The practice of teaching virtue for pay was typical of the Greek sophists but consistently eschewed by their contemporary Socrates. Plato and Xenophon offer various explanations for Socrates' refusal to take pay, explanations intended not only to reflect favourably upon their teacher but also to reflect negatively upon the sophists. Indeed, Plato and Xenophon have been so persuasive in this regard that the mere fact of accepting pay has become a common source of invective against the sophists. This paper examines (...) and evaluates these passages of Plato and Xenophon in light of the historical information we have concerning sophistic and Socratic pedagogy in general and it reaches two major conclusions: first, that most of the reasons ascribed to Socrates for refusing to accept pay are sufficiently problematic to raise serious doubts about their authenticity and, second, that none of these reasons functions successfully as a general critique of the sophists. (shrink)

_Draws out numerous affinities between the sophists and Socrates in Plato's dialogues._.

11 April 2013 marks the 50th anniversary of the papal encyclical, Pacem in Terris, a document that has exerted enormous influence on the doctrines of war and peace articulated by Roman Catholic and non-Catholic writers alike. The argument we make here is that in its understanding of human rights, international peace and philosophical anthropology, the encyclical in effect abandons the ?just war? teachings that had guided the church's view of human conflict for 16 centuries, and we argue that the departure (...) is a mistake. (shrink)

What is the origin of individual differences in ideology and personality? According to the parasite stress hypothesis, the structure of a society and the values of individuals within it are both influenced by the prevalence of infectious disease within the society's geographical region. High levels of infection threat are associated with more ethnocentric and collectivist social structures and greater adherence to social norms, as well as with socially conservative political ideology and less open but more conscientious personalities. Here we use (...) an agent-based model to explore a specific opportunities-parasites trade-off hypothesis, according to which utility-maximizing agents place themselves at an optimal point on a trade-off between the gains that may be achieved through accessing the resources of geographically or socially distant out-group members through openness to out-group interaction, and the losses arising due to consequently increased risks of exotic infection to which immunity has not been developed. We examine the evolution of cooperation and the formation of social groups within social networks, and we show that the groups that spontaneously form exhibit greater local rather than global cooperative networks when levels of infection are high. It is suggested that the OPTO model offers a first step toward understanding the specific mechanisms through which environmental conditions may influence cognition, ideology, personality, and social organization. (shrink)

Bereby‐Meyer, Hayakawa, Shalvi, Corey, Costa and Keysar investigate lying for self‐serving reasons. Participants in their experiments had to report the outcome of rolling a die only known to them. They inflated their outcomes less, and thus lied less, when using a foreign language than when using their native language. The authors suggest that lying for self‐serving reasons is an automatic tendency that can be overcome by speaking in a foreign language. [71].

Conducting or overseeing research in correctional settings requires knowledge of specific federal rules and regulations designed to protect the rights of individuals in incarceration. To investigate the extent to which relevant groups possess this knowledge, using a 10-item questionnaire, we surveyed 885 IRB prisoner representatives, IRB members and chairs with and without experience reviewing HIV/AIDS correctional protocols, and researchers with and without correctional HIV/AIDS research experience. Across all groups, respondents answered 4.5 of the items correctly. Individuals who have overseen or (...) conducted correctional research had the highest scores; however, even these groups responded correctly only to slightly more than half of the items. These findings emphasize the need for ongoing training in federal guidelines governing correctional research, particularly for those individuals who are embarking on this type of research. (shrink)

Generalizing the notion of a tight almost disjoint family, we introduce the notions of a tight eventually different family of functions in Baire space and a tight eventually different set of permutations of $\omega $. Such sets strengthen maximality, exist under $\mathsf {MA} (\sigma \mathrm {-centered})$ and come with a properness preservation theorem. The notion of tightness also generalizes earlier work on the forcing indestructibility of maximality of families of functions. As a result we compute the cardinals $\mathfrak {a}_e$ and (...) $\mathfrak {a}_p$ in many known models by giving explicit witnesses and therefore obtain the consistency of several constellations of cardinal characteristics of the continuum including $\mathfrak {a}_e = \mathfrak {a}_p = \mathfrak {d} < \mathfrak {a}_T$, $\mathfrak {a}_e = \mathfrak {a}_p < \mathfrak {d} = \mathfrak {a}_T$, $\mathfrak {a}_e = \mathfrak {a}_p =\mathfrak {i} < \mathfrak {u}$, and $\mathfrak {a}_e=\mathfrak {a}_p = \mathfrak {a} < non(\mathcal N) = cof(\mathcal N)$. We also show that there are $\Pi ^1_1$ tight eventually different families and tight eventually different sets of permutations in L thus obtaining the above inequalities alongside $\Pi ^1_1$ witnesses for $\mathfrak {a}_e = \mathfrak {a}_p = \aleph _1$.Moreover, we prove that tight eventually different families are Cohen indestructible and are never analytic. (shrink)

