Qualified Sense Research Articles

Flourishing at the end of life

Flourishing is an increasingly common construct employed in the study of human wellbeing. But its appropriateness as a framework of wellbeing at certain stages of life is contested. In this paper, we consider to what extent it is possible for someone to flourish at the end of life. People with terminal illness often experience significant and protracted pain and suffering especially when they opt for treatments that prolong life. Certain aspects of human goods, however, that are plausibly constitutive of flourishing—such as meaning and purpose, deep personal relationships, and character and virtue—can be uniquely realised when life is ending. We argue that there is a qualified sense in which one can flourish at the end of life but that one must make important modifications to the criteria implicit in conventional conceptions of flourishing. We close with a discussion of the empirical assessment of wellbeing at the end of life and explore the possibility of introducing a flourishing measure in palliative care practice.

Why Privation Is a Form in a Qualified Sense for Aristotle

Abstract In Aristotle’s account of change, lacking a form is called privation (Physics I.7 191a14). For example, someone takes on the form of being musical only from previously having the privation of being unmusical. However, he also states that “shape and nature are spoken of in two ways, for the privation too is in a way form” (Physics II.1 193b19). I will demonstrate that these seemingly contradictory statements are not actually in tension. Since all perceptible matter must be enformed, we would have trouble discussing things that have yet to undergo generation, like menstrual fluid, and things that have undergone corruption, like corpses, if we did not cite the privation as a sort of form. I will argue that, given his commitment to hylomorphism, Aristotle is committed to privation being a form in a qualified sense. It cannot be a form in an unqualified sense because privation often spoils the matter such that it can no longer be reformed. The fact of the matter is we cannot draw a bright line between privation and form because the two are contraries and can be said to hold to different degrees at different points on a spectrum.

Qualified Hope and the Ethics of Planetary Boundaries

The present essay explores the way theologies can contribute to the discussion of the ethics of the “planetary boundaries” framework and its rhetorical proposal for a ‘safe operating space’. I first give a brief description of the ‘planetary boundaries’ framework proposed by Johan Rockström and others. The idea of a ‘safe operating space’ is not simply a neutral scientific assessment, but more importantly, a narrative framework that weaves stability, risk, and uncertainty together. This narrative needs both the humanities and the sciences to be understood. Second, I propose how theological reflection can contribute to the discussion through its interpretation of the rhetorical and ethical facets of the ‘planetary boundaries’ proposal. Specifically, a Christian theological lens is able to develop a model of a qualified sense of hope, which can be leveraged as a bridge between the dire warnings and uncertainty of the science of ‘planetary boundaries’, on one hand, and the call for transformation and action that researchers make on the other. Finally, I provide some recent examples of this theologically-inspired ‘qualified hope’ in the face of environmental change.

Should Kant Be Viewed as a Public Philosopher?

Immanuel Kant is rarely appreciated for his contributions to public philosophy. This is unsurprising, given his dry, technical style, criticism of the popular German philosophy movement, and prolonged silence on religious topics following censorship threats from Frederick William II. Yet Kant’s underappreciation vis-à-vis public philosophy is curious: Not only was he a vocal supporter of the early French Revolution, but he also said much on the public and political value of enlightenment. These ideas come across indirectly in his systematic writings and explicitly in writings for the learned public. This paper focuses on the question as to whether Kant should be viewed as a public philosopher, drawing from recent contributions in Kant scholarship to argue for the affirmative, though in an admittedly qualified sense.

Uncanny Teletherapy: Working with Extimacy.

Responses to the question of teletherapy have multiplied over the past decades, yet many therapists are grappling with the challenges and opportunities of teletherapy for the first time in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. For many clinicians, teletherapy was, at least initially, unfamiliar and unsettling. Much of the literature construes teletherapy as a degradation of an original-incapable of providing the intimacy achieved and maintained in two-bodies-in-a-room therapy-or as a good enough simulation. Both positions risk enshrining the consulting room as offering an unmediated scene of therapy. An alternative approach to the strangeness, distance, and mediations so prominent in the transition to teletherapy takes up a qualified sense of Freud's concept of the uncanny: the "minimal uncanny" and its reformulation in Lacanian theory as extimacy, a lens through which to explore intimacy and bodily proximity in the transition to teletherapy. Through the logic of extimacy, a theoretical view emerges that approaches teletherapy not as a poor substitute for real therapy, or a good enough substitute, but as an exemplary case of the therapeutic encounter.

