Andrea Cesalpino is an important figure in the history of science. He demonstrated that blood circulates into heart from veins and from the heart to arteries, paving the way to Harvey’s complete description of blood circulation. Moreover, he was the founder of botany as a systematic discipline, which he based, rather than on the observation of accidental similarities of plants, on the discovery of their vegetative-generative principle. In philosophy, he attempted to conciliate the immortality of the soul (i.e., the form (...) of the body) with the existence of a unique immaterial intellect, which is individuated and multiplied in the singular souls that participate to it. (shrink)

We set out longtermist political philosophy as a research field by exploring the case for, and the implications of, ‘institutional longtermism’: the view that, when evaluating institutions, we should give significant weight to their very long-term effects. We begin by arguing that the standard case for longtermism may be more robust when applied to institutions than to individual actions or policies, both because institutions have large, broad, and long-term effects, and because institutional longtermism can plausibly sidestep various objections to individual (...) longtermism. We then address points of contact between longtermism and some central values of mainstream political philosophy, focusing on justice, equality, freedom, legitimacy, and democracy. While each value initially seems to conflict with institutional longtermism, we find that these conflicts are less clear-cut upon closer inspection, and that some political values might even provide independent support for institutional longtermism. We end with a grab bag of related questions that we lack space to explore here. (shrink)

In conversations with Schlick and Waismann from June and December 1930, Wittgenstein began to turn his attention to the topic of games. This topic also centrally concerned Schlick. In his earliest philosophical output, Schlick had relied on the results of evolutionary biology in setting out an account of the emergence of the human species’ ability to play [Spiel] as a prerequisite for the genesis of scientific knowledge. Throughout his subsequent works one finds fragmentary appeals to this early view, e.g. in (...) his oft misunderstood claim that play constitutes the meaning of life. Wittgenstein’s turn to the topic of games in 1930 not only happened while Professor Schlick was in the room, but was also coupled with an explicit response to Schlick’s 1930 book Fragen der Ethik. Schlick here employs the example of chess to distinguish between rules and their application – a distinction which underlies his whole attempt to naturalise ethics as a descriptive psycho-sociological discipline. This paper investigates the relation between Wittgenstein’s and Schlick’s accounts of games in light of Wittgenstein’s criticisms of Schlick’s ethics. Wittgenstein’s objections can be answered by taking Schlick’s theory of play into consideration. (shrink)

Why, if at all, should we object to economic inequality? Some central arguments – the argument from decreasing marginal utility for example – invoke instrumental reasons and object to inequality because of its effects. Such instrumental arguments, however, often concern only the static effects of inequality and neglect its intertemporal conse- quences. In this article, we address this striking gap and investigate income inequality’s intertemporal consequences, including its potential effects on humanity’s (very) long-term future. Following recent arguments around future generations (...) and so-called longtermism, those effects might arguably matter more than inequality’s short-term con- sequences. We assess whether we have instrumental reason to reduce economic inequality based on its intertemporal effects in the short, medium, and the very long term. We find a good short and medium-term instrumental case for lower economic inequality. We then argue, somewhat speculatively, that we have instrumental reasons for inequality reduction from a longtermist perspective too, primarily because greater inequality could increase existential risk. We thus have instrumental reasons to reduce inequality, regardless of which time-horizon we take. We then argue that from most consequentialist perspectives, this pro tanto reason also gives us all-things-considered reason. And even across most non-consequentialist views in philosophy, this argument gives us either an all-things-considered or at least weighty pro tanto reason against inequality. (shrink)

I propose a new account of the limits of aesthetic testimony. One of this new account's main claims is that, among the kinds of aesthetic cognitive achievements, it is useful to distinguish aesthetic understanding. In particular, I suggest that the aesthetic understanding of X involves an understanding of why X is aesthetically valuable. In turn, aesthetic understanding is essentially connected to the deployment of aesthetic concepts. Given the fine-grained structure of some of these concepts, certain forms of testimony are not (...) adequate to acquire them. (shrink)

We present the main logical theories of action. We distinguish theories identifying an action with its result from theories studying actions in terms of both their results and the means that result is obtained. The first family includes most prominently the logic of seeing-to-it-that and the logic of bringing-it-about-that. The second includes propositional dynamic logic and its variants. For all these logics we overview their extensions by other modalities such as modal operators of knowledge, belief, and obligation.

