Encyclopedia of violence, peace, & conflict, Jan 1, 1999
Examines various arguments about whether and under what circumstances political violence can be j... more Examines various arguments about whether and under what circumstances political violence can be justified and how they can be employed in thinking ethically about violence. It begins by looking at arguments about the justifiability of violence that draw on major ethical theories such as deontology, utilitarianism and consequentialism. It then discusses more specific considerations and arguments concerning obligations to obey the law, the relationship between violence and reason, and between violence and democracy, and whether our duties and obligations regarding the use of violence are universal in scope or are limited by national, religious, community and class affiliation. Finally, it makes some novel suggestions about the overall purpose and conduct of discussions about the justifiability of violence in political theory and philosophy.
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I go on to argue that, in any case, we cannot imagine anything that could count as revealing to us that when a window shatters, given everything as it was at the point of impact, the window did not have to shatter. I argue that even if a case could be made for saying that if we have reason to believe anything, we have reason to believe what God tells us or shows us, there is nothing we can imagine that would give us good reason to believe that it would really be God, and not a hellish impostor, who is doing the showing or telling. Therefore, what van Inwagen invites us to imagine is unimaginable. I conclude that we cannot conceive of any circumstance that can give us good reason for abandoning or modifying our natural and reasonable inclination to say that when causes fail to produce their expected effects, some necessary accompanying condition must have been missing.
'... focuses upon the problems raised by Foucault for one central problem in philosophy, the question of freedom. One traditional philosophical position argues that in order for an individual or a collectivity truly to be free there must be an absence of power relations, or at least a sufficient diminishment of them in order that freedom can be articulated fully. Foucault's work questions this assumption and Magill examines Foucault's ambivalent attitude towards the relationship between freedom and power by situating his work within the philosophical tradition of Stoicism. For the Stoic tradition freedom is a quality obtained through certain practices of goodness and reason which are identified as a person's essential self. Foucault's work challenges this idea in his insistence that there is no essential self, only a self constructed as an effect of power by modern disciplinary technologies, and thus hampered in their ability to be a 'free self'. Magill offers a strong defence of the Stoic conception of freedom by identifying weaknesses in Foucault's account of power and subjectivity. Despite these criticisms Magill suggests that philosophical conceptions of freedom have much to learn from Foucault’s work: if we cannot escape from power, perhaps we are able to utilise the monitoring mechanisms of modern forms of power in order to create new forms of freedom. Foucault's work, Magill concludes, reminds us that philosophical questions such as the nature of freedom must be framed within a discussion of what we are, and what we might become, as human subjects.'"
- 'The man who says that all things come to pass by necessity cannot criticise one who denies that all things come to pass by necessity, for he admits that this too happens of necessity.' -
especially Ted Honderich's argument that the real force of the Epicurean claim is that if belief acquisition is causally necessitated, we will be excluded from possible facts and inquiries that might have produced new knowledge and might have shown some of what we take to be knowledge to be false. Honderich's argument fails to consider that undetermined inquirers might fail to make discoveries that determined inquirers could not fail to make. Determinism would not, therefore, put us in a worse position as seekers of knowledge than indeterminism."
I go on to argue that, in any case, we cannot imagine anything that could count as revealing to us that when a window shatters, given everything as it was at the point of impact, the window did not have to shatter. I argue that even if a case could be made for saying that if we have reason to believe anything, we have reason to believe what God tells us or shows us, there is nothing we can imagine that would give us good reason to believe that it would really be God, and not a hellish impostor, who is doing the showing or telling. Therefore, what van Inwagen invites us to imagine is unimaginable. I conclude that we cannot conceive of any circumstance that can give us good reason for abandoning or modifying our natural and reasonable inclination to say that when causes fail to produce their expected effects, some necessary accompanying condition must have been missing.
'... focuses upon the problems raised by Foucault for one central problem in philosophy, the question of freedom. One traditional philosophical position argues that in order for an individual or a collectivity truly to be free there must be an absence of power relations, or at least a sufficient diminishment of them in order that freedom can be articulated fully. Foucault's work questions this assumption and Magill examines Foucault's ambivalent attitude towards the relationship between freedom and power by situating his work within the philosophical tradition of Stoicism. For the Stoic tradition freedom is a quality obtained through certain practices of goodness and reason which are identified as a person's essential self. Foucault's work challenges this idea in his insistence that there is no essential self, only a self constructed as an effect of power by modern disciplinary technologies, and thus hampered in their ability to be a 'free self'. Magill offers a strong defence of the Stoic conception of freedom by identifying weaknesses in Foucault's account of power and subjectivity. Despite these criticisms Magill suggests that philosophical conceptions of freedom have much to learn from Foucault’s work: if we cannot escape from power, perhaps we are able to utilise the monitoring mechanisms of modern forms of power in order to create new forms of freedom. Foucault's work, Magill concludes, reminds us that philosophical questions such as the nature of freedom must be framed within a discussion of what we are, and what we might become, as human subjects.'"
- 'The man who says that all things come to pass by necessity cannot criticise one who denies that all things come to pass by necessity, for he admits that this too happens of necessity.' -
especially Ted Honderich's argument that the real force of the Epicurean claim is that if belief acquisition is causally necessitated, we will be excluded from possible facts and inquiries that might have produced new knowledge and might have shown some of what we take to be knowledge to be false. Honderich's argument fails to consider that undetermined inquirers might fail to make discoveries that determined inquirers could not fail to make. Determinism would not, therefore, put us in a worse position as seekers of knowledge than indeterminism."