Clinical research must be understood to be the foundation of scientific medicine of the clinical type. But the essence of scientific clinical medicine remains a matter of profound confusion, even in clinical academia, and so does the essence of clinical research. The confusion now revolves, principally, around ‘clinical epidemiology’. We address clinical research in the meaning of quintessentially ‘applied’ clinical research, which we take to be the foundation of the scientific knowledge base of clinical medicine, of gnosis (dia‐, etio‐, pro‐) (...) in it. More specifically, we address the essence, priorities, and status quo of this research – and argue that the requisite theory of this is not a matter of ‘clinical epidemiology’ but of theory of clinical research endogenous to clinical (rather than epidemiological) academia. (shrink)

Im Zentrum dieses Bandes steht die Untersuchung des Wechselspiels und der Eigenlogik von Politik, Religion und Philosophie im Mittelalter und in der Frühen Neuzeit. Untersucht wird die Differenzierung religiöser und politischer Diskurse im Medium der aristotelischen Philosophietradition. Den Leitgedanken bildet dabei die Frage nach der Art und Weise, in der verschiedene Autoren jener Epoche – teils affirmativ, teils polemisch – auf Aristoteles und seine Philosophie Bezug nahmen und so zur Herausbildung einer bestimmten Form von Politischem Aristotelismus beitrugen, der religiöse und (...) philosophische Argumentationen in ihren Geltungsansprüchen kritisch gegeneinander abhebt. Die diachrone Perspektive und die Gleichzeitigkeit von historischer und philosophischer Betrachtungsweise der Studien dieses Buchs fördern nicht nur bedeutende Ergebnisse im Hinblick auf die jeweils untersuchten Autoren und Problemzusammenhänge zutage, sondern erproben anhand des Politischen Aristotelismus zugleich ein Deutungsmuster für das Verhältnis von Wissenskultur und gesellschaftlichem Wandel überhaupt. (shrink)

Im Mittelpunkt des vorliegenden Bandes steht die Untersuchung des Selbstverständnisses der praktischen Wissenschaften, wie es sich im 13. und 14. Jahrhundert im Umkreis der Höheren Fakultäten der Universität sowie insbesondere innerhalb der Philosophie artikuliert. Die Frage nach der Wissenschaftsfähigkeit des überlieferten juristischen und medizinischen Wissens sowie jene nach dem wissenschaftlichen Anspruch der Praktischen Philosophie, insbesondere der philosophischen Ethik, und der Theologie, verstanden als einer "scientia practica", beschreiben die Herausforderung, mit der sich die hier behandelten Autoren und Texte des Mittelalters beschäftigen. (...) Insbesondere werden in den in diesem Band versammelten Einzeluntersuchungen die Beiträge von Albert dem Großen, Thomas von Aquin, Johannes Duns Scotus und Wilhelm von Ockham zur Frage einer philosophischen Begründung des Status des menschlichen Handlungswissens und der praktischen Wissenschaften gewürdigt. (shrink)

Die Vita und die Sentenzen des Neopythagoreers Secundus wurden im Mittelalter in zahlreiche Sprachen ubersetzt und teilweise sehr frei bearbeitet. Eine kritische Edition der arabischen und der athiopischen Versionen blieb jedoch lange ein Desiderat der Forschung. Im Anschluss an die mehr als 120 Jahre alte Forschungsarbeit des Orientalisten Paulus Johannes Bachmann (1862-1894) schliesst Martin Heide nun diese Lucke unter Berucksichtigung samtlicher Handschriften. Die ausfuhrliche Einleitung widmet sich der Komposition des gesamten Buches in den verschiedenen Versionen, besonders aber der (...) Frage nach der Ubersetzungsvorlage der orientalischen Texte. Der kritischen Edition der arabischen, der athiopischen und der syrischen Versionen folgt eine deutsche Ubersetzung, die in zahlreichen Anmerkungen auf die jeweiligen Beziehungen zu ihren Vorlagen verweist. In dem erganzenden Beitrag von Stefan Weninger zur Ubersetzungssprache wird aufgezeigt, wie der athiopische Ubersetzer trotz enger Bindung an seine arabische Vorlage einen freien Ubersetzungsstil wahlte. Die besondere Sprache dieser Version liefert zudem neue Belege fur das athiopische Lexikon. Die hier vorgelegten Versionen des Secundus Taciturnus belegen einmal mehr die grosse Bedeutung und Langlebigkeit von popularphilosophischen Werken der Spatantike sowie die Flexibilitat der syrischen, der arabischen und der athiopischen Sprachen in der Wiedergabe ihrer Vorlagen. (shrink)

