1. Művészet és társadalom; válogatott esztétikai tanulmányok.--2. Világirodalom; válogatott világirodalom tanulmányok 2 v.

Vorrede, von T. Pinkus.--Sein und Bewusstsein, von G. Lukács und H.H.Holz.--Gesellschaft und Individuum, von G. Lukács und L. Kofler.--Grundlegendes zu einer wissenschaftlichen Politik, von G. Lukács und W. Abendroth.--Vorläufige Bilanz, von G. Lukács, W. Abendroth und H. H. Holz.--Bibliographie (p. 125-[128]).

Using the technique of prepared questions, Conversations with Lukacs is a brilliant gathering of thoughts and insights covering topics as ontology, the techniques of manipulative societies, the pitfalls of combating Stalinism with Stalinist methods, and the problems of intellectuals in advanced capitalist societies. Above all, there is the restatement of Lukacs unshaken conviction that the working class, with all the changes that have occurred in its way of life and composition, is still the historical carrier of social transformation. Lukacs's interlocutors (...) in these four conversations are Hans Heinz Holz, Leo Kofler, and Wolfgang Abendroth. Each of them engages Lukacs in separate dialogues, on being and consciousness (Holz), on society and the individual (Kofler), and on the elements of scientific politics (Abendroth). Lukacs, Abendroth, and Holz work toward a "Provisional Summary" in the last conversation. The interlocutors and the editor write that "These conversations show very clearly the basis of abstraction in the experiences of everyday life.... This gives these conversations with Lukacs a more than anecdotal value; for the unmediated way in which thought is produced in conversation corresponds exactly to that primary level of experience, the data of everyday reality, whose theoretical value Lukacs emphasizes.... They aspire to bear witness to the living thought of one of the great men of our century, and to provide the opportunity to approach this thought by the simplest possible route.". (shrink)

Adding an option is a neglected mechanism for bringing about behavioural change. This mechanism is distinct from nudges, which are changes in the choice architecture, and instead makes it possible to pursue republican paternalism, a unique form of paternalism in which choices are changed by expanding people's set of options. I argue that this is truly a form of paternalism (albeit a relatively soft one) and illustrate some of its manifestations in public policy, specifically public options and market creation. Furthermore, (...) I compare it with libertarian paternalism on several dimensions, namely respect for individuals' agency, effectiveness, and efficiency. Finally, I consider whether policymakers have the necessary knowledge to successfully change behaviour by adding options. Given that adding an option has key advantages over nudges in most if not all of these dimensions, it should be considered indispensable in the behavioural policymaker's toolbox. (shrink)

El propósito de este artículo es proporcionar algunas pistas sobre el problema de la naturaleza en la filosofía de Heidegger y mostrar por qué su manera de abordar la naturaleza resulta problemática. Problemática, puesto que, al estar obsesionado por evitar elaboraciones naturalistas de los fenómenos que le conciernen, Heidegger solo se centra en una aproximación existencial a la naturaleza y pone el foco en la forma en que esta se hace manifiesta al Dasein. Esto no le permite elaborar una reflexión (...) filosófica sobre la naturaleza consistente con las ciencias de su época (salvo en algunas contadas ocasiones) y le impide dar un peso suficiente en su obra a la naturaleza. -/- . (shrink)

A character in a novel pulls a book from a shelf and starts to read about himself in a novel. Puzzling, but what does it really mean? Does it force us to fundamentally reconsider the nature of fiction? Does it turn the novel into a kind of liar's paradox? And what exactly is a liar's paradox, anyway? Does the liar's paradox, despite its name, have anything to do with lying? What, if anything, does the liar's paradox have to tell us (...) about reality, beliefs, and fictional discourse? (shrink)

