La question de savoir si l'épistémologie est encore possible, et quelle voie elle doit emprunter, est à l'ordre du jour. En effet, suite à l'échec du modèle standard proposé par l'empirisme logique, nous nous retrouvons pour ainsi dire a la croisée des chemins. C'est ainsi que, par exemple, nous prenons progressivement conscience des enjeux opposant les partisans de la « LSE Position » aussi bien aux empiristes qu'à ceux qui favorisent plutôt une sorte de « virage sociologiste », ou encore que nous nous trouvons confrontés à l'inadéquation des deux principales façons d'envisager la testabilité des théories scientifiques, à savoir la conception hypothético-déductive d'un côté et la conception bayésienne de l'autre (Glymour).

Nous appelons «thèse des descriptions multiples» l'opinion qui veut qu'une seule et même action peut etre decrite de plusieurs façons différentes selon que Ton prend en considération ou non les différentes conséquences, plus ou moins lointaines, de cette action. Cette thèse joue chez certains penseurs un rôle essentiel dans la solution du problème de l'individuation des actions. Chez D. Davidson notamment, elle intervient de façon décisive dans la démonstration de sa fameuse thèse que toute action se réduit à des mouvements corporels. Nous entendons montrer, premièrement, que la thèse des descriptions multiples, à supposer même qu'elle soit vraie, ne saurait remplir le rôle que lui assigne Davidson dans le contexte de l'individuation des actions; deuxièmement, que cette thèse est fondée en fait sur l'ignorance de certaines distinctions importantes concernant l'action et le langage de l'action.

Une hypothèse fondamentale avancée par Searle et Vanderveken dans Foundations of Illocutionary Logic est que la force illocutionnaire est un élé;ment essentiel de la signification conventionnelle. La signification conventionnelle, qui est une propriété d'énoncé, s'oppose en gros ici à la signification intentionnelle, qui est une propriété prédiquée aux locuteurs. J'aimerais questionner certaines des motivations qui sont susceptibles de nous amener à accepter ce point de vue.

Voici deux heureuses initiatives que nous devons à des universitaires canadiens qui n'en sont pas à leurs premiéres armes. Selon toute apparence la conception de ces anthologies ne découle pas d'une planification entre les deux auteurs. Pourtant elles se complètent remarquablement bien, et ce sur plus d'un plan.

1) Leur complémentarité réside tout d'abord dans le choix des problématiques respectives. Bien que les deux auteurs manifestent un même souci pour des problemès contemporains majeurs en matière d'ethique, ils ne se recoupent que quatre fois sur les neuf chapitres contenus dans chaque livre, notamment à propos des questions concernant ravortement, l'euthanasie, lapeine capitale et la sexualité, encore que les textes choisis par Wesley Cragg (W.C.) situent l'euthanasie (involontaire) plutôt dans la perspective de l'infanticide, tandis que ceux retenus par Jan Narveson (J. N.) la discutent du point de vue de l'adulte, rapprochant l'euthanasie volontaire du suicide; la sexualité est abordée par le premier à travers les débats sur la pornographie et la censure, tandis que J.N. la situe dans l'optique de l'érotisme, de l'adultère et des conditions anthropologiques. Quant aux autres problématiques, les auteurs divergent dans leurs choix.

Partagées entre ceux qui, séduits par les succès des sciences pures, tentent d'expliquer l'agir humain en le subsumant sous des lois générales (néo-positivistes), et ceux qui, insistant sur la spécificité de l'objet à saisir, essaient de rendre compte des sociètès humaines en termes de critique ou de légitimation (marxistes), les sciences sociales semblent dans une impasse.

In the spirit of Frege's gripping opener in “Ueber Sinnund Bedeutung”, one can equally well say that the concept of existence challenges reflection; for how can one deny that Pegasus exists without presuming existence? After all, such claims can be informative, for they could be false. Consequently, one might argue, they must say something about something. Thus, they succeed in being, in a back-handed, paradoxical way, existence statements of a sort. This problem is very old; it is Plato's problem of non-being. Frege's solution to the problem is also well known.

For several years philosophy departments across this continent have offered undergraduate philosophy courses designed to acquaint students with philosophical techniques and fundamental ethical theories in the context of concrete moral problems. These “applied ethics” courses go by various names: “Contemporary Moral Issues”, “Practical Ethics”, “Social Ethics”, “Issues in Applied Ethics”, “Current Moral and Legal Problems”, “Moral Philosophy and Medicine”, “Biomedical Ethics”, and so on. I have taught several versions of applied ethics courses many times and have always enjoyed them. Typically they are popular courses, drawing students from many disciplines and backgrounds, most of whom have never taken philosophy before. The range of possible “applied ethics” topics available is limited only by the instructor's imagination, although there is a fascination for the thanatological—hence the pride of place usually given to discussions of abortion, suicide, euthanasia, world starvation, war, and capital punishment.

