When I take a sip from the coffee in my cup, I can taste that it is sweet. When I hold the cup with my hands, I can feel that it is hot. Why does the experience of feeling that the cup is hot give me justification for believing that the cup is hot?And why does the experience of tasting that the coffee is sweet give me justification for believing that the coffee is sweet?In general terms: Why is it that (...) a sense experience that P is a source of justification—a reason—for believing that P? Call this the Question. I will discuss various answers to the Question, and defend the one I myself favor. (shrink)

This paper defends the normativity of meaning thesis by clearing up a misunderstanding about what the thesis amounts to. The misunderstanding is that according to it, failing to use an expression in accordance with the norms which constitute its meaning amounts to changing the expression’s meaning. If this was what the thesis claimed, then it would indeed be easy to show that meaning norms do not yield prescriptions and cannot be followed. However, there is another reading: what is constitutive of (...) meaning is not the norm’s being followed, but the norm’s being applicable. On this reading, some standard arguments against the thesis lose their force. After discussing the alternative reading and its consequences, the paper goes on to sketch a model of how norms of meaning become applicable in the first place. This model supports the view that talk of meaning has its pragmatic home in contexts of linguistic calibration. (shrink)

Wir möchten der Charter on Medical Professionalism, die wir für vorbildlich halten, eine durchdachte Anreicherung hinzufügen. Wir beginnen mit einer skeptischen Note gegen das verbreitete theoretische Vorurteil, die wichtigsten Probleme im Gesundheitssystem seien Gerechtigkeitsprobleme und diese seien theoretisch gut beherrschbar. Unter Bezug auf Norman Daniels, der John Rawls’ Theorie der politischen Gerechtigkeit auf die Bewertung und Gestaltung von Gesundheitssystemen anwendet, sowie auf die biomedizinische Ethik, die von Beauchamp und Childress vertreten wird, analysieren wir das komplexe Verhältnis zwischen moralischer Integrität von (...) Strukturen und Organisationen einerseits und natürlichen Personen, die in ihnen arbeiten, andererseits. Anschließend interpretieren wir die Charta als eine Spezifizierung der ärztlichen professionsmoralischen Verantwortung auf mehreren Ebenen, die Tugend- und Organisationsethik verklammern. (shrink)

This paper argues that ceteris paribus (cp) laws exist based on a Lewisian best system analysis of lawhood (BSA). Furthermore, it shows that a BSA faces a second trivialization problem besides the one identified by Lewis. The first point concerns an argument against cp laws by Earman and Roberts. The second point aims to help making some assumptions of the BSA explicit. To address the second trivialization problem, a restriction in terms of natural logical constants is proposed that allows one (...) to describe regularities, as specified by basic generics (e.g. ‘birds can fly’) and universals (e.g. ‘all birds can fly’). It is argued that cp laws rather than strict laws might be a part of the the best system of such a regularity-based BSA, since sets of cp laws can be both (a) simpler and (b) stronger when reconstructed as generic non-material conditionals. Yet, if sets of cp laws might be a part of the best system of a BSA and thus qualify as proper laws of nature, it seems reasonable to conclude that at least some cp laws qualify as proper laws of nature. (shrink)

Freges Kontextprinzip "Nur im Zusammenhange eines Satzes bedeuten die Wörter etwas" hat auch nach der von ihm vollzogenen Angleichung von Behauptungssätzen an Eigennamen Gültigkeit für die formale Sprache der "Grundgesetze". Der Bedeutungsvollständigkcitsbeweis, den er für sein Logiksystem anstrebt, schließt eine unmittelbare Anwendung dieses Prinzips nicht nur auf die unvollständigen Funktionsausdrücke, sondern auch auf die leerstellenfreien Wertverlaufsnamen ein. Wahrheitsnamen (Sätze) zeichnen sich vor anderen symbolsprachlichen Eigennamen in mehrfacher Hinsicht, insbesondere durch ihre semantische Selbständigkeit aus. Wertverlaufsnamen haben nur im Zusammenhang eines Wahrheitswertnamens (...) eine Bedeutung. Ihre Bedeutung besteht in ihrem Beitrag zur Bestimmung der Bedeutung von Wahrheitswertnamen, in denen sie vorkommen. (shrink)

