For the first time, the reader can have a synoptic view of the reception of Pythagoras and Pythagoreanism in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, East and West, in a multicultural perspective. All the major themes of Pythagoreanism are addressed, from mathematics, number philosophy and metaphysics to ethics and religious thought.

Après une introduction sur la vie et l’œuvre de Raoul de Longchamp, maître actif en France entre le dernier quart du xii e siècle et les deux premières décennies du xiii e, est ici éditée pour la première fois la Cornicula sive Summa de philosophia, rédigée très vraisemblablement vers dans les années 1180-1190. Tout en conférant à son traité une structure précise d’après les sphères des quatre éléments, en partant du feu jusqu’à la terre, du haut en bas du cosmos, (...) Raoul de Longchamp puise principalement dans la Philosophia de Guillaume de Conches et dans les écrits des médecins salernitains. Les sujets abordés relèvent surtout de la philosophie naturelle, tout particulièrement de la météorologie, et ils sont généralement introduits par des questions. (shrink)

Boethius’s De arithmetica, a Latin adaptation of Nicomachus of Gerasa’s Introduction to Arithmetic, was the only truly neo-pythagorean text available in the Latin Middle Ages. It played a major rol...

In December 1924 Wolfgang Pauli proposed the idea of an inner degree of freedom of the electron, which he insisted should be thought of as genuinely quantum mechanical in nature. Shortly thereafter Ralph Kronig and, independently, Samuel Goudsmit and George Uhlenbeck took up a less radical stance by suggesting that this degree of freedom somehow corresponded to an inner rotational motion, though it was unclear from the very beginning how literal one was actually supposed to take this picture, since it (...) was immediately recognised that it would very likely lead to serious problems with Special Relativity if the model were to reproduce the electron's values for mass, charge, angular momentum, and magnetic moment. However, probably due to the then overwhelming impression that classical concepts were generally insufficient for the proper description of microscopic phenomena, a more detailed reasoning was never given. In this contribution I shall investigate in some detail what the restrictions on the physical quantities just mentioned are, if they are to be reproduced by rather simple classical models of the electron within the framework of Special Relativity. It turns out that surface stresses play a decisive role and that the question of whether a classical model for the electron does indeed contradict Special Relativity can only be answered on the basis of an exact solution, which has hitherto not been given. (shrink)

We characterize the collapse of Buss' bounded arithmetic in terms of the provable collapse of the polynomial time hierarchy. We include also some general model-theoretical investigations on fragments of bounded arithmetic.

This note provides a summary of the meaning of the term `Superselection Rule' in Quantum Mechanics and Quantum-Field Theory. It is a contribution to the Compendium of Quantum Physics: Concepts, Experiments, History and Philosophy, edited by Friedel Weinert, Klaus Hentschel, Daniel Greenberger, and Brigitte Falkenburg, to be published by Springer Verlag.

L'article montre l'influence de Sénèque sur certains auteurs du XIIème siècle, notamment sa distinction idea/idos.

A collection of articles originally presented at two conferences, the first at Ventura Hall, Stanford, in April 1998; and the second at the University of Bologna in September 1999.

General Relativity offers the possibility to model attributes of matter, like mass, momentum, angular momentum, spin, chirality etc. from pure space, endowed only with a single field that represents its Riemannian geometry. I review this picture of ‘Geometrodynamics’ and comment on various developments after Einstein.

Despite the burgeoning literature on the governance and impact of cross-sector partnerships in the past two decades, the debate on how and when these collaborative arrangements address globally relevant problems and contribute to systemic change remains open. Building upon the notion of wicked problems and the literature on governing such wicked problems, this paper defines harnessing problems in multi-stakeholder partnerships as the approach of taking into account the nature of the problem and of organizing governance processes accordingly. The paper develops (...) an innovative analytical framework that conceptualizes MSPs in terms of three governance processes harnessing three key dimensions of wicked problems. The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil provides an illustrative case study on how this analytical framework describes and explains organizational change in partnerships from a problem-based perspective. The framework can be used to better understand and predict the complex relationships between MSP governance processes, systemic change and societal problems, but also as a guiding tool in organizing governance processes to continuously re-assess the problems over time and address them accordingly. (shrink)

