Category: Abstracts

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2012 Abstracts Stage 3

The Method behind the Madness. Does Society Inhibit the Recovery from Psychosis?

At first glance, the answer to the above question may seem straight forward. Some may argue that the recovery rate of psychosis has surged within the last century. The development of new drug treatments and behavioural therapies has meant that symptoms are now easier to live with than ever before. In addition, the ability to integrate sufferers back into the community is said to be at an all time high; many are able to live, what our civilisation would call, a ‘normal’ life.

Here lies the problem. In our modern era, the recovery of those dealing with psychosis seems to be too easily structured around normality, therefore ignoring the basic structure of what it actually means to be ‘mad’. Secondarily, with this realisation also comes confusion about the definition itself – what exactly is madness?

In order to strengthen the debate I have chosen to use Darian Leader’s (2011) text What is Madness? Leader is able to provide knowledgeable focus on many topics of primary interest. For example, he uses comparative analysis to insist that old techniques regarding recuperation are often overlooked. Michael Foucault’s text Madness and Civilisation adjoins philosophical depth to the discussion. Foucault suggests that our view of madness is controlled by our culture and constructed by society. The treatment of those who have gone mad depends primarily upon how civilisation perceives them.

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2012 Abstracts Stage 3

Avatar Selves: Ontological Implications of Fluid Identity in the Virtual Age

“We are becoming fluid and many-sided. Without quite realizing it, we have been evolving a sense of self appropriate to the restlessness and flux of our time.” – The Protean Self (R.J.Lifton)

What is the nature of Being in the burgeoning age of virtual networks?

How are modes of relating to one another, spaces, and information changing?

Our society is fast evolving from centering on hard modern technologies to soft postmodern technologies in tandem with a move to a postmodern identification with complexity and flexibility,

Our capacity to project our identity into an interactive cyberspace of other projected identities raises new questions about boundaries of intellect, collaboration, agency, authorship, self-knowledge, transhumanism, identity, shifts in neurological and social function…

Heidegger saw technology as enframing our way of being in the world. It can enable us to satisfy our desires, but there is always the danger of letting it obscure our essence as human beings. We must continually return to this always-already essence of being, and resist becoming functionaries for technology.

This is all the more applicable in an information-based society in which we present ourselves informatically through the medium of technological interfaces we have no understanding of.

The ontological, social and autobiographical implications for self-knowledge and agency in the novel complex networks of our virtualised society.

Philosophers and thinkers: Heidegger/Borgman/Nietzsche/Zizek/Harman/ Eagleman/Gorny/Self/Stirling/Lifton

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2012 Abstracts Stage 2

The Moral Status of Animals

‘Animals obviously cannot have a right of free speech or a right to vote because they lack the relevant capacities. But their right to life and to be free of exploitation is no less fundamental than the corresponding right of humans.’ – Julian H. Franklin

In this project I have looked back through the history of animal rights and the way in which the consideration for them is evidently growing. Will this care for the animals ever grow until their rights become equal to ours? Descartes believed that animals were merely muscular machines, unable to feel pain due to the fact that they were lacking in mind and soul. Bentham began the fight for animal rights in the 1800’s. Today, vivisection continues…

‘Speciesism’ – The argument for putting the rights of humans over those of animals – Peter Singer.

‘How we ought to treat animals depends first of all on the relationship we have with them… There is our relation with pets, who are promoted to honorary membership of the moral community. They are an exception, in a sense a perversion, and a temptation too. There is our relation with animals that we keep for our uses, where we have a clear duty of care but we are not trying to establish quasi-personal relations. Then finally there is our relation with animals in the wild. My argument is that we have duties to animals in all these three areas but they are of a different kind depending on the structure of the relationship.’- Roger Scruton

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2012 Abstracts Stage 2

Honda: the Power of Dreams

The Advertising of Honda – Popular and life-affirming, but is it just a capitalist front designed purely for selling and promoting the spectacle?

Popular and life-affirming, but is it just a capitalist front designed purely for selling and promoting the spectacle?
The Society of the Spectacle (Guy Debord) – claims our society is dominated by the spectacle (TV for e.g.) but is it too cynical?

