It has often been remarked that Bohr's writings on the interpretation of quantum mechanics make scant reference to the mathematical formalism of quantum theory; and it has not infrequently been suggested that this is another symptom of the general vagueness, obscurity and perhaps even incoherence of Bohr's ideas. Recent years have seen a reappreciation of Bohr, however. In this article we broadly follow this "rehabilitation program". We offer what we think is a simple and coherent reading of Bohr's statements about (...) the interpretation of quantum mechanics, basing ourselves on primary sources and making use of and filling lacunas in|recent secondary literature. We argue that Bohr's views on quantum mechanics are more firmly connected to the structure of the quantum formalism than usually acknowledged, even though Bohr's explicit use of this formalism remains on a rather global and qualitative level. In our reading, Bohr's pronouncements on the meaning of quantum mechanics should first of all be seen as responses to concrete physical problems, rather than as expressions of a preconceived philosophical doctrine. In our final section we attempt a more detailed comparison with the formalism and conclude that Bohr's interpretation is not far removed from present-day non-collapse interpretations of quantum mechanics. (shrink)

One major theme in Pope Benedict XVI’s encyclical Caritas in Veritate is the “Principle of Gratuitousness.” The point of this essay is to begin a reflection on what it actually means and its possible relevance. By comparing the “Principle of Gratuitousness” and its normative assumptions about “the logic of gift” with anthropological studies focused on the same phenomenon, I hope to show, not only the relevance of the encyclical’s normative vision but also where and how it needs further clarification. The (...) findings of empirical anthropology provide qualified support for the encyclical’s focus on generating and replenishing “social capital” in order to sustain both markets and politics in an effort to “civilize the economy.” In order to put the “Principle of Gratuitousness” into more effective practice, the encyclical highlights the creative role of “civil society” and calls for the creation social enterprises whose goals are broader and deeper than maximizing profits. Assessing the realism of Benedict’s proposal will require further research and reflection on innovative entrepreneurial ventures designed to address social problems on a commercial basis, for example, Muhammad Yunus’ concept of a “social business” and its development in a series of joint business ventures involving the Grameen Bank and related organizations. (shrink)

Several writers have tried to describe the foundations of an egalitarian moral view. Their aim is to explain the way of thinking on which distinctively egalitarian conclusions depend. Egalitarianism is frequently located by reference to utilitarianism. The basic features of the utilitarian view are reasonably well understood and most of us find it at least plausible. Egalitarians want to show that their own view differs from the utilitarian view in some fundamental respect. They hope to convince us that the egalitarian (...) stand on that fundamental matter is at least as plausible as that of utilitarianism. (shrink)

Abstract: Contemporary analytic philosophers of the “reactive attitudes” tend to share a simple conception of guilt as “self-directed blame”—roughly, an “unpleasant affect” felt in combination with, or in response to, the thought that one has violated a moral requirement, evinced substandard “quality of will,” or is blameworthy. I believe that this simple conception is inadequate. As an alternative, I offer my own theory of guilt’s logic and its connection to morality. In doing so, I attempt to articulate guilt’s defining thought (...) or proposition through an extended investigation and analysis of guilt’s many competing metaphors, which I trace from the Hebrew Bible to the New Testament to Shakespeare to contemporary vernacular. My interpretation of this literary genealogy offers a way to understand guilt’s seemingly disparate metaphors in terms of a single master-image that illuminates our self-conceptions and our relationship to morality. I conclude by making a very brief start toward a moral vindication of guilt against the backdrop of Nietzschean and Freudian analyses that explicitly call guilt’s place in a healthy social and personal life into question. I suggest that once guilt’s logic is made explicit, we can see that it makes sense of, honors, and addresses some of our deepest aspirations and needs. (shrink)

Digital technologies are changing our understanding of ethical emulation. In this article, Matthew Dennis proposes that some social media technologies have given rise to a strikingly new set of ethical ideals, often concerned with the ideal of self-cultivation. While there is relatively little philosophical discussion of these kinds of ideals, Dennis suggests that scrutiny of Friedrich Nietzsche's ethical philosophy offers a guiding account of why the ideal of self-directed character change is important. He concludes by speculating on how (...) the digital affordances of social media technologies will change the way in which ethical exemplars influence future generations. (shrink)

