It is often suggested that social media is a hostile environment for critical thinking and that a major source for epistemic problems concerning social media is that it facilitates emotions. We argue that emotions per se are not the source of the epistemic problems concerning social media. We propose that instead of focusing on emotions, we should focus on the affective scaffolding of social media. We will show that some affective scaffolds enable desirable epistemic practices, while others obstruct beneficial (...) epistemic practices, or enable hostile epistemic practices. Particularly, we will show that emotions play a crucial role in the epistemic practice of critical thinking and that the affective scaffolding of social media can support, or hinder, online critical thinking. The upshot of our argument is that affective scaffoldings of social media can harness emotions to support beneficial epistemic practices, like online critical thinking. (shrink)

According to Steven Pinker and his associates the cooperative model of human communication fails, because evolutionary biology teaches us that most social relationships, including talk-exchange, involve combinations of cooperation and conflict. In particular, the phenomenon of the strategic speaker who uses indirect speech in order to be able to deny what he meant by a speech act (deniability of conversational implicatures) challenges the model. In reply I point out that interlocutors can aim at understanding each other (cooperation), while being in (...) conflict. Furthermore, Pinker’s strategic speaker relies on the Cooperative Principle when conveying a conversational implicature, and so non-cooperative behaviour (denial) only emerges as a response to a negative reaction from the audience. It is also doubtful in the cases Pinker presents whether a denial will successfully cancel the conversational implicature –change the audience’s interpretation of speaker’s meaning. I also argue that a strategic speaker might choose indirect speech due to the ignorability of conversational implicatures, in which case the strategic speaker can be highly cooperative. (shrink)

According to Steven Pinker and his associates the cooperative model of human communication fails, because evolutionary biology teaches us that most social relationships, including talk-exchange, involve combinations of cooperation and conflict. In particular, the phenomenon of the strategic speaker who uses indirect speech in order to be able to deny what he meant by a speech act (deniability of conversational implicatures) challenges the model. In reply I point out that interlocutors can aim at understanding each other (cooperation), while being in (...) conflict. Furthermore, Pinker’s strategic speaker relies on the Cooperative Principle when conveying a conversational implicature, and so non-cooperative behaviour (denial) only emerges as a response to a negative reaction from the audience. It is also doubtful in the cases Pinker presents whether a denial will successfully cancel the conversational implicature –change the audience’s interpretation of speaker’s meaning. I also argue that a strategic speaker might choose indirect speech due to the ignorability of conversational implicatures, in which case the strategic speaker can be highly cooperative. (shrink)

Nowadays, hardly anything works as it should in Germany. Whether energy supply, digitization, health, pension or infrastructure. More and more often, serious consequences of wrong strategic decisions and an increasingly ideologically shaped dilettantism are becoming visible: Purchasing power and prosperity are dwindling, taxes and fees are increasing, regulative proliferation and bureaucracy are hostile to innovation and a todays shrinking middle class must always harder fight to prevent its own decline as well as not to leave worse conditions to the next (...) generation. If this does not change fundamentally, upcoming decades will face in real time how a nation destroys itself and gambles away the future of its children. Freedom, democracy and the rule of law: If we want to preserve them, we have to rely on competence and quality and not on ideology and mediocrity. Otherwise, one day authoritarian systems will take us over! -/- Kaum etwas funktioniert in Deutschland noch wie es sollte. Ob Energieversorgung, Digitalisierung, Gesundheit, Rente oder Infrastruktur. Immer öfter werden gravierende Folgen strategischer Fehlentscheidungen und eines zunehmend ideologisch geprägten Dilettantismus' sichtbar: Kaufkraft und Wohlstand schwinden, Abgaben und Gebühren steigen, der Regelungswildwuchs und die Bürokratie sind innovationsfeindlich und eine schrumpfende Mittelschicht kämpft heute darum, den eigenen Abstieg zu verhindern und der nächsten Generation keine schlechteren Rahmenbedingungen zu hinterlassen. Wenn sich daran nichts grundlegend ändert lässt sich kommende Jahrzehnte in Echtzeit beobachten, wie eine Nation sich selbst zerstört und die Zukunft ihrer Kinder verspielt. Freiheit, Demokratie und Rechtsstaat: Wollen wir sie erhalten, müssen wir auf Kompetenz und Qualität und nicht auf Gesinnung und Mittelmaß setzen. Denn sonst überrollen uns irgendwann autoritäre Systeme! -/- . (shrink)

