At first sight one might be tempted to regard Descartes' "cogito ergo sum" as logically true by existential generalisation. This however would neither exhaust the specific epistemic content of "cogito" nor reveal the philosophical peculiarities of "sum" which the author takes to have two ontologically different meanings. The full sense of "cogito ergo sum" finally turns out to be "Credo* me* cogitare ergo scio* me* $\text{esse}_{1/2}$ ". Furthermore this proposition can formally be proved to be true by means of epistemic (...) logic. (shrink)

This paper addresses a relatively new mode of ecological research: data synthesis studies. Data synthesis studies involve reusing data to create a general model as well as a reusable, aggregated dataset. Using a case from movement ecology, I analyse the trade-offs and strategies involved in data synthesis. Like theoretical ecological modelling, I find that synthesis studies involve a modelling trade-off between generality, precision and realism; they deal with this trade-off by adopting a pragmatic kludging strategy. I also identify an additional (...) trade-off, the synthesis trade-off, between making data easy to synthesise for a particular project, on the one hand, and facilitating data reuse for other projects, on the other. In response to this synthesis trade-off, researchers create flexible datasets that are relatively easy to use for particular projects and can be adjusted to suit some other purposes. The flexibility compromise is also found in broader open data efforts, making it a significant element in the future of data-intensive ecology. (shrink)

One of Hans Christian Andersen's most beautiful tales is "The Emperor's Nightingale." Its message—an exceptionally sobering one in the present context—is that nature is altogether finer and more enduring than art. It tells how a Chinese emperor, beguiled by a precious imitation bird that had been given him, forsook a natural songster he had once favored. But when that glittering counterfeit broke down, its clockwork sound silenced, the now aged ruler found welcome solace in the real bird's return, in its (...) more reliable and spiritually healing song. . . . Despite the artist's foregone defeat in any contest with nature , over the ages artists have been irresistibly drawn to the challenge of imitating nature. The persistence of these claims upon their skills and the inventive flight that have been elicited in the process testify to the extraordinary hold that the desire to mirror nature, or better still, to capture something of its essence, can exert over artists and their public. Accounts of imitative prowess go back to the most ancient days, beyond the fabled skills of Zeuxis and Apelles. There is no need here to summarize the complicated but almost domestically familiar history of illusionism. Rather, it is my present intention to reflect upon some contradictions inherent in the conception of art as illusion and to review some of the more exaggerated forms in which efforts have been made to break down the boundaries between art and nature. Frank Anderson Trapp, William Rutherford Mead Professor of Fine Arts, chairman of the department of art, and director of the Mead Art Museum at Amherst College, is the author of The Attainment of Delacroix and a number of essays on the history of art. (shrink)

Nachdem bisher gedruckte Hilfsmittel zum Studium des Wortschatzes dieses großen Kappadokiers entweder nur summarisch und nicht ausreichend (Lampe, A Patristic Greek Lexicon) bzw. nur fragmentarisch, d.h. nur zu einigen Schriften (vgl. das Repertorio bibliográfico de la lexicografía griega, Madrid 1998, mit Supplement im Internet 2003) existierten, verfügen wir nun über ein ungewöhnlich umfassendes und detailliertes Lexikon, das noch dazu in einem unglaublich schnellen Rhythmus erscheint (inzwischen auch der fünfte, das ganze Kappa enthaltende Band, Leiden 2003, X + 560 S.). Auch (...) wenn uns daneben seit einiger Zeit Gregor von Nyssa auch im Thesaurus linguae graecae (TLG) zur Verfügung steht und im Rahmen des Corpus Christianorum auch ein besonderer „Thesaurus Gregorii Nysseni“ angekündigt ist, so wird dadurch der Unterschied zwischen Konkordanzen und Lexika nur noch deutlicher. (shrink)

Die Arbeit wendet sich gegen die These, daß in nichtiterierten Gefangenendilemmata der Konsequentialismus als solcher die kollektive Erreichbarkeit seines eigenen Zieles der Nutzenmaximierung unterminiere und sich insofern ,,selbst aufhebe". Es sei daher rational, in GD-Konstellationen nichtkonsequentialistische, jene ineffizienten Folgezustände nicht nach sich ziehende Handlungsregeln zu wählen.Ausgehend vom Begriff der Effektivnutzenbewertung bei folgenorientiertem Handeln, von dem die - bei GD-Analysen üblicherweise allein betrachtete - Eigennutzenbewertung nur ein Spezialfall ist, betont die Arbeit demgegenüber folgendes: Es ist keineswegs der Konsequentialismus per se, sondern (...) lediglich eine, je nach CD-Auszahlungsmatrix, hinreichend stark egoistische Folgenbewertung, die jene fatale Implikation der ,,Selbstaufhebung" aufweist. Anhand von 2- bzw. von n-Personen-Dilemmata wird gezeigt, daß eine utilitaristische oder Maximin-Bewertung aller Spieler, aber auch jede nicht interpersonal invariante, hinreichend stark altruistische Folgenbewertung bei kollektiver Anwendung Ineffizienzen vermeidet, daß man also den GD-Klugheitsfallen auch im Rahmen des Konsequentialismus entgehen kann.Darüber hinaus wird der Begriff des nur partiellen Klugheitsdilemmas eingeführt, von dem die üblichen Klugheitsdilemmata nur Grenzfälle sind. (shrink)

