As philosophers of mind we seem to hold in common no very clear view about the relevance that work in psychology or the neurosciences may or may not have to our own favourite questions—even if we call the subject ‘philosophical psychology’. For example, in the literature we find articles on pain some of which do, some of which don't, rely more or less heavily on, for example, the work of Melzack and Wall; the puzzle cases used so extensively in discussions (...) of personal identity are drawn sometimes from the pleasant exercise of scientific fantasy, at times from surprising reports of scientific fact; and there are those who deny, as well as those who affirm, the importance of the discovery of rapid-eye-movement sleep to the philosophical treatment of dreaming. A general account of the relation between scientific, and philosophical, psychology is long overdue and of the first importance. Here I shall limit myself to just one area where the two seem to connect, discussing one type of neuropsychological research and its relevance to questions in the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of psychology. (shrink)

This book explores the scope and limits of the concept of personDS a vexed question in contemporary philosophy. The author begins by questioning the methodology of thought-experimentation, arguing that it engenders inconclusive and unconvincing results, and that truth is stranger than fiction. She then examines an assortment of real-life conditions, including infancy, insanity andx dementia, dissociated states, and split brains. The popular faith in continuity of consciousness, and the unity of the person is subjected to sustained criticism. The author concludes (...) with a look at different views of the person found in Homer, Aristotle, the post-Cartesians, and contemporary cognitive science. (shrink)

The paper discusses the utility of the notion of consciousness for the behavioural and brain sciences. It describes four distinctively different senses of 'conscious', and argues that to cope with the heterogeneous phenomena loosely indicated thereby, these sciences not only do not but should not discuss them in terms of 'consciousness'. It is thus suggested that 'the problem' allegedly posed to scientists by consciousness is unreal; one need neither adopt a realist stance with respect to it, nor include the term (...) and its cognates in the sciences' conceptual apparatus. The paper briefly examines Nagel's [1974] article, since this presents the strongest counter to the thesis proposed. (shrink)

Definition of the problem: In Germany, clinical ethics is still in the state of development. Ethics consultation is very new and rare in the clinical setting in German university hospitals. Therefore this paper describes the clinical ethics activities at the Medical Center of Philipps University, Marburg, regard to ethics consultation in a case report. Clinical ethics rounds at the Surgical Intensive Care Unit are organized according to the theory and practice of the ethics consultation service at the Medical Center of (...) the University of Virginia, established by J.C. Fletcher, F.G. Miller and J.J. Fins. (shrink)

The influence of background music on cognitive functions is still a matter of debate. In this study, we investigated the influence of background music on executive functions (particularly on inhibitory functions). Participants completed a standardized cued Go/NoGo task during three different conditions while an EEG was recorded (1: with no background music, 2: with relaxing or 3: with exciting background music). In addition, we collected reaction times, omissions, and commissions in response to the Go and NoGo stimuli. From the EEG (...) data, event-related potentials (ERPs) were calculated for the Go and NoGo trials. From these ERPs, the N2 and P3 components were specifically analyzed since previous studies have shown that these components (and particularly the Go-NoGo difference waves) are strongly associated with inhibitory functions. The N2 and P3 components of the difference waves (N2d and P3d) were used for statistical analyses. The statistical analyses revealed no differences between the three conditions in terms of amplitudes and latencies of the N2d and P3d components. In addition, reaction times, omissions, and commissions were comparable across all conditions. Our results suggest that in the context of this paradigm, music as background acoustic stimulation has no detrimental effects on the performance of a Go/NoGo task and neural underpinnings. (shrink)

What will it be like to admit Artificial Companions into our society? How will they change our relations with each other? How important will they be in the emotional and practical lives of their owners since we know that people became emotionally dependent even on simple devices like the Tamagotchi? How much social life might they have in contacting each other? The contributors to this book discuss the possibility and desirability of some form of long-term computer Companions now being a (...) certainty in the coming years. It is a good moment to consider, from a set of wide interdisciplinary perspectives, both how we shall construct them technically as well as their personal philosophical and social consequences. By Companions we mean conversationalists or confidants not robots but rather computer software agents whose function will be to get to know their owners over a long period. Those may well be elderly or lonely, and the contributions in the book focus not only on assistance via the internet but also on providing company and Companionship, by offering aspects of real personalization.". (shrink)