Making decisions, as Peter Drucker put it, ‘is the specific executive task’.2 But the situations in which managers decide can differ sharply. Some involve risk, uncertainty or lack of predictability while others lack clear structure and present decision-makers with ambiguity in some form. And yet, in spite of much research, we still have no unified account to explain how managers make decisions let alone to help them decide effectively. Different research streams specialise in different aspects of judgement and decisionmaking (JDM) (...) and produce results which apply in different contexts. Some focus on decisions under risk, some on cases of uncertainty, some on different aspects of ambiguity. Some are objectivist and others interpretive, basing themselves on paradigms which are mutually exclusive. As a result, managers relying on any one of them when making decisions can get only partial help because no one paradigm covers every aspect of the issues on which they decide. This paper addresses the lack of a unified account. It offers a framework for comparing the different research approaches to JDM and their incommensurable paradigms. It describes the central role of metaphors, stories and formal models when managers make decisions. It adopts a neo-pragmatic perspective which treats all three as special forms of model rather than representatives of opposing paradigms. This in turn makes possible a unified account in which specific functions are assigned to each form of model in specific stages of decision-making; metaphors and stories represent the interpretive paradigm and formal models the objectivist paradigm. Finally, to shape future research, the paper derives five propositions about the use and impacts of metaphors, stories and formal models from an account of how they are actually used by managers making decisions. (shrink)

Carbon pricing is one of the most politically important approaches for the mitigation of climate change in the world today. Most political actors who are not committed to climate change denial favor carbon pricing, either as emissions trading or carbon taxation. In this article, I argue that carbon pricing should be considered unfair in most of its forms. I present a line of criticism called the Unfair Burdens Argument. It states that the most politically relevant ways to price carbon needlessly (...) burden the less affluent more than the more affluent. This is unfair because, among other things, the more affluent have on average done more to create the problem of climate change in the first place. Principles for the fair distribution of burdens under climate change mitigation like the Polluter Pays Principle, which were thought to support carbon pricing, turn out to speak against it, when interpreted properly. Although the Unfair Burdens Argument on its own cannot show that carbon pricing is impermissible, it offers important clues for what a morally permissible form of climate change mitigation would look like. (shrink)

We seem to ascribe mental states and agency to groups. We say ‘Google knows such-and-such,’ or ‘Amazon intends to do such-and-such.’ This observation of ordinary parlance also found its way into philosophical accounts of social groups and collective intentionality. However, these discussions are usually quiet about how groups self-ascribe their own beliefs and intentions. Apple might explain to its shareholders that it intends to bring a new iPhone to the market next year. But how does Apple know what it intends? (...) How do groups get to know their own mental states? This is the question of collective self-knowledge. I argue that collective self-knowledge is a distinct phenomenon that deserves our attention. In particular I suggest: that we should be interested in collective self-knowledge, because our behaviour indicates that we already engage with collective self-knowledge in practice; that groups can collectively avow, which indicates that they have privileged and peculiar access to their own intentional states; and that collective self-knowledge is not reducible to intentional states of individuals and therefore is an independent explanandum. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This essay examines the exhibition of dinosaurs at the American Museum of Natural History during the first two decades of the twentieth century. Dinosaurs provide an especially illuminating lens through which to view the history of museum display practices for two reasons: they made for remarkably spectacular exhibits; and they rested on contested theories about the anatomy, life history, and behavior of long-extinct animals to which curators had no direct observational access. The American Museum sought to capitalize on the (...) popularity of dinosaurs while mitigating the risks of mounting an overtly speculative display by fashioning them into a kind of mixed-media installation made of several elements, including fossilized bone, shellac, iron, and plaster. The resulting sculptures provided visitors with a vivid and lifelike imaginative experience. At the same time, curators, who were anxious to downplay the speculative nature of mounted dinosaurs, drew systematic attention to the material connection that tied individual pieces of fossilized bone to the actual past. Freestanding dinosaurs can therefore be read to have functioned as iconic sculptures that self-consciously advertised their indexical content. (shrink)

Modal fictionalists face a problem that arises due to their possible-world story being incomplete in the sense that certain relevant claims are neither true nor false according to it. It has recently been suggested that this incompleteness problem generalises to other brands of fictionalism, such as fictionalism about composite or mathematical objects. In this paper, I argue that these fictionalist positions are particularly threatened by a generalised incompleteness problem since they cannot emulate the modal fictionalists’ most attractive response. I then (...) defend mathematical and compositional fictionalism by showing that the reasons for which the incompleteness problem has been thought to affect them are mistaken. This leads to the question of whether there are other fictionalist positions to which the problem does in fact generalise. I give a general account of the features of a fictionalist position that generate the incompleteness problem and argue that whenever a fictionalist position does exemplify these features then the problem can be addressed in analogy to the modal fictionalists’ preferred response. (shrink)

