The book’s core argument is that an artificial intelligence that could equal or exceed human intelligence—sometimes called artificial general intelligence (AGI)—is for mathematical reasons impossible. It offers two specific reasons for this claim: Human intelligence is a capability of a complex dynamic system—the human brain and central nervous system. Systems of this sort cannot be modelled mathematically in a way that allows them to operate inside a computer. In supporting their claim, the authors, Jobst Landgrebe and Barry Smith, marshal evidence (...) from mathematics, physics, computer science, philosophy, linguistics, and biology, setting up their book around three central questions: What are the essential marks of human intelligence? What is it that researchers try to do when they attempt to achieve "artificial intelligence" (AI)? And why, after more than 50 years, are our most common interactions with AI, for example with our bank’s computers, still so unsatisfactory? Landgrebe and Smith show how a widespread fear about AI’s potential to bring about radical changes in the nature of human beings and in the human social order is founded on an error. There is still, as they demonstrate in a final chapter, a great deal that AI can achieve which will benefit humanity. But these benefits will be achieved without the aid of systems that are more powerful than humans, which are as impossible as AI systems that are intrinsically "evil" or able to "will" a takeover of human society. (shrink)

Inductive thinking is a universal human habit; we generalise from our experiences the best we can. The induction problem is to identify which observed regularities provide reasonable justification for inductive conclusions. In the natural sciences, we can often use strict laws in making successful inferences about unobserved states of affairs. In the social sciences, by contrast, we have no strict laws, only regularities which most often are conditioned on ceteris paribus clauses. This makes it much more difficult to make reliable (...) inferences in the social sciences. In particular, we want knowledge about general causal relations in order to be able to determine what to do in order to achieve a certain state of affairs. Knowledge about causal relations that are also valid in the future requires experiments or so called ‘natural experiments’. Only knowledge derived from such experiences enable us to draw reasonably reliable inferences about how to act in order to achieve our goals. (shrink)

– We offer a new motivation for imprecise probabilities. We argue that there are propositions to which precise probability cannot be assigned, but to which imprecise probability can be assigned. In such cases the alternative to imprecise probability is not precise probability, but no probability at all. And an imprecise probability is substantially better than no probability at all. Our argument is based on the mathematical phenomenon of non-measurable sets. Non-measurable propositions cannot receive precise probabilities, but there is a natural (...) way for them to receive imprecise probabilities. The mathematics of non-measurable sets is arcane, but its epistemological import is far-reaching; even apparently mundane propositions are liable to be affected by non-measurability. The phenomenon of non-measurability dramatically reshapes the dialectic between critics and proponents of imprecise credence. Non-measurability offers natural rejoinders to prominent critics of imprecise credence. Non-measurability even reverses some of the critics’ arguments—by the very lights that have been used to argue against imprecise credences, imprecise credences are better than precise credences. (shrink)

In this article, I engage with Derrida’s deconstructive reading of theories of performativity in order to analyse Max Weber’s sovereignty–legitimacy paradigm. First, I highlight an essential articulation between legitimacy and sovereign ipseity (understood, beyond the sole example of State sovereignty, as the autopositioned power-to-be-oneself). Second, I identify a more originary force of legitimation, which remains foreign to the order of performative ipseity because it is the condition for both its position and its deconstruction. This suggests an essential fallibility of the (...) performative, which implies a ‘mystical’ legitimacy and a paradoxical, divisible and self-differential representation of sovereignty. The structural differentiality of legitimacy and sovereignty signifies an irreducible coloniality of law and language, but also suggests the possibility of an unconditional resistance located in the radical interpretability of the law, beyond determined representations of powers, dominations, sovereignties or resistances. This reflection is triggered by a reading of Cynthia Weber’s theory of ‘performative states’, describing sovereignty under the form of an impossible ontology, which leads me to elaborate the notion of legitimation-to-come as a non-ontological ‘concept’: this notion of unconditional legitimacy, beyond sovereignty, binds beliefs and phantasms to the unpresentable force of the event. Pursuing the efforts of scholars such as Rob Walker and Cynthia Weber, I sketch the implications of this archi-performative legitimacy regarding the methodological protocols of International Relations and sociology, in view of elucidating the persistent ontological presuppositions of these disciplines. (shrink)

Referendums have experienced some sort of a comeback. Citizen involvement in political decisions is seen increasingly as a healthy add-on in democratic polities. While earlier writers on democratic theory often saw a danger in increased participation of citizens, more recently several authors suggest that this participation should be fostered. I argue in this paper that both sides in the debate neglect important aspects of referendums. Discussing whether direct participation by the citizens is a good or bad thing addresses only half (...) the story. More precisely, we have to get a better idea about how referendums interact with the traditional institutions of representative democracy. (shrink)

