Research Profile by Deborah P . Vossen
Research Outreach, 2020
In The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia, Bernard Suits devises a thought experiment using dial... more In The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia, Bernard Suits devises a thought experiment using dialogues between Aesop’s Grasshopper and two former ants. These characters debate the definition of “game,” and how game playing might relate to the meaning of life. In Utopia, all activity would be voluntary and intrinsically valuable, rather than necessary and instrumentally valuable. Unfortunately, Suits leaves the reader with a choice between delusion and oblivion. Dr Deborah Vossen uses the experience of being-in-the-zone to offer an alternative, allowing for the possibility that Utopians might live meaningful lives.
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Philosophy Papers & Publications by Deborah P . Vossen
Sport, Ethics and Philosophy, 2019
Distinguished for the game-parabling expressed in The Grasshopper: Games, Life, and Utopia, Berna... more Distinguished for the game-parabling expressed in The Grasshopper: Games, Life, and Utopia, Bernard Suits is revered as the author of the unorthodox claim that Utopia is intelligible and game playing is what makes Utopia intelligible. Reasonably embraced as a game in itself, the purpose of this metaphysical brainteaser is to present the reader with an enigma, with the challenge of its resolution serving as the very means by which one is to be brought into line with the logic of the Grasshopper’s Utopian thesis. Appreciating the fine intricacies of this challenge, the purpose of this essay is to advance the quest for resolution via a consideration of play as a necessary element of the Grasshopper’s game playing Utopia. As foundational to the enigma, I begin with a portrayal of the Grasshopper’s tangle of riddles about play, games and the good life. Converging upon the insights of the Grasshopper and/or his disciples in respect to the nature, meaning and significance of play in its conceptual relation to work, I entertain—and successively reject—the play-to-work labour ethic, the work-to-play leisure ethic and the play-at-work labour ethic as inadequate to account for the ideal of human existence. Next, in an effort to move beyond the existential stuckedness portrayed in the tale, I entertain—and also reject—the possibility that Utopia might instantiate as a work-at-play labour ethic, with this possibility established upon the foundation supplied by Suits’ distinction between primitive play and sophisticated playing. Finally, entertaining the possibility that work, play, playing and game might interrelate to account for the ideal of human existence, I conclude with the proposal that the Grasshopper’s Utopia might be best conceptualized as a work-at-play game playing ethic.
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Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, 2017
In The Grasshopper: Games, Life, and Utopia, Suits maintains the following two theses: (1) game-p... more In The Grasshopper: Games, Life, and Utopia, Suits maintains the following two theses: (1) game-playing is defined as ‘activity directed towards bringing about a specific state of affairs, using only means permitted by rules, where the rules prohibit more efficient in favour of less efficient means, and where such rules are accepted just because they make possible such activity’ and (2) ‘game playing is what makes Utopia intelligible.’ Observing that these two theses cannot be jointly maintained absent paradox, this essay explores the logical possibility that if (2) is true, then (1) must be false. More specifically, in the tradition of conceptual analysis it is argued that Suits’ definition of game-playing is too narrow inasmuch as it excludes really magnificent Utopian games of significance.
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Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, 2016
Via the existential questioning outlook supplied by the Grasshopper’s three visions as relevant t... more Via the existential questioning outlook supplied by the Grasshopper’s three visions as relevant to the fate of humankind – oblivion, delusion, and really magnificent games – this article seeks to alleviate some of the ambiguity surrounding Bernard Suits’ provocative claim that Utopian existence is fundamentally concerned with game-playing. Specifically, after proposing an interpretation of Suits’ parable designed to enrich the logical intelligibility of his Utopian thesis, I advance the suggestion that the Grasshopper’s picture of people playing really magnificent games is reasonably interpreted as a clue that the philosopher’s quest to discern games worthy of a Utopian might very well be that which saves humanity from the desolate oblivion-delusion paradox erected as a consequence of the initial two visions.
