What Is a Person? PDF Download

Author: Christian Smith
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226765946
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 529

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Book Description
The task of understanding human beings, what we ourselves are, our constitution and condition, is a perennial problem in philosophy and related disciplines. Smith argues here that our understanding of human persons is threatened by technological development and capricious academic theories alike, seeking to deny or relativize the personhood of humanity. Smith's book puts a stake in the ground, in defense of a view of the human that is genuinely humanistic in the traditional sense and capable of sustaining with intellectual coherence things like modern human rights and universal benevolence.

Author: John M. Rist
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108783600
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
In this book, John M. Rist offers an account of the concept of 'person' as it has developed in the West, and how it has become alien in a post-Christian culture. He begins by identifying the 'mainline tradition' about persons as it evolved from the time of Plato to the High Middle Ages, then turns to successive attacks on it in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, then proceeds to the 'five ways' in which the tradition was savaged or distorted in the nineteenth century and beyond. He concludes by considering whether ideas from contemporary philosophical movements, those that combine a closer analysis of human nature with a more traditional metaphysical background, may enable the tradition to be restored. A timely book on a theme of universal significance, Rist ponders whether we persons matter, and how we have reached a position where we are not sure whether we do.

Author: Gerard I. Nierenberg
Publisher: Barnes & Noble Publishing
ISBN: 9781566194013
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 200

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Book Description
This unique program teaches listeners how to "decode" and reply to non-verbal signals from friends and business associates when those signals are often vague and thus frequenly ignored

Author: Derek Parfit
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191622443
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 560

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Book Description
This book challenges, with several powerful arguments, some of our deepest beliefs about rationality, morality, and personal identity. The author claims that we have a false view of our own nature; that it is often rational to act against our own best interests; that most of us have moral views that are directly self-defeating; and that, when we consider future generations the conclusions will often be disturbing. He concludes that moral non-religious moral philosophy is a young subject, with a promising but unpredictable future.

Author: Michael F. Goodman
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1461239508
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 327

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Book Description
The idea for an anthology on personhood grew out of two things, viz. , the work I did with Martin Benjamin during the Summer of 1982 at Michigan State University on the question, What is a person?, and the amount of time, effort, and expense required for serious research on the topic itself. The former experience taught me the importance of, among other things, attempting to get clear about what we are to mean by 'person,' while the latter experience suggested a possible course of action whereby getting clear might be made more manage able simply by having relatively convenient access to some of the most insightful and stimulating writings on the topic. The problems of personhood addressed in this book are central to issues in ethics ranging from the treatment or termination of infants with birth defects to the question whether there can be rational suicide. But before questions on such issues as the morality of abortion, genetic engineering, infanticide, and so on, can be settled, the prob lems of personhood must be clarified and analyzed. Hence What Is a Person? has as its primary theme the examination of various proposed conditions of personhood.

Author: Sheila Heti
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company
ISBN: 1429943483
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
Chosen as one of fifteen remarkable books by women that are shaping the way we read and write in the 21st century by the book critics of The New York Times "Funny...odd, original, and nearly unclassifiable...unlike any novel I can think of."—David Haglund, The New York Times Book Review "Brutally honest and stylistically inventive, cerebral, and sexy."—San Francisco Chronicle Named a Book of the Year by The New York Times Book Review, The New Yorker, San Francisco Chronicle, Salon, Flavorpill, The New Republic, The New York Observer, The Huffington Post A raw, startling, genre-defying novel of friendship, sex, and love in the new millennium—a compulsive read that's like "spending a day with your new best friend" (Bookforum) Reeling from a failed marriage, Sheila, a twentysomething playwright, finds herself unsure of how to live and create. When Margaux, a talented painter and free spirit, and Israel, a sexy and depraved artist, enter her life, Sheila hopes that through close—sometimes too close—observation of her new friend, her new lover, and herself, she might regain her footing in art and life. Using transcribed conversations, real emails, plus heavy doses of fiction, the brilliant and always innovative Sheila Heti crafts a work that is part literary novel, part self-help manual, and part bawdy confessional. It's a totally shameless and dynamic exploration into the way we live now, which breathes fresh wisdom into the eternal questions: What is the sincerest way to love? What kind of person should you be?