Explication usually plays the role of the method of language revision. The paper sticks to the Carnapian project of explication and develops some of the formal requirements imposed on the explicatum. However, it departs from Carnap’s view when it comes to how to construe the simplicity condition. It is suggested that in some cases the simplicity condition, which in the Carnapian project plays the derived role with respect to the other three conditions—the similarity, exactness, and fruitfulness conditions—may be substantive for (...) the overall evaluation of explications. Based on a case study of three different explications of the H-D concept of confirmation :391–437, 1991; Erkenntnis 41:183–188, 1994; Gemes in Philos Sci 60:477–487, 1993; Erkenntnis 49:1–20, 1998; Sprenger in Philos Compass 6:497–508, 2011), we show that there are cases where competing explicata of a common explicandum satisfy the first three conditions equally well. In those cases, then, the simplicity condition is supposed to make the difference. However, instead of using Carnap’s construal of simplicity, we suggest a Principle of instrumental simplicity according to which, ceteris paribus, the simpler the explicatum is, the more likely is its ‘survival’ in competition with other explicata. Moreover, it is suggested that whereas the similarity, exactness and fruitfulness conditions are, in some sense, formal criteria, the simplicity condition is rather tested empirically. (shrink)

Sentences with disjunction in the scope of a universal quantifier, Every A is P or Q, tend to give rise to distributive inferences that each of the disjuncts holds of at least one individual in the domain of the quantifier, Some A is P & Some A is Q. These inferences are standardly derived as an entailment of the meaning of the sentence together with the scalar implicature that it is not the case that either disjunct holds of every individual (...) in the domain of the quantifier, \Every A is P &\Every A is Q. As we show, this derivation faces a challenge in that distributive inferences may obtain in the absence of plain negated inferences. We address this challenge by showing that on particular assumptions about alternatives, a derivation of distributive inferences as scalar implicatures can be maintained without in fact necessitating plain negated inferences. These assumptions accord naturally with the grammatical approach to scalar implicatures. We also present experimental data that suggest that plain negated inferences are not only unnecessary for deriving distributive inferences, but might in fact be unavailable. (shrink)

According to Frege, expressions shift their reference when they occur in indirect contexts: in “Anna believes that Plato is wise” the expression “Plato” no longer refers to Plato but to what is ordinarily its sense. Many philosophers, including Carnap, Davidson, Burge, Parsons, Kripke and Künne, believe that on Frege's view the iteration of indirect context creating operators gives rise to an infinite hierarchy of senses. While the former two take this to be problematic, the latter four welcome the hierarchy with (...) open arms. In this paper I argue that the hierarchy should be avoided and that it can be avoided. (shrink)

This essay confronts Ray Brassier’s vindication of nihilism with other two important but frequently underexamined philosophical attempts to overcome nihilism: Hans Jonas’ and Keiji Nishitani’s. By putting these different takes on nihilism into dialogue, it explores some blind spots in Brassier’s position, as well as some of the practical consequences, for our current planetary situation, of undertaking a radical divorce between the normative and the natural that results from his radical nihilism. The article opts for a more moderate acceptance and (...) eventual self-overcoming of nihilism, according to which, even if natural entities are indifferent to human reasons and meanings, this does not entail that nature is bereft of a human-independent normative dimension. In other words, the essay argues that care must be taken not to confuse criticisms of an anthropocentric conception of reasons and meanings with the belief that meaning is completely absent from the natural world. Thus, the central contention of the article is that, given our current climate and ecological catastrophe, one of the most pressing tasks of contemporary philosophy is to understand normativity in non-anthropocentric ways, so that humans are no longer considered as the only entities that respond to normativity. Such an attitude conceives humans as estranged normative creatures amidst a meaningless, indifferent natural world, toward which they would have no ethical responsibilities. The essay finishes by suggesting ways in which to develop an account that does not fall into this ethical vacuum. (shrink)

