The aim of this paper is to analyse Alexander von Humboldt's views on the theory of evolution and tackle the following question: Can Humboldt be considered an evolutionist? I seek to show that Humboldt acknowledges three essential Darwinian elements of the theory of evolution: fossil records, the geographical distribution of species and the struggle for survival. Further, Humboldt recognises a special relation between the natural environment and organic life, and understands it in light of his (...) naturalistic holism. This holism reveals the unity of organic and inorganic nature and highlights the agency of organic life whilst allowing it to create and preserve the adaptive conditions in the natural environment. Accordingly, I argue that Humboldt believes some kind of evolutionary process happens in nature. However, due to the immense influence of Kant’s transcendental study and the rigid utilisation of the empirical method, Humboldt concludes that we cannot acquire knowledge of the exact course of the evolutionary process. This, however, does not imply Humboldt discredits the theory of evolution. (shrink)

The cognizability of the world according to Alexander von Humboldt: the experience of landscape. According to Alexander von Humboldt, geography ought to aim to go beyond the modern attitude of seeing knowledge as being the result of a spatial and temporal abstraction from the real world. Von Humboldt wishes to create a new theory of knowledge, one that instead of just simplifying, schematizing, and categorizing reality is able to highlight its multiple meanings, its diversity of (...) perspectives, and its hermeneutical keys. Von Humboldt’s project strives to achieve a universal cognition of the world (or a universal geography) by claiming the centrality of the experience of landscape. This is evidence for von Humboldt’s far-sightedness, since he anticipated the present day trend of considering landscape as a corner stone of interdisciplinary enquiries into the meaning of the world. (shrink)

There have been constant and multiple endeavours to argue for Darwin's both epistemic and practical debt to Romanticism. Almost all of these arguments emphasise Darwin's theoretical and aesthetic associations with Alexander von Humboldt, who, from a prevailing Darwin-centred perspective, is in turn usually oversimplified as an undisputed incarnation of Romanticism. The antagonistic view, however, develops nothing other than another stereotype of Humboldt as an anti-idealistic, pro-French, and even highly Anglophone empiricist naturalist, and accordingly rejects the claim of (...) a romantic Darwin in terms of his Humboldtian inheritance. In this paper, I will first portray a balanced figure of Humboldt in terms of both his critical incorporation of romantic philosophy and the idiosyncratic history of his science. Then, I will thematically compare Darwin with Humboldt and other romantics so as to elucidate Darwin's peculiar appropriation of romantic tenets. Three interrelated romantic themes are examined, along with a discrimination of different senses in which the term romanticism is used: a) the literature-science relation, b) the pursuit of the unity in and through multiplicity, and c) the epistemic role of imagination. On the basis of this triadic dissection, both Humboldt's and Darwin's adherence to and departure from romanticism are reevaluated. (shrink)

There have been attempts to subsume Charles Darwin's theory of evolution under either one of two distinct intellectual traditions: early Victorian natural science and its descendants in political economy (as exemplified by Herschel, Lyell, or Malthus) and the romantic approach to art and science emanating from Germany (as exemplified by Humboldt and Goethe). In this paper, it will be shown how these traditions may have jointly contributed to the design of Darwin's theory. The hypothesis is that their encounter created (...) a particular tension in the conception of his theory which first opened up its characteristic field and mode of explanation. On the one hand, the domain of the explanandum was conceived of under a holistic and aesthetic view of nature that, in its combination with refined techniques of observation, was deeply indebted to Humboldt in particular. On the other hand, Darwin fashioned explanations for natural phenomena, so conceived, in order to identify their proper causes in a Herschelian spirit. The particular interaction between these two traditions in Darwin, it is concluded, paved the way for a transfer of the idea of causal laws to animate nature while salvaging the romantic idea of a complex, teleological and harmonious order of nature. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. (shrink)

The reprinted paper refers to Georg Lind and his colleagues’ MCT-based FORM study conducted at several European universities in 1977-1983, including Polish ones. After a short phase of democratization, in 1981 Polish society suddenly faced martial law. That experience had an impact on Polish students moral-, discursiveand democratic competences, as measured by MCT. When Ewa Nowak started her Alexander von Humboldt Foundation supported research stay under the supervision of Professor Georg Lind, they were inspired to revisit and discuss (...) the puzzling Polish research findings of 1981/3. According to their main hypothesis, martial law restricted free speech at universities, and free speech is a key facilitator of the development of moral and democratic competence. In 2018, after a decade of collaborative research on moral and democratic competence, Lind, Nowak and colleagues started a new international MCT study in several Central- and East European countries to examine the impact of the contemporary constitutional crisis in Poland on students’ moral and democratic competencies. In 2018/9 the 40th anniversary of the Moral Competence Test and Konstanz Method of Dilemma Discussion will be celebrated. We would like to provide you with the most recent research findings soon. (shrink)

The year 2009 has been a year of numerous commemorations of both scientific and non-scientific achievements that contributed to the advancement of human kind. Protestants celebrated the 500th anniversary of the birth of Calvin; literary critics celebrated the 200th anniversary of the poet Edgar Allan Poe; and the musical genius Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy was also born 200 years ago. 2009 further marked the bicentennial of the birth of Louis Braille, the inventor of Braille; and Abraham Lincoln, the 16th president of the (...) United States, who founded the National Academy of Sciences. Pierre Curie, famous for his work on radioactivity that he conducted together with his wife Marie Curie, was born 150 ago; as was John Dewey, a philosopher and psychologist who is recognized as one of the founding fathers of both pragmatism as well as functional psychology. UNESCO and the International Astronomical Union dubbed 2009 the International Year of Astronomy. By doing so, astronomers celebrated the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei’s telescopic observations as well as the publication of Johannes Kepler’s Astronomia nova wherein he formulated the first two laws of planetary motion. 2009 also marked the last of a 3-year-long celebration of Planet Earth, another UNESCO-governed initiative. However, for evolutionary biologists and philosophers of science, 2009 will be largely remembered for its worldwide commemorations of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his magnum opus On the origin of species by means of natural selection. Footnote1 In order to pay tribute to Darwin’s major contribution to the advancement of evolutionary science, the International Union of Biological Sciences and the International Union of History and Philosophy of Science have called the year 2009 the Darwin Year. Given that so many scientific discoveries were commemorated, COPUS, the Coalition on the Public Understanding on Science, called out 2009 as the Year of Science, in the hope to pay equal tribute to both the field of biology as well as astronomy. 2009 was indeed a year of biology. Somewhat overshadowed by the big Darwin celebrations, smaller-scaled events were held to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the publication of Lamarck’s Philosophie Zoologique; and the 150th anniversary of the death of Alexander von Humboldt, the father of biogeography. In 1910, Constantin Mereschkowsky wrote his article on symbiogenesis entitled ‘The Theory of Two Plasmas as the Basis of Symbiogenesis, a New Study for the Origins of Organisms’. The article was published in the German Biologisches Zentralblatt, the journal that would later evolve into the current Theory in Biosciences. Somewhat forgotten, but equally important for the field of symbiogenesis, was the 200th anniversary of the birth of Pierre-Joseph Van Beneden, a Belgian paleontologist and zoologist famous for distinguishing parasitism from commensalism. Finally, Henry Bergson, known for inventing the currently rejected notion of élan vital, was born 150 years ago. In order to memorialize the important role these biologists played in the advancement of our understanding of the evolutionary process, a 2-day international conference was organized entitled: Evolution today and tomorrow, Darwin evaluated by contemporary evolutionary and philosophical theories. The conference was organized by The Centre for Philosophy of Science of the University of Lisbon (Portugal), in collaboration with the Centre for Environmental Biology of the same university, and the Lisbon Centre for Applied Psychology. The articles presented here are a spin-off of this conference. The current volumes contain the peer-reviewed articles of a selection of the plenary and invited speakers, as well as those of scholars who were additionally invited to contribute to the volumes. (shrink)

This paper contributes to the on-going research into the ways in which the humanities transformed the natural sciences in the late Eighteenth and early Nineteenth Centuries. By investigating the relationship between hermeneutics -- as developed by Herder -- and natural history, it shows how the methods used for the study of literary and artistic works played a crucial role in the emergence of key natural-scientific fields, including geography and ecology.

The relation (ratio) between humankind and infinity. The Logos.

