Cette thèse travaille sur l’élucidation du sens poétique à l’aide d’outils linguistiques ; elle propose une définition cognitive, phénoménologique et énonciative de la distinction abstrait/concret à partir de statistiques établies sur l’œuvre de John Donne (1572-1631), Meditations upon Emergent Occasions et The Complete English Poems. Le concret résulterait d’une forme de lyrisme indirect, c’est-à-dire non sémiotisé, implicite, auquel le poète aurait recours lorsqu’il serait impliqué affectivement dans une situation de discours. L’expressivité du sujet parlant repose sur une décatégorisation momentanée de catégories disponibles en langue, décatégorisation qui lui permet de dénoncer (implicitement) l’insuffisance des cadres abstraits prévus pour tous pour désigner la singularité de son expérience sentimentale. Les noms en –ness constituent une métaphore grammaticale car ils résultent d’une décatégorisation grammaticale, tandis que les métaphores traditionnelles mettent en jeu une décatégorisation lexicale. La métaphore porte l’empreinte affective du sujet parlant, qui se réapproprie ainsi le langage. La poésie métaphysique de John Donne, oscillant entre métaphores et comparaisons, entre le concret et l’abstrait, apparaît alors comme l’expression d’un travail du sentiment, sentiment d’autant plus travaillé qu’il est religieux, et se construit en l’absence de l’être aimé. / This dissertation studies poetic meaning using linguistic tools. It offers a cognitive, phenomenological and enunciative definition of the distinction between the abstract and the concrete, based on statistics carried out on work of the metaphysical poet, John Donne (1572-1631): Meditations upon Emergent Occasions and The Complete English Poems. I argue that the “concrete” is the result of indirect – implied, unsemiotized – lyricism, a form of lyricism used by the poet when s/he is emotionally implicated in a speech situation. The speaker’s expressivity relies on a temporal decategorization enabling him to (implicitly) claim that generalized (abstract) terms are insufficient to articulate the specificity of his own sentimental experience. Words in –ness – grammatical metaphors – result from a grammatical decategorization, while traditional metaphors derive from a lexical decategorization. Metaphors reflect the affect of the incarnate speaker, who thus repossesses language. Lastly, I understand John Donne’s poetry – hinging on metaphors and comparisons, concrete and abstract elements – as expressing a working of feelings, which is the strongest when the feeling is religious and needs to make up for the absence of the beloved.

In response to Irish philosopher Richard Kearney’s recent proposal of a post-metaphysical re-imagination of God, the thesis asks how we may begin to reimagine the Christ-event, post-metaphysically. Specifically, it investigates the implications of such post-metaphysical thought for the theological categories of hamartiology and soteriology. Methodologically, the thesis proceeds from hermeneutical re-readings of biblical narratives and traditions. Via an archaeology of the biblical yetser, the concept of imagination is offered as a way to re-imagine sin and salvation. The Eden narrative is read within its ancient Near Eastern context, and the narratives of the Annunciation and Transfiguration also receives special mention, as well as the window that Song of Songs opens on the metaphor of the desire of God. What results from this approach is, first, yet another deconstruction of the Augustinian formulation of original sin, as well as an eschatological reinterpretation of the Christ event in terms of the messianic Kingdom of God. Christ, who submits his yetser to the will of the Father in an act of worshipful surrender, becomes the perfect embodiment of the Word of God to a humanity whose yetser is perpetually put in service of itself in an act of idolatry. The enabling of the Kingdom of God in Jesus, who embodies the human telos, captures the human imagination and transfigures humanity through the existential experience of transcendence which breaks into its concrete reality through the Christ-event and its retelling. In this way, realised eschatology is possibilised through the imagination. Christ as prototype of the divinely intended telos of humanity becomes an existential possibility via the transfiguration, enacted by the imagination. This enables humanity to become co-creators with God of a new creation, symbolised by God’s messianic Kingdom of love and justice. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2016. / University of Pretoria Postgraduate bursary / Dogmatics and Christian Ethics / PhD / Unrestricted

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Shortly after Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol was released in 1843, a tradition of adaptation began which has continued seemingly unabated to the present day. Consequently, the tale has become so widely known that one is arguably as likely to have first encountered the iconic miser Scrooge through any number of audio-visual adaptations as through the original work itself. Significant critical attention has been paid to the nature of Scrooge's drastic change from miser to philanthropist. Many would argue that the change, happening both literally and figuratively overnight, is not representative of a genuine psychological transformation. On Christmas day, 2010, Stephen Moffat, Show-runner of the popular sci-fi series Doctor Who, became the latest adapter of the classic tale, with a Christmas themed episode of the series titled Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol. This paper addresses the Scrooge Problem, or the debated legitimacy of Scrooge's transformation. A study of A Christmas Carol and Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol reveals that Dickens in fact represents a genuine transformation based on one primary concept, time as a cyclical journey. This concept accommodates Dickens's belief in the transformative power of childhood memory and the nature of sympathy. Scrooge's transformation is brought to pass in part through his evolving understanding of the nature of time, a phenomenon which becomes even more apparent in Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol.