Liberalist thinking argues that moral agents have a right to pursue an ordinary life. It also insists that moral agent can be bystanders. A bystander is involved with morally bad states of affairs in the sense that they are bound by moral duty, but for a non-blameworthy reason. A common view on the morality of commercial life argues that commercial agents cannot and ought not to assume the status of bystander, when confronted with child labor, pollution, or other overwhelmingly big (...) morally bad states of affairs. According to the common view, the agent will get overdemanded. In this paper, the overdemandingness charge is interpreted as a criticism of the liberalist position. According to this charge, bystander status must be given up in the market because otherwise the right to pursue a personal life is crushed. In this paper, we demonstrate that the overdemandingness charge fails. It does not make sense if bystander status is grounded in the duty of beneficence. It would make sense if the status were grounded in the duty of rescue but that duty does not apply in relation to oMBS. The condition of ‘subjective urgency’ is not fulfilled. Hence, liberalist thinking can withstand the charge of overdemandingness and commercial agents cannot assume a right never to acknowledge bystander status. (shrink)

Although it is well-recognized that Max Weber was of central importance to many of the emigre social scientists who fled Hitler, commentators have overlooked both Weber’s attempt to found a new dynamic political science that would test partisan commitments and the endeavors of emigre political scientists to develop this project. This article lays out this new Weberian political science and assesses the fate of the various attempts on the part of the emigres to translate it into their new setting. It (...) shows that Weber forged a notion of political science that combined an existential notion of politics as inexorable power struggle with a sociology of the business of politics that provided the setting in which that struggle was to take place. It also shows that the central purpose of this political science was to aid political partisans in clarifying the meaning of their political commitments by forcing them to view these commitments as they are shaped in the socio-political context that determines the struggle for power. I then show that Mannheim sought to radicalize this approach to political science by seeking to construct the political backdrop for the testing of political ideas out of a political field not out of parties, politicians, and state institutions but out of competing ideologies, each of which could be shown to have some insight into the dynamics of political conflict. For Mannheim we could now test political ideas against political reality by playing them off against each other. I call this project of testing political ideas against existential and sociological notions of the political field the Weber–Mannheim project. I then show how three emigre political scientists – Arnold Brecht, Hans Morgenthau, and Franz Neumann – sought to carry on the Weber–Mannheim project in their new setting. I argue that, of the three, Franz Neumann in his great work Behemoth, was most successful in staying true to that project. For he was able to find in his analysis of the Weimar Republic and the fascist regime a way of demonstrating the dynamics under which democracy and dictatorship fail or succeed while still maintaining openings for political will. Both Brecht and Morgenthau seem to have flattened the dynamic aspect of the Weberian and Mannheimian notions of a prudential political science – though it was Morgenthau who had the most successful reception in political science. (shrink)

Estamos siendo testigos de grandes avances tecnológicos y, a la vez, de grandes desastres naturales y sociales que nos impulsan a plantearnos cuáles son las causas últimas de la degradación natural ecológica. El abuso en el uso de los recursos tal vez pueda tener relación con el abuso en el uso de la tecnología; incluso ser causa de la gran desigualdad social en el acceso a bienes necesarios para llevar una vida digna, raíz de muchos conflictos sociales. La ecología es (...) una disciplina científica, pero cada vez es más habitual ampararse en este término para lanzar opiniones o generar un debate de ideologías de índole catastrofista que no hacen más que generar malestar social sin visos de solución práctica. Las reflexiones sobre la ecología nos parece que deben plantearse de una forma interdisciplinar, pero no de cualquier manera, sino respetando el estatuto epistemológico de cada área del saber. Cuidar el método científico, en el ámbito científico; el filosófico, en el suyo propio; e incluso el teológico. El tema de nuestra relación con la naturaleza nos afecta tan íntimamente que casi todas las áreas del conocimiento pueden decir algo al respecto. En el presente trabajo comenzamos ese diálogo y presentamos las ideas básicas desde las que se podría plantear un modo de actuar humano respetuoso para con los demás hombres y los demás seres de la naturaleza, que mejore nuestro modo de vivir y evite más daños y perjuicios. A esto nos referimos cuando hablamos de “ética ambiental”. La ecología nos toca de cerca porque tiene que ver con el modo de habitar nuestro mundo y las relaciones que tenemos con los demás seres vivos y no vivos. A fin de poder delinear las líneas principales de una ética orientada al medioambiente es preciso, en primer lugar, conocer los datos científicos sobre el tema; en segundo lugar, analizar los problemas graves que se están detectando y comprender que muchas de sus causas todavía son desconocidas y precisan de un estudio más detenido; finalmente, es conveniente revisar las alternativas de solución que nos orienten a llevar una vida mejor, donde se sugieran modos de obrar que no nos cierren el camino hacia ese destino común que tenemos como seres humanos, y que integre al resto de criaturas porque no somos los únicos seres vivientes del planeta. La propuesta de una “ética ambiental” apunta a considerar un verdadero “ecologismo solidario”. (shrink)