Der Kerngedanke der politischen Theorie des Wilhelm von Humboldt ist äußerst schlicht und übersichtlich: In seinen "Ideen zu einem Versuch, die Gränzen der Wirksamkeit des Staats zu bestimmen" heißt es, dass die Funktion des Staats auf die Erhaltung der inneren und auswärtigen Sicherheit beschränkt werden soll. Diese Staatsauffassung findet ihre Begründung in einer Anthropologie, die dem Menschen das Recht und zugleich die Aufgabe zuweist, durch das spontane Zusammenwirken mit den anderen seine Potenzialitäten zur Entfaltung zu bringen. Schlicht und übersichtlich (...) wie diese Staats- und Menschenlehre auch scheinen mag, ist es an ihr außerordentlich interessant, einerseits welche Leitgedanken ihr zugrunde liegen, und andererseits welche theoretischen Neuigkeiten sie erzielt. Hier möchte ich insbesondere vier Aspekte hervorheben: 1- Individualismus: Der Angelpunkt der gesamten Philosophie Humboldts ist das Individuum, aus dem allerdings nie ein selbstgenügsames Subjekt wird; 2- Liberalismus: Humboldt formuliert als erster den Katalog der Motive des Liberalismus des 19. Jahrhunderts; 3- Gesetzmäßigkeitsprinzip: im Sinne seiner Ausformulierung des Rechts- und Freiheitsbegriffs erarbeitet Humboldt ein Gesetzmäßigkeitsprinzip anthropologischen Charakters; 4- Legitimationsprinzip: in Anlehnung an die Prämissen, aus denen sich das neue Gesetzmäßigkeitsprinzip ergibt, setzt Humboldt ein neues Legitimationsprinzip, das unserem Begriffspaar „materielle Verfassung-formelle Verfassung“ sehr ähnelt. (shrink)

This article was originally published in January 2007 on the online version of the journal “Rivista della scuola superiore dell'economia e delle finanze”. Since the journal’s webpage does not exist anymore, I have uploaded a PDF of the article as it was published in January 2007. In questo articolo esamino l'idea humboldtiana di progresso. Più precisamente, ricostruisco come Wilhelm von Humboldt teorizzi il progresso del singolo individuo, del cittadino e del genere umano. Secondo la mia ricostruzione, l’idea humboldtiana di (...) progresso presenta un intreccio di motivi illuministi, storicisti e antirazionalisti, ed esige una riforma dello stato in senso liberale. La mia tesi è che, tuttavia, il pensiero politico di Humboldt sfoci in un conservatorismo non liberale che in quanto tale spalanca uno iato tra il sistema istituzionale auspicato e la possibilità di progresso. (shrink)

Verteilungsgerechtigkeit befasst sich mit der Verteilung von Gütern innerhalb einer Gruppe, wobei verschiedene Verteilungsprinzipien und -ergebnisse als mögliche Ideale einer solchen Verteilung verhandelt werden. Diese normativen Ansätze sind oft rein verbal formuliert, wodurch ihre Anwendung auf unterschiedliche konkrete Verteilungssituationen, die hinsichtlich ihrer Gerechtigkeit beurteilt werden sollen, häufig schwer fällt. Eine Möglichkeit, fein abgestufte Gerechtigkeitsbeurteilungen verschiedener Verteilungen präzise erfassen zu können, besteht in der formalen Modellierung solcher Ideale durch Maße oder Indizes. Die Auswahl eines geeigneten Maßes, das ein gewisses Ideal abbilden (...) soll, muss ihrerseits eine Fundierung erfahren, was durch die Forderung von begründeten Axiomen erreicht werden kann, denen ein Maß genügen soll. In der vorliegenden Arbeit werden solche Axiome für Maße der Verteilungsgerechtigkeit am Beispiel von Bedarfsgerechtigkeit eingeführt. Ferner werden exemplarische Maße der Bedarfsgerechtigkeit vorgestellt. Damit wird für die Beurteilung und Modellierung von Maßen der Verteilungsgerechtigkeit eine erste diskutable Grundlage gelegt. (shrink)

Im politischen Denken des Wilhelm von Humboldt findet eine konservative Wende statt: Von den radikalen Freiheitsansprüchen der Frühschriften bleibt in den Denkschriften des späten Staatsmannes kaum noch etwas erhalten. In diesem Band wird Humboldts konservative Wende textimmanent freigelegt, historisch situiert und systematisch ergründet. Insbesondere wird Humboldts Konservatismus auf seine zunehmende Angst vor der Demokratie zurückgeführt, was nach seinem Verständnis das schädliche Ergebnis der neuzeitlichen Vernunftrechts- und Vertragslehre darstellt. Aus diesem Grund wird Humboldts konservative Wende letzthin durch seine bereits in (...) der Frühproduktion anzutreffende zweifache Kritik an Rationalismus und Kontraktualismus beleuchtet. (shrink)

In recent decades, Western philosophy, including personalism, has had to face the question of how to respect the otherness of the personal Other, a challenge issued most famously by Emmanuel Levinas. In his Totality and Infinity, Levinas's conclusions about alterity are stark. The Other is beyond all conceptualization and precedes my activity as a subject. It is the Other who founds my own independent subjectivity as an "I."1 These are indeed radical conclusions, but they raise the question, Does the very (...) term Other itself fully capture the alterity Levinas wishes to do justice to? The term Other (autrui) has a certain unavoidable generality and abstractness to it. Any person who is not myself, the world's population minus one, can be referred to by this term. Yet the Other is always richly distinguished in each case, for each Other is unique. I will argue that the personalist philosophy of Dietrich von Hildebrand reveals that the alterity of the Other rests on the more fundamental uniqueness of the content of our personhood. This content, which is a value, is disclosed in love, and it is indicated in the personal name. It is the name that, better than the term Other, captures the alterity of the personal Other. (shrink)

Friedrich Stadler und sein Team schließen über 40 Jahre nach Präsentation der ersten beiden Bände das von Rudolf Haller initiierte Projekt einer umfassenden Werkschau Otto Neuraths (1882–1945) ab. In acht Bänden wird auf fast 5.000 Seiten das Schaffen eines Polyhistors dokumentiert und zugänglich gemacht, dessen intellektueller Spannweite man nicht einmal gerecht wird, wenn man ihn als Philosophen, Nationalökonomen, Gesellschaftstechniker und Aufklärer bezeichnet.

Die folgende Untersuchung nimmt eine informationsethische und anthropologische Perspektive ein und legt einen Schwerpunkt auf die Informations- und Kommunikationstechnologien (IKT) im Gesundheitsbereich. Zunächst beschreiben und problematisieren wir das Feld der Informationsethik, das im Wesentlichen heute als Ethik von umfassenden, digitalen Computersystemen als informationsprozessierenden Maschinen verstanden wird (Kap. 2). Im zweiten, anthropologischen Schritt untersuchen wir, wie informationelle Gesundheitstechnologien das menschliche Selbstverständnis beeinflussen (Kap. 3). Dies leitet über zur ethischen Fragestellung, die Überwachung, Kontrolle und Autonomie als Brennpunkte des Gesundheitsbereichs fokussiert (Kap. 4). (...) Zuletzt geben wir als Ausblick einige Hinweise, wie eine dezidiert theologische Perspektive auf die Herausforderungen aussehen kann (Kap. 5). -- Puzio, Anna/Filipovic, Alexander: Personen als Informationsbündel? Informationsethische Perspektiven auf den Gesundheitsbereich. In: Fritz, Alexis/Mandry, Christof/Proft, Ingo/Schuster, Josef (Hg.): Mensch-Maschine-Interaktion. Anthropologische und ethische Herausforderungen neuer Entwicklungen im Gesundheitsbereich (Jahrbuch für Moraltheologie, 5). Freiburg: Herder 2021, S. 89–114. (shrink)

[ENGLISH] The present article is a contribution to the development of metrological structural realism. This position of philosophy of science goes back to Matthias Neuber, who introduces it as a third variation of the main structural realisms: epistemic structural realism and ontic structural realism. Here, Neuber attempts to tackle the problems of OSR and ESR while preserving their respective strengths. Of central importance to his approach, are the concepts of invariance, structure and, especially, measurement. Starting from Eino Kaila’s „non-linguistic, realist (...) account of logical empricism“, the present article investigates the necessity of yet another position of structural realism. The established structural realisms are examined for their strengths and weaknesses. Afterwards, the requirements on MSR are formulated in a way that extends beyond Neuber’s account. These requirements are of ontological, epistemological and metrological nature. -/- [DEUTSCH] Der vorliegende Aufsatz ist ein Beitrag zur Entwicklung des Metrologischen Strukturenrealismus. Diese Wissenschaftstheoretische Position geht auf Matthias Neuber zurück, der sie als dritte Spielart zwischen den großen Strukturenrealismen – dem Epistemischen Strukturenrealismus und dem Ontischen Strukturenrealismus – ansiedelt. Neuber versucht, die wissenschaftstheoretischen Probleme von ESR und OSR anzugehen, gleichzeitig aber ihre jeweiligen Stärken beizubehalten. Dabei sind die Konzepte der Invarianz, der Struktur und besonders der Messung von zentraler Bedeutung. Ausgehend von Eino Kailas „non-linguistic, realist account of logical empiricism“ untersucht der vorliegende Aufsatz die Notwendigkeit einer weiteren strukturenrealistischen Position. Dazu werden die etablierten Strukturenrealismen auf ihre Stärken und Schwächen hin untersucht. Es folgt eine Ausformulierung der Forderungen an den MSR, die über die Darstellung bei Neuber hinaus geht. Diese Forderungen sind ontologischer, epistemischer und metrologischer Natur. (shrink)

