Myśl fryburskiego filozofa religii, Bernharda Weltego, wielokrotnie dotykała zagadnienia nicości. Artykuł prezentuje funkcje, jaką Welte przypisał idei nicości w kontekście doświadczenia konstytutywnego, wyznaczającego podstawową charakterystykę ludzkiej egzystencji. Doświadczenie konstytutywne pociąga za sobą przenikanie się czyjejś skończoności z nieskończonością. Ta pierwsza wyraża się w byciu świadomym własnej śmiertelności i winy, ta druga w aktywności ludzkiego ducha, szczególnie w odczuwaniu obowiązku. Bycie człowieka sytuuje się między tymi przeciwstawnymi siłami, poszukuje sensu swojej egzystencji. Jednocześnie stwarza ono różne relacje, jakie mogą między nimi zachodzić. (...) Ich porządek może prowadzić do afirmacji bądź negacji czyjejś egzystencji. Jeżeli dodamy do owych relacji doświadczenie nicości (wraz z jej specyfiką), to tworzą one razem akt wyboru między afirmacją a negacja bardziej przypominający ostateczny wybór między nadzieją a rozpaczą. (shrink)

English title: Józef Tischner’s Phenomenology of Boundary Experience. Author of the paper distinguishes four paradigms of phenomenological analysis one can indicate in Tischner’s philosophical writing. Each of these paradigms captures the issue of the genuine source of phenomenological experience. This genuine source can be provided with: transcendental ‘I’, axiological ‘I’, Dasein, or the relationship to another man. By developing the latter, i.e. the paradigm based on the experience of meeting (dialogue), Tischner makes the foundations for his Philosophy of Drama (in (...) Polish: Filozofia dramatu) which should be interpreted, as Piecuch argues, in terms of the possible ways to conduct phenomenological analysis. The peculiarity of this way is that it aims at grasping various aspects of the border experience in which a man experiences the limits of one’s own thinking, activity and sensing. (shrink)

The basis of analyzes carried out in the article is the work of Bernhard Welte: Meister Eckhart. Gedanken zu seinen Gedanken. The central subject of research is the idea Abgeschiedenheit (“isolation”). Following the interpretation of Welte it has been considerated a phenomeno‐ logical description on two ways. From the practical experience, as a modus vivendi a religious man, and from the theoretical, as speculative thought. Theoretical considerations consist of analysis of the concept of truth and goodness, which Eckhart identifies with (...) the idea of God. Welte shows that these concepts of medieval thinker at the starting point considerations are still sink in the schemes of metaphysical thinking, but in the next stages of its argumentation he overcome metaphysical discourse. The purpose of the article, guided by the suggestion Weltes interpretation, is to show ways of reaching the source forms of religious experience. At the same time the text raised the issue of problematic use formulas of mystical union and noticed parallels have been taking place between the method of phenomenological reduction and the idea of Abgeschiedenheit. (shrink)

Early Modern German Philosophy (1690-1750) makes some of the key texts of early German thought available in English, in most cases for the first time. The translations range from texts by the most important figures of the period, including Christian Thomasius, Christian Wolff, Christian August Crusius, and Georg Friedrich Meier, as well as texts by consequential but less familiar thinkers such as Dorothea Christiane Erxleben, Theodor Ludwig Lau, Friedrich Wilhelm Stosch, and Joachim Lange. The topics covered range across a (...) number of areas of theoretical philosophy, including metaphysics (the immortality of the soul, materialism and its refutation, the pre-established harmony), epistemology (the principle of sufficient reason, the limits of reason with respect to matters of faith), and logic (the role of prejudices in cognition and the doctrine of truth). (shrink)

Zwischen 1987 und 1994 sandte ich 20 Briefe an Karl Popper. Die meisten betrafen Fragen bezüglich seiner Antiinduktionsbeweise und seiner Wahrscheinlichkeitstheorie, einige die organisatorische und inhaltliche Vorbereitung eines Fachgesprächs mit ihm in Kenly am 22. März 1989 (worauf hier nicht eingegangen werden soll), einige schließlich ganz oder in Teilen nicht-fachliche Angelegenheiten (die im vorliegenden Bericht ebenfalls unberücksichtigt bleiben). Von Karl Popper erhielt ich in diesem Zeitraum 10 Briefe. Der bedeutendste ist sein siebter, bestehend aus drei Teilen, geschrieben am 21., 22. (...) und 23. Oktober 1992, in dem er eine Vorform jener Definition der probabilistischen Unabhängigkeit entwickelte, die er 1994 im neuen Anhang *XX der 10. Auflage seiner Logik der Forschung (LdF) der wissenschaftstheoretischen Forschergemeinde vorstellte. Der berührendste ist sein letzter, geschrieben am 26. Juli 1994, in dem er trotz Erschöpfung mit Humor schildert, wie mühselig der Druck des Anhangs *XX verlaufen ist. Mein Bericht ist zugleich chronologisch und systematisch gegliedert: die ersten, vergleichsweise wenigen Briefe, großteils 1987 geschrieben, handeln von der Induktion; der große Rest, zeitlicher Schwerpunkt 1992, beschäftigt sich mit der Wahrscheinlichkeitstheorie. Das Kapitel 1 über Induktion ist in vier Abschnitte unterteilt: 1.1 Das Popper/Miller-Argument: eine Nachkonstruktion, 1.2 Karl Poppers Brief vom 25.8.1987: Deduktive Stützung, 1.3 Karl Poppers Brief vom 29.9.1987: Nochmals zur deduktiven Stützung, 1.4 Echt induktive Stützung und Schwächung: zwei eigene Beweise. Das Kapitel 2 über Wahrscheinlichkeit ist ebenfalls in vier Abschnitte unterteilt: 2.1 Ein Mangel an Überschußgesetzen in der Logic of Scientific Discovery, 2.2 Probabilistische Unabhängigkeit, 2.3 Wahrscheinlichkeitstheorie und Wahrscheinlichkeitssemantik, 2.4 Die neue Unabhängigkeitsdefinition im Anhang *XX der LdF. (shrink)

