We characterize Borel line graphs in terms of 10 forbidden induced subgraphs, namely the nine finite graphs from the classical result of Beineke together with a 10th infinite graph associated with the equivalence relation $\mathbb {E}_0$ on the Cantor space. As a corollary, we prove a partial converse to the Feldman–Moore theorem, which allows us to characterize all locally countable Borel line graphs in terms of their Borel chromatic numbers.

To determine what the speaker in a cooperative dialog meant with his assertion, on top of what he explicitly said, it is crucial that we assume that the assertion he gave was optimal. In determining optimal assertions we assume that dialogs are embedded in decision problems (van Rooij 2003) and use backwards induction for calculating them (Benz 2006). In this paper, we show that in terms of our framework we can account for several types of implicatures in a uniform way, (...) suggesting that there is no need for an independent linguistic theory of generalized implicatures. In the final section, we show how we can embed our theory in the framework of signaling games, and how it relates with other game theoretic analyses of implicatures. (shrink)

Previous research on scalar implicature has primarily relied on meta-linguistic judgment tasks and found varying rates of such inferences depending on the nature of the task and contextual manipulations. This paper introduces a novel interactive paradigm involving both a production and a comprehension side and a precise conversational goal. The main research question is what is reliably communicated by some in this communicative setting, both when the quantifier occurs in unembedded and embedded positions. Our new paradigm involves an action-based task (...) from which participants’ interpretation of utterances can be inferred. It incorporates a game-theoretic design, thereby including a precise model to predict participants’ behaviour in the experimental context. Our study shows that embedded and unembedded implicatures are reliably communicated by some. We propose two cognitive principles that describe what can be left unsaid. In our experimental context, a production strategy based on these principles is more efficient than a strategy based on literal descriptions. (shrink)

Auch wenn der Begriff des Kunstwerks sich nicht bündig definieren läßt, so kann man doch wesentliche Aspekte der Kunst angeben und entwickeln, indem man sie auf Voraussetzungen des Faktums bezieht, daß Menschen Wahrheitsansprüche erheben. Kant, Adorno und Heidegger haben im Ausgang von jenem Faktum einen ästhetischen bzw. einen mimetischen bzw. einen alethischen Aspekt der Kunst freigelegt. Dies ist das Thema und die zentrale These der nachfolgenden Bemerkungen. Sie sind in sechs Abschnitte gegliedert. Zunächst wird über das von Adorno so genannte (...) Nichtidentische, dann kurz über das Schöne und das Erhabene, drittens über den bildenden Schein und die Mimesis, viertens über die Wahrheit und ihre begrifflichen Momente, fünftens über Glück und Versöhnung und zuletzt über die Frage der Definierbarkeit der Kunst zu sprechen sein. (shrink)

This essay explores the theoretical implications of Freud's notion of `the narcissism of minor differences' - the idea that it is precisely the minor differences between people who are otherwise alike that form the basis of feelings of strangeness and hostility between them. A comparative survey shows that minor differences underlie a wide range of conflicts: from relatively benign forms of campanilismo to bloody civil wars. Freud's tentative statements link up with the insights of Simmel, Durkheim, Lévi-Strauss, Dumont, Elias, and (...) Girard. Especially helpful is what Bourdieu writes in Distinction: social identity lies in difference, and difference is asserted against what is closest, which represents the greatest threat. An outline of a general theory of power and violence should include consideration of the narcissism of minor differences, also because its counterpart - hierarchy and great differences - makes for relative stability and peace. (shrink)

Peter Singer’s defense of the duty to aid the world’s poor by the pond analogy is self-defeating. It cannot be both true that you ought to save the drowning child from a pond at the expense of ruining your shoes and that you ought to aid the world’s poor if you thereby do not sacrifice anything of comparable moral importance. Taking the latter principle seriously would lead you to let the child in front of you drown whenever you could thereby (...) save more children in the developing world. Though Singer can defend the duty to aid the world’s poor starting from consequentialist principles requiring you to make things go best in the impartial sense, he cannot have it invoking the commonsense judgment about what you ought to do in the pond case. There is no sound path from commonsense morality to Singer’s principles of beneficence. (shrink)

Advances in technology, research development, and teaching practices have brought improvements in the training, levels of autonomy, and quality of life of people who need support and resources appropriate to their circumstances of disability. This article focuses on empirically analyzing the usefulness of treatments that have been supported by technology to answer the question “How do technological ecosystems being used help people with special educational needs?” The multiple case study methodology was used to address six categories of analysis: project data, (...) objectives, processes, outputs and outcomes, technologies, and impact. The processes, open in communication, were characterized as transversal, ethical, and sustainable. The results yielded various technological ecosystems that support people with disabilities, deliver the help they need to improve their health, and provide enjoyable user experiences. At the same time, they promote the training and improvement of teaching methodologies and involve families in order to improve their knowledge, attitudes, and care of children, young people, and adults with functional diversity. (shrink)