Wie können Philosoph/innen mit der Bedrohung der akademischen Freiheit umgehen, die von rechtspopulistischen Strömungen (in Deutschland, Europa und weltweit) und autoritären Staaten (wie der Türkei und Ungarn) ausgeht? – Diese Frage stand im Zentrum der Podiumsdiskussion „Bedrohtes Denken“, die während des DGPhil Kongresses in Berlin am Tag der Bundestagswahl 2017 stattfand. Es war eine Diskussion, deren Ende von der bedrückenden Nachricht überschattet wurde, die rechtsextreme AfD werde drittstärkste Kraft im neuen Bundestag. Angesichts dieses zutiefst beunruhigenden Wahlergebnisses glauben wir, dass es (...) wichtig ist, diese Diskussion weiterzuführen. Dieser Kommentar soll dazu einen Anstoß geben. (shrink)

Unter dem Dach der Philosophie gingen empirische Forschung und normative Theorie lange Zeit Hand in Hand, bis sie spätestens um die Zeit der Emanzipation der Einzelwissenschaften in eine schwierige, nicht immer eindeutig bestimmbare Beziehung zueinander traten; dieses unterbestimmte Verhältnis tritt uns vor dem Hintergrund aktueller Debatten wieder entgegen. Das zeigt sich zum Beispiel auch bei Fragen der Ethik: In den letzten Jahrzehnten zeigten verschiedene wissenschaftliche Disziplinen verstärktes Interesse an empirischen Bemühungen um ein deskriptives Verständnis von Moral. Hier gibt es nach (...) wie vor eine starke Trennung zwischen den Bereichen der normativen Theorie einerseits und der empirischen Forschung andererseits, wobei in beiden Bereichen dazu tendiert wird, die jeweils anderen Diskurse zu vernachlässigen, wobei Unklarheit über die Möglichkeiten und Grenzen einer fruchtbaren Integration herrscht. Auf der anderen Seite gibt es jüngst auch verschiedene Versuche einer Integration beider Domänen. – Dies macht einen Diskurs über die Bestimmung des Verhältnisses von empirischer Forschung und normativer Theorie nötig, was in diesem Band aus verschiedenen historischen sowie systematischen Perspektiven geleistet wird. (shrink)

In assessing the veridicality of utterances, we normally seem to assess the satisfaction of conditions that the speaker had been concerned to get right in making the utterance. However, the debate about assessor-relativism about epistemic modals, predicates of taste, gradable adjectives and conditionals has been largely driven by cases in which seemingly felicitous assessments of utterances are insensitive to aspects of the context of utterance that were highly relevant to the speaker’s choice of words. In this paper, we offer an (...) explanation of why certain locutions invite insensitive assessments, focusing primarily on ’tasty’ and ’might’. We spell out some reasons why felicitous insensitive assessments are puzzling and argue briefly that recent attempts to accommodate such assessments (including attempts by John MacFarlane, Kai von Fintel and Anthony Gillies) all fail to provide more than hints at a solution to the puzzle. In the main part of the paper, we develop an account of felicitous insensitive assessments by identifying a number of pragmatic factors that influence the felicity of assessments. Before closing, we argue that the role of these factors extend beyond cases considered in the debate about assessor-relativism and fit comfortably with standard contextualist analyses of the relevant locutions. (shrink)

Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767-1835) is rightly regarded as a thinker who extended the development of the so-called expressivist conception of language and world that Johann Georg Hamann (1730-1788) and especially Johann Gottfried Herder (1744-1803) initially articulated. Being immersed as Humboldt was in the intellectual climate of German Romanticism, he aimed not only to provide a systematic foundation for how he believed linguistic research as a science should be conducted, but also to attempt to rectify what he saw as (...) the deficiencies of Kant’s philosophical system. My aim in this paper is to show how an expressivist thinker like Humboldt has the conceptual resources from within his own framework and, perhaps surprisingly, with some help from the 20th century philosopher of language and mind, Donald Davidson, to reject a criticism commonly made against expressivist conceptions of language and world. This is the charge that this sort of expressivism threatens the objectivity of the world by emphasizing the role of language in the constitution and disclosure of the world. Cristina Lafont makes just this charge against Humboldt (and other philosophers in the German expressivist-hermeneutic tradition). Specifically, she argues that expressivist philosophers of language are all ultimately committed to some pernicious form of linguistic idealism and relativism. In this paper, I first present Humboldt’s reflections on language and give some textual evidence for why he is often read – mistakenly in my view – as a linguistic idealist and relativist. Second, I briefly sketch Lafont’s charge of linguistic idealism and relativism against Humboldt. Third and finally, I show how she misunderstands Humboldt’s expressivist conception of language and world by connecting my rebuttal to her criticism with Davidson’s argument that successful communication does not require the sharing of explicit rules or conventions that govern in advance the use and understanding of words. (shrink)

In this paper I trace the manner in which Herder’s philosophy of language grounds his approach to hermeneutical issues regarding history, interpretation, and translation. Herder’s approach to the question of language has been repeatedly lauded for its important influence on the later work done by Schleiermacher, Dilthey, and Gadamer, but in this discussion I am going to put him more directly in conversation with Wilhelm von Humboldt. Although recent critics have derided Humboldt’s theory as both derivative and wrong, (...) I will argue that we should instead recognize that Humboldt’s philosophy of language represents a significant development of Herder’s thesis. This development is accomplished by way of Humboldt’s application of Kant’s mature theory of reason to a program for comparative linguistics. In Humboldt’s hands, this amounts to a new strain of philosophical anthropology. (shrink)

