Cellular processes are highly dependent on a dynamic proteome that undergoes structural and functional rearrangements to allow swift conversion between different cellular states. By inducing proteasomal degradation of inhibitory or stimulating factors, ubiquitylation is particularly well suited to trigger such transitions. One prominent example is the remodelling of the centrosome upon cell cycle exit, which is required for the formation of primary cilia – antenna‐like structures on the surface of most cells that act as integrative hubs for various extracellular signals. (...) Over the last decade, many reports on ubiquitin‐related events involved in the regulation of ciliogenesis have emerged. Very often, these processes are considered to be initiated ad hoc, that is, directly before its effect on cilia biogenesis becomes evident. While such a temporal restriction may hold true for the majority of events, there is evidence that some of them are initiated earlier during the cell cycle. Here, we provide an overview of ubiquitin‐dependent processes in ciliogenesis and discuss available data that indicate such an early onset of proteolytic regulation within preceding cell cycle stages. (shrink)

Its author was a Carthusian monk. Offered here is a translation, with annotation and an important introduction, of the four books on natural philosophy, the predecessor of modern science.

Current EEG research emphasizes gamma band coherence as a signature of functional integration, that is, the solution to the binding problem. We note that spatial patterns of coherent neural activity are also observed at other EEG frequencies. If these oscillations reflect Nunez's resonant modes, they offer a solution to the binding problem that emerges naturally from the architecture of cortical connections.

This collection of essays by Gregor Sebba (1905-1985) reflects the curiosity and insight of his mind. The range of topics is wide, including philosophy and the history of ideas, literature and art; yet there is a single underlying theme - human creativity and the search for truth - pursued along paths as diverse as Greek tragedy, Eric Voegelin's concept of order in history, and the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke and T.S.Eliot.

Wie ist es philosophisch zu erklären, dass Menschen frei und selbstbestimmt Entscheidungen treffen, die durch das klassische Begründungsmuster der Eigennützlichkeit und Selbsterhaltung unverständlich bleiben? Der Autor rekonstruiert und erweitert mit seiner neuartigen Konzeption - der autoeidetischen Struktur - Möglichkeitsbedingungen der praktischen Vernunft. Im Mittelpunkt steht dabei die eigene Existenz. Das Streben nach Selbsttreue bedingt das Wollen des Gesollten. Urteil und Praxis werden hierdurch nachvollziehbar zu Bedingungen gelingenden Lebens."--Publisher's website.

In this article, I engage with three overlapping expressions of the increasingly postsecular cast of social and cultural theory. These currents — guided, respectively, by genealogical critique, neo-vitalist social philosophy and postcolonial anti-historicism — seek to problematize the frame of previous radical theorizing by exposing definite connections between the epistemological and political levels of secular understanding, and by assuming that the nature of those linkages counts heavily against secularism. As well as offering an interpretive overview of these contributions, I suggest (...) that they are traversed by a number of conceptual flaws and inconsistencies. The tensions, I argue, stem from the fact that in spite of appearing to be driven by a strong anti-secular thrust, these positionings remain thoroughly intra-secular in character. This needs to be more emphatically acknowledged if the ‘postsecular turn’ is to be productive. (shrink)

Brian Gregor draws together a hermeneutics of the self—through Heidegger, Gadamer, Ricoeur, and Taylor—and a theology of the cross—through Luther, Kierkegaard, Bonhoeffer, and Jüngel.

Gregor Schiemann verteidigt die Aktualität des aristotelischen und cartesianischen Naturbegriffes, die Natur in Gegensatz zu Nichtnatürlichem definieren. Als gültig könnnen sich diese traditionellen Naturbegriffe jedoch nur noch innerhalb begrenzter Kontexte erweisen. -/- Im ersten Teil seines Buches zeigt der Autor, dass Aristoteles' Bestimmung der Natur als Gegenbegriff zur Technik in der Lebenswelt sowie Descartes' Dualismus von Natur und Geist für das eigene Bewusstseinserleben orientierungsleitend geblieben sind. Dass die Begriffspaare nicht nur in gesonderten Kontexten vorkommen, sondern sich ihre Anwendungen auch (...) wechselseitig durchdringen, führt er im zweiten Teil am Beispiel von Aristoteles' Seelenlehre und Descartes' Mechanismus aus. Die naturphilosophische und erkenntnistheoretische Untersuchung verbindet Elemente der analytischen Philosophie mit Ansätzen der Phänomenologie. Sie will zu einem pluralen Verständnis der Natur beitragen, das universelle Geltungsansprüche verabschiedet. (shrink)

Examining developments in two of the central traditions of social and political theory - Marxism and pluralism, this work investigates whether the relation between them is one of progressive convergence.

