Introduction 1. Alexander in Modern Scholarship; The Present Translation The anti-Manichaean treatise of Alexander of Lycopolis has for a long time been...

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

Miller has recently argued that the standard liberal and moderate positions on abortion are incapable of grounding the claim that ‘all non-disabled adult humans are equal’. The reason, he claims, is such accounts base the intrinsic moral worth of a human being on some property (or set of properties) which comes in degrees. In contrast, he argues that moral equality must reside in some binary property, such as the property of being human. In this paper, I offer three criticisms of (...) Miller’s position. (shrink)

Ritual and Myth in the International Corona-Drama. A Conversation with Jeffrey Alexander.

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

The production of a number of vaccines involves the use of cell-lines originally derived from fetuses directly aborted in the 1960s and 1970s. Such cell-lines, indeed sometimes the very same ones, are important to on-going research, including at Catholic institutions. The cells currently used are removed by a number of decades and by a significant number of cellular generations from the original cells. Moreover, the original cells extracted from the bodies of the aborted fetuses were transformed to produce the cell (...) lines, since otherwise they would be incapable of the kind of culturing that is required. (shrink)

Mill predicted that “[t]he Liberty is likely to survive longer than anything else that I have written … because the conjunction of [Harriet Taylor’s] mind with mine has rendered it a kind of philosophic text-book of a single truth, which the changes progressively taking place in modern society tend to bring out in ever greater relief.” Indeed, _On Liberty_ is one of the most influential books ever written, and remains a foundational document for the understanding of vital political, philosophical and (...) social issues. In addition to its many useful appendices, this new edition includes a chronology, bibliography, and a substantial introduction which outlines Mill’s life and works, and sets this central work of 1859 in the context of both his own intellectual development and of the play of ideas and political forces in Victorian society. (shrink)

Proposals by the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) to use bomb disposal robots for deadly force against humans have met with widespread condemnation. Media coverage of the furore has tended, incorrectly, to conflate these robots with autonomous weapon systems (AWS), the AI-based weapons used in armed conflict. These two types of systems should be treated as distinct since they have different sets of social, ethical, and legal implications. However, the conflation does raise a pressing question: what _if_ the SFPD had (...) proposed using AWS for law enforcement purposes? This article argues that current debate on AWS takes place within a ‘killing paradigm’ that leaves us ill-placed to understand the implications of using autonomous force outside of armed conflict. This is because ‘lethality’ is taken as the paradigmatic form of harm, meaning that other harms are understood in a way that is derivative of lethal harm. The article calls for more research on how other sorts of goods, such as freedom from domination, are imperilled by the use of autonomous force. The article also suggests that bringing research on AWS into dialogue with the sorts of concerns that have typically motivated political theory—e.g. power, coercion, the state—provides a fruitful starting point for addressing these issues. (shrink)

This paper discusses two passages from Alexander of Aphrodisias’s commentary on Aristotle’s _ Topics _ that are transmitted in Ps-Jābir’s _ Kitāb al-Nukhab _. It argues that the Arabic translation of Alexander’s commentary may have been made from a fuller version than what came down to us in Greek. Especially since the author(s) of the Jābir-corpus form a tradition different from the school of Ḥunayn b. Isḥāq (d. 873) and authors associated to the ‘Baghdad school’, whose earliest figure (...) is Abū Bishr Mattā b. Yūnus (d. 940), the Arabic fragments of Alexander’s commentary preserved in the _ Kitāb al-Nukhab _ promise to shed more light on the early reception of the _ Topics _ and the different contexts in which Aristotelian dialectic was studied in the Islamic world. (shrink)

R. W. Sharples provides a new edition, with introduction and commentary in English, of the Greek text. The Mantissa is a collection of short discussions, transmitted as a supplement to the treatise On the Soul by the Aristotelian commentator Alexander of Aphrodisias (c.200 AD).The collection includes discussion of a range of topics, among them the nature of soul and intellect, theories of how seeing takes place, issues in ethics, and the nature of fate. The text is based upon a (...) new collation of the principal manuscript, the ninth century Venetus Marcianus graecus 258, and the apparatus corrects Bruns' misreportings of the principal manuscript and of the others that he used. Account has also been taken of the medieval Arabic and Latin versions of some of the sections which circulated independently, notably On Intellect which had a substantial influence on medieval philosophy. The introduction is chiefly concerned with the manuscripts and the relation between them. The commentary is based on the notes to the editor's English translation of the work (London: Duckworth and Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2004); however, the commentary also takes into account more recent work on the collection by various scholars. (shrink)

