Stanley Sfekas

Ο ΒΥΡΩΝΙΚΟΣ ΗΡΩΑΣ: ΑΝΘΡΩΠΟΣ ΚΑΙ ΥΠΕΡΑΝΘΡΩΠΟΣ

The Mantle of Legitimacy

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Η Πλατωνική Αλληγορία του Σπηλαίου: Μια Μεταμοντέρνα Οπτική

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Sfekas Interview on Pythagoras for Samos Periodical (Greek Language)

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Aristotle's Principle of Individuation

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Ousia, Substratum, and Matter

Philosophical Inquiry, 1991

C ooperative learning has galvanized my classes," exclaims an art history teacher at a nationally... more C ooperative learning has galvanized my classes," exclaims an art history teacher at a nationally renowned art institution. "With a PhD from the University of Michigan, I came from a traditional hide-bound academic background where we learned that good teachers are well-organized, entertaining lecturers. But I always knew something was missing: my goal in life was to 'claw my way down the ladder of success' and become not a good lecturer, but a great teacher. Cooperative learning methodology and strategies gave me the means to realize this goal." "Now that the semester is over, I am receiving a lot of positive informal feedback from my students about the cooperative learning groups," reports an accounting professor who attended a cooperative learning workshop at the 1989 POD Conference. ''At the risk of bragging, I am happy to report that they [student evaluations] were by far the highest I have ever received-a 3. 7 and a 3.8 on a 4.0 scale. Moreover, the written comments I received were laudatory and most particularly expressed affirmation of the cooperative learning groups .... As for myself, as I reflect, I realize that this has been the most enjoyable semester I have ever had as a teacher. ... Enhanced performance on exams, outstanding student evaluations, and a personal renewal for enjoyment of teaching-what more could one ask of a new pedagogy?" ''As a speech communication lecturer, I am familiar with group dynamics, but the cooperative learning workshop gave me new ideas and activities," a lecturer at the

From Aristotelianism to Existentialism: The Problem of Being

3rd International Philosophical Forum ANADRASIS. WORLD PHILOSOPHY DAY, “Music, Mathematics, Astro... more 3rd International Philosophical Forum ANADRASIS. WORLD PHILOSOPHY DAY, “Music, Mathematics, Astronomy and Philosophy”, Athens, Nov23,2015,Aegean College DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.1.2854.7920 Eορτασμός της Παγκόσμιας Ημέρας Φιλοσοφίας Διεθνές Πολιτιστικό Κέντρο ΑΝΑΔΡΑΣΙΣ διοργανώνει 3ο Φιλοσοφικό Forum με θέμα: «Μουσική, Μαθηματικά, Αστρονομία και Φιλοσοφία» στο Aegean College, Πανεπιστημίου 17, Δευτέρα 23 Νοεμβρίου 2015, από 9.00 π.μ. έως 10.00 μ.μ.

The End of Life: Euthanasia and Morality. James Rachels

Ethics, 1987

Aristotle's Concept of God

Postmodern Culture: The Death of the Humanist Imagination

Are we witnessing the demise of the concept of the creative human imagination in the postmodern e... more Are we witnessing the demise of the concept of the creative human imagination in the postmodern era? In our 'Civilization of the Image', as Marshall Mc Luhan has characterized it, might we not expect imagination to be accorded a privileged place by contemporary philosophers? The very opposite is the case. Right across the spectrum of structuralist, post-structuralist and deconstructionist thinking, one observes a common concern to dismantle the very notion of imagination. When it is spoken of, it is subjected to suspicion or denigrated as an outdated humanist illusion spawned by the modern movements of romantic idealism and existentialism. The philosophical category of imagination, like that of 'man' himself, appears to be dissolving into an anonymous play of language. For many postmodern thinkers it has become little more than the surface signifier of a linguistic system. Postmodern philosophies reflect this crisis of imagination in a variety of ways. But a central feature of such philosophies is the undermining of the humanist imagination understood as an 'original' creation of meaning. The postmodern philosophers deny the very idea of 'origin'. Meaning is deconstructed into an endless play of linguistic signs, each one of which relates to the other in a parodic circle. There is no possibility of a single founding reference. Language, as an open-ended play of signifiers, is no longer thought to refer to some 'real' meaning external to language (i.e., some 'transcendental signified' called truth or human subjectivity). Deprived of the concept of origin, the concept of imagination itself collapses. For imagination always presupposed the idea of origination: the derivation of our images from some original presence. And this position obtained regardless of whether the model of origination was situated outside of man (as in the biblical God of creation or the Platonic Ideas) or inside of man (as in the model of a productive consciousness promoted by modern idealism and existentialism). The deconstruction of the category of 'origin' is heralded by the famous textual revolution. The humanist concept of 'man' gives way to the anti-humanist concept of intertextual play. The autonomous subject disappears into the anonymous operations of language. Truth is replaced by parody, and the diachronic pattern of narrative history (with a beginning, middle and end) by achronic patterns of repetition and recurrence. The modern philosophy of the creative imagination-whether it be in the form of Kant's transcendental imagination or Sartre's absurd passion-cannot, it would seem, survive this deconstructive turn. At the level of dominant metaphors a paradigm shift has taken place in which the parodic paradigm, replacing the modern productive paradigm, recurs time and again in postmodern works of art and literature. The phenomenon of a unique human imagination producing a unique aesthetic object in a unique time and space collapses into a play of infinite repetition. The work becomes absolutely transparent, a mechanically reproducible surface without depth or interiority, a copy with no reference to anything other than a pseudo-world of copies. Thus Foucault speaks of the death of man, Barthes of the death of the author, and Derrida of endless mimesis and apocalypse without end.

