The paper discusses the nature and functioning of argumentum ad misericordiam, a well-known but less theorised type of argument. A monograph by D. Walton (1997) offers an overview of definitions of misericordia (which he eventually translates as ‘pity’), as well as the careful analysis of several cases. Appeals to pity, Walton concludes, are not necessarily fallacious. This view seems to be supported and further refined by the critical remarks of H. V. Hansen (2000), as well as the recent work of (...) R. H. Kimball (2001, 2004) and A. Aberdein (2016) focusing on the virtue ethical aspects of such arguments. There is, on this account, a difference between ad misericordiam arguments and fallacies, even though the former may be fallacious in some cases. In this paper I argue for a narrower concept of ad misericordiam, as distinguished from the more generic class of appeals to pity, limiting it to cases in which someone asks for the non-application of a certain rule, clearly relevant to their case, with reference to some (unfavourable) circumstance, which is, however, irrelevant for the application of the rule. (shrink)

Arguments from fairness as described in Aristotle’s _Rhetoric_ are usually taken to aim at mitigating the strictness of the law or, in terms of procedure, to favour the defendant. This paper considers a more inclusive interpretation, that is, that arguments from fairness can work both ways. In the example given in the _Rhetoric,_ arguments from fairness are directed at a restrictive interpretation of the text. That may not be necessary however. Likewise, fairness may speak for the claimant. Two examples may (...) support this conclusion: a judicial speech by Hyperides, and the doctrine of issues appearing in Hellenistic school rhetoric. (shrink)

The present article examines the role of narratives in rhetoric and jurisprudence, trying to understand the ancient system of ‘issues’ (staseis), an essential part of the rhetorical curriculum in antiquity, with the help of some basic notions of legal semiotics. After a brief reconstruction of the doctrine, I argue that narratives are essential to classical rhetoric, that the basic types of issues correspond to particular stories in and of the trial, and finally that the system of ancient rhetorical theory is (...) capable of giving an account of the narrativisation of the pragmatics of the trial. Then I turn to a cause célèbre of Roman law, the causa Curiana, trying to show that not only the trial itself but also subsequent (ancient and modern) debates concerning the case were shaped by some grand narratives, and that stories about the trial are likely to return to the court, where they may become part of the story of the trial. (shrink)

In the last decades, regional and global integration processes have made the traditional state-centred view of law less and less obvious. Recent discussions revolve around how to conceptually comprehend, critically reflect on and reasonably control these new developments in the global legal arena. The essays in this volume, written by young Central and Eastern European legal theorists and political scientists, contribute to ongoing discussions in our post-national era. The chapters include conceptual analyses, historical and comparative examples, as well as normative (...) discussions in legal theory, ethics, moral philosophy, constitutional theory, EU law and international relations. (shrink)

The present paper examines three parts of ancient school rhetoric: the issues, the topics, and the questions of style from the perspective of legal semiotics. It aims (1) to demonstrate the roles these have played and can play in the interpretation of legal discourses; and (2) to summarise what insights have been and can be gained from this classical tradition by contemporary legal research. It is argued that the promise of legal semiotics for rhetorical investigations is that it may help (...) to make sense of the functioning of the system of ancient rhetoric, and contribute to our understanding of how rhetorical tradition works, while the research of ancient rhetoric can explore a range of semiotic devices essential for lawyerly thinking, resulting in the knowledge of a richer framework of interpretation. (shrink)

Stasis is a process of classical rhetoric that identifies the core issue in a trial or a similar debate. Hermagoras of Temnos included the first comprehensive analysis of stasis in his second-century BCE treatise on rhetoric, now lost. Modern scholars tend to echo George Kennedy, who maintains that Hermagoras’ inspiration for the hierarchical structure of stasis is indeterminate. This article, however, employs scholarship in legal semiotics, including the work of Miklós Könczöl and Bernard S. Jackson, to argue that Hermagoras based (...) stasiastic structure on Aristotle’s first-figure syllogism. Ideally, knowledge of that structure can enhance modern applications of stasis. (shrink)