Alexander Hamilton presents his early formative years, sharing the way his engagement with the cyanotype process has informed his art practice, from his time at Edinburgh College of Art, to his program of exhibitions and residencies, through to his work within the field of public arts. This personal history is combined with essays by academics, scholars and curators who engage with the intellectual roots of his work and practice. A comprehensive selection of Hamilton’s photography, including his unique plant-based cyanotypes, (...) completes this beautiful book. (shrink)

‘Ecopoiesis: A Manifesto for Ecological Civilization’ contains the main provisions related to a new type of civilization, which should replace the industrial civilization, which has actually exhausted the potential of its development and has become the leading force for the destruction of humans and the living environment. A Manifesto for Ecological Civilization is the basis of the scenario for the development of culture and various public institutions, recognizing the potential of people to control their own destiny, to take effective steps (...) to preserve life on earth. (shrink)

Originally the constitution was expected to express and channel popular sovereignty. It was the work of freedom, springing from and facilitating collective self-determination. After the Second World War this perspective changed: the modern constitution owes its authority not only to collective authorship, it also must commit itself credibly to human rights. Thus people recede into the background, and the national constitution becomes embedded into one or other system of 'peer review' among nations.This is what Alexander Somek argues is the (...) creation of the cosmopolitan constitution. Reconstructing what he considers to be the three stages in the development of constitutionalism, he argues that the cosmopolitan constitution is not a blueprint for the constitution beyond the nation state, let alone a constitution of the international community; rather, it stands for constitutional law reaching out beyond its national bounds. This cosmopolitan constitution has two faces: the first, political, face reflects the changed circumstances of constitutional authority. It conceives itself as constrained by international human rights protection, firmly committed to combating discrimination on the grounds of nationality, and to embracing strategies for managing its interaction with other sites of authority, such as the United Nations. The second, administrative, face of the cosmopolitan constitution reveals the demise of political authority, which has been traditionally vested in representative bodies. Political processes yield to various, and often informal, strategies of policy co-ordination so long as there are no reasons to fear that the elementary civil rights might be severely interfered with. It represents constitutional authority for an administered world. (shrink)

Barlassina and Del Prete argue that the past can change, on the basis that there is no other explanation for the truth values of certain claims involving the past-tense predicate ‘won the Tour de France in 2000’. To establish this, they argue that no contextualist account of this predicate will be able to explain these truth values. I show that their argument straightforwardly fails. Not only does a tweak to the contextualist account they consider suffice to explain these truth values, (...) there is in fact an even simpler and more plausible non-contextualist account that can do the same work. Put simply: there is no puzzle of the changing past. (shrink)

Causal Bayes nets (CBNs) provide one of the most powerful tools for modelling coarse-grained type-level causal structure. As in other fields (e.g., thermodynamics) the question arises how such coarse-grained characterisations are related to the characterisation of their underlying structure (in this case: token-level causal relations). Answering this question meets what is called a “coherence-requirement” in the reduction debate: How are different accounts of one and the same system (or kind of system) related to each other. We argue that CBNs as (...) tools for type-level causal inference are abstract enough to roughly fit any current token-level theory of causation as long as certain modelling assumptions are satisfied, but accounts of actual causation, i.e. accounts that attempt to infer token-causation based on CBNs, for the very same reason, face certain limitations. (shrink)

A. G. Baumgarten's foundation of aesthetics as a branch of philosophical reflection is itself deeply rooted in Leibnizian metaphysics. From this starting-point Baumgarten comes to a kind of monadological concept of the work of art, that gets now an inexhaustible and thruthrepresenting meaning. This truth of the work of art however cannot be recognized rationally, for it is impossible for human beings to be aware of a beautiful object's 'metaphysical truth', which can only be perceived by the senses as - (...) to quote Baumgarten - 'aesthetical truth'. Still it is possible, by rational and scientific hermeneutics, to transfer some aspects of aesthetical to logical truth. The interest in art is therefore at the same time an interest in the cognition of the metaphysical cosmic order, and Baumgarten's aesthetics similarly are the first foundation of philosophical hermeneutics of art. (shrink)