We are going to explain partial blocking as the result of diachronic processes based on what we will call associative learning. Especially, we argue that the task posed by partial blocking phenomena is to explain their emergence from unambiguous and fully expressive languages. This contrasts with approaches that presuppose underspecified semantic meanings or ineffability like Bidirectional Optimality Theory (Bi–OT) and some game theoretic explanations. We introduce a formal framework based on learning, speaker’s preferences and pure semantics for describing diachronic strengthening (...) of meaning. Moreover, we show how the diachronic development of systems of semantically co–extensive forms can be described in terms of a complete system of diachronic laws. (shrink)

The volume presented here is a collection of the contributions to an author s colloquium with Walter Burkert, which was held in November 2007 in the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research at the University of Bielefeld. Well known experts looked in detail at the work of the internationally renowned scholar of Greek. In his epochal cultural-scientific studies focusing on the origins of human co-existence in rites, on violence, sacrifice, guilt and horrific scenarios of death, Burkert approached questions of biological behavioural research, (...) anthropology and aggression theory, and developed an enormous intellectual impact that reached beyond classical and religious studies. ". (shrink)

Dans cette contribution, la Comédie Ancienne est associée de manière surprenante au complexe chamanistique, ou respectivement, au schéma du goës ou magos qui existait dans la Grèce archaïque et dans les premiers temps de la Grèce classique. Après un bref aperçu de l’histoire de la recherche concernant le ‘chamanisme’ grec dans les études classiques, l’auteur écarte explicitement les spéculations essentialistes sur l’origine, mais utilise le phénomène religieux au sens d’un procédé de fantaisie mental et théâtral. Le potentiel performatif du goës (...) est à même de traduire la chute soudaine, constitutive du genre, dans des espaces et des modes de jeu grotesques et ataviques, sur la scène comique. En particulier, les thèmes de la guérison et des voyages dans l’Hadès ou au ciel, thèmes qui jusqu’à présent n’ont pas vraiment été traités comme il l’aurait fallu, comme le héros comique ambigu et excessif, et la poétique alogique et non naturaliste de la Comédie Ancienne, peuvent s’expliquer comme repoussoirs d’un goës chamanique. Dans les pièces populaires de la place de marché, un tel théâtre de bouffons et de médecins charlatans perdure à travers l’histoire. À la fin, l’approche théorique est mise en pratique en prenant comme exemple la Paix d’Aristophane. L’intrigue relativement simple, où le héros chevauche jusqu’au ciel pour trouver une sorte de thérapie pour la cité, est enrichie d’une nouvelle signification totalement englobante, au-delà du politique strict. (shrink)

While it has long been commonplace to advert to thePhenomenology of Spirit's peculiar prosaic form, there has been no sustained, thematic attempt to understand the relationship between that form—as a continuous, quasi-fictional narrative—and the work's philosophical content. I argue that some of what has been felt to be outlandish about the form may be better accounted for by reading it as connected to purposeful literary decisions, decisions in turn exhibiting philosophical claims about the new mode of modern self-understanding that the (...) argument is concerned with advancing. Extending Allen Speight's suggestions that Hegel sees literature as closely connected to his theory of agency, I argue that thePhenomenology's narrative should be understood as itself specifically and deliberately novelesque. I focus on three points that help clarify the book's form as not simply in keeping with, but as expressing aspects of its content: (1) the narrative structure of consciousness (as a unified, unfolding activity through which Hegel explores the notion of actuality), (2) the theatricalizing counterpoint between the ‘in itself’ and ‘for itself’ (as a dramatic device that Hegel connects to the social underpinnings of consciousness), and (3) the role of confession and forgiveness in the argument (as a theme that Schlegel had singled out as essential to the novel, and that Hegel repurposes both to criticize and to overcome Romanticism). I do not say that thePhenomenologyis itself a novel, but that construing some of its formal features and gestures as evoking the genre of the novel can help us to see more of what is philosophically at stake in them, and therefore in the work as a whole. (shrink)

Papers originally presented at a symposium in Bad Homburg, Germany, in April 1993.

