Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 2007. / Title from first page of PDF file. Includes bibliographical references (p. 171-178).

<p>My dissertation is about good arguments and why they fail to persuade. Besides being a common experience of everyday life, this is an old worry of Plato's that continues to motivate two contemporary lines of research. The first concerns what makes something a good argument, and the second concerns what a mind must be like to be moved by one. Together, these lines guide my project and divide it into two parts. Part I is about good reasons, specifically epistemic reasons. In my first chapter, I defend epistemic instrumentalism, the position that epistemic reasons are good reasons only relative to one's epistemic preferences. I acknowledge that epistemic instrumentalism opens the door to a terrible proliferation of incompatible preferences, but claim that this is merely a potential problem, and not an actual problem to be solved. In my second chapter, I discuss the nature of reasonhood, and argue, contrary to orthodoxy, that there is no compelling reason to accept the skeptic's claim that, because of the inconsistency of three very basic epistemic preferences, it is impossible for any position to be conclusively safe to hold. Part II is about immovable minds. Immovable minds are minds that are unpersuaded by good reasons. In my third chapter, I argue that for good reasons to be persuasive, the properties that make them good reasons must be identified, through habituation, with other desirable qualities like pleasure or success. Identifying the merits of good reasons with other rewards cultivates intellectual character, and intellectual character, as I argue in my final chapter, remains worth cultivating, notwithstanding situationist doubts about the existence of character and intuitionist concerns about human rationality.</p> / Dissertation

abstract: The comparative study of the poetics of landscape of the Argentinian poet Diana Bellessi in Sur (1998) and the U.S. poet Mary Oliver in What Do We Know (2002) reveal how each writer acknowledges discourse and perception as means to bridge the nature/culture dichotomy and to unsettle the American landscape from cultural and epistemological assumptions that perpetuate the disconnection with matter. While Bellessi re&ndash;signifies the historical and cultural landscape drawn by European colonization in order to establish a dialogue with the voices of the past related to a present&ndash;day quest to reconnect with nature, Oliver articulates an ontological and phenomenological expression to reformulate prevailing notions of cognizing materiality aiming to overcome the culture/nature divide. I therefore examine the interrelationship between perception, language and nature in Bellessi&rsquo;s and Oliver&rsquo;s poetic works by deploying Maurice Merleau-Ponty&rsquo;s phenomenological theory of perception into material feminist theoretical works by Karen Barad and Susan Hekman. In so doing, I demonstrate how both poets act on language to forge a non&ndash;dualistic expression that, in allowing matter as an agentic force that relates with humans in dynamics of mutual impact and intra&ndash;activity, entails a phenomenological and onto&ndash;epistemological approach to ground language in materiality and produce ethical discursive practices to relate with nature. I argue that Bellessi&rsquo;s and Oliver&rsquo;s approach toward nature proves as necessary in the articulation of efforts leading to overcome the nature/culture dichotomy and thus, to address ecological and environmental concerns. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.A. English 2011

This dissertation proposes the application of rarely-used epistemological and scientific lenses to the works of four authors spanning two centuries: Honoré de Balzac, Émile Zola, Raymond Queneau, and Michel Houellebecq. Each of these novelists engaged closely with questions of science and epistemology, yet each approached that engagement from a different scientific perspective and epistemological moment. In Balzac’s La Peau de chagrin, limits of determinism and experimental method tend to demonstrate that there remains an inscrutable yet guided excess in the interactions between the protagonist Raphaël and his enchanted skin. This speaks to an embodiment of the esprit préscientifique, a framework that minimizes the utility of scientific practice in favor of the unresolved mystery of vitalism. With Zola comes a move away from undefinable mystery to a construction of the novel consistent with Claude Bernard’s deterministic experimental medicine. Yet Zola’s Roman expérimental project is only partially executed, in that the Newtonian framework that underlies Bernard’s method yields to contrary evidence in Zola’s text of entropy, error, and loss of information consistent with the field of thermodynamics. In Queneau’s texts, Zola’s interest in current science not only remains, but is updated to reflect the massive upheaval in scientific thought that took place in the last half of the nineteenth and early part of the twentieth centuries. If Queneau’s texts explicitly mention advances like relativity, however, they often do so in a humorously dismissive manner that values pre-entropic and even early geometric constructs like perpetual motion machines and squared circles. Queneau’s apparent return to the pre-scientific ultimately yields to Houellebecq’s textual abyss. For Houellebecq, science is not only to be embraced in its entropic and relativistic constructs; it is these very constructs - and the style typically used to present them – that serve as a reminder of the abjection, decay, and hopelessness of human existence. Gone is the mystery of life in its totality. In its place remain humans acting as a series of particles mechanically obeying deterministic laws. The parenthesis that opened with Balzac’s positive coding of pre-scientific thought closes with Houellebecq’s negative coding of modern scientific theory.