Abstract:Vice is a neglected concept in business ethics. This paper attempts to bring vice back into the contemporary dialogue by exploring one vice that is destructive to employee and organization alike. Interestingly, this vice was first described by Aristotle asakolastos. Drawing extensively on the criminology literature, the findings challenge both common sense and popular images of white-collar crime and criminals. While not all instances of employee betrayal are attributable to vice, some most certainly are, and the paper offers a description (...) of those violations of trust in which vice may play a role. (shrink)

In contemporary Indian Country, the majority of people who identify as “Indian” fall into the “urban” category: away from traditional lands and communities, in cities and towns wherein the opportunities to live one’s identity as Native can be restricted, and even more so for American Indian religious practice and activity. This article will explore a possible theoretical model for discussing the religious nature of urban Indians, using aspects of the contemporary powwow as exemplary, and suggest ways in which the discourse (...) on Native American religious practices can inform the larger discussion of religion in general by implying a comparative direction between urban Indians and other religious actors in American secular society. (shrink)

Self-care apps are booming. Early iterations of this technology focused on tracking health and fitness routines, but recently some developers have turned their attention to the cultivation of character, basing their conceptual resources on the Hellenistic tradition (Stoic Meditations™, Stoa™, Stoic Mental Health Tracker™). Those familiar with the final writings of Michel Foucault will notice an intriguing coincidence between the development of these products and his claims that the Hellenistic tradition of self-cultivation has much to offer contemporary life. In this (...) article, I explore Foucault’s cryptic remarks on this topic, and argue that today’s self-care developers can improve future products by paying attention to the Hellenistic exercises of self-cultivation he identifies as especially important. (shrink)

This key collection of essays sheds new light on long-debated controversies surrounding Kant’s doctrine of idealism and is the first book in the English language that is exclusively dedicated to the subject. Well-known Kantians Karl Ameriks and Manfred Baum present their considered views on this most topical aspect of Kant's thought. Several essays by acclaimed Kant scholars broach a vastly neglected problem in discussions of Kant's idealism, namely the relation between his conception of logic and idealism: The standard view that (...) Kant's logic and idealism are wholly separable comes under scrutiny in these essays. A further set of articles addresses multiple facets of the notorious notion of the thing in itself, which continues to hold the attention of Kant scholars. The volume also contains an extensive discussion of the often overlooked chapter in the Critique of Pure Reason on the Transcendental Ideal. Together, the essays provide a whole new outlook on Kantian idealism. No one with a serious interest in Kant's idealism can afford to ignore this important book. (shrink)

The ArugmentThis essay answers a single question: what was Robert Hooke, the Royal Society's curator of experiments, doing in his well-known 1665 work,Micrographia?Hooke was articulating a “universal cure of the mind” capable of bringing about a “reformation in Philosophy,” a change in philosophy's interpretive practices and organization. The work explicated the interpretive and political foundations for a community of optical instrument users coextensive with the struggling Royal Society. Standard observational practices would overcome the problem of using nonstandard instruments, while inherent (...) inrepresentation– the interpretive practice championed in the text – were important theological and political meanings. Hooke's kind of experimental philosophy undermined the claims made by “atheists” and “enthusiasts” – the enemies of the restored church and state – while also producing useful knowledge. Equally important, Hooke modeled the community described inMicrographiaupon the classicalres publica, but his community made important concessions to Restoration political realities, especially the growing role of commercial or transactional relationships. (shrink)

This article examines and assesses Bernard Hodgson’s critique of the Neoclassical concept of rationality and its place in the literature. It is argued that Hodgson’s Trojan horse critique is superior to the others because it addresses the role of empiricist epistemology in reducing reason to instrumental rationality and consequent disappearance of the human subject of political economy. The second phase of the empiricist level of analysis reintroduces the capacities for ethical deliberation, self-determination, and the socio-historical conditions and institutional setting of (...) the economic agent. Because Hodgson’s solutions presuppose empiricist terrain, they are arbitrary. This occurs because the fundamental problem of Neoclassical rationality is its ontology. Yet by introducing the human subject into economic theory, Hodgson’s solutions move onto an ontological terrain adequate for economic analysis of human subjects. (shrink)

The notion of information has figured prominently in much modern evolutionary theorizing. But while theorists usually concede the importance of distinguishing between our ordinary use of this notion and its special acceptation in information theory, some biological theorizing requires "information" to serve a double duty. Lorenz's ethological theorizing is a case in point, and this paper challenges its conceptual underpinnings. Special attention is paid to Lorenz's contention that adaptation to an environment is akin to representation, and it is urged that (...) many purportedly (phylogenetically) adapted behaviors might well instead be better interpreted as non-information-laden (ontogenetically) adaptive behaviors. (shrink)

In this paper I reply to the critiques of my recent book *Kant's Radical Subjectivism* by Andrew Brook, Anil Gomes, Robert Howell and Alexandra Newton.