According to statistics, men in Russia and most countries of the world are significantly more likely to cause road accidents than women. Understanding the reasons for these differences may be important for developing measures to reduce the number of road accidents. In the literature on Russia, the issue of the causes of this gender gap remains understudied. We analyse the magnitude of the gap in the odds of committing a serious crash by drivers of different genders and discuss possible reasons (...) for these differences. For this, we use a dataset of 158,000 published court decisions under Article 264 of the Russian Criminal Code for the period from 2010 to 2022. We show that 91.7% of all cases involve male drivers. But even after accounting for differences in the number of drivers of different genders and the number of kilometers they drive on average, men are 3.25 times more likely to commit crashes resulting in criminal prosecutions. One reason for these differences is driving safety. Men are also more likely to commit aggravated road accidents. In almost a quarter of cases, male drivers were driving drunk, while for women the figure is only 10 percent. Judges in turn are more likely to give men a serious sentence if it is a non-fatal offence; in more serious cases, the gender of the driver is less important. We also found a very strong variation in the odds of causing a serious road accident for men and women between Russian regions, suggesting the influence of cultural and socio-economic differences. (shrink)

Terstenjak, A. Franz Webers philosophisches Gedankengut im Umriss.--Wolf, K. Franz Veber und Graz.--Ilc, M. Näheres zur Verdinglichung und Veranschaulichung in Webers Wirtlichkeitsfrage.--Pirjevec, D. Franz Webers ästhetisches Denken.--Urbančič, I. Philosophische Grundanschauungen bei Franz Weber.--Trofenik, R. Franz Weber.--Weber, F. Meine Beziehungen zu Meinong.--Weber, F. Vorlesungen über die Philosophie der Persönlichkeit.--Weber, F. Die Frage der Wirklichkeit.

The architectonic principle, as stated in Aristotle's Politics, is related to the arrangement of the arts, the technai, whereby it is argued that the leading art is the politike techne. Plato, in the Gorgias, has argued for an architectonic of crafts. Four technai provide the best, aei pros to beltiston therapeuousai, and they differ from the pseudo-crafts that offer pleasure while indifferent to the beltiston. The principle for arranging the architectonic is the pursuit of the best, whereby each practitioner of (...) a craft is expected to give logos concerning the "how" as well as the end of the craft. Extending the Platonic principle, Aristotle brings together under a unified theory the intelligibility of nature and human nature in line with the ends of episteme and techne, especially the politike techne. (shrink)

David White’s Myth, Metaphysics and Dialectic in Plato’s Statesman is an ambitious work that aims not only to interpret the message of Plato’s Statesman, but also to situate the dialogue within Plato’s corpus as one that serves as a transition between Plato’s earlier metaphysics and his more mature views in later dialogues such as Philebus and Laws. White makes several adept observations of oddities sprinkled throughout Statesman, and he frequently connects these observations to thoughtful claims concerning possible motivations on the (...) part of Plato as well as possible revelations concerning Platonic metaphysics and philosophy. However, justifiably made inferences are difficult for the reader to discern, as White tends to obfuscate his message with difficult and wordy prose. In addition to these flaws, White makes frequent references to many other Platonic dialogues with little explanation in the way of contextualization. While I find this aspect of White’s thinking to be impressive and indicative of both extensive knowledge and great aptitude for synthesis in thought, readers are warned that novices of Plato scholarship might get lost in the copious references to dialogues beyond those central to the book. That being said, in most respects, White’s interpretation is both sound and refreshing. In my opinion, the virtues of this work heavily outweigh any imperfections. (shrink)

Réflexions sur deux publications récentes en ecclésiologie : «Eclesiología 30 años después de Lumen Gentium. Pueblo de Dios - Cuerpo de Cristo - Templo del Espíritu Santo - Sacramento - Comuniοn», Pedro Rodríguez , Madrid : Rialp, 1994 et François Guillemette, «Théologie des conférences Episcopales. Une herméneutique de Vatican II», Montréal, QC : Médiaspaul, 1994.

Comme le disent le titre et le sous-titre de l'article, l'auteur centre son attention sur la «proposition» faite par l'encyclique Ut Unum Sint aux responsables d'Eglises et aux théologiens, d'approfondir, en dialogue avec le successeur de Pierre, la distinction entre la «substance» du ministère de Pierre et les «formes d'exercice» qu'il pourrait prendre en fonction de la «nouvelle situation». L'article ne se propose pas de faire un commentaire, encore moins d'analyser en détails, le contenu doctrinal de l'encyclique; il se contente (...) d'examiner la «proposition papale» dans le contexte immédiat de l'encyclique. Cela implique certaines coordonnées quant à la méthode et au contenu, pour qu'un thème aussi brûlant soit situé en vue de porter une lumière nouvelle sur la «fonction papale». Approfondir l'essence du ministère. de Pierre représente un désir profond de la «conscience oecuménique», tant de Paul VI que de Jean Paul II. Celui-ci annonça, dès le début de son pontificat, que la «cause oecuménique» était -comme le rappelle la UUS, n. 99 - «une des priorités pastorales» de son pontificat. L'encyclique réaffirme l'«engagement oécuménique» de toute l'Eglise et du pape en personne. La UUS, «de caractère essentiellement pastoral» , ne se préoccupe pas tant de développer les principes doctrinaux contenus dans les décrets conciliaires que de faire appel avec insistance à la conscience des fidèles chrétiens, afin d'avancer ve. (shrink)

