In this thesis I address the claim that theories of moral rights are incompatible with environmental concerns. This claim is often made on the grounds that rights are too individualistic and human-centred. I attempt to answer this, not on the grounds that it misrepresents all theories of rights or that these concerns are not important, but rather by demonstrating that concepts of environmental rights can be developed that will do this work. I argue that rights are dynamic concepts which have altered over their history to accommodate new challenges and problems (a fact frequently disguised by the often rigid and legalistic frameworks of twentieth-century rights theories) and that their associations with individualism and agency should not be seen as central to the ‘core’ concept of a right. I examine various cases that might be regarded as difficult for ‘traditional’ theories, including the rights of future people, groups and animals. I show that certain theories are unable to account for moral rights in these cases (especially, but not only, ‘choice theories’ of the kind espoused by H. L. A. Hart). I develop an account of what an adequate theory of environmental rights must involve. This includes the suggestion that there are ‘essentially’ environmental rights which are not derivable from any of the traditional basic rights. I base this claim on the role that environment plays in identity on a number of interlinked levels. I argue that the ways in which we are involved in and dependent upon our environments are just as fundamental to who and what we are as the ways in which we are autonomous and independent. A theory of rights that places liberty and independence alone at the heart of the self will then rely on an impoverished and unbalanced view of how we relate to the world.

When we make moral judgements and act morally we recognise and respond to reasons that are there whether we recognise them or not. This is the claim defended in this thesis. It has two aspects. The first is that acts of moral judgement aspire, sometimes successfully, to moral knowledge. This is moral cognitivism. The second is that moral truths report reasons for action. In responding appropriately to these reasons we are motivated to action. This is the practicality of morality. Hence, it is claimed, there is a moral reality that we respond to in both cognition and action. Adopting a practical reason approach, I argue that the objectivity and practicality of morality are not in conflict, but are linked by the idea of a practical reason. The moral truths that we can have knowledge of are the truths about the reasons for action that morality provides. I argue for this claim by showing why we should reject Humean ways of thinking about motivation and practical reason and embrace a broadly Kantian account. I argue that this account is compatible with seeing moral reasons as contributory rather than decisive or overriding. I also show how this account enables moral cognitivists to respond convincingly to arguments advanced by non-cognitivists.

This thesis is a study of the life and thought of the Very Reverend Or Isaac Milner (1750- 1820) and his contribution to the Evangelical Revival in England. Milner is not unknown to students of Evangelical history, but his figure is a shadowy one. This work describes his life, considers the ways in which he contributed to the Evangelical Revival, particularly within the Church of England, and assesses his thought and influence. Chapter One analyzes Milner's relationship to the Clapham Sect. He was regarded as one of the advisers to 'the Saints' and the nature of his influence is evaluated. Chapter Two centres on Milner as a scholar, College President and Vice-Chancellor in Cambridge University. An account of Milner's commitment to learning is important to a movement later accused of anti-intellectualism. Chapter Three examines Milner's position as the Dean of Carlisle Cathedral. Milner held this office for twenty years before another Evangelical succeeded to a like position in the Anglican hierarchy, and his leadership in this capacity is assessed. Chapter Four is a study of Milner's primary work, The History of the Church of Christ. Co-authored with Joseph Milner, the work made a notable contribution to ecclesiastical historiographyand remains an important source for Evangelical history. Of special interest is Milner's detailed study of Martin Luther. Chapter Five discusses Milner's contributions to nineteenth-century theological debate concerning the sacrament of baptism and the British and Foreign Bible Society. These controversies influenced the development of Evangelical theology and mission, and are important to an overview of the period. One scholar of Evangelical history, Charles Smyth, asserted that biography presents a primary medium by which to study the history of the Evangelical Revival. This biographical study of Milner is a further contribution toward the picture of the Evangelical movement that has emerged from the pages of history since Smyth's statement over forty years ago. Milner's engagement with the social, ecclesiastical, intellectual and theological spheres of his time allows for the study of a unique cross-section of Evangelical concerns and involvements that helped shape nineteenth-century Britain.

