School of Historical and Philosophical Studies - Theses
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ItemIntentional behaviour : an essay in the philosophy of action( 1971)This is a philosophical study which concerns itself with a very important part of a man's existence, namely with what he does. It will be limited primarily to a study of intentional behaviour. That is, what I will be concerned with will not be cases where the person was not aware of what he is doing nor with cases where what a person is doing is thinking, imagining, remembering and the like which do not involve a person behaving in some way which involves his making movements with his body intentionally, not unintentionally or accidentally or non-intentionally. I will be concerned with what men do from the point of view of their intentionally bringing about a human act, as D'Arcy has it, and I will be asking why intentional acts are brought about in the first place, why are they intentional, and why some philosophers have misconstrued and continue to misconstrue why an intentional act differs from actions and events that are not intentional actions and events.
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ItemLogical principles of scientific inference( 1972)In this essay my aim is to explicate and vindicate the method of ampliative inference which constitutes the basis of scientific and, indeed, of all critical and disciplined reasoning.
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ItemThe hospital south of the Yarra: a history to celebrate the centenary of Alfred Hospital Melbourne 1871-1971( 1972-02)Although this work was commissioned for the purpose of celebrating Alfred Hospital’s first one hundred years, I have made no effort to cover all of those years. I have set out: 1. To isolate the historical precedents for current hospital procedures and in particular to explore the relationship between Alfred Hospital and the State Government. This task was burdened by the scarcity of early hospital records and of research in related fields of charitable and social welfare - which emphasizes the value of rescuing the hospital’s fast vanishing past from oblivion. 2. By attention to human relationships (that constantly inconsistent element in all institutional affairs) to evoke those unique qualities which distinguish Alfred Hospital from other similar hospitals. 3. To convey what the Alfred meant to the greatest number of people associated with it. 4. To provide a useful source of reference.
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ItemA translation and critical discussion of the Commentary of Dionysius Bar Salibi on the Book of Isaiah( 1970)This thesis arises from a keen awareness of the important place of the Old Testament evidenced by the New Testament's frequent recognition of its authority together with extensive quotation, particularly of' the books of Psalms and Isaiah. We note also the statement in Midrash Rabbah Deuteronomy (p 32) that there are no greater prophets than Moses and Isaiah, and John Chrysostom's view that Isaiah's is "the fullest voice of all". The commentary of Dionysius Bar Salibi on Isaiah is part of his commentary on the whole Bible. It belongs to the twelfth century but embodies a variety of earlier hermeneutics from both Syrian and Greek sources. It has not been published so is available only from Syriac Manuscripts and an Arabic translation. My purpose is to put the commentary in a more convenient form for further study, and comparison with other works. The foundation of this thesis is a close study of the five Mss of the commentary which have become available to me. At this point I am particularly indebted to Professor A. Voobus of Chicago who kindly made available photographed copies of the Deir Za'faran, Mosul and Sarfeh Mss. Photographed copies of the Paris and Mingana Mss were made available through the Department of Middle Eastern Studies, University of Melbourne. The study of these five Mss shows that that of Deir Za’faran is the primary one. Though mistakes are evident in this Ms, the later Mss appear to be quite dependent upon this one. The thesis includes some introductory work on the derivation of the commentary and its characteristics. Writers like Rendel Harris and G. Diettrich have indicated that Bar Salibi’s Biblical commentaries are compilations rather than original works. However there could be original elements, and in any case the selection of some parts of earlier works and the rejection of others means that a degree of initiative has been used. In the case of Isaiah and certain other books, the commentaries from which Bar Salibi copies are not extant. This enhances the importance of Bar Salibi’s commentary on these books but greatly reduces the opportunity of assessing what is original to Bar Salibi. The bibliography shows what works of Bar Salibi have been published. It has not been possible within the scope of this thesis to make the kind of close study of these works that would be significant enough to contribute to conclusions on what sources may have been available to Bar Salibi. I believe the reproduction of the Deir Za'faran Ms together with exhaustive comparison with the four other Mss, to be original. Further, conclusions with regard to the relationship of the five Mss to each other are probably original because of the inaccessibility of some of the Mss. I also believe that the translation of this commentary into English has not previously been accomplished in full.