In den Gesellschaftsdiagnosen soziologischer wie feuilletonistischer Provenienz spielt die Angst eine zentrale Rolle. So zeichnet etwa Heinz Bude in seiner Diagnose einer Gesellschaft der Angst ein buntes Spektrum insbesondere sozialer Abstiegs- und Exklusionsängste, die sich seit der Nachkriegszeit vervielfacht und zu einer diffusen sozialen Grundbefindlichkeit erzeugt hätten. Das Aufstiegsversprechen des deutschen Sozialstaates habe sich in eine latente Drohung prekärer Existenz verkehrt und vor dem Hintergrund der umfassenden Zurückverwiesenheit der Individuen auf sich selbst zur Entstehung einer Gesellschaft geführt, in der Angst (...) den größten gemeinsamen Nenner aller Mitglieder bilde. (shrink)

Krueger & Funder (K&F) correctly identify work on conformity, obedience, bystander (non)intervention, and social cognition as among social psychology's most memorable contributions, but they incorrectly portray that work as stemming from a “negative research orientation.” Instead, the work they cite stimulates compassion for the human actor by revealing the enormous complexity involved in deciding what to think and do in difficult, uncertain situations.

In his celebrated "Letter on Humanism," Heidegger spoke of the need for an "original ethics" which did not submit itself to the ideal of something like a "subject" or the "human," two notions that he suggested were no longer serviceable for the task of thinking the problems of ethical life. The purpose of this article is to look at how Gadamer's hermeneutics might offer an avenue for developing this original ethics. To this end, Gadamer's discussion of language, in particular the (...) relation of language and freedom, serves as the guideline for unpacking this claim. (shrink)

The central task of this dissertation is to develop a new interpretation of Leibniz's famous claim that there are no purely extrinsic denominations . Though Leibniz regarded NPE as one of his most important doctrines, he nowhere offers an explicit statement as to what he meant by it. One interpretation of NPE, which enjoys a modest consensus among interpreters, is that all extrinsic denominations reduce to intrinsic denominations. According to the reductionist view, things only have intrinsic denominations as properties; extrinsic (...) denominations are not genuine properties of things. Critics of reductionism have argued that the textual case for it is inconclusive at best, and I share this assessment with them. However, in my opinion, a satisfactory non-reductionist understanding of NPE has not been offered. The goal of my dissertation is to provide such a non-reductionist account. I contend that NPE, far from being a claim of the reducibility of extrinsic denominations, is actually an assertion that extrinsic denominations are genuine properties of the things they denominate. ;To establish my reading of NPE, I examine a line of textual evidence to which interpreters have paid little attention: the way Leibniz argues for NPE. In some passages Leibniz derives NPE from his predicate-in-subject principle of truth. In others, he employs his doctrine of the interconnection of all things to reach NPE. Elsewhere, he bases NPE on the principle of the identity of indiscernibles. Though, as mentioned, Leibniz never explicitly defines NPE, he does have much to say by way of explicit definition of each of these three principles. A consideration of what version of NPE could plausibly be drawn from them is thus a revealing way to proceed. In the case of each argument, I show that my interpretation of NPE is the conclusion naturally suggested by the given principle, while the reductionist version of NPE forms only an awkward, textually implausible fit with it. The result of the examination is an original and serious critique of the reductionist reading of NPE, as well as the development of a far more plausible understanding of that claim. (shrink)

One of the problems with a superficial reading of “Belief Itself” and “Women, the Sacred, Money” is that Irigaray is too easily understood as merely saying that woman is the hidden victim of sacrifice and that one is called to reveal this hidden victim. While this is an important aspect of Irigaray's work, a more radical interpretation is opened up when it is read alongside the work of Lacan and Žižek. Irigaray's work disturbs the traditional discourses on revelation, sacrifice, and (...) woman on one level while at the same time reinforcing their most extreme ramifications. (shrink)