[pt] Esta tese propõe uma interpretação da filosofia de Deleuze a partir de questões aportadas pela Virada Especulativa. Argumenta-se que a filosofia de Deleuze pode ser compreendida enquanto uma metafísica especulativa construída a partir da reversão da crítica de Kant. A importância desse movimento, no mundo atual, seria dada pelas suas consequências práticas em termos ético-político. / [en] This thesis proposes an interpretation of Deleuze s Philosophy through problems imposed by the Speculative Turn. We argue that Deleuze s Philosophy may be understood as a speculative metaphysics constructed through a reversal of Kant s critique. The importance of this movement, contemporaneously, is given by its practical consequences in ethical and political terms.

[pt] Esta tese tem como objetivo investigar a recepção de Spinoza na obra de Marx. Analisa-se, em maior profundidade, as possíveis ressonâncias e convergências em diversos conceitos de Marx presentes entre o período de 1843 a 1871. Com base na análise dos Cadernos Spinoza, da Crítica da Filosofia do Direito de Hegel, da Crítica da Filosofia do Direito de Hegel-Introdução, da Questão Judaica, d A Sagrada Família, d A Ideologia Alemã e d A Guerra Civil na França, demonstra-se que, embora Marx tenha se referido pouquíssimas vezes de forma direta ao filosofo holandês, podemos encontrar algumas ressonâncias do pensamento spinozano em alguns dos conceitos produzidos por Marx durante o período delimitado pela pesquisa. / [en] This thesis aims to investigate Spinoza s reception in Marx s work. The possible resonances and convergences in several concepts of Marx present between the period from 1843 to 1871 are analyzed in greater depth. Based on the analysis of Spinoza s Book, Hegel s Critique of the Philosophy of Law, of Hegel-Introduction, of the Jewish Question, of The Holy Family, of The German Ideology and of The Civil War in France, it is shown that, although Marx rarely referred directly to the Dutch philosopher, we can find some resonances of Spinoza s thought in some of the concepts produced by Marx during the period delimited by the research.

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<p>Toward the end of the nineteenth century, Ernst Mach expressed his worries about obscurities and metaphysical elements in scientific knowledge, and consequently contributed to the development of a Viennese tradition. Later on, Vienna Circle further extended Mach's ideas and led to the development of the logical positivist movement. Among the main tenets of this movement is the view that scientific theories are to be reduced to an empirical base capable of conclusive verification. But scientific theories are usually based on unverified and occasionally unverifiable hypotheses and principles. Thus, once this is realized, positivism in spite of itself will contribute to the development of scepticism about scientific knowledge.</p> <p>In reaction to the verificationism, however, Karl Popper developed his thesis of falsificationism or fallibilism; but this principle also leads to scepticism at least about certainty claims, with far reaching consequences. This chain of events leads to the development of Paul Feyerabend's epistemological anarchisma a rejection of all rules and methods in science in an attempt to reduce science to the level of irrationality and mythology.</p> <p>Against the negativist conclusions of these positions about science, the integrity of scientific knowledge is defended in this thesis. It is shown how scientific knowledge can be defended against scepticism of the type to which verificationism tends: this is done by examining one recent and rigorous sceptical position which undermines not only certainty and rationality of knowledge claims, but the very possibility of knowledge. By examining Popper's fallibilism, it is shown that science can also be defended against the negativist conclusions of fallibilism. Similarly, it is shown that Feyerabend's epistemological anarchism cannot either undermine scientific knowledge.</p> <p>These negativist positions, though they have received strong criticisms in some quarters, yet have not been examined all together, from the standpoint of their impact on the integrity of scientific knowledge. This task is undertaken in this thesis; we thus arrive at a positive and correct evaluation of scientific knowledge in the context of contemporary negativist epistemological trends. It has been shown that in spite of all the negativist arguments of the above positions, we can obtain certainty, justification, and truth in science, and thus we can obtain knowledge. But my rejection of negativism in science does not entail, and should not be construed as an advocacy of a return to, positivism.</p> / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Recent literature seems to have opened up space for naturalistic theistic metaethics in a contemporary context, as proponents of divine command theories have tended to be restricted to either supernatural or theistic non-natural theories within existing taxonomies of normative theory. While perhaps encouraging for theists, would theism add anything substantive to theories of ethical naturalism? In this paper, I examine this question. I argue that theistic naturalism appears to incur certain objections as well as provide a plausible and explanatory constraint on content for theories of ethical naturalism. As a result, a corresponding challenge to non-theistic variants is raised. / Master of Arts / Realists, roughly summarized, are those metaethicists who believe that some moral propositions have truth values, that some (or at least one) of those propositions turn out to be true, and that if rational agents disagree on the truth value of a particular moral proposition, only one of them has the possibility of being correct. Broadly construed, moral realists tend to fall under one of two “tents”, preferring either naturalism (for which moral properties turn out to be wholly natural in constitution) or non-naturalism (which posits that at least some moral properties have, even if only partly, non-natural constituents as part of their make-up. Theists, who base their theories of morality on some facet of the nature or essence (or commands) of God, have tended to either be relegated in philosophical debate to a characterization of “supernaturalism” or to some seldom visited corner of the non-natural “tent” of moral realism. The former tends to limit theistic engagement in contemporary metaethical dialogue such that it can seem (at times) as if theists and non-theists are talking about two different subjects entirely. On the other hand, a non-naturalistic theory of theistic moral realism saddles the view with some fairly difficult metaphysical and epistemological baggage in the form of powerful objections levied against non-naturalistic theories in general. This paper explores another option for theism in light of very recent work by Gideon Rosen, namely his article examining the metaphysical implications of varieties of moral realism, particularly naturalistic ones. This article has already garnered a general characterization (within metaethical research, writ large) as being a “taxonomy” of naturalistic (and non-naturalistic, for that matter) theories. Specifically for my purposes here, Rosen suggests that divine command theory (and theistic metaethics in general) should be understood as being naturalistic in formulation. This would seem to be advantageous to theists, in that their metaethical theories might avoid either the bounded characterization of supernaturalism or the difficult challenges of non-naturalism. However, the theist, should she avail herself of naturalism in this regard, will need to tread carefully. Given that Rosen has couched his 'taxonomy' in terms of metaphysical grounding, I examine some resultant challenges for naturalistic theistic metaethics, concluding they can be overcome, as well as a related objection to non-theistic naturalism that arise as a result of the same grounding discussion coupled with the resources theists can leverage in a naturalistic context.