Die Breslauer Sprechbühnen wiesen in der Zeit des Nationalsozialismus Tendenzen auf, die für das gesamte Theaterleben Deutschlands charakteristisch waren. Die politische Instrumentalisierung der dramatischen Kunst, wie des ganzen literarischen Lebens, resultierte aus dem zentralen, von dem Reichsministerium für Volksaufklärung und Propaganda postulierten Programm, das den Theatern außcrästhetische Propaganda- und F.rziehungsaufgabcn zuschrieb. Die Hauptfrage - nach der Spielplangestaltung - traf auch für die wichtigsten Verfasser der damaligen Literatur zu, zu denen sicher der eng mit der schlesischen Provinz verbundene Gerhart Hauptmann gehörte. (...) Seine Stellung nach dem Jahre 1933 war keineswegs eideutig und sie bestätigte nur die komplizierten Verhältnisse zwischen ihm und dem Regime, das aus Propagandagründen sein Schaffen selektiv akzeptierte. In den ersten Jahren nach der Machtergreifung spielten deutsche Theater nur wenige Stückre Hauptmanns, in Breslau sogar keine. Erst 1935 brachte das Lobetheater die Aufführung der Komödie Der Biberpelz. Zwei Jahre später (anläßlich Hauptmanns 75. Geburtstages) spielte man im Breslauer Schauspielhaus, das seit 1936 die einzige Sprechbühne war, das Drama Michael Kramer. In Anwesenheit des Dichters fand hier auch die Uraufführung des Filmes Der Biberpelz statt. 1938 gastierte mit einem eigenen Ensemble der Staatsschauspieler Paul Wegener mit der Inszenierung von Kollege Crampton in Breslau. Erst zwei Jahre später (Jan. 1940) nahm das Theater in Breslau Hauptmanns Werk wieder in das Repertoire auf. Die Aufführung des Schauspiels Elga, dessen Motive aus Grillparzers Drama entnommen wurden, verursachte heftige Proteste mancher Regime-Ideologen (einschließlich Alfred Rosenbergs) wegen der polnischen Thematik des Dramas. Im Jahre 1941 inszenierte das Breslauer Schauspielhaus das Stück Der Bogen des Odysseus (die erste Aufführung war am Osternsonntag), im März 1942 die Tragödie Rose Bernd. Eine besondere Bedeutung kommt dem 80. Jubiläum des Dichters (Nov. 1942) zu. Die zentralen Feierlichkeiten dazu wurden von der Theaterabteilung des Goebbelschen Propagandaministeriums nach Breslau verlegt. Nach zahlreichen Kontroversen und Abstimmungen beschloß man im Schauspielhaus 4 Dramen zu spielen: Michael Kramer, Die Tochter der Kathedrale, Und Pippa tanzt und Der Biberpelz. Hauptmann verlieh man auch den Schliesischen Literaturpreis. Außerdem wurde er zum Ersten Ehrenbürger der Friedrich-Wilhelm-Universität ernannt. Das Deutsche Institut der Breslauer Universität veröffentlichte aus diesem Anlaß ein dem Jubilar gewidmetes Gedenkblatt, das verschiedene Aspekte seines Schaffens zum Thema hatte. Auch das Reichspropagandaamt Schlesien bereitete eine Broschüre vor, die das Interesse der Partei betonen sollte. Die Krönung des Jubiläums war die Gesamtausgabe von Hauptmanns Werken, deren erstes Exemplar dem Dichter überreicht wurde. Unter den zahlreichen Wünschen, die Gerhart Hauptmann zu seinem Geburtstage bekam, befanden sich auch Telegrammme von Hitler, Goebbels und Schlösser. Das letzte in Breslau inszenierte Drama Hauptmanns war Imphigenie in Delphi, dessen Erstaufführung am 5. Dez. 1943 im Schauspielhaus stattfand. (shrink)