The common cause principle says that every correlation is either due to a direct causal effect linking the correlated entities or is brought about by a third factor, a so-called common cause. The principle is of central importance in the philosophy of science, especially in causal explanation, causal modeling and in the foundations of quantum physics. Written for philosophers of science, physicists and statisticians, this book contributes to the debate over the validity of the common cause principle, by proving results (...) that bring to the surface the nature of explanation by common causes. It provides a technical and mathematically rigorous examination of the notion of common cause, providing an analysis not only in terms of classical probability measure spaces, which is typical in the available literature, but in quantum probability theory as well. The authors provide numerous open problems to further the debate and encourage future research in this field. (shrink)

Cognitive control is a set of mechanisms that help us process conflicting stimuli and maintain goal-relevant behaviour. According to the Affective Signalling Hypothesis, conflicting stimuli are aversive and thus elicit (negative) affect, moreover – to avoid aversive signals – affective and cognitive systems work together by increasing control and thus, drive conflict adaptation. Several studies have found that affective stimuli can indeed modulate conflict adaptation, however, there is currently no evidence that phasic affective states not triggered by conflict also trigger (...) improved cognitive control. To investigate this possibility, we intermixed trials of a conflict task and trials involving the passive viewing of emotional words. We tested whether affective states induced by affective words in a given trial trigger improved cognitive control in a subsequent conflict trial. Applying Bayesian analysis, the results of four experiments supported the lack of adaptation to aversive signals, both in terms of valence and arousal. These results suggest that phasic affective states by themselves are not sufficient to elicit an increase in control. (shrink)

Moti Mizrahi provides experimental evidence according to which subjects judge that a person ought to ? even when she cannot ?. He takes his results to constitute a falsification of the alleged intuitiveness of the ‘Ought Implies Can’ principle. We point out that in the light of the fact that (a) ‘ought’ is multiply ambiguous, that (b) only a restricted set of readings of ‘ought’ will be relevant to the principle, and that (c) he did not instruct his subjects appropriately (...) – or otherwise ensure that in their ‘ought’ judgements they applied the relevant concept(s) – Mizrahi’s conclusions appear premature. We suggest two ways in which the experimental design could be adjusted or supplemented. First, Mizrahi could instruct (or prime) subjects to read the ‘ought’ question in a particular way. Second, he could complement his experiment by asking follow-up questions aimed at uncovering the implications for blame of subjects’ judgements. Once these adjustments are applied, an experiment with a similar outcome would be more significant. (shrink)

Recently, new types of independence of a pair of C *- or W *-subalgebras (1,2) of a C *- or W *-algebra have been introduced: operational C *- and W *-independence (Rédei and Summers, http://arxiv.org/abs/0810.5294, 2008) and operational C *- and W *-separability (Rédei and Valente, How local are local operations in local quantum field theory? 2009). In this paper it is shown that operational C *-independence is equivalent to operational C *-separability and that operational W *-independence is equivalent to (...) operational W *-separability. Specific further sub-types of both operational C *- and W *-separability and operational C *- and W *-independence are defined and the problem of characterization of the logical interdependencies of the independence notions is raised. (shrink)

In diesem Aufsatz erläutere ich Leibniz' Versuche, seinen Infinitesimalkalkül zu rechtfertigen. Die Untersuchung zielt ab auf ein klareres Verständnis, wie tief Leibniz die Begriffe, Ziele und Methoden im Hinblick auf das fragliche Problem faßte. Mein Überblick ist in zwei Teile gegliedert. Der erste stellt die Definition und den Gebrauch einiger Leibnizscher Begriffe dar, die bei der Rechtfertigung des Calculus eine wichtige Rolle spielen. Im zweiten skizziere ich, auf welche Weise Leibniz die Infinitesimalrechnung zu rechtfertigen versuchte.

