Browsing by Department "Department of Philosophy"
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- ItemOpen AccessA comparative study of the political philosophies of Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau(1962) Ehlers, Dirk Leonardus
- ItemOpen AccessA critique of N. Hartmann's theory of values(1947) Rossouw, Machel Catherina
- ItemOpen AccessA libertarian theory of property: its justification, critique and implications(1987) Williams, Graham Andrew; Collins, P H DThe author's major concern in this dissertation is a justification, it's critique and some of its implications, of the libertarian theory of property according to which property, following John Locke, is legitimately acquired through a man's mixing of his labour with unowned resources and held in perpetuity or until the owner voluntarily alienates his just claim. Libertarian theory asserts that property thus acquired is held by natural right. Accordingly, this dissertation commences with an elucidation of how we are to understand the concept of property and the concept and language of natural rights. The dissertation then attempts to show that: .1. The concept of universal natural right, at least in relation to private property, is not non-sensical. 2. The libertarian justification of exclusive private property can be argued for coherently. 3. Universality in the natural right to private property entails (coercive) redistribution. Over 3 the author departs from the 'orthodox' libertarianism of Murray Rothbard, Ayn Rand and John Hospers in favour of a 'welfarist' libertarianism that is more in accord with the positions of Robert Nozick, Milton Friedman, Friedrich v. Hayek and others, and which is closer to the spirit of Locke's Second Treatise. Welfarist libertarianism leads the dissertation through 4. Marx's critique of private property and capitalist political economy. 5. Liberal/non-Marxist arguments advocating equality or greater egalitarianism. 6. Certain implications welfarist libertarianism holds regarding the justification, extent, and operations of the state. The conclusions the author arrives at include: 1. There is a natural right to limited exclusive private property. 2. Property is limited not in its acquisition but in its (perpetual) holding. 3. Redistribution may be coercive, but that coercion is legitimated on grounds of justice. 4. Property rights preserve the liberty of some but necessarily infringe the liberty of others. This too is legitimated on grounds of justice. 5. The Marxist argument that private property and capitalist political economy is exploitative is mistaken, and that it alienates man an argument insufficiently contended for. 6. Egalitarianism and greater egalitarianism as political policies are wrong if welfarist libertarianism is just. Bot? also fail to accord persons a sufficiently central place in moral-political philosophy. Egalitarianism is, furthermore, necessarily self-defeating. 7. The state is not necessary for the protection of our lives, liberty, and property nor for the implementation of redistribution. These functions could be performed through the free market. Should a state justly evolve from the market it cannot ensure its stability due to the pressures morally demanded financial obligations impose upon it.
- ItemOpen AccessA model of shopping behaviour for a select sample of people in greater Cape Town(1969) Feldberg, Meyer; Gouws, D J; Van der Merwe, A J
- ItemOpen AccessAbsurdity in the Early 21 Century(2010) Jurgens, Francois; Galgut, Elisa; Fried, GregoryThis essay argues against contemporary theorists who claim that the concept of Absurdity that flourished in Western Europe in the 1940s is now of purely historical interest. It is argued instead that while it is important to locate the concept of Absurdity in an appropriate historical context, people living in the early twenty-first century are, in fact, living within an historical period that makes the experience, and thus the concept, of Absurdity relevant again. While Absurdity in the 1940s involved a loss of certainty due to the role the Second World War played in undermining secular and religious beliefs, Absurdity in the twenty-first century involves a loss of certainty due to intense exposure to alternative points of view. This loss of certainty means that when one's typical point of view is brought into relief by an atypical perspective, one struggles to reaffirm one's typical perspective. This robust clash of perspectives strikes at the heart of the way in which we understand the world and ourselves, forming part of the experience that has come to be known as Absurdity. If the analysis of Absurdity that is offered in this essay is correct, then Absurdity is best understood as a personal epistemological condition, rather than a universal metaphysical condition that affects all people simply in virtue of their being human.
