Interview mit Steffen Herrmann, dem Generalsekretär der Deutschen Gesellschaft für phänomenologische Forschung (DGPF), der zusammen mit dem Präsidenten der Gesellschaft, Thomas Bedorf, die diesjährige Jahrestagung der DGPF zum Thema " Die Phänomenologie und das Politische " organisiert.

Complex technology has become an essential aspect of everyday life. We rely on technology as part of basic infrastructure and repeatedly for tasks throughout the day. Yet, in many cases the relation surpasses mere reliance and evolves to trust in technology. A new, disruptive technology is blockchain. It claims to introduce trustless relationships among its users, aiming to eliminate the need for trust altogether—even being described as “the trust machine”. This paper presents a proposal to adjust the concept of trust (...) in blockchain applications with the tools provided by conceptual engineering. Its goal is to propose a concept of trust, that offers more than a halo term, devoid of the normative depth that the original, philosophical term actually carries. To evaluate possible concepts of trust in blockchain applications, five criteria are proposed: These criteria ensure that the conceptual relation indeed embodies trust, thereby being richer than mere reliance, and that the chosen concept highlights the active role of the trustor. While the concepts of trust in engineers and trust in algorithms have to be discarded, institutional trust emerges as a viable candidate, given some refinements. Ultimately, the concept of trust by normative expectations and attribution is suggested to capture the essence of trust in blockchain applications. (shrink)

In this article, we address a major outstanding question of probabilistic Bayesian epistemology: how should a rational Bayesian agent update their beliefs upon learning an indicative conditional? A number of authors have recently contended that this question is fundamentally underdetermined by Bayesian norms, and hence that there is no single update procedure that rational agents are obliged to follow upon learning an indicative conditional. Here we resist this trend and argue that a core set of widely accepted Bayesian norms is (...) sufficient to identify a normatively privileged updating procedure for this kind of learning. Along the way, we justify a privileged formalization of the notion of ‘epistemic conservativity’, offer a new analysis of the Judy Benjamin problem, and emphasize the distinction between interpreting the content of new evidence and updating one’s beliefs on the basis of that content. (shrink)

In diesem Beitrag möchte ich eine Lesart von Marcel Mauss Essay "Die Gabe" vorschlagen, die ausgehend von drei Schlüsselszenen zwischen unterschiedlichen Formen der Gabe unterscheidet: der riskanten, der rituellen und der rivalisierenden Gabe. Diese drei Gabepraktiken, so werde ich zeigen, sind dabei in einer aufsteigenden Reihenfolge organsiert, insofern jede auf die Defizite und Probleme der jeweils vorherigen reagiert. Entsprechend werde ich dafür argumentieren, dass die rivalisierende Gabe den normativen Fluchtpunkt von Mauss’ Überlegungen darstellt und dass daher Mauss’ Diktum, die Gabe (...) sei zugleich »freiwillig und obligatorisch«, nicht als deskriptive, sondern als normative Aussage zu verstehen ist, hinter der sich ein Plädoyer für ein Konzept der agonalen Vergesellschaftung verbirgt. Dieses Konzept kann dabei als Mauss’ originärer Beitrag zur Beantwortung der Frage verstanden werden, wie sozialer Zusammenhalt in modernen, pluralistischen Gesellschaften möglich sein kann. Die Einheit der Vielheit kann allein durch das in der agonalen Vergemeinschaftung gesponnene »Band der Teilung« effektiv gesichert werden. (shrink)

The principle of indifference states that in the absence of any relevant evidence, a rational agent will distribute their credence equally among all the possible outcomes under consideration. Despite its intuitive plausibility, PI famously falls prey to paradox, and so is widely rejected as a principle of ideal rationality. In this article, I present a novel rehabilitation of PI in terms of the epistemology of comparative confidence judgments. In particular, I consider two natural comparative reformulations of PI and argue that (...) while one of them prescribes the adoption of patently irrational epistemic states, the other provides a consistent formulation of PI that overcomes the most salient limitations of existing formulations. (shrink)

Over the past decades, the idea that national sovereignty and the authority of the state have been increasingly challenged or even substantially eroded has been a dominant one. Economic globalization advancing a neo-liberal dis-embedding of the economy is seen as the major reason for this erosion. Concerns have increased about the negative consequences for the social fabric of societies, deprived of the strong shock absorption capacity that the welfare states had established in the time of the embedded liberalism to use (...) a term John Ruggie coined. The concerns have also helped nationalistic movements to gain power in many high-income countries, not at least in the United States, calling for putting their economy first. Accordingly, a number of commentators have announced a return of the nation state. In this special issue, we will show that the retreat-of-the-state thesis as well as the return-of-the-state thesis shares the same shortcomings. They conflate state and authority. As a consequence, both theses underestimate important transformations of authority that have taken place since the end of the “short 20TH century,” to use Eric Hobsbawm's periodization. With this special issue, we seek to contribute to a more nuanced analysis of the transformation of authority. The issue is the outcome of a conference that took place at the Copenhagen Business School in 2015, hosted by the research project ‘Institutional Transformation in European Political Economy: A Socio-Legal Approach’ and funded by the European Research Council. (shrink)