We study the values of the higher dimensional cardinal characteristics for sets of functions $f:\omega ^\omega \to \omega ^\omega $ introduced by the second author in [8]. We prove that while the bounding numbers for these cardinals can be strictly less than the continuum, the dominating numbers cannot. We compute the bounding numbers for the higher dimensional relations in many well known models of $\neg \mathsf {CH}$ such as the Cohen, random and Sacks models and, as a byproduct show that, (...) with one exception, for the bounding numbers there are no $\mathsf {ZFC}$ relations between them beyond those in the higher dimensional Cichoń diagram. In the case of the dominating numbers we show that in fact they collapse in the sense that modding out by the ideal does not change their values. Moreover, they are closely related to the dominating numbers $\mathfrak {d}^\lambda _\kappa $. (shrink)

This is a study of the nature of time. In it, redeploying an argument first presented by McTaggart, the author argues that although time itself is real, tense is not. He accounts for the appearance of the reality of tense - our sense of the passage of time, and the fact that our experience occurs in the present - by showing how time is indispensable as a condition of action. Time itself is further analysed, and Dr Mellor gives answers to (...) most of the metaphysical questions it provokes, concerning the relation of time to space, the dissection of time, and its relation to change and causation. (shrink)

D. D. Raphael examines the moral philosophy of Adam Smith (1723-90), best known for his famous work on economics, The Wealth of Nations, and shows that his thought still has much to offer philosophers today. Raphael gives particular attention to Smith's original theory of conscience, with its emphasis on the role of 'sympathy' (shared feelings).

Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission is a 2010 US Supreme Court decision that fundamentally transformed federal election financing. As a result, we have seen a drastic increase in the amount of so-called soft money that wealthy individuals and corporations contribute to political campaigns. Following a brief overview of the case and the precedent that formed the basis for the ruling, this chapter concerns philosophical stakes of the decision and what precisely it says about the public today and the role (...) of philosophy within it. I argue that there are three basic issues here. First is the issue of corruption. Second is the question of propaganda and the potential dangers the Citizens United case might pose for a democratic polity. Finally, I examine the dangers this poses for a democratic polity. (shrink)

In the target article, we presented the hypothesis that parasite-stress variation was a causal factor in the variation of in-group assortative sociality, cross-nationally and across the United States, which we indexed with variables that measured different aspects of the strength of family ties and religiosity. We presented evidence supportive of our hypothesis in the form of analyses that controlled for variation in freedom, wealth resources, and wealth inequality across nations and the states of the USA. Here, we respond to criticisms (...) from commentators and attempt to clarify and expand the parasite-stress theory of sociality used to fuel our research presented in the target article. (shrink)

Evidence-based practice (EBP) is a relatively recent incarnation in social work's long history of valuing evidence as a basis for practice. Few argue with the ethics and usefulness of grounding practice in empirically tested interventions. Critics of EBP instead focus on how it is defined and implemented. Critiques include what counts as evidence, who makes decisions regarding research agendas and processes, and the lack of attention to context. This essay reflects on such critiques and suggests that social work, as a (...) profession that values human diversity, equality, and self-determination, is well situated to shed light on such debates about EBP. As a profession that supports a person-in-environment perspective, we must examine not only the theory but the practice of EPB in academic, institutional, and societal settings. It is also argued that, owing to our professional mission, it is not enough to acknowledge the risk of oppression and harm; we are obligated to take them seriously and include such potential for harm in our assessment of so-called best practices. (shrink)

Representation is central to contemporary theorizing about the mind/brain. But the nature of representation--both in the mind/brain and more generally--is a source of ongoing controversy. One way of categorizing representational types is to distinguish between the analog and the digital: the received view is that analog representations vary smoothly, while digital representations vary in a step-wise manner. I argue that this characterization is inadequate to account for the ways in which representation is used in cognitive science; in its place, I (...) suggest an alternative taxonomy. I will defend and extend David Lewis's account of analog and digital representation, distinguishing analog from continuous representation, as well as digital from discrete representation. I will argue that the distinctions available in this four-fold account accord with representational features of theoretical interest in cognitive science more usefully than the received analog/digital dichotomy. (shrink)