This study is about the Quality. Here I have dealt with the quality that differs significantly from the common understanding of quality /as determined quality/ that arise from the law of dialectics. This new quality is the quality of the quantity /quality of the quantitative changes/, noticed in philosophy by Plato as “quality of numbers”, and later developed by Hegel as “qualitative quantity. The difference between the known determined quality and qualitative quantity is evident in the exhibit form of these (...) two qualities. The exhibit form of the known determined quality from the law of dialectics /or it transformation/ is related with discreteness and abrupt changes. The exhibit form of the qualitative quantity /and it transformation/ is related with the continuity and gradual transition from one condition, to a different condition, without any abrupt changes. In my paper “Quality of the quantity”, I have argued that one of the most ancient implementation of quality of the number can be found in the dimensional mathematical model of point – line – surface – figure - introduced by Plato. The most whole presentation of the idea of quality of number in Plato is embeded in his teaching about the "eidical number". The quality of the quantity emerges as criteria for recognizing the difference between the eidical numbers and natural arithmetical number. The thesis concerning Plato is based on the The Unwritten Doctrine of Plato and one of the most original works in the history of philosophy written in the 20th century - “Arete bei Platon und Aristoteles” – “Arete in Plato and Aristotle” /Heidelberg 1959/ written by Hans Joachim Krämer. The new quality as the quality of the quantity /quality of the quantitative changes/, first noticed in philosophy by Plato as “quality of numbers” was developed in Hegel as “qualitative quantity”. Hegel proclaimed the Qualitative quantity, or Measure in the both of his Logics -The Science of Logic / the Greater Logic/ and The Lesser Logic/ Part One of the Encyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences: The Logic. In my paper I have offered the arguments that the concept of quality of the quantity should be enhanced with the adopted methodological approach of analogy with an implementation in the field of the Topology - Analysis Situs, developed by the Jules Henri Poincare. In the topology we could see homeomorphism as exhibit form of Quality on the Quantity. The explicit form of the quality of the quantity transformation is the continuous deformation – typically known in topology as homeomorphism. The concept of qualitative quantity is linked with the concept “structural stability” and nonequilibrum phase transition. The concept of structural stability is related with the topological homeomorphism. In his book “Synergetics: Introduction and Advanced Topics” /Springer, ISBN 3-540-40824/, in the Chapter 1.13. Qualitative Changes: General approach, p. 434-435, Hermann Haken explores and illustrate the structural stability with an example /figure 1.13, p.434/ given by of D'Arcy W. Thompson, the Scottish biologist, mathematician and classics scholar and pioneering mathematical biologist, Nobel Laureate in Medicine /1960/, the author of the book, On Growth and Form, /1917/. The quality of the quantity could be seen in the Herman Haken’s citation on the D'Arcy W. Thompson. My thesis is that the topological homeomorphism is the explicit form of the quality of the quantity transformation. The qualitative quantity change which becomes phenomenon, according to Émile Boutroux, is the subject of study in Cultural Phenomenology of Qualitative quantity. Our approach to this subject is Poincaré Model of the Subconscious Mind in Mathematics, which is the most suitable tool to unfold the arhetype of qualitative quantity. (shrink)

What are consequential world problems? As “grand societal challenges”, one might define them as problems that affect a large number of people, perhaps even the entire planet, including problems such as climate change, distributive justice, world peace, world nutrition, clean air and clean water, access to education, and many more. The “Sustainable Development Goals”, compiled by the United Nations, represent a collection of such global problems. From my point of view, these problems can be seen as complex. Such complex problems (...) are characterized by the complexity, connectivity, dynamics, intransparency, and polytely of their underlying systems. These attributes require special competencies for dealing with the uncertainties of the given domains, e.g., critical thinking. My position is that it is not IQ, but complex problem-solving competencies for dealing with complex and dynamic situations, that is important for handling consequential global problems. These problems require system competencies, i.e., competencies that go beyond analytical intelligence, and comprise systems understanding as well as systems control. Complex problem-solving is more than analytic intelligence. (shrink)

Complex problem solving (CPS) emerged in the last 30 years in Europe as a new part of the psychology of thinking and problem solving. This paper introduces into the field and provides a personal view. Also, related concepts like macrocognition or operative intelligence will be explained in this context. Two examples for the assessment of CPS, Tailorshop and MicroDYN, are presented to illustrate the concept by means of their measurement devices. Also, the relation of complex cognition and emotion in the (...) CPS context is discussed. The question if CPS requires complex cognition is answered with a tentative “yes.”. (shrink)

In the last 20 years, a stream of research emerged under the label of „complex problem solving“ (CPS). This research was intended to describe the way people deal with complex, dynamic, and intransparent situations. Complex computer-simulated scenarios were as stimulus material in psychological experiments. This line of research lead to subtle insights into the way how people deal with complexity and uncertainty. Besides these knowledge-rich, realistic, intransparent, complex, dynamic scenarios with many variables, a second line of research used more simple, (...) knowledge-lean scenarios with a low number of variables („minimal complex systems“, MCS) that have been proposed recently in problem-solving research for the purpose of educational assessment. In both cases, the idea behind the use of microworlds is to increase validity of problem solving tasks by presenting interactive environments that can be explored and controlled by participants while pursuing certain action goals. The main argument presented here is: both types of systems - CPS and MCS – can only be dealt with successfully if causal dependencies between input and output variables are identified and used for system control. System knowledge is necessary for control and intervention. But CPS and MCS differ in their way of how causal dependencies are identified and how the mental model is constructed; therefore, they cannot be compared directly to each other with respect to the cognitive processes that are necessary for solving the tasks. Knowledge-poor MCS tasks address only a small fraction of the cognitive processes and structures needed for knowledge-rich CPS situations. (shrink)