In this paper we argue that Aristotle operates with a particular theoretical model in his explanation of animal locomotion, what we call the ‘centralized incoming and outgoing motions’ model. We show how the model accommodates more complex cases of animal motion and how it allows Aristotle to preserve the intuition that animals are self-movers, without jeopardizing his arguments for the eternity of motion and the necessary existence of one eternal unmoved mover in Physics VIII. The CIOM model helps to elucidate (...) Aristotle’s two central yet problematic claims, namely that the soul is the efficient cause of animal motion and that it is the internal supporting-point necessary for animal motion. Moreover, the CIOM model helps us to explain the difference between voluntary, involuntary and non-voluntary motions, and to square Aristotle’s cardiocentrism with his hylomorphism, but also, more generally, it provides an interesting way of thinking about the place of intentionality in the causal structure of the world. (shrink)

Cognitive Reserve, according to a recent consensus definition of the NIH-funded Reserve and Resilience collaboratory,1 is constituted by any mechanism contributing to cognitive performance beyond, or interacting with, brain structure in the widest sense. To identity multivariate activation patterns fulfilling this postulate, we investigated a verbal Sternberg fMRI task and imaged 181 people with age coverage in the ranges 20–30 and 55–70. Beyond task performance, participants were characterized in terms of demographics, and neuropsychological assessments of vocabulary, episodic memory, perceptual speed, (...) and abstract fluid reasoning. Participants studied an array of either one, three, or six upper-case letters for 3 s, then a blank fixation screen was presented for 7 s, to be probed with a lower-case letter to which they responded with a differential button press whether the letter was part of the studied array or not. We focused on identifying maintenance-related activation patterns showing memory load increases in pattern score on an individual participant level for both age groups. We found such a pattern that increased with memory load for all but one person in the young participants, and such a pattern for all participants in the older group. Both patterns showed broad topographic similarities; however, relationships to task performance and neuropsychological characteristics were markedly different and point to individual differences in Cognitive Reserve. Beyond the derivation of group-level activation patterns, we also investigated the inter-subject spatial similarity of individual working memory rehearsal patterns in the older participants’ group as a function of neuropsychological and task performance, education, and mean cortical thickness. Higher task accuracy and neuropsychological function was reliably associated with higher inter-subject similarity of individual-level activation patterns in older participants. (shrink)

When does a human being begin to exist? Barry Smith and Berit Brogaard have argued that it is possible, through a combination of biological fact and philosophical analysis, to provide a definitive answer to this question. In their view, a human individual begins to exist at gastrulation, i. e. at about sixteen days after fertilization. In this paper we argue that even granting Smith and Brogaard's ontological commitments and biological assumptions, the existence of a human being can be shown to (...) begin much earlier, viz., with fertilization. Their interpretative claim that a zygote divides immediately into two substances and therefore ceases to exist is highly implausible by their own standards, and their factual claim that there is no communication between the blastomeres has to be abandoned in light of recent embryological research. (shrink)

Two seemingly contradictory tendencies have accompanied the development of the natural sciences in the past 150 years. On the one hand, the natural sciences have been instrumental in effecting a thoroughgoing transformation of social structures and have made a permanent impact on the conceptual world of human beings. This historical period has, on the other hand, also brought to light the merely hypothetical validity of scientific knowledge. As late as the middle of the 19th century the truth-pathos in the natural (...) sciences was still unbroken. Yet in the succeeding years these claims to certain knowledge underwent a fundamental crisis. For scientists today, of course, the fact that their knowledge can possess only relative validity is a matter of self-evidence. The present analysis investigates the early phase of this fundamental change in the concept of science through an examination of Hermann von Helmholtz's conception of science and his mechanistic interpretation of nature. Helmholtz (1821-1894) was one of the most important natural scientists in Germany. The development of this thoughts offers an impressive but, until now, relatively little considered report from the field of the experimental sciences chronicling the erosion of certainty. (shrink)

Political and Social Aspects of Kierkegaard's Thought It is rather common knowledge that S0ren Kierkegaard is called the father of existential philosophy ...

