Phronesis as Professional Knowledge


Book Description

Phronesis is the Aristotelian notion of practical wisdom. In this collected series, phronesis is explored as an alternate way of considering professional knowledge. In the present context dominated by technical rationalities and instrumentalist approaches, a re-examination of the concept of phronesis offers a fundamental re-visioning of the educational aims in professional schools and continuing professional education programs. This book originated from a conversation amongst an interdisciplinary group of scholars from education, health, philosophy, and sociology, who share concerns that something of fundamental importance – of moral signi?cance – is missing from the vision of what it means to be a professional. The contributors consider the ways in which phronesis offers a generative possibility for reconsidering the professional knowledge of practitioners. The question at the centre of this inquiry is: “If we take phronesis seriously as an organising framework for professional knowledge, what are the implications for professional education and practice?” A multiplicity of understandings emerge as to what is meant by phronesis and how it might be reinterpreted, understood, applied, and extended in a world radically different to that of the progenitor of the term, Aristotle. For those concerned with professional life this is a conversation not to be missed.




Phronesis


Book Description

Phronesis, or practical wisdom, has interested philosophers (and more recently psychologists) for millennia. In the last decade or so, a bandwagon of diverse academics has been working with and celebrating the notion of phronesis as a metacognitive capacity, guiding morally aspirational cognition and action. In Phronesis: Retrieving Practical Wisdom in Psychology, Philosophy, and Education, Kristján Kristjánsson and Blaine J. Fowers work through some of the relevant puzzles created by the recent phronesis discourse, filling gaps in the current literatures, and pushing the research agenda in new directions. The book does so in a way that is radically interdisciplinary and draws in equal measure on insights from psychology, philosophy, and education. Through its revised and applied Aristotelianism, the book makes a contribution to vital ongoing debates within moral psychology, moral philosophy, professional ethics, and moral education about the salience of phronesis - addressing the topic accessibly both for academics in key disciplines and for a wider readership of intellectually minded readers. In addition, it offers practical advice about the development and education of phronesis in different areas of professional practice and secondary and college-level education.




Encyclopedia of Ethics: P-W


Book Description

A revised, expanded and updated edition with contributions by 325 renowned authorities in the field of ethics. All of the original articles have been newly peer-reviewed and revised, bibliographies have been updated throughout, and the overall design of the work has been enhanced for easier access to cross-references and other reference features.




Real Social Science


Book Description

A new, hands-on approach to social inquiry for social scientists who wish to make a difference to policy and practice.




Back to the Rough Ground


Book Description

Back to the Rough Ground is a philosophical investigation of practical knowledge, with major import for professional practice and the ethical life in modern society. Its purpose is to clarify the kind of knowledge that informs good practice in a range of disciplines such as education, psychotherapy, medicine, management, and law. Through reflection on key modern thinkers who have revived cardinal insights of Aristotle, and a sustained engagement with the Philosopher himself, it presents a radical challenge to the scientistic assumptions that have dominated how these professional domains have been conceived, practiced, and institutionalized.




The Language of Hermeneutics


Book Description

The first book in English on Gadamer's relationship to Heidegger, this study illustrates the philosophical power Gadamer's thinking has achieved by departing from Heidegger's at certain crucial moments.




