Browsing by Author "Zammito, John H."

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    "Spreading the light": European Freemasonry and Russia in the eighteenth century
    (2007) Bayer, Natalie; Zammito, John H.
    This dissertation attempts to determine the intellectual, cultural, and social contributions of the European Freemasons who corresponded with, traveled to, or lived and worked in Russia. My study is based on the assumption that eighteenth-century Freemasonry was one of the structures through which the ideas about nature, social order, and science contributed to the formation of a public sphere. Despite Freemasonry's well established presence and, as I argue, instrumental influence on Russia, no academic study along the lines of contextual intellectual history has been undertaken for the study of the transmission of ideas between the European and Russian lodges. Freemasonry, an institution that found response and operated in both European and Russian contexts, provides a unique vantage point for a reconstruction of the intellectual milieu of the society, within which people discussed, disputed, and put into practice ideas and ideals of the Enlightenment. Freemasons in Russia "worked" to adapt various Western models to fit the Russian developmental needs. This fusion of different traditions and concepts is the most original aspect of the Russian movement. In my analysis of several interconnected themes---the creation of a public sphere, Westernization, transmission of ideas, and the transition from the Enlightenment to Romanticism---I organize the chapters of this dissertation around two most important transformations: of Russia and of the Enlightenment. During the course of the century, Freemasons in Russia departed from the original cosmopolitanism of the Enlightenment, chose different forms of Freemasonry, and gradually became more involved with in the concept of Russia as a separate national entity. By the end of the eighteenth century, while being closely allied with the intellectual and educational strivings of the Enlightenment, they began producing their own negations of some Enlightenment ideas, providing a transition to the sentimentalism.
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    The Concept of Human Dignity in Bioethics
    (2015-08-26) Eddleman, Lisa McDonald; Brody, Baruch; Sher, George; Zammito, John H.
    The concept of human dignity has gained a great deal of traction in European bioethics, yet there remains in American bioethics a deep skepticism regarding the utility of the notion. I contend that the appeal to human dignity is not reducible to the traditional bioethical appeals of beneficence, autonomy or justice that comprise the predominant American approach to bioethics. Nevertheless, current accounts of human dignity in bioethics lack substance, and too often presume shared convictions grounded in either religious beliefs or some kind secular humanism; consequently, such versions of human dignity fail to do the philosophical work necessary to sustain either normative claims or bioethical policy grounded in the appeal. A philosophically satisfactory theory of human dignity must deliver both sufficiently universal justification and richness of content. To that end, I elaborate an original version of human dignity that balances the seemingly incompatible requirements of universality and content in a surprising way: by developing a richer notion of the Kantian rational valuer. I argue that, properly understood, the rational valuer is both normative and foundational: certain capacities and conditions are necessary to function as a rational valuer, and these can be defended as valuable to every human being. To respect human dignity, then, is to protect and promote these capacities and conditions. Utilizing this conception of human dignity, I revisit the list of European bioethical constraints that motivated my work to begin with. I conclude that, while my account of human dignity sustains few of the prohibitions, it enriches bioethical discourse by reconnecting bioethics to the deeper question of human flourishing. An important consequence of this is that my version of human dignity moves bioethics beyond constraints to entail substantial positive duties that have typically been overlooked in the field. Human dignity has previously been largely set to the side in American bioethics. It is time to bring it to the forefront.
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    The Jesuits and the Japanese: A Musical Journey to Renaissance Europe
    (2014-12-17) Kawashima, Kimi Pauline; Loewen, Peter; Connelly, Brian; Lavenda, Richard; Zammito, John H.
    This paper investigates the significance that music and musical ability held for the Japanese-Jesuit ambassadors who toured Portugal, Spain and Italy from 1584-1586. Specifically, I will demonstrate how the Jesuits used music as a critical means to reach and convert the Japanese in the seminarios, enabling them to read, sing, and play Western polyphonic and secular music. The Jesuits’ pedagogical use of music not only functioned as a significant missionary tool to transmit the liturgy, but ultimately, the Japanese converts’ ability to play western keyboard and string instruments and sing Latin polyphony signifies most directly the Jesuit’s success in conversion and enculturation.