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Narratives of Sino-Middle Eastern Futures attempts to discern the future trajectory and endpoint of Sino-Middle Eastern relations – are we on the precipice of a post-American Chinese hegemony in the region? Or are we reaching the outer limits of what is feasible within what are essentially transactional ties? Drawing on a wide range of multilingual sources from 2010 to 2023, and based on a framework of thin constructivism, the Element delves into the Saudi, Syrian and Chinese elite narratives regarding the Middle Eastern regional order and China's envisaged place within it. By centering local perspectives, it offers insights into how these actors –with diverse positionalities in the region (vis-à-vis the United States) and different national capabilities– are debating the future of China in the Middle East, and what the juxtaposition of their multiple narratives mean for where things are headed. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
This Element provides an argumentative introduction to the doctrines of karma and rebirth in Hinduism. It explains how various Hindu texts, traditions, and figures have understood the philosophical nuances of karma and rebirth. It also acquaints readers with some of the most important academic debates about these doctrines. The Element's primary argumentative aim is to defend the rationality of accepting the truth of karma and rebirth through a critical examination of an array of arguments for and against these doctrines. It concludes by highlighting the relevance of karma and rebirth to contemporary philosophical debates on a variety of issues.
This Element addresses a range of pressing challenges and crises by introducing readers to the Maya struggle for land and self-determination in Belize, a former British colony situated in the Caribbean and Central America. In addition to foregrounding environmental relations, the text provides deeper understandings of Qʼeqchiʼ and Mopan Maya people's dynamic conceptions and collective defence of community and territory. To do so, the authors centre the voices, worldviews, and experiences of Maya leaders, youth, and organisers who are engaged in frontline resistance and mobilisations against institutionalised racism and contemporary forms of dispossession. Broadly, the content offers an example of how Indigenous communities are reckoning with the legacies of empire whilst confronting the structural violence and threats to land and life posed by the driving forces of capital accumulation, neoliberal development, and coloniality of the state. Ultimately, this Element illustrates the realities, repercussions, and transformative potential of grassroots movement-building 'from below.' This title is also available as open access on Cambridge Core.
We humans are diverse. But how to understand human diversity in the case of cognitive diversity? This Element discusses how to properly investigate human behavioural and cognitive diversity, how to scientifically represent, and how to explain cognitive diversity. Since there are various methodological approaches and explanatory agendas across the cognitive and behavioural sciences, which can be more or less useful for understanding human diversity, a critical analysis is needed. And as the controversial study of sex and gender differences in cognition illustrates, the scientific representations and explanations put forward matter to society and impact public policy, including policies on mental health. But how to square the vision of human cognitive diversity with the assumption that we all share one human nature? Is cognitive diversity something to be positively valued? The author engages with these questions in connection with the issues of neurodiversity, cognitive disability, and essentialist construals of human nature.
Draws from an extensive literature review on food politics to propose a Framework of Holistic Politics for Food System Transformation. The Framework posits that food systems transformation would be a process/outcome of interrelated political configurations of actions across four processes or stages: 1) Identifying resistance to change in the current regime, 2) Creating and sustaining new momentum, 3) Converting new momentum into sustainable options; -and cross-cutting, 4) Managing trade-offs, reducing incoherence, and prioritization. At each stage, four domains of politics must be considered, including 1) Power, the political economy of actors, knowledge, and evidence; 2) Cultural dynamics, norms, and behavior; 3) Capacity and financial resources; and 4) Technological innovations). To deliver normative transformation, these actions must be carried out in four distinct processes. The Framework underscores the need for normative and goal-oriented processes, the multi-dimensionality of politics, and the normative driving environment in governance food systems transformation.
This Element analyzes Kant's metaphysics and epistemology of the exact science of nature. It explains his theory of true motion and ontology of matter. In addition, it reconstructs the patterns of evidential reasoning behind Kant's foundational doctrines.
This Element brings work from the philosophy of technology into conversation with media, religion, culture studies, and work in digital religion studies to explore examples of how popular media and emerging technologies are increasingly framed and understood through a distinct range of spiritual myths, metaphors, images, and representations of God. Working with three case studies about how internet memes, popular films, and media coverage of public philosophy link ideas about God and technology, this Element draws attention to common conceptions that describe a perceived relationship between religion and technology today. It synthesizes these discussions and categories and presents them in four distinct models, showing a range of ways in which the relationship between God and technology is commonly depicted. The Element seeks to create a platform for scholarly study and critical discourse on technology's religious and spiritual representation in digital and emerging media cultures and contexts through this work.
