Shorter Pieces
The illustrations are from various sources. The drawings were made by Wilfried Bausch, Heidelberg, and originally published in Inner Necessity and Self-Realization – Thinking about How to Live.
A Response to Roland Barthes' "The Death of the Author"
This is a response to a famous and influential essay, The Death of the Author, by the French cultural critic, Roland Barthes (see http://deathoftheauthor.com for a copy of the text of the essay). In it Barthes makes a number of interesting claims....
Some Philosophical, Psychological and Psychiatric Aspects of the Self
Two lines of thought will be presented which strongly suggest that Cartesian Dualism, the theory that mind and matter/body are two distinct things, cannot be true. These two lines of thought are Aristotle’s view of the soul and some findings from brain-imaging research in schizophrenia. After...
The Decline Effect - Why Most Published Research Findings are False
In a compelling and important programme broadcasted on 26 August 2014 on BBC Radio 4, and produced and presented by Jolyon Jenkins, the distinguished Greek-American professor of health research and policy, and professor of statistics at Stanford University, John Ioannidis, claimed, with...
The practical good and medical practice
In the first book of the Nicomachean Ethics Aristotle considers the nature of "the good", i.e. the highest ethical value. He examines an abstract notion of the good, "the form of the good", which was developed by his teacher, Plato, and rejects it in favour of a practical...
Self-Realization and Inner Necessity – Thinking about How to Live
Theories of self-realization can be divided into two groups: collectivistic and individualistic. Aristotle (384–322 BCE) developed a collectivistic notion of self-realization: human beings have the “telos” or function of acting rationally. By engaging in rational activity humans “flourish” or...
Tips for Authors
Tips for Authors from George Orwell
Eric Arthur Blair (1903–1950) is known by his pen name of George Orwell. He was an English novelist , essayist and journalist. He served as a military policeman in Burma, where he became highly critical of the British imperial attitudes and...