The scientific study of consciousness, also referred to as consciousness science, is a young scientific field devoted to understanding how conscious experiences and the brain relate. It comprises a host of theories, experiments, and analyses that aim to investigate the problem of consciousness empirically, theoretically, and conceptually. This thesis addresses some of the questions that arise in these investigations from a formal and mathematical perspective. These questions concern theories of consciousness, experimental paradigms, methodology, and artificial consciousness. -/- Regarding theories of (...) consciousness, the thesis contributes to the understanding of the mathematical structure that some of the formal theories in the field propose. The work presented here targets the theory of consciousness known as Integrated Information Theory (IIT) and the neuroscientific theory known as Predictive Processing Theory or Free Energy Principle in its Active Inference form (AI-PP). The thesis provides axiomatic definitions of the mathematical structures that constitute these theories, and uses these definitions to address some of the open questions surrounding the theories. For AI-PP, this includes a rigorous derivation of the formula for Active Inference via Free Energy minimisation and a proof of compositionality of Free Energy. For IIT, this includes resolutions of some of the criticisms of IIT's formal scope and applications, but also the identification of new issues that concern the formalism and its derivation. When possible, the definitions are provided in the mathematical framework of category theory. -/- Regarding experiments, the thesis addresses the main paradigm for testing and falsifying theories of consciousness currently applied in the field. This paradigm consists of comparing the conscious experience that a theory predicts with the conscious experience that is inferred from behavioural data or report by use of measures of consciousness. The thesis provides a formal model of this paradigm and shows that under a certain condition—if inference and prediction are independent—, any minimally informative theory of consciousness can always be falsified. This is deeply problematic since the field’s reliance on report or behaviour to infer conscious experiences, in conjunction with the general structure of most contemporary theories of consciousness, implies such independence. This observation provides the exact formal underpinning of the well-known unfolding argument. The thesis analyses the origin of the problem and identifies precisely which changes are required to avoid this problem in future research. The thesis furthermore shows that the problem of falsifying theories of consciousness, and of empirical comparisons of theories of consciousness more generally, follows from a pervasive closure paradigm in consciousness science, that consists of taking a neuroscientific account of the brain as input to a theory of consciousness, so as to explain what consciousness is, without allowing for modifications or adaptations of the neuroscientific account that would accommodate consciousness as part of the brain's functioning. As is shown in the thesis, this paradigm has implications that point to a fundamental need of revision. -/- Regarding methodological and conceptual questions, the thesis contributes to the foundations of structural research in consciousness science. Structural research aims to use mathematical structures or mathematical spaces, instead of verbal descriptions or simple categorisations, to represent conscious experiences scientifically, for example when building theories of consciousness, or when exploring new empirical avenues to measure consciousness. Despite considerable advances in this realm, there was, prior to this thesis, no explicit definition of what a mathematical structure of conscious experience should be; that is, how the attribution of mathematical structure to conscious experiences should be systematically understood. Perhaps the most important contribution of this thesis to the field is to propose such a definition. The definition, a structural concept, extends existing approaches wherever available, and provides a basis for developing a common formal language to study consciousness, bridging developments as far apart as psychophysics and phenomenology. In addition, and independently of this proposal, the thesis offers a critical analysis of which metaphysical premises need to be presumed in structural research, whether the use of particular formal tools (such as structure-preserving mappings or homomorphisms) is justified, and how structural theories of consciousness could otherwise be built in the first place. An attempt to expand the results from consciousness to more general problems in philosophy of science is made in the context of the well-known Newman problem. -/- Regarding the question of artificial consciousness—can AI feel?—, the thesis contributes two results that take the form of no-go theorems, as known from physics. The first no-go theorem shows that if consciousness is relevant for the temporal evolution of a system's states—if it is dynamically relevant—, then contemporary AI systems cannot be conscious. That is because AI systems run on CPUs, GPUs, TPUs or other processors which have been designed and verified to adhere to computational dynamics that systematically preclude or suppress deviations. The second no-go theorem is situated in the context of computational functionalism, a view which posits that consciousness is a computation. The theorem shows that if computational functionalism holds true, consciousness cannot be a Turing computation. Rather, it must be a novel type of computation that has recently been proposed by Geoffrey Hinton, called mortal computation. -/- This thesis is part of a global effort to pioneer a mathematical perspective in consciousness science, now called Mathematical Consciousness Science. The hope behind the research carried out in this PhD is to illustrate the power and usefulness of mathematical approaches in different areas of consciousness science, and in doing so, to lay the foundations for future mathematical work that complements and supports empirical and theoretical work in the further development of this exciting field. (shrink)