With the advent of computers in the experimental labs, dynamic systems have become a new tool for research on problem solving and decision making. A short review of this research is given and the main features of these systems (connectivity and dynamics) are illustrated. To allow systematic approaches to the influential variables in this area, two formal frameworks (linear structural equations and finite state automata) are presented. Besides the formal background, the article sets out how the task demands of system (...) identification and system control can be realised in these environments, and how psychometrically acceptable dependent variables can be derived. (shrink)

Discussions of the implications of sexual reproduction have appeared throughout the history of evolutionary biology, from Darwin to Weismann, Fisher, Muller, Maynard Smith, and Williams. The latest of these appearances highlighted an evolutionary paradox that had previously been overlooked. In many animal and plant species reproduction is obligately sexual and also half the offspring are male, yet the males contribute nothing but genes to reproduction. If asexual mutants of such a species were to produce as many asexual offspring on average (...) as sexual females in that species produce daughters and sons, the growth rate of their population would be twice as large. Whereas half the offspring of sexual females are noncontributory males, all the offspring of such an asexual mutant would contribute to growth rate. Nevertheless, sexual reproduction prevails in most species and is not lost evolutionarily. (shrink)

This chapter proceeds from the standard picture of the relation between intuitions and experimental philosophy: the alleged evidential role of intuitions about hypothetical cases, and experimental philosophy’s challenge to these judgments, based on their variation with philosophically irrelevant factors. I will survey some of the main defenses of this standard picture against the x-phi challenge, most of which fail. Concerning the most popular defense, the expertise defense, I will draw the bleak conclusion that intuitive expertise of the envisaged kind is (...) largely a myth. Next, I will consider the mischaracterization objection, which has mainly been developed by Deutsch and Cappelen on the basis of textual evidence: that philosophers do not appeal to intuitions as evidence for their case judgments, but instead argue for them. This would render the x-phi challenge mostly irrelevant, due to its focus on intuitions about hypothetical cases. I will then consider a few instructive replies to the mischaracterization objection, which are all unconvincing on further inspection. Finally, I will discuss some potential normative consequences of the mischaracterization objection, and I will argue that it recommends a shift away from the excessive focus on intuitions about cases in metaphilosophy and experimental philosophy, towards more work on the role of argumentation in the method of cases. More speculatively, I claim that philosophers should always argue for their case judgments, even if they have strong intuitions about them, because an argument-based methodology would be more transparent and philosophically fruitful than one that mainly relies on intuition. (shrink)

In his "On the Metaphysics of Knowledge" (this volume), Sven Bernecker introduces and defends a novel account of knowledge that he calls ‘identificationism’. In fact, Bernecker’s account is a hybrid view that combines a modal tracking condition – some variation on safety and/or sensitivity – with his original identificationist condition. The reason for including a tracking condition is that some Gettier cases, like the famous fake barn case, are best accommodated in this way. In making this more familiar claim, Bernecker (...) follows epistemologists like Nozick, Sosa, or Pritchard. But he also adds the less familiar claim that there are ‘intractable’ Gettier cases that cannot be dealt with by a tracking condition alone. These intractable cases involve necessary or modally stable propositions, such as '2+2=4' or 'there is carbon on earth', which are either true in all possible worlds, or at least true in all possible worlds that are close to the actual world. In this paper, I will not directly address the epistemological adequacy of Bernecker’s identificationism. Rather, I want to focus on the substantial metaphysical commitments that it incurs, in particular on the problematic idea that our epistemic reasons identify the truthmaker of our respective belief when we know something. My conclusion will be that being a truthmaker for p is metaphysically more demanding than being an epistemic reason for p. A truthmaker for p must necessitate the truth of p, while an epistemic reason for p must merely indicate the truth of p. Thus, we should not expect that epistemic reasons identify the truthmakers of our knowledge-constituting beliefs in the way that Bernecker suggests. (shrink)

According to a classic position in analytic philosophy of mind, we must interpret agents as largely rational in order to be able to attribute intentional mental states to them. However, adopting this position requires clarifying in what way and by which criteria agents can still be irrational. In this paper I will offer one such criterion. More specifically, I argue that the kind of rationality methodologically required by intentional interpretation is to be specified in terms of psychological efficacy. Thereby, this (...) notion can be distinguished from a more commonly used notion of rationality and hence cannot be shown to be undermined by the potential prevalence of a corresponding kind of irrationality. (shrink)

According to Sternberg (Transformational giftedness. In T. L. Cross & P. Olszewski-Kubilius (Eds.), Conceptual frameworks for giftedness and talent development (pp. 203–234). Prufrock Press, 2020; Transformational vs. transactional deployment of intelligence. Journal of Intelligence, 9(15), 2021), transformationally gifted children are those who view to make a positive, meaningful, and enduring difference to the world. To reach their goal, they need competencies to deal with the complexities of the twenty-first century. This means: they must understand the features of complex problems to (...) develop solutions for them. What they need is a kind of critical thinking paired with systems competency, i.e., the ability to construct mental models of abstract systems, to form and test hypotheses about these systems, and to develop strategies for system identification and successful control of such systems. Also, a strong emphasis on values is needed. (shrink)