Un lecteur n'estjamais seul et un auteur, même polycéphale, n'est qu'un ventriloque insulaire. D'oú on peut tirer quelques avantages pour l'édification de l'un et le redressement de l'autre. La lecture prudente de François Lepage m'invite à un excés de vertu que j'étalerai en quatre points et le manque d'éthique qu'il me reproche à bon droit trouvera ici une confirmation nouvelle.

Le dernier livre du Professeur Guy Bouchard est remarquable à bien des égards. C'est d'abord un livre qui arrive à un bon moment, il me semble, pour faire le point sur la fameuse controverse opposant Ricoeur et Derrida. Cette controverse, relative à la possibilité de définir la métaphore et surtout à son rôle dans le discours philosophique, sert de fil conducteur à l'ouvrage. Cette polémique a pris beaucoup d'ampleur au cours des dernières années, en raison du très large auditoire dont jouissent depuis longtemps ces deux philosophes français. Et ce n'est pas un mince mérite que de s'attaquer, comme l'a fait G. Bouchard, à des questions qui intéressent aujourd'hui un nombre impressionnant de philosophes, linguistes, rhétoriciens, poéticiens, psychologues, pédagogues, etc. Ceux et celles qui connaissent déjà « La mythologie blanche » (Derrida), La métaphore vive (Ricoeur) et « Le retrait de la métaphore » (Derrida) apprécieront, j'en suis sûr, le très important travail de « correction » qu'a fait Bouchard des conceptions présentées par Ricoeur et Derrida, et particulièrement des « lectures » que fait Ricoeur d'un grand nombre d'auteurs dans La métaphore vive. Je trouve un peu malheureux que ce travail de correction se retrouve surtout sous forme de notes placées à la fin du volume (il y a soixantehuit pages de notes dans cet ouvrage), ce qui ne contribue pas tellement à le mettre en valeur. Ces corrections me semblent souvent fort éclairantes et permettent de nuancer beaucoup les thèses philosophiques de Ricoeur et Derrida.

Angel's declared purpose is to “demystify” mysticism by approaching it as we do ordinary phenomena, and his eventual conclusion is that mystical experiences are very similar to some of our everyday experiences. To demonstrate that, he provides us with three closely-argued chapters on, successively, the typology of mysticism, the reasons for mystical silence, and the relationship of mysticism to other experiences. Ultimately, he claims that mysticism need not be mysterious because all of us have quasi-mystical experiences (81).

Aristotle's account of phantasia in De anima, III, 3, occurs at a critical juncture of his inquiry into the nature and properties of the soul. Having just completed a long discussion of sensation (II, 5-III, 2), and wishing now to turn to a consideration of the power of thought (nous), which he regards both as distinct from and as analogous to sensation, he suggests that an explanation of phantasia is necessary at this point, since there is no thought without phantasia, just as there is no phantasia without sensation.1 But while this sketch of a complex dependency among the soul's cognitive powers makes clear the importance of phantasia and the need for some explanation of it, the intermediate place of phantasia in the discussion and the incidental way in which it is introduced are indications that Aristotle does not treat it for its own sake, but rather is compelled to turn to a consideration of it by the exigencies of the subject-matter at hand. The analysis of sensation, the characteristic power of animals, could, it seems, be adequately carried out with little reference to phantasia, even though Aristotle is elsewhere led to stress the closeness, and even, in some respect, the identity of these two powers; the discussion of thought, on the other hand, and specifically of the human thought which is Aristotle's concern in De anima, III, 4–8, apparently requires a special preliminary treatment of phantasia.

Donald Regan's book is a study of forms of utilitarian theory and of properties to which these forms may aspire. He deals exclusively with “fully objective” theories that seek to systematize and set conditions for obligations that an agent is supposed to lie under as a consequence of features of situations in which he finds himself, with no dependence on his possibly defective beliefs, attitudes, and values (except as features of his situations). Metaethical questions concerning the nature of these obligations are not raised. And practical problems that could be encountered in attempts to apply these theories receive very little attention. They are said to lie outside the main project of the book which is to explain and then to circumvent a certain apparent logical impasse that utilitarianisms ca. 1980 are supposed to confront. The book consists for the most part of abstract, often very long and difficult, arguments, and detailed elaborations of a small number of minimally specified, highly artificial cases of the sort now common in semi-formal utilitarian theory. In the present note, while leaving unquestioned and unstated the presuppositions of Regan's book, I first outline its central two-stage “argument”. Next I explain several distinctions important to issues it addresses and relate these distinctions to several of Regan's theses. I then discuss prima facie cases against his main claim, according to which the apparent impasse that utilitarianisms confront is circumvented by a new utilitarian theory designed for the task.