<p> This study employed a model of basic qualitative research which explored teachers&rsquo; pedagogical responses to the unique cultural gaps they experienced in schools where most students were of minority cultural identity. Eight teachers who self-identified as majority culture identity formed the sample group for this study. Semistructured interviews were used to collect their insights regarding their pedagogical decision making they used with the students in the school where they were teaching. Additionally, teachers shared what they described were culturally responsive curriculum samples and then provided a reflection on how they implemented this curriculum. The data showed that these teachers understood the value of providing a culturally responsive pedagogy in their classrooms. Despite this, for numerous reasons, teachers struggled to develop and then apply culturally responsive pedagogy that aligned with models described in literature.</p><p>

<p> This qualitative testimonio study centered the voices of two Chicana graduate students and two doctoral students of an Educational Leadership and Policy Studies Program to examine how they interpret the positioning of their intersectionality as well as how these interpretations influenced their college trajectories and conceptualization of educational leadership. Chicana Feminist Epistemology grounded the investigation to claim research as a site of equality where collaborators participated fully in data collection and data analysis. Methods of pl&aacute;tica and reflexi&oacute;n were employed to engage collaborators in a critical reflection of their lived experiences relevant to their intersectionality with the aim of translating these reflections into individual testimonios. Specifically, a Mestiza Methodology Framework was introduced as a model in which collaborators integrated data collection and data analysis to yield a synthesis, analysis, and interpretation of their testimonios presented in the format of a collective testimonio. </p><p> Findings demonstrated by interrogating the imposition of dualities that split the intersections of their identity, collaborators located Nepantla, the space between these dualities to excavate knowledge from El Cenote, the intersection of dualities. From El Cenote findings revealed the family as an intersection of identity with the largest influence on initial educational trajectories defined at the undergraduate level. In addition, overall educational experiences fragmented Chicana intersectionality operating to threaten their academic survival. Lastly, the search for the healing and reconciliation of a fragmented identity reset educational trajectories towards advanced degrees in Educational Leadership framed by a praxis of social justice.</p><p>

This thesis is a study of the relationship between John Wesley's Christology and his broader theology. No specific effort has yet been made to assess whether or not a meaningful change to Wesley's Christology ever occurred, or to what extent Wesley's Christology shaped his broader theology. The purpose of this study is to fill this gap by first demonstrating that a change to Wesley's Christology did occur and describing the implications of this shift for his broader theology and, second, by evaluating to what degree Wesley's broader theology arose out of, or was shaped by, his Christology. Chapter one describes Wesley's inherited theology, which he received from his family and faith tradition, in order to provide a foundation from which to examine changes to his Christology. Chapter two then demonstrates that a change to Wesley's Christology did occur around his 1738 'evangelical conversion', and describes the implications of this shift for Wesley's evangelical theology. John Wesley identified the core doctrines of the early Methodists as repentance, faith, and holiness. Following Wesley's lead, this study examines three correlating areas of focus as representative of these core Methodist doctrines, in order to describe the relationship between these doctrines and Wesley's Christology. Chapter three, 'Christ and Humanity' examines Wesley's doctrine of humanity, including his understanding of the image of God, original sin, and the nature of salvation as restoration of the divine image. This chapter lays out Wesley's understanding of the need for human repentance. Chapter four, 'Christ Working for Us' examines those doctrines most closely tied to justification as an orienting concern. This includes Wesley's understanding of grace, the stages of faith, repentance itself, works meet for repentance, Christ's imputed righteousness, and adoption. Finally, chapter five, 'Christ Working in Us' examines those doctrines most closely linked to sanctification as an orienting concern. This includes the doctrine of the new birth, freedom from sin, assurance, and Christian perfection. By identifying the changes that occurred to Wesley's Christology and evaluating the relationship between his Christology and other core doctrines, this thesis will contribute to the growing body of research into the theological foundations of Methodism and the life and thought of the Rev. John Wesley.