The paper investigates relations between the notions of intentionality and cognition in medieval philosophy. (The investigation is restricted to Latin works written between ca. 1240–1320, mainly those by Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas, Giles of Rome, John Duns Scotus, and Peter Auriol.) It is argued that two different conceptions of intentionality (or esse intentionale) were endorsed by medieval philosophers. In the first conception (called “Aristotelian” here) “to be intentional” is a physical property of the form insofar as abstracted from the (...) matter. On the contrary, the proponents of the second conception (called “Scotistic”) ascribe the property of being intentional to the objects insofar as they are grasped by a cognitive act. Further, it is argued and documented (against some Thomistic commentators) that only the second notion of intentionality relates to the notion of cognition. Esse intentionale in the first meaning, as demonstrated here, is neither sufficient nor even necessary condition of being cognitive. (shrink)

The paper presents a two-level approach to an assessment of meaning theories. To begin with, language is distinguished from lan guage-model and, analogously, meaning is discerned from a model of meaning. The first level of a theory assessment is presented as dealing with the relation of a model of meaning to intra-theoretical aims and assumptions of a theory with specific language-model. The second level of assessment concerns ontological, epistemological, logical and other assumptions underlying the respective language-model. Finally, several questions are (...) set forth as methodological directives for elucidating hidden assumptions behind the theories of meaning. (shrink)

The paper deals with some logical, semantic and methodological aspects of defining and definitions. First of all, basic features of the background semantic theory are specified. Next, three different kinds of definitions are distinguished: codifying definitions, objectual analytic definitions and meaning analytic definitions. It is shown that the relationships between the definiendum and the definiens in a given definition differ with respect to these different kinds of definition. Furthermore, it is argued that definitions and defining are intrinsically connected with so (...) called conceptual systems. Finally, definitions are distinguished from explications. (shrink)

U tekstu se analizira pitanje je li Pasolini u svojim političkim tekstovima naznačio određenu filozofiju odgoja kao kritiku potrošačkog društva. Povezujući njegov nedovršeni pedagoški esej s nekim od njegovih posljednjih članaka pokušava se odrediti Pasolinijeva pozicija kako prema odgoju tako i prema potrošačkom društvu, prema mogućnosti odgajanja i učenja kritičkog mišljenja mladih. Postavlja se pitanje granica i zadataka emancipacijske pedagogije u masovnom društvu. U radu se također pokušava naglasiti utjecaj koji je filozofija prakse, osobito u ličnosti Gramscija, izvršila na Pasolinijevo (...) poimanje i kritiku društvene stvarnosti.The paper analyzes the question of whether Pasolini had sketched out in his writings a philosophy of education as a critique of the consumerist society. By linking his unfinished pedagogical essay with some of his later writings, the determination of his position towards both education itself and the consumerist society, as well as the education of young people for critical thinking is attempted. This raises the question of the limits and objectives of the emancipatory pedagogy in mass society. Furthermore, the paper seeks to explore the influence of Gramsci’s thought and philosophy of praxis in Pasolini’s understanding and critique of social reality. (shrink)

The paper claims that the rule of recognition, given the way it is presented by Hart, cannot be a constitutive rule of any legal system as a whole, but rather a constitutive rule of legal rules as elements of a legal system. Since I take the legal system to be an institutional artifact kind, I claim that, in order to account for a legal system as a whole, at least two further constitutive rules, in addition to the rule of recognition (...) as a token-element constitutive rule, are needed – one constitutive of legal officials and the other constitutive of a legal system as a token. However, given the central role the legal officials' practice occupies in establishing a particular instantiation or token of a legal system, I also claim that the rule of recognition cannot be understood as 'merely' a token-element constitutive rule but also as a legal system's implementation or concretisation rule. (shrink)

In this article, I examine the relationship between engagement and political institutions by using the example of the creation and development of the ombudsman institution. The article starts with the short introduction to key theoretical views about institutions, political institutions and institutionalization. Then, I concentrate on how political institutions change, i.e. whether they can be changed through social engagement and whether and when we can actually say that they are originally created by an engagement. By using the case of ombudsman, (...) I explore if political institutions can engage themselves and under what conditions, that is, whether are institutions characterized by in-built permanent reflexivity possible. nema. (shrink)

Despite the importance the monks had as carriers of programmatic Enlightenment ideas, few of their original texts are available in modern editions. This edition contributes to filling this lacuna by publishing Dom Beda Mayr’s ecumenical Catholic theology.