- ItemOpen AccessAn assessment of the onset of summer rainy season in Southern Africa - case study of Botswana(2008) Cheruiyot, Denis C.; Potgieter, AnetThe economies of most Sub-Saharan African countries are linked to the onset, reliability and performance of seasonal rainfall. Failure of seasonal rains may signal food deficits or worse. Farmers, water conservationists and government bodies responsible for food security, all have an interest in seasonal rainfall: onset, approximate dates for start of the season and probabilities for early, normal or late onset of rains. This knowledge enables them make crucial decisions as to the choice of crops, planting dates, management of dams, pasture and hydro-electric dams. In this thesis, daily rainfall data for 29 rainfall stations in Botswana for the years 1971 - 2004 was analyzed to determine Start-of-Season (505)/ Onset of summer rainfall. We used Principal Component Analysis to determine rainfall homogeneous zones in Botswana. Basically three regions were identified for October, November December (OND) rainfall months. Rainfall values in representative stations in each zone (Northern, Central and South-Eastern and Western regions) were correlated with Sea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) in global oceans to determine ocean regions that correlate well with Botswana rainfall. The onset dates were grouped into false, early, normal, late and failed onsets. Monthly rainfall and Rainfall Onsets for selected 14 rainfall stations and ten other weather parameters, (that include SSTs, Sea Level Pressures (SLPs) and climate indices) were placed in a spreadsheet. Emergent Situation Awareness (ESA) for dynamic Bayesian networks (DBN) was used to analyze this data. The ESA for DBN models temporal dependencies among the weather parameters and climate indices using Direct Acyclic Graphs (DAG). This innovative DBN technology, ESA, reveals more detailed information from complex models. It reveals what is currently happening over time in a domain of interest. Each of the parameters and climate indices revealed varying degrees of beliefs for early, normal, late or failed rainfall onsets in Botswana. Some of the parameters which showed higher degrees of beliefs are promising signals to the onset of summer rains.
- ItemOpen AccessAn investigation into the language of English-speaking adolescents, with particular reference to sex, age and type of school(1989) De Klerk, Vivian Anne; Rajend Mesthrie
- ItemOpen AccessAn investigation on a new synthesis of phenazines(1962) Gaertner, Gerhard; Holliman, F G
- ItemOpen AccessAnalysing Authenticity: Explaining What it is to be True to Yourself and Why this is Good(2021) Mogomotsi, Olerato Kau; Hull, GeorgeMy project is a conceptual analysis of authenticity that seeks to achieve reflective equilibrium with our considered judgments about authenticity. Given that we ordinarily take authenticity to mean “being true to oneself” and to generally be a good thing, I develop a philosophical conception of authenticity that can adequately account for the following questions: “What is it that we are being true to?”, “What does being true to oneself entail?” and “What is good about being authentic?” I take particular interest in Aristotelianism virtue Eudaimonism and how it can help in providing a tenable understanding of what authenticity is. In answering the first question, I seek to develop a modified account of Alasdair's MacIntyre's (1981) narrative unity of the self, which I term the Extrapolated Narrative Unity of Self [ENUS], as a tenable understanding of the self which we are being true to when being authentic. The ENUS, in short, is a configured narrative unity of self that combines an individual's actual past and present with their projected future self where the projected future self is a function of their telos. Thereafter, I will take being true to ones ENUS to be laden in the effort and wholesome commitment required for one to put into configuring, expressing, maintaining and reasserting the self. Finally, I argue that we ordinarily understand authenticity to be good because we generally take it to require and reinforce a virtuous life for the individual who is authentic. In addition, I argue that we generally understand authenticity to be good because of its inextricable link to a characteristically Eudaimonic life.
- ItemOpen AccessAspects of the theory of negation(1982) Bezuidenhout, Anne LouiseIn this thesis I deal with a series of problems which involve the notion of negation. In Chapter 2 I discuss the issues raised by the question whether we should admit negative facts into our ontology or not. In Chapter 3 I discuss the so-called paradox of non-being and the problem of giving an account of both singular and general negative existentials (i.e. negative existentials containing singular and general subjects respectively) that avoids this paradox. In Chapter 4 I deal with three related logical and linguistic problems involving negation. Chapter 1 contains a discussion of some treatments of negation in the history of philosophy. The choice as to which philosophers to include in this chapter was determined by the topics discussed in later chapters. That is to say, I have chosen to discuss the views of philosophers who were concerned in one way or another with the problems discussed in a more methodical manner in Chapters 2 to 4. Bibliography: pages 171-8
- ItemOpen AccessAugustinus oor die verval van beskawings.(1951) Treurnicht, A P (Andries Petrus), 1921-
