The greatest deception: fiction,falsity and manifestation in Spinoza’s Metaphysical Thoughts

ABSTRACT

“The first meaning of true and false”, writes Spinoza in a neglected passage of the Metaphysical Thoughts, “seems to have had its origin in stories”. Ideas are true when they “show” us things as they are; they are false when they do not, when they are fictional. In this essay, I argue that what appears at first sight to be a simple assertion of a correspondence theory of truth in fact opens onto broad historical transformations in the nature of meaning that reshaped the very atmosphere of truth: the emergence of a new kind of fictionality, transformations in the sense of logical interpretation, and ultimately transformations in the structures and sources of the natural light, that “clarity” which constitutes for Spinoza, as for Descartes, an indispensable criterion for certainty.     

Trephination as a possible treatment for scurvy in a middle bronze age (ca. 2200 BC) skeleton

Although trephination of sub-adults in antiquity is rare, scurvy both infantile and adult, is even more rare in the archaeological record. Pathological changes appearing in the maxilla, mandible and orbits of a child of 8–9 years of age are highly suggestive of infantile scurvy. Advanced forms of this metabolic disturbance lead to severe subperiosteal haemorrhaging, at times turning the skin of the face and skull black. This condition may have led to the trephination along the sagittal suture as a form of blood letting in hopes of draining the subperiosteal haemorrhage in the cranium. Although cause and effect are often confusing in antiquity, the surgical intervention presented here led to the ultimate death of the child.     

Refit and Oxygen Isotope Analysis of Freshwater Mussel Shells from the Tillar Farms Site (3DR30), Southeast Arkansas

ABSTRACT

We investigate the link between the consumption of foodstuffs, excavation of a large pit, and disposal of waste at the Tillar Farms site (3DR30), southeast Arkansas, using refit and oxygen isotope analyses of well-preserved freshwater mussel shells from Feature 1. Only 0.13% of 7,408 valves analyzed were unidentifiable to species.The refit analysis produced 460 refits across 23 species and strongly indicates that the shell midden represents a single episode of shellfish gathering, consumption, and discard. Oxygen isotope analysis of five randomly selected shells are used as a test of the refit results. δ¹⁸O values from the five archaeological shells are compared to modern control samples of live-collected specimens from Bayou Bartholomew in winter of 2011. Refit analysis suggests the accumulation of mussel shells occurred quickly, likely as a result of one collection, consumption, and discard event. δ¹⁸O values suggest this activity took place during a single winter season.     

Serial craniectomies for intracranial infection 5.5 millennia ago

A skull found in a burial cave near Jericho with evidence of craniectomies dating approximately 5500 years ago had signs of frontal sinusitis and intracranial infection. The location of the three craniotomies in the frontal bone of this skull and evidence of the infection bursting from the sinus intracranially suggest that this is the oldest known cranial surgery performed due to symptoms of a medical aetiology : epidural infection.