The distinction between voluntarism and intellectualism has recently been criticized for inaccurately characterising early modern theories of divine freedom. In response, defenders of the distinction have argued that these labels are needed in order to account for the famous correspondence between Leibniz (intellectualist) and Clarke (voluntarist). In this paper, I argue that the voluntarism/intellectualism distinction is unable to account for the opposition between Leibniz and Clarke. In the first part, I provide an analysis of Clarke’s theory of divine freedom, and (...) show how he employs the distinction between activity and passivity in order to account for the separation between God’s will and intellect, which ultimately safeguards God’s freedom. I also analyse Clarke’s correspondence with Leibniz, and show how Clarke deals with choice among equals, the principle of sufficient reason, and the principle of the best. In the second part, I argue on the basis of this analysis that Clarke is not a voluntarist, but should instead be interpreted as an intellectualist (if one wants to keep the labels). Therefore, the Leibniz-Clarke correspondence cannot be explained as a clash between voluntarism and intellectualism. Published on 2022-02-18 12:23:56. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Philosophy may be accused of being an exclusive theoretical enterprise. Although it is concerned with the important issues of life it may appear to be a purely academic matter pursued by few educated scholars and therefore somehow detached from everyday way of being of people uneducated in philosophy. In the field of the philosophy of sport, the essential ambition is to provide relevant insights into a vast area of sport that will promote our philosophical understanding and knowledge of the (...) relevant topics. This paper offers another perspective on the role of philosophy in sport. I argue that philosophy is not just about reflecting from an academic distance, but the process of philosophizing could be situated within the sporting practices. This type of relationship between philosophy and sport is already apparent in ancient Greece where philosophers (such as Pythagoras or Socrates) liked to be engaged in physical exercises and to combine them with philosophical discussions with athletes. The article explores a practical role of philosophy in sport, namely the process of philosophical thinking and dialogue with athletes and their coaches. It offers insights into methodology, goals, benefits, and limits of using philosophy in practice. I reflect on my personal experience of being a mental coach and philosophical consultant in sport in the Czech Republic. The aim of this article is to demonstrate the relevance of using philosophy (philosophical practice) in the sporting environment. In doing so, I reflect on the nature and purpose of philosophical thinking and its possible relation to sport psychology and mental coaching. (shrink)

Expectations play an important role in how people plan their lives and pursue their projects. People living in highly industrialized countries share a way of life that comes with high levels of emissions. Their expectations to be able to continue their projects imply their holding expectations to similarly high future levels of personal emissions. We argue that the frustration or undermining of these expectations would cause them significant harm. Further, the article investigates under what conditions people can be thought to (...) hold legitimate expectations, in particular about permissible levels of future emissions. We distinguish differing theories of understanding these conditions, namely authority-based and justice-based theories, that each allows us to systematically distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate expectations. Furthermore, with respect to individuals’ future permissible emissions we give several reasons for holding that such theories cannot identify a particular expectation to a specific level of personal emissions as the only legitimate one. Finally, we argue that the set of legitimate expectations that people hold with respect to a just and effective solution to climate change has normative significance in at least two ways: the differing but equally legitimate expectations ought to be taken into account when justifying what could count as such a solution and when determining the just way of arriving at and implementing such a solution. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis paper provides a detailed account of the period of the complex history of British algebra and geometry between the publication of George Peacock's Treatise on Algebra in 1830 and William Rowan Hamilton's paper on quaternions of 1843. During these years, Duncan Farquharson Gregory and William Walton published several contributions on ‘algebraical geometry’ and ‘geometrical algebra’ in the Cambridge Mathematical Journal. These contributions enabled them not only to generalize Peacock's symbolical algebra on the basis of geometrical considerations, but also to (...) initiate the attempts to question the status of Euclidean space as the arbiter of valid geometrical interpretations. At the same time, Gregory and Walton were bound by the limits of symbolical algebra that they themselves made explicit; their work was not and could not be the ‘abstract algebra’ and ‘abstract geometry’ of figures such as Hamilton and Cayley. The central argument of the paper is that an understanding of the contributions to ‘algebraical geometry’ and ‘geometrical algebra’ of the second generation of ‘scientific’ symbolical algebraists is essential for a satisfactory explanation of the radical transition from symbolical to abstract algebra that took place in British mathematics in the 1830s–1840s. (shrink)