Der berühmte Ameisenmann E.O. Wilson war schon immer einer meiner Helden - nicht nur ein hervorragender Biologe, sondern eine der winzigen und verschwindenden Minderheit von Intellektuellen, die es zumindest wagt, die Wahrheit über unsere Natur anzudeuten, die andere nicht verstehen oder, soweit sie es verstehen, aus politischen Gründen unermüdlich vermeiden. Leider beendet er seine lange Karriere auf äußerst schäbige Weise als Partei eines ignoranten und arroganten Angriffs auf die Wissenschaft, der zumindest teilweise durch die religiöse Inbrunst seiner Harvard-Kollegenmotiviertist. Es zeigt (...) die abscheulichen Folgen, wenn Universitäten Geld von religiösen Gruppen annehmen, Wissenschaftszeitschriften von großen Namen so bewundert sind, dass sie eine ordnungsgemäße Peer Review vermeiden und wenn Egos außer Kontrolle geraten dürfen. Es führt uns in die Natur der Evolution, die Grundlagen der wissenschaftlichen Methodik, wie Mathematik mit Wissenschaft zusammenhängt, was eine Theorie ausmacht, und sogar, welche Einstellungen zu Religion und Großzügigkeit angemessen sind, wenn wir uns unaufhaltsam dem Zusammenbruch der industriellen Zivilisation nähern. Ich fand Abschnitte in 'Conquest' mit dem üblichen prägnanten Kommentar (obwohl nichts wirklich Neues oder Interessantes, wenn man seine anderen Werke gelesen hat und auf biologie im Allgemeinen ist) in der oftgestylten Prosa, die sein Markenzeichen ist, aber war ziemlich überrascht, dass der Kern des Buches seine Ablehnung inklusiver Fitness (die seit über 50 Jahren ein Standbein der Evolutionsbiologie ist) zugunsten der Gruppenauswahl ist. Man nimmt an, dass von ihm kommen und mit den articles er bezieht sich auf veröffentlicht von sich selbst und Harvard Mathematik Kollege Nowak in großen Peer-Review-Zeitschriften wie Nature, muss es ein wesentlicher Fortschritt sein,, trotz der Tatsache, dass ich wusste, Gruppenauswahl wurde fast überall abgelehnt, da mit jeder großen Rolle in der Evolution. Ich habe zahlreiche Rezensionen im Netz gelesen und viele haben gute Kommentare, aber die, die ich am meisten sehen wollte, war, dass von renommierten Wissenschaftsautor und Evolutionsbiologe Richard Dawkins. Im Gegensatz zu den meisten von Fachleuten, die in Zeitschriften nur für diejenigen mit Zugang zu einer Universität zur Verfügung stehen, ist es leicht im Netz verfügbar, obwohlanscheinend, entschied er sich, es nicht in einer Zeitschrift zu veröffentlichen, da es angemessen abscheulich ist. Leider findet man eine vernichtende Ablehnung des Buches und den acerbic Kommentar über einen wissenschaftlichen Kollegen, den ich je von Dawkins gesehen habe -- über alles in seinem vielen Austausch mit dem verstorbenen und unbeklagten Demagogen und Pseudowissenschaftler Stephan Jay Gould. Obwohl Gould für seine persönlichen Angriffe auf seinen Harvard-Kollegen Wilson berüchtigt war, stellt Dawkins fest, dass ein Großteil von "Conquest" einen unbequem an Goulds häufige Verfehlungen in "bland, unfocussed ecumenicalis" erinnert. Dasselbe gilt mehr oder weniger für Wilsons populäres Schreiben, einschließlich seines jüngsten Buches "The Meaning of Human Existence" – eine weitere schamlose Eigenwerbung seiner diskreditierten Ideen zu Inklusiver Fitness (IF). Dawkins weist darauf hin, dass das berüchtigte 2010-Papier von Nowak, Tarnita und Wilson in Nature von über 140 Biologen, die einen Brief unterzeichnet haben, fast überall abgelehnt wurde und dass es in Wilsons Buch kein Wort darüber gibt. Auch in den folgenden 4 Jahren mit Artikeln, Vorträgen und mehreren Büchern haben sie dies nicht korrigiert. Es gibt keine andere Wahl, als Dawkins trenchant Kommentar zuzustimmen: "Für Wilson nicht zu zugeben, dass er für sich selbst gegen die große Mehrheit seiner professionellen Kollegen spricht - es schmerzt mich, dies von einem lebenslangen Helden zu sagen -- ein Akt mutwilligen Arroganz." Angesichts von Nowaks späterem Verhalten muss man ihn auch einbeziehen. Ich habe das Gefühl, dass einer der fassungslosen Menschen, die man im Fernsehen sieht, interviewt wird, nachdem der nette Mann von nebenan, der seit 30 Jahren alle Kinder babysitten, als Serienmörder entlarvt wird. Dawkins weist auch darauf hin (wie er und andere seit vielen Jahren), dass inklusive Fitness mit dem Neo-Darwinismus (d.h. logischerweise folgt) entsteht und nicht abgelehnt werden kann, ohne die Evolution selbst abzulehnen. Wilson erinnert uns erneut an Gould, der Kreationisten von der einen Seite seines Mundes anprangerte, während er ihnen Trost spendete, indem er endlosen ultraliberalen marxistisch gefärbten Kauderwelsch über Spandrels, unterbrochenes Gleichgewicht und Evolutionspsychologie von der anderen ausspeist. Die Unbestimmtheit und mathematische Opazität (für die meisten von uns) der Mathematik der Gruppen- oder Mehrebenenauswahl ist genau das, was die Sanftmütigen ihnen ermöglichen wollen, dem rationalen Denken in ihren endlosen antiwissenschaftlichen Gerüchten und (in der Wissenschaft) postmodernen Wortsalate zu entkommen. Schlimmer noch, Wilsons "Eroberung" ist ein schlecht durchdachtes und schlampig geschriebenes Durcheinander voller Nonsequiturs, vager Streifzüge, Verwirrungen und Inkohärenz. Eine gute Bewertung, die einige davon im Detail ist, dass von Absolvent Gerry Carter, die Sie im Netz finden können. Wilson hat auch nichts mit unserem gegenwärtigen Verständnis der Evolutionspsychologie (EP) zu tun (siehe z.B. die letzten 300 Seiten von Pinkers 'The Better Angels of our Nature'). Wenn Sie eine seriöse Buchlänge Bericht über die soziale Evolution und einige relevante EP von einem Experten wollen, siehe 'Principles of Social Evolution' von Andrew F.G. Bourke, oder ein nicht ganz so ernster und zugegebenermaßen fehlerhafter und irrender Bericht, aber ein Muss,das Robert Trivers dennoch lesen muss—'The Folly of Fools: The Logic of Deceit and Self-Deception in Human Life' und ältere, aber immer noch aktuelle und durchdringende Werke wie 'The Evolutionof Cooperation':Revised Edition by Robert Axelrod and 'The Biology ofMoral Systems' von Richard Alexander. (shrink)

The aim of this text, derived from an investigation, is to propose a reflection on the future of the university, from the problematization of the neoliberal rationality impact on the forms of knowledge production and organization of academic life. To develop this analysis, the main transformations of the modern university since its advent with the founding of the Berlin University by Wilhelm von Humboldt, in 1810, who created the model of the research university, until the emergence of the neoliberal (...) university model. The purpose of the article is to highlight the rationalities that govern the transformation of the university over time. This historical analysis attempts to demonstrate that no model can be considered natural, absolute, inevitable, non-negotiable, and that and that the university as an institution is inhabited by a mixture of contradictory rationalities. To conclude, the Derrida's essay (2001), is used to show that the uncontested adoption of the neoliberal model can destroy the autonomy of research and teaching that until today characterized the modern university, and compromise its mission in the future. (shrink)

In seiner ‘Existenzerhellung der Freiheit’ reflektiert Jaspers, das Problemfeld der Freiheit in einem Kontrast zu den Begriffen, Phänomenen und Bedingungen der Unfreiheit und der Grenzen der Freiheit. Dem Problemfeld der Freiheit kann man im Denken und Handeln nur dann gerecht werden, wenn man nicht nur zwischen den verschiedenen Begriffen und Phänomenen der Freiheit unterscheidet, sondern auch zwischen den verschiedenen Begriffen und Phänomenen von Grenzen der Freiheit, wie z.B. durch die allgemeine Naturgesetzlichkeit und die menschliche Natur, durch besondere Bedingungen in Natur, (...) Kultur und Gesellschaft, durch gesundheitliches Befinden und individuelle Persönlichkeit, durch situative Begrenzungen, normative Forderungen und konkrete Grenzsituationen, wie z.B. von Leiden, Kampf, Schuld, Wagnis und Tod zeigen. Jaspers hat sich zum Problemfeld der Freiheit sowohl in seiner Allgemeinen Psychopathologie, in seinen pathographischen Untersuchungen, in seiner Psychologie der Weltanschauung und in einigen seiner philosophischen Schriften geäußert. Im zweiten Band seines frühen Hauptwerkes Philosophie mit dem Titel Existenzerhellung hat er jedoch eine umfassende Abhandlung zu dem komplexen Problemfeld der Freiheit verfasst. Dort behandelt Jaspers fast alle wesentlichen Begriffe und Phänomene der Freiheit bis hin zu seiner Konzeption einer existenziellen Freiheit. Jaspers geht anfangs von einem unbestimmten Begriff der Freiheit aus, dem kein bestimmtes Phänomen entspricht und der deswegen nur Illusionen erzeugen und einem ideologischem Denken dienen kann. Dann aber unterscheidet Jaspers zwischen verschiedenen Begriffen und Phänomenen der Freiheit. Dabei scheint er nicht nur wie die meisten zeitgenössischen Philosophen an Locke und Hume, Kant und Brentano, Wilhelm von Humboldt und John Stuart Mill anzuknüpfen, sondern auch an die Konzeptionen des Selbstbewusstseins bei Hegel, Fichte und Schelling. Da sich Jaspers nicht zuletzt auch mit den Schriften von Kierkegaard und Nietzsche auseinandergesetzt hat, gelangt er zu einer besonders umfangreichen und differenzierten Diskussion des ganzen Problemfeldes der Freiheit in der Moderne. Jaspers hat jedoch nicht nur verschiedene Freiheitsbegriffe und -phänomene unterschieden, sondern er hat auch zu den überlieferten Denkweisen im Form einer existenzphilosophischen Erhellung der Freiheit Stellung genommen. Dabei hat Jaspers’ Stellungnahme anders als viele zeitgenössische Beiträge über Freiheit und Determinimus den deutlichen und bewahrenswerten Vorzug, dass sie die unverfügbare und irreduzible Subjektivität der Willensfreiheit anerkennt. Damit knüpft Jaspers an Kants Einsicht an, dass der Freiheit des menschlichen Willens und ihrer praktischen Wirksamkeit immer nur die subjektive Evidenz inneren Erlebens zukommen kann. Dies unterscheidet sie von der Wahl- und Handlungsfreiheit, die man auch in konkreten Handlungssituationen objektiv feststellen kann. Der Freiheit des menschlichen Willens kommt damit weder die Objektivität empirischer Erkenntnis noch metaphysische Notwendigkeit zu. Die subjektive Evidenz des Erlebens eines freien Willens spricht nach Jaspers jedoch auch gegen einen weltanschaulichen, methodischen oder metaphysischen Determinismus, der sie aufgrund seiner Annahme einer kausal geschlossenen Wirklichkeit leichtfertig für eine bloße Illusion hält. Eine deterministische Weltanschauung oder Philosophie kann der condition humaine zumindest dann nicht gerecht werden, wenn sie die evidente Subjektivität eines freien Willens nicht auf eine plausible Art und Weise integriert. Jaspers’ wird der potentiellen Freiheit des menschlichen Willens dadurch gerecht, dass er ihre unverfügbare und irreduzible Subjektivität versteht und akzeptiert und erst gar nicht den abwegigen Versuch macht, sie durch eine objektivierende Einstellung zu objektivieren, wissenschaftlich zu erklären oder gar zu beweisen. (shrink)

