Your search for: subjects:"Identity Philosophical Concept"

Free Speech and the Politics of Identity challenges the scholarly view as well as the dominant legal view outside the United States that the right of free speech may reasonably be traded off in pursuit of justice to stigmatized minorities. These views appeal to an alleged reasonable balance between ...

Free Speech and the Politics of Identity challenges the scholarly view as well as the dominant legal view outside the United States that the right of free speech may reasonably be traded off in pursuit of justice to stigmatized minorities. These views appeal to an alleged reasonable balance between two basic human rights: the right of free speech and the right against unjust discrimination. Compelling arguments of normative political theory and interpretative history show, however, that these rights are structurally linked: the abridgement of one compromises the other. To make this case, David Richards offers an original political theory of toleration and of structural injustice that addresses the nature and scope of the right of free speech and the right against unjust discrimination; its analytic focus is on the role played by members of subordinated groups in the protest of the terms of structural injustice (the politics of identity), advancing constitutional justice under law. While the argument is developed on the basis of American constitutional experience from the antebellum period forward, its normative force is brought to bear both in defending and criticizing some aspects of American law and in challenging the continuing legitimacy of laws against group libel, obscenity, and blasphemy under national legal systems (including Germany, France, Britain, Canada, Israel, India, South Africa, and others), regional systems (the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights), and public international law. The book's innovative normative and interpretative methodology calls for a new departure in comparative public law, in which all states responsibly address their common problems not only of inadequate protection of free speech but correlative failure to take seriously the continuing political power of such evils as anti-Semitism, racism, sexism, and homophobia.

Most philosophers writing about personal identity in recent years claim that what it takes for us to persist through time is a matter of psychology. In this groundbreaking new book, Eric Olson argues that such approaches face daunting problems, and he defends in their place a radically ...

Most philosophers writing about personal identity in recent years claim that what it takes for us to persist through time is a matter of psychology. In this groundbreaking new book, Eric Olson argues that such approaches face daunting problems, and he defends in their place a radically non-psychological account of personal identity. He defines human beings as biological organisms, and claims that no psychological relation is either sufficient or necessary for an organism to persist. Olson rejects several famous thought-experiments dealing with personal identity. He argues, instead, that one could survive the destruction of all of one's psychological contents and capabilities as long as the human organism remains alive--as long as its vital functions, such as breathing, circulation, and metabolism, continue.

The topic of personal identity has prompted some of the liveliest and most interesting debates in recent philosophy. In a fascinating new contribution to the discussion, Peter Unger presents a psychologically aimed, but physically based, account of our identity over time. While supporting the ...

The topic of personal identity has prompted some of the liveliest and most interesting debates in recent philosophy. In a fascinating new contribution to the discussion, Peter Unger presents a psychologically aimed, but physically based, account of our identity over time. While supporting the account, he explains why many influential contemporary philosophers have underrated the importance of physical continuity to our survival, casting a new light on the work of Lewis, Nagel, Nozick, Parfit, Perry, Shoemaker, and others. Deriving from his discussion of our identity itself, Unger produces a novel but commonsensical theory of the relations between identity and some of our deepest concerns. In a conservative but flexible spirit, he explores the implications of his theory for questions of value and of the good life.

The essays in Constructing Identities in Late Antiquity concern themselves with the theme of identity, an increasingly popular topic in Classical studies. Through detailed discussions of particular Roman texts and images, the contributors show not only how these texts were used to create and ...

The essays in Constructing Identities in Late Antiquity concern themselves with the theme of identity, an increasingly popular topic in Classical studies. Through detailed discussions of particular Roman texts and images, the contributors show not only how these texts were used to create and organise particular visions of late antique society and culture, but also how constructions of identity and culture contributed to the fashioning of 'late antiquity' into a distinct historical period.