1,523 research outputs found
THE THEOLOGICAL FOUNDATION OF ADAM SMITH'S WORK
No full textThe paper will discuss the theological foundation to Smith's writings. Teleology, final causes and divine design were initially seen as central to understanding Smith's writings. Over time, this view fell out of fashion. In the period after World War II, with the rise of positivism, commentators tended to overlook or downplay this interpretation. In the last decade, or so, teleology has started to be restored to its former position as an essential element in understanding Smith. After spelling out Smith's teleology and his view of final causes, divine design and the ends of nature, we try to explain the Panglossian nature of the 'new theistic view' of Smith. While our view differs somewhat, we agree with the essence of the 'new view' claim: a theological view exists in Smith which underpins his moral and economic theories.Political Economy,
Dissolving the Chimera of the ‘Adam Smith Problem’
No full textIn The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith set out his influential theory that societies achieve prosperity by securing the freedom of individuals to pursue their own end by the means they choose within a framework of rules of justice. In his earlier work The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith developed his thesis about the origins of our moral sentiments and the emergence of rules of justice. The socalled ‘Adam Smith Problem’ concerns the perceived inconsistency between Smith’s defence of selfinterest in the Wealth of Nations and his emphasis of sympathy as the origin of moral sentiments in the earlier work. The existence of the ‘Adam Smith Problem’ has been contested by many writers. The present author provides a number of new arguments to demonstrate the illusory nature of the problem by revisiting the key elements Smith’s moral theory. The author argues that the problem dissolves when the role of justice in providing the conditions of free trade is understood. Smith’s tirade against wealth worship is explained as part of his defence of justice and not a condemnation of wealth accumulation. According to this reading, the Theory of Moral Sentiments is a powerful statement of the moral basis of capitalism.
Cult: A Composite Novel
No full textCult (redacted)
The first component of the thesis is a composite novel called Cult which falls into two parts with seven narratives in each. Part 1 tracks the protagonist, Ellen, from her first involvement with the cult through to her eventually leaving it. Although fiction, the first half of the book answers the kinds of questions the author is asked when people discover that she was once a sannyasin (a follower of the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh). While the experiences of meditation, group therapy and communal living are all faithfully rendered within the stories, the need for strong characters, narrative drive and a lightness of touch takes precedence.
Part 2 picks up Ellen’s story some twenty or so years later and explores what becomes of her in middle age. It also looks at other groups in society, such as academia, the law and the internet dating community which each have their own jargon, hierarchies, rituals and rules but are not considered to be cults.
The book examines the question raised in the Epigraph, ‘how do we be together when we feel so alone’ with a focus on relationships other than the familial and the romantic.
Collisions, Chasms and Connections: a Performative Exploration of the Composite Novel Form
The second part of the thesis is both a critical and creative response to three contemporary American books: Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout; A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan; and Legend of a Suicide by David Vann. The critical element comprises a close reading of the three books; a chronological reconstruction of their overarching storylines; and a consideration of what their authors have said about writing the books. It concludes that, in the composite novel, the simultaneous presentation of multiple views and storylines operate much like a 3D image to give the impression of depth to the characters and situations rendered. The creative element of the essay is a playful and personal response to the texts
A unique and conflicted enlightener: Adam Ferguson’s political thought
No full textAdam Ferguson (1723–1816) was a leading figure of the Scottish Enlightenment but his fame has long been eclipsed by those of his contemporaries, David Hume and Adam Smith. As Lisa Hill discusses in her review article on Iain McDaniel\u27s book Adam Ferguson in the Scottish Enlightenment: The Roman Past and Europe’s Future, attempts to recover Ferguson from obscurity are wise: he was interested in a central question of our times: how to prevent large, prosperous and competitive commercial states from degenerating into counter-democratic militarism.
Book title: Adam Ferguson in the Scottish Enlightenment: The Roman Past and Europe’s Future
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Date published: 2013
Author: Iain McDanie
The birth of economic rhetoric: communication, arts and economic stimulus in David Hume and Adam Smith
No full textThis book explores and compares the works of two great economists and philosophers, David Hume and Adam Smith, considering their contributions to language, perception, sympathy, reason, art and theatre to find a general theory of rationality and economics. The author considers and analyses both figures through a range of approaches, and moves on to demonstrate how different concepts of language affect Hume's and Smith's idea of value and economic growth. This book contributes to a wider literature on communication and language to demonstrate that economics is linked to rhetoric and is an essential part of human nature.Depto. de Economía Aplicada, Estructura e HistoriaFac. de Ciencias Económicas y EmpresarialesTRUEpu
2025 Westview Festival with Keynote Speaker David R. Slayton
No full textThe annual Westview Festival was on Wednesday, April 16th, 2025 at Southwestern Oklahoma State University (SWOSU) in Weatherford, Oklahoma, featuring fantasy author David R. Slayton.