Since intelligent design (ID) advocates claimed the ubiquitous mouse trap as an example of systems that cannot have evolved, mouse trap history is doubly relevant to studying material culture. On the one hand, debunking ID claims about mouse traps and, by implication, also about other irreducibly complex systems has a high educational value. On the other hand, a case study of mouse trap history may contribute insights to the academic discussion about material culture evolution. Michael Behe argued that mouse traps (...) cannot trap mice with any part missing; therefore, they cannot have a precursor with one part less, therefore, cannot have a continuous history, and therefore, cannot have evolved. The patented and seminal precursor of current flat snap traps, however, had one part less, because spring and striker were formed of one wire. Secondly, historical records that reach back into the Bronze Age suggest that its history continued for a very long time. Thirdly, all prerequisites for evolution (variation, transmission, and selection) abound in mouse trap populations. Hence, Behe’s triple-jump conclusion about mouse traps is false each step. There is no, in principle, impossibility for mouse traps to evolve. An evolutionary account of mouse trap history also has academic merits beyond its educational value. Three important conclusions can be drawn: (1) reticulate phylogenies of artifact systems may be resolvable as overlapping, but branching, phylogenies of parts; (2) homologous ideas may be realized by analogous material, that is, phylogenies of information do not necessarily coincide with those of material parts; (3) recombination of parts between different artifact systems increases the cumulative nature of cultural evolution. (shrink)

The discussion in Perspectives on Psychological Science about criteria for scholarly merit shows a potential bias of quantitative measurements compared with informed judgments of scholarly merits. This comment argues for a selection procedure that is open for qualitative arguments.

In 1935, A. G. Tansley, who was knighted later, proposed the ecosystem concept. Nevertheless, this concept was not without predecessors. Why did Tansley’s ecosystem prevail and not one of its competitors? The purpose of this article is to pin the distinguishing features of Tansley’s ecosystem down, as far as the published record allows. It is an exercise in finding the difference that made a difference. Besides being a pioneering ecologist, Tansley was an adept of psychoanalysis. His interest even led him (...) to visit Sigmund Freud in Vienna for a while. Psychologists had to regard the mind as an entity in its own right, while knowing that it truly was part of a larger whole (body + mind), because the causal relation between body and mind was unknown. This lead Tansley to conclude that psychologists must not objectify the system under study, have to search for causes within their own field, and must not speculate unless this serves a scientific purpose. In 1925, Tansley defended psychoanalysis in a prolonged controversy against a concerted attack criticizing its speculative content and poor scientific standing. This could have been the reason why Tansley kept his ecosystem free of speculative content and unscientific connotation. The competing ecosystem-like concepts, however, have contained philosophical speculation, non-deterministic properties like vitalism or entelechy, or have been burdened with unscientific connotations. Hence, rigorous restraint distinguished the ecosystem concept and made it ready for use by later researchers. (shrink)

Most philosophers believe that testimony is not a fundamental source of knowledge, but merely a way to transmit already existing knowledge. However, Jennifer Lackey has presented some counterexamples which show that one can actually come to know something through testimony that no one ever knew before. Yet, the intuitive idea can be preserved by the weaker claim that someone in a knowledge-constituting testimonial chain has to have access to some non-testimonial source of knowledge with regard to what is testified. But (...) even this weaker claim has a counterexample which I develop in close connection with a safety-account of knowledge. Thus, testimonial statements can sometimes enable us to know something for which none of our informants has any source of knowledge available. I conclude that my counterexample nevertheless does not affect the core of our intuitions about testimony, although it establishes that testimony can indeed be a fundamental source of knowledge. (shrink)

We focus on the thesis that action understanding is a function of the mirror neuron system. According to our opinion, understanding is a process that runs through hermeneutic circles from the “Vorverständnis” (“previous understanding”) to steps of deeper understanding. Our critique relates to the narrow neuroscientific definition of action understanding as the capacity to recognize several movements as belonging to one action. After a reconstruction of the model's developments, we will challenge the claims of the model by Rizzolatti and Sinigaglia (...) (2010). By analyzing the relation between the experimental results and its interpretation, we will conclude that there is no proof that mirror neuron activity leads to action understanding. (shrink)

PurposeIn this article, we aim to present and defend a contextual approach to mathematical explanation.MethodTo do this, we introduce an epistemic reading of mathematical explanation.ResultsThe epistemic reading not only clarifies the link between mathematical explanation and mathematical understanding, but also allows us to explicate some contextual factors governing explanation. We then show how several accounts of mathematical explanation can be read in this approach.ConclusionThe contextual approach defended here clears up the notion of explanation and pushes us towards a pluralist vision (...) on mathematical explanation. (shrink)