The primary objective of this thesis is to provide an account of productive imagination in Kant's Critique of Pure Reason using Heidegger's interpretation in Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics. Kant's account of productive imagination largely remains in the context of his own project to establish the conditions for the possibility of experience which can ground a theory of knowledge. Thus, Kant's project can largely be read as a work of epistemology leaving an account of experience that is limited to knowledge of empirical objects. Therefore, in turning to Heidegger, I seek to provide an account of experience in the Critique that is not merely epistemic. Rather, in focusing on productive imagination in the Critique, as Heidegger has, one can obtain an account of experience that is revelatory of human finitude. Therefore, the thesis proceeds as follows. First, I offer an introduction providing proper context for the project. In Chapter 1, I offer a reading of both the A and B deductions from Kant's Critique of Pure Reason in order to establish the role and limits of productive imagination. Chapters 2 and 3 follow Heidegger through a large section of Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics in order to highlight the role of productive imagination and to move beyond the limits present in Kant's account. Lastly, I offer a conclusion.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-11T19:31:41Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2009-07-03Bitstream added on 2014-06-13T20:22:42Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 arruda_acjz_dr_bauru.pdf: 1273241 bytes, checksum: 732b6df8a598729f8d23a7a570d557d6 (MD5) / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) / Esta pesquisa possui como objetivo discutir a Noção de Inteligência na Epistemologia Genética de Piaget e possíveis implicações para o Ensino de Ciências que busca a construção de sujeitos autônomos e conscientes de sua importância histórica, isto é, de uma educação que não seja mera transmissão de conteúdos. Segundo Piaget as teorias clássicas que versam sobre a inteligência, não levam em conta que esta noção possui uma gênese. A inteligência nasce do esquematismo das ações e caracteriza-se como ação que coordena meios e fins (desde as ações sensório-motoras). Neste sentido, a inteligência expressa o aspecto dinâmico da construção da razão no sujeito, que possibilita o conhecimento / The purpose of this study is to discuss the Intelligence Notion of Piaget's Genetic Epistemology and possible implications to the Science Education, which searches for the building of independent subjects and it is aware of its historical significance, i.e., an education that is not just transmitting content. According to Piaget, the classic theories about intelligence do not considerer that this notion has genesis. Intelligent comes from the schematism of the actions and it is characterized as an action that coordinates centers and ends (since the motor sensory actions). In this way, the intelligent shows the dinamic aspect of the bulding of the reason on the subject, which enables the knowledge

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-11T19:35:37Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2012-06-20Bitstream added on 2014-06-13T20:46:34Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 deffacci_fa_dr_arafcl.pdf: 856044 bytes, checksum: 634d24b7bb2744d4a4240de1a73bdd12 (MD5) / Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) / Este trabalho pretende expor a crise contemporânea dos intelectuais a partir da correlação com a dimensão epistemológica. A denúncia do esgotamento da capacidade de atuação dos intelectuais tornou-se a principal fonte de preocupação nos debates que apareceram nas últimas décadas. Paralelo a esta preocupação estão as alterações no campo da ciência, para onde os intelectuais se deslocaram. O discurso epistemológico produzido pela era moderna, sustentado nas concepções iluministas voltadas para o progresso da humanidade a ser alcançado por intermédio da ciência, passou a ser reavaliado no século XX devido aos condicionantes históricos de um período de crise. A abordagem institucional da ciência projetou uma nova perspectiva epistemológica responsável por apresentar os condicionantes externos da atividade científica. Junto a isso, os intelectuais foram envolvidos pelo processo de institucionalização da ciência, uma vez que o espaço da profissionalização tornou-se uma via necessária. A inserção dos intelectuais no campo científico abriu espaço para uma nova postura, a qual abandonou significativamente as expectativas projetadas tanto pelo ideário humanista do século XIX, onde a base para a atuação dos intelectuais engajados constituía-se a partir dos valores universais, quanto pelas aspirações científicas que têm no pensamento de Mannheim sua expressão mais elevada. Assim, um dos aspectos da crise contemporânea dos intelectuais está diretamente vinculado com a questão epistemológica / This paper intends to expose the contemporary crisis of the intellectuals from the correlation with the epistemological dimension. Denunciation of the exhaustion of the intellectual capacity to act has become the main source of concern in the debates that have appeared in recent decades. Parallel to this are the changes in science, where intellectuals have shifted. The epistemological discourse produced in modernity, the Enlightenment conceptions sustained focused on the progress of humanity to be achieved through science, came to be reassessed in the twentieth century due to historical conditions for a period of crisis. The institutional approach of science has designed a new epistemological perspective responsible for presenting the external conditions of scientific activity. Along this, the intellectuals were involved by the process of institutionalization of science, since the space of professionalism has become a necessary way. The insertion of intellectuals in the scientific environment paved the way for a new position, which dropped significantly expectations projected by both the humanistic ideals of the nineteenth century, where the basis for the work of intellectuals was engaged themselves from the universal valves and aspirations for scientific thought in Mannheim have its highest expression. Thus, one aspect of the contemporary crisis of the intellectuals is directly linked with the epistemological question