This thesis analyzes the direction of time problem in the framework of philosophy of science. The radiation arrow, Newtonian arrow, thermodynamical arrow and quantum mechanical arrow have been studied in detail. The importance of the structure of space-time concerning direction of time is emphasized.

This thesis is a comparison of the philosophical systems of Zen Buddhism, which is an Eastern Philosophy, with Ludwig Wittgenstein&rsquo / s philosophical studies, who is an extraordinary name of the Western Philosophy in the 20th century. The history and sources of Zen Buddhism were given with its adoption in the use of language and arts. Besides, this study exemplifies the philosophy of Zen Buddhism with the examples from the life story of Wittgenstein. The thesis is written with a full awareness of the sensitivity of comparing different systems which always embody counterexamples and speculations. This is the reason why speculative ideas and resources were deliberately ignored. The aim is to contribute the cultural life of Turkey by taking such a subject to the academic milieu. Moreover, Turkey is the passage of the East and the West both geographically and culturally. There are resemblances between Zen and Wittgenstein by means of method and the useof language. Furthermore, it was given the names of the books that Wittgenstein read and the philosophers who influenced Wittgenstein. The parallels between Zen and Wittgenstein are justified.

The question of who is participating in today’s debate around theologies of other religions is important. Religious difference and the many ways of dealing with it are issues in political, social and theological initiatives. The reality of religious plurality in daily life leaves some Christians wondering about the best way to relate to non-Christian neighbors. In light of this, a series of questions emerges about who is shaping conversations with people of other faiths and what priorities they reflect. A Lutheran voice is lacking in this debate. Despite this, there has been a wide response from other Christian traditions. In some cases denominations have raised questions of religious pluralism as a theological issue, while elsewhere individual theologians have contributed to the debate. The project that follows will examine such contributions from three ecclesial traditions (Roman Catholic, Evangelical and Protestant) and individual theologians in order to chart some common concerns in the theology of religions debate. In an effort to highlight a tradition-constituted approach to the other, connections will also be made between individuals’ positions and their ecclesial traditions. This thesis will also propose a distinctively Lutheran theology of religions first by using the works of Martin Luther to introduce the Lutheran history of engagement with non-Christians. Then, Lutheran statements and resources, partnerships and institutions will be examined to discover the ways in which the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America engages non-Christians. Finally, this project will propose crucial elements for a specifically Lutheran theology of religions. These elements will be put in conversation with individual Lutheran theologians who have made contributions to the debate. Ultimately a theology of kinship will emerge. Using distinctively Lutheran themes, this theology recognizes a connection between all people and calls Lutherans to live in kinship with the religious other.

The handling of patient confidentiality in the medical, and more specifically as dealt with in this article, the pharmaceutical profession, is accepted as a given. Confidentiality cannot, however, always be guaranteed. The reason is that, amongst other things, the utilitarian principle of the ‘greatest good for the greatest number of people’ determines that certain exceptions have to be made in order to protect the health of the nation as a whole. Provision is made for exceptions in the Pharmacy Act where confidentiality may be breached. However, there are certain cases which are not provided for in the Act (and Acts change from time to time). This situation makes it necessary for the pharmacist to make moral judgements in specific instances related to specific patients. The objective of this article is to investigate these exceptions within a philosophical framework and to determine what the philosophical basis of such decisions would entail. This article initially will examine the current Pharmacy Act and the exceptions will be discussed that allow for the breaching of patient confidentiality. This will be followed by a brief exposition of modernist ethics and the issue of confidentiality under the headings of the idea of duty as moral imperative, as well as the utility idea. Pluralistic alternatives such as the ethics of virtue, postmodern ethics, and anti-moralism, will be explored as possible solutions to the pharmacist’s dilemma in this regard. / Thesis (MPhil)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013

The handling of patient confidentiality in the medical, and more specifically as dealt with in this article, the pharmaceutical profession, is accepted as a given. Confidentiality cannot, however, always be guaranteed. The reason is that, amongst other things, the utilitarian principle of the ‘greatest good for the greatest number of people’ determines that certain exceptions have to be made in order to protect the health of the nation as a whole. Provision is made for exceptions in the Pharmacy Act where confidentiality may be breached. However, there are certain cases which are not provided for in the Act (and Acts change from time to time). This situation makes it necessary for the pharmacist to make moral judgements in specific instances related to specific patients. The objective of this article is to investigate these exceptions within a philosophical framework and to determine what the philosophical basis of such decisions would entail. This article initially will examine the current Pharmacy Act and the exceptions will be discussed that allow for the breaching of patient confidentiality. This will be followed by a brief exposition of modernist ethics and the issue of confidentiality under the headings of the idea of duty as moral imperative, as well as the utility idea. Pluralistic alternatives such as the ethics of virtue, postmodern ethics, and anti-moralism, will be explored as possible solutions to the pharmacist’s dilemma in this regard. / Thesis (MPhil)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013