Clade selection is unpopular with philosophers who otherwise accept multilevel selection theory. Clades cannot reproduce, and reproduction is widely thought necessary for evolution by natural selection, especially of complex adaptations. Using microbial evolutionary processes as heuristics, I argue contrariwise, that (1) clade growth (proliferation of contained species) substitutes for clade reproduction in the evolution of complex adaptation, (2) clade-level properties favoring persistence – species richness, dispersal, divergence, and possibly intraclade cooperation – are not collapsible into species-level traits, (3) such properties (...) can be maintained by selection on clades, and (4) clade selection extends the explanatory power of the theory of evolution. (shrink)

The method of reflective equilibrium (MRE) is a method of justification popularized by John Rawls and further developed by Norman Daniels, Michael DePaul, Folke Tersman, and Catherine Z. Elgin, among others. The basic idea is that epistemic agents have justified beliefs if they have succeeded in forming their beliefs into a harmonious system of beliefs which they reflectively judge to be the most plausible. Despite the common reference to MRE as a method, its mechanisms or rules are typically expressed in (...) a metaphorical or simplified manner and are therefore criticized as too vague. Recent efforts to counter this criticism have been directed towards the attempt to provide formal explications of MRE. This paper aims to supplement these efforts by providing an informal working definition of MRE. This approach challenges the view that MRE can adequately be characterized only in the negative as a set of anti-essentialisms. I argue that epistemic agents follow MRE iff they follow four interconnected rules, which are concerned with a minimalistic form of foundationalism, a minimalistic form of fallibilism, a moderate form of holism, and a minimalistic form of rationality. In the critical spirit of MRE, the corresponding working definition is, of course, provisional and revisable. In general, the aim is to contribute to a reflective equilibrium (RE) concerning MRE. If it is successful, this working definition provides a better grasp of the most basic elements of the method and thereby enhances our understanding of it. (shrink)

While more species are being identified as cultural on a regular basis, stark differences between human and animal cultures remain. Humans are more richly cultural, with group-specific practices and social norms guiding almost every element of our lives. Furthermore, human culture is seen as cumulative, cooperative, and normative, in contrast to animal cultures. One hypothesis to explain these differences is grounded in the observation that human children across cultures appear to spontaneously over-imitate silly or causally irrelevant behaviors that they observe. (...) The few studies on over-imitation in other species are largely taken as evidence that spontaneous over-imitation is not present in other species. This leads to the over-imitation hypothesis – that the differences between human culture and animal cultures can be traced to the human unique tendency to over-imitate. In this paper, we analyze the current state of the literature on animal over-imitation and challenge the adequacy of the over-imitation hypothesis for the differences between humans and animal cultures. To make this argument, we first argue that the function of human over-imitation is norm-learning and that over-imitation, like skill-learning, should be subject to selective social learning effects. Then we review the empirical evidence against animal over-imitation and argue that these studies do not take into account the relevant variables given the normative and selective nature of over-imitation. We then analyze positive empirical evidence of over-imitation in great apes and canids from the experimental literature and conclude that the current body of evidence suggests that some canids and primates may have the capacity for over-imitation. This paper offers a methodological suggestion for how to study animal over-imitation, and a theoretical suggestion that over-imitation might be much more widely found among species. The larger implication for claims about human uniqueness suggests that if we do find widespread evidence of over-imitation across species, many of the current theories of human uniqueness that focus on human hyper-cooperation or social norms may have only identified a difference of degree, not of kind, between humans and other animals. (shrink)

This book is a translation of W.V. Quine's Kant Lectures, given as a series at Stanford University in 1980. It provide a short and useful summary of Quine's philosophy. There are four lectures altogether: I. Prolegomena: Mind and its Place in Nature; II. Endolegomena: From Ostension to Quantification; III. Endolegomena loipa: The forked animal; and IV. Epilegomena: What's It all About? The Kant Lectures have been published to date only in Italian and German translation. The present book is filled out (...) with the translator's critical Introduction, "The esoteric Quine?" a bibliography based on Quine's sources, and an Index for the volume. (shrink)

Things and Their Place in Theories Our talk of external things, our very notion of things, is just a conceptual apparatus that helps us to foresee and ...

In terms of validity in Kripke frames, a modal formula expresses a universal monadic second-order condition. Those modal formulae which are equivalent to first-order conditions are called elementary. Modal formulae which have a certain persistence property which implies their validity in all canonical frames of modal logics axiomatized with them, and therefore their completeness, are called canonical. This is a survey of a recent and ongoing study of the class of elementary and canonical modal formulae. We summarize main ideas and (...) results, and outline further research perspectives. (shrink)

In the world of philosophy of science, the dominant theory of confirmation is Bayesian. In the wider philosophical world, the idea of inference to the best explanation exerts a considerable influence. Here we place the two worlds in collision, using Bayesian confirmation theory to argue that explanatoriness is evidentially irrelevant.