According to the scientific ideal of modernity, the propositions of science are considered fundamentally fallible. On the other hand, science strives for objective knowledge. Kant saw in the apriori the precondition for objective knowledge. But with the new conception of science the apriori (if it is not to be only logic) has become problematic. With it, however, the objectivity of scientific knowledge is at stake. As long as one grants objectivity to scientific knowledge, the question of the apriori remains topical. (...) On the one hand, this volume wants to trace the historical roots as well as the different interpretations of the apriori, and on the other hand, it wants to ask for approaches for a contemporary reinterpretation of this basic concept. (shrink)

Suppositions can be introduced in either the indicative or subjunctive mood. The introduction of either type of supposition initiates judgments that may be either qualitative, binary judgments about whether a given proposition is acceptable or quantitative, numerical ones about how acceptable it is. As such, accounts of qualitative/quantitative judgment under indicative/subjunctive supposition have been developed in the literature. We explore these four different types of theories by systematically explicating the relationships canonical representatives of each. Our representative qualitative accounts of indicative (...) and subjunctive supposition are based on the belief change operations provided by AGM revision and KM update respectively; our representative quantitative ones are offered by conditionalization and imaging. This choice is motivated by the familiar approach of understanding supposition as `provisional belief revision' wherein one temporarily treats the supposition as true and forms judgments by making appropriate changes to their other opinions. To compare the numerical judgments recommended by the quantitative theories with the binary ones recommended by the qualitative accounts, we rely on a suitably adapted version of the Lockean thesis. Ultimately, we establish a number of new results that we interpret as vindicating the often-repeated claim that conditionalization is a probabilistic version of revision, while imaging is a probabilistic version of update. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Topos quantum theory is standardly portrayed as a kind of ‘neo-realist’ reformulation of quantum mechanics.1 1 In this article, I study the extent to which TQT can really be characterized as a realist formulation of the theory, and examine the question of whether the kind of realism that is provided by TQT satisfies the philosophical motivations that are usually associated with the search for a realist reformulation of quantum theory. Specifically, I show that the notion of the quantum state (...) is problematic for those who view TQT as a realist reformulation of quantum theory. 1Introduction 2Topos Quantum Theory 2.1Phase space 2.2Hilbert space 2.3Beyond Hilbert space 2.4Defining realism 2.5The spectral presheaf 2.6The logic of topos quantum theory 3Interpreting States in Topos Quantum Theory 4Interpreting Truth Values and Clopen Subobjects in Topos Quantum Theory 4.1Interpreting the truth values 4.2Interpreting Subcl 5Neo-realism 5.1The covariant approach 6Conclusion. (shrink)

Proponents of the reasoning view analyze normative reasons as premises of good reasoning and explain the normativity of reasons by appeal to their role as premises of good reasoning. The aim of this paper is to cast doubt on the reasoning view by providing counterexamples to the proposed analysis of reasons, counterexamples in which premises of good reasoning towards φ‐ing are not reasons to φ.

Hegel war einer der ersten Theoretiker, der die soziale Bedeutung der zu Beginn des 19. Jahrhunderts entstehenden Marktgesellschaft reflektierte. Er betont dabei die Gefahren dieser Vergesellschaftungsform, aber auch deren emanzipative Potenziale. Letztere entfalten sich für ihn mit Hilfe der Institution der Korporation. In korporativen Vereinigungen verwandelt sich das zweckorientierte Gegeneinander der Marktakteure in wechselseitige Solidarität. Hegel nennt die Korporation daher auch die eigentliche ‚sittliche Wurzel‘ der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft. Im vorliegenden Band wird Hegels Korporationslehre rekonstruiert und auf ihre Aktualität hin befragt. (...) Dafür werden Anschlüsse aus der Wirtschaftsphilosophie, der Sozialphilosophie sowie der politischen Philosophie diskutiert. (shrink)

Does Normative Behaviourism Offer an Alternative Methodology in Political Theory?

The problem of old evidence, first described by Glymour [1980], is still widely regarded as one of the most pressing foundational challenges to the Bayesian account of scientific reasoning. Many solutions have been proposed, but all of them have drawbacks and none is considered to be definitive. Here, we introduce and defend a new kind of solution, according to which hypotheses are confirmed when we become more confident that they provide the only way of accounting for the known evidence.

Dieser Aufsatz will zeigen, dass die Beiträge von Jakob Friedrich Fries (1773–1843) zur Psychiatrie leider (zu Unrecht) vergessen, aber überaus aktuell sind. Seine Überlegungen sowie die der Wissenschaftler, die ihm gefolgt sind, haben in den Darstellungen der Geschichte der Psychiatrie mehr Beachtung verdient.

