious, philosophical, moral or political views. This liberal exclusion of deep and deeply held reasons from political discussions has been controversial. In this article I will point out a way in which the discussion seems to presuppose a foundationalist conception of human reasoning. This is rather surprising, inasmuch as one of the foremost advocates of liberalism, John Rawls, is also known for being one of the first advocates of reflective equilibrium, which is clearly a coherentist approach to theory construction and justification. I will begin in Park I by making my charge against an almost embarrassingly crude presentation of the liberal position. Then in Part II I will leap to Rawls' version of liberalism, obviously by far the most sophisticated working out of the position, and try to see whether anything remains of my criticism.     

Being Unimpressed with Ourselves: Reconceiving Humility

I first sketch an account of humility as a character trait in which we are unimpressed with our good, envied, or admired features, achievements, etc., where these lack significant salience for our image of ourselves, because of the greater prominence of our limitations and flaws. I situate this view among several other recent conceptions of humility (also called modesty), dividing them between the inward-directed and outward-directed, distinguish mine from them, pose problems for each alternative account, and show how my understanding of humility captures truths present but exaggerated in several of them. Responding to some problems for my view, including what I call “Driver’s Paradox”(i.e., the strangeness of someone’s proclaiming ‘I’m humble!’), I suggest that some over-ambitious claims about our moral responsibilities may indicate a lack of proper humility. I discuss the relationship of the character trait of humility both to what humiliates and to what humbles, concluding with consideration of the background assumptions against which, and the circumstances in which, humility may reasonably be classified as a moral virtue.