In his classical paper C. Wright Mills suggests a novel view of the motives within the framework of sociology of knowledge. Contrasting an approach of sociology of knowledge to subjectivistic understanding of the motives as outer manifestation of the inner elements, Mills locates a particular types of action within typical frames of normative actions and socially situated clusters of motive. Motives is something that is imputed and avowed by actors, therefore it is necessary to consider, first, how different motives are (...) assigned by different actors to themselves and others in certain social and historical situations, and second, how different vocabularies of motive conflict with each other and replace each other over time. In this case motives are not a manifestations of some inner impulses but a justifications of the behavior. (shrink)

This paper explores the central question of why soldiers in democratic societies might decide to fight in wars that they may have reason to believe are objectively or questionably unjust. First, I provide a framework for understanding the dilemma caused by an unjust war and a soldier's competing moral obligations; namely, the obligations to self and state. Next, I address a few traditional key thoughts concerning soldiers and jus ad bellum. This is followed by an exploration of the unique and (...) contradicting moral problems that confront modern soldiers and their officers. I argue that although traditional positions such as invincible ignorance provide a rather dangerous ‘head-in-the-sand’ mentality, soldiers serving a democratic government are nonetheless very limited in their legal and moral ability to interpret what is a justifiable war. However, a very few select senior officers are in positions to make such legal and moral decisions concerning jus ad bellum. (shrink)

Max Weber and Ernst Toller are regarded as political opposites with the former viewed as the responsible realist and the latter as an ethical idealist. I argue that this contrast between the two is not as great as is customarily thought.

Käthe Truhel’s 1934 doctoral dissertation, prepared under the supervision of Karl Mannheim, repays detailed examination for a number of reasons. First, it serves as an important counter-example to commonplace generalities about the alleged incapacity of women social workers of Truhel’s generation, supposedly enmeshed in ideological myths about ‘motherliness’, to reflect on their power relations to a male-dominated society and state. Second, it offers an intrinsically interesting and subtle analysis of the emerging bargaining structure for negotiations between bureaucrats and social workers (...) in the context of late Weimar, understood as a site of the crisis of modernity. Third, it illustrates the quality and range of empirical work fostered by Mannheim during his brief tenure in Frankfurt. (shrink)

This paper addresses the notion of communicative action on the basis of Alfred Schutz’ writings. In Schutz’ work, communication is of particular significance and its importance is often neglected by phenomenologists. Communication plays a crucial role in his first major work, the Der sinnhafte Aufbau der sozialen Welt from 1932, yet communication is also a major feature in his unfinished works which were later completed posthumously by Thomas Luckmann: The Structures of the Life World (1973, 1989). In these texts, Schutz (...) sometimes refers to “communicative action,” and he comes to ascribe a crucial role to communication within the domain of the life world he calls everyday life. Based on Schutz’ texts, I shall first attempt to critically reconstruct the defining features of his notion of communication and communicative action. As a result, it emerges that Schutz’ notion of communication, particularly in its early incarnation, seems to be, at first glance, characterized by a dichotomy between virtual communication, that is communicative action in a narrow sense, and non-virtual communication. As I want to show with respect to the seemingly established dichotomous distinction between “mediated” and “immediate social action,” Schutz himself started to overcome this dichotomy. Based on this thesis, I will try to sketch a basic outline of a theory of communicative action, a theory less formulated by Schutz’ than built on Schutz’ writings. As the idea of communicative action, and particularly the transgression of the distinction between mediated and immediate action, affects the very structures of the life-world described by Schutz and Luckmann, I will ultimately demonstrate that any mundane phenomenology of the life-world requires a triangulatory method. (shrink)

Gender greatly impacts access to opportunities, potential, and success in corporate leadership roles. We begin with a general presentation of why such discussion is necessary for basic considerations of justice and fairness in gender equality and how the issues we raise must impact any ethical perspective on gender in the corporate workplace. We continue with a breakdown of the central categories affecting the success of women in corporate leadership roles. The first of these includes gender-influenced behavioral factors, such as the (...) requirements and expectations of gendered verbal and nonverbal communication styles as well as appearance. We move on to address the impact of family on corporate leadership opportunities and success, discussing the asymmetrical evaluation of an individual’s potential, authority, and competence based on gender stereotypes of familial obligations and expectations. Finally, we address how gender impacts access to networking and sponsorship opportunities and the long-term effects of systematic limitations on women’s inclusion in the upper echelons of corporate leadership. We conclude with a summary of the questions and issues raised by our discussion and direct individuals to consider how different ethical systems and moral requirements might influence their interpretations of gender and leadership in the corporate workplace. (shrink)

In a recent paper in this journal, David Botting defended pragma-dialectics against epistemological criticisms by exponents of the epistemological approach to argumentation, i.e. Harvey Siegel, John Biro and me. In particular, Botting tries to justify with new arguments a Functional Claim, that the function of argumentation is to resolve disputes, and a Normative Claim, that standpoints that have the unqualified consensus of all participants in a dispute will generally be epistemically sound. In this reply it is shown that Botting’s arguments (...) are fallacious, that the two Claims are false and that the epistemological approach to argumentation, of course, outclasses pragma-dialectics epistemically and is at least as good as it in other respects. (shrink)