Do the sciences aim to uncover the structure of nature, or are they ultimately a practical means of controlling our environment? In Instrumental Biology, or the Disunity of Science, Alexander Rosenberg argues that while physics and chemistry can develop laws that reveal the structure of natural phenomena, biology is fated to be a practical, instrumental discipline. Because of the complexity produced by natural selection, and because of the limits on human cognition, scientists are prevented from uncovering the basic structure (...) of biological phenomena. Consequently, biology and all of the disciplines that rest upon it--psychology and the other human sciences--must aim at most to provide practical tools for coping with the natural world rather than a complete theoretical understanding of it. (shrink)

El proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje de la Historia de Cuba adquiere singular relevancia en la carrera Ingeniería de Minas, esta tiene como graduar un ingeniero minero de perfil amplio, que esté capacitado científica y técnicamente para ejecutar trabajos de explotación racional de los recursos minerales. Los cambios son muy rápidos y la educación debe facilitar la adaptación de los alumnos a los mismos. Para ello, la utilización de un entorno virtual de aprendizaje o EVA puede ser una herramienta de gran utilidad.

Since Truth and Method, Gadamer’s account of language or linguisticality as the medium of hermeneutic experience has prompted an ever-recurring reflection and critical engagement with the interpretive implications of this claim. For Gadamer, there is no subject matter that comes to the fore without linguisticality, that is, without the possibility of the subject matter to come into language in the first place. However, in later essays, he briefly discusses what he calls ‘prelinguistic’ in hermeneutic expe­rience. In this essay, I offer (...) an account of the prelinguistic in Gadamer’s works that still maintains the primacy of language in his hermeneutic project. The prelinguistic marks not only a kind of precondition of linguisticality itself, but it also marks the fundamentally disclosive and demanding character of hermeneutic experience as such. As a precondition, the prelinguistic is not something beyond or outside of language, but is the very impulse or drive towards linguistic expression. (shrink)

This paper provides critical insights into the inclusion of sexual minorities in Flemish fictional TV shows aimed at children. Narratives including LGBT+ characters and non-normative gender performances have gained presence, and especially Nordic and Dutch productions have been acknowledged for their inclusive storytelling. Following up on this premise, our study analyzes five Flemish programs aimed at children aged six to twelve, which all include at least one character who identifies as LGBT+. Our analysis concludes that Flemish children’s productions show a (...) visible willingness to include diversified and inclusive storytelling. However, the assimilationist venture of minimizing the ‘otherness’ of non-heterosexual characters has led to a rather homogenous and normative portrayal of these characters. More stereotypical representations like frivolous singing hairdressers have now been replaced by rather heteronormative and gender-conforming characters. Not confining representations to either end of the spectrum are a necessity if Flemish children’s television wants its audience to understand the diversified range of sexual and gender identities. (shrink)

The "Supplement" transmitted as the second book of "On the Soul" by Alexander of Aphrodisias is a collection of short texts on a wide range of topics from psychology, including the general hylomorphic account of soul and its faculties, and the theory of vision; questions in ethics ; and issues relating to responsibility, chance and fate. One of the texts in the collection, "On Intellect", had a major influence on medieval Arabic and Western thought, greater than that of (...) class='Hi'>Alexander's "On the Soul" itself. The treatises may all be by Alexander himself; certainly the majority of them are closely connected with his other works. Many of them, however, consist of collections of arguments on particular issues, collections which probably incorporate material from earlier in the history of the Peripatetic school. This translation is from a new edition of the Greek text based on a collation of all known manuscripts and comparison with medieval Arabic and Latin translations. (shrink)

Since Truth and Method, Gadamer’s account of language or linguisticality as the medium of hermeneutic experience has prompted an ever-recurring reflection and critical engagement with the interpretive implications of this claim. For Gadamer, there is no subject matter that comes to the fore without linguisticality, that is, without the possibility of the subject matter to come into language in the first place. However, in later essays, he briefly discusses what he calls ‘prelinguistic’ in hermeneutic experience. In this essay, I offer (...) an account of the prelinguistic in Gadamer’s works that still maintains the primacy of language in his hermeneutic project. The prelinguistic marks not only a kind of precondition of linguisticality itself, but it also marks the fundamentally disclosive and demanding character of hermeneutic experience as such. As a precondition, the prelinguistic is not something beyond or outside of language, but is the very impulse or drive towards linguistic expression. (shrink)

Alexander Eliot, distinguished critic and art historian, breaks through to the silent world of masterpieces and makes them live anew in the eye of the imagination. Eliot plumbs the truths expressed by the greatest works of painting, sculpture and architecture. Eliot¿s style is crystalline, and his purpose plain: to bring art back to the center of our culture.