Derrida: Apocalypse Without End

has said that we live in the "Civilization of the Image". Yet one of the greatest paradoxes of co... more has said that we live in the "Civilization of the Image". Yet one of the greatest paradoxes of contemporary culture is that at a time when the image reigns supreme, the very notion of a creative human imagination seems under mounting threat. We no longer appear to know who exactly produces or controls the images which condition our consciousness. We are at an impasse where the relationship between imagination and reality has been turned on its head or even subverted altogether. We cannot be sure which is which. And this very undecidability lends weight to the deepening suspicion that we may be witnessing the death of imagination. The imminent demise of imagination is a clearly a postmodern obsession. Postmodernism undermines the modernist belief in the image as an authentic expression. The typically postmodern image is one that displays its own artificiality, its own pseudostatus, its own representational depthlessness. Hence the significance of Andy Warhol's brazen boast that if Picasso, the modernist master par excellence, could produce four thousand works in a lifetime, then he, Warhol, could produce as many in a day, as his seriograph of Marilyn Monroe demonstrates. Warhol, the Pontiff of pop art, rejects the accredited idea of the art work as an original creation in a unique time and space. He proclaims the postmodern message that the image has now become a mechanically reproducible commodity-part of the new total communications package where globally conceived and

Soteriological Convergences in the Hindu-Christian Dialogue

Hinduism is a diverse system of thought with beliefs spanning monotheism, polytheism, henotheism,... more Hinduism is a diverse system of thought with beliefs spanning monotheism, polytheism, henotheism, monism and atheism. In this paper, I shall strive to indicate certain structural affinities between the ideas of Liberation from Bondage found in theistic Hinduism and Salvation in History found in Christian thought. This entails an elucidation of the meaning of Moksha, the Hindu counterpart of salvation. One of the significant features of Hindu thought is a polarization of two standpoints: the theistic and the absolutist. This polarity must be recognized in order to understand Hinduism. Absolutist Hinduism is characterized by its view of Liberation as liberation from Time, the World and all that has been conditioned by time. Absolutist Hinduism declares the world to be a Falsity. Theistic Hinduism, on the other hand, has been shaped by the stimulus of the challenge of Buddhism and its concern with the suffering of this world. Theistic Hinduism of all shades stands defined by its readiness to affirm freedom, love, personality, community, history and moral obligation, and to rediscover their spiritual significance for man. Their positive role in the service of man's freedom from the thralldom of unfreedom can be duly appreciated once man is liberated from the penumbra of illusion, or Maya. There is a spiritual purpose to history: to reclaim man estranged from himself and from others in consequence of his estrangement from the ground of his very being. God's cosmic function is to help us grow into full spiritual realization through the historical process. History, as the sphere of man's conscious, deliberate and collective striving, is what makes possible the realization of his values. This is not itself viewed as an accomplishment, but as an aspect of cosmic history. Two kinds of eschatologies-under the categories of 'bondage' and 'liberation'-are used. There is a continuity between the two. Bondage, or samsara, includes the conception of an 'after-life' which remains on the same level as the present life and is grounded in moral responsibility. The corollary to this afterlife concept is karma. The individual continues from life to life in an embodied existence, the contents and forms of his life dependent on what the individual has performed in former lives, yet affording some scope for growth and gradual perfection by the performance of meritorious actions. This is the sphere of dharma.

THE END OF LIFE; EUTHANASIA AND MORALITY

Ο ΒΥΡΩΝΙΚΟΣ ΗΡΩΑΣ: ΑΝΘΡΩΠΟΣ ΚΑΙ ΥΠΕΡΑΝΘΡΩΠΟΣ

The Mantle of Legitimacy

DESCRIPTION

Η Πλατωνική Αλληγορία του Σπηλαίου: Μια Μεταμοντέρνα Οπτική

DESCRIPTION

Sfekas Interview on Pythagoras for Samos Periodical (Greek Language)

DESCRIPTION

Aristotle's Principle of Individuation

ABSTRACT

Ousia, Substratum, and Matter

Philosophical Inquiry, 1991

From Aristotelianism to Existentialism: The Problem of Being

The End of Life: Euthanasia and Morality. James Rachels

Ethics, 1987

Aristotle's Concept of God

Postmodern Culture: The Death of the Humanist Imagination

Derrida: Apocalypse Without End

Soteriological Convergences in the Hindu-Christian Dialogue