Lawrence Haworth's book, Autonomy, discusses “Autonomy as a Psychological Idea”, and “Autonomy as a Normative Idea”. Part 1 discusses autonomy in relation to rationality, agency, and responsibility, defends it against Skinnerian sceptics, and outlines a theory of autonomous decision-making and the autonomous task environment. Haworth's conception of autonomy integrates and builds on the concepts of S. I. Benn, G. Dworkin, H. Frankfurt, and R. W. White. Part 2 centres on social/political theory, and not, despite the book's subtitle, on ethics as such. Haworth argues that only autonomy, and not liberty or happiness, is an intrinsic (non-moral) value, and fundamental right. His “autonomist” theory of liberty rights, a form of revisionary liberalism derived from the later idealists, is opposed to the classical liberal/libertarian theory. The arguments prompt a re-examination of the role of autonomy in the arguments for liberty (and happiness), but do not, in my view, make a persuasive case for “autonomism” against classical liberalism (hereafter liberalism). The book is chiefly noteworthy for its success in covering many important topics connected with autonomy, in an impressively short space, and in an always clear and often very insightful way.

Dans son article nécrologique sur Abraham Robinson, Simon Kochen consignait une impression de Gödel qui ne manquera pas d'intéresser un grand nombre de spécialistes de Leibniz. Gödel, dont il faut rappeler l'intérêt particulier pour les travaux philosophiques de Leibniz, pensait en effet que, de tous les logiciens modernes, Abraham Robinson était celui qui avait le mieux réalisé l'idéal leibnizien d'une logique constituée en ars inveniendi pour les mathématiques. Nous voudrions examiner ici à quel aspect de l' ars inveniendi selon Leibniz ce jugement rend justice et quelle caractéristique de la logique contemporaine il fait ressortir. S'agissant des travaux d'Abraham Robinson, nous nous intéresserons surtout au secteur de la théorie des modèles, bien que celui-ci n'ait pas l'exclusivité de mettre en oeuvre l'idée que les résultats logiques sont propres à faciliter la découverte mathématique.

“What is phenomenology? It may seem strange that this question has still to be asked half a century after the first works of Husserl. The fact remains that it has by no means been answered.” Merleau-Ponty made this observation in 1945. It is still substantially correct, except that it is now three-quarters of a century after the first works of Husserl.

It is a great pleasure to be asked to describe to philosophers the papers of Bertrand Russell. Russell's papers were acquired by McMaster University in the spring of 1968. Professor William Ready, the University Librarian, who is almost solely responsible for their acquisition, has created a special department for them in the library with ample funds for their expansion and scholarly exploitation. Before their arrival in Canada, I had had the privilege of working on the papers for a year while they were being catalogued in London. After their sale to McMaster, Professor Ready hired me as someone who knew his way in the dozens of cabinet drawers and trunks. Although my interests in the papers are primarily bibliographical and personal, I shall try to outline what philosophers, especially those with an historical interest, could find of importance in them. In doing so, I shall mention some topics of possible inquiry and suggest specific manuscripts to study in connection with them, but I shall not attempt to trace in detail the development of any of Russell's ideas. That is for philosophers to do.

One of the central features of Kant's moral theory is the sharp distinction he draws between the moral Tightness (legality) of actions and their moral worth or goodness (morality). As we know from the first pages of the Groundwork, the rightness of an action is determined by the conformity of the agent's maxim to the categorical imperative; the moral goodness or worth of an action is determined by the agent's motives, by whether the agent acted from the motive of duty or from some other (non-moral) empirical motive. Morally good actions must be morally right, according to Kant, whereas morally right actions are not necessarily morally good.

Richard Wollheim (1962) provided an acute formulation of the problematic situation of an outvoted democrat. We are invited to consider an individual who endorses the democratic procedure, or ‘democratic machine’. Furthermore, this person prefers policy A, and has voted for it. “He chooses A or prefers A to B, because he thinks that A is the best policy, is the policy that ought to be enacted, or, alternatively, that A is a better policy than B or ought to be enacted in preference to B” (pp. 77–78). Now, how does this person react when it turns out that the democratic decision was in favour of B? “How can the citizen accept the machine's choice, which involves his thinking that B ought to be enacted when, as we already know, he is of the opinion, of the declared opinion, that A ought to be enacted?” (p. 78).

According to ‘strong cognitivism’, all reasons for action are rooted in normative features that the motivated subject (explicitly or implicitly) takes objects to have (or lack) independently of her attitudes towards these objects. My main concern in this paper is to argue against strong cognitivism, that is, to establish the view that conative attitudes do provide subjects with reasons for action. My central argument to this effect is a top-down one that proceeds by an analysis of the complex phenomenon of caring and derives a conclusion regarding the (motivational and normative) nature of more basic mental phenomena—particular desires.