Joji

Reviewed by: Joji Abhishek Sarkar and Balagopal S. Menon Joji Produced by Bhavana Studios, Working Class Hero, and Fahadh Faasil and Friends, streaming on Amazon Prime Video from 7 April 2021. Directed by Dileesh Pothan. Written by Syam Pushkaran.Cinematography by Shyju Khalid. Edited by Kiran Das. Music by Justin Varghese. With Fahadh Faasil (Joji), Spadikam Sunny (Kuttappan), Baburaj (Jomon), Joji Mundakayam (Jaison), Unnimaya Prasad (Bincy), Alister Alex (Popy), and others. In the interviews that followed the release of the Malayalam film Joji, both its director Dileesh Pothan and its writer Syam Pushkaran made a point of specifying that the film “was inspired by Macbeth” (John). The lead actor, Fahadh Faasil, reiterated this sentiment in another interview, explaining that the film is not a direct adaptation of the play but “something inspired by Macbeth in today’s scenario” (PTI). Early in the opening credits of Joji, the film itself acknowledges that it is “Inspired from Shakespeare’s Macbeth,” but in its initial moments the plot has a closer resemblance to King Lear, due to its portrayal of intergenerational conflict and the children’s greed for their father’s property. The action unfolds in a sprawling and sequestered rubber plantation belonging to a Syrian Christian family in the southern Indian state of Kerala. The estate is ruled over by Kuttappan (Spadikam Sunny), a domineering patriarch whose adult sons cower before him. The eldest son, Jomon (Baburaj), is a hot-headed alcoholic who has no material ambitions, while the second son, Jaison (Joji Mundakayam), and his wife Bincy (Unnimaya Prasad), want to set up a separate household of their own in the city. The youngest son, Joji (Fahadh Faasil), severely resents Kuttappan’s authority and wants to emigrate, but is dependent on his father’s finances. When Kuttappan is incapacitated after suffering a stroke, Joji expects to be liberated from his father’s tyranny. But Kuttappan recovers substantially after a tricky surgery, to the extent that he can sign a check flawlessly and jeer at Jaison and Bincy’s desire for autonomy. [End Page 464] Moreover, when Joji comes to Kuttappan begging for money, he almost throttles Joji with his one working hand before unceremoniously tossing him on the floor. Joji decides to kill Kuttappan by switching his pills, a plan that is detected but connived at by Bincy. After the scheme succeeds and the sons start discussing partition of the property, Jomon increasingly suspects that Joji is responsible for Kuttappan’s death. When Jomon tries to coerce a confession out of Joji in a desolate field, Joji shoots him twice with an air pistol and then bombards him with a crude explosive (used commonly by local agriculturists to sculpt the hilly terrain). The autopsy of Jomon’s body reveals the air pistol pellets that are not consistent with Joji’s eyewitness account of the murder. Suspected by his family and cornered by the police, Joji tries to commit suicide by shooting himself in the skull with the same air pistol. But, bathetically enough, he survives the bid and ends up paralyzed. The film rivals Shakespeare’s shortest tragedy as regards the compactness of the plot. Previous adaptations of Shakespeare’s tragedies in Mollywood (the moniker for the Malayalam film industry based in Kochi) include three films by Jayaraj—Kaliyattam (1997; based on Othello), Kannaki (2002; based on Antony and Cleopatra), and Veeram (2016; based on Macbeth). While these films took great liberties in reimagining Shakespeare’s plays, they seldom rewrote the basic plot or character elements of his texts. In this regard, Joji may be seen as a novel attempt in the industry as it tries to reimagine and reset Macbeth by taking it beyond the genre of tragedy. The film is thus an adaptation of Macbeth in a very qualified sense. It borrows plot or character elements from the play only selectively, most often inverting the ethos of Shakespeare’s tragedy. The choice of the protagonist makes this process amply clear. Joji is not “Valour’s minion” (1.2.19) or “Bellona’s bridegroom” (1.2.55) like Macbeth, but an indolent and feckless young man caught in an eternal adolescence. His puny, spare build is in stark contrast with...