Zum Coronavirus grassier(t)en allerlei obskure Theorien und Mythen. Viele halten es für harmlos. Manche argumentier(t)en bei der Sterblichkeit gar mit einer Zyklischen Welle: Es träfe vor allem jene, die in einem halben Jahr sowieso (an was auch immer) gestorben wären. Im Falle von Coronamaßnahmen würde deren Tod im Folgejahr lediglich nachgeholt. Das ist natürlich mehr als zynisch: Wer will das einem Menschen im Pflegeheim beibringen? Wer maßt sich die Entscheidung darüber an, ob es sich für einen Anderen lohnt, noch (...) ein paar zusätzliche Monate zu leben? -/- Leider erntete man in der Pandemie, was man jahrzehntelang gesät hatte: Beliebiges Nebeneinander von Forschung und Aberglaube, Wissenschaft und Esoterik, musste in der Bevölkerung den Eindruck einer Gleichberechtigung von Aussagen erwecken. Ganz so, als wäre Vernunft oder Unsinn eben eine Frage des persönlichen Geschmacks, einer alternativen Weltanschauung. Doch zwischen Tatsachen und Blödsinn gibt es keinen Kompromiss. Es existiert kein Recht auf Aberglaube. CoViD-19 wird nicht von 5G-Handymasten ausgelöst. Auch nicht vielleicht! In der Folge stagnieren nun die Impfquoten. Die lassen sich jetzt, nach Jahrzehnten boomender Esoterik, auch durch mehr „Kommunikation mit dem Volk“ nicht wesentlich steigern. (shrink)

In this article, I argue that Hegel’s concept of recognition and Levinas’ concept of responsibility complement each other and lead to the idea of an asymmetrical reciprocity in which the origin of our social relations is not mutual equality, but rather mutual inequality. I will unfold this argument in three steps. I will first work out a fundamental asymmetry of recognition in Hegel by means of the figure of the bondsman before elucidating in a second step the asymmetry (...) of responsibility in Levinas by means of the figure of the hostage. In the last and third step, I will correlate both asymmetries and show how far the asymmetry of recognition and the asymmetry of responsibility constantly develop from and transition into one another in our social relationships. (shrink)

Technology should be aligned with our values. We make the case that attempts to align emerging technologies with our values should reflect critically on these values. Critical thinking seems like a natural starting point for the critical assessment of our values. However, extant conceptualizations of critical thinking carve out no space for the critical scrutiny of values. We will argue that we need critical thinking that focuses on values instead of taking them as unexamined starting points. In order to (...) play a crucial role in helping to align values and technology, critical thinking needs to be modified and refocused on values. Here, we outline what value-centred critical thinking could look like. (shrink)

This book is a new scholarly edition of Lincoln Steffensâ classic, â oemuck-rakingâ account of Gilded Age corruption in America. It provides the broader political background, theoretical and historical context needed to better understand the social and political roots of corruption in general terms: the social and moral nature of corruption and reform. Steffens enjoyed the support of a multitude of journalists with first-hand knowledge of their localities. He interviewed and came to know political bosses, crusading district attorneys and indicted (...) corruptionists spanning a cast of hundreds. He also benefited from the support of a large-scale, nationally prominent network of anti-corruption specialists and luminaries, including President Theodore Roosevelt. Steffens explored in detail the high Gilded Age corruption of New York City, Chicago, â oecorrupt and contentedâ Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, St. Louis and Minneapolis. His work culminated in a well-documented record of Gilded Age corruption in the cities; and, with the addition of the editorial annotations, Chronology and Introduction of this edition, the reader is placed in a position to gain an overview and considerable insight into the general, moral and social-political phenomenon of corruption. This book will be of interest for students and professionals in political philosophy, political science, American history and American studies. (shrink)