As automating technologies are increasingly integrated into workplaces, one concern is that many of the human workers who remain will be relegated to more dull and less positively impactful work. This paper considers two rival theories of meaningful work that might be used to evaluate particular implementations of automation. The first is achievementism, which says that work that culminates in achievements to workers’ credit is especially meaningful; the other is the practice view, which says that work that takes the form (...) of an open-ended practice is especially meaningful. Of the two, the practice view is the better tool for assessing the future of meaningful work, because achievementism is explanatorily inadequate in two ways. Moreover, the practice view can explain why the most meaningful forms of work cannot be automated. A procedure can only be automated as long as the steps are defined, whereas, in such work, which steps to take is indefinitely open to redefinition. This reveals the real threat to meaningful work to be a political-economic one. The relevant ethical questions there have to do with how much creative control workers retain in crafting their own jobs, when those jobs involve meaningful work in collaboration with machines; and how to liberate workers from jobs that do not involve meaningful work, which should be left to machines anyway. (shrink)

Ausgangspunkt ist die Frage, was Masse ist, wodurch sie insbesondere befähigt ist, Dauer zu konstituieren und deshalb - im Sinn des kinematischen Relativitätsprinzips - ebenso als bewegt wie als ruhend betrachtet werden kann. In einem Gedankenexperiment wird diese Frage, in Umkehrung der Perspektive, hier nicht von der Masse selbst, sondern von einer stehenden Lichtwelle her angegangen. In diesem Modell lassen sich masse-analoge Strukturen rekonstruieren, die in relativer Bewegung sein können. Die (empirisch bekannte) Unabhängigkeit der Lichtgeschwindigkeit vom Bezugssystem ist dabei nicht (...) vorausgesetzt. Doch kann gezeigt werden, dass die Lichtgeschwindigkeit Grenzgeschwindigkeit solcher relativer Bewegungen ist, dass dies für alle durch masse-analoge Strukturen konstituierte, relativ zueinander gleichförmig bewegten Bezugssysteme gilt und dass die Lichtgeschwindigkeit selbst in allen diesen Systemen gleich ist. Die Absolutheit der Lichtgeschwindigkeit und die Relativität der Massebewegungen erweisen sich so als zwar differente, aber intrinsisch zusammengehörende Momente des kinematischen Relativitätsprinzips: ein Beitrag zu einer Philosophie der Relativitätstheorie. - Die mathematischen Zusammenhänge werden im Anhang ausführlicher dargelegt. (shrink)

In this paper, we bring together research on complex problem solving with that on motivational psychology about goal setting. Complex problems require motivational effort because of their inherent difficulties. Goal Setting Theory has shown with simple tasks that high, specific performance goals lead to better performance outcome than do-your-best goals. However, in complex tasks, learning goals have proven more effective than performance goals. Based on the Zurich Resource Model, so-called motto-goals should activate a person’s resources through positive affect. It was (...) found that motto-goals are effective with unpleasant duties. Therefore, we tested the hypothesis that motto-goals outperform learning and performance goals in the case of complex problems. A total of N = 123 subject participated in the experiment. In dependence of their goal condition, subjects developed a personal motto, learning, or performance goal. This goal was adapted for the computer-simulated complex scenario Tailorshop, where subjects worked as managers in a small fictional company. Other than expected, there was no main effect of goal condition for the management performance. An unexpected gender effect revealed better performance for men than women, pointing to a potential stereotype threat. As hypothesized, motto goals led to higher positive and lower negative affect than the other two goal types. Even though positive affect decreased and negative affect increased in all three groups during Tailorshop completion, participants with motto goals reported the lowest rates of negative affect. Exploratory analyses investigated the role of affect in complex problem solving via mediational analyses and the influence of goal type on perceived goal attainment. (shrink)

Nudging works through dispositions to decide with specific heuristics, and has three component parts. A nudge is a feature of an environment that enables such a disposition; a person is nudged when such a disposition is triggered; and a person performs a nudged action when such a disposition manifests in action. This analysis clarifies an autonomy-based worry about nudging as used in public policy or for private profit: that a person’s ability to reason well is undermined when she is nudged. (...) Reasoning well is a component of self-guidance, which is an aspect of autonomy and so something there is reason to promote, preserve, or respect. However, a person can reason well when she is nudged: Many of these heuristics are good rules to reason with, and she can be flexible with respect to them when she takes there to be a better way to reason. Along the way, this paper uncovers several design specifications for responsible nudging, and discusses open empirical questions. However, nudging’s being compatible with reasoning well crystallizes a distinct worry about manipulation: that nudge designers can rely on nudged people guiding themselves toward the designers’ own ends. Manipulation of this sort exploits one aspect of autonomy (namely, self-guidance) to undermine autonomy in other respects. (shrink)

How people understand the fundamental dynamics of stock and flow is an important basic theoretical question with many practical applications. In this paper, we present a universal frame for understanding stock-flow reasoning in terms of the theory of force dynamics. This deep-level analysis is then applied to two different presentation formats of SF tasks in the context of climate change. We can explain why in a coordinate-graphic presentation misunderstandings occur, whereas in a verbal presentation a better understanding is found. We (...) end up with recommendations for presentation formats that will help people to better understand SF dynamics. Better public SF understanding might in turn also enhance corresponding public action – such as enhancing pro-environmental actions in relation to climate change. (shrink)

