The possibility of pragmatic reasons for belief and the wrong kind of reasons problem

In this paper I argue against the stronger of the two views concerning the right and wrong kind of reasons for belief, i.e. the view that the only genuine normative reasons for belief are evidential. The project in this paper is primarily negative, but with an ultimately positive aim. That aim is to leave room for the possibility that there are genuine pragmatic reasons for belief. Work is required to make room for this view, because evidentialism of a strict variety remains the default view in much of the debate concerning normative reasons for belief. Strict versions of evidentialism are inconsistent with the view that there are genuine pragmatic reasons for belief.

Trauma: the seductive hypothesis

In much of contemporary culture, "trauma" signifies not so much terrible experience as a particular context for understanding and responding to a terrible experience. In therapy, in the media, and in international interventions, the traumatized are seen not simply as people who suffer and so are deserving of concern and aid; they are seen also as people who suffer for us, who are given special dispensation. They are treated with awe if they tell a certain kind of trauma story, and are ignored or vilified if they tell another. Trauma has become not simply a story of pain and its treatment, but a host of sub-stories involving the commodification of altruism, the justification of violence and revenge, the entry point into "true experience," and the place where voyeurism and witnessing intersect. Trauma is today the stuff not only of suffering but of fantasy. Historically, trauma theory and treatment have shown a tension, exemplified in the writings of Freud and Janet, between those who view trauma as formative and those who view it as exceptional. The latter view, that trauma confers exceptional status deserving of special privilege, has gained ground in recent years and has helped to shape the way charitable dollars are distributed, how the traumatized are presented in the media, how governments justify and carry out international responses to trauma, and how therapists attend to their traumatized patients. This response to trauma reflects an underlying, unarticulated belief system derived from narcissism; indeed, trauma has increasingly become the venue, in society and in treatment, where narcissism is permitted to prevail.     

On the Desymbolization of Psychoanalytic Metaphors of Gender: Commentary on Velleda C. Ceccoli's “Beyond Milk and the Good Breast: Reconfiguring the Maternal Function in Psychoanalytic Dyads”

Ceccoli (1999a) argues that, because of their capacity for maternity, women analysts are capable of certain interventions that men are not. Taking issue with such assertions, this commentary argues that although the gendered metaphors of psychoanalytic intervention have changed usefully since Freud's paternalistic imagery, in favor of the maternal language of Klein and Winnicott, these metaphors are regressive if their value as symbolism is undermined. Ceccoli's case study is revisited and reevaluated to posit an alternative view: that theory is sometimes employed to fill gaps that might be more productively tolerated in the service of the analysis. It is argued that Ceccoli's use of Kristevan theory to support an essentialist position that translocates the paternal phallus into the female analysts' “gendered, bodily specificity … on the basis of our capacity for maternity” (p. 695) is an example of such a use of theory.     

Ward assessment questionnaire--a further possibility for objectively evaluating therapeutically significant milieu conditions

Ways of evaluating the therapeutic environment in psychiatry and psychotherapy are discussed, and an account of work with Engels Ward Assessment Form is given.     

The Renaissance Ethics of Music: Singing,Contemplation and Musica Humana

Abstract

This article considers Calvin's late work, the Harmony of the Pentateuch (1563). It takes account of previous attempts to illuminate Calvin's purpose in this production by De Boer, Blacketer, Thiel, Wright and Balserak. There follows a consideration of Calvin's view of the ceremonial law for Christians, and a distinction is drawn between the Old Testament cult and the Old Testament law concerning that cult. It finally takes soundings from the work itself to argue that for Calvin, the timeless spirit of worship could be understood behind its outward expression. What matters is that God is seen to call believers out of the flow of everyday occurrence into worship.