I aim to understand whether apriority entails necessity, aposteriority entails contingency and conceivability entails possibility; that is, the relationship between, and the nature of, rationality and modality. The thesis is split into two parts: one on apriority and modality (chs. 2-4), and another on conceivability, apriority/aposteriority and modality (chs. 5 to 7). In Chapter 1, I discuss ‘two-dimensional modal semantics’, arguing that it is ill-equipped to provide a substantive account of rationality and modality, before setting out the basis of such an understanding. I begin the first part of the thesis (in Chapter 2) by outlining a preliminary account of the a priori: it is, strictly, not defeasible by empirical evidence; it involves a kind of necessity (‘rational necessity’); and it is (at least in its prima facie variant) fallible. In Chapter 3 I discuss the contingent a priori, arguing that genuine apriority entails necessity, before placing apriority qua ‘rational necessity’ (and ‘rational modality’ more widely) with respect to other kinds of modality (in Chapter 4). I conclude Part I of the thesis, by arguing that the a priori is not coextensive with, but is grounded in, metaphysical necessity. Part II of the thesis begins with a discussion of the necessary a posteriori (Chapter 5), where I argue that there are no genuine cases, thus aposteriority entails contingency and conceivability entails possibility. I then deal with Frege’s and Kripke’s puzzles (Chapter 6), which I claim (as with the necessary a posteriori) pose no genuine problem for conceivability-possibility reasoning. Finally (in Chapter 7), I offer a deeper account of rational modality together with a tentative account of metaphysical modality (and essence). I then conclude that genuine apriority qua rational necessity entails metaphysical necessity; similarly, strictly, aposteriority (rational contingency) entails metaphysical contingency and, (in)conceivability (rational (im)possibility) entails metaphysical (im)possibility.

My thesis contests a putative congruity between Derrida and Levinas concerning discussions of responsibility, ethics and otherness. It attends to the fundamental 'metaphysical' differences between the two with respect to ontology, language and historicity. Consequently, it foregrounds two distinct conceptions of philosophy, which differ with respect to task, strategy and presentational form. Since Levinas's key notion of the 'face' [le visage], which cannot be equated to any actual countenance, breaks with phenomenality - no small issue for an avowed phenomenology - this thesis will begin by treating the category of the other (or. Other) in Levinas's writings as a conundrum. By analysing the two major topographies of the Other developed by Levinas in Totality and Infinity and Otherwise than Being (with particular attention to their differences), I ask: who or what counts as the other for Levinas? Concurrently, I track Derrida's writings across his career to see if he can be held to subscribe to either of these models, noting the transformations that Derrida effects upon Levinas. By analysing them in tandem, the metaphysical and speculative contours of both thinkers (which if not neglected in the secondary literature are transformed into quasi-theological positions) come to the fore. Thereby, this thesis seeks to revive questions of speculative thought in contemporary philosophy, whilst simultaneously asking how this speculative dimension preserves its status as philosophy despite its break with norms of written form and argumentation. Crucially, this is the terrain on which Derrida, in 'Violence and Metaphysics', had first criticised Levinas - his lack of attention to language and presentation meant his writing remained non-philosophical. '... exteriority and alterity are concepts which themselves have never surprised philosophical discourse. Philosophy by itself has always been concerned with them. These are not conceptual headings under which philosophy's border can be overflowed: the overflow is its object. Instead of determining some other circumscription, recognizing it, practicing it, bringing it to light, forming it, in a word producing it (and today this word serves as the crudest "new clothes" of the metaphysical denigration which accommodates itself very well to all these projects), in question will be, but according to a movement unheard of by philosophy, an other which is no longer its other. ' Jacques Derrida 'Tympan' [1972] translated by Alan Bass in Margins of Philosophy (Brighton, Harvester Press, 1982), pp. ix-xxix; pp. xiii-xiv. 'As has often been remarked, one of the gravest misfortunes that can affect a writer of great intellectual seriousness and strong ethical passions is to have his ideas "naturalized" by the English. ' Allan Janik and Stephen Toulmin Wittgenstein's Vienna (New York, Simon & Schuster, 1973), p. 19.