[pt] Nosso trabalho buscou apresentar a concepção de juízo na obra de Hannah Arendt, cuja compreensão se apoia em uma livre interpretação do juízo reflexionante estético de Kant. As razões pelas quais Arendt teria se voltado para o tema refletem sua preocupação com o obscurecimento do mundo, cuja pluralidade esteve visivelmente ameaçada com o advento do totalitarismo. Para a pensadora, os acontecimentos sem precedentes decorrentes do totalitarismo fazem parte de um contexto em que a ausência de reflexão e uma consequente inabilidade para julgar o que se passava fizeram do século XX um dos mais sombrios períodos da história da humanidade. A faculdade do juízo reflexionante estético, capaz de refletir sobre o particular sem que exista um universal dado, foi pensada por Arendt em um contexto político, e suas características apontam para a necessidade de compreender sem corrimãos os assuntos mundanos que se apresentam na contemporaneidade. Poderíamos considerar uma teoria do juízo arendtiana apenas de um modo fragmentado, uma vez que esse foi um projeto de uma pesquisa teórica que não foi realizado integralmente por ela, e do qual temos um quebra-cabeça a ser montado. Suas peças podem ser resgatadas desde os seus primeiros ensaios, quando a ação política era o seu leit motif intelectual. Posteriormente, a partir do julgamento de Eichmann, quando ao cunhar a expressão banalidade do mal ela própria se tornou exemplar em seu juízo reflexionante. Julgar prospectivamente com uma mentalidade alargada ou retrospectivamente com desinteresse são, pois, lados possíveis da mesma moeda: o juízo de gosto, cujo resgate Arendt se esforçou em trazer à luz. Tal juízo possui as características da comunicabilidade e intersubjetividade que possibilitam a existência do mundo, entendido como o espaço entre homens e espaço de visibilidade do pensamento reflexivo. Por essa razão, a atividade de julgar assim compreendida é a única faculdade espiritual do homem capaz de estabelecer o horizonte da pluralidade. / [en] Our work intended to present the notion of judgment in the writings of Hannah Arendt, whose comprehension supports itself on a free interpretation of Kantian aesthetic reflective judgment. The reasons why Arendt would have turned herself to the theme reflect her concern about the darkening of the world, whose plurality had been visibly threatened by the advent of totalitarianism. For philosopher, the unprecedented events that came from totalitarianism are part of a context in which the lack of deliberation and a subsequent inability to judge what was happening made the 20th century one of the darkest periods of human history. Arendt studied the faculty of aesthetic reflective judgment, capable of deliberating about the particular without a given universal, in a political context, and its characteristics point to the necessity of comprehending without handrails the mundane topics that present themselves on contemporaneity. We are able to consider only a fragmented Arendtian theory of judgment, since this was a research project not done solely by herself, and of which we have a whole puzzle to assemble. The pieces of this puzzle can be found beginning on her first essays, when the political action was her intellectual leit motif. Later, from Eichmann s judgment on, when she became an example on her own reflective judgment after coining the expression banality of evil. Judging prospectively with an enlarged mentality or retrospectively with disinterest are, then, two possible sides of the same coin: the judgment of taste, something Arendt tried to rescue and bring to light. This judgment holds the same characteristics of communicability and intersubjectivity that make possible the existence of the world, understood as the space between men and space of visibility of reflective judgment. For this reason, the activity of judging, comprehended this way, is the only spiritual faculty of men capable of establishing the horizon of plurality.