Relativistic locality is interpreted in this paper as a web of conditions expressing the compatibility of a physical theory with the underlying causal structure of spacetime. Four components of this web are distinguished: spatiotemporal locality, along with three distinct notions of causal locality, dubbed CL-Independence, CL-Dependence, and CL-Dynamic. These four conditions can be regimented using concepts from the categorical approach to quantum field theory initiated by Brunetti, Fredenhagen, and Verch (2003). A covariant functor representing a general quantum field theory is (...) defined to be causally local if it satisfies the three CL conditions. Any such theory is viewed as fully compliant with relativistic locality. We survey current results indicating the extent to which an algebraic quantum field theory satisfying the Haag–Kastler axioms is causally local. (shrink)

Most philosophers believe that a person can have an obligation only insofar as she is able to fulfil it, a principle generally referred to as “Ought Implies Can”. Arguably, this principle reflects something basic about the ordinary concept of obligation. However, in a paper published recently in this journal, Wesley Buckwalter and John Turri presented evidence for the conclusion that ordinary people in fact reject that principle. With a series of studies, they claimed to have demonstrated that, in people’s judgements, (...) obligations persist irrespective of whether those who hold them have the ability to fulfil them. We argue in this paper that due to some problems in their design, Buckwalter & Turri’s conclusions may not be war- ranted. We present the results of a series of studies demonstrating the problems with their design and showing that, with an improved design, people judge that obligation depends on ability after all. (shrink)

We prove that it is decidable of a finite algebra whether it has a near-unanimity term operation, which settles a ten-year-old problem. As a consequence, it is decidable of a finite algebra in a congruence distributive variety whether it admits a natural duality.

Let be a finite collection of finite algebras of finite signature such that SP( ) has meet semi-distributive congruence lattices. We prove that there exists a finite collection 1 of finite algebras of the same signature, , such that SP( 1) is finitely axiomatizable.We show also that if , then SP( 1) is finitely axiomatizable. We offer new proofs of two important finite basis theorems of D. Pigozzi and R. Willard. Our actual results are somewhat more general than this abstract (...) indicates. (shrink)

Reichenbach’s Common Cause Principle is the claim that if two events are correlated, then either there is a causal connection between the correlated events that is responsible for the correlation or there is a third event, a so called (Reichenbachian) common cause, which brings about the correlation. The paper reviews some results concerning Reichenbach’s notion of common cause, results that are directly relevant to the problem of how one can falsify Reichenbach’s Common Cause Principle. Special emphasis will be put on (...) the question of whether EPR-type correlations can have an explanation in terms of Reichenbachian common causes. Most of the results to be recalled indicate that falsifying Reichenbach’s Common Cause Principle is much more tricky than one may have thought and that, contrary to some claims in the literature, there is no conclusive proof yet that the EPR correlations predicted by ordinary, non-relativistic quantum mechanics cannot have a common cause; furthermore, recent results about possible Reichenbachian common causes of correlations predicted by quantum field states between spacelike separated local observable algebras in algebraic quantum field theory strongly indicate that there may very well exist Reichenbachian common causes of superluminal correlations predicted by quantum field theory. (shrink)

If $\mathcal{A}$ (V) is a net of local von Neumann algebras satisfying standard axioms of algebraic relativistic quantum field theory and V 1 and V 2 are spacelike separated spacetime regions, then the system ( $\mathcal{A}$ (V 1 ), $\mathcal{A}$ (V 2 ), φ) is said to satisfy the Weak Reichenbach's Common Cause Principle iff for every pair of projections A∈ $\mathcal{A}$ (V 1 ), B∈ $\mathcal{A}$ (V 2 ) correlated in the normal state φ there exists a projection C (...) belonging to a von Neumann algebra associated with a spacetime region V contained in the union of the backward light cones of V 1 and V 2 and disjoint from both V 1 and V 2 , a projection having the properties of a Reichenbachian common cause of the correlation between A and B. It is shown that if the net has the local primitive causality property then every local system ( $\mathcal{A}$ (V 1 ), $\mathcal{A}$ (V 2 ), φ) with a locally normal and locally faithful state φ and suitable bounded V 1 and V 2 satisfies the Weak Reichenbach's Common Cause Principle. (shrink)