In this paper, I defend a reasons-first view of epistemic justification, according to which the justification of our beliefs arises entirely in virtue of the epistemic reasons we possess. I remove three obstacles for this view, which result from its presupposition that epistemic reasons have to be possessed by the subject: the problem that reasons-first accounts of justification are necessarily circular; the problem that they cannot give special epistemic significance to perceptual experience; the problem that they have to say that (...) implicit biases provide epistemic. The first problem will be overcome by introducing presentational attitudes that are not in need of justification as basic ways of possessing epistemic reasons. The latter two problems will be solved by introducing epistemic rational capacities of two different kinds, which are exercised in mental states that are ways of possessing epistemic reasons, and by distinguishing these from mental states that are not exercises of epistemic rational capacities. (shrink)

I present an explanatory argument for the reasons-first view: It is superior to knowledge-first views in particular in that it can both explain the specific epistemic role of perception and account for the shape and extent of epistemic justification.

It is a consequence of the theory of imprecise credences that there exist situations in which rational agents inevitably become less opinionated toward some propositions as they gather more evidence. The fact that an agent's imprecise credal state can dilate in this way is often treated as a strike against the imprecise approach to inductive inference. Here, we show that dilation is not a mere artifact of this approach by demonstrating that opinion loss is countenanced as rational by a substantially (...) broader class of normative theories than has been previously recognised. Specifically, we show that dilation-like phenomena arise even when one abandons the basic assumption that agents have (precise or imprecise) credences of any kind, and follows directly from bedrock norms for rational comparative confidence judgements of the form `I am at least as confident in p as I am in q'. We then use the comparative confidence framework to develop a novel understanding of what exactly gives rise to dilation-like phenomena. By considering opinion loss in this more general setting, we are able to provide a novel assessment of the prospects for an account of inductive inference that is not saddled with the inevitability of rational opinion loss. (shrink)

Current debates about reasons and reasoning often draw comparisons between epistemic and practical reasons and reasoning and presuppose substantial unity between the practical and epistemic domains. This stance seems to conflict with a stark Humean contrast between the two domains: With respect to practical reasons and reasoning, Hume highlights the role of impressions, especially the passions, in motivating and rationalizing action, while apparently downplaying the potential relevance of beliefs, reason, or reasons. With respect to epistemic reasons and theoretical reasoning, he (...) urges us to proportion our belief to the evidence (EHU 10.4), which suggests a significant epistemic role for evidential reasons. My contribution ar-gues that there is nonetheless a convincing and interesting unified Humean account of reasons and reasoning across both domains. To present my case, I first narrow down the unity claim that I am interested in. I then closely engage with Hume’s claims in epistemology, the philos-ophy of action, and metaethics to develop the unified Humean account. (shrink)

The question of time travel stimulates the imagination and provides material for whimsical stories. A work on the topic of "time travel" forces us to deal with the concept of "time". The complexity and the antinomic character of this concept make it difficult to grasp "time" more precisely. We encounter time as a form of perception in its deeply subjective aspect, as a biological rhythm, as a social phenomenon in the sense of a collective determination of time, but also as (...) a physical quantity. Einstein's theory of relativity revolutionized our ideas of space and time. His Special Theory of Relativity (1905) allows "travel into the future" through the effect of time dilation he predicted, and Einstein's theory of gravity allows for closed time lines as solutions to its equations (e.g., Gödel cosmos, anti-de Sitter cosmos). However, traveling in a time loop would immediately lead to a number of paradoxes (e.g., grandfather paradox, information paradox). Although, surprisingly, the basic laws of physics (apart from extremely rare and macroscopically non-appearing quantum mechanical effects) would not be violated in a time reversal, there seems to be a fundamental prohibition of traveling into the past in nature. (shrink)

Stephen Hawking claims: Philosophy is dead! Natural scientists use terms like 'natural law', 'matter', 'nature' and 'theories'. Often these terms are taken for granted without reflection. The task of philosophy of science as a metatheory of science is to clarify these terms. In doing so, philosophy of science is confronted with epistemological, ontological and metaphysical questions. But it also deals with questions such as "How do we define the boundaries between different scientific disciplines?" or "How do we distinguish science from (...) pseudoscience?". In addition, philosophy of science deals with ethical problems of modern technology, with methodological issues, with reconstructing the structure and development of scientific theories, and with exposing ideological paternalism of science. The optimistic conclusion is: Philosophy is not dead - but philosophers must discuss with scientists on an equal footing. (shrink)

