Category: Stage 3

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

‘Mountains of the Mind’. Leisure, Thrill and the Nature of Human Existence

Object/Territory: I chose to study the sport of mountaineering with reference to the historical development and change in attitude towards it. I essentially wanted to provide a philosophical explanation behind the reason people take part in such a high risk sport.

Philosophers and Concepts: Immanuel Kant and Burke- The Theory of the Sublime Jean- Paul Sartre- Existential Freedom and Authentic Existence. Vertigo Theory. Martin Heidegger- Dasein, Being-towards-death.

By using the above philosophical concepts I intend to explain what makes mountaineering so appealing to the human mind and how these attitudes have changed over the course of time. I will take into account the history of the sport and the changing attitudes that have resulted in the change from a leisure activity to one that seeks a deeper, more satisfying thrill factor concerning human endurance. Ultimately I want to demonstrate that mountaineering provides fundamental experiences that are vital to the human condition and to our sense of self-understanding.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

An Ethical Study into the Importance of the Autonomy of the Individual within Russian Society, before, during and after Communist Rule through a Dialogue with Aleksandr Solzhenitisyn’s “Cancer Ward”

Main Aim: In this project I aim to explore the changes in Russian politics and ideology from the Tsarist autocracy through to the information revolution that ultimately brought to an end the oppressive Communist regime affected by Josef Stalin. With respect to these changes I will look at how important the concept of the autonomy of the individual is in maintaining an ethical and moral way of life and how the autonomy and subsequent freedom of the individual was affected throughout these socio‐political changes. The use of Solzhenitsyn’s ‘Cancer Ward’ is particularly useful firstly because of the personal nature of his experience; he was arrested and put into forced labour for eight years before being confined to internal exile following criticism of Stalin in a personal letter. With regards to this, the semi‐autobiographical nature of the book allows a fictional insight into the workings of the Soviet State post Stalin with the authenticity of personal experience. Secondly, it provides a detailed insight into how the government treated individuals but also of how individuals treated each other while under the morally dubious Stalinist state. Philosophy: Kant – A major contributor to contemporary ethical thought the works of Kant had a significant effect on how the individual was thought of to be able to work out and make their own ethical decisions. It will be important to see how the autonomy of the individual changes under the communist and totalitarian Stalinist state. Marx/Hegel – the concepts of alienation and the abolition of private property from these two thinkers created the original structure around which Lenin’s communism would be built. Their thoughts on both subjects will require explanation. Sartre – His post war work meant his name became synonymous with existentialism, the absolute freedom with which we make our decisions contrasted harshly with the reality of Russia during the mid 20th Century where people often declined to make the correct ethical choice, or were altered to act in a way unbefitting a moral human being. His later writings reflect a more measured approach to the effects of one’s situation and I will explore his subsequent change in direction. Personal Considerations: This project has allowed me to explore an area of personal interest (Russian literature) combined with the aspects of philosophy I find most interesting. I have also been able to understand the link between society and philosophy more thoroughly and regarding this the importance that the individual plays in how he treats his fellow man, no matter how powerful or oppressive the government is.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

Dying in Denial: the Industrialisation of Death in Contemporary Society

For my stage three project I have decided to explore the industrialisation of death in our current society. My examination begins with a look at the gradual change in the perception of death, from the classical age to the modern day. By taking a genealogical approach to this historical change I am able to identify the specific reasons for these changes and reflect upon what significance these changes have on the perceived meaning of death. Beginning with the role in which death played in the Classical Age, I examined how death was once understood as a harsh reality of life to which everyone was made aware through events such as the bubonic plague and the limitations in medical knowledge. After which I explored the gradual development of anatomical pathology in the modern age and the effect that demography, pathology and sociology had and currently have on how death is now approached. In particular I looked at the importance that has been placed on defining death in terms of its physiological cause and the implication that this definition has on each of the specific areas of study I have mentioned. By understanding the changes that have occurred between these two points of history, I highlight the key issues that are involved in the industrialisation of death and what exactly this means in relation to our individual approach to death and our common understanding.

