“My proposition is at the beginning to formalize not what the paradigm of the world is but what the fundamental relations are which formalize, finally, the fact for a multiplicity to be the world. That is the point. After that, when you know what the transcendental is, what the discussion of the multiplicity of the transcendental, and so on is, you can propose many forms, in fact an infinite multiplicity of different forms of the paradigm of the world.”.

By now it has been pretty well established that the Flemish Jesuit Leonardus Lessius was an economist of the highest grade. Joseph A. Schumpeter, perhaps the 20th century’s most important historian of economics, afforded Lessius more than ample mention in his monumental work, History of Economic Analysis. In Interest and Usury, Schumpeter’s pupil, Bernard W. Dempsey, likewise gave Lessius generous attention. The Belgian historian Raymond de Roover, however, who considered Lessius to be primarily a deserving epigone of the famous ‘Salamanca (...) School’, did not completely share their enthusiasm, at least initially. De Roover’s somewhat lukewarm attitude was, nevertheless, drowned out by the laudatory contribution of Barry T. Gordon on the subject in his Economic Analysis Before Adam Smith. Robert Beutels brought respect to Lessius’ work in his bio-bibliographical essay published in 1987 and restored something of the honour due to Lessius which, according to Beutels, he had been unjustly denied, certainly in his own land.The image of Lessius presented by all these authors is uncommonly fresh, yet at the same time surprisingly familiar. In their works they have shown him to be a modern thinker who merits comparison with contemporary economists. His analyses give witness to his profound insight into the economy of his day and are still relevant, thought not directly applicable, for economists today. The market principle, portfolio theory, the quantity theory of money, and much more can, according to the authors we have mentioned, be found in Lessius. But does this rather trendy image of Lessius agree with the historical reality?An appropriate way to begin answering this question would be to examine his discussion on the lending of money and the taking of interest in his monumental tractate of 1605, On Justice and Law . Did Lessius endorse or reject the traditional proscription against usury? When did he consider it permissible to claim interest? To what extent did his moral judgment depend on an economic analysis of the phenomenon of interest? Perhaps the answers to these questions will enable us to judge Lessius as both economist and ethicist, as he rightly deserves. (shrink)

Starting from Justus Lipsius's _Monita et exempla politica _, this book offers a collection of essays dealing with the disputed Macchiavellian, Tacitean or Neostoic character of Lipsius's political thought, and its impact on the dynamics of political discourse in Early Modern Europe.

The King Report on Corporate Governance (1994) evoked unprecedented interest in corporate governance in South Africa. This does not mean that corporate governance was not an issue of concern before the release of this historical report. To the contrary, corporate governance in its broader sense has been at stake since the inception of the first publicly owned companies in South Africa. This article intends to give an overview of corporate governance in South Africa. It starts by making a distinction between (...) broad and narrow conceptions of corporate governance. Before applying this distinction to the practice of corporate governance in South Africa, a brief overview of the corporate landscape in South Africa is provided. Then the South African situation with regard to broad and narrow corporate governance respectively is analysed. The article ends with a discussion of the review of corporate governance that currently is in the making in South Africa. Throughout the article both the financial and ethical dimensions of corporate governance is attended to. (shrink)

For a large proportion of our daily lives, spontaneously occurring thoughts tend to disengage our minds from goal-directed thinking. Previous studies showed that EEG features such as the P3 and alpha oscillations can predict mind-wandering to some extent, but only with accuracies of around 60%. A potential candidate for improving prediction accuracy is the Steady-State Visual Evoked Potential, which is used frequently in single-trial contexts such as brain-computer interfaces as a marker of the direction of attention. In this study, we (...) modified the sustained attention to response task that is usually employed to measure spontaneous thought to incorporate the SSVEP elicited by a 12.5-Hz flicker. We then examined whether the SSVEP could track and allow for the prediction of the stickiness and task-relatedness dimensions of spontaneous thought. Our results show that the SSVEP evoked by flickering words was able to distinguish between more and less sticky thinking but not between whether a participant was on- or off-task. This suggests that the SSVEP is able to track spontaneous thinking when it is strongly disengaged from the task but not off-task thought in general. Future research should determine the exact dimensions of spontaneous thought to which the SSVEP is most sensitive. (shrink)