In The Moral Mystic James Home has written a sequel to his Beyond Mysticism, where he ably explored a variety of philosophical issues arising from mysticism. This time his study has a special focus, and he makes an important contribution to the ongoing philosophical discussion of relations between religion and morality. As Home notes, “There is a very wide consensus in the philosophic world that religion and morality are independent of each other and that we can produce reliable moral judgments independently, with no need for religious guidance” (95). Home agrees that a non-religious morality is a reasonable option, but he claims that a religious commitment and perspective can sometimes intelligibly and legitimately affect an agent's morality. He supports this claim, not by an abstract argument, but by a descriptive analysis of the reflective process which goes on in a particular kind of religious person whom he calls the “moral mystic”. Why appeal to mysticism to show that religion can be positively and rationally relevant to morality? Such an appeal is initially implausible, for philosophers and others have severely criticized mystics for being amoral and perhaps even immoral. Home begins his book with a summary of such criticisms, but he claims that they apply to “pure” mystics rather than to his moral mystics. This distinction between mystics is crucial for his thesis.

In Abortion and Moral Theory, L. W. Sumner develops a moderate view of abortion, having dispatched as “indefensible” (ix) “two equally prominent and extreme positions: the liberal view … and the conservative view” (ix). It is a distinctive feature of the book that, having formulated what he regards as the correct intuitive position, the author seeks for it “the needed foundation for a moderate view of abortion” (ix), since “the defense of a moderate position must ultimately be grounded in moral theory” (ix), in which the position acquires “theoretical depth”, and without which it would lack “philosophical justification” (ix). The moral theory in which Professor Sumner seeks to lodge his moderate position is the “classical version of utilitarianism” (x), which “can serve as the deep structure of a moderate view of abortion” (195). Thus, a central task for the appraisal of Abortion and Moral Theory is to ascertain whether classical utilitarianism can be made to accommodate “common-sense morality [which] plainly regards murder as wrong principally because of its central effects …”, that is, because murder causes “its victim some form of harm” (201).

This is a highly interesting book, and one that is, in its own way, most important. The Structure of Experience is well written and effectively argued. It shows Gordon Nagel to be a rigorous and independent thinker who is as well acquainted with Kant's Critique of Pure Reason as he is with modern analytic philosophy. Because he has been successful in avoiding “to presuppose a background in Kant studies”, the book can indeed “be read by anyone interested in perception, cognition, or the philosophy of mind” (vii). In fact, it is to be recommended as an introduction to recent epistemology as well as to Kant. And this is perhaps as it should be, as the study of Kant has deeply influenced the broader developments of contemporary philosophy. P. F. Strawson, Jonathan Bennett, Richard Rorty, and Barry Stroud, to name only a few of the best-known figures, all developed their own views in conscious dependence upon and/or opposition to Kant. Since Nagel is firmly rooted in this tradition, his book may be taken as a contribution to both the study of Kant and the discussion of contemporary philosophieal issues.

Much of the abortion debate has revolved around questions of the ontological status of the fetus: many liberals and conservatives agree that if the fetus is a person in the fullest sense of “person”, it would require very weighty reasons to justify killing it; if, on the other hand, the fetus is not a person in the fullest sense, considerations of less moment should suffice to justify killing it. Resolution of questions about the morality of abortion, thus, should be quite straightforward: stipulate criteria of personhood and determine whether fetuses, in general, or some particular fetus satisfies those criteria. If a fetus satisfies them, it is a person in the fullest sense and has the same right to life as any other person; if it fails to satisfy those criteria, it is not a person in the fullest sense and, thus, does not have the same right to life as a person. Unfortunately, such a programme is easier envisaged than achieved. The literature is laden with controversial analyses of personhood, none of which are acceptable to all parties to the abortion controversy, and, thus, discussions of the morality of abortion continue at a shrill level; unable to find any common ground from which to initiate reasoned discourse the two sides talk past each other and no progress is made.

Norman Kemp Smith began his famous work on Hume by reminding us how difficult Hume is: not difficult to follow paragraph by paragraph, but difficult to interpret as a whole. He then went on to try to remedy this situation by offering an overall interpretation that essentially reversed the dominant reading of Hume as a sceptic, and argued instead that he is a naturalist—a thinker who views our beliefs, as well as our moral commitments, as products of the instinctive and passionate natures with which we are endowed. On this view, the key Humean text is the famous pronouncement that reason is, and ought only to be, the slave of the passions; for it is in his account of the passions that we must find the basis of the natural history of our cognitive and moral commitments. This lends a systematic unity to Hume's thought, by making his epistemology and his ethics offshoots of his psychology of the emotions. It also allows Kemp Smith to emphasize the importance of the influence on Hume of the work of his older contemporary Francis Hutcheson.

Although Donald Evans and I argue for similar forms of life, he emphasizes non-egoism in mystical morality and I stress its personal character. In addition, we differ on whether the scholar of mysticism should commit himself to its actual practice. Our basic agreement is partly evinced in his succinct ten-point characterization of my concepts of the “moral mystic”, and “proper-name morality”. Evans clarifies my presentation and implicitly challenges me to attempt further development of my ideas.