This essay confronts Ray Brassier’s vindication of nihilism with other two important but frequently underexamined philosophical attempts to overcome nihilism: Hans Jonas’ and Keiji Nishitani’s. By putting these different takes on nihilism into dialogue, it explores some blind spots in Brassier’s position, as well as some of the practical consequences, for our current planetary situation, of undertaking a radical divorce between the normative and the natural that results from his radical nihilism. The article opts for a more moderate acceptance and (...) eventual self-overcoming of nihilism, according to which, even if natural entities are indifferent to human reasons and meanings, this does not entail that nature is bereft of a human-independent normative dimension. In other words, the essay argues that care must be taken not to confuse criticisms of an anthropocentric conception of reasons and meanings with the belief that meaning is completely absent from the natural world. Thus, the central contention of the article is that, given our current climate and ecological catastrophe, one of the most pressing tasks of contemporary philosophy is to understand normativity in non-anthropocentric ways, so that humans are no longer considered as the only entities that respond to normativity. Such an attitude conceives humans as estranged normative creatures amidst a meaningless, indifferent natural world, toward which they would have no ethical responsibilities. The essay finishes by suggesting ways in which to develop an account that does not fall into this ethical vacuum. (shrink)

In the controversy on the philosophical foundations of quantum mechanics Whitehead's philosophy of organism has an essential place. But its realistic position invalidates any attempt to relate it to the School of Copenhagen's “orthodox interpretation”. Unlike, the Eurhythmic Physics developed by the Lisbon School has notable theoretical tunings with Whitehead's philosophy. In both, the notion of passive matter disappears; entities are understood as ecstatic process of becoming arising from a continuum of potentialities; and they achieve physical persistence grace to a (...) set of synergistic interactions among their own regimes of rhythmical activity. The principle of Eurhythmy proposed by Prof. Croca then appears as the hypothesis, in contemporary theoretical physics, corresponding to the organicist vision of a universe in a developmental process of realization of the abstract potentiality of all possible worlds: a universe that, as a living organism, should be described as guided by an immanent teleological principle. (shrink)

Seperti beberapa buku Delio yang lain, The Ours of the Universe mengusung tema umum ‘dialog antara teologi dan sains’. Dalam dunia teologi, Delio tertarik pada teolog Abad Pertengahan, khususnya Bonaventura (1217-1274). Baginya paradigma teologi Bonaventura, tampil dalam pemikiran Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955), paleontolog, Jesuit, yang hidup di antara era pencerahan dan modernisme, namun tak membaca Teologi Fransiskan.

Largely unacknowledged by historians of the human sciences, late-19th-century psychical researchers were actively involved in the making of fledgling academic psychology. Moreover, with few exceptions historians have failed to discuss the wider implications of the fact that the founder of academic psychology in America, William James, considered himself a psychical researcher and sought to integrate the scientific study of mediumship, telepathy and other controversial topics into the nascent discipline. Analysing the celebrated exposure of the medium Eusapia Palladino by German-born Harvard (...) psychologist Hugo Münsterberg as a representative example, this article discusses strategies employed by psychologists in the United States to expel psychical research from the agenda of scientific psychology. It is argued that the traditional historiography of psychical research, dominated by accounts deeply averse to its very subject matter, has been part of an ongoing form of ‘boundary-work’ to bolster the scientific status of psychology. (shrink)

Glauben und unser Begriff von ihm stehen seit wenigstens hundert Jahren mit im Zentrum der theoretischen Philosophie. Glauben im weitesten Sinn: jederlei Art des Fürwahrhaltens. Die Frage, was es ist und welchen Begriff wir davon haben, war und bleibt ein Thema insbesondere auch der Erkenntnistheorie, der Philosophie des Geistes und der Ontologie. Welche Auskünfte bietet die Philosophie heute darüber, was das Glauben ist? Wie gut sind sie? Inwieweit lassen sie sich aus dem Begriff begründen, den wir vom Glauben haben? Was (...) für ein Begriff ist das eigentlich? Können wir Wissen vom Glauben haben, wenigstens vom eigenen? Solchen Fragen geht dieser Essay nach, oft ohne definitive Antwort. Es ist eher der Versuch, erkennbar werden zu lassen, weshalb die Erwartung, es gebe solche Antworten, keinen guten philosophischen Grund hat. Und daß dies kein Grund ist, die Wirklichkeit des Glaubens in Frage zu ziehen. (shrink)

