The essay has its beginning in the source material that deal with ancient Norse religion before the people in the Nordic countries became Christian. The fact that there are no contemporary written or authentic sources available that can tell us something about the Norse religion during the Viking age is problematic. Archeological source materials is available, but tend to talk more about power relationships and social status than the old Norse religion and the way people practiced their faith. Medieval Christian writers are a source of knowledge of the Norse religion; however, they can only highlight the Norse religion from a Christian point of view and ways of evaluating the pagan faith, making them less reliable.The written sources of this paper are based on the written by two medieval Christian writers, Saxo Grammaticus and Snorri Sturluson. These sources are among the first to treat the Norse religion process after the introduction of Christianity in Scandinavia.

The Swedish government ratified on May 1 2009 an amendment of marital law, resulting in same-sex marriage becoming legalized. With the rights of the Christian Swedish state church to officiate weddings originating from the same law, the church was thereby faced with two options: Either officially include same-sex couples in the Christian concept of holy matrimony and keep the right to officiate weddings; or give up the right to officiate weddings altogether. An official decision to accept the terms was reached on October 22 2009, but not without being preceded by an agitated medial debate.This research attempts to analyze the arguments of the debate in three stages: In the first stage the arguments are categorized according to their respective ideological standpoint. In the second stage these categories are examined from post-modern, social constructivist and socialization theory perspectives. Based on this, the third stage sees the arguments analyzed from a viewpoint based in the Copenhagen school concept of securization.The research concludes that the debate does not only simply feature two sides with differences of opinion; but rather that the arguments of the two opposing sides are founded in a common view of the other side as a fundamental threat to ones conception of a sound society..

The present essay concerns Walter Benjamin´s engagement with the concept of critique in four of his early writings from 1916-1928. It revolves around three main themes, or objects of interest: the critique of language [Sprache], the critique of the work [das Werk] and the critique of history [Geschichte]. The main objective of this study is to show how we can understand Benjamin?s conception of critique and how he develops it in regard to language, the work and history. The essay argues that this is a vital part to understand his philosophy in general as well as his later philosophy of history in particular.

In this thesis I examine how the phenomenological philosophy of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger differ with regard to the phenomenological reduction, and in particular why there is no reduction in Sein und Zeit. I examine in what way philosophy is seen as an overcoming of the naïvete of a ?natural? attitude and how this natural attitude is understood, starting with Husserl?s descriptions of the phenomenological reduction, of the natural attitude of our daily lives and of his notion of transcendental subjectivity. By presenting these main aspects, I try to elucidate why, in Husserl?s view, laying the foundation of all knowledge must take form of a phenomenological first philosophy.

I den här uppsatsen tänker jag reda ut det epistemologiska begreppet a priori. Att det är ett epistemologiskt begrepp innebär att det handlar om kunskap. Den här kunskapen kan uttryckas i satser. Sådana satser är satser som vi har a priorisk kunskap om. Exempel på vad man brukar kalla a prioriska satser är: ?inget kan vara helt täckt av rött samtidigt som det är helt täckt av grönt? och ?om A kommer före B och B kommer före C så kommer A före C? eller mer metafysiska utsagor som ?ett fysiskt objekt kan inte vara på två ställen vid samma tidpunkt? och ?alla effekter måste ha en orsak?, men som främsta exempel brukar man tala om logiska eller matematiska utsagor.

Grundtanken i deliberativ demokrati är att politiska beslut skall grundas på en fri och förnuftig deliberation mellan fria och jämlika medborgare. Målet med denna deliberation är att nå en rationell konsensus, och kräver att deltagarna sätter sina personliga intressen, värderingar och perspektiv åt sidan, samt fokuserar på det allmänna bästa. I denna uppsats presenterar jag teorin bakom, och framför kritik mot den nuvarande utformningen av deliberativ demokrati. Denna kritik går huvudsakligen ut på att deliberativ demokrati inte fullt respekterar samhällets pluralism, eftersom den antar orimliga normer förhur politisk kommunikation får bedrivas, och därmed riskerar att marginalisera vissa människor. Jag diskuterar också hur en alternativ demokratimodell, som bevarar grundtanken i deliberativ demokrati, skulle kunna vara utformad..

This essay attempts to examine whether it is possible to find a mutual understanding of the concept of drive between Spinoza?s philosophy and Freud?s psychoanalytical theory. Former texts on this subject have given a variety of conclusions: from a radical separation between the two authors to a complete identification between the two. The drive, or the desire which is the term Spinoza uses, has in Spinoza?s philosophy its foundation in the concept of conatus.

This qualitative research is a contribution to the ongoing debate among marketing researchers regarding if there is a dominant paradigm and viewpoint of marketing and which one is the most appropriate. In this study current views of marketing are identified and then compared against the older Goods-Dominant Logic of Marketing and Vargos? and Luschs? alternative Service-Dominant Logic of Marketing. The trends that have been observed are situated in the framework of Thomas S. Kuhn?s philosophy of science.

