Appraisal theories of emotion have had a strong impact on the development of theory and experimental research in the domain of the affective sciences. While there is generally a high degree of convergence between theorists in this tradition, some central issues are open to debate. In this contribution three issues have been chosen for discussion: (a) varieties of relevance detection, (b) varieties of valence appraisal, and (c) sequential-cumulative effects of appraisal results. In addressing these issues, new theoretical ideas are suggested (...) and an update of recent research on the sequence of appraisal processes is provided. Special emphasis is placed on nonverbal signatures of appraisal processes. (shrink)

Foundations of Dialectical Psychology is a compilation of the writings of Klaus F. Riegel on dialectical psychology. The book presents chapters discussing such topics as the dialectics of human development; history of dialectical psychology; temporal organization of dialogues; and the analysis of the concept of crisis and its underlying philosophical model and ideology. Psychologists and students will find the book invaluable.

Eine wissenschaftliche Methode oder Verfahrensweise, die man als ›die‹ philosophisch-wissenschaftliche Methode des Aristoteles bezeichnen könnte, gibt es nicht. Vielmehr ist es so, dass Aristoteles in unterschiedlichen Kontexten auch unterschiedliche Verfahren zur Anwendung bringt. Wenn man daher von einer einheitlichen philosophisch-wissenschaftlichen Methode bei Aristoteles sprechen wollte, so könnte man dies nur der Analogie nach tun.

Das Bild des »goldenen Berges« geht zurück auf geographische Angaben und Beschreibungen, die in der Antike als glaubwürdig angesehen wurden. In der Literatur illustriert die Metapher das Bedeutungsspektrum von Reichtum, Wohlergehen, Überfluss und Glück, spricht aber auch Warnungen aus. Dagegen werden in den philoso-phischen Interpretationen vor allem Konstitutionsprobleme des Fiktiven, auch der entia rationis, thematisiert. Die Metapher exemplifiziert Objekte, die logisch möglich sind, aber nicht wirk-lich existieren. In der Philosophiege-schichte – bis in die aktuellen Analysen der non-existent objects hinein – (...) wurde das Bild des »goldenen Berges« daher stets mit der Frage verbunden, welche Instanzen wir als »wirklich«, »möglich« oder »unmöglich« rechtfertigen kön-nen. Als Beispiel spiegelt die Metapher die Transformationen, in denen sich das Wirklichkeitsverständnis der philoso-phischen Tradition wie in einem Prisma gebrochen hat. (shrink)

Diagnosing emotion disturbances should be informed by current knowledge about normal emotion processes. I identify four major functions of emotion as well as sources for potential dysfunctions and suggest that emotions should only be diagnosed as pathological when they are clearly dysfunctional, which requires considering eliciting events, realistic person-specific appraisal patterns, and adaptive responses or action tendencies. Evidence from actuarial research on the reported length of naturally occurring emotion episodes (including potential determinants) illustrates appropriateness criteria for the clinical evaluation of (...) emotion duration—an essential element in the DSM-5 symptom catalogue for major depression episodes, especially in bereavement. The need for more actuarial evidence on normal emotion responses and its consideration by the clinical community is highlighted. (shrink)

I strongly endorse many of the suggestions made by the authors of the extremely useful reviews in this issue. In particular, the need to identify the complex causal mechanisms underlying the major health risk factors requires urgent attention of the research community. I suggest considering the important role of emotional disturbances as contributors to health risks given the empirically established comorbidity between mental and somatic illness. Better knowledge of these mechanisms is an essential prerequisite to develop tailored personalized prevention and (...) intervention programs, including reliable and valid assessment of deficits. (shrink)

When anthropologists and other social scientists study health services in medical institutions, tensions sometimes arise as a result of the social scientists and health care professionals having different ideas about the ethics of research. In order to resolve this type of conflict and to facilitate mutual learning, we describe two general categories of research ethics framing: those of anthropology and those of medicine. The latter focuses on protection of the individual through the preservation of autonomy expressed through the requirement of (...) informed consent whereas the former focuses on broader political implications. After providing an example of a conflict, we outline four issues that characterize the occasional clashes between social scientists and medical staff: (1) a discrepancy in the way anthropologists perceive patients and medical staff; (2) ambiguity concerning the role of medical staff in anthropological research; (3) impediments to informed consent in qualitative research projects; and (4) property rights in data. Enhanced dialogue could serve to invigorate the ethical debate in both traditions. (shrink)

The prelims comprise: Introduction Basic Concepts of Systems Science Dynamical Systems, Chaos, and Other Attractors Dynamical Systems and Time‐series Analysis Dynamical Systems in Nature and Society Dynamical, Information, and Computational Systems.