De Marchi and Lorenzetti :253-261, 2016) have recently argued that in fields where the journal impact factor is not calculated, such as in the humanities, it is key to find other indicators that would allow the relevant community to assess the quality of scholarly journals and the research outputs that are published in them. The authors' suggestion is that information concerning the journal's rejection rate and the number of subscriptions sold is important and should be used for such assessment. The (...) question addressed by the authors is very important, yet their proposed solutions are problematic. Here I point to some of these problems and illustrate them by considering as a case in point the field of philosophy. Specifically, here I argue for four main claims. First, even assuming that IF provides a reliable indicator of the quality of journals for the assessment of research outputs, De Marchi and Lorenzetti have failed to validate their suggested indicators and proxies. Second, it has not been clarified why, in absence of IF, other journal-based metrics that are currently available should not be used. Third, the relationship between IF and rejection rate is more complex than the authors suggest. Fourth, accepting the number of sold subscriptions as a proxy would result in discrimination against open access journals. The upshot of my analysis is that the question of how to assess journals and research outputs in the humanities is still far from resolved. (shrink)

Since communism collapsed we have witnessed the emergence of numerous political actors - neopopulists, neoliberals, fundamentalists, nationalists, and others - who share one ideological leitmotif: their deep contempt for modern democratic politics. The book asks an old question: What is politics? And it adds a new one to the agenda of social sciences: What is antipolitics? Some authors trace antipolitical traditions in Western political thought, while others analyze the rhetoric of contemporary antipolitical actors in the US, the former Soviet Union, (...) and South America. The book contains contributions from Charles H. Fairbanks Jr, Barry Hindess, Erwin A. Jaffe, Norbert Lechner, Jose Nun, Louis Pauly, Andreas Schedler, and Gershon Weiler. (shrink)

We wish to point out an additional consequence of the Catch-22 described by Andreae and colleagues (Andreae et al. 2016). The decades-long research gridlock of controlled drugs has unintentionally...

Papers by Andreas Bartels, Ansgar Beckermann, Frédéric Bouchard, Thomas Breuer, Bruno Eckhardt, Bruce Glymour, Claus Kiefer, Roberta Millstein and Alexander Rosenberg.

"How can human beings, who are liable to error, possess knowledge, since the grounds on which we believe do not rule out that we are wrong? Andrea Kern argues that we can disarm this skeptical doubt by conceiving knowledge as an act of a rational capacity. In this book, she develops a metaphysics of the mind as existing through knowledge of itself."--Provided by publisher.

Knowledge and Self-Knowledge in Plato's "Theaetetus" examines the dialogue in conversation with others, arriving at the conclusion that it is the absence of self-knowledge in the Theaetetus which leads to its closing impasse regarding knowledge. What Socrates accomplishes in the dialogue is to lead the mathematician Theaetetus to the recognition of his ignorance—the first step toward self-knowledge.

Werte sind selbstverständlich. Über sie redet jeder. Und jeder nimmt sie für sich in Anspruch. Häufig für Widersprüchliches: beispielsweise ebenso dafür, sich für Flüchtlinge einzusetzen, wie dafür, sie abzuweisen. Werte scheinen allgegenwärtig und alternativlos. Und doch sind Werte eine moderne Erfindung und näher besehen gar nicht selbstverständlich. Dieses Buch fragt, worüber wir reden, wenn wir über Werte reden und sie in Anspruch nehmen. Vielleicht gibt es keine Werte. Vielleicht sind Werte Fiktionen. Vielleicht aber nützliche Fiktionen.

Many arguments are affected by context sensitivity, because they include sentences that have different truth conditions in different contexts. Therefore, it is natural to think that a general criterion for evaluating arguments must take context sensitivity into account. One way to give substance to that thought is provided by the definition of validity offered by David Kaplan within his theory of indexicals. However, the route indicated by Kaplan is hindered by a problem whose importance is often underestimated. This paper explores (...) a different route, and outlines a definition of validity that does not run into that problem. Its moral is that Kaplan's definition is not the only plausible definition. This is not to say that the definition outlined is the only plausible definition or that it is correct in some absolute sense. There might be equally important problems with it that the paper does not take into account. But until such problems are found and brought up, the departure from Kaplan's route remains a viable option. (shrink)

The notion of truth is a central subject both in Philosophy and Mathematical Logic. The logical approach on the one side and the philosophical one on the other, however, mostly deal with problems which, apparently, require different tools to be tackled. In this paper I argue that such a separation can and should be overcome, and, in order to build a bridge, I focus on the philosophical issue of the insubstantiality of truth, which is a crucial topic to distinguish inflationist (...) from deflationist proposals. Elaborating on the interpretation of insubstantiality in terms of the sparse/abundant classification of properties, I put forward a refined version in which certain flaws afflicting other formulations are solved. Then, I show how, using this improved variant, the philosophical notion of abundance can be fruitfully related to the formal notion of expandability of models, if a logical framework is adopted. Among other virtues, the obtained link can shed new light on the debate of deflationism and conservativity. (shrink)