Nietzsche’s name has become almost synonymous with militant atheism. Born into a pious Christian family, this son of a Lutheran pastor declared himself the Antichrist. But could this have been yet another of his masks of hardness? Nietzsche rarely revealed his innermost self in the published writings, and this can be gleaned mainly from his private letters and the accounts of friends. These sources bring to light the philosopher’s inner struggle with his own, deeply religious nature.Losing his father at a (...) young age was a calamity from which Nietzsche never recovered, and I argue that his famous thought-image “God is dead” was a transfiguration of the painful memory of this loss. In this essay, I trace Nietzsche’s tortuous path from an ardent devotee of God to a vociferous critic of Christianity, a path that was punctuated with veiled longings for a loving deity. Deep in his heart, he remained faithful to Christian ideals. Rather like Cordelia, the only truly loving daughter of King Lear, Nietzsche refused to utter words of intense affection and reverence, as these had been blatantly devalued and corrupted. Instead, he adopted a mask of a wrongdoer and a blasphemer who took not the punishment but the guilt.Nietzsche’s attitude to religion is discussed from the perspective of his life, his personality, and his mental condition. The discussion draws on psychoanalytical concepts of Freud, Erikson, Winnicott and Kohut. This is not an exclusive reading, but complementary to other studies in this field. (shrink)

Recently, a number of critical social theorists have argued that the analysis of social relations of unfreedom should take into account the phenomenon of self-subordination. In my article, I draw on Hegel’s theory of recognition to elucidate this phenomenon and show that recognition can be not only a means of self-realization, but also of subjugation. I develop my argument in three steps: As a first step, I reconstruct the idea of social pathologies in the tradition of Critical Theory. In the (...) course of this reconstruction, it becomes clear that the analysis of social pathologies should focus on the binding force of recognition. As a second step, I reinterpret Hegel and show that a close reading of the relationship of lordship and bondage can help us to understand how a subject can become bound by recognition. As a third step, I make an attempt at reactualizing Hegel’s idea. Following Sartre’s analysis of anti-Semitism, I outline three stages of how subjects can gradually come to subordinate themselves and become entrapped in social relations of unfreedom such as race, class or gender. (shrink)

Menschen können missachtet werden. Woher aber rührt diese symbolische Verletz-barkeit? Und welche Folgen hat sie für unser soziales Zusammenleben? Im Ausgangvon den Theorien der Anerkennung und den Theorien der Alterität geht Steffen Herrmann diesen beiden Fragen nach. Er argumentiert im Anschluss an G.W.F. Hegel dafür, dass eine asymmetrische Abhängigkeit von der Anerkennung von Anderendie Ursache von symbolischer Verletzbarkeit bildet. Sodann zeigt er im Anschluss an E. Levinas, dass die Folge dieser Verletzungsoffenheit eine asymmetrische Ausge-setztheit an die Verantwortung für Andere (...) ist. Aus den Arbeiten von Hegel und Levinas wird so die Grundthese der vorliegenden Untersuchung gewonnen: Die Begegnung zwischen Ich und Anderem ist strukturiert durch die doppelte Asymmetrie des Sozialen. (shrink)

The intent of this chapter is to suspend the belief in the goodness of literacy -- our chirographic bias -- in order to gain a deeper understanding of how the engagement with texts structures human consciousness, and particularly the minds of children. In the following pages literacy (a term which in this chapter refers to the ability to read and produce written text) is discussed as a consciousness altering technology. A phenomenological analysis of the act of reading shows the child’s (...) engagement with texts as a perceptual as well as a symbolic event that builds upon but also alters children’s speech acts. Speaking and reading are both forms of language use, but with different configurations of perceptual and symbolic qualities. Children’s literature uses textual technology and, intentionally or not, participates in structuring children’s pre-literate minds. Some of its forms, such as picture books and early readers, are directly intended to bridge the gap between the pre-literate listener and the literate reader and ease the transition into the literate state. It is my hope that the phenomenological analysis of the experiences of speaking and reading might help us understand more clearly how children’s literature impacts the minds of children. Such an analysis can awaken a critical awareness of the power that letters wield as they shape the reader’s psychological reality, and it can sharpen our sense of wonder about the metamorphosis of language from speaking to writing. (shrink)

The ten original studies included in this Research Topic investigate selected assumptions and predictions of parochial altruism theory in detail. We, the editors, are convinced that their highly instructive findings will help researchers interested in parochial altruism, but also in intergroup psychology more generally, to gain a much more fine-grained understanding of the interplay of altruistic and spiteful motives in human decision making in the context of intergroup relations. The broad range of disciplines represented by the authors contributing to this (...) Research Topic and the variety of methods used in their studies are representative for the current interdisciplinary interest in parochial altruism. The most important insight that, in our view, can be derived from the works collected here is that human decision making in intergroup contexts is more complex than suggested by current theory. Thus, we hope that future theorizing on parochial altruism will be stimulated by the evidence gathered in this Research Topic. In this editorial, we briefly highlight central findings reported here, which, to us, appear most informative for prospective enhancements of parochial altruism theory. (shrink)