Relative to digital computation, analogue computation has been neglected in the philosophical literature. To the extent that attention has been paid to analogue computation, it has been misunderstood. The received view—that analogue computation has to do essentially with continuity—is simply wrong, as shown by careful attention to historical examples of discontinuous, discrete analogue computers. Instead of the received view, I develop an account of analogue computation in terms of a particular type of analogue representation that allows for discontinuity. This account (...) thus characterizes all types of analogue computation, whether continuous or discrete. Furthermore, the structure of this account can be generalized to other types of computation: analogue computation essentially involves analogue representation, whereas digital computation essentially involves digital representation. Besides being a necessary component of a complete philosophical understanding of computation in general, understanding analogue computation is important for computational explanation in contemporary neuroscience and cognitive science. (shrink)

Corey W. Dyck presents a new account of Kant's criticism of the rational investigation of the soul in his monumental Critique of Pure Reason, in light of its eighteenth-century German context. When characterizing the rational psychology that is Kant's target in the Paralogisms of Pure Reason chapter of the Critique commentators typically only refer to an approach to, and an account of, the soul found principally in the thought of Descartes and Leibniz. But Dyck argues that to do so (...) is to overlook the distinctive rational psychology developed by Christian Wolff, which emphasized the empirical foundation of any rational cognition of the soul, and which was widely influential among eighteenth-century German philosophers, including Kant. In this book, Dyck reveals how the received conception of the aim and results of Kant's Paralogisms must be revised in light of a proper understanding of the rational psychology that is the most proximate target of Kant's attack. In particular, he contends that Kant's criticism hinges upon exposing the illusory basis of the rational psychologist's claims inasmuch as he falls prey to the appearance of the soul as being given in inner experience. Moreover, Dyck demonstrates that significant light can be shed on Kant's discussion of the soul's substantiality, simplicity, personality, and existence by considering the Paralogisms in this historical context.Readership: Scholars and advanced students in history of philosophy, especially those working on Kant. (shrink)

This paper brings empirical and theoretical studies of ethical leadership into conversation with one another in an effort to determine the antecedent to perceived ethical leadership. Employing a Levinasian perspective, I argue that ethical leadership entails being faced with the impossible task of realizing the needs of many individual others. For this reason, I argue, perceived ethical leadership is grounded in an employee’s perception that a leader struggles to make decisions based on the conflicting demands placed upon her. More important (...) than the result of a leader’s decision is the degree to which the leader demonstrates concern for the well-being of others in her decision-making process. I ground my discussion through reference to results of empirical studies on behaviors associated with ethical leadership, including Brown, Treviño, and Harrison, Kalshoven, Den Hartog, and De Hoogh, and Treviño, Hartman, and Brown. I identify several mediating factors which may influence employee perception of ethical leadership, proposing avenues for further research which can help to clarify the relationship between concrete leadership behaviors and perceived ethical leadership. (shrink)

I argue that the appropriateness of an assertion is sensitive to context—or, really, the “common ground”—in a way that hasn’t previously been emphasized by philosophers. This kind of context-sensitivity explains why some scientific conclusions seem to be appropriately asserted even though they are not known, believed, or justified on the available evidence. I then consider other recent attempts to account for this phenomenon and argue that if they are to be successful, they need to recognize the kind of context-sensitivity that (...) I argue for. (shrink)

ABSTRACTRecent discussions in the field of moral cognition suggest that the relationship between emotion and judgment-formation can be described in three separate ways: firstly, it narrows our atte...