Following this I introduced the philosophical theory of Martin Heidegger and his explanation of death in relation to his phenomenological task to uncover true meaning in ‘Being and Time’. By setting out a brief explanation of how Heidegger attempts to understand the meaning of being in general through human experience, I examine the significance that death has in making possible the discovery of true meaning. From this I moved onto Heidegger’s later work, ‘The Question Concerning Technology’ and his thought on the role of technology in the pursuit of understanding being and the distinction he makes between authentic and inauthentic perception. It is at this point where I applied the issues I raised, in the study of my concept, to Heideggerian theory and translate what effect the industrialisation of death has had on the authenticity of understanding the true meaning of death in the modern day. In conclusion I offered a personal insight to my opinion on the impact that contemporary society has had on our perceived meaning of death and what significance this has to our eventual confrontation with death.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

A Foucauldian Investigation into Conceptions and Opinions of Tattooing held by the British General Society in the Present Day

My Stage three project is a Foucauldian investigation into tattooing in England  in the present day. I have based my research around Foucault’s theories of  power, history and governmentality. 

I have also investigated psychological and social theories that relate to the Foucauldian ideas of power and governmentality. 

From working through my investigation, I decided that I should make history the greatest aspect of my analysis, and that allowed me an insight into collective notions in what I termed the “general society” and this  has made up the main body of my work. 

I have also investigated how the view of the tattooed community has changed, as well as investigating where negative opinions held by the societies at each point in history originated from. 

I have discovered through my investigation that negative attitudes towards tattooing stem from the orthodox Judeo-Christian belief that the Body is the property of God, and that to scar or tattoo it is a sin against God. Tattooed Jews are still not allowed the same burial rites as non‐tattooed Jews.  

This project represents a new understanding of tattooing as a genealogical  entity, as much has been written about the social, psychological and  anthropological impact of allowing tattooing in civilised society.  

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

Hearing without Knowing: Music, Recording and Differance

This project began with Bill Drummond’s poster, Notice. For Drummond, the digitization and instant access to music through the internet has rendered recorded music a dead art form. To try and understand Drummond’s perception, I have chosen to examine three moments where technology had altered musical production and dissemination: – (1) The birth of notation. (2) The advent of file-sharing software such as Napster. (3) The rise of house music and ecstasy culture where DJs perform using recorded music. Throughout, I have used Deleuze and Guatarri’s A Thousand Plateaus as a conceptual tool-kit. Drawing on their notion of the rhizome, faciality, the refrain, becoming-imperceptible and micro-politics I have attempted to understand both these three movements and develop an approach to music itself. In order to cast some light on Drummond’s perception of recorded music as a single, irrelevant genre, I have turned to Adorno’s conception of the culture industry. Through Derrida’s Dissemination, I have attempted to show that the dichotomy between recording and performance cannot be sustained and that the musical experience returns the listener to the play of differance.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

The Threat of 21st Century Global Terror: are Terrorist Organisations Psychotic [Freud]?

Territory: Terror and the Suicide Bomber.
Terrorism is not a new weapon but in the 21st Century we have seen it used to devastating effect. A 21st Century phenomenon is the suicide bomber, the human bomb willing to sacrifice their own life for terrors cause. The suicide bomber is an utterly baffling weapon 9 times out of 10 it is unable to be defused and its explosive force can cause widespread damage to infrastructure, troops and civilians. For counter terror organisations around the world the suicide bomber presents the ultimate nightmare and risk to the civilian population. It is a bomb combined with human thought and human emotion, a bomb that shouldn’t exist.

Concept: Freudian Psychosis.
The aim of my project is to engage with the terrorist’s mind-set, in particular the suicide bombers with respect to Freudian psychology. The simple answer is to declare terrorism and its follower’s psychotic thought, but could this assumption merely be just a Western attitude?

Secondary Concept: Levinas’s Autrui.
For further discussion I will also engage the terrorist with Autrui [the Other] to discuss if the suicide bomber truly understands the people it destroys as Autrui.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

The Prevention of the two Possible Outcomes for Society

Territory: My project this year is a follow on from my project last year and so my territory has remained the same. My territory is society itself, but particularly the problems of society and the two possible futures for society those being either; the civilised state of nature where everyone is out to get everyone in order to increase their standing in society, this is seen in things such as the culture of legal action. The other scenario is a totalitarian state where the government take absolute control to prevent a collapse in the civilised state of nature or full anarchy, but it can also be seen happening through such things as political correctness and the nanny culture. Aim: My aim for my project is to find a way to prevent these two scenarios from occurring but also to find a way to tackle some of today’s societies problems. I plan to do this by looking for the root of the problem and then tackle the problem from the root up. I believe that the root is society’s obsession with liberty and equality with liberty being the more problematic of the two. To tackle the problem I shall be using theories from Social Contract thinkers such as Hobbes and Hegel to thinkers such as Levinas and their view on meaning. Overall I want to try and make a system where there is liberty and equality, but it is not an obsession rather a balance between liberty, equality, order and meaning to ensure a society where we can grow as moral human beings with the most pleasant life possible without having to resort to extremes to do so.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

Is the Shaping of Self-Identity in the Post-Modern Era in a Crucial Sense a Body Project?