E. E. Constance Jones (1848–1922) published widely in philosophical logic and in ethics and moral psychology and was an active member of the British philosophical community from 1890 until her death. Her contributions to philosophical logic were wide-ranging and sophisticated, anticipating celebrated insights of later twentiethcentury philosophy of language and logic. In ethics, her writings on hedonism and practical reason, though influenced by her mentor, Henry Sidgwick, were innovative and merit further examination.
In null instantiation (NI) an optionally unexpressed argument receives either anaphoric or existential interpretation. One cannot accurately predict a predicator's NI potential based either on semantic factors (e.g., Aktionsart class of the verb) or pragmatic factors (e.g., relative discourse prominence of arguments), but NI potential, while highly constrained, is not simply lexical idiosyncrasy. It is instead the product of both lexical and constructional licensing. In the latter case, a construction can endow a verb with NI potential that it would not otherwise have. Using representational tools of sign based construction grammar, this Element offers a lexical treatment of English null instantiation that covers both distinct patterns of construal of null-instantiated arguments and the difference between listeme-based and contextually licensed, thus construction-based, null complementation.
Received theories of self-deception are problematic. The traditional view, according to which self-deceivers intend to deceive themselves, generates paradoxes: you cannot deceive yourself intentionally because you know your own plans and intentions. Non-traditional views argue that self-deceivers act intentionally but deceive themselves unintentionally or that self-deception is not intentional at all. The non-traditional approaches do not generate paradoxes, but they entail that people can deceive themselves by accident or by mistake, which is controversial. The author argues that a functional analysis of deception solves these problems. On the functional view, a certain thing is deceptive if and only if its function is to mislead; hence, while (self-)deception may but need not be intended, it is never accidental or a mistake. Also, self-deceivers need not benefit from deception and they need not end up with epistemically unjustified beliefs; rather, they must 'not be themselves'. Finally, self-deception need not be adaptive.
The aim of this Element is to forge new conceptual tools to give more ecological power to the human imagination. Imagination, both an innovative force and one that distances and blinds, is central to the ecological crisis as well as its potential resolution. Human imagination creates a bubble of denial, fostering the illusion of a smooth, reassuring, controlled, and neatly compartmentalized world. This Element critically contrasts the harmful modern concepts of reality and imagination with a more grounded “earthly” and “animal” imagination. It proposes to overcome the tension between two currents in environmental thought: those advocating imagination for utopian transformation, and proponents of realism, urging confrontation with the material world beyond anthropocentrism. Through analysis of key contemporary environmental work alongside insights from ethology and biosemiotics, the Element underpins the concept of “animal imagination,” offering an alternative approach to environmental imagination and activism that fosters deeper engagement with the living world.
This Element explores the relation between historiography and testimony as a question about what it means to know and understand the past historically. In contrast with the recent rapprochement between memory accounts and history in historical theory, the Element argues for the importance of attending to conceptually distinct relations to past actions and events in historical thinking compared with testimony. The conceptual distinctiveness of history is elucidated by placing historical theory in dialogue with the epistemology of testimony and classical philosophy of history. By clarifying the rejection of testimony inherent in the evidential paradigm of modern historical research, this Element provides a thoroughgoing account of the ways in which historical knowledge and understanding relates to testimony. The argument is that the role of testimony in historiography is fundamentally shaped by the questioning-activity at the core of critical historical research. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
This Element analyses how Kant's practical philosophy approaches social suffering, while also taking into account the elusiveness of this concept in his work, especially when viewed through a contemporary lens. It claims that Kant's theory of human dignity is a vital tool for detecting social structures in need of improvement, even if the high demands it imposes on the subject show a propensity to conceal situations of domination and oppression. In his writings, Kant investigated various societal challenges such as widespread poverty, duties towards animals, care for the mentally ill, and motherhood out of wedlock, suggesting that the state should solve most of these through financial support from the wealthier segments of society. Although the direct testimony of victims of social suffering does not play a role in Kant's approach, the author holds that he views social interdependence – including, notably, non-humans – as a fundamental commitment underpinning human development.