‘Kontakion der reuigen Zerknirschung, gesungen auf jegliches Erdbeben und (jegliche) Feuersbrunst’ (ϰοντάϰιον ϰατανυϰτιϰòν ψαλλóμενον εις εϰαστον σεισμòν ϰαι εμπϱησμóν), so wird das Lied des Romanos 54 M.-Tr. in dem einzigen vollständigen Textzeugen bezeichnet und überdies dem Mittwoch der dritten Fastenwoche zugewiesen. Doch keines von Romanos' Liedern ist als ganzes so wenig zum wiederholten Gebrauch geeignet wie dieses. Paul Maas erkannte, daß hier auf die Nika-Revolte vom Januar 532 angespielt wird, in deren Verlauf die Kirche der Heiligen Weisheit und große Teile (...) der Stadt in Flammen aufgingen, und bei deren Unterdrückung nach zeitgenössischen Berichten mehr als dreißigtausend Angehörige der Demen von den Truppen der kaiserlichen Feldherren Belisar und Mundus im Hippodrom von Konstantinopel wehrlos niedergemacht wurden. (shrink)

Originally presented as the author's habilitation under the title: Endlichkeit und Vernunftanspruch. Zur Deutung eines fundamentalen Spannungsverhèaltnisses im Selbstverstèandnis des Menschen.

Keine ausführliche Beschreibung für "Genese und Analyse" verfügbar.

The literature on human ethos evinces terminological arbitrariness, which can in my opinion be overcome in only one way: through historical reflection of the meaning which the moral-philosophical concepts have expressed at the very beginning of European philosophy. The first part of the paper is therefore dedicated to the reflection on Greek notions and then its Latin translations. In this respect there appears a fundamentally historical and substantial difference between classical Greek “ethos” and modern “morality”. The second part begins with (...) the nowadays prevailing impression that “ethos” is foredoomed to disappearance for the sake of “morality”. Attempts at rehabilitating the ethos of virtues in contrast to modern morality, undertaken by communitarily inclined philosophers after the publication of Alisdair MacIntyre’s After Virtue, have for the most part been justly criticized. By means of the phenomenological method of stepping back to originary experience, I would like to approach this matter from a different and new angle. My thesis is that “ethos” represents the normality of the world of experience. “Morality” of the modern world is based upon the borderline case of such “normality”, which is elevated to the level of a normal case. In conclusion, I will try to provide a phenomenological explanation of this historical development by interpreting it as the process of “idealization”. (shrink)

Der Tierrechte-Ansatz stellt den Anspruch des Menschen auf Nutzung von Tieren prinzipiell in Frage. Der Grund besteht darin, dass durch den Gebrauch von Tieren zu menschlichen Zwecken typischerweise deren Rechte verletzt werden. Um welche Rechte es sich dabei handelt und welche Tiere sie allenfalls besitzen, ist Teil anhaltender Diskussionen sowohl in der Tierethik als auch innerhalb der Tierrechtsbewegung.

The article critically assesses Ulrich Beck’s body of work and its importance for contemporary sociology. It demonstrates that Beck’s elaboration of his original theory of the ‘risk society’ into a theory of the ‘world risk society’, ‘cosmopolitanism’ and ‘metamorphosis’ involved several key theoretical innovations. Firstly, Beck adjusted his notion of risk to include the threat of international terrorism in his diagnosis of the risk society. Secondly, he introduced a distinction between ‘cosmopolitanism’ and ‘cosmopolitization’ in order to capture the specificity of (...) contemporary social change. Thirdly and most recently, Beck outlined a theory of ‘the metamorphosis of the world’ which marks an important shift of emphasis from ‘the negative side effects of goods’ to ‘the positive side effects of bads’. In conclusion, the article identifies a number of theoretical ambiguities and unresolved questions in Beck’s theory. (shrink)

Advances in multiagent simulation techniques make it possible to study more realistic dynamics of complex systems and allow evolutionary theories to be tested. Here I use simulations to assess the relative importance of reproductive systems (haplodiploidy vs. diploidy), mate selection (assortative mating vs. random mating) and social economics (pay-off matrices of evolutionary games) in the evolutionary dynamics leading to the emergence of social cooperation in the provision of parental care. The simulations confirm that haplo-diploid organisms and organisms mating assortatively have (...) a higher probability for fixing alleles and require less favorable conditions for their fixation, than diploids or organisms mating randomly. The simulations showed that social behavior was most likely to emerge a) when the cost for parental investment was much lower than the benefits to the offspring, b) when cooperation improved synergistically the fitness of offspring compared to the corresponding egoistic behavior and c) when alleles coding for altruistic or social behavior could be rapidly fixed in the population, thanks to mechanisms such as haplo-diploidy and/or assortative mating. Cooperative social behavior always appeared if sociality conferred much higher fitness gains compared to non cooperative alternatives suggesting that the most important factors for the emergence and maintenance of social behavior are those based on energetic or efficiency considerations. The simulations, in congruence with the scant experimental evidence available, suggest that economic considerations rather than genetic ones are critical in explaining the emergence and maintenance of sociality. (shrink)