David Matheson
Biographic Data
| ID | 3697512 |
|---|---|
| NAME | David Matheson |
| GIVEN NAMES | David |
| FAMILY NAME | Matheson |
| SIGNATURE | MATHESON D |
| AFFILIATIONS | Carleton University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-3695-3167 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 13 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 9 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 13 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1975 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
A Naturalist's Defence of Meaning in Religious Pursuits
Objectivist naturalists about life's meaning regard it as implicating no world but the natural one, and yet as deriving from more than just subjective attitudes or interests. Such naturalists must obviously deny prominent religious conceptions of meaning. But must they further deny that it can be found in religious pursuits? In this article, I defend a negative answer by arguing that, contrary to a prima facie plausible consideration in support o…
Meaning in the Pursuit of Pleasure
Here I speak in favor of the view that life's meaning can be found in the pursuit of pleasure. I first present an argument for this view that is grounded in a traditional concept of meaning. To help ease remaining concerns about accepting it, I then draw attention to four things the view does not imply: (1) that we have a reason to take hedonistic theories of meaning seriously; (2) that meaning can be found in the deeply immoral, the deeply ignor…
Health-Related Quality of Life and Associated Factors: Regional Differences Among Oldest-Old in Brazil
Purpose The aim of this research was to investigate the extent to which socioeconomic and regional differences in Brazil may influence the quality of life. To this end, we examined factors associated with health-related quality of life in two populations of oldest-old people, aged 80 and over: one from the Northeast of Brazil and the other from the Southeast. Methods 417 participants aged 80 and over were interviewed face-to-face, 179 from Brejo …
Socioeconomic Factors and Health Status Disparities Associated with Difficulty in ADLs and Iadls among Long-Lived Populations in Brazil: A Cross-Sectional Study
Financial constraints may favor the development of functional limitations among older seniors in large urban centers. In poor rural areas, inadequate nutritional status and chronic diseases may increase their susceptibility to functional decline
The Human Predicament: A Candid Guide to Life's Biggest Questions
In his earlier contribution to the philosophy of life, Better Never To Have Been (OUP, 2006) Benatar presented two core arguments. According to his ‘asymmetry’ argument, whereas to begin living (or ‘to come into existence’) is always partly harmful and partly beneficial, not to begin living is never even partly harmful; and if this is so, then it is always better not to begin living than to begin living. According to his quality of life argument,…
How to Be an Epistemic Value Pluralist
In this paper I defend an epistemic value pluralism according to which true belief, justified belief, and knowledge are all fundamental epistemic values. After laying out reasons to reject epistemic value monism in its central forms, I present my pluralist alternative and show how it can adequately explain the greater epistemic value of knowledge over both true belief and justified belief, despite their fundamentality. I conclude with a sketch of…
Knowing Persons
There is an intuitive distinction between knowing someone in a detached manner - impersonally - and knowing someone in a more intimate fashion - personally. The latter seems to involve the specially active participation of the person known in a way that the former does not. In this paper I present a novel, communication account of knowing someone personally that successfully explains this participation. The account also illuminates the propositio…
Community development: Freire and Grameen in the Barrowfield Project, Glasgow, Scotland
This article is an attempt to examine one of the better-known failures in UK community development – the Barrowfield Project in Glasgow (1986–1996) – and to compare and contrast it with other attempts at community development, especially some associated with the work of Mohammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank, and the legacy of Paulo Freire. We conclude that both Freire and Yunus make assumptions about the pre-existence of community which limit the p…
Languages of Scotland: Culture and the classroom
The indigenous languages of Scotland are in a precarious position faced with the massive presence of English. This essay examines the state and nature of the Scots and Gaelic languages. It places them in their historical context and traces how each has had its heyday in Scotland, in the case of Gaelic to be supplanted by Scots and in the case of Scots to be supplanted by English. Both have become marginalised in Scottish life and in the Scottish …
An examination of some of the difficulties of establishing an open university in a small linguistic area: The case of Suisse romande
This paper aims to describe and discuss the various initiatives currently being undertaken in Switzerland (and more specifically the Francophone Suisse romande) with regard to the introduction or adoption of an open university. The paper sets these developments in their historical context by outlining the growth of open universities and the various models available in the world today. The writer regroups these models in a simple typography of fou…
Adult Education in Suisse Romande
Non‐vocational, Non‐formal Further Education in Highland Region in Scotland and the Canton of Valais in Switzerland
Commission des conseils de la culture du Canton du Valais
The Split in the Finnish Rural Party: Populism in Decline in Finland
How to Be an Epistemic Value Pluralist
In this paper I defend an epistemic value pluralism according to which true belief, justified belief, and knowledge are all fundamental epistemic values. After laying out reasons to reject epistemic value monism in its central forms, I present my pluralist alternative and show how it can adequately explain the greater epistemic value of knowledge over both true belief and justified belief, despite their fundamentality. I conclude with a sketch of…
Knowing Persons
There is an intuitive distinction between knowing someone in a detached manner - impersonally - and knowing someone in a more intimate fashion - personally. The latter seems to involve the specially active participation of the person known in a way that the former does not. In this paper I present a novel, communication account of knowing someone personally that successfully explains this participation. The account also illuminates the propositio…