Abstract:“Black art” is often understood as being inherently political. In examining two major Black arts movements, the Harlem Renaissance and the Black Arts movement, many of the works attributed to those periods fit the description of “political art” but not all of them. Black art movements are not defined exclusively by similar styles or methodologies, like Expressionism or Surrealism, either. Instead, Black art movements are complex movements that blend social, political, and aesthetic criteria. In this article, I list seven conditions (...) that I take to be jointly sufficient for a Black art movement to be signified as such. In this assertion, I also argue that this current era, paralleling the Black Lives Matter movement, is worthy of Black art movement signification, if we update the mediums by which the conditions are met in the Harlem Renaissance and the Black Arts movement. (shrink)

For those who subscribe to a pro-Black political ideology, like that of Pan-Africanism or Black Nationalism, is there a specific moral obligation between Black agents to protect one another against intersectional/multidimensional oppressions? Africana people are often subjugated to other forms of domination outside of anti-Black racism exclusively. When examining offenses against Black women, queer Black people, poor Black people, etc., both Black Nationalist and Pan-Africanist ethics suggest a moral obligation of protection to all Africana people, but there are varying ways (...) that obligation is explicated. In this argument, I assert that Amílcar Cabral’s text Resistance and Decolonization provides a critical framework for the ways in which disenfranchised, Africana people should be advocated for by their Africana counterparts that take Black collectivity seriously. This argument, as a starting point, conceptualizes Africana people defending one another as a form of decolonization, and it describes four dimensions of moral obligation for defense both within and outside of Black communities: political, economic, cultural, and armed defense. (shrink)

Current orthodoxy takes representation to be essential to computation. However, a philosophical account of computation that does not appeal to representation would be useful, given the difficulties involved in successfully theorizing representation. Piccinini's recent mechanistic account of computation proposes to do just that: it couches computation in terms of what certain mechanisms do without requiring the manipulation or processing of representations whatsoever (Piccinini 2015). Most crucially, mechanisms must process medium-independent vehicles. There are two ways to understand what "medium-independence" means on (...) this account; however, on either understanding, the account fails. Either too many things end up being counted as computational, or purportedly natural computations (e.g., neural computations) cannot be counted at all. In the end, illustrating this failure sheds some light on the way to revise the orthodoxy in the hope of a better account of computation. (shrink)

While philosophers and scientists sometimes suggest (or take for granted) that consciousness is an essential condition for free will and moral responsibility, there is surprisingly little discussion of why consciousness (and what sorts of conscious experience) is important. We discuss some of the proposals that have been offered. We then discuss our studies using descriptions of humanoid robots to explore people’s attributions of free will and responsibility, of various kinds of conscious sensations and emotions, and of reasoning capacities, and examine (...) the relationships between these attributions. Our initial results suggest that people’s attributions of free will are strongly influenced by their attributions of conscious emotions, such as happiness and disappointment, including Strawsonian emotions, such as pride and regret. These results provide some support for an intriguing proposal: Free will requires the capacity to make decisions that really matter to the agent, and for anything to really matter to the agent, she must be able to consciously experience the good and bad effects of the decisions she makes—to suffer and regret, or to enjoy and feel proud of, their outcomes. (shrink)

Computationalism about the brain is the view that the brain literally performs computations. For the view to be interesting, we need an account of computation. The most well-developed account of computation is Turing Machine computation, the account provided by theoretical computer science which provides the basis for contemporary digital computers. Some have thought that, given the seemingly-close analogy between the all-or-nothing nature of neural spikes in brains and the binary nature of digital logic, neural computation could be a species of (...) digital computation. A few recent authors have offered arguments against this idea; here, I review recent findings in neuroscience that further cement the implausibility of this view. However, I argue that we can retain the view that the brain is a computer if we expand what we mean by “computation” to include analog computation. I articulate an account of analog computation as the manipulation of analog representations based on previous work on the difference between analog and non-analog representations, extending a view originally articulated in Shagrir :271–279, 2010). Given that analog computation constitutes a significant chapter in the history of computation, this revision of computationalism to include analog computation is not an ad hoc addition. Brains may well be computers, but of the analog kind, rather than the digital kind. (shrink)

Representation is typically taken to be importantly separate from its physical implementation. This is exemplified in Marr’s three-level framework, widely cited and often adopted in neuroscience. However, the separation between representation and physical implementation is not a necessary feature of information-processing systems. In particular, when it comes to analog computational systems, Marr’s representational/algorithmic level and implementational level collapse into a single level. Insofar as analog computation is a better way of understanding neural computation than other notions, Marr’s three-level framework must (...) then be amended into a two-level framework. However, far from being a problem or limitation, this sheds lights on how to understand physical media as being representational, but without a separate, medium-independent representational level. (shrink)