"The objective of this book is to review the complex of issues in Soren Kierkegaard's concept of existence. It is evident that for Kierkegaard existence is always composed of three elements: namely, the subject, freedom, and the ethical. In the process of clarifying the relation between these three elements in the different stages of existence, the course of the development the individual must go through in order to become the single individual is described. "The study falls into four parts. The (...) first section describes the levels in existence on which as person attempts by his own powers to actualize the ethical ideals; in this stage the center of gravity for a person's effort still lies within the bounds of immanence. The second section describes a person's ethical and religious growth as it develops in relation to a transcendent power, whose highest expression is Christ as the revelation of God. The third section discusses the issues in existence that Kierkegaard himself designated as the most difficult of all for human thought. The last section points to the highest existential position to which philosophy in the broader sense and Christianity respectively can take a person. Kierkegaard utilizes these positions as a standard for evaluating existence within immanence and for Christian existence. (shrink)

Gregor Betz explores the following questions: Where are the limits of economics, in particular the limits of economic foreknowledge? Are macroeconomic forecasts credible predictions or mere prophecies and what would this imply for the way economic policy decisions are taken? Is rational economic decision making possible without forecasting at all?

Despite its being one of Roger Penrose’s greatest contributions to spacetime physics, there is a dearth of philosophical literature on twistor theory. The one exception to this is Bain (2006)—but although excellent, there remains much to be said on the foundations and philosophy of twistor theory. In this article, we (a) present for philosophers an introduction to twistor theory, (b) consider how the spacetime–twistor correspondence interacts with the philosophical literature on theoretical equivalence, and (c) explore the bearing which twistor theory (...) might have on philosophical issues such as the status of dynamics, the geometrisation of physics, spacetime ontology, the emergence of spacetime, and symmetry-to-reality inferences. We close with an elaboration of a variety of further opportunities for philosophical investigation into twistor theory. (shrink)

This paper investigates in how far a theory of dialectical structures sheds new light on the old problem of giving a satisfying account of the fallacy of petitio principii, or begging the question. It defends that (i) circular argumentation on the one hand and petitio principii on the other hand are two distinct features of complex argumentation, and that (ii) it is impossible to make general statements about the defectiveness of an argumentation that exhibits these features. Such an argumentation, in (...) contrast, has to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. “Petitio principii”, this paper thence suggests, is one name for, in fact, a multitude of different and quite complex dialectical situations which require specific analysis and evaluation. (shrink)

We give a construction of the square principle by means of forcing with finite conditions.

This article critically examines the structure and content of the ‘New American Cultural Sociology’, through an engagement with the recent writings of its main representative, Jeffrey Alexander. Alexander’s project to retool sociology and cultural studies alike is coherent and ambitious, and his transition from theory scholar to public intellectual makes an assessment of that project additionally necessary. I argue, however, that while it gives a necessary jolt to conventional thinking around culture and meaning, major weaknesses and problems can be identified (...) in each of the three main levels of analysis: the articulation of the theoretical programme of cultural sociology, its application in substantive cultural exploration, and its emerging political ideology of civil society multiculturalism. Overall, the key theme of the critique is that Alexander’s long-standing concern, and talent, for ‘multidimensional’ social theory is heavily compromised by his equally strong inclination towards excessive culturalism and idealism. (shrink)

As climate policy decisions are decisions under uncertainty, being based on a range of future climate change scenarios, it becomes a crucial question how to set up this scenario range. Failing to comply with the precautionary principle, the scenario methodology widely used in the Third Assessment Report of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) seems to violate international environmental law, in particular a provision of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. To place climate policy advice on a (...) sound methodological basis would imply that climate simulations which are based on complex climate models had, in stark contrast to their current hegemony, hardly an epistemic role to play in climate scenario analysis at all. Their main function might actually consist in ‘foreseeing future ozone-holes’. In order to argue for these theses, I explain first of all the plurality of climate models used in climate science by the failure to avoid the problem of underdetermination. As a consequence, climate simulation results have to be interpreted as modal sentences, stating what is possibly true of our climate system. This indicates that climate policy decisions are decisions under uncertainty. Two general methodological principles which may guide the construction of the scenario range are formulated and contrasted with each other: modal inductivism and modal falsificationism. I argue that modal inductivism, being the methodology implicitly underlying the third IPCC report, is severely flawed. Modal falsificationism, representing the sound alternative, would in turn require an overhaul of the IPCC practice. (shrink)