Vagueness and variety in person-centred care

Person-centred care is a cornerstone of contemporary health policy, research and practice. However, many researchers and practitioners worry that it lacks a ‘clear definition and method of measurement,’ and that this creates problems for the implementation of person-centred care and limits understanding of its benefits. In this paper we urge caution about this concern and resist calls for a clear, settled definition and measurement approach. We develop a philosophical and conceptual analysis which is grounded in the body of literature concerning the theory and practice of person-centred care. We consider a range of influential definitional frameworks of person-centred care, highlighting their differences and showing that they do not correspond to a clearly circumscribed and consistent underlying concept. We argue that a degree of indeterminacy and vagueness should not be seen as a problem with the concept of person-centred care; these are features of a rich and contested concept which exists prior to and outside of practical and technical operational definitions and applications. We defend the value of operating with multiple accounts of person-centred care, arguing that what counts as being person-centred can vary across different care contexts, in relation to different patient groups, and as a reflection of different, defensible ethical perspectives. Although the idea of a single, agreed definition is attractive and may seem to be a practical or even necessary step towards meaningful and coordinated action, we argue that this is only the case in a qualified sense. Comprehensive attempts to narrow down the concept in this way should be resisted, as they risk undermining what it is that makes person-centredness a valuable concept in healthcare.

Vagueness and variety in person-centred care.

Person-centred care is a cornerstone of contemporary health policy, research and practice. However, many researchers and practitioners worry that it lacks a 'clear definition and method of measurement,' and that this creates problems for the implementation of person-centred care and limits understanding of its benefits. In this paper we urge caution about this concern and resist calls for a clear, settled definition and measurement approach. We develop a philosophical and conceptual analysis which is grounded in the body of literature concerning the theory and practice of person-centred care. We consider a range of influential definitional frameworks of person-centred care, highlighting their differences and showing that they do not correspond to a clearly circumscribed and consistent underlying concept. We argue that a degree of indeterminacy and vagueness should not be seen as a problem with the concept of person-centred care; these are features of a rich and contested concept which exists prior to and outside of practical and technical operational definitions and applications. We defend the value of operating with multiple accounts of person-centred care, arguing that what counts as being person-centred can vary across different care contexts, in relation to different patient groups, and as a reflection of different, defensible ethical perspectives. Although the idea of a single, agreed definition is attractive and may seem to be a practical or even necessary step towards meaningful and coordinated action, we argue that this is only the case in a qualified sense. Comprehensive attempts to narrow down the concept in this way should be resisted, as they risk undermining what it is that makes person-centredness a valuable concept in healthcare.

Virtue and Grace in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas by Justin M. Anderson

Reviewed by: Virtue and Grace in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas by Justin M. Anderson David Elliot Virtue and Grace in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas. By Justin M. Anderson. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 2020. Pp. 341. $99.99 (hardcover). ISBN: 978-1-108-48518-0. Struck by the unique way he combines comprehensive genius and judicious balance with an air of serene detachment, many regard St. Thomas Aquinas as such a complete thinker that the idea of him repeatedly changing his mind can seem outlandish. While it is not controversial to say that his thought developed from his early to his later works, few could imagine him writing a book like St. Augustine’s Retractations, or would suggest that Thomism would have taken some radically different shape had he lived a decade longer. His mature works come across not as brilliant detours but as fully ripened conclusions, making the notion of an incessantly “evolving” Aquinas seem deeply eccentric. At the same time, there were a few periods—such as his fruitful stay at Orvieto and then Rome in the 1260s—where Aquinas made remarkable discoveries and changed course in important ways. Recognition of this is sometimes traced to the twentieth century, but already in the 1440s John Capreolus (the “Prince of Thomists”) noted major shifts in Aquinas’s teaching on grace after his earlier Scriptum on the Sentences, as did Cardinal Cajetan and the Salamancan Dominic de Soto a century later. For Capreolus the Summa theologiae was a kind of understated Retractations in that Aquinas fully “moved back from the Pelagian error” which his contemporaries and his own earlier Scriptum did not completely root out. On this view, it is to the late Aquinas that we owe a fully adequate doctrine of grace from which the theological and infused cardinal virtues flow. In this excellent book, Justin Anderson takes up the role of a latter-day Capreolus, pushing firmly against any current trends toward a “Thomistic Pelagianism” (169). He argues that Aquinas’s theology of virtue and grace underwent “titanic developments” that led him to stress themes such as the moral necessity of grace and the damaging effects of sin in ever more refined and emphatic ways. This argument is substantially correct and vast in its implications, but Anderson holds that these shifts have yet fully to impact Thomistic moral theology, like a detonation that has flashed on the horizon but whose fallout has yet to land. The book seeks to trace the fallout, showing how Aquinas’s mature teaching on grace and sin pulled his virtue theory in ever more Augustinian and Pauline directions, yet without forfeiting core Aristotelian [End Page 299] commitments. The book also joins this stress on Christian particularity with a quite different effort to affirm the category of “pagan virtue” on very generous terms. It is by turns an in-depth exegesis of Aquinas’s texts, an historical examination of the hundred years preceding, and an attempt to shift the conversation in Thomistic virtue scholarship toward the moral consequences of Aquinas’s later teaching on grace. It is an engaging story that in some ways could have been better told, but there is no doubting its importance. The first chapter gives a general outline of Thomistic virtues as habits perfective of human powers. Anderson distinguishes virtues based on their causes and ends, and as bundled into cardinal and theological, acquired and infused, and other familiar clusters. The second examines Aquinas’s exact vocabulary of virtue to describe its many meanings and analogous senses. The most important concern virtue simpliciter or “without qualification,” and virtue secundum quid or in a “qualified sense.” Gratuitous or infused virtue, which directs us to our ultimate end, is virtue simpliciter (61). By contrast, connatural or acquired virtue falls short of that end, and yet its level of perfection does qualify it as virtue secundum quid. It can be said that the full definition of virtue (simpliciter) is theological while leaving space for “pagan virtue” in a secondary sense (secundum quid). But it is from the third chapter onward that the really significant achievement of this book emerges. Anderson gives a detailed study of how the...