The paper has a twofold aim. On the one hand, it provides what appears to be the first game-theoretic modeling of Napoleon’s last campaign, which ended dramatically on 18 June 1815 at Waterloo. It is specifically concerned with the decision Napoleon made on 17 June 1815 to detach part of his army against the Prussians he had defeated, though not destroyed, on 16 June at Ligny. Military historians agree that this decision was crucial but disagree about whether it was rational. (...) Hypothesizing a zero-sum game between Napoleon and Blücher, and computing its solution, we show that it could have been a cautious strategy on the former's part to divide his army, a conclusion which runs counter to the charges of misjudgement commonly heard since Clausewitz. On the other hand, the paper addresses methodological issues. We defend its case study against the objections of irrelevance that have been raised elsewhere against “analytic narratives”, and conclude that military campaigns provide an opportunity for successful application of the formal theories of rational choice. Generalizing the argument, we finally investigate the conflict between narrative accounts – the historians' standard mode of expression – and mathematical modeling. (shrink)

Nach einem weit verbreiteten Urteil gibt Kant der Ökonomie in seinem Werk keinen nennenswerten Raum. Die vorliegende Studie widerlegt dies, indem sie Kants Äußerungen zu ökonomischen Themen systematisiert: zur Selbstständigkeit, zum Kaufmann, zum Handel, zum Geld, zur „Staatswirthschaft" sowie zum technischen Fortschritt. Sie erschließt Kants Ökonomie aus der Ergänzung rechtlicher und ethischer Pflichten durch deren anthropologische Ausführungsbedingungen. Dabei geht sie aus von einem zeitgenössischen Verständnis der Ökonomie als Wissenschaft vom Wohlstand. Im deutschsprachigen Raum des 18. Jahrhunderts konkurrieren hier drei Paradigmen (...) miteinander: das aristotelische, das smithianische und das kameralistische. Sie identifizieren jeweils das Haus, den Markt oder den Staat als zentrale Handlungssphäre der Ökonomie. Die Studie kommt zu dem Schluss, dass Kants praktische Philosophie für Ergänzungen aus jeder dieser ökonomischen Handlungssphären offen ist, solange diese freiheitliche Prinzipien erfüllen; sie ist damit nicht, wie gelegentlich behauptet, auf eine einzige Wirtschaftsordnung festgelegt, etwa auf eine rein marktliberale. Relevant ist dies für die Kant-Forschung, für die Wirtschaftsphilosophie sowie für die Ideengeschichte. (shrink)

This contribution focuses on strategic ineffability in Plato. Strategic ineffability serves different purposes. In Plato, it is mainly used to express a religious feeling of dependence and to emphasize the remoteness of the divine. However, its meaning is not only religious. It is also part of a complex narrative device that often resorts to irony in order to de-emphasize the most arduous and controversial metaphysical speculations. Whereas topoi of affected modesty and unspeakability may only play an aesthetic role, strategic ineffability (...) has to do with relevant communication: it is a way to share with (and induce in) other people feelings, goals and morally relevant beliefs, without entailing any accurate conceptual content. Knowledge is not the primary goal here. The paper argues that Plato, Plotinus and other ancient philosophers used the notion of divine ineffability strategically to share beliefs with their selected audiences and lead their disciples to spiritual change. (shrink)

Many states make use of personal identity numbers to govern people living in their territory and jurisdiction, but only a few rely on an all-purpose PIN used throughout the public and private sectors. This article examines the all-purpose PIN in Finland as a political technology that brings people to the sphere of public welfare services and subjects them to governance by public authorities and expert institutions. Drawing on documentary materials and interviews, it unpacks the history and uses of the PIN (...) as an elementary building block of the Nordic welfare state, and its emerging uses in the post-welfare data economy. The article suggests that, although the PIN is capable of individualizing, identifying, and addressing individuals, its most important and widely embraced feature is the extent to which it enables interoperability among public authorities, private businesses, and their data repositories. Interoperability, together with advances in computing and information technology, has made the PIN a facilitator of public administration, state knowledge production, and everyday life. More recently, in the post-welfare data economy, interoperability has rendered the PIN a national asset in all the Nordic countries, providing a great advantage to biomedical research, innovation business, and healthcare. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to show how young people typically interact with technology. Young people take up modern technology and incorporate it in their everyday lives more rapidly and more unceremoniously than others. As they make use of technical artifacts, the everyday lives of young people change, as does their perception of society, because it is through the artifacts that relationships with others are organized. The significance of technology in young people’s everyday lives remains largely unexplored. This deficiency (...) clearly contrasts with an information society, the very basis of which is supposed to be the knowledge of its organizing principles. This article reports on recent findings of how clearly defined social relationships disintegrate because of new technologies and on how young people are challenged to put the applications that technology offers to them into new contexts. The idea is to make a subjectively important choice among the large variety of options given. It shows that technology is no longer result but rather experience oriented. One can foresee the considerable consequences not only for politics, education, and technology development but also for research done in the social sciences. (shrink)