Unlike conceptual analysis, conceptual engineering does not aim to identify the content that our current concepts do have, but the content which these concepts should have. For this method to show the results that its practitioners typically aim for, being able to change meanings seems to be a crucial presupposition. However, certain branches of semantic externalism raise doubts about whether this presupposition can be met. To the extent that meanings are determined by external factors such as causal histories or microphysical (...) structures, it seems that they cannot be changed intentionally. This paper gives an extended discussion of this ‘externalist challenge’. Pace Herman Cappelen’s recent take on this issue, it argues that the viability of conceptual engineering crucially depends on our ability to bring about meaning change. Furthermore, it argues that, contrary to first appearance, causal theories of reference do allow for a sufficient degree of meaning control. To this purpose, it argues that there is a sense of what is called ‘collective long-range control’, and that popular versions of the causal theory of reference imply that people have this kind of control over meanings. (shrink)

A philosopher argues that state-sponsored cyberattacks against central military or civilian targets are always acts of war. What is this philosopher doing? According to conceptual analysts, the philosopher is making a claim about our concept of war. According to philosophical realists, the philosopher is making a claim about war per se. In a quickly developing literature, a third option is being explored: the philosopher is engineering the concept of war. On this view, the philosopher is making a proposal about which (...) concept we should have – even if it deviates from the extant concept, and even if it does not capture ‘what war really is’. The activity or method of proposing such revisionary definitions, as well as the metaphilosophical reflection on it, has become known as conceptual engineering. (shrink)

Max Deutsch has recently argued that conceptual engineering is stuck in a dilemma. If it is construed as the activity of revising the semantic meanings of existing terms, then it faces an unsurmountable implementation problem. If, on the other hand, it is construed as the activity of introducing new technical terms, then it becomes trivial. According to Deutsch, this conclusion need not worry us, however, for conceptual engineering is ill-motivated to begin with. This paper responds to Deutsch by arguing, first, (...) that there is a third construal of conceptual engineering, neglected by him, which renders it both implementable and non-trivial, and second, that even the more ambitious project of changing semantic meanings is no less feasible than other normative projects we currently pursue. Lastly, the value of conceptual engineering is defended against Deutsch’s objections. (shrink)

It is often assumed that how we talk about the world matters a great deal. This is one reason why conceptual engineers seek to improve our linguistic practices by advocating novel uses of our words, or by inventing new ones altogether. A core idea shared by conceptual engineers is that by changing our language in this way, we can reap all sorts of cognitive and practical benefits, such as improving our theorizing, combating hermeneutical injustice, or promoting social emancipation. But how (...) do changes at the linguistic level translate into any of these worthwhile benefits? In this paper, we propose the nameability account as a novel answer to this question. More specifically, we argue that what linguistic resources are readily available to us directly affects our cognitive performance on various categorization-related tasks. Consequently, our performance on such tasks can be improved by making controlled changes to our linguistic resources. We argue that this finding supports and extends recent motivations for conceptual engineering, as categorization plays an important role in both theoretical and practical contexts. (shrink)

Conceptual engineers aim to revise rather than describe our concepts. But what are concepts? And how does one engineer them? Answering these questions is of central importance for implementing and theorizing about conceptual engineering. This paper discusses and criticizes two influential views of this issue: semanticism, according to which conceptual engineers aim to change linguistic meanings, and psychologism, according to which conceptual engineers aim to change psychological structures. I argue that neither of these accounts can give us the full story. (...) Instead, I propose and defend the Dual Content View of Conceptual Engineering. On this view, conceptual engineering targets concepts, where concepts are understood as having two kinds of contents: referential content and cognitive content. I show that this view is independently plausible and that it gives us a comprehensive account of conceptual engineering that helps to make progress on some of the most difficult problems surrounding conceptual engineering. (shrink)

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.

This paper argues for explanatory eliminativism about topics (and cognates, such as subject matters) relative to the domain of conceptual engineering. It has become usual to think that topics serve an important explanatory role in theories of conceptual engineering, namely, to determine the limits of revision. I argue, first, that such limits can be understood either as thenormative limitspertaining to the justification of conceptual engineering, as themetaphysical limitspertaining to the identity of the concepts in question, or as theterminological limitspertaining to (...) usage of the original terminology. Second, I argue that the metaphysical reading is disputable as a theory of concepts and inconsequential for conceptual engineers, and that neither of the two leading accounts of topics that have been presented in the literature—the samesaying account and functionalism—determine the limits of revision in either of the two remaining senses. In the absence of more promising competitors, I conclude that there is no theoretical role for topics to play in theories of conceptual engineering. An upshot of my argument is that conceptual engineers should stop worrying about things like topic (dis)continuity, and instead shift their attention to the issues that really matter for justifying conceptual revisions or replacements, making terminological choices, and underpinning conceptual engineering with a theory of concepts. (shrink)

