Volume 94, Issue 3

: Abū Bakr al-Rāzī (d. 925), a doctor known not only for his medical expertise but also for his notorious philosophical ideas, has not yet been given due credit for his ideas on the ethical treatment of animals. This paper explores the philosophical and theological background of his remarks on animal welfare, arguing that al-Rāzī did not (as has been claimed) see animals as possessing rational, intellectual souls like those of humans. It is also argued that al-Rāzī probably did not, as is usually believed, endorse human-animal transmigration. His ethical stance does not in any case depend on shared characteristics of humans and animals, but rather on the need to imitate God’s providence and mercy.

: Michael of Ephesus was the first medieval author to comment upon Book V of the Nicomachean Ethics . In his work, he paid special attention to passage 1134b18–1135a5, in which Aristotle delineates the distinction between that which is just by nature and that which is just by convention. Michael not only detects the fundamental questions arising from this text that have occupied the attention of interpreters in the intervening centuries, he also manages to offer original solutions, especially with regards to the problem of change in those things that are just by nature.

: It is widely believed that Hugo Grotius played a central role in shaping a selfconsciously “modern” form of ethical philosophy in the seventeenth century. There is disagreement, however, about what is distinctively new or “modern” in Grotius’s thought. Moreover, Terence Irwin has argued recently that Grotius’s ideas marked no significant departure from an earlier “Aristotelian naturalist” orthodoxy. This essay argues that there is indeed something importantly new in Grotius: a theory of perfect rights as legitimate demands, which Grotius places at the heart of a complementary conception of morality. Morality, as Grotius conceives it, consists of “obligations” whose binding force cannot be reduced to reasons that recommend or “counsel” conduct, however strongly. Thus arose the modern problem: how to account for morality’s distinctive normative force or “authority”.

: In the present paper I challenge what I take to be a common view concerning Kant’s intellectual development between 1768 and 1770, namely, the idea that the phenomenon of incongruent counterparts has played an important role in his adoption of the thesis that sensibility and understanding are of a completely different nature. My argument has two parts. First, I try to show that the phenomenon was not considered by Kant, in 1768, as requiring any change in his conception of the cognitive faculties. On the contrary, he seems to provide an account of the knowledge of counterparts that is completely in accordance with his previous views on that matter. Second, I show that the discussion of counterparts in his 1770 Dissertation played no role in either eliciting or justifying his endorsement of dualism.

: In this paper, I aim to explain Berkeley’s sudden endorsement of Descartes’ distinction between mind and body in De Motu . This approval of Cartesianism has been seen as disingenuous by several recent commentators. On the contrary, I shall argue that Berkeley’s claims here are consistent with his ‘immaterialism’ and are in accordance with his conception of the distinction between natural science and metaphysics. I will conclude by explaining how to understand Berkeley’s turn not only towards modern, but also towards ancient authorities. Likewise, I will argue that in De Motu , Berkeley begins his quest of redescribing his ‘immaterialist’ philosophy as part of an ancient philosophical tradition, an enterprise that dominates his later works, Alciphron and Siris .