Investment protection clauses, and the investor-state dispute settlement mechanisms they enable, have become a common feature of international agreements on trade and investment. Intended to promote foreign investment, these protections may also discourage governments from regulating in the public interest. This raises challenging normative questions about the rights of investors and distributive justice. In this paper, I argue that a global investment regime that disadvantages developing countries and socially disadvantaged groups is prima facie unfair. This conclusion must be defended against (...) the claim that investors have certain independent moral rights to have their property protected, regardless of the distributive consequences. Granting the premise that such investor rights exist, I argue that these cannot plausibly ground a general rule against public interest regulation that undermines the value of property. I conclude that even if foreign investors have rights that must be safeguarded, the current investment regime must be reformed. (shrink)

Simulation modeling, the core thesis of Calculated Surprises, is transforming the established conception of mathematical modeling in fundamental ways. These transformations feed back into philosophy of science, opening up new perspectives on longstanding oppositions. The book integrates historical features with both practical case studies and broad reflections on science and technology.

The paper takes a look at insurance customer dishonesty as a special case of consumer ethics, understood as a way of situation handling, as a moral choice between right and wrong, such as between self-interest vs. common-interest, in other words, a “moral temptation”. After briefly raising the question if different schools, of moral philosophy would conceptualize such moral temptations differently, the paper presents ‘moral psychology’ as a frame of reference, with a focus on cognitive moral development, moral attitude and moral (...) neutralization. Conceptualization questions can’t be answered finally without thinking at the same time of empirical research design and instrument design decisions, e.g. choosing between experiment vs. questionnaire studies, designing suitable moral temptation situations as an experiment vs. questionnaires with scenario vignettes. The paper discusses then experiences from a 2004 pilot survey, with a main focus on a few insurance dishonesty scenarios with follow-up questions. The paper has an open end, i.e. outlines desirable future theoretical, empirical and practical work with insurance customer dishonesty. (shrink)

WHAT IS PRESENT TO THE MIND? Donald DAVIDSON The University of California at Berkeley There is a sense in which anything we think about is, ...

What is the significance of attentiveness in teaching? A spontaneous answer would be that attentiveness is a crucial aspect in the practice of teaching, because if the students do not pay attention...

The disappearing agent problem is an argument in the metaphysics of agency. Proponents of the agent-causal approach argue that the rival event-causal approach fails to account for the fact that an agent is active. This paper examines an analogy between this disappearing agent problem and the exclusion problem in the metaphysics of mind. I develop the analogy between these two problems and survey existing solutions. I suggest that some solutions that have received significant attention in response to the exclusion problem (...) have seen considerably less attention in response to the disappearing agent problem. For example, one solution to the exclusion problem is to reject the exclusion assumption. Analogously, one solution to the disappearing agent problem could be to deny the claim that the agent-causal approach and the event-causal approach are mutually exclusive. Similarly, proportionality theories of causation, a solution to the exclusion problem, can be transferred to the disappearing agent problem. After establishing the plausibility of the analogy between the two problems, I examine how this latter solution in particular can be transferred from the one problem to the other. (shrink)

Business ethics as an academic field is, not least, about moral criticism and self‐criticism, of business and of business education. However, the business ethics discourse appears to shift between a critique of immorality and a crude moralism. The article explores the concept of moralism with reference to the relevant literature and illustrates its various manifestations with reference to empirical studies. This is followed up by theses for further discussion and research.