Although consolation is one of the classic religious subjects it plays no role in the current debate about religious emotions. One reason for this neglect could be that this debate is mostly based on classical emotions such as joy and fear, love and hope, and that consolation is not understood as an emotion. This paper tries to show that consolation in fact can and should be seen as an emotion. After naming and refuting some reasons that speak against taking consolation (...) to be an emotion, I will explain how consolation can be positively conceptualized as an emotion within a recent theory of emotions. It will be decisive to see that the experience of consolation can be understood not only hedonistically-qualitatively, but also intentionally. This structural conception allows for a differentiated description of various types of consolation as an emotion, also, in the tradition of William James, of a secular as well as a religious form of consolation. (shrink)

The problem of synthetic judgements touches on the question of whether philosophy can draw independent statements about reality in the first place. For Kant, the synthetic judgements a priori formulate the conditions of the possibility for objectively valid knowledge. Despite the principle fallibility of its statements, modern science aims for objective knowledge. This gives the topic of synthetic a priori unbroken currency. This paper aims to show that a modernized version of transcendental philosophy, if it is to be feasible at (...) all, must “bid farewell” to the concept of being “free of empiricism” or the “purity” of the a priori. Approaches to this end can already been found in Kant’s reflections on non-pure synthetic knowledge. Moreover, the a priori validity of knowledge does not exclude the possibility that it can be discovered empirically. In keeping with Kant, Fries and Nelson anticipated this separation (usually first attributed to Reichenbach) between the validity and discovery context of knowledge and pointed out that the a priori could be discovered empirically, but never proven. There are currently still good reasons why transcendental philosophical concepts are of fundamental importance for modern science, although it must not be overlooked that even within the framework of a modernized transcendental philosophy, several unsolved problems remain or are raised. For example, the irredeemability of the universal validity and necessary claims of the a priori, the problem of a clear demarcation between the phenomenal and noumenal world. Moreover, the “beautiful structure” or the Kantian system, which constituted its persuasive power, is lost. (shrink)

Worte verletzen und kränken. Woher aber kommt diese Verletzungsmacht? Während in der deutschsprachigen Philosophie Sprache meist als Gegenmittel zur Gewalt begriffen wird, hat die US-amerikanische Debatte um "hate speech" gezeigt, dass das Sprechen Gewalt nicht nur androhen oder verhindern, sondern selbst eine Form von Gewaltausübung sein kann. Wie nun sind sprachliche Verletzung, Ausgrenzung und Missachtung zu erklären und zu verstehen? Aus der Sicht verschiedener Disziplinen untersuchen die Beiträge dieses Bandes, welcher Logik, Grammatik und Rhetorik unser verletzendes Sprechen gehorcht. Mit Beiträgen (...) von u.a. Pierre Bourdieu, Penelope Brown/Stephen Levinson, Harold Garfinkel und Rae Langton. Steffen Kitty Herrmann und Hannes Kuch sind wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiter am Institut für Philosophie der Freien Universität Berlin und arbeiten im Forschungsprojekt”Zur Performanz sprachlicher Gewalt“am Sonderforschungsbereich 447”Kulturen des Performativen“. Sybille Krämer ist Professorin für Philosophie an der FU Berlin und Permanent Fellow am Wissenschaftskolleg Berlin. (shrink)

The logic of indicative conditionals remains the topic of deep and intractable philosophical disagreement. I show that two influential epistemic norms—the Lockean theory of belief and the Ramsey test for conditional belief—are jointly sufficient to ground a powerful new argument for a particular conception of the logic of indicative conditionals. Specifically, the argument demonstrates, contrary to the received historical narrative, that there is a real sense in which Stalnaker’s semantics for the indicative did succeed in capturing the logic of the (...) Ramseyan indicative conditional. (shrink)

Some recent theories of emotion propose that emotions are perceptions of value laden situations and thus provide us with epistemic access to values. In this paper I take up Mark Wynn’s application of this theory to religious experience and try to argue that his McDowell-inspired account of intentional emotions leads to limitations for the justificatory force of religious experiences and to difficult questions about the metaphysical status of the object of religious experiences: if emotions and religious experiences are largely similar, (...) then, just as emotions, religious experiences cannot justify beliefs about the existence of objects, but merely beliefs about certain qualities they might have. Also, if emotions and religious experiences are largely similar, then, just as the objects of emotions, the object of religious experience turns out to be essentially mind-dependent. (shrink)