Who is morally permitted to tell jokes about Jews? Poles? Women? Only those in the group? Only those who would be punching up? Anyone, since they are just jokes? All of the standard approaches are too broad or too narrow. In on the Joke provides a more sophisticated approach according to which each person possesses "joke capital" that can serve as "comic insurance" covering certain jokes in certain contexts. When Bob tells a joke about Jews, we can never know exactly (...) what Bob is intending since we cannot see inside Bob’s mind. But we could reasonably infer, if we knew Bob himself was Jewish, if he worked tirelessly for Jewish causes, or was a card-carrying Neo-Nazi. Each would affect his joke capital, and, in certain circumstances, we would have a moral standing to demand to see his ledger to see how much joke capital he had with respect to Jews. The permissibility of that joke depends upon four factors: the joke, the teller of the joke, the audience, and the setting. The view developed in In on the Joke is the only view that clearly explains how each of these components work together in an integrated, effective ethic of humor. (shrink)

The primary aim of this study is to dissolve the mind-body problem. It shows how the ‘problem’ separates into two distinct sets of issues, concerning ontology on the one hand, and explanation on the other, and argues that explanation – whether or not human behaviour can be explained in physical terms – is the more crucial. The author contends that a functionalist methodology in psychology and neurophysiology will prove adequate to explain human behaviour. Defence of this thesis requires: an examination (...) of the mental/physical dichotomy, and its rejection in favour of a distinction between psychological and physical terms; a description and discussion of functionalism in psychology and neurophysiology, showing how the notorious problem of the necessary intensionality of psychological terms may be circumvented; an examination of the role of computer simulation in psycho-physical research; and an explanation of how the phenomena of sentience fit the functional framework. The book concludes that the thesis presented is in all essentials that of Aristotle; Aristotle had no ‘mind-body problem’, and were it not for a subsequent over-obsession with Cartesian scepticism, we need not have had one either. (shrink)

Keine ausführliche Beschreibung für "Metaphysische und transzendentale Dynamik in Kants opus postumum" verfügbar.