Das Bild vom glaubwürdigen Wissenschaftler? vom Universalgelehrten der Renaissance zu modernen Laborspezialist*innen - ist ein kulturelles Konstrukt, das die Ansprüche seiner Zeit widerspiegelt. Wie es entsteht, wird im Galvanismusdiskurs um 1800 deutlich.Dieser Band beschäftigt sich mit den Fragen: Wer gilt um 1800 als Naturwissenschaftler? Wie findet man als junger Forscher Aufnahme in die wissenschaftliche Gemeinschaft? Und worin manifestieren sich die wissenschaftskulturellen Unterschiede in Deutschland und Großbritannien zu Beginn des 19. Jahrhunderts? Anhand der frühen Publikationen der jungen aufstrebenden Naturforscher Alexander (...) von Humboldt, Johann Wilhelm Ritter und Christian Heinrich Pfaff sowie ihrer britischen Kollegen untersucht der Autor die Konstruktion vom modernen Naturwissenschaftler durch die wissenschaftliche Gemeinschaft. (shrink)

This book presents new findings that deal with different facets of the well-being of children and their relevance to the proper treatment of children. The well-being of children is considered against the background of a wide variety of legal, political, medical, educational and familial perspectives. The book addresses diverse issues from a range of disciplinary perspectives using a variety of methods. It has three major sections with the essays in each section loosely organized about a common general theme. The first (...) section focuses on issues concerning the relation between children’s well-being and autonomy or agency. The second section deals with child well-being insofar as the limits of parental authority are concerned. The third section has a more applied orientation and addresses a variety of public policy controversies involving the interpretation of children’s well-being. (shrink)

Some, notably Peter van Inwagen, in order to avoid problems with free will and omniscience, replace the condition that an omniscient being knows all true propositions with a version of the apparently weaker condition that an omniscient being knows all knowable true propositions. I shall show that the apparently weaker condition, when conjoined with uncontroversial claims and the logical closure of an omniscient being's knowledge, still yields the claim that an omniscient being knows all true propositions.

"Alexander's commentary on Book 1 concerns the definition of Aristotelian syllogistic argument; its resistance to the rival Stoic theory of inference; and the character of inductive inference and of rhetorical argument. Alexander distinguishes inseparable accidents, such as the whiteness of snow, from defining differentiae, such as its being frozen, and considers how these differences fit into the schemes of categories. He speaks of dialectic as a stochastic discipline in which success is to be judged not by victory but (...) by skill in argument. Alexander also investigates the subject of ambiguity, which had been richly developed since Aristotle by the rival Stoic school."--BOOK JACKET. (shrink)

A new speculative ontology of aesthetics. In Aesthesis and Perceptronium, Alexander Wilson presents a theory of materialist and posthumanist aesthetics founded on an original speculative ontology that addresses the interconnections of experience, cognition, organism, and matter. Entering the active fields of contemporary thought known as the new materialisms and realisms, Wilson argues for a rigorous redefining of the criteria that allow us to discriminate between those materials and objects where aesthesis (perception, cognition) takes place and those where it doesn't. (...) Aesthesis and Perceptronium negotiates between indiscriminately pluralist views that attribute mentation to all things and eliminative views that deny the existence of mentation even in humans. By recasting aesthetic questions within the framework of "epistemaesthetics," which considers cognition and aesthetics as belonging to a single category that can neither be fully disentangled nor fully reduced to either of its terms, Wilson forges a theory of nonhuman experience that avoids this untenable dilemma. Through a novel consideration of the evolutionary origins of cognition and its extension in technological developments, the investigation culminates in a rigorous reevaluation of the status of matter, information, computation, causality, and time in terms of their logical and causal engagement with the activities of human and nonhuman agents. (shrink)

This volume contains the Arabic translations of a lost treatise by Alexander of Aphrodisias "On the Principles of the Universe" with English translation, introduction and commentary. It also includes an Arabic and Syriac glossary. The introduction and commentary deal in detail with the manuscripts, the translators and the exegetical tendencies of the text, as well as with its reception in Arabic philosophy. The main theme of the work is the motion of the heavenly bodies and their influence on the (...) physical world. (shrink)