‘The Power of Dreams’ or ‘the glitter of the spectacle’s distractions’? Through this project, I aim to examine the theory Guy Debord asserts in his The Society of the Spectacle in detail, in order to discuss the relevance of a Debordian analysis with relation to Honda’s advertising.

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2012 Abstracts Stage 3

Deconstructing the Narrative of Psychiatry: An exploration into how psychiatry has hindered its own progress.

Psychiatry is an admirable and important profession, but one which is regarded in very different ways depending upon which side of the fence you sit; a patient may resent psychiatry or praise it, a psychiatrist may feel comfortable or uncomfortable within their profession, and a lay person may or may not understand the need for psychiatric practice.

My project is focused on an exploration of the component concepts of psychiatry.

Deconstruction is a term given to the philosophy of Jacques Derrida, which resembles an intimate reading of a text, and I call psychiatry a narrative in relation to the work of Jean François Lyotard, referring to its tendencies to create a type of reality into which its patients and practitioners must assert themselves. It is my view (and that of others), that such a thing that makes its own reality must be in total accord with itself and so I decided that the best way to uncover any disharmonious concepts in psychiatry was to deconstruct it.

A deconstruction of psychiatry consists, in my project, of looking the way that psychiatry tends to favour finding instances of insanity over instances of sanity; the way psychiatry appears to suffer from a form of ‘diagnostic creep’; and the imbalance of power that runs through the structure of psychiatry.

My conclusions are that although psychiatry is fraught with problems, it is capable of becoming a fully functioning profession, if it would be willing to receive critical review from an outside source.

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2012 Abstracts Stage 2

The Ethics of the Hero: Can Comic Books and Graphic Novels be Used for Moral Guidance?

My project was an examination of Comic Books and Graphic Novels and whether or not they can be used to give us Ethical and Moral Direction in our lives. I focused on the Comic Books Kick Ass by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr. and also on V for Vendetta by Alan Moore and David Lloyd. I looked at the Ethical Philosophy of John Stuart Mill, looking at his Utilitarian theory from his Book titled Utilitarianism, Immanuel Kant and his theory from Groundwork for the metaphysics of Morals and also Thomas Hobbes’s theory seen in the Leviathan. I also looked at the Aesthetic Theory of Arthur Schopenhauer. I applied the Philosophy to the actions portrayed in the comic books to see if there was any ethical guidance to be taken from the comic books. Also looking at the Comics as works of art to see if there is any element of Aesthetic pleasure to be gained from them.

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2012 Abstracts Stage 3

A Philosophical Enquiry into the Consumerism and Advertising used in the Housing Industry in Britain

Our Commodity Fetishism has led to a growing consumer culture which advertising capitalises on and helps generate.

We are bound by our desperate consumer culture according to both Philosophers. Marx believes that humanity has created a culture of ‘Commodity Fetishism’ where use and exchange value have been warped by our capitalist culture. Where Debord despairs that: ‘all that was once directly lived has become mere representation.

Comparing luxury development One Hyde Park with affordable Norfolk Homes one I have found that advertising capitalises on and helps generate the commodity fetishism. The advertising feeds the audience response not the product through signs of satisfaction; these satisfactions are different for diverse audiences. Gap in luxury and price is maintained through specific target marketing.

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2012 Abstracts Stage 3

Is Music Worth Saving? How Changing Social Norms and Conventions have Contributed to the Decline of the Music Industry.

Aims
 To gain an understanding of how largely capitalist organizations, such as Apple, Sony BMG and Warner are slowly eliminating the competition – smaller independent record labels and stores and alienating the musician from their art
 To investigate whether the use of free illegal downloading and file sharing websites can ever be justified in the current economic climate?
 To decide whether or not we should care about the demise of the record industry and whether music is a good that is worth saving?

Thinkers + Texts
 Mark Fisher— Capitalist Realism
 Immanuel Kant—Groundwork for the Metaphysic of Morals
 Karl Marx—Capital
 Arthur Schopenhauer—The World and Will as Representation

“It is easier to imagine a total catastrophe which ends all life on earth than it is to imagine a real change in capitalist relations” (Zizek, 334: 2011)

“We could just as well call the world embodied music as embodied will; this is the reason why music makes every picture, indeed every scene from real life and from the world, at once appear in enhanced significance” (Schopenhauer, 262-263: 1969)

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2011 Abstracts Stage 3

Identity on a Razor’s Edge: the Dialectic of Self-Hood in “Blade Runner”

A study in the dialectic existing between the master and the slave within the post-modern situation of Ridley Scott’s 1982 movie ‘Blade Runner’, in discussing the theories found within Hegel and Nietzsche.