Frank Knight (1921) famously distinguished the epistemic modes of certainty, risk, and uncertainty in order to characterize situations where deterministic, probabilistic or possibilistic foreknowledge is available. Because our probabilistic knowledge is limited, i.e. because many systems, e.g. the global climate, cannot be described and predicted probabilistically in a reliable way, Knight's third category, possibilistic foreknowledge, is not simply swept by the probabilistic mode. This raises the question how to justify possibilistic predictionsincluding the identication of the worst case. The development of (...) such a modal methodology is particularly vital with respect to predictions of climate change. I show that a methodological dilemma emerges when possibilistic predictions are framed in traditional terms and argue that a more nuanced conceptual framework, distinguishing dierent types of possibility, should be used in order to convey our uncertain knowledge about the future. The new conceptual scheme, however, questions the applicability of standard rules of rational decision-making, thus generating new challenges. (shrink)

The dynamics of neural populations capture the laws of the mindThis paper focuses on the level of neural networks. Examining the case of recurrent neural networks, the paper argues that the dynamics of neural populations form a privileged level of explanation in cognitive science. According to Schöner, this level is privileged, because it enables cognitive scientists to discover the laws governing organisms’ cognition and behaviour.

Als ›Climate Engineering‹ bezeichnet man großtechnische Eingriffe in das Klimasystem, die darauf abzielen, den anthropogenen Klimawandel zu kompensieren. Neben Mitigation- und Adaptation-Maßnahmen bilden Climate-Engineering-Verfahren damit eine dritte Kategorie möglicher Reaktionen auf den anthropogenen Klimawandel.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, best known for his involvement in the anti-Nazi resistance, was one of the 20th century's most important theologians. His ethics have been a source of guidance and inspiration for men and women in the face of evil. Today, Bonhoeffer's theology is being read by Continental thinkers who value his contributions to the recent "religious turn" in philosophy. In this volume, an international group of scholars present Bonhoeffer's thought as a model of Christian thinking that can help shape a (...) distinctly religious philosophy. They examine the philosophical influences on Bonhoeffer and explore the new perspectives his work brings to the perennial challenges of faith and reason, philosophy and theology, and the problem of evil. These essays add Bonhoeffer's voice to important contemporary debates in the philosophy of religion. (shrink)

An e-mail interview made by Francisco Guzmán. April 2010.

This paper gives an explication of our intuitive notion of strength of justification in a controversial debate. It defines a thesis' degree of justification within the bipolar argumentation framework of the theory of dialectical structures as the ratio of coherently adoptable positions according to which that thesis is true over all coherently adoptable positions. Broadening this definition, the notion of conditional degree of justification, i.e.\ degree of partial entailment, is introduced. Thus defined degrees of justification correspond to our pre-theoretic intuitions (...) in the sense that supporting and defending a thesis t increases, whereas attacking it decreases, t's degree of justification. Moreover, it is shown that (conditional) degrees of justification are (conditional) probabilities. Eventually, the paper explains that it is rational to believe theses with a high degree of justification insofar as this strengthens the robustness of one's position. (shrink)