Considering the popular framing of an artificial intelligence as a rational agent that always seeks to maximise its expected utility, referred to as its goal, one of the features attributed to such rational agents is that they will never select an action which will change their goal. Therefore, if such an agent is to be friendly towards humanity, one argument goes, we must understand how to specify this friendliness in terms of a utility function. Wolfhart Totschnig, argues in contrast that (...) a fully autonomous agent will have the ability to change its utility function and will do so guided by its values. This commentary examines computational accounts of goals, values and decision-making. It rejects the idea that a rational agent will never select an action that changes its goal but also argues that an artificial intelligence is unlikely to be purely rational in terms of always acting to maximise a utility function. It nevertheless also challenges the idea that an agent which does not change its goal cannot be considered fully autonomous. It does agree that values are an important component of decision-making and explores a number of reasons why. (shrink)

In the Planetary Hypotheses, Ptolemy summarizes the planetary models that he discusses in great detail in the Almagest, but he changes the mean motions to account for more prolonged comparison of observations. He gives the mean motions in two different forms: first, in terms of ‘simple, unmixed’ periods and next, in terms of ‘particular, complex’ periods, which are approximations to linear combinations of the simple periods. As a consequence, all of the epoch values for the Moon and the planets are (...) different at era Philip. This is in part a consequence of the changes in the mean motions and in part due to changes in Ptolemy’s time in the anomaly, but not the longitude or latitude, of the Moon, the mean longitude of Saturn and Jupiter, but not Mars, and the anomaly of Venus and Mercury, the former a large change, the latter a small one. The pattern of parameter changes we see suggests that the analyses that yielded the Planetary Hypotheses parameters were not the elegant trio analyses of the Almagest but some sort of serial determinations of the parameters based on sequences of independent observations. (shrink)

This paper takes as its starting point the conjoining of the perceived and conceived spaces of what Soja (1996) calls Thirdspace and what Lefebvre calls ‘lived space’ to launch a discussion about ideas surrounding contemporary concepts of community. The sites under discussion are the ubiquitous shopping malls and the enclave estates or master planned communities (mpcs) which, it is argued, by their design offer only ‘illusions of community.’ The claim in this paper is that within these spaces of control are (...) spatialities of resistance–vagrant spaces-that can, under certain circumstances, point to the—poverty of participation—in the community experience. (shrink)

Focusing on Heidegger and the work of Paul Klee, Schmidt pursues larger issues in the relationship between word, image, and truth.

Recent accounts on the global workspace theory suggest that consciousness involves transient formations of functional connections in thalamo-cortico-cortical networks. The level of connectivity in these networks is argued to determine the state of consciousness. Emotions are suggested to play a role in shaping consciousness, but their involvement in the global workspace theory remains elusive. In the present study, the role of emotion in the neural workspace theory of consciousness was scrutinized by investigating, whether unconscious and conscious display of emotional compared (...) to neutral facial expressions would differentially modulate EEG coherence. EEG coherence was measured by means of computing an average EEG coherence value between the frontal, parietal, and midline scalp sites. Objective awareness checks evidenced that conscious identification of the masked facial expressions was precluded. Analyses revealed reductions in EEG coherence in the lower frequency range for the masked as compared to unmasked neutral facial expressions. Crucially, a decline in EEG coherence was not observed for the emotional facial expressions. In other words, the level of EEG coherence did apparently vary as a function of awareness, but not when emotion was involved. The current finding suggests that EEG coherence is modulated by unconscious emotional processes, which extends common views on the global workspace architecture of consciousness. (shrink)

Abstract Several scholars have observed that in contrast to ?socialism,? ?capitalism? was not an ideology promoted by a social class or movement but an economy that emerged ?spontaneously? from particular historical conditions. Since the decline of the Soviet Union, no new version of socialism has been promulgated, although complaints about the inequalities of capitalism inevitably persist and will certainly continue. Capitalism, if not ?eternal,? remains a highly probable form of economy under conditions of economic surplus, extensive division of labor, urbanism, (...) and the absence of fully centralized state power. An inevitably wide variation in its forms will certainly endure and in no way amounts to the ?end of history,? as a few writers have suggested. (shrink)

Genetic engineering often generates fear of out of control scientists creating Frankenstein creatures that will terrorize the general populace, especially in the cases of human-animal chimeras. While sometimes an accurate characterization of some researchers, this belief is often the result of repugnance for new technology rather than being rationally justified. To facilitate thoughtful discussion the moral issues raised by human-animal chimeras, ethicists and other stakeholders must develop a rational ethical framework before raw emotion has a chance of becoming the dominating (...) justification for public opinion and policy. Derek Parfit’s work on lives worth living for human beings can provide valuable insight into the morality of creating chimeras. As long as their lives are overall good, then bringing them into existence does not harm them even if they are used for medical research or procedures, or they are created to carry on the homo sapiens’ “family” line. (shrink)