Nicomachean Ethics


Book Description




The Ways of Aristotle


Book Description

Preface 9 Part 1 Aristotle, Social Research, and Action Research 13 1. Introduction -- The Challenge of Phrónêsis 15 1.1 Three Kinds of General Theory 25 1.2 Aristotle and Critical Action Research 33 2. Action Research Approaching Phrónêsis 39 2.1 A Philosopher Defending Action Research 40 2.2 Making Social Science Matter 43 2.3 Abandoning Techniques 45 Part 2 Reading Aristotle -- Limits and Possibilities for Phrónêsis 49 3. Virtues -- Intellectual and Ethical 53 3.1 Particulars of Ethical Virtues 59 4. Phrónêsis and the Other Intellectual Virtues 65 4.1 Theoretical Knowledge, and Knowledge about Things We Influence 68 4.1.1 Overlaps and Intermeshes 74 4.2 Phrónêsis as an Intellectual Virtue 77 4.2.1 Excursus: Knowledge Forms and Ways of Knowing in Aristotle 79 4.2.1.1 Praxis, Poiêsis, Khrêsis, Páthos And the Various Forms of the Epistêmai 81 4.2.1.2 Theoretical and Practical Truth 94 4.2 (Continued) Phrónêsis as an Intellectual Virtue 97 4.3 Phrónêsis and Rhetoric, Phrónêsis and Practical Syllogisms 105 4.3.1 The relationship to rhetoric 106 4.3.2 The relationship to practical syllogisms 111 5. Phrónêsis on Means and Ends, Phrónêsis and General Knowledge 115 5.1 Means and Ends, and Kinds of Causes 115 5.1.1 Poiêsis Makes Things, Praxis Makes Perfect 122 5.1.2 "Professional" Deliberations and Deductions 132 5.2 Knowledge, General and Particular 138 5.2.1 General Knowledge, Appropriate Knowledge, Knowledge in Action 138 5.2.2 Héxis (Habitus), and Empeiria (Experience) 149 5.2.3 Knowing Particulars 157 5.2.3.1 By What? 158 5.2.3.2 How? 160 5.2.3.3 Preconditions for a Universally Flexible Consideration 165 6. Developing and Defining Virtue 181 6.1 Developing Virtue 182 6.1.1 Epistêmê and Virtue through the Formation of Habit, Once More 186 6.1.2 What "Means" Means 194 6.1.3 Practical Development with a Hinge to It, the Question of Standards Again 196 6.2 Defining Virtue 205 6.2.1 Nóêsis as Dialogue, or, the Reason Why Aristotle Insists on Letting Phrónêsis Deliberate about Means Only 212 6.2.1.1 The Unfolded Know-How of Nous 214 6.2.1.2 The Topica and the Enfolded Habitus of Dialectics 217 6.2.1.3 The Philosopher, the Dialectician, and Experience 224 6.2.1.3.1 Dialogical Peculiarities 231 6.2.1.3.2 Dialogue and Experience 237 6.2.1.3.3 Basic Principle, Beginning, Medium, and End 251 6.2.1.4 Ways of Learning 256 6.2.1.5 Self-Evident First Principles? 263 6.2.1.6 Praxis1, and Praxis2 267 6.2.2 The Ethical Works do not Deliberate about Means, They Develop and Define Ends 271 6.2.3 Epistêmê, Virtue, and Phrónêsis Defined 281 6.3 Who Develops and Defines? The Art and Practice of Architectonics 292 7. Eudaimonia and Wisdom as "The Highest Practical Good"; Aristotelian Phron-Ethics, Theor-Ethics, and the Way of the Intellectual Commons 299 7.1 Kinds of Theory, Kinds of Practice 301 7.2 Ethics and Politics as Methodological Guidelines for Autonomous Practitioners 313 7.2.1 The Laws of Virtue 316 7.2.2 Tékhnê and Phrónêsis - At the Parting of the Ways 324 7.3 The Wisdom of the Commons - Common Wisdom 327 7.3.1 Tà Koiná - The Commons 333 7.3.2 The Common Skholê 340 7.4 Theor-Ethics and Primary Friendship 342 7.4.1 The Noetic "I" and the Psychological "Me" 349 7.4.2 Theorethical Interventions? 359 7.5 The Way of Theor-Ethics 361 7.5.1 Ethical Excellence - Settling with the Best "for Us", i.e. for the Second Best "Absolutely" 371 7.6 The Ways of Politics - Continuous Learning in Common 385 7.6.1 Community: What Are the Things Common? 387 7.6.2 Oikos, Pólis, and Constitutions 392 7.6.3 Developing Concord - The Ethico-Political Role of Dialogical Gatherings 399 7.6.4 Different Concepts of Politics 413 7.6.5 Unity and Diversity in the Pólis 422 7.6.6 The Koinópolis as Panarchy Aristocracy Suspended and Transcended 434 7.6.7 Religious Politics? 447 Part 3 Aristotelian Action Research - Wisdom and Eudaimonia Transposed, Social Research Transformed 455 8. Neo-Epistemic, Dialogical Action Research 459 9. From Oikos to Pólis, and Beyond 467 10. Aristotle, Marx, and Modern Work Life 479 11. Aristotle Suspended 493 12. Epilogue 503 References 509 Appendix 525 Index 527




Practical Intelligence and the Virtues


Book Description

One of the most important developments in modern moral philosophy is the resurgence of interest in the virtues. In this new book, Daniel Russell explores two important hopes for such an approach to moral thought: that starting from the virtues should cast light on what makes an action right, and that notions like character, virtue, and vice should yield a plausible picture of human psychology. Russell argues that the key to each of these hopes is an understanding of the cognitive and deliberative skills involved in the virtues. If right action is defined in terms of acting generously or kindly, then these virtues must involve skills for determining what the kind or generous thing to do would be on a given occasion. Likewise, Russell argues that understanding virtuous action as the intelligent pursuit of virtuous goals yields a promising picture of the psychology of virtue. This book develops an Aristotelian account of the virtue of practical intelligence or 'phronesis'—an excellence of deliberating and making choices—which Russell argues is a necessary part of every virtue. This emphasis on the roots of the virtues in the practical intellect contrasts with ambivalence about the practical intellect in much recent work on the virtues—a trend Russell argues is ultimately perilous for virtue theory. This book also takes a penetrating look at issues like the unity of the virtues, responsibility for character, and that elusive figure, 'the virtuous person'. Written in a clear and careful manner, Practical Intelligence and the Virtues will appeal to philosophers and students alike in moral philosophy and moral psychology.




The Specter of Relativism


Book Description

Specter of Relativism addresses the timely topic of relativism from the perspective of Gadamer's hermeneutics. This collection of essays explores several of the key issues in contemporary philosophy--the nature of truth, the model of conversation, and the possibility of an ethics in postmodern conditions--in the context of the work of Gadamer. Although centered on Gadamer and including the first English translation of one of his essays, the volume does not narrowly define or defend the approach of philosophical hermeneutics; the contributors present a broad range of views, in some cases championing a Gadamerian perspective, in others challenging it.




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