According to the directives of Lgr11, learning about Christianity should be an important part of religious education in secondary school (7th-9th grade) in Sweden. A school teacher must therefore have good knowledge of the field and of different aspects of the beliefs of the various Christian traditions.This essay is about how salvation is conceived of by two members of the laity in each of three different Christian traditions: the Syriac Orthodox Church, the Roman Catholic Church and the Church of Sweden (which is Lutheran). As a theoretical perspective for my analysis, I have chosen the official views of salvation of these three churches. That is to say, views of the members of the laity have been compared with the official views of the respective churches. It is thus a very limited qualitative study aiming at finding out how the views of the laity conform to the official creed concerning salvation and whether there are any differences here between the churches.

The Swedish government ratified on May 1 2009 an amendment of marital law, resulting in same-sex marriage becoming legalized. With the rights of the Christian Swedish state church to officiate weddings originating from the same law, the church was thereby faced with two options: Either officially include same-sex couples in the Christian concept of holy matrimony and keep the right to officiate weddings; or give up the right to officiate weddings altogether. An official decision to accept the terms was reached on October 22 2009, but not without being preceded by an agitated medial debate.This research attempts to analyze the arguments of the debate in three stages: In the first stage the arguments are categorized according to their respective ideological standpoint. In the second stage these categories are examined from post-modern, social constructivist and socialization theory perspectives. Based on this, the third stage sees the arguments analyzed from a viewpoint based in the Copenhagen school concept of securization.The research concludes that the debate does not only simply feature two sides with differences of opinion; but rather that the arguments of the two opposing sides are founded in a common view of the other side as a fundamental threat to ones conception of a sound society..

This thesis in Educational Sciences consists of a narrative ideology-analysis of the Swedish school's fundamental values with perspectives from the philosophy of Nietzsche and Kant, which also analyzed the same way, with the aim to trace and problematize the ideological foundations of "our society's shared values" that teachers should convey to the students. Based on a theory that a humanism crisis occurs when important values are perceived as threatened, does the introduction of the basic values of the curriculum appear as a response tosocietal changes. Nietzsche and Kant represent completely different idea currents that both have been reflected in the curriculum in which basic values have different meanings. Nietzsche has inspired social criticism, postcolonial and postmodern thinkers to a critical constructivist approach that is an asset in the multicultural classroom to deconstruct stereotypes and prejudices. That culture, ethnicity, morality and religion do not have an objective essence, but seen as social constructions, using a critical approach is a way of thinking which was developed with inspiration from Nietzsche.

Metaforen har genom historien fängslat filosofer, och redan på Aristoteles tid fördes en diskussion kring metaforens plats i språket och vad metaforer kan tänkas betyda. Innan man börjar undersöka detta bör man nog först och främst stanna till och fråga sig vad en metafor egentligen är. Det finns ett otal metaforer och variationerna är oändliga, men i regel består en metafor av ett eller flera objekt i ljuset av attribut hos ett annat objekt. Metaforarbete sätter således två entiteter i en relation till varandra, en relation som oftast anses baserad på någon typ av likhet. Ett klassiskt exempel är Shakespares berömda scenmetafor ur As you like it ? ?All the world's a stage / And all the men and women merely players / They have their exits and their entrances?.

The Swedish government ratified on May 1 2009 an amendment of marital law, resulting in same-sex marriage becoming legalized. With the rights of the Christian Swedish state church to officiate weddings originating from the same law, the church was thereby faced with two options: Either officially include same-sex couples in the Christian concept of holy matrimony and keep the right to officiate weddings; or give up the right to officiate weddings altogether. An official decision to accept the terms was reached on October 22 2009, but not without being preceded by an agitated medial debate.This research attempts to analyze the arguments of the debate in three stages: In the first stage the arguments are categorized according to their respective ideological standpoint. In the second stage these categories are examined from post-modern, social constructivist and socialization theory perspectives. Based on this, the third stage sees the arguments analyzed from a viewpoint based in the Copenhagen school concept of securization.The research concludes that the debate does not only simply feature two sides with differences of opinion; but rather that the arguments of the two opposing sides are founded in a common view of the other side as a fundamental threat to ones conception of a sound society..

"The Value of Knowledge - Towards a Virtue Epistemological Position" The classical question, first posed in Plato's Meno, concerning the value of knowledge constitutes the starting point of this essay. Value analysis has long been neglected in epistemologist's accounts until its re-emergence with the tradition called ?virtue epistemology?, in particular with scholars following Ernest Sosa. Like virtue ethics virtue epistemological accounts changes the focus from the object to the agent, i.e. from knowledge to intellectual virtue.

Abstract ?The Vampire from past to present?. This essay studies and compares the early historical Vampire as it is presented in some of the Western Europe countries, primarily Greece, but also Romania and how their descriptions of the Vampire have inspired the portrait of vampires in modern films and literature. The essay aims to answer the questions:How has the historical, traditional, European Vampire developed through the centuries into the modern Vampire of today? Which original facts and perceptions about the Vampire from a Christian and pre-Christian point of view can be observed in the modern Vampire, as it is presented in the chosen films and furthermore, can any new ideas be observed in the films?By studying Vampire literature and poems throughout the centuries, a very interesting picture appears.