This paper explores the relationship between business experience in cross-sector partnerships and the co-creation of what we refer to as ‘dynamic capabilities for stakeholder orientation,’ consisting of the four dimensions of sensing, interacting with, learning from and changing based on stakeholders. We argue that the co-creation of dynamic capabilities for stakeholder orientation is crucial for CSPs to create societal impact, as stakeholder-oriented organizations are more suited to deal with “wicked problems,” i.e., problems that are large, messy, and complex. By means (...) of a grounded theory approach of inductive research, we collected and interpreted data on four global agri-food companies which have heterogeneous experience in participating in CSPs. The results of this paper highlight that only companies’ capability of interacting with stakeholders continually increases, while their capabilities of sensing, learning from, and changing based on stakeholders first increase and then decrease as companies gain more experience in CSP participation. To a large extent, this can be attributed to the development of corporate strategies on sustainability after a few years of CSP participation, which entails a shift from a reactive to a proactive attitude towards sustainability issues and which may decrease the need or motivation for stakeholder orientation. These findings open up important issues for discussion and for future research on the impact of CSPs in a context of wicked problems. (shrink)

The Case for a Critique of the Category of Totalitarianism. In this article Domenico Losurdo sketches a history of the category of totalitarianism, rehearsing the various shifts it has been subject to since the October revolution. While the roots of the notion are to be located both in the violence inflected by the colonial enterprise upon indigenous populations and the violence exercised at the very heart of the capitalist metropolis, upon the poor and the outcast, such violence did take (...) on a number of unprecedented characteristics in the twentieth century phenomenon of total war. The imperatives of the cold war were subsequently to lead western liberals to the formulation of a strange indictment of the revolutionary. (shrink)

In this contribution I wish to address the question whether, and how, the global cosmological expansion influences local physics, like particle orbits and black hole geometries. Regarding the former I argue that a pseudo Newtonian picture can be quite accurate if “expansion” is taken to be an attribute of the inertial structure rather than of “space” in some substantivalist sense. This contradicts the often-heard suggestion to imagine cosmological expansion as that of “space itself”. Regarding isolated objects in full General Relativity, (...) like black holes, I emphasise the need for proper geometric characterisations in order to meaningfully compare them in different spacetimes, like static and expanding ones. Examples are discussed in some detail to clearly map out the problems. A slightly extended version of this contribution may be found at philsci-archive.pitt.edu/10033. (shrink)

Great historical crises oblige us to choose not between violence and nonviolence, but between two different forms of violence. Nonviolent movements are no exception to this rule. In the US, with the outbreak of the War of Secession, the Christian-nonviolent movement was obliged to choose between the violence of the Union-army and the violence of slavery. With the outbreak of World-War One, Lenin chose revolution, while, in India, Gandhi became the ‘recruiting agent-in-chief’ for the British army. At that moment, he (...) struggled not for the general emancipation of colonial peoples, but only for the co-optation of the Indian people under the ruling races, and this co-optation was to be gained on the battlefield. While in the past, in spite of their mistakes and oscillations, the protagonists of nonviolence were an integral part of the anticolonialist movement, today nonviolence is the watchword of imperialism, which tries to discredit as violent its enemies and challengers. (shrink)

APh 75-03933: Discussione di problemi testuali e nuove proposte di lettura.

Background Decisions on limiting life-sustaining treatment for patients in the vegetative state (VS) are emotionally and morally challenging. In Germany, doctors have to discuss, together with the legal surrogate (often a family member), whether the proposed treatment is in accordance with the patient's will. However, it is unknown whether family members of the patient in the VS actually base their decisions on the patient's wishes. Objective To examine the role of advance directives, orally expressed wishes, or the presumed will of (...) patients in a VS for family caregivers' decisions on life-sustaining treatment. Methods and sample A qualitative interview study with 14 next of kin of patients in a VS in a long-term care setting was conducted; 13 participants were the patient's legal surrogates. Interviews were analysed according to qualitative content analysis. Results The majority of family caregivers said that they were aware of aforementioned wishes of the patient that could be applied to the VS condition, but did not base their decisions primarily on these wishes. They gave three reasons for this: (a) the expectation of clinical improvement, (b) the caregivers' definition of life-sustaining treatments and (c) the moral obligation not to harm the patient. If the patient's wishes were not known or not revealed, the caregivers interpreted a will to live into the patient's survival and non-verbal behaviour. Conclusions Whether or not prior treatment wishes of patients in a VS are respected depends on their applicability, and also on the medical assumptions and moral attitudes of the surrogates. We recommend repeated communication, support for the caregivers and advance care planning. (shrink)

Numerical tables are important objects of study in a range of fields, yet they have been largely ignored by historians of science. This paper contrasts and compares ways in which numerical tables were used by Galileo and Mersenne, especially in the Dialogo and Harmonie Universelle. I argue that Galileo and Mersenne used tables in radically different ways, though rarely to present experimental data. Galileo relied on tables in his work on error theory in day three of the Dialogo and also (...) used them in a very different setting in the last day of the Discorsi. In Mersenne's case they represent an important but so far unrecognized feature of his notion of universal harmony. I conclude by presenting a classification of different ways in which tables were used within the well-defined disciplinary and temporal boundaries of my research. In doing so, however, I provide a useful tool for extending similar investigations to broader domains. (shrink)

We show that every model of IΔ0 has an end extension to a model of a theory where log-space computable function are formalizable. We also show the existence of an isomorphism between models of IΔ0 and models of linear arithmetic LA.

traduzione di n. de domenico del testo di f. brentano "sul nominalismo. contro guastella".