I cannot help feeling as though there is something seriously wrong with society at the moment if the way we look is the main concern for many individuals. There are a number of things that one must take into consideration as to why and how all of this possibly came about: internet, mass culture, mass consumption the list goes on, ultimately it seems there is a distinct relationship between the way in which we perceive ourselves today and modernity, and the ultimate question then is, are we autonomous subjects within modernity? And is this ultimately affecting our transcendence? I believe the most appropriate research methods for this particular topic will be mainly observational and qualitative. I am also interested in the historical context of identity thinking and the relationship it has with the body for instance the history of dieting, the fashion industry and investigating whether or not there is a specific source or reason as to why we think about our body shapes and physical appearances the way we do today. It becomes obvious that this particular topic is relevant to history and the attitudes people have on the subject matter are tied within the social situations at various times. In my project I will be making philosophical reference to Kant and the autonomy of the subject, discussing how in our present day there are various structures between subjects, for instance the internet, networking systems which mediate our relationships with others. Today bodily existence and spiritual existence are projected as the same…is this making it harder for subjects to know themselves? Are we fragmented selves? Jean Baudrillard points out in the Consumer in Society that the body has taken over the soul’s moral and ideological role as an object of salvation, and Oscar Wilde says “To be really medieval one should have no body. To be really modern one should have no soul.” We have become a society obsessed with the way we look, but does the way we look in such a superficial sense really tell us anything at all about us as individuals… and is this way of thinking pulling us further and further away from ourselves and the understanding of others. In the case of a traditional dualism between the soul and the body, as especially found in Platonic and Christian traditions, the identity of the body will be relatively unimportant, because identity will primarily have to do with the soul, not the body. Increasingly however, it is the body that has taken centre stage in connection with the shaping of identity.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

Is the BBC Still an Important Moral and Cultural Institution within Contemporary Society?

Territory: I chose to consider the BBC and the recent scandals in which it had been involved, focusing particularly on the Ross and Brand voicemail scandal and rigged phone-ins involving Blue Peter and Comic Relief. Concepts: My territory led me to consider morality and identity for the individual within modern society, focusing on the relationship between these concepts and institutions such as the BBC. Aims: Following the BBC scandal involving Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand and the public outrage this caused I decided to evaluate the role of the BBC today. My objective was therefore to determine the ways in which the BBC had changed over the years in order to debate whether it was still morally and culturally important today. In order to evaluate these changes I chose to look at Beck and his notion of Individualization to understand our changing society and the problems faced by the BBC today. To further consider the effects of cultural institutions such as the BBC for the individual I chose to look at Adorno’s “The Culture Industry” and Taylor’s “Sources of the Self”, which both highlighted the significance of cultural institutions within the formation of morality and identity. This led me to argue that the BBC still has an important role to play within society today both morally and culturally. However it must attempt to balance its traditional values with the developing attitudes of our society if it is to retain this significance.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

How has the Rise in Technology Changed the Way we View the Human Environment and Human Identity?

TERRITORY: West Ham United. AIM: In my investigation I wanted to see how the rise of technology has affected the human environment and identity. As a keen West Ham supporter I thought this would be an interesting place to start. From its humble origins as an amateur club to the rise of its top premiership I assumed this community has been subject to a lot of technological modifications over the years. Method: I examined how the club has changed from over 50 years ago in order to see the affect technological advancements have had with regards to the club; satellite television, the internet and advanced forms of transport illustrated how the human environment has turned into a global network. I also wanted to see how this has affected the players of West Ham United in order to see if the human subject has changed. After establishing this I could then see which philosophical theories were relevant to the past and present eras of West Ham United. I considered Kant’s theory of knowledge which places the rational human subject above the causal necessity of reality. This notion seemed to express how the individual in West Ham (the footballer and manager) related to the club in the past. I then decided to look at postmodern ideas on reality and the human subject. It expressed a more complex view of reality where the individual’s autonomy is undermined as man is unable to establish what is image and what is reality. I believed this expressed the organisation of West Ham and how the footballer relates to his environment in contemporary times. After examining both these attitudes I could then draw some conclusions about how we must view our human environment and human identity.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

Identity Theft: an Investigation into the Repercussions of the Identity Card on the Identity and Existence of the Individual

Territory: Through the developments especially within recent years, the identity card has become a prominent part of modern life. The territory under examination is the identity card. The debate of protection over control and the amount of information that is held about each individual has become evermore important. The identity card suggests the ability to allow people to be recognised as the individual they are through the information contained on and within the card. The identity card therefore appears to present implications to the idea of identity presenting it as a fixed material idea which seems to do against the modern understanding of the self and the individual identity.