With the evidence for anthropogenic climate change piling up, suggesting that climate impacts of GHG emissions might have been underestimated in the past (Allison et al. 2009; WBGU 2009), and mitigation policies apparently lagging behind what many scientists consider as necessary reductions in order to prevent dangerous climate change, the debate about intentional climate change, or “climate engineering”, as we shall say in the following, has gained momentum in the past years. While efforts to technically modify earth’s climate had been (...) the focus of sporadic discussions at least since the White House’s Report “Restoring the Quality of Our Environment” (cf. Keith 2000), Paul Crutzen’s cautious plea for research into the feasibility and side-effects of stratospheric sulphur injections (Crutzen 2006) has incited an inter-disciplinary controversy (with a preliminary culmination in the Royal Society’s assessment (Royal Society 2009)), while increasing public awareness and debate about climate engineering, as well. The controversy, though, does not focus on the question whether climate engineering should be carried out today (which is largely reckoned to be a bad idea, unnecessary, or premature) or at some point in the future (which is considered a decision we don’t have to take now), but on whether to engage in large-scale research into the alternative technological options for carrying out intentional climate change. It is this paper’s purpose to make that controversy more transparent. In order to do so, we analyse what seems to be the major argument in favour of research into climate engineering: the lesser evil-, or, as Stephen Gardiner has called it, the arm the future-argument — in short: the AF-argument (Gardiner 2010). Such an argumentative analysis makes explicit the normative and descriptive assumptions which underlie the reasoning, without ascertaining or denying them, and thus enables one to assess the overall strength of the argument as well as to determine which objections do, and which don’t undermine it. (shrink)

Menschliches Bewusstein findet sich immer schon als verkörpertes vor. Diese Einsicht steht im Zentrum des kognitionswissenschaftlichen Paradigmas der embodied cognition: Der Geist ist „innig an einen Körper gebunden und innig in seine Welt eingebettet“. Der Geist ist kein in einem vermeintlichen Innenraum verborgenes und von der Welt weitgehend gelöstes neuronales Netzwerk, sondern als eine dynamische Weise des leiblichen In-der-Welt-Seins zu verstehen. Mit der Philosophie der Verkörperung gewinnt die Theologie einen Gesprächspartner, der ihr hilft, ihre eigene Körpervergessenheit zu überwinden und Anschluss (...) an die biblischen Anthropologien zu gewinnen. Denn diese verstehen die menschliche Existenz grundsätzlich als leiblich verfasst. Aktuelle Forschungen an der Schnittstelle von Neurobiologie und Philosophie einerseits und Exegese und Systematik andererseits lassen sich so in einen spannenden Diskurs bringen, an dessen Ende eine neue interdisziplinäre Anthropologie stehen könnte. Der vorliegende Band eröffnet diesen Diskurs mit Beiträgen aus Philosophie, Exegese und Systematischer Theologie. (shrink)

If Kant's account of rights had continued the "early modern Natural Law tradition", basing rights on some notion of human flourishing, there would be no difficulty about including socio-economic rights for the needy in his theory. However, his division of moral philosophy into Rechtslehre and Tugendlehre limits Rechtspflichten to duties that a moral agent can be coerced to fulfill. If a state is to give the needy statutory rights, the justification for using coercion on its citizens cannot be that they (...) have a duty of virtue to assist the needy. In order to determine whether such a justification can be found, the one innate socio-economic right Kant admits, a child's right to be cared for and educated, is examined and found to be a right against its parents, not against the state. Kant does, however, hold that a state should establish institutions to provide for abandoned children and for the poor in general. His justification for a state's use of coercion with regard to such statutory rights is considered and a criterion is suggested for the possible consent of its non-virtuous citizens to proposed measures for assistance to the needy. It is suggested that if advocates of aid to the needy cannot justify their proposals by such a criterion they will have to provide a very different account of rights than Kant gives in his Rechtslehre , which is concerned with the moral permissibility of using coercion. Wenn Kants Lehre von den subjektiven Rechten nichts anderes wäre als eine Fortsetzung der "ihr vorangehenden modernen Naturrechtstradition" und die subjektiven Rechte infolgedessen auf das eine oder andere Konzept von menschlichem Wohlergehen gestützt hätte, dann wäre es nicht sonderlich schwierig, sozio-ökonomische Rechte für die Bedürftigen in diese Lehre einzubauen. Nun schränkt Kants Einteilung der Moralphilosophie in Rechtslehre und Tugendlehre den Begriff der Rechtspflicht allerdings auf diejenigen Pflichten ein, zu deren Erfüllung ein Mensch gezwungen werden kann. Deshalb kann, wenn ein Staat den Bedürftigen durch ein positives Gesetz irgendwelche Rechte auf Hilfe gewährt, die Rechtfertigung der Anwendung von staatlichem Zwang nicht darin gesucht werden, daß die dadurch in Anspruch genommenen Personen die Tugendpflicht haben, die Bedürftigen zu unterstützen. Um festzustellen, ob sich staatlicher Zwang in bezug auf solche Hilfspflichten überhaupt rechtfertigen läßt, erörtert der Beitrag das Recht des Kindes auf Fürsorge und Ausbildung als das eine und einzige angeborene sozio-ökonomische Recht, das Kant akzeptiert. Freilich ist das Recht des Kindes ein Recht gegen seine Eltern und nicht gegen den Staat. Gleichwohl nimmt Kant an, daß der Staat Einrichtungen schaffen sollte, die für verlassene Kinder und für die Armen im allgemeinen zu sorgen haben. Der Beitrag untersucht die Rechtfertigung, die Kant für die Anwendung von staatlichem Zwang zur Durchsetzung solcher positiv-gesetzlicher Rechte gibt, und arbeitet die Gründe dafür heraus, warum der nicht tugendhafte Staatsbürger in die vorgesehenen Hilfsmaßnahmen für die Bedürftigen einwilligen könnte. Wenn sich die Verfechter von Hilfsmaßnahmen für die Bedürftigen außerstande sehen, ihre Vorschläge auf Gründe dieser Art zu stützen, dann werden sie mit einem Konzept von subjektivem Recht aufwarten müssen, das sich von dem Konzept Kants von Recht und Rechtslehre , bei dem es allein um die moralische Erlaubtheit von Zwangsmaßnahmen geht, ganz erheblich unterscheidet. (shrink)