This chapter situates Karl Marx’s dissertation The Difference between the Democritean and Epicurean Philosophy of Nature (1841) within his intellectual biography. It explores the role of a German ideal known as Bildung, translated as “education”, “cultivation” or “culture”, within Marx’s classical education in the Gymnasium and the dissertation itself. Both Wilhelm von Humboldt, who reformed the Gymnasium curriculum prior to Marx’s attendance, and philosopher G.W.F. Hegel have classically inspired notions of Bildung. Each presents the white European man as the (...) model for this “education” or “cultivation”. This chapter argues that the dissertation assimilates Epicurus and his atom into this Eurocentric paradigm, with Marx taking for granted his predecessors’ racist teleology of history and applying their conception of the individual to the atom. Then, it addresses the dissertation’s influence in the development of historical materialism, a facet of Marxism already critiqued for its Eurocentrism. This chapter concludes by showing how non-White and non-Western Marxists have updated Marxist thought through constant critique of its Eurocentrism instead of abandoning its revolutionary vision. It suggests that Marxism is relevant to scholars of antiquity not because of the dissertation but the tradition’s self-interrogation of its foundational ideas and persistent focus on improving the conditions of the marginalised. (shrink)

Austria, by the end of the nineteenth century, clearly lagged behind its more developed Western neighbours in matters of intellect and science. The Empire had witnessed a relatively late process of urbanization, bringing also a late development of those liberal habits and values which would seem to be a presupposition of the modern, scientific attitude. It therefore lacked institutions of scientific research of the sort that had been founded in Germany since the time of von Humboldt. On the other (...) hand, as more liberal ways began to be established in Austria - effectively in the second half of the nineteenth century - the desire to enjoy the trappings of a modern enlightened culture made itself felt. The Austrians were not of course in a position to summon forth the means to create reputable institutions and traditions of science in the narrow sense, and this created a vacuum which the theory of a practice so attractively pursued elsewhere could then fill. (shrink)

In this essay Ernst Cassirer addresses two currents of the philosophical reflection about man and culture that emerged at the end of the 18th century. Th e naturalistic one, conceives of man and culture as an outcome of the processes that takes place beyond the reach of human will and consciousness. Among such naturalistically oriented philosophies Cassirer includes Hegel’s idealism, Taine’s positivism and Spengler’s psychologism. All of them imply a characteristic kind of historical fatalism. In opposition to such a deterministic (...) vision of human development stands a philosophy that emphasizes the importance of individual decision and responsibility for the course of history. Cassirer names it “humanistic” as it places man in the very middle of its research. The initiators of this tradition were Johann Gottfried Herder and Wilhelm von Humboldt, foremost representatives of the German romantic movement. The philosopher who took up their humanistic thought and elevated it to the importance of a distinct knowledge was Wilhelm Dilthey. While bearing in mind who is the real creator of culture all these thinkers pay special attention to the question of man’s responsibility for culture as well as for himself. The problem of human responsibility that totally escaped the attention of naturalistically oriented philosophers is somehow a distinguishing characteristic of all humanistic philosophies of culture. (shrink)

The investigation that I am going to pursue here is part of a larger effort on my part to understand the relationship between Kant’s so-called “philosophical anthropology” and the development of early German anthropology since it is my sense that Kant had a determinate, if indirect, effect on the history of that separate field. For now this larger project has three main foci: an account of Kant’s philosophical anthropology in all its parts, an inquiry into Kant’s relationship to the theories (...) engaged by German anthropologists between roughly the 1750s-1790s, and finally, an effort to track the subsequent routes taken by German anthropology in the first half of the 19th-c. In this discussion I am going look at one particular trajectory in anthropological research where we can see Kant’s effect. (shrink)

In der musikalischen Methode der kollektiven Improvisation kommt eine Spielauffassung zum Ausdruck, deren demokratisch-emanzipatorische Grundeinstellung Vergleiche mit dem von Jürgen Habermas formulierten Konzept der idealen Sprechsituation nahe legt. Diese Vermutung wird im Rahmen einer einleitenden Annäherung an die kollektive Improvisation als von Interaktivität und Synchronizität geprägtes Beziehungsgeschehen näher ausgeführt. Nach einer Diskussion des improvisatorischen Handelns in der Musik in Bezug auf theoretische, historische und psychologische Aspekte werden die verschiedenen, aus dem Free Jazz der 1960er Jahre hervorgegangenen Entwicklungsstufen der freien bzw. (...) kollektiven Improvisation dargestellt. Im Anschluss daran wird die Kollektiv-Improvisation unter Bezugnahme auf das Konzept der idealen Sprechsituation diskutiert und im interkulturellen Kontext verortet, wobei die von Musikern wie Derek Bailey geforderte Sublimierung idiomatischer, kulturell geprägter Ausdrucksformen durch die individuelle Entwicklung einer charakteristischen Klangsprache am Instrument als egalisierend für die tendenziell asymmetrisch geprägten Dialogformen dieser Situation erläutert wird. Inklusive Interviews mit Evan Parker, Alexander von Schlippenbach und Joe Fonda. (shrink)