Aims: The primary aim of this project was to explore the extent to which identity cards impact the creation and development of the individual identity. Through the development in technology, particularly those within the area of the identity card it is possible to recognise a decline within the understanding of the individual and unique identity. The secondary aim of this project was to examine the effect that the restriction on the ability of the individual in the creation of the identity would have on the idea of existence that the self would have within the world. It is possible to suggest that existence is affirmed within the world through authentic experience and the projection of the identity in its individual being. Therefore if we are unable to create the self as we wish and perpetuate the individual identity this would seem to have a detrimental effect on projecting our existence.

Philosophers: Through the work of Sartre I have explored the way in which we strive to live an authentic life and the importance that Sartre places on this. I have explored the manner in which the identity card restricts the possibility for the individual to live this authentic life and create the self as they wish. The writings of Sartre were also used in the exploration of the idea of affirming our existence within the world, in that we are only an identity within our action, and through our action we are able to have existence within the world. The work of Heidegger was also important to this idea and his understanding of being. If we identify ourselves as a certain idea we are conforming and reducing the self to something that is less than the existence that we have. The idea that we are much more than we understand ourselves as being was important for Heidegger. We must not reduce our identities and our ability to exist by taking the identity card to be all that we are.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

Is Marketing Unethical? An Investigation through the Thoughts of Karl Marx and Theodor Adorno

For my stage three project I have decided to study the unethical issues that surround marketing in contemporary society. My interest in this topic has developed due to the fact that I recently applied, and was accepted, to a postgraduate course at Lancaster University in ‘Management and Marketing.’ The application required a personal statement, and it was through this requirement that I began to consider how I could link my philosophical background to a management and marketing application. In researching the course I became aware that one of the taught modules was ‘understanding business ethics’, as a result I decided to focus on business ethics for my project. The area of business ethics that I am going to concentrate on is marketing ethics. My aim in this project is to give a detailed discussion into the various marketing techniques apparent in contemporary society, through this discussion I aim to establish certain ethical pitfalls that marketing schemes slip into. Within this investigation I will concentrate on two areas, false and deceptive marketing and selective marketing. Thinkers: Karl Marx and Theodor Adorno. I believe both are ideal for my project as both of their thoughts relate to a critique of capitalism. I shall begin with Karl Marx and his notion of commodity fetishism, in doing this I will concentrate on his work entitled ‘The fetishism of commodities and the secret thereof’. This will lay the foundations from which I will introduce the thoughts of Theodor Adorno and his work on the culture industry, and the deceptive qualities of mass culture.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

The Impact of Scientific Knowledge on the Philosophical Questions of Creation

Object/Territory: The James Webb Space Telescope / The impact of the advancement of scientific knowledge. Aim: To investigate the differences between types of knowledge. Comparisons: • William Paley’s Watchmaker Analogy vs. The Existence of Dark Matter and Dark Energy • Thomas Aquinas’ First Cause Vs The Big Bang Theory. C.P. Snow: Two cultures know little or nothing about each other. Communication is difficult if not impossible. No common ground to achieve creative chances. Thomas Kuhn: Encompassing Vs Overthrowing. Isaiah Berlin: Growing tension, path to progress, elitist view of science, defence by Vico, new form of science. Jean-François Lyotard: Correspondence theory of truth. Language Games. Truth. Progress. Problem justifying scientific knowledge. God of the Gaps. In conclusion the distinction we have made between science and other forms of knowledge leaves us at a disadvantage. Both forms of knowledge are needed for us to gain true knowledge about our world.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