In the Marxist tradition, capitalism is understood as a commodified society based on markets. The article argues that the ultimate justification of this position does not lie in any ‘materialistic’ approach, but in the disembedding of markets that was the result of the historical ‘Great Transformation’ analysed by Karl Polanyi. Disembedded markets are not an economic subsystem within society but take the place of the most encompassing social system, which Durkheim had reserved for religion. The article distinguishes between spatial, social, (...) material and temporal dimensions of disembedding, thereby elaborating and correcting the analysis of Karl Polanyi. As a genuine form of society, disembedded markets give rise to the epistemological dilemma, which, as Luhmann had shown, is fundamental to any encompassing social theory: Society as a whole cannot be viewed by any observer. According to this viewpoint, economic theories take on ‘theological’ functions, as they provide rationality and legitimacy to a reality that is unknowable. (shrink)

The concept of social capital has become more important in understanding contemporary economic development in the era of globalization. This concept, however, requires a theoretical framework that could help to distinguish between forms of social capital with positive effects on local development and other forms that may have negative consequences. This article argues that in order to understand this difference, two conditions are crucial. First, social capital has to be considered in terms of social relations and social networks, rather than (...) in terms of culture and civicness. The second condition is that the interaction between social capital and other institutions, especially political institutions, has to be carefully analysed. Therefore, this article points to the crucial role of political factors - of the `embedded autonomy' of political action - in favouring a positive role of social capital in local economic development. (shrink)

The post-truth regime is a regime in which certain central categories of modernity seem to be inadequate: that of truth as correspondence, that of truth as verification, and that of truth as sincerity. This reflection aims at proposing a shift from the category of truth to the category of legitimacy, in order to rethink those of correctness, objectivity, adequacy. The advantage potentially offered by the concept of legitimacy, with regards to that of truth, has to do with the reference to (...) a given context, with an element of social recognition and a processual dimension, which makes the management of discourses more flexible, without abdicating to their deregulation. (shrink)

ZusammenfassungEine Analyse empirisch ausgerichteter Beiträge zu sportsoziologischen Themen und Fragestellungen in der vorliegenden Zeitschrift zeigt, dass gängige sozialwissenschaftliche Erklärungsmodelle bzw. Erklärungsansätze selten zum Einsatz gelangen. Es dominiert meist eine beschreibende und verstehende Methodologie. Dies führt u. a. zu einem Defizit von Erklärungswissen und in Folge wohl auch zu einer verlangsamten Theoriefundierung innerhalb der Sportsoziologie. Um die „erklärende Soziologie“ zu forcieren, werden die aktuell in der Soziologie detailreich und auch kontrovers diskutierten methodischen Erklärungsmodelle und Ansätze einschließlich ihrer Voraussetzungsbedingungen skizzierend dargestellt. Dies (...) geschieht in der Hoffnung, die methodologische Anwendungslücke zu minimieren, da eine auf Erkenntniszuwächse ausgerichtete Sportsoziologie nicht auf eine kriterienorientierte Methodologie verzichten sollte. (shrink)

This paper proposes a reconstruction of Georg Lukács’ thesis of reification by viewing it through the normative theory of consciousness. As I see it, reification of consciousness is the result of the ways that norms that have been patterned by external social systems come to be absorbed into the background structures of cognition. As a result, consciousness becomes increasingly fitted to these normative patterns. A web of norms therefore comes to heteronomously link consciousness and social systems via processes of socialisation. (...) I end with a consideration of how a theory of critical judgment can be used to overcome this reification of consciousness, all the while sticking to Lukács’ basic line of argument. (shrink)

Corporate social responsibility has been intensively discussed in business ethics literature, whereas the social responsibility of private consumers appears to be less researched. However, there is also a growing interest from business ethicists and other scholars in the field of consumer social responsibility. Nevertheless, previous discussions of ConSR reveal the need for a viable conceptual basis for understanding the social responsibility of consumers in an increasingly globalized market economy. Moreover, evolutionary aspects of human morality seem to have been neglected despite (...) the fact that private consumers are undoubtedly human beings. In addition to that, empirical studies suggest that many consumers believe themselves to be responsible but do not act according to their alleged values or attitudes. This raises the question of what deters them from doing so. Therefore, the contribution of this conceptual paper is threefold: we conceptualize ConSR in terms of a combination of a Max Weber-inspired approach with the social connection approach to shared responsibility proposed by Iris Marion Young; shed light on the previously neglected implications of an evolutionarily induced bounded morality for ConSR, and identify potential obstacles to socially responsible consumption, particularly against the backdrop of shared social responsibility and bounded morality. In this latter respect, the paper focuses specifically on the obstacles of low moral intensity, moral stupefaction, informational complexity, and the lack of perceived consumer effectiveness. In sum, the paper advances knowledge in the field of ConSR by using a transdisciplinary, literature-based approach. (shrink)