It seems natural to think that Carnapian explication and experimental philosophy can go hand in hand. But what exactly explicators can gain from the data provided by experimental philosophers remains controversial. According to an influential proposal by Shepherd and Justus, explicators should use experimental data in the process of ‘explication preparation’. Against this proposal, Mark Pinder has recently suggested that experimental data can directly assist an explicator’s search for fruitful replacements of the explicandum. In developing his argument, he also proposes (...) a novel aspect of what makes a concept fruitful, namely, that it is taken up by the relevant community. In this paper, I defend explication preparation against Pinder’s objections and argue that his uptake proposal conflates theoretical and practical success conditions of explications. Furthermore, I argue that Pinder’s suggested experimental procedure needs substantial revision. I end by distinguishing two kinds of explication projects, and showing how experimental philosophy can contribute to each of them. (shrink)

Conceptual engineering concerns the assessment and improvement of our concepts. But how can proposals to engineer concepts be implemented in the real world? This is known as the implementation challenge to conceptual engineering. In this paper, I am concerned with the meta-philosophical implications of the implementation challenge. Specifically, must we overcome the implementation challenge prior to undertaking conceptual engineering? Some critics have recently answered this question affirmatively. I intend to show that they are mistaken. I argue as follows. First, successful (...) implementation is not an integral part of conceptual engineering. Second, the idea that the value of conceptual engineering relies on successful implementation is in tension with widespread assumptions about normative theorizing. (shrink)

Linguistic interventions aim to change our linguistic practices. A commonly discussed type of linguistic intervention is meaning revision, which seeks to associate existing words with new or revised meanings. But why does retaining old words matter so much? Why not instead introduce new words to express the newly defined meanings? Drawing on relevant psycholinguistic research, this paper develops an empirically motivated, general, and practically useful pro tanto reason to retain rather than replace the original word during the process of conceptual (...) improvement. (shrink)

Ameliorative projects design and propagate new linguistic content for some expressions we use for political or social justice purposes. These projects are often driven by an anti-essentialist agenda: they aim to debunk the idea that social categories such as “woman,” “man,” or “race” are constituted by natural essences. But critics argue that nouns tend to trigger essentialist thinking. And because ameliorative projects typically retain nouns, it is argued that these projects cannot achieve their anti-essentialist goals. In response, I argue that (...) the psychological effects of noun use tend to support, rather than hinder, the anti-essentialist goals of ameliorators. (shrink)

Public discourse is increasingly characterized by a climate of intolerance, a culture of exclusion (cancel culture) and thinking in categories of political correctness. (German) language is systematically manipulated by public broadcasting in line with a gender political agenda. A more and more uncritical and ideologically coloured trend journalism is on the rise there. The Freedom and quality of science are also methodically undermined due to nonproven and populist claims. -/- Der Öffentliche Diskurs ist zunehmend geprägt von einem Klima der Intoleranz, (...) einer Kultur der Ausgrenzung (cancel culture) und einem Denken in Kategorien der political correctness. Die (deutsche) Sprache wird im Sinne einer genderpolitischen Agenda im Öffentlichen Rundfunk systematisch manipuliert. Ein zunehmend unkritischer und ideologisch gefärbter Tendenzjournalismus gewinnt dort an Terrain. Auch die Freiheit und die Qualität der Wissenschaft werden aufgrund unhaltbarer und populistischer Behauptungen methodisch untergraben. -/- . (shrink)

You sit in your office and put on the latest pair of virtual reality (VR) goggles. Suddenly, you stand in the middle of Times Square. A car almost hits you. You.