● Sergio Cremaschi, The non-existing Island. I discuss the way in which the cleavage between the Continental and the Anglo-American philosophies originated, the (self-)images of both philosophical worlds, the converging rediscoveries from the Seventies, as well as recent ecumenic or anti-ecumenic strategies. I argue that pragmatism provides an important counter-instance to both the familiar self-images and to the fashionable ecumenic or anti-ecumenic strategies. My conclusions are: (i) the only place where Continental philosophy exists (as Euro-Communism one decade ago) is America; (...) (ii) less obviously, also analytic philosophy does not exist, or does no more exist as a current or a paradigm; what does exist is, on the one hand, philosophy of language and, on the other, philosophy of mind, that is, two disciplines; (iii) the dissolution of analytic philosophy as a school has been extremely fruitful, precisely in so far as it has left room for disciplines and research programmes; (iv) what is left, of the Anglo-American/Continental cleavage is primarily differences in styles, depending partly on intellectual traditions, partly owing to sociology, history, institutional frameworks; these differences should not be blurred by rash ecumenism; besides, theoretical differences are alive as ever, but within both camps; finally, there is indeed a lag (not a difference) in the appropriation of intellectual techniques by most schools of 'Continental' philosophy, and this should be overcome through appropriation of what the best 'analytic' philosophers have produced. ● Michael Strauss, Language and sense-perception: an aspect of analytic philosophy. To test an assertion about one fact by comparing it with perceived reality seems quite unproblematic. But the very possibility of such a procedure is incompatible with the intellectualistic basis of logical positivism and atomism (as it is for example to be found in Russell's Analysis of Mind). According to the intellectualistic approach pure sensation is meaningless. Sensation receives its meaning and order from the intellect through interpretation, which is performed with the help of linguistic tools, i.e. words and sentences. Before being interpreted, sensation is not a picture or a representation, it is neither true nor false, neither an illusion nor knowledge; it does not tell us anything; it is a lifeless and order-less matter. But how can a thought (or a proposition) be compared with such a lifeless matter? This difficulty confronts the intellectualist, if on the one hand he admits the necessity of comparing thought with sense-perception, and on the other hand presupposes that we possess only intellectual and no immediate perceptual understanding of what we see and hear. In this paper I give a critical exposition of three attempts, made by Russell, Neurath and Wittgenstein, to solve this problem. The first attempt adheres to strict conventionalism, the second tends to naturalism and the third leads to an amended, very moderate version of conventionalism. This amended conventionalism looks at sense impressions as being a peculiar language, which includes primary symbols, i.e. symbols not founded on convention and not being in need of interpretation. ● Ernst Tugendhat, Phenomenology and language analysis. The paper, first published in German in 1970, by which Tugendhat gave a start to the German rediscovery of analytic philosophy. The author stages a confrontation between phenomenology and language analysis. He argues that language analysis does not differ from phenomenology as far as the topics dealt with are concerned; instead, both currents are quite different in method. The author argues that language-analytic philosophy does not simply lay out of the mainstream of transcendental philosophy, but that instead it challenges this tradition on the very level of foundations. The author criticizes the linguistic-analytic approach centred on the subject as well as any object-centred approach, while proposing inter-subjective understanding through language as the new universal framework. This is, when construed in so general terms, the same program of hermeneutics, though in a more basic version. ● Jürgen Habermas, Language game, intention and meaning. On a few suggestions by Sellars and Wittgenstein. The paper, first published in German in 1975, in which Habermas announces his own linguistic turn through a discovery of speech acts. In this essay the author wants to work out a categorical framework for a communicative theory of society; he takes Wittgenstein's concept of language game as a Leitfade and, besides, he takes advantage also of Wilfried Sellars's quasi-transcendental account of the genesis of intentionality. His goal is to single out the problems connected with a theory of consciousness oriented in a logical-linguistic sense. ● Zvie Bar-On, Isomorphism of speech acts and intentional states. This essay presents the problem of the formal relationship between speech acts and intentional states as an essential part of the perennial philosophical question of the relation between language and thought. I attempt to show how this problem had been dealt with by two prominent philosophers of different camps in our century, Edmund Husserl and John Searle. Both of them wrote extensively about the theory of intentionality. I point out an interesting, as it were unintended, continuity of their work on that theory. Searle started where Husserl left off 80 years earlier. Their meeting point could be used as the first clue in our search. They both adopted in effect the same distinction between two basic aspects of the intentional experience: its content or matter, and its quality or mode. Husserl did not yet have the concept of a speech act as contradistinguished from an intentional state. The working hypothesis, however, which he suggested, could be used as a second clue for the further elaboration of the theory. The relationship of the two levels, the mental and the linguistic, which remained for Husserl in the background only, became the cornerstone of Searle' s inquiry. He employed the speech act as the model and analysed the intentional experience by means of the conceptual apparatus of his own theory of speech acts. This procedure enabled him to mark out a number of parallelisms and correlations between the two levels. This procedure explains the phenomenon of the partial isomorphism of speech acts and intentional states. ● Roberta de Monticelli, Ontology. A dialogue among the linguistic philosopher, the naturalist, and the phenomenological philosopher. This paper proposes a comparison between two main ways of conceiving the role and scope of that fundamental part of philosophy (or of "first" philosophy) which is traditionally called "ontology". One way, originated within the analytic tradition, consists of two main streams, namely philosophy of language and (contemporary) philosophy of mind, the former yielding "reduced ontology" and the latter "neo-Aristotelian ontology". The other way of conceiving ontology is exemplified by "phenomenological ontology" (more precisely, the Husserlian, not the Heideggerian version). Ontology as a theory of reference ("reduced" ontology, or ontology as depending on semantics) is presented and justified on the basis of some classical thesis of traditional philosophy of language (from Frege to Quine). "Reduced ontology" is shown to be identifiable with one level of a traditional, Aristotelian ontology, namely the one which corresponds to one of the four "senses of being" listed in Aristotle's Metaphysics: "being" as "being true". This identification is justified on the basis of Franz Brentano's "rules for translation" of the Aristotelian table of judgements in terms of (positive and negative) existential judgments such as are easily translatable into sentences of first order predicate logic. The second part of the paper is concerned with "neo-Aristotelian ontology", i.e. with naturalism and physicalism as the main ontological options underlying most of contemporary discussion in the philosophy of mind. The qualification of such options as "neo-Aristotelian" is justified; the relationships between "neo-Aristotelian ontology" and "reduced ontology" are discussed. In the third part the fundamental tenet of "phenomenological ontology" is identified by the thesis that a logical theory of existence and being does capture a sense of "existing" and "being" which, even though not the basic one, is grounded in the basic one. An attempt is done of further clarifying this "more basic" sense of "being". An argument making use of this supposedly "more basic" sense is advanced in favour of a "phenomenological ontology". ● Kuno Lorenz, Analytic Roots in Dialogic Constructivism. Both in the Vienna Circle ad in Russell's early philosophy the division of knowledge into two kinds (or two levels), perceptual and conceptual, plays a vital role. Constructivism in philosophy, in trying to provide a pragmatic foundation - a knowing-how - to perceptual as well as conceptual competences, discovered that this is dependent on semiotic tools. Therefore, the "principle of method" had to be amended by the "principle of dialogue". Analytic philosophy being an heir of classical empiricism, conceptually grasping the "given", and constructive philosophy being an heir of classical rationalism, perceptually providing the "constructed", merge into dialogical constructivism, a contemporary development of ideas derived especially from the works of Charles S. Peirce (his pragmatic maxim as a means of giving meaning to signs) and of Ludwig Wittgenstein (his language games as tools of comparison for understanding ways of life). 7. Albrecht Wellmer, "Autonomy of meaning" and "principle of charity" from the viewpoint of the pragmatics of language. In this essay I present an interpretation of the principle of the autonomy of meaning and of the principle of charity, the two main principles of Davidson's semantic view of truth, showing how both principles may fit in a perspective dictated by the pragmatics of language. I argue that (I) the principle of the autonomy of meaning may be thoroughly reformulated in terms of the pragmatics of language, (ii) the principle of charity needs a supplement in terms of pragmatics of language in order to become really enlightening as a principle of interpretation. Besides, I argue that: (i) on the one hand, the fundamental thesis of Habermas on the pragmatic theory of meaning ("we understand a speech act when we know what makes it admissible") is correlated with the seemingly intentionalist thesis according to which we understand a speech act when we know what a speaker means; (ii) on the other hand, to say that the meaning competence of a competent speaker is basically a competence about a potential of reasons (or also of possible justifications) which is inherently connected with the meaning of statements, or with their use in utterances. ● Rüdiger Bubner, The convergence of analytic and hermeneutic philosophy This paper argues that the analytic philosophy does not exist, at least as understood by its original programs. Differences in the analytic camp have always been bigger than they were believed to be. Now these differences are coming to the fore thanks to a process of dissolution of dogmatism. Philosophical analysis is led by its own inner logic towards questions that may be fairly qualified as hermeneutic. Recent developments in analytic philosophy, e.g. Davidson, seem to indicate a growing convergence of themes between philosophical analysis and hermeneutics; thus, the familiar opposition of Anglo-Saxon and Continental philosophy might soon belong to history. The fact of an ongoing appropriation of analytical techniques by present-day German philosophers may provide a basis for a powerful argument for the unity of philosophizing, beyond its strained images privileging one technique of thinking and rejecting the remainder. Actual philosophical practice should take the dialogue between the two camps more seriously; in fact, the processes described so far are no danger to philosophical work. They may be a danger for parochial approaches to philosophizing; indeed, contrary to what happens in the natural sciences, Thomas Kuhn's "normal science" developing within the framework of one fixed paradigm is not typical for philosophical thinking. And in philosophy innovating revolutions are symptoms more of vitality than of crisis. ● Karl-Otto Apel, The impact of analytic philosophy on my intellectual biography. In my paper I try to reconstruct the history of my Auseinandersetzung mit - as I called it - "language-analytical" philosophy (including even Peircean semiotics) since the late Fifties. The heuristics of my study was predetermined by two main motives of my beginnings: the hermeneutic turn of phenomenology and the transformation of "transcendental philosophy" in the light of the "language a priori". Thus, I took issue with the early and the later Wittgenstein, logical positivism, and post-Wittgensteinian and post-empiricist philosophy of science (i.e. G.H. von Wright and the renewal of the "explanation vs understanding controversy" as well as the debate between Th. Kuhn and Popper/Lakatos); besides, with speech act theory and the debate about "transcendental arguments" since Strawson. The "pragmatic turn", started already by C.L. Morris and the later Carnap, led me to study also the relationship between Wittgensteinian "use" theory of meaning and of truth. This resulted on my side in something like a program of "transcendental semiotics", i.e. "transcendental pragmatics" and "transcendental hermeneutics". ● Ben-Ami Scharfstein, A doubt on both their houses: the blindness to non-western philosophies. The burden of my criticism is that contemporary European philosophers of all kinds have continued to think as if there were no true philosophy but that of the West. For the most part, the existentialists have been oblivious of their Eastern congeners; the hermeneuticians have yet to stretch their horizons beyond the most familiar ones; and the analysts remain unaware of the analyses and linguistic sensitivities of the ancient non-European philosophers. Briefly, ignorance still blinds almost all contemporary Western philosophers to the rich, variegated philosophical traditions outside of their familiar orbit. Both Continental and Anglo-Americans have lost the breadth of view that once characterized such thinkers as Herder and the Humboldts. The blindness that has resulted is not simply that of individual Western philosophers but of our whole, still parochial philosophical culture. (shrink)

2024 jährt sich der Geburtstag Immanuel Kants, dem neben Hegel, Marx und Wittgenstein wohl bekanntesten deutschen Philosophen, zum 300. Mal. In jüngster Zeit gab es eine Reihe von Veröffentlichungen, in denen behauptet wurde, Kant sei ein „Rassist“ gewesen. Was ist von diesen Vorwürfen zu halten? Diese Frage haben wir Volker Gerhardt, dem Initiator und Mitherausgeber der neuen Akademie Ausgabe der Werke Kants gestellt. Er lehrt als Seniorprofessor an der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. -/- .