In this paper, I critically discuss Charles Taylor’s employment of the concept of ontology by shining a spotlight on a shift in emphasis from an anthropocentric to a non-anthropocentric viewpoint in his more recent writings on ontology. I also argue that Stephen White’s characterization of Taylor’s ‘weak’ ontology, while revealing, only partly explains Taylor’s position, as White’s interpretation leaves no room for the metaphysical thrust in Taylor’s thought. Drawing attention to a Taylor left out of White’s Taylor, I ultimately seek to show why Taylor’s distinctive mode of argumentation is not consonant with White’s weak-ontological approach.

Deux ouvrages de l'éminent platonisant français, V. Goldschmidt, ont paru en 1970 aux éditions Vrin et Aubier-Montaigne. Il s'agit de Platonisme et Pensée Contemporaine et de Questions Platoniciennes. Le premier reproduit un texte déjà ancien La Religion de Platon. (pp. 11–125) que l'auteur avait déjà publié en 1949 en guise d'introduction a la philosophiE de Platon, et un texte inédit Les Querelles sur le Platonisme (pp. 133–265) dans lequel l'exégète de métier s'interroge sur «l'apparente inactualité actuelle» de Platon (p. 7). Au point de départ, il ne s'agissait que d'une réédition de La Religion de Platon à laquelle l'auteur devait ajouter quelques remarques sur l'actualité du platonisme. Ces remarques s'élargirent jusqu'à donner un texte suffisamment long pour constituer la seconde partie de l'ouvrage et lui donner son titre. La seconde publication groupe sous le titre Questions Platoniciennes un ensemble d'articles publiés par l'auteur dans diverses revues philosophiques entre les années 1947 et 1955, à l'exception de la dernière étude sur «Le vide pythagoricien et le nombre chez Bergson» qui fut rédigée en 1966. Nous espérons avoir l'occasion de revenir sur cet ensemble d'articles qui offre aux platonisants un instrument de travail de haute qualité tant par la profondeur de la réflexion que par la rigueur de la méthode d'analyse du texte platonicien. Nous n'avons pas à revenir sur la Religion de Platon, texte bien connu de l'auteur. Mais nous aimerions nous limiter, ici, à ce texte tout à fait nouveau que constitue Les Querelles sur le Platonisme parce qu'il nous permet, d'une part, de situer le platonisme à l'intérieur de la pensée contemporaine, et d'autre part, parce qu'il est le reflet de la confrontation actuelle des méthodes d'interprétation en histoire de la philosophie.

Peut-on s'entendre en matière d'esthétique? Y a-t-il une objectivité possible des jugements dans ce domaine marginal de la philosophie? La question du sens commun dans la Critique de la faculté de juger, semble, aux dires de certains, mener directement à cette problématique contemporaine. Nous ne reprendrons pas ici les multiples articles et ouvrages sur le sensus communis parus dans la dernière décennie à la suite de l'impact conceptuel du thème de la rationalité communicationnelle. Notre intention est plutôt, au-delà de la “dérive” du célèbre paragraphe 40 vers une idée plus actuelle (et aussi plus banale) de “consensus”, de repérer les tensions entre le versant transcendantal et le versant empirique du sens commun qui surgissent significativement à l'occasion de cette dérive. Avant d'aborder le sens esthétique défini dans la troisième Critique et de le confronter aux interprétations qui nous semblent plus déterminantes comme celles de L. Ferry de J.-F. Lyotard ou de J. Habermas nous voudrions d'abord examiner l'usage général de cette notion dans l'histoire de la philosophie précritique pour vérifier ensuite la spécificitÉ qu'elle acquiert chez Kant.

Le long débat sur le « problème de la transformation », qui a marqué si profondément le développement de la pensée marxiste depuis cent ans, est probablement l'un des plus étranges mais peut-être aussi Fun des plus instructifs parmi ceux que l'histoire encore jeune des sciences sociales peut offrir à l'attention croissante que lui porte l'analyse épistémologique.

Plato is not serious when he has Socrates deduce that poetry must be mostly narrative with just a little dialogue. Not only is the argumentation purposely flawed, but he also has Socrates purposely obfuscate a key distinction. He then has Socrates pretend to be confused by his own obfuscation. By forcing us to work our way through the thickets of his faulty argumentation, Plato gives us the opportunity to become more deeply involved with the underlying issues and to discover his theme: a good person is one who is stoically indifferent to both bad fortune and good fortune.

Self-knowledge is a permanent and necessary aim for man. By ‘self-knowledge’ I mean the knowledge of oneself as a human being; the understanding of what it is to be a human being; the grasp of human nature as such. There are many sides to this knowledge: the sciences and social sciences, the arts, history, reflexion on day-to-day experience. Philosophy has traditionally been seen as a road that can lead towards self-knowledge. What I propose here is an essay in the philosophy of self-knowledge. It is a study of one aspect of human nature among others, namely human embodiment.