[pt] Esta tese desenvolve uma abordagem sobre a escola brasileira como uma instituição que pode contribuir para a democratização do espaço público. Nessa perspectiva, considera que, por razões teóricas, éticas e políticas, a pluralidade presente na sociedade brasileira e que atravessa a escola pública precisa se constituir com referência nas lutas em torno da igualdade substantiva. Sustenta-se que, frente ao aprofundamento das desigualdades sociais impostas pelo capital em sua fase de desenvolvimento global, uma rica compreensão da pluralidade só pode se realizar mediante o estabelecimento de condições de igualdade nas relações sociais, buscando superar tanto as injustiças de ordem socioeconômica quanto às injustiças decorrentes dos processos de desrespeito, de não reconhecimento e dominação cultural-valorativa. Com base nessa orientação, empreende-se uma análise crítica de concepções pós-modernas que se apropriam de conceitos como cultura, identidade e diferença, sem relacioná-los às lutas por uma sociedade igualitária, democrática e socialista. Ao mesmo tempo, enfatiza-se o trabalho como princípio ordenador da pluralidade, pois potencializa os processos de individualização pela capacidade de criar cultura, de formar identidades e de enunciar diferenças nas formas de sentir, pensar e intervir no mundo. A compreensão do trabalho como princípio ordenador da pluralidade coloca para a escola pública brasileira os desafios de valorizar a relação pedagógica entre educador e educando e de superar os mecanismos internos que inibem a vida escolar para viabilizar a apropriação e reapropriação do conhecimento na direção da emancipação humana e da transformação social. / [en] This thesis develops an analysis of Brazilian public schools as institutions that can contribute towards the denmocratization of public space. The analysis considers that, for theoretical, ethical and political reasons, the plurality present in Brazilian society, and which manifests itself in its public schools, needs to make reference to the struggles for substantive equality. It is argued that, in the face of the profound social inequalities imposed by capital in its phase of global development, a rich comprehension of plurality can only be realized through the establishment of conditions of equality in social relations, looking towards the overcoming of socioeconomic injustices as well as the injustices that are products of lack of respect, lack of recognition and cultural domination. On the basis of this argument, the thesis develops a critical analysis of postmodern conceptions that appropriate concepts such as culture, identity and difference, without relating them to the struggles for an egalitarian, democratic and socialist society. At the same time, the dissertation emphasizes labour as an organising principle of plurality, because it potentializes the processes of individualization by its capacity to create culture, to form identities and to enunciate differences in ways of feeling, thinking and intervening in the world. The comprehension of labour as an organising principle of plurality confronts the Brazilian public school with the challenge to value the pedagogical relation between educator and educated and to overcome the internal mechanisms that inhibit school life, in order to make possible the appropriation and reappropriation of knowledge in the direction of human emancipation and social transformation.

Cette thèse étudie le fonctionnement des déterminations définie et indéfinie au sein des syntagmes nominaux génériques en anglais contemporain à partir d’un corpus essentiellement composé de textes encyclopédiques et scientifiques. La catégorisation générique peut relever de processus cognitifs et de niveaux d’abstraction distincts signifiés par les déterminations définie et indéfinie. La première partie décrit successivement le cadre référentiel de cette étude, la formalisation morphosyntaxique de la généricité nominale, la spécification dont sont porteurs les articles définis et indéfinis, ainsi que les contraintes déterminatives liées à la classe lexico-grammaticale des substantifs et au contexte prédicatif. La deuxième partie étudie les possibilités et impossibilités déterminatives au regard des contextes prédicatifs lorsque le syntagme nominal est associé à un prédicat d’espèce. Nous considérons plus spécifiquement l’interaction entre la classification des espèces, le nombre singulier ou pluriel et la détermination définie ou indéfinie en nous intéressant aux espèces conçues dans leur pluralité interne. La troisième partie examine le fonctionnement de l’article défini comme opérateur d’abstraction. L’étude des spécialisations de the montre qu’il est lié à une visée référentielle externalisante et synthétique. La quatrième partie traite du fonctionnement des syntagmes nominaux génériques définis et indéfinis au sein des textes génériques eu égard à la structuration du discours. L’article défini sous-tend une dimension anaphorique au générique également, et reste la marque de la saillance cognitive du référent. / This dissertation deals with the use of definite and indefinite determiners in generic noun phrases in contemporary English, using a corpus based on encyclopedic and scientific texts mainly. The categorization which genericity is based on results from various cognitive processes and levels of abstraction which are signified in the use of definite and indefinite determiners. The first part successively describes the referential framework of our study, the morphosyntactical forms of generic noun phrases, the values of definite and indefinite articles, as well as the pattern of constraints on definite and indefinite articles established by the lexico-grammatical features of nouns and the predicative context. The second part examines determiner possibilities and impossibilities with regard to the predicative context when a generic noun phrase is combined with a kind-predicate. More specifically, we correlate species classification, singular/plural number marking and definite/indefinite determination as we examine the plural structure of generic referents. The third part studies the use of the definite article as an abstraction operator. As we consider cases in which the use of definite noun phrases is favored, we show that its reference involves an externalizing and synthetic dimension. The fourth part deals with the way generic definite and indefinite noun phrases combine in generic texts with regard to the discourse structure. The use of the definite article presupposes an anaphoric dimension in generic reference also and indicates that the referent is salient in a cognitive perspective.