Languages of Scotland: Culture and the classroom
The indigenous languages of Scotland are in a precarious position faced with the massive presence of English. This essay examines the state and nature of the Scots and Gaelic languages. It places them in their historical context and traces how each has had its heyday in Scotland, in the case of Gaelic to be supplanted by Scots and in the case of Scots to be supplanted by English. Both have become marginalised in Scottish life and in the Scottish …
Non‐vocational, Non‐formal Further Education in Highland Region in Scotland and the Canton of Valais in Switzerland
Commission des conseils de la culture du Canton du Valais
A Naturalist's Defence of Meaning in Religious Pursuits
Objectivist naturalists about life's meaning regard it as implicating no world but the natural one, and yet as deriving from more than just subjective attitudes or interests. Such naturalists must obviously deny prominent religious conceptions of meaning. But must they further deny that it can be found in religious pursuits? In this article, I defend a negative answer by arguing that, contrary to a prima facie plausible consideration in support o…
The Split in the Finnish Rural Party: Populism in Decline in Finland
Non‐vocational, Non‐formal Further Education in Highland Region in Scotland and the Canton of Valais in Switzerland
Commission des conseils de la culture du Canton du Valais
Adult Education in Suisse Romande
An examination of some of the difficulties of establishing an open university in a small linguistic area: The case of Suisse romande
This paper aims to describe and discuss the various initiatives currently being undertaken in Switzerland (and more specifically the Francophone Suisse romande) with regard to the introduction or adoption of an open university. The paper sets these developments in their historical context by outlining the growth of open universities and the various models available in the world today. The writer regroups these models in a simple typography of fou…
Languages of Scotland: Culture and the classroom
The indigenous languages of Scotland are in a precarious position faced with the massive presence of English. This essay examines the state and nature of the Scots and Gaelic languages. It places them in their historical context and traces how each has had its heyday in Scotland, in the case of Gaelic to be supplanted by Scots and in the case of Scots to be supplanted by English. Both have become marginalised in Scottish life and in the Scottish …
Community development: Freire and Grameen in the Barrowfield Project, Glasgow, Scotland
This article is an attempt to examine one of the better-known failures in UK community development – the Barrowfield Project in Glasgow (1986–1996) – and to compare and contrast it with other attempts at community development, especially some associated with the work of Mohammad Yunus and the Grameen Bank, and the legacy of Paulo Freire. We conclude that both Freire and Yunus make assumptions about the pre-existence of community which limit the p…
Knowing Persons
There is an intuitive distinction between knowing someone in a detached manner - impersonally - and knowing someone in a more intimate fashion - personally. The latter seems to involve the specially active participation of the person known in a way that the former does not. In this paper I present a novel, communication account of knowing someone personally that successfully explains this participation. The account also illuminates the propositio…
How to Be an Epistemic Value Pluralist
In this paper I defend an epistemic value pluralism according to which true belief, justified belief, and knowledge are all fundamental epistemic values. After laying out reasons to reject epistemic value monism in its central forms, I present my pluralist alternative and show how it can adequately explain the greater epistemic value of knowledge over both true belief and justified belief, despite their fundamentality. I conclude with a sketch of…
The Human Predicament: A Candid Guide to Life's Biggest Questions
In his earlier contribution to the philosophy of life, Better Never To Have Been (OUP, 2006) Benatar presented two core arguments. According to his ‘asymmetry’ argument, whereas to begin living (or ‘to come into existence’) is always partly harmful and partly beneficial, not to begin living is never even partly harmful; and if this is so, then it is always better not to begin living than to begin living. According to his quality of life argument,…
Socioeconomic Factors and Health Status Disparities Associated with Difficulty in ADLs and Iadls among Long-Lived Populations in Brazil: A Cross-Sectional Study
Financial constraints may favor the development of functional limitations among older seniors in large urban centers. In poor rural areas, inadequate nutritional status and chronic diseases may increase their susceptibility to functional decline
Meaning in the Pursuit of Pleasure
Here I speak in favor of the view that life's meaning can be found in the pursuit of pleasure. I first present an argument for this view that is grounded in a traditional concept of meaning. To help ease remaining concerns about accepting it, I then draw attention to four things the view does not imply: (1) that we have a reason to take hedonistic theories of meaning seriously; (2) that meaning can be found in the deeply immoral, the deeply ignor…
Health-Related Quality of Life and Associated Factors: Regional Differences Among Oldest-Old in Brazil
Purpose The aim of this research was to investigate the extent to which socioeconomic and regional differences in Brazil may influence the quality of life. To this end, we examined factors associated with health-related quality of life in two populations of oldest-old people, aged 80 and over: one from the Northeast of Brazil and the other from the Southeast. Methods 417 participants aged 80 and over were interviewed face-to-face, 179 from Brejo …
A Naturalist's Defence of Meaning in Religious Pursuits
Objectivist naturalists about life's meaning regard it as implicating no world but the natural one, and yet as deriving from more than just subjective attitudes or interests. Such naturalists must obviously deny prominent religious conceptions of meaning. But must they further deny that it can be found in religious pursuits? In this article, I defend a negative answer by arguing that, contrary to a prima facie plausible consideration in support o…
Sociology (8 works) · Political science (6 works) · Epistemology (5 works) · Philosophy (5 works) · Medicine (4 works) · Aesthetics (3 works) · Geography (3 works) · Law (3 works) · Psychology (3 works) · Theology and Philosophy of Evil (3 works)