Im Zentrum des Buches steht ein kurzer Traktat des Albinos, der sogenannte Prologos. Albinos ist geistesgeschichtlich dem Mittelplatonismus zuzuordnen, der Phase des antiken Platonismus, die dem um 250 n.Chr. einsetzenden Neuplatonismus Plotins vorausging. Der antike Autor fuhrt den Leser seines Prologos mit folgenden Fragen an die Dialoge Platons heran: Was ist ein Dialog? In welche Typen lassen sich die Platonischen Dialoge einteilen? Mit welchem Dialog soll das Studium der Platonischen Dialoge beginnen? Welche Anordnung der Dialoge ist Platons Philosophie angemessen? Der (...) Prologos wurde in der alteren Forschung aus verschiedenen Grunden vernachlassigt: Zum einen glaubte man, die philosophische Position des Albinos besser aus dem umfangreicheren Didaskalikos, der ihm zunachst zugewiesen wurde, rekonstruieren zu konnen; zum anderen sahen die meisten Forscher in dem Prologos nur eine schlecht gearbeitete Zusammenfassung (Epitome). Diese Vorurteile grundeten auf der Monographie "Der Platoniker Albinos und der falsche Alkinoos", die J. Freudenthal 1879 publizierte. Seit einigen Jahren wird der Didaskalikos jedoch wieder Alkinoos, einem nur in den Handschriften auftauchenden und ansonsten unbekannten Autor, zugewiesen. Somit wurde der Weg fur eine unvoreingenommene Neubewertung des Prologos frei.Das Buch beginnt mit einem Uberblick uber die Forschungsgeschichte zum Prologos. Ein Durchgang durch Leben, Werk und Lehren des Albinos mundet in eine Einordnung des Traktats unter die Testimonien zu Albinos und dessen Lehrer Gaios. In einem dritten Abschnitt wird in dem Buch die zentrale Frage diskutiert, worum es sich bei dem Prologos handelt, um ein Exzerpt oder eine Epitome. Aus einer philologischen und philosophiehistorischen Untersuchung der Textstellen, die von Freudenthal in seiner oben erwahnten Monographie als verderbt beanstandet wurden, geht hervor, dass es sich bei dem Prologos um ein Exzerpt und nicht um eine Epitome handelt. In einem vierten Kapitel wird mittels eines formalen und funktionalen Vergleichs des Prologos mit spateren Einfuhrungsschriften dessen spezifischer Charakter herausgearbeitet: Der Prologos gibt sich als unkorrigierte Mitschrift einer Vorlesung zu erkennen und gewahrt als solche Einblick in den Horsaal eines Platonikers der Kaiserzeit. In einem langeren funften Abschnitt wird die handschriftliche Uberlieferung dargelegt und kritisch betrachtet. Reis beschreibt hier ausfuhrlich 21 griechische Handschriften und eine lateinische Ubersetzung unter kodikologischen, historischen und palaographischen Gesichtspunkten. Die Verflechtung der Textgeschichte mit derjenigen Platons und spaterer Platoniker macht diese Untersuchung wunschenswert. Die Abhangigkeit der Handschriften voneinander wird ermittelt, worauf eine kritische Edition des Prologos folgt. Die beigegebene Ubersetzung macht den Text auch interessierten Nicht-Grazisten zuganglich. (shrink)

Der Autor hat Hegels Phänomenologie des Geistes aus dem Abstrakten in das Konkrete übersetzt und die einzelnen Kapitel so entschlüsselt, dass sie für alle Leser nachvollziehbar sind. Da Hegels Abstraktionen zu keiner befriedigenden Erklärung der Welt führen, fordert der Autor in seiner Kritik dazu auf, zum gesunden Menschenverstand zurückzukehren.

What mechanisms led to the intractable legal situation of “enemy combatants” detained by the U.S. government in Guantánamo Bay and elsewhere? And what does the role of the judiciary in the enemy combatants cases suggest about politically contentious court cases in general? This article develops a two-stage theory of political justice that is based on the U.S. post-9/11 terrorism cases. It demonstrates mechanisms by which politically contentious cases turn into political justice. Political justice in these cases is mainly the result (...) of violations of the separation of powers that are legitimized by portraying the defendants/detainees as enemies beyond the law. (shrink)

Is the tendency to morally prioritize humans over animals weaker in children than adults? In two pre-registered studies (N = 622), 5- to 9-year-old children and adults were presented with moral dilemmas pitting varying numbers of humans against varying numbers of either dogs or pigs and were asked who should be saved. In both studies, children had a weaker tendency to prioritize humans over animals than adults. They often chose to save multiple dogs over one human, and many valued the (...) life of a dog as much as the life of a human. While they valued pigs less, the majority still prioritized ten pigs over one human. By contrast, almost all adults chose to save one human over even one hundred dogs or pigs. Our findings suggest that the common view that humans are far more morally important than animals appears late in development and is likely socially acquired. (shrink)

Keine ausführliche Beschreibung für "Aristoteles' Transzendentaler Realismus" verfügbar.