Although it is known that reachability in undirected finite graphs can be expressed by an existential monadic second-order sentence, our main result is that this is not the case for directed finite graphs (even in the presence of certain "built-in" relations, such as the successor relation). The proof makes use of Ehrenfeucht-Fraisse games, along with probabilistic arguments. However, we show that for directed finite graphs with degree at most k, reachability is expressible by an existential monadic second-order sentence.

Reichenbach's principles of a probabilistic common cause of probabilistic correlations is formulated in terms of relativistic quantum field theory, and the problem is raised whether correlations in relativistic quantum field theory between events represented by projections in local observable algebrasA(V1) andA(V2) pertaining to spacelike separated spacetime regions V1 and V2 can be explained by finding a probabilistic common cause of the correlation in Reichenbach's sense. While this problem remains open, it is shown that if all superluminal correlations predicted by the (...) vacuum state between events inA(V1) andA(V2) have a genuinely probabilistic common cause, then the local algebrasA(V1) andA(V2) must be statistically independent in the sense of C*-independence. (shrink)

This chapter describes how philosophical theorizing about justice can be connected with empirical research in the social sciences. We begin by drawing on some received distinctions between ideal and non-ideal approaches to theorizing justice along several different dimensions, showing how non-ideal approaches are needed to address normative aspects of real-world problems and to provide practical guidance. We argue that there are advantages to a transitional approach to justice focusing on manifest injustices, including the fact that it enables us to set (...) aside some reasonable disagreements about justice. The ‘bottom-up’ approach we advocate, for which we borrow Wolff’s term ‘real-world political philosophy’, is an empirically-informed normative analysis that attends to specific, identifiable injustices, and thus is partial, though not isolationist. We illustrate our approach by considering how different models of the nature of disability suggest different kinds of remedy for injustices faced by persons living with disabilities. We reflect on the nature and significance of vulnerabilities, and we assess the role of public opinion in normative theorizing, suggesting a particular significance for the opinions and experiences of marginalized groups. We finally reflect on the relevance of European legal and institutional frameworks for theorizing justice in Europe. (shrink)

We investigate the general properties of general Bayesian learning, where ``general Bayesian learning'' means inferring a state from another that is regarded as evidence, and where the inference is conditionalizing the evidence using the conditional expectation determined by a reference probability measure representing the background subjective degrees of belief of a Bayesian Agent performing the inference. States are linear functionals that encode probability measures by assigning expectation values to random variables via integrating them with respect to the probability measure. If (...) a state can be learned from another this way, then it is said to be Bayes accessible from the evidence. It is shown that the Bayes accessibility relation is reflexive, antisymmetric and non-transitive. If every state is Bayes accessible from some other defined on the same set of random variables, then the set of states is called weakly Bayes connected. It is shown that the set of states is not weakly Bayes connected if the probability space is standard. The set of states is called weakly Bayes connectable if, given any state, the probability space can be extended in such a way that the given state becomes Bayes accessible from some other state in the extended space. It is shown that probability spaces are weakly Bayes connectable. Since conditioning using the theory of conditional expectations includes both Bayes' rule and Jeffrey conditionalization as special cases, the results presented generalize substantially some results obtained earlier for Jeffrey conditionalization. (shrink)