“The inquiry into the foundations of knowledge is a systematic inquiry into the problem of truth. This problem constitutes one of the three main concerns of philosophical analysis, the others being the problem of beauty and the problem of goodness.” Thus Evangelos P. Papanoutsos, Greece’s leading contemporary philosopher, introduces this third book of his “Trilogy of the Mind.” The first two volumes covered aesthetics and ethics; this one is a major work in epistemology. Combining rigorous analysis with thorough-going scholarship, displaying (...) an intimate acquaintance with the physical and humanistic sciences, and drawing on a deep understanding of philosophical method and the history of philosophy, Professor Papanoutsos is held in high esteem by his European colleagues. This translation of his masterpiece will enhance his reputation and influence among readers of English. The themes of The Foundation of Knowledge range over the topics that have been continually challenging to the modern era of philosophers: being and consciousness, experience and reason, common sense and science, and the domains of knowledge, including the nature of philosophical knowledge. Special attention is paid to the analysis of theoretical consciousness, the problems of categorical thinking, the theory of judgment, mathematics and logic, and the limits of historical understanding. (shrink)

L'objet de l'article est de considérer le document du magistère «Ordinatio sacerdotalis» dans le cadre de la gnoséologie théologique. Vatican II a légué, au sujet de l'objet et de l'étendue du magistère pontifical ordinaire trois critères-clé que l'ecclésiologiste doit appliquer pour l'interprétation des textes du magistère. a) La nature du document ; b) La proposition fréquente du thème en d'autres documents du magistère et sa transmission dans la tradition vivante de l'Eglise; c) Les formules employées pour déterminer le caractère de (...) l'acte magistériel et l'étendue de l'adhésion requise des destinataires. Il est de la compétence de l'ecclésiologiste, en accueillant en principe le document en la forme requise par sa présentation, d'approfondir la connexion véritable de la doctrine proposée avec le dépôt révélé et l'analogie de cette doctrine avec les autres vérités du message chrétien. Ainsi seulement pourra-t-on situer le document en raison de son contenu et de l'acte formel du magistère qui s'y exprime, dans le contexte qui lui correspond par rapport à l'entièreté du dépôt de la foi. (shrink)

Gregory Bateson’s work on play led him to conclude that paradox is the ground of propositions and denotation. Working through the concepts of analog and digital communication, logical typing problems, and various dimensions of “framing” and meta-discourse, I broadly illustrate how what Bateson came to call “the paradoxes of abstraction” inevitably arise within denotative utterances. In addressing the root paradoxes of framing and denotation which Bateson’s work on play identified and sought to elucidate, this manuscript outlines and advances some of (...) Bateson’s main contributions to communication theory. (shrink)

Abstract The infantilization of older adults seems morally deplorable whereas very young children are appropriate recipients of such treatment. Children, we argue, are not mentally capable of acting autonomously and reasoning clearly. However, we have difficulty reconciling this justification with the fact that many of the elders whom we respect are mentally deficient in those very same ways. In this paper, I try to make sense of this asymmetry between our justifications for infantilizing the young and our conviction that our (...) elders ought to be respected. I argue that our intuitions against adult infantilization are non-consequentialist (i.e., deontic). I consider several candidates for the deontic factor that might explain the asymmetry of our judgments and practices. I argue that a very specific kind of dignity (one that is socially constructed and reified) grounds our disparate judgments and treatments of very young and very old persons with similar needs. (shrink)

Ethics is demanding by nature, telling us what we should or should not do. But one ethical theory in particular, utilitarianism, is more demanding than most, and is often criticized as requiring too much of us. Neither utilitarianism nor deontology requires Superman to care about truth, justice, or the American way. It might not be possible for Superman to be supererogatory since very little is above or beyond the call of duty for him, given our incredibly high expectations. Virtue ethics (...) has the best chance to explain how Superman can perform supererogatory acts, since it doesn't focus on good action as such, but rather good character. While people use the name “big blue boy scout” in a derogatory way with Superman, it is a nice way to capture an ethical theory that might grant Superman’s responsibilities while allowing him a chance to live his own life: virtue ethics. (shrink)