This commentary introduces the notion of “technical alterity” in order to address the following questions: is it possible that technical objects can become “others” in analogy to Levinas’ ethics and can this relation provide solutions for the subject in the Anthropocene? According to Levinas, the human subject’s only break from having to be itself is in the consumption and enjoyment of things. Objects constitute thus an “other” that can be consumed, i.e., appropriated and be made one’s own. But, in times (...) of the Anthropocene, where the entanglement of human and non-human actors becomes increasingly obvious and intricate, and a question of survival for human beings in the face of the climate crisis, it is necessary to develop a relation with non-human actors that does not reduce them to mere means to an end. This ethical relation with technical objects relies upon an epistemic act, since technical objects precisely do not have a “face” in the Levinasian sense. Technical objects as “technical others” have therefore—in light of Simondon’s philosophy of technology—to be invented. (shrink)

Die Sophisten waren und sind umstritten. In der Zeit des Perikles, der Hochblüte der griechischen Kultur, als Wanderlehrer in Griechenland tätig, bewirkten sie mit ihrer Lehrtätigkeit, welche die verschiedensten Wissensgebiete umfasste, einen grundlegenden Blickwandel: Ihre Befassung mit Erkenntnistheorie, Rhetorik und Politik lenkte den Blick vom Kosmos zurück auf den Menschen. Indem sie den Menschen in den Mittelpunkt ihres Denkens stellten, ja ihn sogar zum Maß aller Dinge erklärten, wendeten sie sich zugleich gegen die traditionelle Sittlichkeit, die in der Regel religiös (...) begründet war. So waren sie für die einen gefeierte Aufklärer, für die anderen jedoch Zerstörer der Tradition. Diese Ambivalenz in der Einschätzung ihres Wirkens ist bis heute geblieben. Was auch geblieben ist und von Moderne wie Postmoderne aufgenommen wurde, sind wesentliche Ansätze ihres Denkens: z. B. ihr erkenntnistheoretischer Relativismus, ihre Vertragstheorie und ihre Lehre vom Recht des Stärkeren. Weil ihr Denken so aktuell ist, untersucht der vorliegende Band nicht nur die antiken Sophisten, sondern vergleicht sie auch mit ihren modernen und postmodernen Wiedergängern wie bspw. Nietzsche, Butler und Foucault. Mit Beiträgen von Viktoria Bachmann, Thomas Buchheim, Bettina Fröhlich, Benjamin Hahn, Hendrik Hansen, Raul Heimann, Johannes Hoerlin, Vanessa Jansche, Christina Kast, Peter Kainz und Barbara Zehnpfennig. (shrink)

Aim of the lectures -- Early Brahmanical literature -- Panini's grammar -- A passage from the Chandogya Upanisad -- The structures of languages -- The Buddhist contribution -- Vaisesika and language -- Verbal knowledge -- The contradictions of Nagarjuna -- The reactions of other thinkers -- Sarvastivada Samkhya -- The Agamasastra of Gaudapada -- Sankara -- Kashmiri Saivism -- Jainism -- Early Vaisesika -- Critiques of the existence of a thing before its arising -- Nyaya -- Mimamsa -- The Abhidharmakosa (...) bhasya of Vasubandhu -- The Abhidharmasamuccaya of Asanga and its bhasya -- Bhartrhari -- The problem of negation -- Dignaga and verbal knowledge -- The Bodhisattvabhumi -- Prajnakaragupta -- Indian thinkers and the correspondence principle -- Appendix. The Mahaprajnaparamitasastra and the Samkhya tanmatras. (shrink)

This paper argues that epistemic smothering is not a form of epistemic paternalism. In this sense, it refutes the claim recently made by Valerie Chock and Jonathan Matheson, who defend epistemic smothering as epistemically permissible form of epistemic paternalism. After an outline of what is meant by epistemic paternalism and epistemic smothering, based on the work by Kristoffer Ahlstrom-Vij and Kristie Dotson on these topics, the paper argues against the identification of epistemic smothering as a form of epistemic paternalism. In (...) the conclusion, it also calls for a reconsideration of how exactly to conceive of epistemic paternalism. (shrink)