Mutually beneficial exchanges in markets can be exploitative because one party takes advantage of an underlying injustice. For instance, employers of sweatshop workers are often accused of exploiting the desperate conditions of their employees, although the latter accept the terms of their employment voluntarily. A weakness of this account of exploitation is its tendency for over-inclusiveness. Certainly, given the prevalence of global and domestic socioeconomic inequalities, not all exchanges that take place against background injustices should be considered exploitative. This paper (...) offers a framework to identify exploitation in mutually beneficial exchange, focusing on the case of sweatshop labor. It argues that an employer can be viewed as taking unfair advantage of an underlying injustice if and only if the employer’s surplus from the exchange in the unjust state of affairs exceeds the surplus it could maximally obtain in a just state of affairs. The paper illustrates the applicability of this framework using three different conceptions of justice and argues that it is superior to microlevel accounts of exploitation that regard background justice as irrelevant. The paper concludes by describing some normative implications that follow from judging an exchange exploitative. (shrink)

John von Neumann (1903-1957) was undoubtedly one of the scientific geniuses of the 20th century. The main fields to which he contributed include various disciplines of pure and applied mathematics, mathematical and theoretical physics, logic, theoretical computer science, and computer architecture. Von Neumann was also actively involved in politics and science management and he had a major impact on US government decisions during, and especially after, the Second World War. There exist several popular books on his personality and various collections (...) focusing on his achievements in mathematics, computer science, and economy. Strangely enough, to date no detailed appraisal of his seminal contributions to the mathematical foundations of quantum physics has appeared. Von Neumann's theory of measurement and his critique of hidden variables became the touchstone of most debates in the foundations of quantum mechanics. Today, his name also figures most prominently in the mathematically rigorous branches of contemporary quantum mechanics of large systems and quantum field theory. And finally - as one of his last lectures, published in this volume for the first time, shows - he considered the relation of quantum logic and quantum mechanical probability as his most important problem for the second half of the twentieth century. The present volume embraces both historical and systematic analyses of his methodology of mathematical physics, and of the various aspects of his work in the foundations of quantum physics, such as theory of measurement, quantum logic, and quantum mechanical entropy. The volume is rounded off by previously unpublished letters and lectures documenting von Neumann's thinking about quantum theory after his 1932 Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics. The general part of the Yearbook contains papers emerging from the Institute's annual lecture series and reviews of important publications of philosophy of science and its history. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to demonstrate that the teaching of Clement of Alexandria on marriage is closely related to the author’s soteriology and cosmology. The study focuses on the Third Book of Stromateis, which provides insight into the different Christian views on marriage at the end of the second century. Study of the Third Book of Stromateis also reveals Clement’s unique method of argument, by means of which he corrects the theological positions of his opponents. Last but not (...) least, Clement’s discussions of family life provide a window onto the social life of the Late Empire from the point of view of a second-century Christian philosopher. (shrink)

Das Buch geht von dem heute angenommenen Stand der Wissenschaft aus: die Peripatetiker brachten eine Terminuslogik zustande, während die stoische Logik eine Aussagenlogik war. Sie standen feindlich einandern gegenüber.Der Verfasser, mit Hilfe eines Textes Avicennas, wo er die Lehre der hypothetischen Syllogismen behandelt, versucht zu beweisen, dass auch die Peripatetiker eine, von der Terminuslogik nicht in jedem Hinblick losgelöste Aussagenlogik hatten, und diese peripatetische Aussenlogik wurde under dem Namen hypothetische Syllogismen" in den griechischen Quellen erwähnt. Die zerstreuten Bermerkungen der Griechen (...) über die hypothetischen Syllogismen lassen sich im Lichte des Textes Avicennas in einem neuen Sinn deuten.Die klassischen/griechischen und lateinischen/ Quellen, wenn wir sie richtig deuten, und wenn wir die versammelten Bruchstücke der Lehre richtig zusammenstellen, zeigten uns das ganze, von dem stoischen abweichende System der peripatetischen Aussagenlogik.Man kann aber nicht nur die ganze Theorie rekonstruieren, sondern auch die Geschichte der peripatetischen Aussagenlogik, von Theophrast bis zu unserem Jahrhundert.". (shrink)

