In this paper, I offer an original account of meaning in life, which I call the passionate yearning theory. Within the framework of the passionate yearning theory, meaning is understood as the intrinsically derived yearning, and passionate striving, for something that possesses some plausible objective claim to truth or facticity, which makes it worth pursuing for its own sake. To properly delineate the view, I present the various criteria that serve as the foundation for the passionate yearning view. These include (...) the truth/facticity criterion, the lack of immorality, intrinsic subjectivity, passion, yearning and striving. I then show how these criteria coalesce into the passionate yearning theory and how exactly the theory works. Finally, I motivate the passionate yearning theory by addressing some possible criticisms and objections that can be raised against the view and also differentiate it from similar competing views. (shrink)

Thought experiments, one of the most effective ways of acquiring knowledge, are an intellectual tool frequently used by scientists or thinkers in their fields of study. Thought experiments used to respond to scientific issues are considered scientific thought experiments, while thought experiments used for philosophical problems are called philosophical thought experiments. In this context, firstly, the differences between scientific and philosophical thought experiments are determined in the article. In particular, philosophical thought experiments are often needed in discussions within the field (...) of epistemology. For this reason, in the rest of the study, the knowledge argument put forward against the idea of physicalism, which is one of the important views in epistemology and which claims that the natural world is basically physical and that everything can be explained by physical laws is included. The knowledge argument briefly argues that there are non-physical properties and information that can only be discovered through conscious experience. Accordingly, it is argued that someone who has all physical knowledge about another conscious may lack knowledge of what it would feel like to have subjective experiences of that entity such as qualia. Consequently, the main idea of the article is to reveal how an epistemological thesis has been questioned by various philosophers in the context of philosophical thought experiments such as Mary’s room, ‘What is it like to be a Bat’, The Martian and the Philosophical Zombie. - Bilgi edinmenin en etkili yollarından bir tanesi olarak değerlendirilen düşünce deneyleri bilim insanları ya da düşünürler tarafından kendi çalışma alanları içerisinde sıklıkla başvurulan düşünsel bir araçtır. Bilimsel konulara cevap vermek amacıyla gerçekleştirilen düşünce deneyleri bilimsel düşünce deneyleri olarak değerlendirilirken, felsefi sorunlara yönelik kullanılan düşünce deneyleri ise felsefi düşünce deneyleri olarak adlandırılmaktadır. Bu kapsamda makalede ilk olarak bilimsel ve felsefi düşünce deneyleri arasındaki farklılıklar belirlenmektedir. Özellikle, epistemoloji alanı içerisinde yer alan tartışmalarda felsefi düşünce deneylerine sıklıkla ihtiyaç duyulmaktadır. Bu nedenle çalışmanın devamında epistemolojide önemli görüşlerden bir tanesi olan ve doğal dünyanın en temelde fiziksel olduğu ve fiziksel yasalarla her şeyin açıklanabileceği iddiasında bulunan fizikalizm düşüncesine karşı ileri sürülmüş bilgi argümanına yer verilmektedir. Bilgi argümanı kısaca sadece bilinçli deneyim yoluyla elde edilebilen ve fiziksel olarak ifade edilemeyen öznel deneyimlerin ve özelliklerin olduğunu savunmaktadır. Buna göre, başka bir bilinçli varlık hakkında bütün fiziksel bilgiye sahip olan birinin, o varlığın qualia gibi öznel deneyimlerine sahip olmasının nasıl bir his olduğu konusundaki bilgilerden yoksun olabileceği fikri savunulmaktadır. Bu doğrultuda, makalenin temel savı fizikalizm gibi epistemolojik bir teze Mary’nin Odası, ‘Yarasa Olmak Nasıl Bir Şeydir’, Marslı ve Felsefi Zombi gibi felsefi düşünce deneyleri bağlamında çeşitli filozoflarca nasıl itiraz edildiğini ve düşünce deneylerinin bu bağlamda nasıl kullanıldığını ortaya koymaktır. (shrink)