What is discrimination and what makes wrongful discrimination wrong? Even after an ever-rising tide of research over the course of the past twenty-five or so years these questions still remain hard to answer. Exercising candid and self-critical hindsight, Larry Alexander, who contributed his fair share to this tide, thus remarked: “All cases of discrimination, if wrongful, are wrongful either because of their quite contingent consequences or perhaps because they are breaches of promises or fiduciary duties.” If this is true (...) it raises serious doubts as to how wrongful discrimination can be a moral wrong in itself. Also, the question comes up as to who it is who breaches a promise or a fiduciary duty. This paper defends the view that the substance of these remarks is better understood by couching them in a political approach towards discrimination. Against this background, they give rise to real and pressing concerns. Once we conceptualise the realm political along Hobbesian lines as the battleground comprising both the private sphere of the individual and the public sphere of the commonwealth it emerges that discrimination has different significance with regard to these respective spheres. In order to illustrate this, I adopt Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen’s descriptive account of discrimination as „differential treatment on the basis of membership of a socially salient group“ and the common view that wrongful discrimination is wrong because it is harmful, disrespectful, or both. In the private sphere the case can be made for morally permissible cases of discrimination. Sexual discrimination due to sexual self-determination with consequently freely choosing your sexual or romantic partner is the central case in point. Where somebody feels unfairly rejected and consequently hurt neither the charge of harm inflicted nor that of disrespect endured need be justified. No “breach of promises or fiduciary duties” is involved. The case is different, however, when it comes to the fiduciary of power. In discriminating, he who exercises the power of the commonwealth necessarily breaches a promise and a fiduciary duty. Discrimination thus appears to be more of a problem of political philosophy than one of applied ethics. [in German] **************************************************************************************************** ******************** Was ist Diskriminierung und warum ist Diskriminierung verwerflich, wenn sie es denn ist? Dies bleibt ungeachtet der seit fünfundzwanzig Jahren anschwellenden Forschungsliteratur unverändert eine harte Nuss. Larry Alexander, der selbst maßgeblich zu dieser Forschungsliteratur beigetragen hat, merkt daher selbstkritisch an: „All cases of discrimination, if wrongful, are wrongful either because of their quite contingent consequences or perhaps because they are breaches of promises or fiduciary duties.“ Wenn dies der Fall ist, stellt sich die Frage, wie moralisch verwerfliche Diskriminierung dann noch an sich verwerflich sein kann. Es stellt sich dann auch die Frage, wer hier ein Versprechen bricht und seine Treuepflichten verletzt. Die leitende Annahme dieses Aufsatzes ist es, dass man dem sachlichen Kern dieser Bedenken Rechnung tragen kann, indem man eine politische Perspektive auf das Phänomen der Diskriminierung einnimmt. Die Bedenken erweisen sich dann als substanziell und zutreffend. Konzeptualisieren wir den Bereich des Politischen mit Thomas Hobbes als das Spannungsfeld, das die private Sphäre des Individuums und die öffentliche Sphäre des Gemeinwesens gegeneinander abgrenzt, wird sichtbar, dass Diskriminierung in diesen Sphären jeweils unterschiedlich zu bewerten ist. Um dies zu verdeutlichen, lege ich Kasper Lippert-Rasmussens deskriptives Verständnis von Diskriminierung als „differential treatment on the basis of membership of a socially salient group“ zugrunde und mache von der in der Diskussion verbreiteten Ansicht Gebrauch, dass das Zufügen von Schaden oder die Verweigerung von Respekt Diskriminierung verwerflich macht. In der privaten Sphäre kann es nun Fälle moralisch zulässiger Diskriminierung geben. Zentral ist die sexuelle Diskriminierung aufgrund der Ausübung einer freien Wahl des eigenen Sexual- oder Liebespartners. Auch wenn sich der Abgewiesene womöglich geschädigt sieht, wird unbilliger Schaden nicht zugefügt und geschul- deter Respekt nicht verweigert. Den Grund finden wir in Alexanders Formel: Ein „breach of promises“ oder eine Verletzung „fiduciary duties“ liegt nicht vor. Anders im Fall staatlicher Diskriminierung: Ein „breach of promises“ oder eine Verletzung „fiduciary duties“ liegt hier stets vor, da Fälle staatlicher Diskriminierung regelmäßig Machtmissbrauch darstellen: Der Inhaber staatlicher Gewalt verletzt die Treuepflicht, das Mandat unparteilich auszuüben, das getreulich auszuführen er gelobt hat. Diskriminierung erscheint also weniger als ein Problem der angewandten Ethik denn als eines der politischen Philosophie. (shrink)

Grounding and explanation are said to be intimately connected. Some even maintain that grounding just is a form of explanation. But grounding and explanation also seem importantly different—on the face of it, the former is ‘worldy’ or ‘objective’ while the latter isn’t. In this paper, we develop and respond to an argument to the effect that there is no way to fruitfully address this tension that retains orthodox views about grounding and explanation but doesn’t undermine a central piece of methodology, (...) namely that explanation is a guide to ground. (shrink)

This dissertation examines the theory of perceptual cognition laid out by the 7th century Buddhist scholar, Dharmakīrti, in his magnum opus, the Pramāṇavārttika. Like most theories of perception, both ancient and modern, the sensory cognition of ordinary objects is a topic of primary concern. Unlike other theorists, however, Dharmakīrti advances a technical definition of “perception” as a cognition which is both nonconceptual and non-erroneous. Dharmakīrti’s definition of perception is thereby deliberately inclusive of three additional types of “perceptual” cognition, in addition (...) to veridical sensory awareness: the nonconceptual mental apprehension of an immediately-preceding cognition (“mental perception”), the vivid appearance of soteriologically efficacious objects of contemplative practice (“yogic perception”), and the sheer unmediated presence of the contents of cognition—whatever these might be—to the cognizing mind (“reflexive awareness”). Through the logical examination of what it means to be aware of an object, Dharmakīrti demonstrates that the awareness of an object is just the awareness of a phenomenal form or cognitive image produced by that object. Pursuing this analysis further, however, Dharmakīrti argues that the very notion of an object of cognition that exists “externally” or outside the mind is incoherent. Additionally, Dharmakīrti maintains that the phenomenological structure of subject and object—that is, the “first-personal” sense of one’s own cognitions as pertaining to oneself (“for-me-ness”), together with the inseparably concomitant sense that the objects of cognition exist “out there” in an extramental world—is strictly a form of cognitive error. Therefore, because ordinary sensory cognition is inherently structured by this subject-object duality, ordinary sensory cognition must in the final analysis be understood as erroneous. According to Dharmakīrti, in other words, ultimately only the nondual “luminosity” of reflexive awareness is genuinely perceptual, because only reflexive awareness is undistorted by nature. In this way, Dharmakīrti’s epistemology provides a theoretical foundation for the advanced nondual contemplative practices of Indian and Tibetan Buddhism, particularly Mahāmudrā and rDzogs chen. (shrink)

Can there be grounding without necessitation? Can a fact obtain wholly in virtue of metaphysically more fundamental facts, even though there are possible worlds at which the latter facts obtain but not the former? It is an orthodoxy in recent literature about the nature of grounding, and in first-order philosophical disputes about what grounds what, that the answer is no. I will argue that the correct answer is yes. I present two novel arguments against grounding necessitarianism, and show that grounding (...) contingentism is fully compatible with the various explanatory roles that grounding is widely thought to play. (shrink)