Recent work in the philosophy of science has been debunking theory and acclaiming practice. Recent work in philosophical psychology has been neglecting practice and emphasizing theory, suggesting that common?sense psychology is in all essential respects like any scientific theory. The marriage of these two strands of thought would serve to make science and common sense virtually indistinguishable. My paper resists this conflation. The main target is the attempt to assimilate everyday psychology to a scientific theory; I argue that this is (...) badly mistaken, and does a disservice both to scientific and to common?sense psychology. A secondary aim is to argue that some of the new pragmatism in the philosophy of science is overstated. The suggested conflation would have interesting implications, as would its denial; in a concluding section, some of these implications are briefly explored. (shrink)

O advento da sociedade em rede promoveu mudanças significativas na experiência-com-o-mundo. Observa-se nos últimos anos a crescente toxidade no ambiente informacional, marcado tanto pela vivência tóxica da informação que circula legalmente nas redes sociais como por informações que intoxicam os indivíduos e grupos. O objetivo é discutir, em tempos de pós-verdade e da sociedade non-stop, o aspecto tóxico da informação, que ao tornar o ambiente informacional tóxico, adoece indivíduos e também as sociedades democráticas, ao esmaecer a empatia para com os (...) demais e de pôr em risco a própria ideia de democracia e de vida partilhada de modo democrático. A proposta é discutir a intoxicação pela informação não pelo excesso (infoxicação), mas pelo que nomeio informação tóxica, i.e., o aspecto tóxico da informação e de ambiente informacional tóxico tendo como referência os discursos de ódio. Para tanto serão consideradas a desconstrução de experiências de estados democráticos mediante o crescimento da circulação de discursos de ódio e de discursos de ódio fascistas; o crescimento da desinformação; o crescimento da circulação de notícias fraudulentas (Fake news) e de notícias falsas (por exemplo, as não endossadas pelos saberes científicos, como o terraplanismo, a ideia da supremacia branca); os robots e os algoritmos. (shrink)

Given the central place organisms occupy in Kant’s account of living nature, it might seem unlikely that his claims about biological wholes could be relevant to current debates over the problem of biological individuality. These debates acknowledge the multiple realizability of biological individuality in vastly different forms, including parts of organisms and complex groups of organisms at various levels of the biological hierarchy, sparking much controversy in attempts to characterize a biological individual. I argue that, far from being irrelevant to (...) this controversy, Kant’s account provides a key insight for addressing the multiple realizability problem. I show how the reciprocal causality between a self-organizing whole and its parts, which Kant thinks characterizes a natural end, is not limited to organisms but is exhibited by numerous types of beings in living nature. Self-organizing wholes of various kinds, and at various biological levels, may count as biological individuals, depending on the degree to which their functionally integrated parts are represented by reflective judgement as a natural end. (shrink)

Die meisten der hier versammelten Studien gehen zurück auf eine Tagung zum Zusammenhang von Gewalt und Verstehen, die die Herausgeber gemeinsam im September 2000 im Tagungszentrum Hohenheim der Akademie der Diözese Rottenburg-Stuttgart veranstaltet haben. Diese Tagung gehört in den Kontext des ersten Jahres der vom Herausgeber (B.L.) zusammen mit Jürgen Straub am Essener Kulturwissenschaftlichen Institut geleiteten Studiengruppe,,Lebensformen im Widerstreit". Eine der wichtigsten Fragen, die uns damals beschäftigte, war das,,Angelegtsein" von Gewalt in menschlichen Lebensformen, die unvermeidlich im Widerstreit existieren. Nachdem diese (...) Fragestellung ausftihrlich entwickelt worden und auf Potenziale der Verfeindung bezogen worden ist, wurde auf der genannten Tagung nun der Versuch gemacht, das Verstehen von Gewalt - ausgehend von der subtilen Verletzung bis hin zu entfesselten Formen wie Feindschaft und Krieg - als solches vor dem skizzierten Hintergrund zur Sprache zu bringen. (shrink)