The Apocalyptic Narrative

An analysis of the value systems of critical social issues is difficult to carry out in any qualified sense from an unstructured basis and that attempts to do so easily result in relatively superficial discussions of particular issues. Instead, we suggest how this might be viewed from a more holistic ethical and systems theological perspective. In doing so, we review a new framework that aims to distil relevant issues regarding necessary trade-offs and how this can be done. Broadly speaking, this consists of a kind of Socratic dialogue that systematically examines the value basis of the decisions that need to be made, as well as whether the effects of the decisions become unacceptable and thus need to be modified vis-à-vis the normative system embraced by the decision-maker. We discuss the role of theologians in this and emphasise that they should take a larger place in discussions on how to deal with complex societal crises.

Informar de modo qualificado: a finalidade central do jornalismo nas sociedades democráticas

Este artigo teórico discute a finalidade central do jornalismo nas sociedades democráticas, que é informar de modo qualificado. O trabalho traz um mapeamento de autores sobre o papel do jornalismo de informar, desde a primeira tese conhecida sobre jornalismo em 1690. Além disso, aponta que o papel de informar é primordial no discurso de veículos, jornalistas e leitores quando definem o dever do jornalismo na sociedade. A partir do entendimento de que não se pode compreender a finalidade de informar como um processo finalístico, aponta-se que é preciso diferenciar informação de informação jornalística. Conclui-se que a informação deve ter alguns atributos de qualidade, sem os quais se invalidaria classificar uma informação como jornalística. Para ser qualificada, a informação deve ser verificada, relevante, contextualizada, plural e envolvente.

Three kinds of competitive excellence

ABSTRACT I call the trait that makes for a good or great competitor, the trait that makes its possessor compete well, ‘competitive excellence’. We seem to be of two minds about this trait: on the one hand, we often admire great competitors, but on the other hand, we sometimes identify their competitive drive as ‘pathological’, recognizing something unhealthy in it. Why are we so ambivalent? The answer I will defend is that there are at least three distinct traits, each of which satisfies the definition of competitive excellence and so has something of a claim to be the trait we admire in great competitors. One of these traits is a virtue, one a vice, and one can be either a virtue or a vice depending on what other traits accompany it. This accounts for our deep ambivalence about great competitors and implies that we should only seek to be great competitors in a qualified sense.