Genealogy, Power and War: Death from Inside

That which mankind has called war throughout the ages has become a very different phenomenon to what it once was; in our day and age we find ourselves part of a world continuously in conflict, but the very fact that we know this is due to the scope and depth of the information which has been compiled and disseminated by the media. This project will focus on how war, and in particular the very nature of our understanding and views governing it, has been inexorably changed with the advent of advanced information technologies. Paying specific attention to the means of its dissemination and the techniques and methods involved in this process, I will discuss how information, the very stuff of which our truths and ideas are composed of, and its constant manipulation not only affect our views on war and the societies which it involves, but also those of the entirety of our working geopolitical structure. I will focus mainly on late-twentieth to early twenty-first century U.S. warfare, explaining certain practices and decisions implemented by Americans as a whole, keeping these in line with the aims and context of my inquiry. I have chosen to apply Foucault’s ideas on genealogy as the central methodology upon which this inquiry will be constructed as I believe it to be not only pertinent and applicable to the subject matter, but more rigorous and conducive to the production of truth necessary to its competent investigation than any traditional historical method. Although I deviate slightly from the “traditional” foucaultian understanding of genealogy, choosing to rely heavily on statistics gathered through the process of polling and information distributed through newspaper, journal, and magazine articles instead of using mainly primary accounts, I believe my adaptation to his methodology to both ground my study in the temporal contexts which I analyze and complement my work and its search for interruptions within the context of political history, war, and technology. I will also draw heavily upon other concepts previously explored by Foucault to better explain my own views, with specific attention paid to the natures of truth and power; I will then adapt these ideas in such a manner as to allow for further elaboration of certain ideas essential to the development of my thesis which I will address later on in this work. In order to achieve a more in-depth understanding of the subject, I will juxtapose the philosophy of power and right of Thomas Hobbes, the ideas of which I argue to be outdated and now completely at odds with the realities of modern global, and especially American, politics, against that of Paul Virilio; a large portion of this investigation will deal with some of the more prominent ideas ascribed to this contemporary thinker, as I will seek to explain parts of his analysis of the first Gulf War through an inquiry of the media’s effect on the American, and indeed global, populace within this context. I will then conclude by condensing different aspects of both Foucault’s and Virilio’s theories into a single, working thesis.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

Media Immobilising Britain: Educational Aspiration

This project investigates social mobility in Britain within the last 20 years, and after finding Britain to be socially immobile looks into the role that education has within making Britain immobile. The education system is then evaluated to explore the possibility of education having a causative role in forming an immobile society. A common underlying factor in education’s role within an immobile society is a poor level of aspiration among the lower classes. I then look at the possible role British media has to play in forming poor levels of aspiration under the theories of the culture industry from Adorno and Horkheimer, and Vattimo’s ethics of provenance , which is transposed onto the issue of false consciousness and Marxist ideologies. This project uses government figures to show that Britain is immobile; that the education system plays a key role within immobility, and that media is responsible for breeding students with low levels of aspiration. This, when explored with Adorno and Horkheimer’s views on the culture industry, shows that mass media deceives its consumers in order to keep the bourgeois’ advantage over the lower classes and reinforce Britain’s immobility throughout the generations by depicting mobility as unlikely within the media. This is backed up by figures which show that class and the media consumed is closely linked so the elite few in charge of the majority of media consumed by the masses can install a false consciousness in which it promises mobility to the lower classes whilst never having an intention of delivering it.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

Witches – what the Concept Shows about the Apparent ‘Progression’ of Rationality

Object: Witches. Setting: 16th/17th century Europe, the height of the witch persecutions. Context: Rationality. How it is irrational to believe in witchcraft now, yet it was perfectly rational just a few hundred years ago. Aim: The aim of my project is to investigate the concept of the progressiveness of rationality; whether we can ever say that our rationality, and what is logical, is getting more sophisticated, and more correspondent to the truth. Whether we can say that our current denial of the physical reality of witchcraft is more superior to the 16th century affirmation of it. Method: In my project, I have first examined the ‘witch craze’ in detail, considering some significant points it highlights on the concept of progressive rationality. I have then examined philosophical opinions to support my findings. Philosophers: The main philosophers I have used are Kuhn and Foucault, who do not think a linear progression of rationality is possible. I have also looked at Lyotard and Kant, who do think progression occurs.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

How Far do we have to Travel before we ‘Find Ourselves’?

When discussing travelling, it is very common for people to say they are going to ‘find themselves’, this idea has inspired me to philosophically explore the extent to which we discover more about ourselves when we go travelling. To supplement my discussion I have drawn upon my own experiences of travelling, especially my recent University Exchange trip to the University of Vermont, America.

One of the books I have studied is “The Art of Travel” by Alain de Botton, he explains several aspects of travelling such as the curiosity and expectations we have of somewhere and the feeling of surprise or disappointment we get when we arrive. He also finds interest in the ways we travel, such as the mystery of aeroplanes flying, or the “poetry” of a service station on the M25. He suggests that the reason we travel and have a desire to wander the earth without reference to a particular destination, is because we want to escape the confinement of the ordinary, rooted world.