John P. Burgess kritisiert Kurt Gödels Begriff der mathematischen oder rationalen Anschauung und erläutert, warum heuristische Intuition dasselbe leistet wie rationale Anschauung, aber ganz ohne ontologisch überflüssige Vorannahmen auskommt. Laut Burgess müsste Gödel einen Unterschied zwischen rationaler Anschauung und so etwas wie mathematischer Ahnung, aufzeigen können, die auf unbewusster Induktion oder Analogie beruht und eine heuristische Funktion bei der Rechtfertigung mathematischer Aussagen einnimmt. Nur, wozu benötigen wir eine solche Annahme? Reicht es nicht, wenn die mathematische Intuition als Heuristik funktioniert? Für (...) Gödel sind Mengen Extensionen von Begriffen und er beharrt beispielsweise auf dem ontologischen Objektstatus von Mengen, weil Denken für ihn einen Input benötigt, den es selbst nicht zu liefern im Stande ist. Im Falle der mathematischen Anschauung darf dieser Input allerdings nicht subjektiv kontingent sein, wenn es sich um objektiv gültige Theorien handeln soll. (Zudem vertritt Gödel eine Korrespondenztheorie der Wahrheit.) Der Begriff der heuristischen Intuition, den Burgess expliziert, stammt hingegen nicht zuletzt aus der kognitiven Psychologie, der bei der Verarbeitung impliziter, also unbewusster Informationen ansetzt und so das menschliche Vermögen erklärt, Entscheidungen und Urteile zu fällen, ohne sich der Urteilsgrundlagen bewusst zu sein. Über den ontologischen oder erkenntnistheoretischen Status dieser Urteilsgrundlagen sagen diese Theorien nichts aus. Sie könnten auch subjektiv kontingent zustande gekommen sein. Ihr normativer Anspruch ergibt sich lediglich aus „dem Funktionieren“, nicht daraus, dass es sich um Gesetze des Wahrseins handelt. (shrink)

According to influential arguments from several branches of philosophy, there exist some gradable natural language expressions that violate the following principle: if x and y are both F to some degree, then either x is at least as F as y or y is at least as F as x. Dorr, Nebel and Zuehl (2022) (DNZ), who refer to this principle as ‘Comparability’, respond to these arguments and offer a systematic case in support of Comparability. In this paper, I respond (...) to DNZ and develop an opposing case against Comparability that (i) buttresses previous criticisms of the principle, (ii) identifies two new arguments against the principle, and (iii) rebuts DNZ’s prospective arguments in favour of the principle. (shrink)

As parents of a young woman who very much resembles Ashley, we recognize the way her parents speak of their daughter’s preciousness, and of the love and joy she brings into their life. We know too well the hardships associated with rearing a child with severe physical and intellectual disabilities, especially in our own society, unyielding as it is to the medical needs even “normals” have. We would not have our daughter Sesha undergo similar interventions. We do not believe she (...) is a perpetual child, even if her intellectual capacities do not exceed those of a child, for she has lived for thirty-seven years in this world and with that has acquired knowledge, sensitivities, and sensibilities that no child of “comparable” capacities could have. (shrink)

American philosopher Zhu Dien • Ba Tele that for granted with a series of related discussion, and while there are of a fixed body of the material. Bate Le read de Beauvoir's "Second Sex" that this is not Sartre's "Being and Nothingness" women's issues or situations in the application. De Beauvoir said that consciousness exists in which a person's body, and in the cultural vein, the participation in the formation of a person's gender. Ba Tele think understanding the philosophy of (...) Sartre's body, in many ways we can improve the appreciation of Beauvoir thought, and concluded that she is a thinker with originality. (shrink)

Maurice Merleau-Ponty beschreibt die Phänomenologie als einen erkennbaren, praktischen Denkstil, der als Bewegung schon bestand bevor er sich als Philosophie bewusst war. Im Folgenden wird gezeigt, wie Goethe’s naturwissenschaftliches Denken in diesen erkennbaren, praktischen Denkstil der phänomenologischen Bewegung hineinpaßt. Diese Studie über Goethe und die Phänomenologie ist auf drei Themenkreise beschränkt: die phänomenologische Weltanschauung, die von Husserl’s Werk geprägt wurde; die phänomenologische Methode, die ihren Ursprung in Husserl, aber ihre Ausarbeitung in neueren Phänomenologen hat; und letztlich die phänomenologische Naturphilosophie, die (...) ihre Ansätze im Spätwerk Merleau-Ponty’s findet. (shrink)

In this paper I argue for a theory of punishment I call Multilateral Retributivism. Typically retributive notions of justice are unilateral: focused on one person’s desert. I argue that our notions of desert are multilateral: multiple people are owed when a moral crime is committed. I argue that the purpose of punishment is communication with the end-goal of reconciling the offender to society. This leads me to conclude that the death penalty and life without parole are unjustified because they necessarily (...) cut communication short. (shrink)

Dependency is a keyword in disability studies. The article reviews the negative force of the term and why disability researchers and activists have made the case for the independence of disabled people. But dependency, I claim, is a feature of any human life and I argue that disability studies needs to neutralize the term and appropriate dependency as that which binds people, regardless of their abilities or disabilities. I argue that we can acknowledge dependency and work toward an ideal of (...) "managed dependency.". (shrink)

In this paper we compare Kierkegaard’s and Marx’s views on social reform. Then we argue that Kierkegaard’s own reasoning is consistent with the expression of neighbor-love through collective action, i.e. social reform. However, Kierkegaard’s approach to social reform would be vastly different than Marx’s. We end by reviewing several questions that Kierkegaardian social reformers would ask themselves. Our hope is that this exploration will provide helpful insights into how those who genuinely love their neighbors ought to seek the common good (...) through collective action. (shrink)

This is an abstract of a discussion of Martha Minow's article "Equalities" in APA Symposium Eastern Division 1991 .