Le Pere Xavier Tilliette est l'un des plus grands historiens contemporains de la philosophie. Il est l'auteur d'une monumentale etude en deux volumes sur Schelling... qui il avait d'ailleurs consacre plusieurs autres ouvrages. Il a egalement ecrit d'excellents livres sur d'autres grandes figures de la philosophie occidentale notamment Fichte, Merleau-Ponty, Lequier. Il est aussi et surtout le representant le plus connu d'un genre unique de la philosophie de la religion, celui qui traite des grands themes de la theologie chretienne selon (...) leurs dimensions proprement philosophiques. Rappelons simplement plusieurs travaux tres novateurs sur le Christ et la philosophie, mais aussi sur la philosophie et l'Eglise ou encore la philosophie et l'Eucharistie. Toutefois, Xavier Tilliette n'est pas seulement philosophe, il est aussi un grand erudit de l'histoire litteraire francaise, notamment de l'oeuvre de Paul Claudel. Apres deux Festschrift anterieures parues respectivement en Allemagne et en Italie, ce troisieme recueil publie en l'honneur du Pere Tilliette est edite en Belgique. Il contient trente contributions, plus de la moitie consacrees... l'histoire de la philosophie, avec un nombre eleve de textes sur Schelling. Les autres etudes, tres variees, tres originales, relevent de la philosophie de la religion, de la theologie philosophique et de l'histoire de la litterature. Ces travaux dont les auteurs, en provenance de huit pays et de trois continents, vont de jeunes erudits... peine trentenaires jusqu'aux contemporains de l'illustre jesuite, sont rediges en Francais, en Italien, en Allemand et en Anglais. Ils manifestent et illustrent la fecondite de l'oeuvre de ce disciple fervent des Peres de Lubac et Danielou, son rayonnement extraordinaire, les richesses multivalentes de ses deux-mille publications. (shrink)

In this paper we analyze and discuss Jennifer Saul’s account of the famous Gricean notions of ‘what is said’ and ‘what is implicated’ and the alleged conflict between them and the so- called Speaker- Meaning Exhaustiveness Thesis (SMET), which is standardly attributed to Grice in the literature. SMET declares that speaker- meaning divides exhaustively into what is said and what is (conventionally or nonconventionally) implicated by the speaker. After a detailed interpretation of Saul’s position, we argue that her analysis partly (...) misconstrues the relation between Grice’s theory of speaker- meaning and his normative account of conversational implicature. First of all, because SMET is not a genuine part of the Gricean theory of language and meaning – Grice was never committed to it. Secondly, Saul’s interpretation of the Gricean account of conversational implicature does not reflect accurately his original ideas. Although we agree with Saul that conversational implicature has an essential normative aspect, her account cannot capture well the real nature of this normativity, since it does not identify its source and does not delineate its scope. Finally, we present an alternative, speaker- oriented normative interpretation of Grice’s account of conversational implicatures, and argue that it fits better with the Gricean picture of communication and handles better the various problematic cases of conversational implicature than Saul’s mainly audience- oriented interpretation. (shrink)

