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Willem drees on the humanities

What Are the Humanities

In this issue of Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science, Donald Drakeman, Peter Harrison, Douglas Ottati, Michael Ruse, and Lisa Stenmark reflect on Willem B. Drees, What Are the Humanities For? In my response to Harrison, I argue that the humanities do form a coherent domain, shaped by two fundamental orientations—the quest to understand fellow humans and self-involvement. In response to Ruse, I defend my definition of the humanities as neither too wide nor too narrow. With Ottati, I concur that institutional proximity of religious studies and theology is beneficial to both. Against Stenmark, who considers my approach typically Western, I challenge the distinction she makes. Her contribution confirms what Drakeman writes, that ambitions about “value-free” scholarship are controversial. His own contribution makes clear that this aspiration is necessary to serve the well-being of peoples around the world. These five responses to my book provide an opportunity to reflect on my proposal for envisaging the humanities.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/zygo.12725

The coherence and character of the humanities: A reply to critics

Editor's introduction Part I. The First Draft of the Introduction: 1. The first draft of the introduction Part II. Critique of the Power of Judgment: 2. Preface 3. Introduction Part III. First Part: Critique of the Aesthetic Power of Judgment: 4. First section, first book: analytic of the beautiful 5. First section, second book: analytic of the sublime 6. Deduction of pure aesthetic judgments 7. Second section: the dialectic of the aesthetic power of judgment 8. Appendix: on the methodology of taste Part IV. Second Part: Critique of the Teleological Power of Judgment: 9. First division: analytic of the teleological power of judgment 10. Second division: dialectic of the teleological power of judgment 11. Appendix: methodology of the teleological power of judgment.

Critique of the Power of Judgment

This chapter examines whether morality really evolved, as many philosophers, psychologists, anthropologists, and biologists claim. It distinguishes three possible versions of this claim and reviews the evidence in support of each. It concludes that two versions of the claim that morality evolved are relatively well supported, but that they are unlikely to have significant philosophical consequences, while the stronger version, which is of real interest to philosophers, is in fact empirically unsupported.

Evolution of morality

It is suggested that the plates along the arched back and tail of Stegosaurus served an important thermoregulatory function as forced convection "fins." Wind tunnel experiments on finned models, internal heat conduction calculations, and direct observations of the morphology and internal structure of stegosaur plates support this hypothesis, demonstrating the comparative effectiveness of the plates as heat dissipaters, controllable through input blood flow rate, temperature, and body orientation (with respect to wind).

Willem drees on the humanities

Citations

What Are the Humanities

The coherence and character of the humanities: A reply to critics

References

Critique of the Power of Judgment

Evolution of morality

Plates of the Dinosaur Stegosaurus: Forced Convection Heat Loss Fins?

The Cambridge Handbook of Evolutionary Ethics

Misuse of the Term Strategy