I Speak for the Water: Anishinaabe Nibi Grandmothers and Watershed Discipleship in Northern Midwestern Protestant Communities

I Speak for the Water: Anishinaabe Nibi Grandmothers and Watershed Discipleship in Northern Midwestern Protestant Communities Kiara Jorgenson (bio) Ne-be Gee Zah- gay- e- gooGee Me-gwetch -wayn ne- me—gooGee Zah Wayn ne- me- goo1 Every Sunday morning Sharon Day gathers near the waters of the Gichi Ziibi (Mississippi River) at Hidden Falls Regional Park in St. Paul, MN, to sing prayers for the river. Much like the words of her sister’s prayer above, Sharon’s prayers offer love, gratitude, and respect to the waters. Though her shared company changes from week to week, she is rarely alone in her efforts as she has extended an invitation for any and all to join in this spiritual ritual of reverence and reciprocity. Sharon’s longstanding leadership with the Indigenous Peoples Taskforce and role as a second degree M’dewiwin of the Bois Forte Band of Ojibwe in northern Minnesota have positioned her as a powerful elder in northern Midwestern indigenous communities and beyond, but it has been her particular work related to the protection and preservation of waters that has distinguished her as one of few celebrated Nibi (water) grandmothers. THE IMPORTANCE OF INTENTION SETTING & RITUAL PROTOCOLS In settings like those Sunday mornings beside the Gichi Ziibi and on formal Nibi Walks, Ojibwe elders like Sharon generously share traditional ecological knowledge within and without their communities, often leading educators and activists, clergy and lobbyists to a deeper understanding of water’s dignity and the collective call to care for its future (see figure 1). As a type of spiritual-ecological resistance movement (my term, not Sharon’s) Nibi Walks are particularly powerful given recent infringements upon the water rights of many indigenous groups, including the Ojibwe of Fond du Lac Reservation in northern Minnesota where Enbridge, a multinational energy transportation [End Page 194] Click for larger view View full resolution Fig. 1. Sharon Day, Executive Director of the Indigenous People’s Taskforce and curator of the Nibi Walks website. Courtesy of Sharon Day, nibiwalk.org. company, seeks to complete construction of the controversial Line 3 crude oil pipeline. But perhaps equally valuable to the lessons learned on Nibi Walks is the very way Nibi grandmothers like Sharon gather to honor lakes and rivers, oceans and watersheds. As I shall seek to illustrate below, their model of water walking showcases the spiritual value of prayerful presence and intentional connection with one’s place. With water, as with all facets of a responsible life, the intentions and rituals that make them plain prove paramount. A good example of how method can itself be a spiritual lesson is the Nibi Walk orientation, a half-day of guidance wherein the spiritual goal of Nibi Walks is clearly explained and related protocols outlined. As inherently inclusive Nibi Walks are not M’dewiwin spiritual ceremonies or religious practices in a qualified sense, but neither are they political events or environmental rallies devoid of spiritual tenor. In Sharon’s words, “Nibi Walks are about prayer, not protest.” And because they connect people from divergent contexts and places, the walks require protocols to clarify purpose. During a Nibi Walk water is carried in a copper pail, to remind all involved of Earth’s elements in its tender beginnings. Water, itself rendered an inanimate noun in Ojibwe language as opposed to animate rocks, trees and plants, is to be carried in relay, moving continuously like the river itself [End Page 195] and always in close proximity to the snaking, forging current. As privileged and anointed carriers of the same primordial water that birthed the cosmos, women carry the enclosed water wearing skirts to demonstrate both ceremonial intent and respect for Shkaakaamikwe (Mother Earth), understood as inseparable from one’s very self. If men are present on a walk they carry the eagle feather staff, a symbol of protection for the journey. Finally, endangered Ojibwe language is used whenever possible throughout the walk, its spoken form a prayerful consecration. When I presented the multi-media research which serves as the foundation of this essay in San Diego at the 2019 American Academy of Religion’s “Christian Spirituality Unit,” I also began by setting an...

Summoning, No-Signalling and Relativistic Bit Commitments.

Summoning is a task between two parties, Alice and Bob, with distributed networks of agents in space-time. Bob gives Alice a random quantum state, known to him but not her, at some point. She is required to return the state at some later point, belonging to a subset defined by communications received from Bob at other points. Many results about summoning, including the impossibility of unrestricted summoning tasks and the necessary conditions for specific types of summoning tasks to be possible, follow directly from the quantum no-cloning theorem and the relativistic no-superluminal-signalling principle. The impossibility of cloning devices can be derived from the impossibility of superluminal signalling and the projection postulate, together with assumptions about the devices’ location-independent functioning. In this qualified sense, known summoning results follow from the causal structure of space-time and the properties of quantum measurements. Bounds on the fidelity of approximate cloning can be similarly derived. Bit commitment protocols and other cryptographic protocols based on the no-summoning theorem can thus be proven secure against some classes of post-quantum but non-signalling adversaries.