Lin, Kwan Ting Maggie. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 190-195). / Abstract also in Chinese. / Chapter Chapter 1 --- Introduction / Literature Review --- p.17 / "Theories of the Body, Class and Social Status" --- p.21 / Theories of Globalization --- p.28 / Why Yoga in Hong Kong --- p.32 / Defining Social Class in Hong Kong --- p.32 / Methodology --- p.39 / Personal Statement --- p.42 / Structure of the Thesis --- p.44 / Chapter Chapter 2 --- Yoga in Hong Kong and its Historical Development / The 1950s Indian Wave --- p.48 / The 1980s-90s Western Wave --- p.52 / The Commercial Yoga Boom --- p.54 / Characteristics of Yoga in Hong Kong --- p.58 / My Fieldsites --- p.61 / Chapter Chapter 3 --- Yoga Studios: The Construction of Difference and Distinction / Features of Yoga Studios in Hong Kong --- p.65 / Studio Space for Leisure --- p.68 / Liminality and Yogic Ambience --- p.70 / "“Playing Yoga""" --- p.74 / Conspicuous Leisure --- p.75 / Discipline vs. Leisure --- p.81 / Membership as a Status Symbol --- p.87 / Conclusion --- p.90 / Chapter Chapter 4 --- Practitioners and Teachers: Ethnicity and Respect / Verbs for Describing Degree of Engagement in Yoga --- p.92 / “Doing Yoga´ح --- p.93 / “Practicing Yoga´ح --- p.93 / "Ethnicity, Respect, and Relationships" --- p.95 / "Yoga, Ethnicity，and Status" --- p.103 / Ethnicity and Social Class --- p.112 / Beyond Ethnicity? Internationalism --- p.117 / Conclusion --- p.118 / Chapter Chapter 5 --- Yoga and the Fetishism of the Body / Marketing and Advertising of Yoga and the Ideal Female Body --- p.122 / Yoga and the Slim Body Ideal in Hong Kong --- p.124 / Different Slimming Rhetorics --- p.125 / Mirrors and Discipline --- p.127 / Studios as Panopticon --- p.129 / The Slimming Myth --- p.131 / Yoga and the Fetishism of the Body in Hong Kong --- p.133 / Body as Capital --- p.134 / Body as Class Signifier --- p.135 / Conclusion --- p.139 / Chapter Chapter 6 --- Beyond the Body? Spirituality and Distinction / Yoga and Spirituality --- p.143 / Yoga and Mysticism --- p.147 / Beyond the Body? --- p.150 / "Yoga, Spirituality and Progression" --- p.154 / Body vs. Spirituality --- p.156 / Disciplining the Body --- p.162 / Distinction and Class Analysis --- p.172 / Conclusion --- p.175 / Chapter Chapter 7 --- Conclusion: The Significance of Yoga as Distinction in Hong Kong Limitation --- p.178 / Summary of Chapters --- p.179 / Leisure and Discipline in Hong Kong --- p.181 / Globalization and Yoga in Hong Kong --- p.182 / Capital Transference in the Capitalist Society --- p.183 / "Yoga, Class，and Status Evolution" --- p.184 / Reflections from the Failure of the Hong Kong Yoga Journal --- p.186 / "A New ""Yogic"" Hong Kong?" --- p.187 / Bibliographies --- p.191 / Appendix --- p.198