- ItemOpen AccessAutomotive policy and the restructuring of the south african industry, 1990 - 2005.(2007) Black, Anthony; Kaplan, DavidSince 1990 the South African automotive industry has been through the most dramatic phase of its long history as reduced protection has led to much greater international integration. This thesis analyses the restructuring of the sector in response to these developments. The first major section provides a detailed assessment of the international environment and its impact on the prospects for growth of the automotive industry in developing countries and South Africa in particular. In many developing countries, the sector has been subject to extensive state support and intervention. While traditional production locations in advanced countries remain dominant, there has been a significant shift of production to developing countries. This expansion has, however, been focused on a relatively small number of locations. For countries which do not have very large existing or potential domestic markets, policy needs to define an 'automotive space' and provide some protection to anchor the domestic industry if local capacity is to be retained and developed. In South Africa, a gradual but sustained period of tariff liberalisation has been coupled with import-export complementation measures aimed at increasing exports and achieving a higher degree of specialisation. With its unfavourable geographical location and history of heavy protection, the prognosis for the South African industry in the early 1990s was not good. To date the costs of liberalisation have been quite low. The export response to the realignment of the incentive structure has been strong and the industry has become much more efficient and competitive. However, other objectives have not been achieved. Recently, the share of vehicle imports has grown sharply. Local content levels remain low partly because of lower protection. There have also been serious distortions. The system of export credits used to offset import duties has led to rapid expansion of 'peripheral' component exports, driven more by the objective of rebating import duties than any real economic justification. Investment levels have been modest compared to the investments flowing into some of the world's more dynamic emerging automotive industries. Historically, the development of small-scale, multi-model plants has been the central structural problem in the South African automotive industry. It exacerbated the lack of competitiveness associated with high levels of protection and limited the prospects for expanding local content. One of the key objectives of policy has been to encourage industry rationalisation. But while a theoretical case for industrial policies can easily be made, implementation is much more complex. There has been progress in achieving higher model volumes, but it has not been sufficient to justify investments in high levels of local content. A number of case studies of firm level restructuring were conducted. These illustrate that the major reason for the lack of competitiveness in the initial stages was not necessarily inefficiency or a lack of dynamism on the part of firms but rather an inefficient industry structure consisting of too many low volume producers. Component firms have in fact proved quite dynamic in adapting to this environment. Restructuring has taken a number of forms and firms have proved remarkably resourceful. But internal or plant level changes, while necessary have seldom proved sufficient. In many cases firms have been forced to seek out a foreign partner. Foreign ownership or control in turn has had a number of effects on firm performance and prospects in areas such as exports, R&D and the use of domestic suppliers. The industry has made substantial progress towards developing a more efficient and competitive structure. But difficulties remain as it attempts to attract investment in an increasingly competitive international environment. The scale of domestic production is still not sufficient to encourage high levels of localisation of components. That in turn means that assembly sector costs remain high because of the logistics costs associated with high import levels. The challenge for policy currently is to encourage investment in high volume, sustainable automotive production while at the same time gradually moving to more neutral and lower levels of support.
- ItemOpen AccessCompeting paradigms for explaining the etiology of human male homosexual orientation: a case study in the application of the methodology of scientific research programs(2003) Mbûgua, Karori; Ross, Don; Odhiambo, Jack[pg 41,59-61,71,99,110 ,172,173 missing] This thesis is a case study in the application of the principles of the methodology of scientific research programs to a contemporary scientific debate: the debate concerning the causes and origins of human male homosexual orientation. It begins by identifying two major research programs that seek to explain homosexual phenomenon, namely, the biological and experiential research programs. Using the methodology of research programs as a framework for analysis, the study shows that the two programs have stagnated. Neither of them meets the Lakatosian criterion of 'progressivity'. The study argues that lack of progress in this area may be a consequence of the two groups of researchers, the biologists and the experientialists, rigidly clinging to the hard cores of their respective programs. The study calls for an interactionist approach to the study of homosexual etiology and suggests that such an approach could benefit from recent trends in developmental systems theory and evolutionary psychology. It is also argued that this episode in the history of science undermines the normative generalizability of Lakatos' account of science.
- ItemOpen AccessThe concept of autonomy(1996) Jennings, Ian DouglasThe question of which of our actions or desires are genuinely attributable to us is the question I examine in this thesis. I use the term "autonomous" to describe those agents whose desires or actions are genuinely their own, and I refer to actions or desires which cannot genuinely be attributed to agents as heteronomous actions or desires. I have chosen to discuss this question under the rubric of the concept of autonomy, although the number of near-synonyms in the philosophical literature means that I could, perhaps, have referred instead in my title to concepts such as freedom, responsibility, independence, authenticity, self-determination, self-identity, freedom of the will and similar concepts. But whatever terminological choice is made, the issue that interests me concerns the nature of those actions or desires which are genuinely the agent's - those desires and actions which, as some have put it, are the agent's rear desires and actions.