Are the Gospels “Historically Reliable”? A Focused Comparison of Suetonius’s Life of Augustus and the Gospel of Mark

Are the Gospels historically reliable? Authors of ancient historical literature had objectives for writing that differed somewhat from those of modern historians. Consequently, the literary conventions that were in play also differed. Therefore, it is difficult to speak of the historical reliability of ancient texts without certain qualifications. In this essay, a definition for the historical reliability of ancient texts is proposed, whereby such a text provides an accurate gist, or an essentially faithful representation of what occurred. Four criteria that must be met are then proposed. Suetonius’s Life of the Divine Augustus and the Gospel of Mark, are then assessed by using the criteria. Suetonius was chosen because he wrote more closely than his peers to how modern biographers write, and the Augustus was chosen because it is the finest of Suetonius’s Lives. The Gospel of Mark from the Bible was chosen because it is probably the earliest extant account of the “Life of Jesus.” The result of this focused comparison suggests that the Life of Augustus and the Gospel of Mark can be said to be historically reliable in the qualified sense proposed. However, an additional factor challenging this conclusion is described, and further discussion is needed and encouraged.

Reliabilism, the Generality Problem, and the Basing Relation

AbstractIn “A Well‐Founded Solution to the Generality Problem”, Comesaña argues, inter alia, for three main claims. One is what I call the unavoidability claim: Any adequate epistemological theory needs to appeal, either implicitly or explicitly, to the notion of a belief's being based on certain evidence. Another is what I call the legitimacy claim: It is perfectly legitimate to appeal to the basing relation in solving a problem for an epistemological theory. According to Comesaña, the legitimacy claim follows straightforwardly from the unavoidability claim. The third is what I call the basing solution claim: An appeal to the notion of basing relation is all we need to solve the generality problem for (process) reliabilism. In this article, I argue that the unavoidability claim and the basing solution claim are false and that the legitimacy claim might be true only in a qualified sense.

Maps from a surface into a compact Lie group and curvature

These are notes on seminal work of Freed, and subsequent developments, on the curvature properties of (Sobolev Lie) groups of maps from a Riemannian manifold into a compact Lie group. We are mainly interested in critical cases which are relevant to quantum field theory. For example Freed showed that, in a necessarily qualified sense, the quotient space $W^{1/2}(S^1,K)/K$ is a (positive constant) Einstein `manifold' with respect to the essentially unique PSU(1,1) invariant metric, where $W^{s}$ denotes maps of $L^2$ Sobolev order s. In a similarly qualified sense, and in addition making use of the Dixmier trace/Wodzicki residue, we show that for a Riemann surface Sigma, $W^1(\Sigma,K)/K$ is a (positive constant) Einstein `manifold' with respect to the essentially unique conformally invariant metric. As in the one dimensional case, invariance implies Einstein, but the sign of the Ricci curvature has to be computed. Because of the qualifications involved in these statements, in practice it is necessary to consider curvature for $W^s(\Sigma,K)$ for s above the critical exponent, and limits. The formula we obtain is surprisingly simple.

First-Price Auctions with Budget Constraints

Consider a first-price, sealed-bid auction with interdependent valuations and private budget constraints. Private budget constraints introduce subtle strategic tradeoffs with first-order consequences for equilibrium bidding. In a pure-strategy, symmetric equilibrium, agents may adopt discontinuous bidding strategies resulting in a stratification of competition along the budget dimension. In an asymmetric setting, equilibria in “nondecreasing” strategies exist, albeit in a qualified sense. Private budgets introduce significant confounds for the interpretation of bidding data due to their interaction with risk preferences and their countervailing strategic implications.

Seven Ways of Looking at Pointless Suffering: What Philosophy Can Tell Us about the Hardest Mystery of All by Scott Samuelson

