Anthropologie ist der Versuch des Menschen, nach seinem Wesen und seiner Natur zu fragen sowie seine Herkunft und Möglichkeiten zu ergründen. Während sich Philosophen schon immer mit diesem Thema beschäftigt haben, sind im 20. Jahrhundert viele Disziplinen hinzugekommen. Der Autor beschreibt anhand von 35 biografischen und werkanalytischen Erörterungen, wie sich Ärzte und Philosophen im 20. Jahrhundert auf die Suche nach der „Formel des Menschen“ begeben haben. Dabei setzt er sich mit den verschiedenen Denkrichtungen kritisch auseinander.

L'histoire des fondements des mathématiques du xxe siècle montre qu'il nous faut réviser la signification des notions philosophiques traditionnelles comme « évidence », « existence », « expérience » ou « rationalité ». On expose comment le logicien Paul Bernays, familier des conceptions de la philosophie de Jacob Friedrich Fries et de Léonard Nelson, donne aux résultats techniques une interprétation philosophique dont il s'inspire de plus en plus - à partir du milieu du siècle - de la « philosophie ouverte (...) » de Ferdinand Gonseth. Bien avant Thomas Kuhn, Bernays conçoit la révision envisagée non pas simplement comme une question de vérité ou de fausseté, mais comme un problème exigeant l'introduction d'un nouveau système conceptuel. Cependant, l'affaiblissement du concept de vérité est pour lui une conséquence épistémologique provenant de la théorie de la connaissance adoptée et non une conséquence méthodologique issue d'un changement de paradigme et donc d'une incommensurabilité. (shrink)

Wissenschaftstheorie und Erkenntnistheorie gehen der Frage nach, was Wissenschaft ist und in welcher Weise Wissenschaft zu Erkenntnis fuhren kann. Die von Friedrich G. Wallner begrundete Wiener Schule des Konstruktiven Realismus beleuchtet kritisch bisherige Positionen und kommt zu einer grundsatzlich neuen Sichtweise in diesen Fragen. Als Folge sind Begriffe wie Wissenschaft, Erkenntnis, Wahrheit, Wirklichkeit, Realitat und weitere neu zu fassen. Der Prozess ist nicht abgeschlossen und fand und findet in Vortragen und Publikationen seinen Ausdruck. Das Worterbuch tragt exemplarisch und in chronologischer (...) Reihenfolge deutsche Originalzitate zusammen. Als Quellen dienten Vorlesungen, Vortrage und Werke Wallners der letzten zwanzig Jahre.". (shrink)

Stories do not fossilize. Thus, exploring tales shared during prehistory, the longest part of human history inevitably becomes speculative. Nevertheless, various attempts have been made to find a more scientifically valid way into our deep human past of storytelling. Following the social brain hypothesis, we suggest including into the theory of human storytelling more fine-grained and evidence-based findings about the manifold exaptation and adaptation, genetic changes, and phenotypic plasticity in the deep human past, which all shaped the emergence of storytelling (...) in hominins. We identify three preconditions for humans sharing stories: first, the long evolution of language in the different taxa as one of the preconditions of ostensive signaling; second, the pivotal role of childhood in the evolution of collaborative intentionality; and third, the role of fireside chats in the rise of elaborative sharing of stories. We propose that humans, albeit perhaps no other hominins learned to understand others through sharing stories, not only as intentional agents, but also as mental ones. (shrink)

Donald Davidson's unified theory of language and action can be understood as a continuation of the traditional analytic approach within philosophy of language and action. In the following we give an outline of some of the main themes of his philosophy centered around his core theory of radical interpretation (RI). His theory of rationality, his thesis of the anomalousness of the mental, and the externalist approach in his model of triangulation all follow in a systematic way from RI. Yet, Davidson's (...) philosophy can also be seen as giving a new systematic elaboration of central perspectives of W,v.O Quine's theory of language. In order to follow Davidson's main theses one therefore has to clarify the main differences and correspondences between both approaches. (shrink)

Our know-it-alls, the new spirits, assert that faith alone saves and that works and external things contribute nothing to this end. We answer: It is true, nothing that is in us does it but faith, as we shall hear later on. But these leaders of the blind are unwilling to see that faith must have something to believe—something to which it may cling and upon which it may stand. Thus faith clings to the water and believes it to be Baptism (...) in which there is sheer salvation and life, not through the water, as we have sufficiently stated, but through its incorporation with God's Word and ordinance and the joining of his name to it. When I believe this, what else is it but believing in God as the one who has implanted his Word in this external ordinance and offered it to us so that we may grasp the treasure it contains? 1. (shrink)

This paper is intended as a contribution to a recent vigorous debate inThe Times, between the distinguished journalist Bernard Levin, the eminent Oxford economist Wilfred Beckerman and the Archbishop of York, John Habgood, among others. The debate concerns morality, ‘free will’ and determinism. As a former German Jew, who lost close relatives at Auschwitz and who suffered personally severely in my youth under daily virulent Nazi persecution, I obviously cannot remain strictly detached and neutral. Yet, I shall attempt to retain (...) as much neutrality as possible, since I think that the main rivals in this debate have all some very relevant, interesting and valid things to say. Let me also state other, probably very relevant, biases. I am an ardent Zionist. In addition, I am a diehard mechanistic materialist as regards basic philosophy, although I am tolerant of other people's religious feelings, because I realize that my materialism is as metaphysical as their religious views. With this as background let me return to the technical issues. Obviously, in a philosophical journal one can write at a level above that ofThe Times, where there is, perhaps, insufficient room to debate philosophical, biological, physical and other niceties in some depth. (shrink)

A short overview relating trends in cultural and social changes of the European family lifestyle and structure points out that the particular delay in West-German family policy as social policy is based on a gender order that still privileges the male breadwinner model and mother‘s sole childcare responsibility. This model is backed up by legal and theological doctrines of marriage as a social institution that contradicts the liberal contract-theory and the equality of the sexes. From the viewpoint of gender-justice the (...) challenge is to re-define what is referred as a Christian-Western concept of marriage. (shrink)