In the corporate social responsibility (CSR) literature, the principle of voluntarism is predominant and implies that responsible business activities are discretionary and reach beyond the rule of law. This principle fails to explain that governments have a great interest in CSR and exercise influence on firms’ CSR activities. Therefore, we argue in favour of a contingency approach on voluntarism in CSR. To this end, we analyse the academic literature to demonstrate how governments are part of the CSR debate. We selected (...) 703 papers where the impact of governments is mentioned from five journals in our field (BEER, BEQ, BSE, BAS, JBE) in the period 1982–2011. We studied the titles and abstracts of these papers and provide an overview of: (i) the geographical orientation of the reviewed studies; (ii) the variety of government levels involved; and (iii) the various subjects where governments appear to be involved. In addition, an in‐depth reading of a subsample of 39 articles offers more details on the role of governments in the CSR literature. Hence, we offer a structured overview on the discussion of CSR and governments while stimulating a contingent understanding of the voluntarism concept in CSR. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 61.3 (2000) 381-395 [Access article in PDF] Minds, Forms, and Spirits: The Nature of Cartesian Disenchantment Han van Ruler What is Descartes's contribution to Enlightenment? Undoubtedly, Cartesian philosophy added to the conflict between philosophical and theological views which divided intellectual life in the Dutch Republic towards the end of its "Golden Age." 1 Although not everyone was as explicit as Lodewijk Meyer, who (...) said that his theological doubts were inspired by Descartes's philosophical method, Cartesianism along with Copernicanism, Socinianism, and Cocceianism played an important part in the growing skepticism towards the authority of Scripture. 2 Apart from Descartes's general method, however, specific Cartesian ideas encouraged a new view towards nature and towards God's role in governing it. In physics and physiology the new philosophy replaced the image of mind working on matter with the image of a self sufficient mechanism. This new causal metaphor led to a typically Cartesian form of "disenchantment." In this article I argue that on account of their approval of a Cartesian theory of causality, even authors with sincere religious motives came close to accepting radical and nearly Spinozistic ideas. I start with disenchantment in a very literal sense: Balthasar Bekker's denial of the activities of devils, angels, and other spirits. A comparison of Bekker's arguments with those of another Cartesian, Arnold Geulincx will, I hope, bring out the nature and importance of what I shall present as [End Page 381] Descartes's "mechanical reduction" in physics. Finally, I argue that the Cartesian separation of mind and body gave rise to a form of disenchantment that reached far beyond contemporary debates. Devils, Ghosts, and God's Omnipotence Balthasar Bekker's classic book The World Bewitched (1691-93) does not so much deal with the practice of sorcery as with its theory. Bekker offers a wide range of theological and philosophical arguments in order to combat the idea that ghosts, devils, and angels influence natural or historical events. In particular Bekker draws some important conclusions from the philosophy of Descartes. Yet it is immediately clear to the reader that the motives for his critique are religious rather than philosophical. 3 The World Bewitched is not written as a scientific assault on superstition. Bekker, at the time serving as a Calvinist minister in Amsterdam, presents his work as a new and perhaps final phase in the perfection of Christianity. For two centuries it had been a goal of the Protestant Reformation to accentuate God's majesty and to establish the idea of His absolute power over creation. Bekker's World again expresses this idea. His denial that ghosts and devils are active in the world is a logical consequence of the belief that there is no room for demigods in nature. Bekker thus adds a final touch to the project of the Reformation. The World Bewitched will testify to the fact "that I return as much of the honor of His Power and Wisdom to the Almighty, as they took from Him who gave it to the Devil. I ban [the Devil] from the World and I bind him in Hell." 4 Removing devils and spirits from nature, Bekker aims to distinguish superstition from true faith. The battle against superstitious beliefs had formed a characteristic element of Protestant tactics. Dutch Calvinists, for instance, took offense at the continuing practices of blessings and incantations. 5 Bekker wanted to go even further. The Protestantization of Christian dogma could only be completed by making everything in nature's course depend on God's unique power and providence. 6 "Science" in our sense of the word was a subsidiary matter. 7 Still, Bekker saw the new scientific theories of his day as useful allies. In particular it was the new philosophy of Descartes that attracted him. Following Descartes, Bekker reasons "that I think, that I will, [End Page 382] [and] that I understand something," without any part of my body being involved in this type of consciousness. Mind and body in fact have nothing in common: My... (shrink)

ABSTRACTBoth auditory and visual emotional memories can be made less emotional by loading working memory during memory recall. Taxing WM during recall can be modality specific (giving an audit...

Recent policy developments in the area of livestock husbandry have suggested that, from the perspective of optimizing animal welfare, new animal husbandry systems should be developed that provide opportunities for livestock animals to be raised in environments where they are permitted to engage in “natural behavior.” It is not known whether consumers regard animal husbandry issues as important, and whether they differentiate between animal husbandry and other animal welfare issues. The responsibility for the development of such systems is allocated jointly (...) between farmers, regulators, different actors in the food chain, and consumers. This research focuses on understanding consumer attitudes and preferences regarding the development and introduction of such systems, to ensure that they are acceptable to consumers as well as producers, regulators, and scientists. Consumer perceptions of animal welfare and animal husbandry practices were evaluated using quantitative consumer survey, which focused on two animal husbandry issues – farmed pigs and farmed fish. Following pilot work, 1000 representative Dutch consumers were sampled about their attitudes to either pig or fish husbandry. The results indicated that consumers think about animal welfare in terms of two broad categories related to their health and living environment, but do not think about welfare issues at a more detailed level. Greater concern was expressed about the welfare of pigs compared to fish. Consumer trust in labeling also emerged as an important issue, since consumers need to trust different food chain actors with responsibility for promoting animal welfare, and are reluctant to consider the details of animal husbandry systems. As a consequence, a transparent, enforceable, and traceable monitoring system for animal welfare friendly products is likely to be important for consumers. (shrink)