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Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, Sep 9, 2014
The question of acceptability in respect to the strategic foul in sport has provoked a rich and s... more The question of acceptability in respect to the strategic foul in sport has provoked a rich and seemingly irreconcilable dispute with normative theorists currently divided amongst three schools of thought including formalism, conventionalism and interpretivism. In this paper, I seek to transcend the three-way intellectual stalemate portrayed in the literature via a consideration as to whether or not the strategic foul qualifies as ‘Utopian’. More specifically, after demonstrating that Bernard Suits’ theory of game-playing is fully capable of embracing all three rival accounts, I seek to end the normative debate altogether via a conceptual analysis of the strategic foul as unacceptable via the higher-order point of view afforded by essentialism.
Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, 2008
Traditionally, acts of sportsmanship have been upheld as worthy of praise. The purpose of this pa... more Traditionally, acts of sportsmanship have been upheld as worthy of praise. The purpose of this paper is to discern whether Bernard Suits’ Grasshopper -- in "The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia" -- would share this approval. The paper begins with a conceptual analysis of good sportspersonship. From this, four action categories are identified including good sportspersonship in the forms of game desertion, changing the game, not trying, and lusory self-handicapping. A strategy for evaluation is derived from the Grasshopper’s theory. Game-playing is defined as action reflecting lusory attitude acknowledgement. Game-spoiling is introduced as action demonstrating lusory attitude abandonment. Three of the four actions categories are characterized as game-spoiling including good sportspersonship in the forms of game desertion, changing the game, and not trying. It is concluded that genuine good sportspersonship is characterized solely by altruistic forms of lusory self-handicapping.
Philosophy Looks at Chess. B. Hale (Ed.)., 2008
As described in Benjamin Hale’s Introduction to “Philosophy Looks at Chess”:
“Deb Vossen asks w... more As described in Benjamin Hale’s Introduction to “Philosophy Looks at Chess”:
“Deb Vossen asks whether chess can rightly be considered a game in the first place. She concludes, much to the surprise of many readers, that chess is not a game. Her evocative claim turns on a distinction between a game and the idea of a game, which evolved out of Bernard Suits’s phenomenally underappreciated work The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia. She advances this position by way of a technical argument that employs Suits’s discussion of “prelusory” goals and “lusory” attitudes. The word “lusory” generally means sporty or playful; and in Suits’s sense, it means that when we engage in the play of chess, we must enter the lusory attitude. She uses the notion of a prelusory goal to argue that such goals exist in a game (in this case, a game of chess) but not at all in the idea of the game (in the idea of chess).”
Physical education curricula have often been grounded within game classifications derived from th... more Physical education curricula have often been grounded within game classifications derived from the play-game-sport continuum models. Nevertheless, criticism of the continuum model of games suggests that it misunderstands the nature of the phenomenon itself and thereby renders game classifications and/or physical education curricula derived from it less than compelling. Essentialist definitions contrast continuum models and thereby provide alternative perspectives from which game classifications and physical education curricula may be derived. Bernard Suits (1978) is best known for his broad yet discerning essentialist definition of games. The purpose of this paper is to champion Suits' position via a demonstration of its inclusive scope. This purpose is served in the proposal of a taxonomy of games including three game distinctions: competitive versus noncompetitive games, interactive versus noninteractive games, and physical versus nonphysical games. Paralleling these distinctions are six subcategories of games: noncompetitive nonphysical games, parallel nonphysical games, interactive nonphysical games, noncompetitive sports, parallel sports, and interactive sports.
Imagine that we are in a time period prior to the widespread condemnation of, and bans against, p... more Imagine that we are in a time period prior to the widespread condemnation of, and bans against, performance-enhancing substances (PES) within elite sport and that the first questions surrounding their use have arisen. Within such a scenario, the question arises as to whether organizing committees, such as the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and its associated International Federations (IFs), are justified in establishing a system of eligibility rules specifically banning the use of PES therein.
The typical philosophical approach to this question requires an attempt to demonstrate that there is something wrong with the use of PES in sport with such a demonstration serving as justifiable grounds for bans against their use. So, if it can be demonstrated that there is something wrong with the use of PES in Olympic sport, then bans against their use are philosophically justified. Beginning with this assumption, nine general arguments are often put forth in an attempt to validate rules against the use of PES. These include the consensus argument, the argument from paternalism, the coercion argument, the role-model argument, the dehumanization argument, the unnatural argument, the unfair advantage argument, the cheating argument, and the perversion of sport argument. Nevertheless, research in the area of philosophy of sport has demonstrated that all nine of these arguments may in fact be unsound, thereby abolishing, or at least placing doubt upon, all justifications for the current rules limiting the use of PES in Olympic sport. In response to this state of affairs and the “gut instinct” that the use of PES in Olympic sport is wrong, this study represents an attempt to revisit the perversion of sport argument as a justification for the bans.