In the last hundred years of commentarial literature on Schopenhauer, the breadth and profundity of the relationships that exist between aesthetics and ethics in his philosophy have been overlooked and overshadowed by studies of Schopenhauer as a metaphysician. This exploration of the status of the metaphysical connection between aesthetics and ethics in his philosophy. In order to establish the significance of this connection for contemporary debates on aesthetics and ethics, I elucidate Schopenhauer's philosophy in a manner that addresses its inconsistencies and inadequacies whilst being conducive to the clear articulation and development of its key themes and central insights.

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This thesis addresses the creative encounter between volition and politics, in the philosophical, theological and political writings of Locke and Rousseau. Utilising historical, contextual and philosophical forms of interpretation, it aims to explore whether Locke or Rousseau held consistent views about volition and what those were. It then seeks to cash out these views for their understanding of political institutions and political agents. This thesis explores the way Locke and Rousseau understood volition according to a traditional distinction between active and passive powers; however, both of them reconsider the nature of this dichotomy. Locke, it is argued, thought volition could be either active or passive. Rousseau, by contrast, believed volition to be a composite of interrelating active and passive capacities. Both thinkers identify active willing with real virtue and freedom, and both believe a kind of sublimated love is essential to realise this activity. Furthermore, this thesis considers the ways in which these theories of volition underlie Locke and Rousseau’s broader understandings of an agent’s disposition. This links Locke’s views on active volition to the mentalities appropriate for discourse, philosophy and Christian charity. Likewise, Rousseau’s understanding of true philosophy and virtue presuppose the conditions of active, moral will. This thesis cashes out the political importance of volition for Locke and Rousseau in two ways: a) as a heuristic and polemical device to reject unacceptable forms of government and to construct appropriate ones; b) as a philosophical framework with which the relationship between political agents and political institutions can be explained and constructed so as to cultivate citizens’ active will. Thus, the active dispositions appropriate to legitimate communication and politics are pivotal for Locke’s refutation of Filmer. But further, Lockean politics is constituted to preserve a space in which active dispositions might actually flourish. For Rousseau, the terms of the state of nature, the original compact and the Sovereign itself are all attuned to human agency, yet, this thesis explores how this scheme of political justice is only realised when the General Will is determined and enlightened. Thus, Rousseau uses his understanding of agency to explain the Legislator, his relation to the body politic, and the subsequent relations amongst the people, the Sovereign, Government and public moeurs as actual phenomena by which an active will is evoked.

This thesis concerns the problem of applying the ideas developed in contemporary virtue ethics to political philosophy. The core of the problem, explained in the opening chapters, is that assessment of right action offered by virtue ethics - in terms of what 'the virtuous person' characteristically does or would do - is focused on individual persons, rather than political principles of government. Accordingly, interpretations of traditional Aristotelianism have struggled to accommodate the putative value of modern value pluralism and manifold conceptions of the 'good life', whilst liberal theories that employ virtue concepts fail to offer a political philosophy that is distinctly virtue ethical. Rather than trying to fit individualistic virtue ethics to political theory in these ways, subsequent chapters start from the viewpoint of individuals and look outward to their social and political environment, arguing that an adequately socio-political virtue ethics requires, and suits, an ethics of social roles. Various virtue ethical approaches to roles, however, fail in different ways to determine what it means to act virtuously in such a role. Inresponse, it is argued that virtue ethics needs a normative account of what specific role-determining institutions should be like. The possibilities for the Aristotelian ergon - function or 'characteristic activity' - serving as a normative criterion for a good institution of its kind are discussed and modified, leading to a positive account of institutional ergon that links the primary function of an institution with the specific and distinct human good or goods that it serves. The promissory conclusion to the thesis is that contemporary virtue ethics can, in this way, offer a distinct and enlightening approach to social and political philosophy, whilst also strengthening itself as an ethical theory.

No description available.