[pt] Diante do momento marcado pela transição paradigmática entre a Modernidade e a Pós-modernidade, como estariam posicionadas as concepções de ciência de professores/as de ciência/biologia nesse cenário? Quais suas posições diante da reformulação curricular da década de 90 após a divulgação do PCN de Ciências Naturais e temas transversais? Como as principais temáticas multiculturais raça, gênero e orientação sexual estão apresentadas no discurso de professores/as de ciências/biologia? Este trabalho apresenta uma pesquisa, que tem buscado entender como os/as professores/as de ciências naturais e biologia de uma escola de elite da zona sul da cidade do Rio de Janeiro representam o conhecimento científico, o currículo de ensino de ciências e suas possíveis implicações com as questões centrais do multiculturalismo (raça, gênero e orientação sexual). Para tanto, optou-se por uma pesquisa qualitativa, através de dois instrumentos: (1) análise documental do PCN de Ciências e temas transversais e (2) entrevistas semi-estruturadas. Neste trabalho, verificou-se uma tendência dos discursos desses/as professores/as de oscilarem entre uma visão tradicional moderna e uma abordagem mais pós-moderna de ciência. Essa postura, identificada inclusive no tratamento das temáticas multiculturais selecionadas, estaria de acordo tanto com as propostas curriculares dos PCN quanto como um reflexo do período de transição paradigmática em que estamos inseridos. O trabalho de pesquisa visa contribuir com a reflexão sobre os possíveis avanços e limites de uma epistemologia multicultural (pós-moderna) no ensino de ciências. / [en] As we face a period characterized by a paradigmatic transition between Modernity and Post-Modernity, how would the science conceptions of science/biology teachers fit in this scenery? What would be their positions regarding the curricular reformation set in the 90`s after the publication of the PCN of Natural Sciences and transversal themes? How the main multicultural themes race, gender and sexual orientation are presented inside their speech? This work presents a research which has seek to comprehend how the science and biology teachers from an elite school at Rio de Janeiro represent scientific knowledge, science curriculum and their possible implications concerning the main multicultural issues (race, gender and sexual orientation). Therefore, it has been chosen a qualitative research using two instruments: (1) documental analyses of the Natural Sciences PCN and transversal themes and (2) semi-structural interviews. It was evident a tendency among the teachers discourses to oscillate between a more traditional and modern science view and a more post-modern approach. This kind of posture that was also identified regarding the multicultural issues would be in agreement with both the curricular proposals inside the PCNs and as a reflection of the transitional period in which we are immersed. This work aims to contribute with the debate regarding possible progress and limits of a multicultural (post-modern) epistemology inside science teaching.

Esta tese pergunta pelo sentido do pária na obra de Hannah Arendt, buscando compreende-lo dentro do sentido mais amplo do pensamento político da autora. A pesquisa teve como ponto de partida artigos reunidos na coletânea Escritos Judaicos, em que a autora tratou do pária pelo viés de experiências dos judeus europeus, sobretudo entre o século 19 e o século 20; passou por Origens do Totalitarismo (1951), texto em que Arendt definiu o movimento de exclusão e destruição de párias europeus, em especial os judeus, como o “agente catalítico” do colapso da Europa; chegando a textos como A Condição Humana (1958), em que Arendt apresentou a pluralidade e a unicidade como novos princípios requeridos pela reconstrução da dignidade humana num contexto póstotalitário. Articulando-se de forma não-monística, este texto tem, como eixos, temas da obra de Arendt como a assimilação, tentativa de absorção de judeus e outros párias pelo “social”; a despersonalização, movimento radical de dissolução da personalidade e alienação do “eu” em favor de forças históricas; e a unicidade, como condição básica de seres humanos plurais e insubstituíveis. O trabalho sustenta, de forma geral, que a experiência do pária, levando em conta sua exclusão, desaparecimento e tentativa de reaparecimento, é um exemplo fundamental para a ação e o pensamento políticos na contemporaneidade. / This dissertation questions the meaning of the pariah in Hannah Arendt’s work, aiming at its comprehension within the broader context of Arendt’s political thought. The research departed from articles published in the anthology The Jewish Writings, in which Arendt approached the pariah relying on experiences of European Jews, mainly between the 19th and the 20th centuries; dealt with The Origins of Totalitarianism, text in which she defined the exclusion and destruction of European pariahs, specially Jews, as the “catalytic agent” of Europe’s broader collapse; arrived at texts such as The Human Condition (1958), in which Arendt presented plurality and uniqueness as new principles required by the reestablishment of human dignity in a post-totalitarian world. Developed in non-monistic lines, this text deals with topics of Arendt’s work, as assimilation, the attempt of absorption of Jews and other pariahs by the “social”; depersonalization, the radical movement of dissolution of personality and alienation of the ego towards historical forces; and uniqueness, as a basic condition of plural and irreplaceable human beings. It holds, in broad terms, that the pariah’s experience, its exclusion, disappearance and attempt of reappearance, is a fundamental example for acting and thinking politically in the present world.