Wright (1998) and Bar-On (2004) put pressure on the idea that self-knowledge as an explanandum should be identified with privileged belief formation. They argue that setting up the discourse on the level of belief and belief formation rules out promising approaches to explain self-knowledge. Hence, they propose that we should characterize self-knowledge on the level of linguistic practice instead. I argue against them that self-knowledge cannot be fully characterized by features of our linguistic practice. I propose that in some circumstances (...) – disagreements about one's mental states – self-knowledge plays a role, but this role cannot be described in virtue of features of our linguistic practice. I consider three objections to the argument and conclude that we should not conceive self-knowledge solely in terms of linguistic practice. (shrink)

The article takes the renewed popularity and interest in epidemiological modelling for Covid-19 as a point of departure to ask how modelling has historically shaped epidemiological reasoning. The focus lies on a particular model, developed in the late 1920s through a collaboration of the former field-epidemiologists and medical officer, Wade Hampton Frost, and the biostatistician and population ecologist Lowell Reed. Other than former approaches to epidemic theory in mathematical formula, the Reed-Frost epidemic theory was materialised in a simple mechanical analogue: (...) a box with coloured marbles and a wooden trough. The article reconstructs how the introduction of this mechanical model has reshaped epidemiological reasoning by shifting the field from purely descriptive to analytical practices. It was not incidental that the history of this model coincided with the foundation of epidemiology as an academic discipline, as it valorised and institutionalised new theoretical contributions to the field. Through its versatility, the model shifted the field’s focus from mono-causal explanations informed by bacteriology, eugenics or sanitary perspectives towards the systematic consideration of epidemics as a set of interdependent and dynamic variables. (shrink)

Subverting a once widely held Quinean paradigm, there is a growing consensus among philosophers of logic that higher-order quantifiers (which bind variables in the syntactic position of predicates and sentences) are a perfectly legitimate and useful instrument in the logico-philosophical toolbox, while neither being reducible to nor fully explicable in terms of first-order quantifiers (which bind variables in singular term position). This article discusses the impact of this quantificational paradigm shift on metaphysics, focussing on theories of properties, propositions, and identity, (...) as well as on the metaphysics of modality. (shrink)

Many people living in highly industrialised countries and elsewhere emit greenhouse gases at a certain high level as a by-product of their activities, and they expect to be able to continue to emit at that level. This level is far above the just per capita level. We investigate whether that expectation is legitimate and permissible. We argue that the expectation is epistemically legitimate. Given certain assumptions, we can also think of it as politically legitimate. Also, the expectation is shown to (...) be morally permissible but with major qualifications. The interpretation of the significance of the expectation is compatible with the understanding that historical emissions should count in terms of fairly distributing the benefits of emission-generating activities over people’s lifetimes but constrains the way in which we may collectively respond to climate change. (shrink)

Machine intelligence already helps medical staff with a number of tasks. Ethical decision-making, however, has not been handed over to computers. In this proof-of-concept study, we show how an algorithm based on Beauchamp and Childress’ prima-facie principles could be employed to advise on a range of moral dilemma situations that occur in medical institutions. We explain why we chose fuzzy cognitive maps to set up the advisory system and how we utilized machine learning to train it. We report on the (...) difficult task of operationalizing the principles of beneficence, non-maleficence and patient autonomy, and describe how we selected suitable input parameters that we extracted from a training dataset of clinical cases. The first performance results are promising, but an algorithmic approach to ethics also comes with several weaknesses and limitations. Should one really entrust the sensitive domain of clinical ethics to machine intelligence? (shrink)