Conceptual engineering is the process of assessing and improving our conceptual repertoire. Some authors have claimed that introducing or revising concepts through conceptual engineering can go as far as expanding the realm of thinkable thoughts and thus enable us to form beliefs, hypotheses, wishes, or desires that we are currently unable to form. If true, this would allow conceptual engineers to contribute to solving stubborn problems – problems that cannot be solved with our current ways of thinking. We call this (...) kind of conceptual engineering heavy-duty conceptual engineering. As exciting as the idea of heavy-duty conceptual engineering sounds, it has never been developed or defended. In this paper, we pursue a two-fold goal. First, to offer a theory of heavy-duty conceptual engineering that distinguishes it from other kinds of conceptual engineering; second, to show that heavy-duty conceptual engineering is possible, both in theory and in practice, and to explain how it can be applied in the service of solving stubborn problems. The central idea is that heavy-duty conceptual engineering can enhance the semantic expressive power of a conceptual system by the use of bootstrapping processes. (shrink)

Recently developed large language models (LLMs) perform surprisingly well in many language-related tasks, ranging from text correction or authentic chat experiences to the production of entirely new texts or even essays. It is natural to get the impression that LLMs know the meaning of natural language expressions and can use them productively. Recent scholarship, however, has questioned the validity of this impression, arguing that LLMs are ultimately incapable of understanding and producing meaningful texts. This paper develops a more optimistic view. (...) Drawing on classic externalist accounts of reference, it argues that LLM-generated texts meet the conditions of successful reference. This holds at least for proper names and so-called paradigm terms. The key insight here is that the LLM may inherit reference from its training-data through a reference-sustaining training mechanism. (shrink)

The Chomskian holds that the grammars that linguists produce are about human psycholinguistic structures, i.e. our mastery of a grammar, our linguistic competence. But if we encountered Martians whose psycholinguistic processes differed from ours, but who nevertheless produced sentences that are extensionally equivalent to the set of sentences in our English and shared our judgements on the grammaticality of various English sentences, then we would count them as being competent in English. A grammar of English is about what the Martians (...) and we share. In this note, I argue that a recent attack on the Martian Argument by Laurence fail to mitigate its force. (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)

This paper discusses the logical space of alternative conceptual engineering projects, with a specific focus on (1) the processes, (2) the targets and goals, and (3) the methods of such projects. We present an overview of how these three aspects interact in the contemporary literature and discuss those alternative projects that have yet to be explored based on our suggested typology. We show how choices about each element in a conceptual engineering project constrain the possibilities for the others, thereby giving (...) rise to distinct groupings of possible projects under the banner of conceptual engineering. We conclude with a critical reflection on the potential ethical issues that arise as a result of effectively putting conceptual engineering into practice. (shrink)

In this paper, we present and discuss the findings of two experiments about reference change. Cases of reference change have sometimes been invoked to challenge traditional versions of semantic externalism, but the relevant cases have never been tested empirically. The experiments we have conducted use variants of the famous Twin Earth scenario to test folk intuitions about whether natural kind terms such as ‘water’ or ‘salt’ switch reference after being constantly (mis)applied to different kinds. Our results indicate that this is (...) indeed so. We argue that this finding is evidence against Saul Kripke’s causal-historical view of reference, and at least provisional evidence in favor of the causal source view of reference as suggested by Gareth Evans and Michael Devitt. (shrink)

This is a survey article about reliabilism. It introduces its main ideas, outlines some of its core challenges and discusses a number of solutions.

The philosophical background important to Mill’s theory of induction has two major components: Richard Whately’s introduction of the uniformity principle into inductive inference and the loss of the idea of formal cause.

Prometheus has grown four years older since its last and highly controversial special issue, published in 2017 on the Shaken Baby Debate. But, as always, Prometheus is committed to open discussion and dissemination of scientific research, regardless of the potential backlash or controversy that may ensue from such a venture, a venture that is at the core of authentic scholarship. Since the beginning of 2020, the world has changed irrevocably, making once-held norms seem obsolete in favour of new ways of (...) being in the world and new technologies emerging to face these new ways of living. Although it has been a long-held insight in the philosophy of technology that technical systems are carriers of values, the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has made manifest how these values, and their incarnations in sociotechnical systems, can likewise change. Prometheus has, since its inception, danced in tandem with the critical interpretations, theories, and methods for understanding innovation, and how innovations fundamentally impact and are impacted by the world in which they emerge and are situated. For this reason, Steffen Steinert, Tristan de Wildt, and I chose to guest edit this special issue on designing for value change and chose Prometheus as its home. (shrink)