It is common for religiously motivated actions to be specially protected by law. Many legal theorists have asked why: what makes religion special? What makes it worthy of toleration over and above other non-religious deeply held convictions? The answer I put forward is that religions’ alleged afterlife consequences call for a principle of toleration that warrants special legal treatment. Under a Rawlsian principle of toleration, it is reasonable for those in the original position to opt for principles of justice that (...) accommodate actions with alleged afterlife consequences. And, under a utilitarian principle of toleration, a greater psychological harm is eased by such accommodations. Additionally, this alleged afterlife consequence is found in most of the religions that are thought to warrant some level of special toleration—not only do the Abrahamic religions have alleged afterlife consequences, but many eastern religions do as well, e.g. reincarnation. (shrink)

Economic pressures, mounting environmental, security and health requirements, are all critical factors that shape economic action. With regard to environmental protection, an economic entity acting as homo oeconomicus finds himself in a situation resembling a prisoner’s dilemma. Signposts for a possible resolution of this dilemma include an environmental management system, a system of environmental law based on the principles of environmental ethics, and a new conception of human nature.

Concentration of the world’s wealth in the hands of a few, corporate owners as heads of state – these are facts that lend plausibility to Marx' pronouncements. Yet, how should we evaluate his ideas from today’s vantage point?

Nelson's Proof of the Impossibility of the Theory of Knowledge -/- In addressing the possibility of a theory of knowledge, Leonard Nelson noted the contradiction of an epistemological criterion that one would require in order to differentiate between valid and invalid knowledge. Nelson concluded that the inconsistency of such a criterion proves the impossibility of the theory of knowledge. -/- Had the epistemological criterion had a perception, then it would presume to adjudicate on its own truth (thus epistemological circular argument). (...) However, if one were to assume that the criterion is not knowledge, one would then have to justify how this is a criterion for truth - yet this would only be possible when it may be considered as an object of knowledge. One would equally have had to predetermine the criterion in order to determine the truth of this knowledge, thereby providing another circular argument. Ostensibly, every criterion of truth fails at its very own test since it cannot guarantee its own truth, just as Munchausen, contrary to his assertion, could not draw himself out of the swamp by tugging on a tuft of his own hair. -/- Nelson proposed a solution of the epistemological problem (the question of the differentiation between valid and invalid knowledge), that based on Jakob Friedrich Fries' differentiation between proof and deduction. Proof, according to Nelson (in reference to Fries), can be defined as derivation of truth from one statement from another statement. Thus, from the truth in the statement that "all men are mortal", one is then able to say that "Socrates is a man" and thence extrapolate from the truth of the statement that "Socrates is mortal." If knowledge were to be considered somewhat judgmental (in a statement), then an attempt at proof (i.e. recourse to previous judgments) would inevitably lead to an infinite regression in justification, since each judgment would necessitate a further justification from another judgment. Every attempt to prove an epistemological criterion is thus also confronted by this regression in justification. -/- Nelson's attempt at a solution rests on the assumption of the existence of an immediate knowledge as a justification of the truth (mediate) of knowledge. Nelson considers immediate knowledge to be non-judgmental knowledge. These include intuitions (e. g. seeing-the-red-roof) and also philosophical knowledge that pre-exists in his opinion before a judgmental reflexion (immediate) in our reason (e. g. the principle of causality). -/- Proof of the truth of mediate knowledge can be effected by showing its compliance with attendant immediate knowledge (rational truth = correspondence of mediate knowledge with their immediate knowledge). Nelson considered this as a resolution of the circular epistemological argument. In regard to philosophical knowledge, Nelson sees these as subject to deduction and not proof. The following example illustrates the goal of deduction: -/- An approach for deducing the principle of causality: A) Every change has a cause. (The principle of causality) A´) A is a reiteration of an immediate knowledge. (Meta-assertion following A) -/- "A" may not be provable, but A´ may justified, and thus Nelson identified it as a deduction following from A. // reference: http://www.friesian.com/nelproof.htm. (shrink)