Skeptics claim that we know radically less than we think we do. For example, skeptics might claim that we have next to no knowledge of the past, the future, or other minds. Here we will consider the skeptical claim that we have next to no knowledge of the external world: the world of physical objects that we at least seem to perceive. One well-known argument in support of this claim appeals to the possibility of being a BIV: a brain in (...) a vat. According to the BIV Hypothesis, you are a mere BIV without a normal body. This of course means, among other things, that you don't have hands. The nerve endings of your brain are stimulated in a manner so sophisticated that the perfect illusion of a normal life is generated. Let's distinguish between the.. (shrink)

Neo-logicism is, not least in the light of Frege’s logicist programme, an important topic in the current philosophy of mathematics. In this essay, I critically discuss a number of issues that I consider to be relevant for both Frege’s logicism and neo-logicism. I begin with a brief introduction into Wright’s neo-Fregean project and mention the main objections that he faces. In Sect. 2, I discuss the Julius Caesar problem and its possible Fregean and neo-Fregean solution. In Sect. 3, I raise (...) what I take to be a central objection to the position of neo-logicism. In Sect. 4, I attempt to clarify how we should understand Frege’s stipulation that the two sides of an abstraction principle qua contextual definition of a term-forming operator shall be “gleichbedeutend”. In Sect. 5, I consider the options that Frege might have had to establish the analyticity of Hume’s Principle: The number that belongs to the concept F is equal to the number that belongs to the concept G if and only if F and G are equinumerous. Section 6 is devoted to Frege’s two criteria of thought identity. In Sects. 7 and 8, I defend the position of the neo-logicist against an alleged “knock-down argument”. In Sect. 9, I comment on Frege’s description of abstraction in Grundlagen, §64 and the use of the terms “recarving” and “reconceptualization” in the relevant literature on Fregean abstraction and neo-logicism. I argue that Fregean abstraction has nothing to do with the recarving of a sentence content or its decomposition in different ways. I conclude with remarks on global logicism versus local logicisms. (shrink)

(2013). Critical notice of Aaron James, Fairness in Practice: A Social Contract for a Global Economy. Canadian Journal of Philosophy: Vol. 43, No. 3, pp. 382-401.

The integration of ethics into the day-to-day work of research and innovation is an important but difficult challenge. However, with the Aachen method for identification, classification and risk analysis of innovation-based problems an approach from an engineering perspective is presented that enables the integration of ethical, legal and social implications into the day-to-day work of R&I practitioners. AMICAI appears in particular capable of providing a procedural guidance for R&I practitioners based on a method established in engineering science, breaking down the (...) object of consideration into partial aspects and prioritizing the innovation-based problems in dependence of potential risk. This enables the user to apply AMICAI continuously during all stages of the research and development process and to analyze and choose between certain sociotechnical alternatives. In this way, problems that affect ethical, legal, and social aspects can be understood, reflected and considered in the mostly technically focused R&D process. The paper gives a general guidance about AMICAI by describing principles and assumptions, providing the steps of analysis and application aids, giving an example application, explaining the necessary adjustments of AMICAI compared to the methodical basis of failure mode, effects, and criticality analysis and discussing the advantages and limits. AMICAI’s simple applications can stimulate interdisciplinary cooperation in the R&D process and be a starting point for the development of an “open RRI risk analysis platform” allowing society to evaluate innovation-based problems. (shrink)

Special Issue: Chantal Mouffe: agonism and the politics of passion.

ABSTRACT In Europe’s Crisis of Legitimacy: Governing by Rules and Ruling by Numbers in the Eurozone, Vivien Schmidt authoritatively charts how the European Union weathered the crisis of its single currency in the 2010s, gradually moving from fiscal austerity and structural reform to a more systemic solution and flexible interpretation of the euro’s governing rules. Using a discursive institutionalist approach in combination with a “systems theory” understanding of democratic decision making, Schmidt persuasively argues that we need to look at the (...) euro problem as a fundamentally political problem that lacked democratic legitimacy as long as technocrats were in charge of policy solutions. Schmidt argues that the euro crisis needs to be broached from the point of view of the E.U.’s split-level legitimacy as well as the growing politicization of E.U. governance in an era of increasing populism and rising Euroskepticism. Schmidt’s application of discursive institutionalism allows readers to judge for themselves whose and which ideas mattered, why and in what way they were implemented, and how they gradually evolved over time. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Paragrana Jahrgang: 23 Heft: 2 Seiten: 194-203.

Name der Zeitschrift: Paragrana Jahrgang: 25 Heft: 1 Seiten: 333-345.

Name der Zeitschrift: Deutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie Jahrgang: 66 Heft: 6 Seiten: 802-804.