Als Signatur moderner demokratischer Gesellschaften gilt heute weithin, was John Rawls zu Beginn der 1990er Jahre als „vernünftigen Pluralismus“ bezeichnet hat. Mit ihm einher geht die Frage, wie divergierende Lebensformen miteinander ins Gespräch gebracht werden können und wie sich dabei zu legitimen politischen Urteilen kommen lässt. Ich werde in meinem Beitrag argumentieren, dass sich die genannte Frage lösen lässt, wenn wir uns der jüngeren Diskussion von Arendts Theorie der Urteilskraft von Linda Zerilli zuwenden und diese mit Rahel Jaeggis Überlegungen zur (...) Kritik von Lebensformen verbinden. Dafür werde ich zunächst Arendts Überlegungen zur politischen Urteilskraft rekonstruieren und zeigen, wie diese Kants Modell der ästhetischen Urteilskraft auf den Bereich des Politischen zu übertragen versucht. Ich werde argumentieren, dass Arendt diese Transposition nur teilweise gelingt und eine Reihe von wichtigen Fragen ungelöst bleibt. Arendts Überlegungen sind damit jedoch keineswegs obsolet, sondern müssen vielmehr weiter gedacht werden. Zerilli hat hierfür jüngst einen wegweisenden Vorschlag vorgelegt, der Arendts Theorie der Urteilskraft nicht mehr im Ausgang von Kant, sondern von Wittgenstein zu denken versucht. Die damit einhergehende Perspektivverschiebung erlaubt es, den Streit zwischen divergierenden Lebensformen mit Jaeggi als eine mit den Mitteln der immanenten Kritik geführte Auseinandersetzung um deren Lernfähigkeit zu begreifen, was am Beispiel des Streits zwischen den Lebensformen der Kleinfamilie und der Kommune deutlich gemacht werden soll. (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 (M.A.) und Hannes Kuch (M.A.) 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)

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)

Poniższa praca odnosi się głównie do tezy Huberta Orłowskiego, według której „niemiecka dyskusja o Polsce miała legitymujące, nic do pominięcia znaczenie dla wynalezienia niemieckiego narodu”. Wobec rozmiarów i rozdrobnienia społeczno-wyznaniowego Rzeszy Niemieckiej ok. 1700 r. temat ten ograniczony jest do Prus Zachodnich i głównego problemu (teoria państwowości, religia, historia) debaty o przyczynach funkcjonowania powstałego obrazu Polski. Koncentracja na Prusach Zachodnich wynika z modalnego charakteru, jaki musiał mieć „problem Polski” jako odzwierciedlenie procesów tworzenia się granic na danym obszarze, którego niemiecki rejon (...) kulturalny miał polską przynależność państwową. Przedstawia się tu sposób, w jaki nowa, w dyskusyjnych ramach europejskiego wczesnego Oświecenia powstająca świadomość wnosiła stopniowy odwrót od rozpadającej się polskiej Republiki Szlacheckiej, a tym samym konieczność poszukiwania nowej władzy ochronnej. Wynikała z tego pewna opcja narodowa, która następnie zmieniła regionalnie obraz Polski. Ta trafnie podkreślana przez Orłowskiego konccplualizacja obrazu Polski służyła do przekształcenia stanowo uformowanej boruskiej świadomości regionalnej w nowożytną (pozytywnie lub negatywnie) skupioną na Prusach świadomość państwową. Punktem wyjścia poniższych rozważań jest spór o to, czy forma państwa polskiej Republiki Szlacheckiej w drugiej połowie XVII w. mogła jeszcze być wystarczającą dla ekonomicznych i politycznych potrzeb mieszczaństwa. Rozważania te wskazują zarówno z obcej jak też z własnej perspektywy na ten w tamtym okresie z mieszczańskiego punktu widzenia mało atrakcyjny obraz Polski. Obcy znaczy tu jednak nie tyle trochę specyficzny „polski”, ile nie do zaakceptowania jako patriotyczny i nierozsądny ekonomicznie dla mieszczanina sposób postępowania polskiego szlachcica. W tymże sensie informuje zrekonstruowana tu debata o wczesnym mieszczańskim (nie zabarwionym jeszcze narodowo) obrazie Polski. Przedstawia ona jednocześnie, w jak wielkim stopniu konstruowany był portret własny mieszczaństwa w kulturalnie niemiecko ukształtowanych miastach Polski, według etosu protestanckiego w przeciwieństwie do katolickiej szlachty polskiej. Rozwijający się z tego późny pruski obraz Polski jest następnie podejmowany jako kompleks dalej działających i umacniających się uprzedzeń, które powstają na początku XVIII w. i oddzielają się stopniowo od ich prawdziwych kulis. Jako stereotyp ma to więc swoje korzenie w przeciwieństwie mieszczańsko-boruskich i polskich, skierowanych na konstelacje władzy w Republice Szlacheckiej interesów i poczynań. Teza ta uwidacznia też, że nie chodziło tylko o opis stereotypowej struktury dziś rozprzestrzenionych opinii o Polsce. Dużo większe zainteresowanie skierowane zostało na „ziarenko prawdy” , które, z historycznego punktu widzenia, zawarte jest w każdym stereotypie. (shrink)