To accompany Alain De Botton’s theory, I’ve also had a look at Sartre’s phenomenology, as he argues that our consciousness constructs our ego. He explains that our experiences are transparent and are shaped by the state we are in and our disposition at the time. The ego is the last factor in our consciousness, and we only really acknowledge it when we reflect on things.

This means that essentially our consciousness is really free, and I think this is the key to understanding how and why our experiences change us. New experiences challenge our preconceptions about things, and therefore affect our ego. Sartre explains that a conception of something is given as a whole idea, where as when we perceive something it is given in profiles, it is broken down into individual aspects. If you apply this to travelling, we can have a conception of a place, and a general idea of what it might be like, but when we arrive we are often surprised by the many different things we observe. As our understanding of a place changes, our perception of ourselves changes too.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

In Braveheart we see Men Willing to Die for Freedom: is Freedom more than just a Concept?

Territory: Braveheart the 1995 film by Mel Gibson. Focus: William Wallace: I *am* William Wallace! And I see a whole army of my countrymen, here in defiance of tyranny. You’ve come to fight as free men… and free men you are. What will you do with that freedom? Will you fight? Concept: Freedom / Free will. What I will do in this project: I intend to look at the concept of freedom and free will. In the film Braveheart we see William Wallace lead the Scottish people in an uprising against the rule of King Edward I. Edward took over Scotland when the Scottish king died without an heir giving Scottish lands to English lords: such behaviour led to an uprising in Scotland as lower class took on the English armies in a bid for freedom. Freedom is so important people will give their lives for it. I explore the Kantian notion of the transcendental self, he believed that our purpose was to be rational with intrinsic value because of our ability to reason. This ability to reason sets us apart from all other creatures. This ability to reason is only possible if we are autonomous, because how can we make rational decisions unless we have free will. I will then counterbalance this view with reference to Karl Marx. Marx believes our nature is shaped by a social structure that rests upon an economic base. This means we are therefore determined by economics, freedom is restricted by the means of production, and we can only have any semblance of freedom if we can afford freedom.

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

A Philosophical Enquiry into the Class Differences of Social Deviance and its Links to Philosophy

Aim of project – form an enquiry into the idea of social deviance, focussing particularly on how it differs depending upon the social group and why it seems to be more prevalent in the working classes. I will look to give possible explanations of social deviance based upon the philosophical thought I am going to look at. • General idea of deviance – any act which goes against the social norms or laws of a particular society. • Common explanation found for the greater prevalence of deviance in lower working class groups – harder for the individuals in the lower classes to fulfil their potential in society. This leads to feelings of frustration, which can lead to social deviance • This links into the ideas of Marx, and his ideas on class struggle, and how the lower class, or proletariat are the powerless people in society, which leads to feelings of resentment and frustration and may lead to certain antisocial behaviours – this class struggle will ultimately lead to what would be considered deviance as he suggests that a social revolution will occur • Work done with Engels on the family – microcosm of larger society showing negative side of society • PHILOSOPHY – Sartre – ‘Red mist’ showing the connection between mans subconscious and violence and idea that man is completely free to be whatever he wants to be SO man is free to act in a totally socially deviant manner, however it is one’s own responsibility to act in this way • “Being and Nothingness” – conflict is central to all human relationships

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2009 Abstracts Stage 3

Whodunnit? An Investigation into Autonomy and the Subject within the British Justice System

My project is an investigation into responsibility. In modern times more and more people are getting reduced prison sentences due to diminished responsibility. This inspired me to look into the autonomy of the Subject. This investigation charts its way through the history of the subject, starting with the wholly autonomous subject as proposed in John Rawls theory of justice, justice as fairness. This theory relies on respect for others, freedom and equality and most importantly an autonomous self. The first person to challenge this idea concerning the self was Sigmund Freud when he proposes that the mind was in fact split in three parts, the id, ego and the super‐ego, which all have different effects on our actions and choices. With this theory in mind I look into scientific evidence to back up Freud and show how illness such as schizophrenia and narcissistic personality disorder affect the mind and the Subject. Finally I look at the theories of Keith Ansell Pearson in his book Viroid Life in which he questions the autonomy of the Subject altogether. He produces a theory of the cyborg and the hybrid self and proposes that the rapid rise in technology has created a more deterministic reality and halted the autonomy of man.