Naturwissenschaften, Mathematik und Logik waren für Nelson von zentraler Bedeutung. Er pflegte bereits als Jugendlicher intensive Kontakte zu Naturwissenschaftlern und Mathematikern. Dadurch erhielt er Anregungen, die von Anfang an seine philosophischen Ansätze beeinflussten. Inspiriert von der Kant-Fries’schen Philosophie und der Axiomatik der Mathematik, konzipierte Nelson seine Philosophie als exakte Wissenschaft. Wie Kant und Fries betrachtete Nelson die Suche nach den allgemeinen Prinzipien der Naturwissenschaften als Hauptaufgabe der Naturphilosophie. Ergebnis dieser kritischen Analyse ist ein System von metaphysischen Grundsätzen der Naturwissenschaft. Nelson (...) übernimmt Kants Lehre von den Grundsätzen des reinen Verstandes. Keine empirisch gefundene Gesetzmäßigkeit könne diesen Grundsätzen widersprechen. Für die Gesetze der Newton’schen Mechanik hätten, so meint Nelson, Kant und Fries diesen Nachweis erbracht. Deshalb formulierte Nelson das sogenannte Postulat der Mechanistik, gemäß dem alle Naturerscheinungen auf mechanische Vorgänge zurückgeführt werden können. Das starre Festhalten an diesem Postulat veranlasste ihn zur Ablehnung bedeutsamer physikalischer Konzeptionen (z. B. des auf der Elektrodynamik basierenden Relativitätsprinzips, des Nahwirkungskonzepts und des Atommodells). Das „Relativitätsprinzip der Elektrodynamik“ lehnte er mit dem Argument ab, es verhindere die Anwendung der dritten Analogie der Erfahrung, da es den Verzicht auf den Begriff der Gleichzeitigkeit von Naturerscheinungen erzwinge. Eine kritische Nelson-Rezeption muss der Historizität etlicher Thesen Nelsons Rechnung tragen, aber zugleich die Bedeutsamkeit von Kernaussagen Nelson’scher Naturphilosophie im Hinblick auf die modernen Naturwissenschaften untersuchen. Das ist auch die Zielrichtung des vorliegenden Beitrages. Der erste Teil beleuchtet Nelsons wissenschaftliches Umfeld. Einerseits wird untersucht, welche Wissenschaftler Nelson beeinflussten, andererseits soll dargestellt werden, welcher Personenkreis an der Fortentwicklung der Nelson’schen Naturphilosophie beteiligt war. Beispielhaft sollen daran anschließend zwei Themenbereiche aus seinem reichhaltigen Werk disktiert werden, denen besonders im Hinblick auf aktuelle philosophische Diskussionsschwerpunkte Bedeutsamkeit zukommt. Im zweiten Teil werden nämlich Nelsons Betrachtungen zum Verhältnis von Freiheit und Naturnotwendigkeit sowie seine Unterscheidung zwischen wissenschaftlicher und ästhetischer Naturbetrachtung besprochen. Der Beitrag beansprucht nicht, die Rezeptionssgeschichte und den Inhalt von Nelsons Naturphilosophie sowie die aktuelle Bedeutsamkeit seiner Thesen im Detail darzustellen aufzuarbeiten. Vielmehr geht es darum, Ansätze für eine zeitgemäße Interpretation Rezeption aufzuzeigen und anhand von Beispielen zu erörtern. (shrink)

Sofern man die Existenz objektiver Erkenntnisse anerkennt, ist man mit der Frage nach den Bedingungen der Möglichkeit für diese Erkenntnisse konfrontiert. Der Grund muss in Voraussetzungen liegen, die selbst wiederum empirisch nicht zu rechtfertigen sind. Zwar verwerfen Popper und Carnap den Begriff des "synthetischen Urteils a priori", doch die Voraussetzung, dass es "in der Natur gesetzlich zugeht", räumen beide ein. Diese empirisch nicht zu rechtfertigende Prämisse ist ein synthetisches Urteil a priori. Gemäß Kant ist innerhalb der Klasse der Erkenntnisse a (...) priori zwischen reinen und nicht-reinen Erkenntnissen a priori zu unterscheiden. Es in vorliegender Arbeit argumentativ dafür plädiert, Naturgesetze als apriorische Erkenntnisse zu betrachten, die der Klasse der nicht-reinen synthetischen Urteile a priori zuzurechnen sind. Vor diesem Hintergrund kommt die Arbeit zu der Schlussthese: Ein empirischer (d. h. empirische Begriffe enthaltender) Satz (etwa ein Naturgesetz) kann über den (empirisch nicht einlösbaren, aber als Postulat durchaus sinnvollen) Anspruch auf allgemeine und notwendige Geltung verfügen und somit Bedingungen der Möglichkeit für objektive Erkenntnis formulieren. Doch sind für die Entdeckung empirischer Sätze mit Anspruch auf allgemeine und notwendige Geltung empirische Studien (etwa das physikalische Experiment) erforderlich. (shrink)