This is a review article of Herman Cappelen's monograph 'Fixing Language. An Essay on Conceptual Engineering' (OUP 2018). It summarizes the key elements of the book and objects to various of Cappelen's claims.

Was ist Sozialphilosophie? Um diese Frage zu beantworten, wird in der vorliegenden Einführung das Soziale entlang der drei Figuren Ich, Anderer und Dritter bestimmt. Davon ausgehend werden Grundbegriffe der Sozialphilosophie jeweils anhand eines maßgeblichen Primärautors erläutert. Den Lesenden wird mit dieser Einführung so dreierlei geboten: Eine Bestimmung leitender Grundfiguren, eine Vorstellung zentraler Grundbegriffe und eine Rekonstruktion einschlägiger Grundlagenautoren der Sozialphilosophie. Die vorliegende Einführung ist so gestaltet, dass sie insbesondere für Studienanfänger_innen geeignet ist. Der Text ist durchweg mit Marginalien versehen, wodurch (...) der Einstieg und die Orientierung erleichtert werden. Außerdem weisen Zusammenfassungen des Forschungsstandes und weiterführende Literaturempfehlungen den Weg zur eigenständigen Lektüre. (shrink)

The corona pandemic poses major challenges for society. Many people lack (basic) scientific knowledge. They are skeptical and distrust fundamental research principles and concepts. Esotericism and superstition replace them access to reality. -/- Not only facts are recently considered "alternative". Pseudo-scientific healing methods and occult procedures have long been presented to the public as equivalent alternatives to modern medicine, despite the lack of evidence of their effectiveness. Just as if reason or nonsense were just a question of personal taste, a (...) different world view. Seconded by talk of an "exaggeratedly scientific world view", empiricism and logic were systematically defamed. -/- As a result of this distorted picture, all kinds of conspiracy theories are now rampant. Spiritual healers, seers, shamans, charlatans, quacks, sectarians, and zealots of all stripes and persuasions are in demand. Diffuse pandemic management and miserable communication do the rest and contribute to the fact that infection control measures are often flatly rejected and vaccination rates can hardly be increased significantly. -/- Die Coronapandemie stellt die Gesellschaft vor große Herausforderungen. Vielen Menschen mangelt es an (elementaren) naturwissenschaftlichen Kenntnissen. Sie sind skeptisch und misstrauen grundlegenden Prinzipien und Konzepten der Forschung. Esoterik und (Aber-) Glaube ersetzen ihnen den Zugang zur Wirklichkeit. -/- Nicht nur Fakten sind neuerdings "alternativ". Auch pseudowissenschaftliche Heilmethoden und okkulte Verfahren wurden der Bevölkerung trotz fehlender Wirksamkeitsnachweise lange als gleichwertige Alternativen zur modernen Medizin präsentiert. Ganz so, als wären Vernunft oder Unsinn eben eine Frage des persönlichen Geschmacks, einer anderen Weltanschauung. Sekundiert durch das Gerede von einem "übertrieben szientistischen Weltbild", wurden Empirie und Logik systematisch diffamiert. -/- Infolge dieses Zerrbilds grassieren nun allerhand Verschwörungstheorien. Geistheiler, Seher, Schamanen, Scharlatane, Quacksalber, Sektierer, und Eiferer aller Richtungen und Couleur haben Konjunktur. Ein diffuses Pandemiemanagement und eine miserable Kommunikation tun ihr Übriges und tragen dazu bei, dass Infektionsschutzmaßnahmen oft rundweg abgelehnt und Impfquoten sich nun kaum noch signifikant steigern lassen. -/- . (shrink)