PhD. Dissertation, Aug 2000
If you were an all-powerful being possessing the ability to create a perfect world of game partic... more If you were an all-powerful being possessing the ability to create a perfect world of game participation, what would your world look like? More specifically, what would count as ethical conduct therein? Many would readily agree that “fair play” and/or “good gamespersonship” represent concepts descriptive of actions that would likely be contained within any proposed “Utopia of ethical game participation.” “Cheating” and/or “bad gamespersonship,” on the other hand, represent concepts descriptive of actions signifying vision betrayal. Despite such commonsense assertions, it appears that clear and precise understandings of these concepts are very much lacking within the current literature pertinent to the ethics of game participation. Consequently, proposed visions of a perfect world of game participation have emerged as uncertain and nondescript.
In response to this state of affairs, this study attempts to elucidate the abovementioned commonsense vision of a “Utopia of ethical game participation” via a conceptual analysis of the concepts held to be central to it as well as those believed to demonstrate vision betrayal. In other words this dissertation will summarize and critically evaluate current definitions of each of the concepts of “fair play,” “cheating,” “good gamespersonship,” and “bad gamespersonship.” After the identification of three specific types of problems contained with the literature, and proper resolution of these, alternative definitions will be proposed for each of the abovementioned concepts in an attempt to clarify the essential nature of ethical and unethical conduct within and surrounding the realm of games.
Other Papers & Publications by Deborah P . Vossen
Transforming our Learning Experiences, 2015
Writing-to-learn involves the use of low-stakes informal writing activities intended to help stud... more Writing-to-learn involves the use of low-stakes informal writing activities intended to help students reflect on concepts or ideas presented in a course. Writing-to-learn can be a flexible and effective tool to help students understand and engage with course concepts, and past research has shown that writing-to-learn activities can substantially improve performance on summative assessments. Not only is coherent writing helpful for learning, it is also a skill that students are expected to acquire during their degree. However, it can be a challenge to provide writing opportunities that are both interesting to students and easy for instructors to implement and grade, particularly in courses with a large number of students. Reflective journaling is one method that can address these learning objectives. The versatility of reflective writing means that it can be adapted to suit a number of different disciplines. In this essay, we will explore reflective writing as a subgenre of writing-to-learn activities, summarizing some of the benefits associated with these assignments that have been described in the pedagogical literature. We will then describe how to tailor the assignments to different kinds of disciplines, including STEM courses, professional programs, and the social sciences and humanities. We will provide some guidance on how to resolve tension around marking and feedback for such an assignment. Finally, we will describe our individual experiences with using this kind of assignment in two courses. As there were a number of contextual differences between the two courses, including size and discipline, our commentary is advanced within the specific context supplied by each.
Health Education Journal, 2004
Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 2000
... Comparison of Dynamic Push-Up Training and Plyometric Push-Up Training on Upper-Body Power an... more ... Comparison of Dynamic Push-Up Training and Plyometric Push-Up Training on Upper-Body Power and Strength ... Page 2. Comparison of Push-Up Training Programs 249 ...
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Research Profile by Deborah P . Vossen
LINK: https://researchoutreach.org/articles/envisioning-utopia/
Philosophy Papers & Publications by Deborah P . Vossen
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“Deb Vossen asks whether chess can rightly be considered a game in the first place. She concludes, much to the surprise of many readers, that chess is not a game. Her evocative claim turns on a distinction between a game and the idea of a game, which evolved out of Bernard Suits’s phenomenally underappreciated work The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia. She advances this position by way of a technical argument that employs Suits’s discussion of “prelusory” goals and “lusory” attitudes. The word “lusory” generally means sporty or playful; and in Suits’s sense, it means that when we engage in the play of chess, we must enter the lusory attitude. She uses the notion of a prelusory goal to argue that such goals exist in a game (in this case, a game of chess) but not at all in the idea of the game (in the idea of chess).”