In the fictional early 21st Century, mankind has developed technology to such an extent that artificial beings, replicants can now be produced; these are not to be employed for the emancipation and enlightenment of man, but as slaves. They are granted no freedom and are subject to death at the end of their service or upon their return to the birth place. They are the ultimate slave, and mankind has become the ultimate master.

Their very servitude grants these replicants an identity, which forms an aspect to the dialectic which constitutes mankind’s self-hood. Hegel informs us of the need for recognition in the formation of self-hood; the master requires the slave in order to be recognised as an individual, but relationship is unequal. The slave has a greater access to the needs to man and as a result grows in humaneness leading to the eventual overthrowing of the master. This process culminates in a replicant saving the life of the police ‘Blade Runner’ who has slaughtered his friends; the civilised slave has overcome the barbaric master.

The replicants and their motivation to overthrow the shackles of their servitude and forced deaths, act as an example of Nietzsche’s ‘will to power’, by which an individual affirms their existence by overcoming the obstacles which stand between him and autonomy. This occurs as throughout the movie, the replicants, the artificial human beings, show a greater degree of humaneness than the human masters.

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2011 Abstracts Stage 2

Anarchism: the Path to Freedom

Aims: 
To highlight the impotence, invalidity and ineffectiveness of our current economic and political systems. Whilst illustrating the detriment this causes to our social and personal lives.
To promote Anarchism as a means to securing greater freedom and liberty whilst overcoming the problems of our current system.

Thinkers:
Kropotkin – A collection of Revolutionary writings.  
Nietzsche – Thus spoke Zarathustra  
Chomsky – On Anarchism

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2011 Abstracts Stage 3

The Means-End Mindset of Modernity and Beyond: How Capitalism is devaluing the Education System

This project serves to assess the contemporary situation that education finds itself in within our Western Capitalistic society, before analysing the makeup of Capitalism itself. This will provide the platform for an attack on the system, where arguments will made critiquing Capitalism’s inherent characteristics; the characteristics that quash out independent thought, rational judgement and wisdom in favour of ticking boxes and tangible exam results. Education’s value as a nurturer has been lost: it has morphed into a tool for gain rather than an intrinsic virtue that has value in and of itself. The subtle and deep-rooted power systems that Capitalism makes inevitable are the cause of this.

‘Browne Report’ Lord Browne’s report on Higher Education will provide the context for this project. The report is indicative of attitudes towards education as a means, rather than an end in itself.

Marx’s ‘Communist Manifesto’ The father of communism will be used to outline the inherent flaws of Capitalism in terms of private property and the free market and how these affect education.

Gadamer’s ‘Treatment and Dialogue’ This hermeneutical thinker’s arguments regarding the nature of intelligence will be assessed and made relevant to the situation that education finds itself in today. Contemporarily, our education system marginalizes traditional concepts of wisdom so that independent thought becomes devalued.

Foucault’s ‘Discipline and Punish’ The climax of this critique will come with Foucault and his advocacy that, though less obvious, brutal and violent than the past, we are subject to deep-rooted power systems within the West that indirectly control our desires and actions. These affirmations will be used to highlight education’s impartiality – and the deeper consequences the way we are taught has on society as a whole.

Today, we are a docile nation with a docile mind-set. This needs to stop: education is the cause; education is the cure.

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2011 Abstracts Stage 3

The Origin of Plagiarism (or Why Copying is Good)

In my project I intend to look at the historical genealogy of plagiarism and how it has come to be seen negatively in contemporary society. I will attempt at giving a counter argument to the negative nature of plagiarism.

In the first chapter I will begin by arguing that in pre-modern society copying and indeed imitation were promoted as being tools to preserve tradition, and as a way to intellectual enlightenment.