IN NEWMAN’S EPISTEMOLOGY CERTITUDE IS THE LIMIT OF CUMULATED CONVERGING PROBABILITIES. IT IS REFLEX ASSENT WHICH IS PROVED BY MENTAL IMPLICIT REASONING, WHOSE VERBAL FORMULATION IS SOMETHING SECONDARY. ASSENT IS NOT AN AUTOMATIC RESULT OF SYLLOGISMS. PERFECTION OF PERSONAL FACULTY OF REASONING IN CONCRETE MATTER IS THE ILLATIVE SENSE, WHICH INCLUDES PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY, ETHICAL PRESUPPOSITIONS AND USES ANTECEDENT PROBABILITIES. RELIGIOUS PHILOSOPHY: PHENOMENA OF CONSCIENCE MANIFEST A DIVINE LAWGIVER. PHENOMENA OF THE SENSE OF GUILT AND LONGING FOR ATONEMENT POINT TO DIVINE (...) INTERVENTION AND REVELATION. SOCIOLOGY OF KNOWLEDGE: RUDIMENTS IN HIS THEORY OF DOCTRINAL DEVELOPMENT. INFLUENCES AND PARALLELS DO NOT TOUCH NEWMAN’S ORIGINALITY. (shrink)

The idea of a firm connection of the seven artes liberales came first into being in Augustine's early concept of education. Whereas this idea has been analyzed primarily in view of its philosophical sources, this paper is supposed to clarify its internal logic. The main feature of Augustine's concept is the distinction between the two projects of a critique of reason and of a metaphysics, and the coordination of these projects within a treatise on theodicy. Augustine systematizes the disciplinae in (...) the perspective of reason's self-recognition. Reason manifests itself in culture and nature. Through the sciences, reason is led to a reflection upon its own products and, finally, to an understanding of them as reason's self-manifestations. Thus, reason becomes able to comprehend itself. Augustine distinguishes language-based disciplinae from number-oriented ones. The first group leads to a critical reflection upon the conditions of knowledge and into the insight to reason's power of creating sciences. The second group helps carry out a metaphysical ascent from the material to the intelligible world. In philosophy, reason comprehends its ability to constitute knowledge as a synthetic capacity that points to a transnumerical unity as the main ontological feature of the intelligible world. The insight into this kind of unity reveals the meaningful interwovenness of all beings and events and, thus, leads to a refutation of all objections against divine providence. (shrink)

The scientific and practical fields—especially high-performance sports—increasingly request a stronger focus be placed on individual athletes in human movement science research. Machine learning methods have shown efficacy in this context by identifying the unique movement patterns of individuals and distinguishing their intra-individual changes over time. The objective of this investigation is to analyze biomechanically described movement patterns during the fatigue-related accumulation process within a single training session of a high number of repeated executions of a ballistic sports movement—specifically, the frontal (...) foot kick (mae-geri) in karate—in expert athletes. The two leading research questions presented for consideration are (1) Can characteristics of individual movement patterns be observed throughout the entire training session despite continuous changes, i.e., even as fatigue-related processes increase? and (2) How do intra-individual movement patterns change as fatigue-related processes increase throughout a training session? Sixteen expert karatekas performed 606 frontal foot kicks directed toward an imaginary target. The kicks were performed in nine sets at 80% (K-80) of the self-experienced maximal intensity. In addition, six kicks at maximal intensity (K-100) were performed after each of the nine sets. Between the sets, the participants took a 90-s break. Three-dimensional full-body kinematic data of all kicks were recorded with 10 infrared cameras. The normalized waveforms of nine upper- and lower-body joint angles were classified using a supervised machine learning method (support vector machine). The results of the classification revealed a disjunct distinction between the kinematic movement patterns of individual athletes. The identification of unique movement patterns of individual athletes was independent of the intensity and the degree of fatigue-related processes. In other words, even with the accumulation of fatigue-related processes, the unique movement patterns of an individual athlete can be clearly identified. During the training session, changes in intra-individual movement patterns could also be detected, indicating the occurrence of adaptations in individual movement patterns throughout the fatigue-related accumulation process. The results suggest that these adaptations can be modeled in terms of changes in patterns rather than increasing variance. Practical consequences are critically discussed. (shrink)