Westview is published semiannually by the Language Arts Department of Southwestern Oklahoma State University. Publications include previously unpublished short fiction, poetry, prose poems, creative nonfiction, and artwork.
David R. Slayton is a fantasy author from Guthrie, OK. He is the author of such books as the Adam Binder series (White Trash Warlock, Trailer Park Trickster, and Deadbeat Druid) as well as the Gods of Night and Day series (Dark Moon, Shallow Sea)
Eco-Leadership in Practice: A Mixed Methods Study of County 4-H Programs
No full textOur understanding of leaders and the role they play in organizations and society is changing. Four broad discourses of leadership have been identified as occurring during the past 100 years: controller, therapist, messiah, and eco-leader. The most recent, eco-leader discourse, is characterized by collective decision-making, collaboration, shared leadership, and grassroots organization. Eco-leadership is believed to be beneficial for organizations operating in a 21st century, knowledge-driven economy. A quintessential example of an ecological organization is the Extension Service's 4-H program, the organization which this study examines. However, in 4-H, as in many organizations, a majority of leadership development efforts focus on the individual, positional leader. Further, the vast majority of the literature devoted to eco-leadership is conceptual in nature; empirical studies linking leadership approaches to organizational outcomes are rare.
This study uses an explanatory sequential mixed methods design to examine: (a) the nature of the relationship between county 4-H agents' leadership discourse preferences and programmatic success; (b) county 4-H association members' levels of systemic and hierarchical thinking and programmatic success; (c) the way in which county 4-H association members' perceive their leadership within their counties; and (d) the relationship between these volunteers' perceptions of their leadership and other variables associated with programmatic success.
Findings indicate that the therapist discourse was the most preferred discourse among county 4-H agents, but that agents' discourse scores were unrelated to county 4-H program success. Associations' levels of hierarchical and systemic thinking were also not related to county 4-H program success. Additionally, county 4-H association members reported that: (a) agents play a central role in decision making and communication within the association; (b) association members rarely make decisions on programmatic matters; (c) associations are often not structured in accordance with 4-H's policy for associations; and (d) members are not provided opportunities for development in their roles as association members.Ph. D.The one thing we know about leadership is that it changes. Who we recognize as a leader changes over time. What we recognize as leadership also changes over time. In the last 100 years, there have been four eras of leadership, which one researcher dubbed: controller, therapist, messiah, and ecoleader. The latter, eco-leader era, is a 21st century society’s response to the technological and social changes taking place. As the world and its problems become more complex, so too have our ways of addressing them — and that requires a new kind of leader and a new kind of leadership.
But no one knows if this new form of leadership is more effective than any other. There is no scientific evidence, in other words. Rather, most claims are theoretical — it should be better, in theory. This study sought to link the eco-leader era’s approach to actual programmatic success and verify that it is effective. I studied county 4-H programs, which, it is generally believed, subscribe to the eco-leader approach. I surveyed two groups involved in 4-H, categorized the counties as high or low scoring based on their program’s success, and then followed up with small-group discussions in six counties.
What I found is that one group, agents, actually preferred an older era of leadership: therapist. The other group, volunteers, had a variety of views. Regardless of either group’s views, neither seemed to be related to program success. It seems any type of leadership could lead to success or failure. When we met for small-group discussions, however, the three high-scoring counties did tend to describe a more eco-leader style organization, while the low-scoring counties tended to favor older approaches to leadership in which the person in charge makes most of the decisions and the rest carry them out.
This is important to investigate because leadership is, at its root, the way in which people accomplish things in groups. Understanding how we as humans change those ways to meet the demands of our time and determining if they are effective, and, if so, how can we share those strategies with others, is important work to help people grapple with the challenges of an ever-more-complex world
Theology in suspense : how the detective fiction of P.D. James provokes theological thought
No full textElectronic redacted version excludes material for which permission has not been granted by the rights holderThe following dissertation argues that the detective fiction of P.D. James
provokes her readers to think theologically. I present evidence from the body of
James’s work, including her detective fiction that features the Detective Adam
Dalgliesh, as well as her other novels, autobiography, and non-fiction work. I also
present a brief history of detective fiction. This history provides the reader with a
better understanding of how P.D James is influenced by the detective genre as well as
how she stands apart from the genre’s traditions.