Distributive justice deals with allocations of goods and bads within a group. Different principles and results of distributions are seen as possible ideals. Often those normative approaches are solely framed verbally, which complicates the application to different concrete distribution situations that are supposed to be evaluated in regard to justice. One possibility in order to frame this precisely and to allow for a fine-grained evaluation of justice lies in formal modelling of these ideals by metrics. Choosing a metric that is (...) supposed to map a certain ideal has to be justified. Such justification might be given by demanding specific substantiated axioms, which have to be met by a metric. This paper introduces such axioms for metrics of distributive justice shown by the example of needs-based justice. Furthermore, some exemplary metrics of needs-based justice and a three dimensional method for visualisation of non-comparative justice axioms or evaluations are presented. Therewith, a base worth discussing for the evaluation and modelling of metrics of distributive justice is given. (shrink)

In 1937 Joan Robinson proposed that “when capitalism is rightly understood, the rate of interest will be set at zero and the major evils of capitalism will disappear”. A permanent zero rate would abolish capitalist profit except in limited cases, leaving nearly all output to be claimed by labour as wages. It would allow capital to be allocated on the basis of prospective social benefit rather than short-term profitability and a collateral basis that favours the wealthy. It would remove some (...) of the economic pressure to use resources unsustainably. So why not do this? I argue that the few available philosophical arguments for positive interest rates are unsatisfactory. Those who want a just and sustainable form of capitalism should target net zero for the interest rate. (shrink)

Discussion of the relevance of grounding to substantiveness, theory-choice, and “location problems” in metaphysics.

Jason Bowers and Meg Wallace have recently argued that those who hold that every individual instantiates a ‘haecceity’ are caught up in a Euthyphro-style dilemma when confronted with familiar cases of fission and fusion. Key to Bowers and Wallace’s dilemma are certain assumptions about the nature of metaphysical explanation and the explanatory commitments of belief in haecceities. However, I argue that the dilemma only arises due to a failure to distinguish between providing a metaphysical explanation of why a fact holds (...) vs. a metaphysical explanation of what it is for a fact to hold. In the process, I also shed light on the explanatory commitments of belief in haecceities. (shrink)

Otto Neurath’s empiricist methodology of economics and his contributions to politi- cal economy have gained increasing attention in recent years. We connect this research with contemporary debates regarding the epistemological status of thought experiments by reconstructing Neurath’s utopias as linchpins of thought experiments. In our three reconstructed examples of different uses of utopias/dystopias in thought experiments we employ a reformulation of Häggqvist’s model for thought experiments and we argue that: (1) Our reformulation of Häggqvist’s model more adequately complies with many (...) uses of thought experiments, especially with the open-ended discussions of utopias and dys- topias in thought experiments. (2) As a strict logical empiricist, Neurath is committed to a strictly empiricist account of thought experiments. John Norton’s empiricist argument view can indeed account for the justifications of empirical beliefs and genuine discoveries targeted by scientific utopianism in three distinct (yet connected) ways, all of which Neur- ath already contemplated: (2.I) Dealing with utopias and thought experiments on a regular basis increases creativity and inventiveness. (2.II) Particular ways of presenting knowl- edge facilitate scientific discovery and social progress. (2.III) The use of utopias in thought experiments can prompt conceptual change and allow access to new phenomena. We con- clude by highlighting that, even though thought experiments support a positive attitude for exploring new social possibilities, Neurath points out that active decisions are unavoidable. The exploration of alternatives and the awareness of a need for decisions in policy discus- sion avert a technocratic outlook in social science. (shrink)

In this paper, we argue that a distinction ought to be drawn between two ways in which a given world might be logically impossible. First, a world w might be impossible because the laws that hold at w are different from those that hold at some other world (say the actual world). Second, a world w might be impossible because the laws of logic that hold in some world (say the actual world) are violated at w. We develop a novel (...) way of modelling logical possibility that makes room for both kinds of logical impossibility. Doing so has interesting implications for the relationship between logical possibility and other kinds of possibility (for example, metaphysical possibility) and implications for the necessity or contingency of the laws of logic. (shrink)

I develop an expressivist account of verbal disagreements as practical disagreements over how to use words rather than factual disagreements over what words actually mean. This account enjoys several advantages over others in the literature: it can be implemented in a neo-Stalnakerian possible worlds framework; it accounts for cases where speakers are undecided on how exactly to interpret an expression; it avoids appeals to fraught notions like subject matter, charitable interpretation, and joint-carving; and it naturally extends to an analysis of (...) metalinguistic negotiations. (shrink)

A common objection to the very idea of conceptual engineering is the topic continuity problem: whenever one tries to “reengineer” a concept, one only shifts attention away from one concept to another. Put differently, there is no such thing as conceptual revision: there’s only conceptual replacement. Here, I show that topic continuity is compatible with conceptual replacement. Whether the topic is preserved in an act of conceptual replacement simply depends on what is being replaced (a conceptual tool or a conceptual (...) role) and what the topic under discussion is. Thus, the topic continuity problem only arises from a failure to specify these two things. (shrink)

The willful ignorance doctrine says defendants should sometimes be treated as if they know what they don't. This book provides a careful defense of this method of imputing mental states. Though the doctrine is only partly justified and requires reform, it also demonstrates that the criminal law needs more legal fictions of this kind. The resulting theory of when and why the criminal law can pretend we know what we don't has far-reaching implications for legal practice and reveals a pressing (...) need for change. (shrink)

In the study of modal and nonclassical logics, translations have frequently been employed as a way of measuring the inferential capabilities of a logic. It is sometimes claimed that two logics are “notational variants” if they are translationally equivalent. However, we will show that this cannot be quite right, since first-order logic and propositional logic are translationally equivalent. Others have claimed that for two logics to be notational variants, they must at least be compositionally intertranslatable. The definition of compositionality these (...) accounts use, however, is too strong, as the standard translation from modal logic to first-order logic is not compositional in this sense. In light of this, we will explore a weaker version of this notion that we will call schematicity and show that there is no schematic translation either from first-order logic to propositional logic or from intuitionistic logic to classical logic. (shrink)

Introduction -- What is personal responsibility? -- Ordinary language -- Common conceptions -- What do philosophers mean by responsibility? -- Personally responsible for what? -- What do philosophers think? part I -- Causes -- Capacity -- Control -- Choice versus brute luck -- Second-order attitudes -- Equality of opportunity -- Deservingness -- Reasonableness -- Reciprocity -- Equal shares -- Combining criteria -- What do philosophers think? part II -- Utility -- Self-respect -- Autonomy -- Human flourishing -- Natural duties and (...) special obligations -- A matter of perspectives -- Combining values -- What do politicians think? -- A brief typology -- International comparisons -- Welfare reform -- Healthcare reform -- Rights and responsibilities -- On the responsibilities of politicians -- What do ordinary people think? -- Why ask? -- Attitudes to welfare claimants -- When push comes to shove -- Perceptions and reality -- Further international comparisons -- The trouble with opinion surveys -- Four contemporary issues in focus -- Unemployment -- Health -- Drug abuse -- Personal debt and financial rewards -- So how do we decide? -- Getting the public involved -- Citizens juries -- Answering some potential criticisms. (shrink)

The prescriptive force of methodological rules rests, I argue, on the acceptance of scientific theories; that of the most general methodological rules rests on theories in the philosophy of science, which differ from theories in the several sciences only in generality and abstraction. I illustrate these claims by reference to methodological disputes in social science and among philosophers of science. My conclusions substantiate those of Laudan except that I argue for the existence of transtheoretical goals common to all scientists and (...) concrete enough actually to have bearing on methodology. And I argue that Laudan is committed to such goals himself, willy nilly. (shrink)

Many of my first students at Anzaldúa’s alma mater read Borderlands/La Frontera and concluded that Anzaldúa was not a philosopher. Hostile comments suggested that Anzaldúa’s intimately personal and poetic ways of writing were not philosophical. In response, I created “American Philosophy and Self-Culture” using backwards course design and taught variations of it in 2013, 2016, and 2018. Students spend nearly a month exploring Anzaldúa’s works, but only after reading three centuries of U.S.-American philosophers who wrote in deeply personal and literary (...) ways about self-transformation, community-building, and world-changing. The sections of this chapter: 1) describe why my first students rejected Anzaldúa as a philosopher in terms of the discipline’s parochialism; 2) present Anzaldúa’s broader understanding of herself as a philosopher; 3) summarize my reconstructed Anzaldúa-inspired American Philosophy course and outline some assignments; 4) discuss how my students respond to Borderlands/La Frontera when we read it through the lens of self-culture; and 5) explain my attempt to shape the subdiscipline of American Philosophy by teaching Anzaldúa to specialists at the 2017 Summer Institute in American Philosophy. (shrink)