Tracking technology has been heralded as transformative for animal ecology. In this paper I examine what changes are taking place, showing how current animal movement research is a field ripe for philosophical investigation. I focus first on how the devices alter the limitations and biases of traditional field observation, making observation of animal movement and behaviour possible in more detail, for more varied species, and under a broader variety of conditions, as well as restricting the influence of human presence and (...) observer bias. I reconstruct these as shifts in scope, objectivity, accuracy and fruitfulness. The second transformation is slightly less obvious but equally significant for animal ecology. Tracking devices generate complex data that demands both statistical and biological expertise, which has led to increasingly frequent and intensive collaborations between statisticians and biologists. Based on interviews, I examine how researchers in these interdisciplinary collaborations negotiate the collection, analysis and interpretation of movement data, integrating research interests, methodological constraints, previous field observations, and background theory. Tracking technology is therefore also shifting which disciplinary considerations are brought to bear on research into animal movement and behaviour and how this research is conducted. (shrink)

A thorough analysis of the Golden Rule (GR) is given including formal investigations of its logical structure and essential implications. Starting with the general distinction of positive and negative forms of GR a set of sixteen formal implications, one for each variant of the rule, is presented. The moral acceptability of the output of the different versions of GR is assessed in various problem contexts and in discussing several objections to GR with the conclusion that GR is hopelessly inadequate as (...) a general criterion of moral choice. (shrink)

To ensure ethical employee behavior, companies often utilize several forms of mostly one-way communication such as codes of conduct. The extent to which these efforts, in addition to informing about the company stance on ethics, are able to positively influence behavior is disputed. In contrast, research on business ethics communication and behavior indicates a relatively clear, positive link between open workplace dialogue about ethical issues and ethical conduct. In this article, I therefore address the question: What influences employee attitudes to (...) talking openly about ethical issues? Answers are proposed on the basis of focus group interviews with staff at the Denmark and Brazil affiliates of the global healthcare company Novo Nordisk. It was found that interest in discussing ethical issues was influenced by two main factors: employee conceptualizations of business ethics and the level of inter-collegial trust, credibility, and confidence. In this article, by examining these phenomena, I aim at providing insight that can both inform scholars in these fields as well as help managers in their attempts to promote open workplace dialogue about ethical issues. (shrink)

Biological individuality is a notoriously thorny topic for biologists and philosophers of biology. In this paper we argue that biological individuality presents multiple, interconnected questions for biologists and philosophers that together form a problem agenda. Using a case study of an interdisciplinary research group in ecology, behavioral and evolutionary biology, we claim that a debate on biological individuality that seeks to account for diverse practices in the biological sciences should be broadened to include and give prominence to questions about uniqueness (...) and temporality. We show that broadening the problem agenda of biological individuality draws attention to underrecognized philosophical issues and discussions and thereby organizes and enriches the existing debate. (shrink)

In this paper I develop a concept of behavioural ecological individuality. Using findings from a case study which employed qualitative methods, I argue that individuality in behavioural ecology should be defined as phenotypic and ecological uniqueness, a concept that is operationalised in terms of individual differences such as animal personality and individual specialisation. This account make sense of how the term “individuality” is used in relation to intrapopulation variation in behavioural ecology. The concept of behavioural ecological individuality can sometimes be (...) used to identify individuals. It also shapes research agendas and methodological choices in behavioural ecology, leading researchers to account for individuals as sources of variation. Overall, this paper draws attention to a field that has been largely overlooked in philosophical discussions of biological individuality and highlights the importance of individual differences and uniqueness for individuality in behavioural ecology. (shrink)

Niche construction theory (NCT) aims to transform and unite evolutionary biology and ecology. Much of the debate about NCT has focused on construction. Less attention has been accorded to the niche: what is it, exactly, that organisms are constructing? In this paper I compare and contrast the definition of the niche used in NCT with ecological niche definitions. NCT’s concept of the evolutionary niche is defined as the sum of selection pressures affecting a population. So defined, the evolutionary niche is (...) narrower than the ecological niche. Moreover, when contrasted with a more restricted ecological niche concept, it has a slightly different extension. I point out three kinds of cases in which the evolutionary niche does not coincide with realized ecological niches: extreme habitat degradation, commensalism, and non-limiting or super-abundant resources. These conceptual differences affect the role of NCT in unifying ecology and evolutionary biology. (shrink)