Author:
Publisher: ببلومانيا للنشر والتوزيع
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
You can go after the job you want…and get it! You can take the job you have…and improve it! You can take any situation you’re in…and make it work for you! Since its release in 1936, How to Win Friends and Influence People has sold more than 30 million copies. Dale Carnegie’s first book is a timeless bestseller, packed with rock-solid advice that has carried thousands of now famous people up the ladder of success in their business and personal lives. As relevant as ever before, Dale Carnegie’s principles endure, and will help you achieve your maximum potential in the complex and competitive modern age. Learn the six ways to make people like you, the twelve ways to win people to your way of thinking, and the nine ways to change people without arousing resentment.

Author: Mark S. Latkovic
Publisher: Our Sunday Visitor
ISBN: 1612782884
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 142

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Book Description
Moral decision-making made easier From Internet access to lottery tickets, from pet ownership to R-rated entertainment, we're faced with more ethical decisions than we might realize, every single day. What's a person to do - especially when there is no definitive Catholic teaching on a subject? Do we just brush off these pesky moral dilemmas? Do we happily live in the gray areas of life and simply go along with conventional wisdom? Or do we make an honest attempt to face these moral questions head on? The way we deal with these seemingly small ethical decisions can have a huge impact on our own lives as well as those of our children and families. This book is an ethical toolbox, providing you with a process for making confident choices, asking yourself challenging questions, developing moral virtue, and discovering deeper happiness. "A bracing wake-up call to those of us who often overlook the moral dimensions of the decisions we make in everyday life. Mark Latkovic gently guides us through the ethical minefield of contemporary society." - Mary Ann Glendon, Learned Hand Professor of Law at Harvard Law School "The book will be particularly welcome to parents and catechists, as they fulfill their responsibilities for giving moral guidance to the next generation of believers." - Archbishop Allen H. Vigneron, Detroit "Not only a reliable guide to resolving some of the ethical questions we face in our everyday lives, it is a guidebook to thinking well about decisions that shape our characters." - Robert P. George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence, Princeton University About the Author Dr. Mark S. Latkovic is professor of moral and systematic theology at Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit, Michigan, and the author of numerous articles, essays, and other writings on moral theology. He is also a nationally known speaker, panelist, reviewer, and consultant. Dr. Latkovic and his wife, Christine, have four children.

Author: Christian Smith
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226765938
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 529

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Book Description
What is a person? This fundamental question is a perennial concern of philosophers and theologians. But, Christian Smith here argues, it also lies at the center of the social scientist’s quest to interpret and explain social life. In this ambitious book, Smith presents a new model for social theory that does justice to the best of our humanistic visions of people, life, and society. Finding much current thinking on personhood to be confusing or misleading, Smith finds inspiration in critical realism and personalism. Drawing on these ideas, he constructs a theory of personhood that forges a middle path between the extremes of positivist science and relativism. Smith then builds on the work of Pierre Bourdieu, Anthony Giddens, and William Sewell to demonstrate the importance of personhood to our understanding of social structures. From there he broadens his scope to consider how we can know what is good in personal and social life and what sociology can tell us about human rights and dignity. Innovative, critical, and constructive, What Is a Person? offers an inspiring vision of a social science committed to pursuing causal explanations, interpretive understanding, and general knowledge in the service of truth and the moral good.

Author: James William Walters
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 9780252022784
Category : Anencephaly
Languages : en
Pages : 220

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Book Description
By providing a much-needed religious/philosophical context for the discussion - examining contemporary thinking on just what constitutes valuable life - Walters broadens his inquiry beyond the human to include other animals and also deals with the phenomenon of anencephalic infants, those who are born without higher brains.