Amalia Holst was an important pedagogical theorist and philosopher who was part of the distinctive intellectual milieu of Hamburg in the late 18th and early 19th century. Holst has enjoyed a fair amount of attention from scholars working on the history of feminism, and she has recently come to the attention of historians of philosophy for her incisive critique of (Rousseau-inspired) educational theories, her vocal advocacy for women’s access to higher education, and for apparently radical lines of thinking in her (...) views on history, religion, and morality. While Holst was something of a public figure in Hamburg—she published two controversial treatises in her lifetime, in addition to a lengthy review of a popular novel—there is relatively little known about her life, with most of what we do know owed to only a sparse handful of sources. It is, therefore, a rather significant development for scholars working on Holst that two letters by her should come to light. These letters are replete with new details of Holst’s life, her intellectual network, and they seem to have been wholly unaccounted for by Holst’s biographers. In this article, I will provide a transcription and translation, with annotations, of the two new letters. (shrink)

Russellian monism (RM) attributes experience to the intrinsic nature of physics’ abstract mathematical accounts of the world. It’s touted as a promising mind-body solution, for it avoids dualist and physicalist issues. Yet this status is imperiled by its deeply obscure ideas of mental combination, protophenomenal entities, emergent experience, grounded abstractions, et cetera. This “metaphysical magical mystery tour” may render RM as problematic as competing views. A clear, simple panpsychism akin to Strawson’s might avoid these issues. In this theory (NPP), experience (...) is the real, underlying nature of matter-energy, hidden beyond its sensory appearances. NPP may avoid panpsychist combination problems by showing how neurons can electrically bind their minimal experience to form percepts, thoughts, and subjects. This might explain combination in testable ways, while RM instead turns to questionable microsubjects and binding mechanisms. NPP’s virtues are its metaphysical simplicity, empirical support, testable foundations—and its avoidance of the issues in RM and other standard theories. It might point to a mind-body solution. (shrink)

How do brains create all our different colors, pains, and other conscious qualities? These various qualia are the most essential aspects of consciousness. Yet standard neuroscience (primarily based on synaptic information processing) has not found the synaptic-firing codes, sometimes described as the “spike code,” to account for how these qualia arise and how they unite to form complex perceptions, emotions, et cetera. Nor is it clear how to get from these abstract codes to the qualia we experience. But electromagnetic field (...) (versus synaptic) approaches to how qualia arise have been offered in recent years by Pockett, McFadden, Jones, Bond, Ward and Guevera, Keppler and Shani, Hunt and Schooler, et cetera. These EM-field approaches show promise in offering more viable accounts of qualia. Yet, until now, they have not been evaluated together. We review various EM field theories of qualia, highlight their strengths and weaknesses, and contrast these theories with standard neuroscience approaches. -/- . (shrink)

In recent years, academics and educators have begun to use software mapping tools for a number of education-related purposes. Typically, the tools are used to help impart critical and analytical skills to students, to enable students to see relationships between concepts, and also as a method of assessment. The common feature of all these tools is the use of diagrammatic relationships of various kinds in preference to written or verbal descriptions. Pictures and structured diagrams are thought to be more comprehensible (...) than just words, and a clearer way to illustrate understanding of complex topics. Variants of these tools are available under different names: “concept mapping”, “mind mapping” and “argument mapping”. Sometimes these terms are used synonymously. However, as this paper will demonstrate, there are clear differences in each of these mapping tools. This paper offers an outline of the various types of tool available and their advantages and disadvantages. It argues that the choice of mapping tool largely depends on the purpose or aim for which the tool is used and that the tools may well be converging to offer educators as yet unrealised and potentially complementary functions. (shrink)

The Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget contends that children below the age of 12 see no necessity for the logical law of non-contradiction. I argue this view is problematic. First of all, Piaget's dialogues with children which are considered supportive of this position are not clearly so. Secondly, Piaget underestimates the necessary nature of following the logical law of non-contradiction in everyday discourse. The mere possibility of saying something significant and informative at all presupposes that the law of non-contradiction is enforced.

In the last two decades we have witnessed considerable efforts directed towards making electronic healthcare records comparable and interoperable through advances in record architectures and (bio)medical terminologies and coding systems. Deep semantic issues in general, and ontology in particular, have received some interest from the research communities. However, with the exception of work on so-called ‘controlled vocabularies’, ontology has thus far played little role in work on standardization. The prime focus has been rather the rapid population of terminologies at the (...) level of fine detail. In this paper, we argue that more efforts are needed on the side of both research and standardization to ensure that the coding systems used in electronic healthcare records enjoy a semantics that is coherent with the semantics of the record. We propose realist ontology as a method to bring about this coherence by means of a robust system of top-level ontological categories. (shrink)

It is sometimes said that permitting, say, voluntary euthanasia would erode the motivations and inhibitions supporting other, legitimate prohibitions on killing to the point where widespread disregard for the moral law would result. this paper discusses the relevance of such "slippery slope" arguments for the rule-utilitarian who claims that we can assess moral rules by asking whether their acceptance would maximize utility. first it is argued that any normative theory of this type cannot recognize slope arguments as legitimate considerations in (...) this assessment. second, it is suggested that a theory based on the very different notion of choosing a moral code can permit slope arguments to weigh as relevant considerations. (shrink)