Analog representations come in different types. One distinction is between those representations that have parts that are themselves representations and those that do not (i.e., those for which the Parts Principle is true and those for which it is not). I offer a unified account of analog representation, showing what all types have in common. This account clarifies when the Parts Principle applies and when it does not, thereby illuminating why the Parts Principle is less interesting than one might have (...) thought. Understanding analog representation instead requires understanding the kinds of magnitudes used in a particular representation, and the kinds of variation possible within a representational scheme. (shrink)

In the target article, we presented the hypothesis that parasite-stress variation was a causal factor in the variation of in-group assortative sociality, cross-nationally and across the United States, which we indexed with variables that measured different aspects of the strength of family ties and religiosity. We presented evidence supportive of our hypothesis in the form of analyses that controlled for variation in freedom, wealth resources, and wealth inequality across nations and the states of the USA. Here, we respond to criticisms (...) from commentators and attempt to clarify and expand the parasite-stress theory of sociality used to fuel our research presented in the target article. (shrink)

Climate scientists often apply statistical tools to a set of different estimates generated by an “ensemble” of models. In this paper, I argue that the resulting inferences are justified in the same way as any other statistical inference: what must be demonstrated is that the statistical model that licenses the inferences accurately represents the probabilistic relationship between data and target. This view of statistical practice is appropriately termed “model-based,” and I examine the use of statistics in climate fingerprinting to show (...) how the difficulties that climate scientists encounter in applying statistics to ensemble-generated data are the practical difficulties of normal statistical practice. The upshot is that whether the application of statistics to ensemble-generated data yields trustworthy results should be expected to vary from case to case. (shrink)

Robin illustrates the central role that fear has played and continues to play in the wielding of power, particularly in politics and the workplace.

Contrary to the narrative of collapse that attends much of the discussion of the humanities today, recent data suggest that for many programs in the United States, at least, stagnation is the real challenge. Committed to teaching models that support faculty rather than student needs, graduate programs, in particular, are struggling to extend their reach beyond an established constituency of students interested in traditional disciplinary specialization and academic research. By emphasizing the teaching of empathy and communication, which underlie the various (...) humanities disciplines, pursuing inter- and transdisciplinary teaching within and beyond the humanities, and securing administrative support for academic innovation, programs can find and serve a larger graduate student audience. Facing unique financial pressures, smaller colleges may prove more open to such innovation and merit greater attention in the discussion of the future of humanities graduate education. (shrink)

The point of departure in this article is the Danish debate about democracyin schools. This article presents a first step in a study of how the relationshipbetween democracy and education can be understood. A juxtaposition of thetwo concepts requires, first of all, an analysis of how the concept of democracyis used in the educational debate. In this article three models of democracy areapplied as an analytical framework: a liberal model (Hobbes, Locke, Kant, Rawls,Dworkin), a communitarian model (MacIntyre, Sandel, Nussbaum) and (...) a communicative/deliberativemodel (Walzer, Benhabib, Taylor, Habermas). Numerous contradictions and tensionsbetween concepts of democracy and education can be found in such a juxtaposition,depending on which conception of democracy one chooses to apply. In this articleI discuss which conception affords us the most meaningful concept of democraticteaching. As an introduction, a brief historical overview of the interplay betweendemocracy and education in Danish school is provided. (shrink)

A number of philosophers of science have argued that there are important differences between robustness in modeling and experimental contexts, and—in particular—many of them have claimed that the former is non-confirmatory. In this paper, I argue for the opposite conclusion: robust hypotheses are confirmed under conditions that do not depend on the differences between and models and experiments—that is, the degree to which the robust hypothesis is confirmed depends on precisely the same factors in both situations. The positive argument turns (...) on the fact that confirmation theory doesn’t recognize a difference between different sources of evidence. Most of the paper is devoted to rebutting various objections designed to show that it should. I end by explaining why philosophers of science have (often) gone wrong on this point. (shrink)

Following a line of research initiated in [4], we describe a general framework for turning reduction concepts of relative computability into diagrams forming an analogy with the Cichoń diagram for cardinal characteristics of the continuum. We show that working from relatively modest assumptions about a notion of reduction, one can construct a robust version of such a diagram. As an application, we define and investigate the Cichoń diagram for degrees of constructibility relative to a fixed inner model W. Many analogies (...) hold with the classical theory as well as some surprising differences. Along the way, we introduce a new axiom stating, roughly, that the constructibility diagram is as complex as possible. (shrink)