Reviewed by: Seven Ways of Looking at Pointless Suffering: What Philosophy Can Tell Us about the Hardest Mystery of All by Scott Samuelson E. Christian Brugger SAMUELSON, Scott. Seven Ways of Looking at Pointless Suffering: What Philosophy Can Tell Us about the Hardest Mystery of All. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2018. vi + 270 pp. Cloth, $25.00 The author, an academic philosopher, draws from seven sources, six philosophical and one artistic, in an attempt to develop a kind of epistemic instrument, more idiosyncratic than systematic, for rehabilitating what he believes to be a perennial but forgotten approach to suffering, "paradoxical" he calls it, whereby we (humans, the sufferers) grow to a mature acceptance of suffering, even in a qualified sense a befriending of it, while at the same time never giving up the fight to overcome it. The seven sources in textual order include the philosophy of J. S. Mill and utilitarianism, of Nietzsche and of the challenge to embrace the [End Page 399] "eternal return," of Hannah Arendt's conception of the "banality of evil," of the Book of Job's picture of how suffering reveals God, of Epictetus and the Stoic conception that suffering atones us with nature, of Confucius on the relationship between suffering and empathy, and of how the life of the great blues musician Sidney Bechet illustrates suffering's potential for stimulating artistic creativity. Samuelson exhibits an admirable grasp of his subject matter and a rare facility for rendering difficult concepts intelligible to a nonspecialized reader. Although he plays the agnostic toward all the seven ways, his least favourite is obviously utilitarianism, which proposes the elimination of pointless suffering by any means necessary to maximize the happiness of the many. He seems most to sympathize with Stoicism's view that life here and now is a gift and suffering an unavoidable part. If we reject suffering, we reject the gift. If we pine for some counterfactual vision of the happy life, we are doomed to unhappiness. But if we wish things to happen as they do, then even the worst happenings will not destroy happiness. Thus he admires Nietzsche's idea of life as an artistic work, where the canvas of our face is set bravely and grimly toward pain, aiming to create an aesthetic masterpiece, as well as Walt Whitman's preoccupation with "the starry system," that is, with wonder and reverence for the here and now (since that is all there is). Much of the book is written in narrative form with the author reflecting on his years of experience teaching philosophy to inmates at a medium security prison in Iowa. The literary technique is on the whole effective. When introducing us (his readers) to great texts and thinkers on suffering, he recounts how his student inmates received the same material. The freshness of some of their responses, especially from a man named Simon, offers the text an effectual ground wire, and, frankly, makes for a more interesting read. A weakness with the method is its assumption that prison sufferings are a fit paradigm for all pointless suffering, something the author seems to believe, but that some readers are likely to question. The author is strongest when he assumes the role of philosophical pedagogue, and weakest when he descends into his frequent political commentaries on how penal reform ought to be undertaken in the U.S. The text's great flaw in my mind is what I expect the author believes its greatest strength, namely, its syncretism. It assumes that the leading protagonists of the perennial conversation about the meaning of pointless suffering, however logically contradictory their accounts—atheist, nihilist, amoralist, monist, Christian theist—are all equally valid shareholders of history's still-developing response to humanity's greatest problem, or to change the metaphor, equal chair-holders at history's table of discussion: Nietzsche, Darwin, Lewis, Mill, Chesterton, Aquinas, Kafka, Foucault, Pliny, Sartre, Singer, Nussbaum, Marx, Merton, Pascal, Voltaire, Eliot, Epictetus, O'Connor (Flannery), Confucius, Solzhenitsyn, the Budda, and Jesus. All together, like the proverbial lion and lamb. From every page the distinctively modern plaintive complaint can be heard: why can't we all just get along? [End Page 400...

COLORS FERTILE T. UYAR WAYS OF READING IN THE DILEMMA / FIRST CHOICE: BLACK AND WHITE ...

Since all light from the sun, which is still dominated by the first light of the sky or the sun. World time gave even at their disposal. They do people, he must realize that, albeit in different forms in the light. the main source of artificial light until it has never been changed. Poetry actually crushed under the light, will be written. He said the poet who want to reach an unknown time, the intention is to go on the road as close to divine theology. Take under the influence of the environment as a soul the dust of the poem depends to spread the spirit of all known. That's why we look at our poets, they move beyond what we see at a glance. The sense of light known by everyone. Special meaning is a reflection of the property.Iknci Yeni, has witnessed a time of poetic intensity in the Turkish poetry tradition. Different trends in the world, has seen a time when the break occurred. All transitions have very different reactions in the human world of poets exception. Turgut Uyar, then all the values of the semi-urban stuck together as a personality we can say that to their climate. Light is a double value illuminating or decision they want to see him. Besides the special general sense, it also carries a qualified sense. Particularly striking is filled with black and white images load. White is interesting to carry the same attributes in the black space of the tragic point. This Turgut Uyar, adds a different dimension to the meaning of the poem.