This work considers Karl Rahner’s theology of the person as hearer through a critical engagement with Julia Kristeva’s post-structuralist notion of the speaking subject. This offers an experimental exploration of contemporary theological understanding of subjectivity, with specific reference to ideas of relationality, and with a particular interest in the possibility of dialogue with post-structuralist ideas. From separate disciplines, with different tools and to different effects, Rahner and Kristeva reject the modernist cast of the human self. They demonstrate a common desire to explore subjectivity as a notion that has been problematised. In examining the person as hearer and the speaking subject together we discover a surprising number of areas of coherence as well as those of fundamental divergence. To this end we consider our theorisits’ pre-supposed arenas for human subjectivity, their epistemologies, and the importance each gives to language and otherness. We also examine how they relate intra- and inter-relationality. For Kristeva this involves a consideration of notions of the M/Other, the semiotic and the stranger in society. With Rahner we consider the social Trinity, the self-alienation of symbolism and the concept of neighbour-love. We suggest here that Rahner both pre-empts aspects of current theological interest in subjectivity and provides important resources that are especially useful in relating theology to post-structuralist notions.

The thesis introduces the Archetypal Market Hypothesis (AMH). Based on complex psychology and supported by insights from other (mind) sciences it describes the unconscious nature of investing and how it shapes price patterns. Specifically, it emphasises the central role of numerical archetypes in price discovery. Its ontological premise is the market’s mind, a complex adaptive system in the form of collective consciousness which originates from the collective unconscious. This premise suggests that investing involves more than cognition and reaches beyond rationality and logic. Among others, the thesis clarifies the affective impact of price discovery: it is not only what we can do with prices, but also what they can do with us. Numbers receive their affective powers from the numerical archetypes. They preconsciously create order in the mind by facilitating the dynamics of symbolic mapping as the mind attempts to make sense of what it senses, bridging the imaginative with the real. This autonomous and often dominating impact of the numerical archetypes manifests itself: • in individual consciousness via numerical intuition, and • in crowd consciousness via participation mystique which underlies intersubjectivity. The thesis will argue that both are supported cerebrally. The collective intersubjective nature of the market’s mind and its symbolic expression via prices make it an exemplary phenomenon to be researched because the archetypal dynamics are strongest in such spheres. The PhD’s goal, as part of the AMH proposition, is twofold. First, to formalise theoretically the concept of the market’s mind, in particular the collective experience of market states, generally known as market moods, and how these shift as a result of herd instinct. Second, to propose a framework for further empirical research to show that representing market data in a non-traditional way, based on Jung’s active imagination and similar techniques, can improve investors’ understanding of those states. If successful, the method (including bespoke software) can complement analytical investment research methods currently used by investors.

Hick’s pluralist assumption has remained the most knowable model of religious pluralism in the last few decades. Many have, from the perspectives of various major world religions, questioned his notion that the teachings of all religions are derived from the same Absolute Truth and that salvific-end is one, yet little attention has been paid to the traditions that he graded as unauthentic and non-valuable according to his soteriological and ethical criteriology. The purpose of this thesis was to demonstrate the exclusiveness of Hick’s model by describing a tradition called “Chinese Folk Religion” that does not fit into his definition of ‘authentic religion’. As the study suggested, his understanding of the world religious situation is over-generalised and simplified, and his particular criteriology does not treat all traditions fairly or pluralistically. As a response, this thesis proposed a more inclusive theory that also integrates the currently disregarded tradition into the interpretation.

The main objective of this master&rsquo / s thesis is to analyze the place assigned to the phenomenon of desire by Hegel and Spinoza, and to show that the main difference between two philosophers in terms of their understanding of desire and human phenomenon consists in their understanding of the relation between the substance and particulars. In order to fulfill the requirements of this objective, what is focused on is, as different from a certain philosophical thought excluding desire from a true account of human phenomenon due to two aspects of desire, namely being an immediate drive and being purely self-referential, which are not regarded as being capable of explaining the specific distinctness of human being, how Spinoza and Hegel give an account of desire, and how they conceive mentioned aspects of desire. Throughout the thesis, first Spinoza&rsquo / s ontology, as it is elaborated in the Ethics, and the place of the phenomenon of desire in this ontology are explained. Then through an analysis of the fourth chapter of the Phenomenology of Spirit, it is argued that Hegel&rsquo / s conception of desire enables one to conceive the distinctive human institutions such as sociality, morality, and etc., as derivatives of desire. Finally it is argued that, since Hegel conceives the relation between the substance and particulars as a total detachment, he is able to give the spiritual dimension of human phenomenon in terms of desire. In this way moreover the specific distinctness of the human phenomenon is preserved in the philosophy of Hegel.

Is alienation a process of self-discovery or is it a loss of reality? The subject of this thesis is how alienation is discussed in Hegel and Marx&rsquo / s philosophies in terms of this question. In Hegel&rsquo / s philosophy, alienation is part of the process of self-creativity and self-discovery. For Marx, it is the result of the capitalist mode of production. While Hegel explains the existence of the human being through focusing on its ontological dimension, Marx evaluates the term alienation in terms of the economic dimension which he claims that Hegel ignores. The understanding of these philosophers about how they make understandable the process, circumstances and results of alienation is significant for the subject of this thesis. The thesis concludes that, Marx, in spite of his criticisms of Hegel is closer to Hegel than is thought. An additional claim is that Marx&rsquo / s criticisms of Hegel complement Hegel&rsquo / s philosophy rather than overcoming it. The supporting analysis of the thesis is the discussion of whether Marx&rsquo / s criticisms related to Hegel&rsquo / s understanding of alienation as abstract, mystifying, and nonsense are right or wrong. Hegel&rsquo / s conception of alienation has thus been examined by way of Marx&rsquo / s criticisms.

This study mainly investigates the reason of living in civil society, the motives of people to live under the government and necessity of commonwealth by design to live in peace based on modern social contract theories of Hobbes and Locke. Hobbes has a decisive role for developing a western political thought and Locke goes a step further to put superiority of the community and latitude of thought in his theory. In order to examine these topics, similarities of both philosophers in terms of their effort on setting free political thoughts from medieval world view, and their differentiations regarding considerations on human nature, desires and rights of men, formation of the society and the role of government are focused on.

This thesis aims to contribute to ecocentric views by revising and criticising Callicott&#039 / s conception of environment and ecocentric ethics that he develops in the light of ecology and the Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum physics. The thesis also aims to support the ecocentric point of view by suggesting a different approach to the conception of environment in the light of the Existential Interpretation.