Resumen: En un contexto en que la pregunta por lo humano parece divagar entre su desaparición bajo las críticas anti y post-humanistas y su reactivación justamente como respuesta a un entorno de alta incertidumbre y complejidad, la interrogante por los inicios de aquella relación entre sociología y ser humano se torna del todo importante. A partir de un análisis del núcleo fundamental de algunos de los más importantes clásicos de la sociología, se persigue a continuación desentrañar la postura original que (...) la sociología tomó con respecto a éste, así como dilucidar los motivos que la explican. En ese marco, se sostiene la tesis de que la sociología clásica habría desarrollado un intento de destierro del ser humano; un destierro que a pesar de estar afincado en su desarrollo teórico-conceptual, se ve complementado por su raigambre socio-institucional. La lectura es ya en ese entonces clara: inmersa en una incipiente lucha por reconocimiento científico, el cariz filosófico de la pregunta por lo humano se erige como un obstáculo para una cientificidad que solo puede terminar de alcanzarse a través de su exclusión.: In a context where the question about the human being seems to move between its disappearance under anti- and posthumanist critiques, and its reactivation as an answer to an environment of high uncertainty and complexity, the question about the origins of the relations between sociology and the human being becomes especially relevant. Based on a revision of the fundamental core of some of the more important classics of sociology, this article tries to reconstruct sociology’s original position regarding the human being, as well as elucidating the reasons that explain it. Within this framework, it is argued that classical sociology developed an attempt to displace the human being; a displacement that despite relying on its theoretical-conceptual development, it is complemented by its socio-institutional roots. This interpretation was already clear at that time: immersed in an incipient struggle for its scientific recognition, the philosophical tenor of the question about the human erects as an obstacle against the scientificity that can only be reached through its exclusion. (shrink)

This paper argues that Habermas's conception of the rationality of moral and legal discussions has import for argumentation theorists interested in the rationality of public deliberations in politics and law. I begin with a survey of Haber mas's discourse theory and his criteria of rationality for moral and legal discourse. I then explain why, in his view, the forms of rational discourse in morality and law complement each other. My aim is to show how Habermas's account of this complementary relationship (...) opens up fruitful perspectives for argumentation theory. Specifically, his thought can stimulate research regarding, on the one hand, the ways in which legal procedures provide for presumptively rational resolutions of moral disputes and, on the other hand, the applicability of ideal argumentation-theoretic models to the legal field. I conclude with a proposal for integrating Habermas's ideas in a research program for legal argumentation. (shrink)

In what follows, I appeal to Charles Babbage’s discussion of the division of mental labor to provide evidence that—at least with respect to the social acquisition, storage, retrieval, and transmission of knowledge—epistemologists have, for a broad range of phenomena of crucial importance to actual knowers in their epistemic practices in everyday life, failed adequately to appreciate the significance of socially distributed cognition. If the discussion here is successful, I will have demonstrated that a particular presumption widely held within the contemporary (...) discussion of the epistemology of testimony—a presumption that I will term the personalist requirement—fails to account for those very practices of knowers that I detail here. I will then conclude by suggesting that an alternate account of testimonial warrant, one that has heretofore been underappreciated, ought to be given more serious consideration—in particular because it is well suited to account for those actual practices of knowers that the personalist requirement leaves unrecognized. (shrink)

This paper argues that rules and norms are conceptually distinct: what is norm is not thereby rule, and vice versa. Versions of conflating the two are discussed and an argument for distinction given. Two objections to the argument are responded to. It is accepted that rules and norms are often intimately related. They are so causally, not conceptually: what norms we live by can make a difference to what rules we accept and what rules we accept can make a difference (...) to what norms we live by. This is a social, dynamic and continuous causal process of development of the social practices of community. (shrink)