Pierre Duhem’s influential argument for holism relies on a view of the role that background theory plays in testing: according to this still common account of “auxiliary hypotheses,” elements of background theory serve as truth-apt premises in arguments for or against a hypothesis. I argue that this view is mistaken. Rather than serving as truth-apt premises in arguments, auxiliary hypotheses are employed as “epistemic tools”: instruments that perform specific tasks in connecting our theoretical questions with the world but that are (...) not premises in arguments. On the resulting picture, the acceptability of an auxiliary hypothesis depends not on its truth but on contextual factors such as the task or purpose it is put to and the other tools employed alongside it. (shrink)

Hilbert’s choice operators τ and ε, when added to intuitionistic logic, strengthen it. In the presence of certain extensionality axioms they produce classical logic, while in the presence of weaker decidability conditions for terms they produce various superintuitionistic intermediate logics. In this thesis, I argue that there are important philosophical lessons to be learned from these results. To make the case, I begin with a historical discussion situating the development of Hilbert’s operators in relation to his evolving program in the (...) foundations of mathematics and in relation to philosophical motivations leading to the development of intuitionistic logic. This sets the stage for a brief description of the relevant part of Dummett’s program to recast debates in metaphysics, and in particular disputes about realism and anti-realism, as closely intertwined with issues in philosophical logic, with the acceptance of classical logic for a domain reflecting a commitment to realism for that domain. Then I review extant results about what is provable and what is not when one adds epsilon to intuitionistic logic, largely due to Bell and DeVidi, and I give several new proofs of intermediate logics from intuitionistic logic+ε without identity. With all this in hand, I turn to a discussion of the philosophical significance of choice operators. Among the conclusions I defend are that these results provide a finer-grained basis for Dummett’s contention that commitment to classically valid but intuitionistically invalid principles reflect metaphysical commitments by showing those principles to be derivable from certain existence assumptions; that Dummett’s framework is improved by these results as they show that questions of realism and anti-realism are not an “all or nothing” matter, but that there are plausibly metaphysical stances between the poles of anti-realism and realism, because different sorts of ontological assumptions yield intermediate rather than classical logic; and that these intermediate positions between classical and intuitionistic logic link up in interesting ways with our intuitions about issues of objectivity and reality, and do so usefully by linking to questions around intriguing everyday concepts such as “is smart,” which I suggest involve a number of distinct dimensions which might themselves be objective, but because of their multivalent structure are themselves intermediate between being objective and not. Finally, I discuss the implications of these results for ongoing debates about the status of arbitrary and ideal objects in the foundations of logic, showing among other things that much of the discussion is flawed because it does not recognize the degree to which the claims being made depend on the presumption that one is working with a very strong logic. (shrink)

Favoring individual entrepreneurial freedom and free-market competition, neoliberalism has reshaped the social and discursive practices of higher education institutions (HEIs) around the world. In this paper, I draw on methods from critical multimodal discourse studies and an analytic concept from linguistic anthropology to examine several sets of student service materials circulating on the campus of a Hong Kong university between 2016 and 2017. While these materials are purportedly designed with student welfare in mind, I demonstrate how they effectively position students (...) as (1) consumers of tailored services or experiences provided by the university; and (2) entrepreneurial selves, that is, socio-economically competitive and self-managed young individuals. I conclude by arguing that these service materials are shaped by and espouse a neoliberal governmentality that (re)orients HEIs and their students towards an all-pervasive marketization, competitiveness, and assertion of class privilege in a globalizing, particularly Westernized late capitalist society in Asia. (shrink)

The way people experience time is a major theme in the film Doctor Strange, which traces the spiritual metamorphosis of the title character as he moves from self‐centered materialism to selfless spirituality. The revolutionary philosopher Henri Bergson argued that time had suffered from the scientific rationality of the late‐nineteenth and early‐twentieth centuries, because scientific approaches to time failed to get at time's essence. For Bergson, scientifically closed mechanism, which views reality as nothing more than the inner workings of a clock, (...) distorted the truth of time and eliminated the possibility of living meaningfully within it. According to Bergson, the purpose of life is to move from Doctor Stephen Strange's experience of time to the Ancient One's, to go from what Bergson called quantitative multiplicity to qualitative multiplicity. Kaecilius' rejection of time serves to emphasize Strange's qualitative progression, which reaches a tipping point at the film's emotional apex, the Ancient One's moment of death. (shrink)