The quest for power is an unacknowledged central motive of human action and behaviour. Considering social relationships power structures meet daily and ubiquitous both in the private and in the public domain. They determine our life, limit our personal development and influence our thinking and experiences in everyday life. Knowledge, money, position, prestige, office and dignities, access to information, networks and teams, fortunes and much more essentially are convertible currencies of power. Some examples given in this text may illustrate the (...) aspect of power in social relationships. A plausible explanation of this phenomenon is under consideration. --- Machtbeziehungen sind alltäglich und treten ubiquitär in Erscheinung. Sie begegnen im privaten und im öffentlichen Bereich. Jedermann ist in eine Vielzahl solcher Verhältnisse eingebunden, meist ohne dass er sich dessen bewusst ist. Sie bestimmen unser Leben, setzen unserer Entfaltung Grenzen und beeinflussen unser Denken und unsere Alltagserfahrung. Wissen, Stellung, Geld, Ansehen, Amt und Würden, Zugang zu Information, der Aufbau von Netzwerken und Seilschaften, gutes Aussehen, Vermögen und vieles mehr sind im Grunde nur konvertible Währungen der Macht. Das Streben nach Macht ist ein uneingestandener, aber dennoch zentraler, Beweggrund menschlichen Handelns. Der Text beleuchtet ein Kaleidoskop von Machtbeziehungen, mit dem wir alltäglich konfrontiert werden. Unterschiedliche Beispiele illustrieren die Wirkung von Machtverhältnissen in unserem Umfeld. Ein plausibler Erklärungsansatz für das Streben nach Macht wird diskutiert. (shrink)

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)

The integration of standardized biomedical terminologies into a single, unified knowledge representation system has formed a key area of applied informatics research in recent years. The Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) is the most advanced and most prominent effort in this direction, bringing together within its Metathesaurus a large number of distinct source-terminologies. The UMLS Semantic Network, which is designed to support the integration of these source-terminologies, has proved to be a highly successful combination of formal coherence and broad scope. (...) We argue here, however, that its organization manifests certain structural problems, and we describe revisions which we believe are needed if the network is to be maximally successful in realizing its goals of supporting terminology integration. (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)

Eine der grundsätzlichen Thesen von Maurice Merleau-Ponty lautet, dass unser Zur-Welt-Sein nicht ausgehend von der Instanz des Bewusstseins, sondern ausgehend von der Instanz der Leibes zu verstehen ist. Auch wenn Merleau-Ponty aus dieser These selbst kaum politische Konsequenzen gezogen hat, sind seine Überlegungen doch im Feld der politischen Philosophie von einer ganzen Reihe von Theoretikerinnen und Theoretikern aufgenommen worden, von denen ich im Folgenden zwei aufgreifen möchte: Iris Marion Young und Judith Butler. Beide, so werden ich zeigen, knüpfen in ihren (...) Überlegungen nicht nur direkt an Merleau-Pontys Überlegungen am, um zu zeigen inwiefern der Leib sowohl Objekt als auch Subjekt des politischen Handelns ist, zugleich auch entwickeln beide dessen Überlegungen in entscheidenden Hinsichten weiter: Während uns Young vor Augen führt, dass die Persistenz von politischen Machtverhältnissen ausgehend von der Eigensinnigkeit des Leibes verstanden werden kann, zeigt uns Judith Butler ausgehend von der Idee der Geschichtlichkeit der Leibes, dass dieser als ein Ort von transformativen Möglichkeiten verstanden werden kann. Ausgehend von diesen Anknüpfungen an Merleau-Ponty durch Young und Butler werde ich abschließend argumentieren, dass ‚Weltlichkeit’, ‚Eigensinnigkeit’ und ‚Geschichtlichkeit’ drei wesentliche Momente einer Politik der Leiblichkeit sind. (shrink)