This dissertation relies on an interview that I conducted with P.D. James in
November, 2008. During the interview, I asked James how Christianity has
influenced her detective fiction and her responses greatly contribute to this
dissertation. However, James’s novels should be interpreted and explored in the
manner that they are received by the reader. How the reader receives and responds to
the novels, not only how James writes the novels, is what causes her stories to
provoke theological thinking.
By examining Christian symbolism that is present in setting, character, the
Detective Adam Dalgliesh, and plot, this dissertation seeks to assert that James
contributes to a theological conversation through her popular detective fiction
Pietro Verri’s Contribution to the Economic Theory of the 18th Century: Commercial Society, Civil Society and Governance of the Economy
No full text'Count Pietro Verri (1728-97) - Schumpeter writes (History, p. 178) - - would have to be included in any list of the greatest economists'. Within the Milanese school, he certainly stands out, alongside with Cesare Beccaria, during one of the most interesting periods from a history of analysis point of view. Luigi Cossa's famous introduction to the study of political economy rates Pietro Verri to be inferior to Beccaria in ingenuity and scientific cultivation, but greatly to be ahead of him as an economist.1 This judgement by Cossa, in particular, seems to echo the relative position of the two men in the history of ideas, particularly after Beccaria's rise to fame with a book - On crimes and punishments - which had in fact been largely inspired by Verri himself and defended by him.2 It is proposed in the present paper to revisit some of the basic tenets of Pietro Verri's political economy, with more in view than dwell on specific intuitions and theorems: namely relate those to Verri's own - quite original - conception of the economy. The scholarly work of Pietro Verri - with a special reference to his Meditazioni sulla economia politica of 1771 - provides the first systematic contribution stemming from the quarters of Lombard enlightenment in the field of political economy, especially so if one considers that Cesare Beccaria's parallel work - namely his Elementi di economia pubblica, conceived and drafted at the same time as Verri's Meditazioni - would only be published posthumously several years later. From the vantage point afforded by Verri's political economy, we gain a considerably attractive view of the most significant elements and characteristic concepts of Lombard enlightenment during the latter half of the 18th century; Verri, moreover, as we shall see, builds on a number of them in a new and original way. This paper is aimed at discussing Verri's political economy mainly along two distinct, but related, lines. In the first place the conception of commercial society is considered such as it is treated by the author particularly in his Meditazioni. In this perspective the analysis of such issues as competition and the market or money and taxation occupy a central place. Secondly it will be necessary to emphasise that Verri's approach has little to do either with forms of pure economics on one side - largely yet to be born throughout the 18th century - or, on the other side, with such conceptions of the polis - contrariwise well alive among his own contemporaries - as are founded on a sovereign authority conceived to be situated above the law. What Verri's political economy ultimately amounts to is an economic conception of civil society. The latter has natural strong connections with his own fact-mindedness - emphasised by Schumpeter - as well as with his deep practical involvement in administrative affairs and in the reforming process taking place during the latter half of the 18th century in Milan. In our view, a thorough investigation along the mentioned lines is the precondition for an understanding of the intellectual stature and of the scholarly contribution of Pietro Verri. His main ground is distinctly analytical and only by appreciating his analysis is it possible to shed light on the meaning and intellectual significance also of his practical contributions. Moreover Verri's pronouncements on the criticism of despotic government, the relevance of intermediate powers or bodies and on multiple levels of governance will be examined in a new and original light, showing how close they are to the gist of his analysis.
Tagging of Biomedical Articles on CiteULike: A Comparison of User, Author and Professional Indexing
No full textThis paper examines the context of online indexing from the viewpoint of three different groups: users, authors, and professional indexers. User tags, author keywords and descriptors were collected from academic journal articles, which were both indexed in Pubmed and tagged on CiteULike, and analysed. Descriptive statistics, informetric measures, and thesaural term comparison shows that there are important differences in the use of keywords between the three groups in addition to similarities which can be used to enhance support for search and browse. While tags and author keywords were found that matched descriptors exactly, other terms which did not match but provided important expansion to the indexing lexicon were found. These additional terms could be used to enhance support for searching and browsing in article databases as well as to provide invaluable data for entry vocabulary and emergent terminology for regular updates to indexing systems. Additionally, the study suggests that tags support organisation by association to task, projects and subject while making important connections to traditional systems which classify into subject categories
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