In the second chapter I will look at the way the invention of the printing press influenced society and made people more concerned with originality and plagiarism from perspectives of private property and authenticity.

In the third chapter I will argue that plagiarism as a concept has been invented and that everything anyone ever says or writes derives from something that has already occurred.

Some texts I have included in my work are: T.S.Eliot: The Sacred Wood, Matthew Arnold: Culture and Anarchy, Sartre: Being and Nothingness, Kierkegaard: Repetition, Borges: Labyrinths, Aristotle: Poetics and Hegel: Elements of the philosophy of Right

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2011 Abstracts Stage 3

Nietzsche made me do it!!!!

Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, a German philosopher, notorious for his blistering eruptions on Christianity, moral conventions and contemporary modern society. Estranged from the outside world and in deep mental breakdown, Nietzsche left the world with an astounding legacy that would carry on to question and criticize traditional customs and morality long after his death. Nietzsche writings would have ramifications for more than a hundred years for how certain psychopathic criminals would distinguish and rationalize their crimes, and attribute their atrocities to the influence Nietzsche’s writing would have on them. However in every writers fan base there may be a misguided group of readers, this does not make the writer responsible for the misinterpretation and even less guilty of the perpetrators crimes. Nietzsche seems more than most writers to come under a lot of criticism and suspicion, this is partly to do with the content of his writing but also he seems to be attacked from another more biased angle, these are the people who want the mud to stick because Nietzsche seems to be threatening their value or belief system. One such writer who seems determined to tarnish the philosophers name is Katherine Ramsland, Ph. D. Graduate of the private, exclusive, Catholic DeSales University, established by the Oblates of St. Francis de Sales, who’s foundation for teaching are on the theology of the believed saint.

Ramslands writes an article which seems to be leaning in the direction of this bias view the title of her article was; “Existential Murder: The Nietzsche Syndrome” and within this article she claims that “Nietzsche inspired Hitler and other killers.” Within this project I will be investigating what Ramsland coined the “Nietzsche Syndrome” and looking at the killers which she suggests were influenced by Nietzsche’s philosophy. I hope to prove that not only is Nietzsche misunderstood in many of his concepts but that he can actually be looked at from a positive angle, I also hope to show how Nietzsche’s work has been used for good. In my research I have also noticed that Ramsland has handpicked the murderers she uses, but in no way compares them to killers who have not used Nietzsche as an inspiration, failing to draw any comparisons and pinning down any common traits held by killers seems as though she is trying to strengthen the blame on Nietzsche without any real investigation, I hope to provide these comparisons and links, and hopefully vindicate the work of Nietzsche.

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2011 Abstracts Stage 3

True (?) Romance. How has the Ideal of Love Been Lost in Contemporary United Kingdom and What Are the Ramifications?

Current relationships are under strain due to the gap between fictional love (the ideal) and genuine love. Marriage and monogamy are the metanarrative structures and institutions of the ideal of love that are causing tension in love, requiring paramours to be more consistent than their identity allows for. As identity lacks an origin without the ideal, it becomes relative to the Other in a cyclical relationship that causes identity to be in constant flux. Without a stable base on which to love, the ideal can longer function.

Therefore if agents still want to love, then they must accept that each moment is unique and the only ground for love is the individual’s experience of the other in the Other. The essay is heavily influenced by the works of Jacques Derrida (Violence and Metaphysics), Jean-Paul Sartre (Being and Nothingness) and Emmanuel Levinas (Totality and Infinity).

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2011 Abstracts Stage 2

Is it Right for an Editor to Have so Much Influential Power?

In my project I aim to discuss whether or not individuals have too much power when it comes to the media and journalism. I will look particularly into the jobs of the editors and owners. I will do this by investigating several case studies including the 1992 general election that Murdoch believed was won due to The Sun’s Headline: “If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights”

I will mainly be focusing on John Stuart Mill’s novel On Liberty. Mill focused on freedom of speech, believing that no matter what position or job you have in society you should always be allowed to have your own opinions. However, he also believes that individuals should not spread their opinion if it will be harmful to others. I will be looking into and analysing both of these claims.