By means of multi-agent simulations, it investigates the truth and consensus-conduciveness of controversial debates. The book brings together research in formal epistemology and argumentation theory.

Wo Meinungen aufeinanderprallen, um Verständnis geworben und Überzeugungsarbeit geleistet wird, sind Begründungen nicht weit. Für jede Überzeugung gibt es immer ein, zwei Gründe, die mit Gegengründen konfrontiert und, im Gegenzug, mit weiteren Überlegungen verteidigt werden usw. usf. Schnell sind wir verwirrt und drohen, ohne uns der "Grammatikregeln" vernünftigen Argumentierens zu besinnen, nicht mehr durchzublicken. Die Theorie dialektischer Strukturen leistet einen Beitrag zur Grammatik vernünftigen Argumentierens. Sie stellt Begriffe und Verfahren bereit, um Fragen, die sich angesichts einer komplexen Argumentation stellen können, (...) zu beantworten: Wie beziehen sich die einzelnen Argumente der Debatte aufeinander? Welche Positionen vertreten die verschiedenen Proponenten, und wie lassen sich diese bewerten? Wie gut ist die zentrale These der Kontroverse alles in allem begründet? Ist die und die Argumentationshandlung angesichts des Debattenstandes tatsächlich zweckmäßig und rational? Liegt hier eine zirkuläre - und damit fehlerhafte - Argumentation vor? Die klassische Logik, die sogenannte informal logic und argumentationstheoretische Ansätze der Künstlichen Intelligenz bilden Anknüpfungspunkte der Theorie dialektischer Strukturen. Exemplarisch werden die entwickelten argumentationstheoretischen Methoden zur Analyse umfangreicher philosophischer Kontroversen eingesetzt. (shrink)

Thinking is a kind of dialogue ─ according to Plato thinking is a silent and inner conversation of the soul with itself. Understanding presupposes thinking. Therefore, understanding presupposes a kind of dialogue. From this conclusion arises not only the question of what dialogue and understanding are in essence, but also the question of the connection between dialogue and understanding. This volume explores these two question complexes in both a philosophical-historical and a systematic manner and presents possible answers from a classical (...) as well as a modern perspective. Contributors to this volume are Gregor Damschen (Oldenburg), Lourdes Flamarique (Navarra), Vittorio Hösle (Notre Dame), Hans Lenk (KIT), Dmitri Nikulin (The New School for Social Research), Jorge Afredo Roetti (CONICET), Jochen Sauer (Bielefeld), Alejandro G. Vigo (Navarra), Mirko Wischke (Halle), and Ángel Xolocotzi (Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla). (shrink)