Rational choice theory enjoys unprecedented popularity and influence in the behavioral and social sciences, but it generates intractable problems when applied to socially interactive decisions. In individual decisions, instrumental rationality is defined in terms of expected utility maximization. This becomes problematic in interactive decisions, when individuals have only partial control over the outcomes, because expected utility maximization is undefined in the absence of assumptions about how the other participants will behave. Game theory therefore incorporates not only rationality but also common (...) knowledge assumptions, enabling players to anticipate their co-players' strategies. Under these assumptions, disparate anomalies emerge. Instrumental rationality, conventionally interpreted, fails to explain intuitively obvious features of human interaction, yields predictions starkly at variance with experimental findings, and breaks down completely in certain cases. In particular, focal point selection in pure coordination games is inexplicable, though it is easily achieved in practice; the intuitively compelling payoff-dominance principle lacks rational justification; rationality in social dilemmas is self-defeating; a key solution concept for cooperative coalition games is frequently inapplicable; and rational choice in certain sequential games generates contradictions. In experiments, human players behave more cooperatively and receive higher payoffs than strict rationality would permit. Orthodox conceptions of rationality are evidently internally deficient and inadequate for explaining human interaction. Psychological game theory, based on nonstandard assumptions, is required to solve these problems, and some suggestions along these lines have already been put forward. Key Words: backward induction; Centipede game; common knowledge; cooperation; epistemic reasoning; game theory; payoff dominance; pure coordination game; rational choice theory; social dilemma. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Die Überwindung von Theorie-Praxis-Differenzen wird entlang der Unterscheidung zwischen wissenschaftlicher Rigorosität und Relevanz geführt. Der direkte Übertrag von wissenschaftlichen Befunden in die Praxis könnte im Sport auch durch die Übernahme von Führungspositionen gelingen. Forschungen, in welchem Maße und warum WissenschaftlerInnen Führungspositionen im Sport parallel zu einer Position an der Hochschule begleiten, liegen bislang noch nicht vor. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass nur ein geringer Teil der Vorstandsämter in DOSB/dsb, Landessportbünden und olympischen Spitzenverbänden durch forschende WissenschaftlerInnen besetzt ist und diese bei (...) Amtsübernahme und -ausübung nicht die Lösung der Theorie-Praxis-Differenz priorisieren. (shrink)

The paper critically reconstructs the crowd psychological heritage in phenomenological and social science emotion research. It shows how the founding figures of phenomenology and sociology uncritically adopted Le Bon’s crowd psychological imagery as well as what I suggest calling the disease model of emotion transfer. Against this background, it can be examined how Le Bon’s understanding of emotional contagion as an automatic, involuntary, and uncontrollable mechanism has remained a dominant force in emotion research until today. However, a closer look at (...) phenomenological descriptions and empirical investigations of how emotion’s spread shows that there is little evidence supporting Le Bon’s crowd psychological framework. Thus, I suggest that the disease model should be dismissed in favor of more plausible approaches to interpersonal emotion dynamics. (shrink)

The rise of populism in the West is often depicted as opposition to a “double liberalism”, which is economic and cultural in tandem. In this optic, neoliberalism and multiculturalism are allied under a common liberal regime that prescribes “openness”, while populism rallies against both under the flag of “closure”. This paper questions the central assumptions of this scenario: first, that neoliberalism and multiculturalism are allies; and, secondly, that populism is equally opposed to neoliberalism and to multiculturalism. With respect to the (...) alliance hypothesis, it is argued that only a diluted version of multiculturalism, in terms of diversity and antidiscrimination, is compatible with neoliberalism, which also needs to be sharply distinguished from liberalism. With respect to the dual opposition hypothesis, it is argued that the economic inequalities generated by neoliberalism may objectively condition populist revolts, but that these inequalities are not centrally apprehended and addressed in their programs; furthermore, it is argued that the rejection of multiculturalism indeed is central to populist mobilization, but that the two have important things in common, not least that both are variants of identity politics, if incompatible ones. (shrink)

This article will provide an illustration of Max Weber’s theory of rationalization with a specific impetus on its interdependency with the development of capitalism. Following Horkheimer, I shall critically draw on Weber to outline a theory of human freedom, showing that rationalization not only implies economic and social liberation but entails a totalizing tendency that invades all spheres of socio-political life including people’s mental infrastructure. This mental colonization can be framed as a process of substituting value rationality with instrumental rationality. (...) I will claim that this substitution can be understood as an impediment for human freedom. Following contemporary theories of action, I will show the centrality of value orientation for understanding human freedom. Therefore, I propose a critical theory of freedom that centers value rational action as realization of freedom and can be understood as emancipative. (shrink)

Focusing on the case of Colombia, this article sets out a sociological examination of constitutions marked by strong, activist judiciaries, by entrenched systems of human rights protection, and by emphatic implementation of global human rights law. Contra standard critiques of this constitutional model, it argues that such constitutions need to be seen as creating a new pattern of democracy, which is often distinctively adapted to structures in societies in which the typical patterns of legitimation and subject formation required for democratic (...) government were obstructed. In polities with such constitutions, legal institutions and norm setters have at times assumed the status offunctional equivalentsfor more typical democratically mandated actors and institutions. In such polities, further, global law assumes essential importance as it creates new sources of normative authorization for legislation and stimulates new lines of articulation between government and society. The article concludes that analysis of such polities, exemplified by Colombia, shows that the common categories of democratic-constitutional analysis are no longer always adequate for understanding current tendencies in democratic formation, and they can easily undermine democracy itself. (shrink)