Contemporary Complex Cinema. Complex conditions: the resurgence of narrative complexity ; Complex cinema as brain-candy for the empowered viewer ; Narrative taxonomies: simple, complex, puzzle plots -- Cognitive Approach to Contemporary Complex Cinema. Why an (embodied-)cognitive approach? ; Various forms of complexity and their effects on sense making ; Problematizing narrative linearity ; Complicating narrative structures and ontologies ; Under-stimulation and cognitive overload ; Contradictions and unreliabilities ; A cognitive approach to classifying complexity ; Deceptive unreliability and the twist film (...) ; Disorienting but solvable puzzle films ; Impossible puzzle films -- Narrative Complexity and Dissonant Cognitions. The concept of cognitive dissonance ; Cognitions in dissonance: from social psychology to narrative engagement ; Types of dissonance in narrative comprehension ; Narrative incongruities ; Narrative impossibilities ; Cognitive access to impossible storyworlds: immersed and reflected operations ; 'Impossibilities' and embodied cognition ; Disrupting viewers' reliance on image schemas by perceptual impossibility ; Disrupting viewers' reliance on image schemas by formal impossibility -- Taming Dissonance: Cognitive Operations and Interpretive Strategies. Cognitive dissonance versus narrative coherence ; Reducing dissonance: interpretation and naturalization ; Foregrounding ; Narrating agency and authorship ; Artefact emotions and metareflexive appreciation ; Interpretation as dissonance reduction ; Coping with dissonance: frame-switches and poetic and aesthetic readings ; Frame-switching as hermeneutic play in impossible puzzle films ; Switching between narrative and symbolical readings: Enemy and Mulholland Drive ; Cognitive hesitation and the fantastic -- Impossible Puzzle Films: Between Art-Cinema and (Post-) Classical Narration. From art-cinema to puzzle films ; Art-cinema as a narrative mode ; Dissonance in modernist art-cinema ; Art-cinema as a cognitive reception frame ; Narrative complexity and meaning-making in art-cinema ; Impossible puzzle films and (post-)classical narration ; High degree of tellability ; Identification with goal-oriented characters ; Strong reliance on classical genre elements ; Adherence to classical narrative cohesion devices ; Inclusion of quasi-rational frames of naturalization -- Wallowing in Dissonance: The Attractiveness of Impossible Puzzles. Hermeneutic play and interpretive multiplicity ; Orientation, navigation, mapping ; Game logic and the fascination in failure ; Effort justification ; Diegetization of decoupling ; Fascination in infinity ; Destabilized ontological certainty ; Eudaimonic motivations and intrinsic needs. (shrink)

Gabriel Marcel a été l'un des plus grands penseurs du XXe siècle. Antérieurement et parallèlement à la Phénoménologie, il a élaboré une philosophie concrète où il traite avec une grande rigueur conceptuelle des notions que la métaphysique de l'Occident n'a pas su ou voulu thématiser. Opposant être et avoir, problème et mystère, dénonçant les erreurs et les travers de l'objectivation, il pense et repense, grâce à une seconde réflexion, la philosophie morale aussi bien que l'univers de l'intersubjectivité. Il soumet à (...) un nouvel éclairage la fidélité, la trahison, le don. Il analyse avec profondeur la famille, le mariage, la paternité. Contre l'arrière-fond des totalitarismes de son temps, il énonce inlassablement la pertinence et la validité des vertus de l'individu. Penseur chrétien, il présente des méditations d'une nouveauté inentamée sur la foi, sur l'immortalité, sur Dieu comme le Toi absolu. Dans les quatre décennies qui ont suivi sa disparition, la grande figure de Gabriel Marcel a subi une éclipse, voire un quasi-oubli. Or tout récemment, cette pensée riche et profonde recommence à attirer. Après l'édition d'une partie de sa correspondance, la parution des actes d'un colloque et d'un important recueil d'études sur sa philosophie, le livre de Miklos Vetö se veut une introduction systématique aux thèmes majeurs de ce socratisme chrétien. (shrink)

Weak and strong consistency of the Abstract Principal Principle are defined in terms of classical probability measure spaces. It is proved that the Abstract Principal Principle is both weakly and strongly consistent. The Abstract Principal Principle is strengthened by adding a stability requirement to it. Weak and strong consistency of the resulting Stable Abstract Principal Principle are defined. It is shown that the Stable Abstract Principal Principle is weakly consistent. Strong consistency of the Stable Abstract Principal principle remains an open (...) question. (shrink)