Some authors have recently suggested that it is time to consider rights for robots. These suggestions are based on the claim that the question of robot rights should not depend on a standard set of conditions for ‘moral status’; but instead, the question is to be framed in a new way, by rejecting the is/ought distinction, making a relational turn, or assuming a methodological behaviourism. We try to clarify these suggestions and to show their highly problematic consequences. While we find (...) the suggestions ultimately unmotivated, the discussion shows that our epistemic condition with respect to the moral status of others does raise problems, and that the human tendency to empathise with things that do not have moral status should be taken seriously—we suggest that it produces a “derived moral status”. Finally, it turns out that there is typically no individual in real AI that could even be said to be the bearer of moral status. Overall, there is no reason to think that robot rights are an issue now. (shrink)

Lawyers pretend as if the process of application of laws, as well as its outcome, could be an analytic-deductive derivation; especially law students learn that legal decision-making is primarily a logic process. But we know that application of laws depends on analytic-logical as well as on voluntaristic (wilful) elements. Exact relations between these components are unknown and will be unknown. At most German law schools students as the most important imperative tool learn the so called “Auslegung” through the use of (...) theoretical instruments, which do not reflect the interpretation of law practice. These mentioned causes result in irrationality of legal decision-making. In order to achieve more rationality in the process and result of legal decision-making, the contribution makes four suggestions regarding legal methodology and legal education. These proposals consist of few long-term pragmatic approaches to more rationality of legal decision-making. (shrink)

ABSTRACTSport is the locus of varieties of athletic experience. In this paper, I focus on anxiety as a felt experience in sport. Anxiety is often experienced as a form of psychological distress. It...

Traditionally, Gender Studies differentiates between the term “sex”, indicating sex differences from the biological point of view, and the term “gender”, indicating that sex differences are social and cultural constructions. In this paper I discuss some recent neuroscientific theses concerning sexual differences to sketch a path of inquiry that goes beyond the logic of the separation of biological and cultural studies.

ABSTRACT Thaddeus Metz’s new book ‘God, Soul and the Meaning of Life’ presents a brief analysis of supernaturalist views about the meaning of life – my specific concern being the Divine purpose theory. While the view locates meaning in the fulfilment of some divine mandate, I show that this theory is, at best, unattractive. In this essay, I challenge the view that a belief in God is not necessary for the Divine purpose theory to be viable. I show that if (...) we were to agree that a belief in God is inconceivable, then a theory built on such a belief is, at best, wishful thinking. Arguing from a subjectivist perspective, I make clear the fact that any recourse to a godly mandate as what makes life meaningful inadvertently assumes an extrinsic and instrumental character, which makes such a pursuit an unattractive form of meaningfulness. Finally, I show that the God purpose theory is much too narrow as it fails to capture other paths to meaningfulness that do not involve a recourse to God, and also that any assigned purpose is unnecessary (and, therefore, unattractive), if God is all-knowing, all-powerful, etc. (shrink)

The present era of biological annihilation lends significant urgency to the need to radically reconfigure human–animal–nature relations along more ethical lines and sustainable trajectories. This article engages with largely post-humanist scholarship to offer up an in-depth qualitative analysis of a set of semi-structured interviews, conducted in August 2017–2018 with 26 radical environmental activists (REAs) from a variety of movements. These activists are posited as contemporary manifestations of the ‘post-anthropocentric paradigm shifts’ that challenge traditional notions of human separateness from – and (...) superiority to – the nonhuman world. However, despite being broadly categorised as post-humanist or post-anthropocentric in their efforts to deconstruct hierarchical and dualistic constructions of the human–animal–nature relationship, considerable variations abound in terms of who and what REAs value and on what basis. The article concludes with a brief discussion of the nature of REAs’ post-anthropocentric sensibilities and mobilisations, and considers implications for the development of more ethical modes of human– animal–nature relationality that value and respect the irreducible alterity of nonhuman others. (shrink)

Qualia in the node-point between mind and body: Dilemma of present discussion about the subjectivity of mental states. The present discussion about qualia shows a bewildering variety of different positions. We show implicit assumptions about brain, subject, and qualia of this complex discussion. By means of three assumptions we divide the discussion about qualia into three different positions (proposition, opposition, intermediate solutions). These positions and their exemplaric authors are briefly presented along the lines of the three assumptions. The next step (...) shows how each position solves the dilemma which arises if one relates all three assumptions by eliminating at least one of the three assumptions. Finally, general problems in the discussion of qualia are shown by means of which the dilemma of the relation between brain, subject and qualia may be brought closer to a solution without eliminating one assumption. (shrink)