In this paper, I distinguish three claims, which I label individual intentional autonomy, individual intentional autarky, and intentional individualism. The autonomy claim is that under normal circumstances, each individual's behavior has to be interpreted as his or her own action. The autarky claim is that the intentional interpretation of an individual's behavior has to bottom out in that individual's own volitions, or pro-attitudes. The individualism claim is weaker, arguing that any interpretation of an individual's behavior has to be given in (...) terms of individual intentional states. I argue that individual intentional autonomy implies neither individual intentional autarky, nor intentional individualism, with which it is usually lumped together. I further argue that this insight is the key to an adequate view of an important class of actions, i.e., plural actions. Key Words: joint action • shared intentions • methodological individualism • intentional interpretation • collective agents • influence • autonomy. (shrink)

The distinction between teleology and deontology is today almost universally accepted within practical philosophy, but deontology is and has from the beginning been subordinate to utili-tarianism. ‘Deontology’ was constructed by Bentham to signify the art and science of private morality within a utilitarian worldview. The classical distinction was constructed by Broad as a refinement of Sidgwick’s utilitarianism, and then adopted by Frankena. To Broad it signified two opposite tendencies in ethics, in Frankena’s textbooks, however, it becomes an exclusive distinction, where (...) de-ontology signifies disregard for consequences, and it is therefore almost impossible to think of deontology as a framework for a com-prehensive ethical theory. This conception, however, is adopted by Rawls, and in his contractarian interpretation of deontology it is in fact no more within the sphere of ethics. (shrink)

El presente artículo comienza reconstruyendo las razones por las cuales las teorías modernas se concentran en la ciudadanía como una garantía muy importante de legitimidad -arguyendo que la ciudadanía está intrínsecamente ligada a una forma republicana de orden político. La segunda parte del artículo muestra que, bajo las actuales condiciones de la globalización, la ciudadanía crea o mantiene un orden transnacional multinivel que impide que otras personas y políticas puedan realizar una ciudadanía (completa), y que incluso contribuyen a violaciones directas (...) de exigencias legítimas por parte de no-ciudadanos. La tercera parte discute críticamente las propuestas de Archibugi, Owen y Baubóck acerca de cómo repensar la ciudadanía transnacional o formas equivalentes de participación y control. En la parte final, el artículo aboga por una conexión entre la concepción de la ciudadanía constelación y una forma específica de democracia transnacional. Tal conexión permitiría a la ciudadanía seguir siendo el factor clave para la legitimidad. This article starts by reconstructing the reasons for the modern focus on citi-zenship as a major guarantee for legitimacy - arguing that citizenship is intricately linked to a republican form of political order. In its second part this paper shows that under the current conditions of globalization citizenships creates or maintains a transnational multi-level order which prevents other persons and polities from realizing (full) citizenship, and even contributes to direct violations of legitimate claims of non-citizens. The third part of the article critically discusses proposals by Archibugi, Owen and Baubóck, how to rethink transnational citizenship or equivalent forms of participation and control. And in its final part it advocates linking the conception of constellational citizenship to a specific form of trans-national democracy. With such a link citizenship could continue to be the key factor for legitimacy. (shrink)

The objective of this article is to see whether desire for recognition might contain an emancipatory aspect. Could this desire be a political ally? The argumentative strategy is to fully acknowledge the oppressive mechanisms at work before trying to find a way to other outcomes, including emancipation, with which desire for recognition has been associated in the tradition from Hegel. Through a re-interpretation of the master-and-slave dialectic, supplemented by sociological research on status expectations, I suggest a way out of the (...) vicious circle, where desire produced by power finds satisfaction through a preexisting other, resulting in an endless dynamic of compulsive conformity and regressive assertion of status. The hold of this dynamic must not be underestimated, yet, as I argue, both desire and what satisfies desire are liable to change, through struggle. The transformation of the generalized other, which provides recognition, is seen to be a crucial feature of all collective struggle. The very source of recognition is transformed, behind the backs of the actors, in turn affecting their desire. This can but must not lead to the emancipatory outcomes which are traditionally tied to recognition in the Hegelian tradition. (shrink)

Although some scholars acknowledge the decisive role of the felt body in the process of perspective taking, the precise role of the felt body remains unclear. In this paper, a theory of affective communication is developed in order to explain and understand the process of perspective taking in human interaction on a corporeal, pre-reflective and thus affective level. The key assumption of the outlined theory is that any process of perspective taking is essentially based on the two dimensions of the (...) felt body, namely attraction and repulsion, dominance and subdominance. The dimension of attraction and repulsion determines whether individuals attractively converge or repulsively diverge in their perspectives. Regarding the dimension of dominance and subdominance, it is assumed that there is always a dominant and a subdominant side in human interaction. In the case of attraction as a necessary condition for finding common ground, the dominant side serves as the perspective giver and the subdominant side serves as the perspective taker. The outlined theory is phenomenologically based on the works of Schmitz and Rappe and marks a contribution to the research program of neophenomenological sociology. (shrink)