The paper takes thePrincipal Principle to be a norm demanding that subjective degrees of belief of a Bayesian agent be equal to the objective probabilities once the agent has conditionalized his subjective degrees of beliefs on the values of the objective probabilities, where the objective probabilities can be not only chances but any other quantities determined objectively. Weak and strong consistency of the Abstract Principal Principle are defined in terms of classical probability measure spaces. It is proved that the Abstract (...) Principal Principle is weakly consistent and that it is strongly consistent in the category of probability measure spaces where the Boolean algebra representing the objective random events is finite. It is argued that it is desirable to strengthen the Abstract Principal Principle by adding a stability requirement to it. Weak and strong consistency of the resulting Stable Abstract Principal Principle are defined, and the strong consistency of the Abstract Principal Principle is interpreted as necessary for a non-omniscient Bayesian agent to be able to have rational degrees of belief in all epistemic situations. It is shown that the Stable Abstract Principal Principle is weakly consistent, but the strong consistency of the Stable Abstract Principal principle remains an open question. We conclude that we do not yet have proof that Bayesian agents can have rational degrees of belief in every epistemic situation. (shrink)

Simone Weil is one of the major religious writers of the twentieth century. Hers is a unique blend of spiritual experience, social concern, and philosophical theory. She had marvelous command of the Western philosophical tradition, yet she also had profound insights into Oriental philosophies. Since its publication in France, Veto's book has been considered by most scholars as the standard work on Simone Weil. Now this important book is available in English. It is the only available reconstruction of the entire (...) philosophy of Simone Weil. It operates out of the perspective of the spiritual concerns of her maturity, yet it never fails to return to the issues and the positions of the early texts. It carries out the reconstruction according to some major philosophical themes, but gives its due share to the French thinkers' social and political preoccupations as well. The book is erudite, yet simple, written in a clear, concise and yet often eloquent language. (shrink)

Three classes are introduced which are closely related to the class included in the title. It is proven that the class obtained from by replacing axiom C4 by the commutativity of single substitutions can be considered as the abstract class in the Resek–Thompson theorem, thus it is representable by set algebras. Then the class is defined and it is shown that the necessary and sufficient condition for neat embeddability of an algebra in CAα into is the validity of the merry-go-round (...) properties. Finally, the class is introduced which class is a counterpart of among the polyadic like algebras. (shrink)

Consequentialism is often criticized as being overly demanding, and this overdemandingness is seen as sufficient to reject it as a moral theory. This paper takes the plausibility and coherence of this objection—the Demandingness Objection—as a given. Our question, therefore, is how to respond to the Objection. We put forward a response relying on the framework of institutional consequentialism we introduced in previous work. On this view, institutions take over the consequentialist burden, whereas individuals, special occasions aside, are required to set (...) up and maintain institutions. We first describe the Objection, then clarify the theory of institutional consequentialism and show how it responds to the Objection. In the remainder of the paper, we defend the view against potential challenges. (shrink)

The book then discusses another group of issues ("whether it is, what it is, how and why it is"), which determined the argumentation, the axiomatic ordering of the sciences, and concludes with a demonstration on the basis of concrete ...

ABSTRACT As is well-known, a classical representation theorem of the theory of cylindric algebras is: A ε IGwsa if and only if A ε SNrαCAα+ε. The part “only if” is trivial. Regarding to the other part “A ε SNrαCAα+ε then A ε IGwsα“ the following question arises: is it possible to replace the class CA in the hypothesis A ε SNrαCAα+ε by a larger class so that the theorem still holds. Such a larger class Kα β is defined. The class (...) Kα β is the best possible, in a sense to be made precise. Representability of set algebras is investigated, too. (shrink)

Cylindric set algebras are algebraizations of certain logical semantics. The topic surveyed here, i.e. probabilities defined on cylindric set algebras, is closely related, on the one hand, to probability logic (to probabilities defined on logical formulas), on the other hand, to measure theory. The set algebras occuring here are associated, in particular, with the semantics of first order logic and with non-standard analysis. The probabilities introduced are partially continous, they are continous with respect to so-called cylindric sums.