This Element examines the roles and activities of women and their contributions to the Platonic tradition from Plato's time-fourth century BCE- through to the sixth century CE. Drawing on recent research on female agency, gender studies and the connections between ancient philosophy and religious traditions, this Element re-assesses the multi-faceted roles of women within Platonism. Methodologically, any assessment of ancient women philosophers must consider the contexts of the production, transmission and (partial) survival of the range of evidence attesting to their activities, and the historical minimisation or elision of women's intellectual contributions within the western philosophical tradition, science and the academy. As such, this Element argues that the existing evidence allows us to glimpse a much wider pattern of female philosophical and intellectual activity within the Platonic tradition and that we should be careful not to underestimate or minimise the significance of ancient women within the history of Platonism.
Crime fiction first emerged in the Victorian era and its series form continues to dominate the genre. Despite the prevalence of crime series, very little research has been done on how character is conceived. The Element's focus is contemporary, from the 1970s onward, and it determines the theory and conventions behind writing the detectives in these modern meganarratives. Exemplary series and a range of subgenres are analysed, thriller to cosy crime, professional investigator to amateur sleuth, embracing diversity and different gender identities. Previous examinations have tended to interpret the detective figure as either mythic or realist, but the author argues that both modes are combined in the contemporary crime series, generating a mythorealist protagonist. This creative-critical Element celebrates the vibrancy of the form and its capacity to investigate the human condition. It also considers future trends and concludes with the author's own guide to writing a crime fiction series.
Japan's Takarazuka Revue is arguably the most commercially successful all-female theatre company in the world. Renowned for its glamour-laden staging of musicals and revues, the company's signature shows are heterosexual Western romances where women play both male and female roles. Since its audience consists almost entirely of women, Takarazuka creates a space for queer intimacy between performers and ardent female fans. This Element analyses the recent experimental show, The Poe Clan, directed by Koike Shūichirō, which portrays a male homoerotic relationship, argued as a façade for a queer, kin-like relationship between women. It also explores works by the female director Ueda Kumiko, which depict an anti-capitalist shared commons for female intimacy. These shows exhibit resistant girls' aesthetics, expressed in the company's two-dimensional performance style.
Despite unprecedented opportunities to publish content in accessible formats, most books remain inaccessible to people with print disability. Technological advances and new legal frameworks are creating a transition toward inclusive publishing practices, but systemic barriers continue to limit equitable access to books for millions of individuals worldwide. Scholarship has also moved slowly, leaving a significant gap in our understanding of the strategic, technological and ethical dimensions of inclusive publishing. This Element offers the first holistic examination of this landscape, and argues for the need to move away from ad hoc remediation of books towards the commercial production of 'born-accessible' content. Through policy research, industry case studies, and strategic partnership mapping, it critically examines the rationale, implementation, and potential of inclusive publishing. By articulating both business imperatives and social responsibilities, it proposes a transformative framework for understanding accessibility that offer valuable insights for researchers, industry professionals, and advocacy groups.
Hieratic was the most widely used script in ancient Egypt, but is today relatively unknown outside Egyptology. Generally written with ink and a brush, it was the script of choice for most genres of text, in contrast to hieroglyphs which was effectively a monumental script. The surviving papyri, ostraca and writing boards attest to the central role of hieratic in Egyptian written culture, and suggest that the majority of literate people were first (and not infrequently only) trained in the cursive script. This Element traces the long history of hieratic from its decipherment in the nineteenth century back to its origins around 2500 BC, and explores its development over time, the different factors influencing its appearance, and the way it was taught and used.
The philosophy of linguistics reflects on multiple scientific disciplines aimed at the understanding of one of the most fundamental aspects of human existence, our ability to produce and understand natural language. Linguistics, viewed as a science, has a long history but it was the advent of the formal (and computational) revolution in cognitive science that established the field as both scientifically and philosophically appealing. In this Element, the topic will be approached as a means for understanding larger issues in the philosophy of science more generally.
The Penguin Modern Painters (1944–1959) was a groundbreaking series of British art monographs designed to promote the work of contemporary artists to a general readership. In examining the factors that influenced the wartime conception and development of the series, this Element makes a contribution to the understanding of the relationship between publishing and the visual arts during the Second World War. The study argues that the emergence of The Penguin Modern Painters was inextricably linked to the aims of British wartime cultural policy and the ideology of the pre-war adult education movement. The key personalities involved are identified and their multiple and often conflicting motives analysed to provide new insights into the shifting perspectives of Britain's elites regarding the way that art was presented to the public in the 1940s. This Element provides a foundation on which further study of twentieth-century art publishing in Britain might be developed.