The typical philosophical approach to this question requires an attempt to demonstrate that there is something wrong with the use of PES in sport with such a demonstration serving as justifiable grounds for bans against their use. So, if it can be demonstrated that there is something wrong with the use of PES in Olympic sport, then bans against their use are philosophically justified. Beginning with this assumption, nine general arguments are often put forth in an attempt to validate rules against the use of PES. These include the consensus argument, the argument from paternalism, the coercion argument, the role-model argument, the dehumanization argument, the unnatural argument, the unfair advantage argument, the cheating argument, and the perversion of sport argument. Nevertheless, research in the area of philosophy of sport has demonstrated that all nine of these arguments may in fact be unsound, thereby abolishing, or at least placing doubt upon, all justifications for the current rules limiting the use of PES in Olympic sport. In response to this state of affairs and the “gut instinct” that the use of PES in Olympic sport is wrong, this study represents an attempt to revisit the perversion of sport argument as a justification for the bans.
In response to this state of affairs, this study attempts to elucidate the abovementioned commonsense vision of a “Utopia of ethical game participation” via a conceptual analysis of the concepts held to be central to it as well as those believed to demonstrate vision betrayal. In other words this dissertation will summarize and critically evaluate current definitions of each of the concepts of “fair play,” “cheating,” “good gamespersonship,” and “bad gamespersonship.” After the identification of three specific types of problems contained with the literature, and proper resolution of these, alternative definitions will be proposed for each of the abovementioned concepts in an attempt to clarify the essential nature of ethical and unethical conduct within and surrounding the realm of games.
Other Papers & Publications by Deborah P . Vossen
LINK: https://researchoutreach.org/articles/envisioning-utopia/
EPRINT: https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/62DYuDg4tTQSbpfaPPQj/full?target=10.1080/17511321.2019.1602161
EPRINT: http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/TJQmqGJ5pnGRWzVj7i4w/full
EPRINT: http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/yEkj9tXY3PxATHyTitYt/full
“Deb Vossen asks whether chess can rightly be considered a game in the first place. She concludes, much to the surprise of many readers, that chess is not a game. Her evocative claim turns on a distinction between a game and the idea of a game, which evolved out of Bernard Suits’s phenomenally underappreciated work The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia. She advances this position by way of a technical argument that employs Suits’s discussion of “prelusory” goals and “lusory” attitudes. The word “lusory” generally means sporty or playful; and in Suits’s sense, it means that when we engage in the play of chess, we must enter the lusory attitude. She uses the notion of a prelusory goal to argue that such goals exist in a game (in this case, a game of chess) but not at all in the idea of the game (in the idea of chess).”
The typical philosophical approach to this question requires an attempt to demonstrate that there is something wrong with the use of PES in sport with such a demonstration serving as justifiable grounds for bans against their use. So, if it can be demonstrated that there is something wrong with the use of PES in Olympic sport, then bans against their use are philosophically justified. Beginning with this assumption, nine general arguments are often put forth in an attempt to validate rules against the use of PES. These include the consensus argument, the argument from paternalism, the coercion argument, the role-model argument, the dehumanization argument, the unnatural argument, the unfair advantage argument, the cheating argument, and the perversion of sport argument. Nevertheless, research in the area of philosophy of sport has demonstrated that all nine of these arguments may in fact be unsound, thereby abolishing, or at least placing doubt upon, all justifications for the current rules limiting the use of PES in Olympic sport. In response to this state of affairs and the “gut instinct” that the use of PES in Olympic sport is wrong, this study represents an attempt to revisit the perversion of sport argument as a justification for the bans.
In response to this state of affairs, this study attempts to elucidate the abovementioned commonsense vision of a “Utopia of ethical game participation” via a conceptual analysis of the concepts held to be central to it as well as those believed to demonstrate vision betrayal. In other words this dissertation will summarize and critically evaluate current definitions of each of the concepts of “fair play,” “cheating,” “good gamespersonship,” and “bad gamespersonship.” After the identification of three specific types of problems contained with the literature, and proper resolution of these, alternative definitions will be proposed for each of the abovementioned concepts in an attempt to clarify the essential nature of ethical and unethical conduct within and surrounding the realm of games.