Philosophers have studied mechanisms in many fields in biology. The focus has often been on molecular mechanisms in disciplines such as neuroscience, genetics and molecular biology, with some work on population-level mechanisms in ecology and evolution. We present a novel philosophical case study of individual-level mechanisms, mechanisms in ecology and evolution that concern the interactions between an individual and its environment. The mechanisms we analyze are called Niche Choice, Niche Conformance and Niche Construction (NC3) mechanisms. Based on a detailed analysis (...) of biologists’ research practices, we develop metaphysical claims about the components and organization of NC3 mechanisms, the phenomena they bring about and how these phenomena relate to individual differences, a major explanatory target in the field. We provide reasons for why processes of niche choice, conformance and construction are mechanisms and how they differ from molecular mechanisms underlying individual differences. Finally, we demonstrate that a general representation of NC3 mechanisms is highly abstract, with more specific types of NC3 mechanisms in particular study systems exhibiting more complex components organized in more complex ways. Our case study highlights some distinctive features of individual-level mechanisms in ecology and evolution, such as complex and heterogeneous organization and multiple phenomena. (shrink)

O artigo objetiva demonstrar que a Semântica formal, enquanto campo de articulação entre Lógica e Ontologia, exige sua fundamentação em uma Antropologia. Para isso, será necessário demonstrar que Tugendhat conduz a Semântica formal ao modo de fundamentação da Fenomenologia de Heidegger, por meio dos estados-de-ânimo. Para tanto, partiremos da distinção entre fundamento relativo e absoluto, introduzida nos primeiros capítulos das Lições Introdutórias à Filosofia Analítica da Linguagem, com a finalidade de demonstrar que a dimensão semântica da filosofia de Tugendhat somente (...) pode fundamentar relativamente seu conceito de Filosofia. Pelo contrário, a dimensão fenomenológica, enquanto oferece uma motivação para a atividade de filosofar, pode fornecer também o ponto de apoio para uma fundamentação absoluta deste conceito. Com isto, entretanto, o que Tugendhat parece não ter percebido é que, por meio desse movimento, ele inverte a relação de implicação entre ambos os métodos, de tal modo a tornar o método fenomenológico fundamento do método analítico. Assim, sendo absoluta, devemos considerar a dimensão motivadora, no caso os estados-deânimo, fundamento da fenomenologia de Ser e Tempo, como originária frente à dimensão relativa oferecida pela Semântica formal. Será com base nesta relação, portanto, que tomaremos a circularidade entre o fundamento nos estados-de-ânimo e o fundamento nas regras semânticoformais para enunciados assertóricos com a finalidade de demonstrar que o campo de articulação entre Lógica e Ontologia exige sua fundamentação em uma Antropologia. (shrink)

Ethik und Seelsorge sind Bereiche, in denen menschliches Sein und Handeln reflektierend begleitet wird, um Orientierung, Unterstützung oder Trost zu geben. Bei Berufen, in denen Menschen auf eine gewaltverstrickte Lebenswelt treffen, ihrerseits staatlich legitimiert Gewalt ausüben und selbst von Gewalt betroffen sind, tauchen dabei besondere Widersprüche und Sinnfragen auf. Diese Herausforderungen in den Blick zu nehmen und an der Schnittstelle von Philosophie und praktischer Theologie zu erörtern, so wie es der Münsteraner Theologe Werner Schiewek richtungsweisend vorgezeichnet hat, ist das Ziel (...) des vorliegenden Bandes. (shrink)

Management accounting and control seeks to provide information that substantiates decision-making at all firm levels and thus may also foster ethical decision-making. Against this background, this article presents a systematic literature review of research on management accounting and control and business ethics that has been published in the Journal of Business Ethics. Through this review, we intend to bring to the forefront a research topic that has been widely neglected in broader literature reviews on accounting ethics research and that has (...) been covered by a small number of articles published by traditional leading accounting journals only. Our systematic literature review is guided by a theoretical framework that integrates the decision-facilitating and decision-influencing roles of management accounting and control information and the stages of the ethical decision-making process. Through this theoretical lens, we analyze 64 management accounting and control articles published in the Journal of Business Ethics over more than three decades. Synthesizing and structuring this research, we discuss prior accomplishments and elaborate on avenues for future research. (shrink)

To what extent can we feel what someone else feels? Data from neuroscience suggest that empathy is supported by a simulation process, namely the neural activation of the same or similar regions that subserve the representation of specific states in the observer. However, expectations significantly modulate sensory input, including affective information. For example, expecting painful stimulation can decrease the neural signal and the subjective experience thereof. For an accurate representation of the other person’s state, such top-down processes would have to (...) be simulated as well. However, this is only partly possible, because expectations are usually acquired by learning. Therefore, it is important to be aware of possible misleading simulations that lead to misinterpretations of someone’s state. (shrink)

Biological individuality is without a doubt a key concept in philosophy of biology. Questions around the individuality of organisms, species, and biological systems can be traced throughout the philosophy of biology since the discipline’s inception, not to mention the sustained attention they have received in biology and philosophy more broadly. It’s high time the topic got its own Cambridge Element. McConwell’s Biological Individuality falls short of an authoritative overview of the debate on biological individuality. However, it sends a welcome message (...) to new and seasoned scholars to reorient the debate towards practically and politically relevant themes. (shrink)