Justin Bell

John Dewey’s theory of communication supplies the basis for a response to the exclusion of the experiential perspectives of persons with intellectual disabilities and those on whom they depend for advocacy and care in philosophical conversations about intellectual disability. Drawing from the work of Licia Carlson and Eva Feder Kittay, we shall begin by exploring some assumptions about epistemic authority which appear to motivate this problematic pattern. We will show that Dewey’s understanding of communication provides tools for explaining how firsthand accounts of living with intellectual disability or caring for someone who does can guide philosophical inquiries about intellectual disability.

In this chapter, we critique a concept of resilience that has emerged from contemporary positive psychology and its application to health education. We argue that the present popularity of “resilience” as a strategy for managing mental health discourages educational institutions from providing students with the mental health services they need. Using the tools of American pragmatism, especially the work of John Dewey, we criticize the paradigm of resilience and identify several concrete reformulations of disability studies which would make concrete differences in the lives of those with mental disability.

In Memories and Portraits, H. G. Callaway presents us with the memoir of a philosopher. I will, as readers of this review will hardly find surprising, be reviewing this book with two foci. First, I will address the merits of the work itself and, second, with an eye toward our shared interests in John Dewey, other pragmatists, and how the work incorporates or neglects pragmatism’s contributions to the themes Callaway discusses. However, in many ways this second task is auxiliary. Callaway does not present us with a systematic text in philosophy, but rather a text that is a memoir about the author as much as it is about a philosopher, specifically, how the philosopher’s experiences have demonstrated the importance..

Seth Vannatta argues that there can be a fruitful synthesis of pragmatism and classical conservatism. In doing this, he focuses the methodological commitments of pragmatism and conservatism. However, I will demonstrate with a reading of Dewey’s Liberalism and Social Action that other commitments might prevent this synthesis—at least a synthesis between the thought of John Dewey and Edmund Burke. My conclusion is that pragmatism and conservativism might travel parallel to one another but that we have good reasons for keeping some separation between the theories based upon their fundamental commitments. Deweyan pragmatism remains tied to democracy; conservatism remains tied to history.

Funding: Research funded by Canadian Institutes of Health Research, NNF 80045, States of Mind: Emerging Issues in Neuroethics. While there are those who object to the prospective use of propranolol to prevent or treat post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), most obstreperous among them the President’s Council on Bioethics, the use of propranolol can be justified for patients with severe PTSD. Propranolol, if effective, will alter the quality of certain memories in the brain. But this is not a serious threat to the self understood in terms of narrative identity. A narrative identity framework acknowledges that memory is always being subtly altered or modified. For severe cases of PTSD propranolol may help victims who don’t respond to any other therapy or therapy combination regain their authentic self-narrative and engage once more in life activities. For those whose symptoms are not so severe the potential risks and side-effects of the drug may outweigh the benefits. Patients and family members should be allowed to decide, in consultation with their physician, whether this drug is appropriate in their case.

In a typical book review, I would look for and examine what is new about a particular thinker’s idea or presentation. However, as I read The Cambridge Companion to Dewey I find that I cannot and should not use the same criteria for evaluation. I pick up a Cambridge Companion when I need an introduction or a refresher on material—not when I need to see what the cutting-edge scholarship is. That being said, a companion ought not propagate the status quo or fail to communicate what is current in the understanding of a figure or an area. Therefore, a companion ought, first, to provide an adequate introduction to a literate, but inexpert, person to the field it purports to introduce. Second, a companion should show the..

Based upon research done by evolutionary psychologists into the reason why human beings feel depression in social situations, I argue that philosophers have significant warrant to consider depression as an important feature conditioning moral imagination. The moral imagination come up with new enterprises and new ways of organizing social life. This reorganization would meet many of the goals put forth by pragmatist philosopher John Dewey. I argue that depression will work as a leading clue and unique imaginative “space” to reconstruct various social situations.