A general hypothesis of atom size effects for G.P. zone formation is discussed in this paper and results are presented of precipitation in the systems Fe-Au and Fe-Mo. Techniques used are resistivity measurements and electron microscopy. In the Fe-Mo system it is shown that after initial cluster formation during the early stages of ageing after the quench, further growth ceases and vacancies anneal out into dislocation loops. The activation energy for the initial clustering was 1·3 ev whilst the excess vacancy (...) concentration estimated from the loop area gave a vacancy formation energy of ∼1·5 ev. These results confirm recent quenching results on pure iron. The refusal of Mo zones to grow confirms the general hypothesis of size effects.In the Fe-Au system precipitation of gold platelets after quenching is shown to be associated with the high density of dislocations formed during quenching through the phase transformation of the iron matrix. The effect of the dislocations is shown by the low value of ∼0·5 for the Johnson—Mehl kinetic parameter and by the activation energy for growth which is ∼0·8 of the equilibrium diffusion energy for Au in Fe. As the size-effect hypothesis does not apply to precipitation on dislocations the growth of zones in Fe—Au does not affect its validity. (shrink)

Burkhard Nonnenmacher analysiert Kants Verhältnisbestimmung von Vernunft und Glaube von Grund auf, stellt Kants fundamentaltheologische Weichenstellungen dar und zeigt, zu welchen materialdogmatischen Konsequenzen diese führen. Der Autor fragt, welche methodologischen Probleme in Kants Entwurf enthalten sind und was diese für die Systematische Theologie der Gegenwart bedeuten.

This discussion paper continues the debate over risk‐related standards of mental competence which appears in Bioethics 5. Dan Brock there defends an approach to mental competence in patients which defines it as being relative to differing standards, more or less rigorous depending on the degree of risk involved in proposed treatments. But Mark Wicclair raises a problem for this approach: if significantly different levels of risk attach, respectively, to accepting and refusing the same treatment, then it is possible, on this (...) account, for a patient to be considered competent to accept, but not refuse, the treatment, or vice versa. I argue that this puzzle does not constitute a genuine problem for a risk‐related standard. To this end I focus on the situation where, of two mutually exclusive options, one is riskier, but offering more pronounced benefit, while the other is safer, but offering less benefit. I argue for this proposition: it can take far less insight to know that the safe option is good than to know that the risky option is better. Now say one is actually informed enough to know that the safe option is good, but not enough to know whether the risky option is better; in such a case one is competent to say yes to that first option (the safe one), but not to say yes to the other. (I argue in passing that Pascal's Wager can be interpreted as having precisely this deliberative structure.) I thus conclude that cases do indeed exist where one can be competent to say yes but not no, or vice versa; and that it is thus not an anomaly in the risk‐related standard that it entails the existence of such cases. (shrink)

Arguments strong enough to justify skeptical theism will be strong enough to justify the position that every claim about God is empirically unfalsifiable. This fact is problematic because that position licenses further arguments which are clearly unreasonable, but which the skeptical theist cannot consistently accept as such. Avoiding this result while still achieving the theoretical objectives looked for in skeptical theism appears to demand an impossibly nuanced position.

Successful transitions to a sustainable bioeconomy require novel technologies, processes, and practices as well as a general agreement about the overarching normative direction of innovation. Both requirements necessarily involve collective action by those individuals who purchase, use, and co-produce novelties: the consumers. Based on theoretical considerations borrowed from evolutionary innovation economics and consumer social responsibility, we explore to what extent consumers’ scope of action is addressed in the scientific bioeconomy literature. We do so by systematically reviewing bioeconomy-related publications according to (...) the extent to which consumers are regarded as passive vs. active, and different domains of consumer responsibility. We find all aspects of active consumption considered to varying degrees but observe little interconnection between domains. In sum, our paper contributes to the bioeconomy literature by developing a novel coding scheme that allows us to pinpoint different aspects of consumer activity, which have been considered in a rather isolated and undifferentiated manner. Combined with our theoretical considerations, the results of our review reveal a central research gap which should be taken up in future empirical and conceptual bioeconomy research. The system-spanning nature of a sustainable bioeconomy demands an equally holistic exploration of the consumers’ prospective and shared responsibility for contributing to its coming of age, ranging from the procurement of information on bio-based products and services to their disposal. (shrink)