I will also be studying Dale Jacquette’s novel Journalistic Ethics: Moral Responsibility in the Media, Heinz Steinert’s novel Culture Industry, and Political Freedom (Problems of Philosophy) by George G. Brenkert, along with many others. As well as Mill I will be critically analysing Debord’s work on the media and comparing it to other philosophers.
Overall I aim to come to a conclusion about whether or not the editors and owners of newspapers have the right to print fabricated stories, whether the facts are true or whether they are lies.

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2011 Abstracts Stage 2

Journalism Ethics: Integrity in Reporting

Purpose
• Key concept: the invasion of individual’s privacy in relation to public interest
• Do journalists always have the sole intention of providing us with the truth?
• Do they pursue the truth by the right means for the right reasons?

Philosophy
• Mill’s Harm Principle
• Pragmatism as a theory of truth
• Correspondence Theory of Truth
• Kant’s Moral Philosophy: Obligation

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2011 Abstracts Stage 3

Does Art Succeed where Language Fails? Art as the Vehicle for the Expression of Emotion

I aim to see why we as humans ever need to say such phrases and is it at this point that art comes to the fore.

I will use the following Philosophers:
Heidegger M. On the Way to Language. 1982. Harper Collins Basic Writings: Martin Heidegger. Ed. David Farrell Krell. 2010. Routledge.

Mugerauer R. Heidegger’s Language and Thinking. 1991. Humanities Press International.

Van der Heiden G-J. The Truth (and Untruth) of Language. 2010. Duquesne University Press.

Silverman D. and Torode B. The Material Word. 1980. Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Derrida J. Writing and Difference. 2010. Routledge.

Derrida J. Of Grammatology. 1997. John Hopkins University Press.

Basic Writings: Jean-Paul Sartre. Ed. Stephen Priest. 2006. Routledge.

A Nietzsche Reader. Ed. Hollingdale R.J. 1977. Penguin Classics.

Gadamer H-G. Truth and Method. 2006. Continuum

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2011 Abstracts Stage 3

A Questionable Interpretation: a study into John Nash’s Game Theory, its reliance on a dubious interpretation of Adam Smith’s economic theory, and how it has been detrimental to competition in modern day economics

The aim, as such, of this writing is to examine the idea that there is a questionable interpretation underpinning modern economics and if it is attacked we are left with the notion that the economics we have is not the economics it should be. This is because the theory of capitalism that we have today is not exactly the one argued for, by its founder, Adam Smith. I also wish to show that we cannot go back to the more true form of capitalism however nor can we move to any other system because of the damage already done. This shall be hinted at by using some segments of Capital by Karl Marx.

The object which has driven me to examine such an idea that something has gone wrong in economics is the film A Beautiful Mind. I believe the portrayal of John Nash in this film is biased and unjustifiable as I believe his wrong interpretation of Smith may have led to an unending cycle of greed that will slowly pervert and consume any form of morality.

My territories of discussion are economics and the application of game theory and within this writing the concepts that I wish to discuss are: Nash equilibria, game theory and competition.

The thinkers and relevant sources that I shall use within this writing are:

Karl Marx – Capital
Adam Smith – Wealth of nations
John Nash – non-cooperative games and two person cooperative games (contained within issues of Econometrica, the economics journal)

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2011 Abstracts Stage 2

It’s Better if You Don’t Own Land

Aim: to determine if humanity has a right to own land

When progress is interpreted in respect to potential living standards, it is undeniable that examples such as the developments made in medicine are evidence of humanity’s progress.

BUT: 10% of the world (0.88 billion) live on an income of under $1 a day
20 years leading up to 1997 child poverty doubled worldwide.
Mortality rates: North America (7) VS Africa (88).

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2011 Abstracts Stage 2

Genesis Vs The Big Bang Theory

‘Isn’t it enough to see that the garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?’ (Adams, 2009)

Object of study – Which creation story appears to be more valid in our society. I will compare Genesis and the Big Bang theory. I will critically analyse whether science assumes that Genesis is an explanatory theory, when perhaps it is not. It is very much a scientific discourse.

I plan to find that The Big Bang theory is a better explanation of creation in today’s society, and whether an atheist can explain creation.

Richard Dawkins – The God Delusion
Kant – The Critique of Pure Reason
David Hume – Meditations concerning natural religion
Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Nagel – The View from Nowhere