Diesen Ausführungen liegt eine Auswahl von Leibniz' Briefen und Aufsätzen zugrunde‚ die sein Interesse an der Aufhebung der Zensur des kopernikanischen Systems bekunden. Die hier gesammelten Dokumente stammen aus den Jahren 1684 bis 1705 und enthalten Auszüge aus der Korrespondenz mit dem Landgrafen Ernst von Hessen-Rheinfels sowie Briefe und Memoranda von der italienischen Reise und Passagen aus dem Specimen Dynamicum und den Nouveaux Esseais. Im besonderen wird gezeigt, daß der von Louis Couturat als Vorrede zum Phoranomus herausgegebene Aufsatz als ein (...) vom Phoranomus unabhängiges Werk betrachtet werden muß.Ferner wird ein neuer Korrespondent von Leibniz als der italienische Jesuit Antonio Baldigiani identifiziert. Sodann wird die sogenannte „Zweite Bearbeitung“ vom Tentamen de Motuum Coelestium Causis datiert und es wird dargelegt‚ daß dieser Aufsatz im Rahmen der Auseinandersetzung Leibnizens mit der Zensur zu verstehen ist. (shrink)

This article delves into Blaise Pascal’s religious philosophy, focusing on his use of the phrase “Scio cui credidi” (I know whom I have believed) to explore his understanding of faith. It analyzes Pascal’s “Memorial” and the “Summary of the Life of Jesus Christ”, highlighting how Christ is central to Pascal’s belief system. The discussion reveals the transformational nature of Pascal’s faith, particularly after his mystical experience on November 23, 1654. This experience is crucial in understanding his shift from a philosophical (...) to a deeply personal, Christ-centered faith. The article underscores Pascal’s journey from a scientific and philosophical perspective to an intimate, emotional resonance with Christian faith, demonstrating how his personal encounters with the divine profoundly shaped his religious perspective. (shrink)

The relations between the Iranian, in particular Zoroastrian, and Jewish apocalyptic literature as well as their mutual influences have, since the beginning of the twentieth century, constituted a rich and exciting battlefield for the scholars of these respective traditions. This article aims to present some topics concerning the definition of Iranian apocalyptics and its relation with its Jewish counterpart, as well as to establish an updated starting point for a new scholarly debate.

Several studies have highlighted the role of cross- linguistic influence in determining the over-use of overt subject pronouns in near- native speakers of a null- subject language as Italian. In this work we inquire on the role of other factors, such as age of onset of exposure and dominance with respect to the choice of subject anaphoric devices in two null-subject languages by bilingual speakers. In order to do so we first single out two languages, Italian and Greek, which do (...) not differ significantly as far as subject anaphoric devices are concerned and instantiate thus a suitable language combination to inquire on the role of relevant factors in bilingual speakers of these two languages, in the absence of cross- linguistic influence related effects (Study 1). In Study 2 we compare the productions in Italian of a group of natives speakers and two groups of near- native speakers: Greek- Italian bilinguals from birth and L2ers of Italian with Greek as an L1. Results reveal that age of onset of exposure to Italian is a relevant factor influencing over- use of overt pronouns: while bilinguals from birth do not differ from native speakers, L2ers over-use overt pronouns compared to both native speakers and bilinguals from birth. In order to establish whether dominance is a possible factor determining bilinguals’ choice of subject anaphoric devices, in Study 3 we compare two groups of Greek- Italian bilinguals from birth: bilinguals living in Greece (dominant in Greek) and bilinguals living in Italy (dominant in Italian). Results reveal no effect of dominance with respect to the production of overt subject pronouns. We found however an unexpected effect in the dominant language of one group: bilinguals living in Greece produce significantly more null pronouns and less lexical DPs in Greek compared to bilinguals living in Italy. We interpret this effect as stemming from the need to differentiate the two languages that these bilingual speakers have to handle in everyday life. Interestingly, this effect is found in the dominant language rather than in the non- dominant one, and does not concern overt pronouns. (shrink)