The monograph Drei Wurzeln des Krieges. Und warum nur eine nicht ins Verderben führt by Bernhard Taureck was published in 2019. It is one of the few current philosophical contributions on the theory of war that is not limited to the question of the moral justification of war (such as Michael Walzer’s work). Instead, the book contains not only various references to the war discourses of antiquity and their multiple references to actuality, but also a detailed examination of the question (...) of how radically war determines our history, present and future. In this book, interdisciplinary statements on Taureck’s concisely summarised approach make critical reference to this question in the common interest of finding ways out of this situation. With contributions by Lothar Brock, Hans-Georg Ehrhart, Martin Kahl, Wolfgang Knöbl, Barbara Kuchler, Ishay Landa, Burkhard Liebsch, Herfried Münkler, Max Mutschler, Norman Paech, Christopher Pollmann, Bernhard H. F. Taureck and Pascal Weitmann. (shrink)

Laut Hegel muss jede Darstellung des Absoluten als Selbstdarstellung begriffen werden. Doch was heißt das? Dass das Absolute überhaupt nur als sich Manifestierendes begriffen werden kann? Und wenn ja, welche Konsequenzen hat das für den Begriff des Absoluten? Burkhard Nonnenmacher zeigt, welche Antwort Hegels Logik und reifes System auf diese Fragen entwickeln.

Lange Zeit hielt sich der westliche Mensch für besonders frei und autonom. Menschen anderer Kulturen hingegen beschrieb und beurteilte er oft als gefangen in verwandtschaftlichen, sozialen, kulturellen, wirtschaftlichen, religiösen und politischen Zwängen. In seinen Essays hinterfragt Burkhard Schnepel dieses Selbst- und Fremdbild. So bricht er die damit einhergehenden Verzerrungen des 'exotischen' und 'orientalischen' Anderen auf. Der Autor betrachtet unterschiedliche Manifestationen und Typen von Personen in Afrika, Indien und in der Welt des Indischen Ozeans. Neben Königen, Narren und Träumern stellt (...) er auch den Tänzer und den Touristen in den Blickpunkt seiner ethnologischen Untersuchungen. (shrink)

Collection of texts, some previously published.

Employee misconduct is prevalent in organizations and may be counterproductive in social and material terms. It is thus important to better understand how misconduct is construed by employees and the factors that determine its ethical acceptability in specific cases. This study explores attitudes towards unethical and minor deviant behaviours by examining the degree of acquiescence towards them in a sample of employees. Based on previous studies it was hypothesized that both organizational commitment and job satisfaction would be negatively related to (...) the acceptance of such behaviours in organizational settings. Results show that there is a relationship between the degree of acquiescence and organizational commitment and a more modest relationship with job satisfaction. They further indicate that organizational tenure impacts very significantly on the degree of acceptance. Although differences were found for age, neither gender nor organizational variables were found to be significant. (shrink)

Muße ist ein freies Verweilen in der Zeit jenseits von Zweckrationalismus. Die Eigenzeitlichkeit wird zum Freiraum simultaner Möglichkeiten unserer Lebensgestaltung. Muße zielt auf ästhetisch und räumlich inszenierte Lebensformen, die in der Zeit nicht der Herrschaft der Zeit unterliegen. Konzepte von Muße sind stets eingebettet in ihre historischen und kulturellen Kontexte. Der Band beleuchtet historische Paradigmen der Muße in ihren literarischen Inszenierungen, diskursiven Verflechtungen und performativen Effekten. Die Beiträge aus der Philosophie, Klassischen Philologie, Alten Kirchengeschichte, germanistischen Mediävistik, neueren deutschen Literatur, Anglistik, (...) Soziologie, Geschichtswissenschaft, Archäologie, Kunstgeschichte, Ethnologie und Sinologie untersuchen Muße als anthropologisches und kulturgeschichtlich distinktes Phänomen, das sich Zeitzwängen widersetzt und Freiräume eröffnet. Analysiert werden unterschiedliche Semantisierungen, Ähnlichkeiten und Umbesetzungen, wie beispielsweise 'Freizeit', die Überschneidungen, aber auch gravierende Abgrenzungen zur Muße aufweisen. (shrink)