- ItemOpen AccessThe concept of the lived world : an introduction to the phenomenology of Merleau-Ponty(1974) Wait, Eldon ChristopherThe task we have set ourselves in this thesis is not to interpret or translate Merleau-Ponty's expressions but rather to re-create his philosophy, avoiding as far as possible the actual expressions he used, not because we find any fault with them but because we wish to re-create the conditions under which they can appear in their original urgency and vitality. We must understand Merleau-Ponty by being present at the birth of his philosophy, to experience the philosophy "from the inside" Our approach must be distinguished from a purely historical or a phychological one. We do not wish to introduce the thought of Merleau-Ponty by an examination of pre-phenomenological thought, nor do we wish to concern ourselves with his personal development which led to the writing of "The Phenomenology of Perception". Our approach is phenomenological. We wish to understand Merleau-Ponty's existential phenomenology as itself an intentional movement, as the "coming about" of the structure of intentionality, or as we will refer to it, the coming about of the imperfect unity, or the informal essence. Our discussions of the psychological ego and the transcendental ego are important not only as an historical introduction, but because psychologism and transcendentalism are respectively the noetic and noematic poles of this intentional movement.
- ItemOpen AccessCorporate Social investment and development(2010) Menzies, GailCan the Corporate Social Investment initiatives of small businesses contribute to development? Corporate Social Investment (CSI) and its counterpart Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) are the terms used for the external and internal initiatives undertaken by companies to contribute to the upliftment of their stakeholders and communities. This research paper attempts to establish whether the CSI initiatives of small, local (Cape Town) companies have the potential to contribute to this upliftment or development. The literature review conducted on the relevant topic discovered three major arguments surrounding this debate. Firstly there are those authors that believe that CSI / CSR cannot contribute to development; secondly those authors that believe that CSI / CSR can contribute to development; and finally those authors that believe that more research on this topic is required before any such statements can be made. The outcome of the literature will reveal some issues surrounding this argument. They are: motivations, compatibility, implementation, business advantage, business and NGOs and community focus and research and sustainability. Following the establishment of the technical issues the paper will then propose that Amartya Sen's Development as Freedom theory be used to further investigate the development potential of CSI initiatives. Along with the technical suggestions, Sen's five 2 freedoms will be used to analyse whether any potential development successes can be observed from seven case studies. The freedoms are: political freedoms, economic facilities, social opportunities, transparency guarantees and protective security. Each of these can contribute to development. The case studies are CSI initiatives selected from local small businesses and the required information was extracted by means of an openended qualitative questionnaire. These case studies will be analysed against the freedoms and the discoveries from the literature review. The conclusions drawn show that some potential does exist for CSI initiatives. It also shows that Sen's Development as Freedom can be effectively applied to small scale projects at the micro level.
- ItemOpen AccessA critial exploration of Philip Pettit's theory of group agency(2013) Townsend, L; Fried, Gregory
- ItemOpen AccessDas Historische Drama in Deutschland 1918-1933 : Stoffe, Formen, Tendenzen(1969) De Vries, Monica Fidélia; Rosteutscher, J H W
- ItemOpen AccessDemocratizing money : from the federalist papers to the community currency movement(2011) Wainwright, Saul; Nash, AndrewThis thesis examines the political idea of democratic money, within the historically specific capitalist democracy (Wood, 1995: 213), and critically evaluates counter claims to be democratizing money made by advocates of community currencies.
- ItemOpen AccessDo we have a duty to prevent predation in the wild?(2023) Ashwin, Michelle; Benatar, DavidThe animal ethics literature has focused a great deal on the harms that culpable moral agents cause animals, and our duties to prevent this. What is less clear is whether there is a duty to stop nonhuman animals from harming other creatures, considering that they lack moral agency. In this dissertation, I investigate whether we ought to prevent the harm of wild predation. Firstly, I consider two arguments against interfering with the wild. Ecological holists claim that the natural world has ultimate value. They argue against all interventions in predation which threaten to undermine the integrity of nature. Sue Donaldson and Will Kymlicka argue that we should refrain from interfering with predatory cycles out of respect for wild animal communities' sovereignty and a preference to remain independent from humans. I reject both views, by arguing that their reasons for thinking that we do not have a duty to intervene in predation on a large scale are flawed. Secondly, I argue that animals possess basic moral rights and that it is reasonable for them to have a right to be rescued from predation under some circumstances. If intervening is easy and it will not severely injure or kill the predator, the prey creature has a right to be rescued. Otherwise, an intervention in predation is required if and only if three practical conditions are met: 1) the intervention is possible, 2) the burden of intervening is reasonable and feasible, and 3) the intervention does not create as much or more suffering than it aims to avoid. I argue that largescale interventions cannot meet condition 3 insofar as we lack knowledge about how to interfere with predation cycles without devastating ecological consequences. The question of a moral requirement to intervene once-off will depend on whether the prey-victim had her rights violated and on the extent of our morally relevant relationship with the prey-victim. These factors determine whether the intervention meets condition 2. Therefore, the question of a duty to intervene once-off must be assessed on a case-by-case basis.