The role of governments in business and society research remains underexplored. The generally accepted principle of voluntarism, which frames responsible business conduct as an unregulated subject under managerial discretion, accounts for this gap. Paradoxically, there are sufficient acknowledgments in academia and practice on different roles of governments. The present article identifies three broad topics for research, addressing the paradox between the principle of voluntarism and the role of governments in B&S, the boundaries of governments and business in their contribution to (...) B&S issues, and the mechanisms of government intervention that affect corporate social performance. The authors approach the first topic with a literature review of 703 articles marked with the term “government” from five journals in the field between 1982 and 2011. This study indicates that the principle of voluntarism remains, despite the broad variety of research related to the role of government in B&S. In addition, the identified content provides deeper insight into the mechanisms of government intervention and on the boundaries of governments in the B&S discourse. This article then provides a summary of the other three research articles included in this special research forum, with a contribution oriented toward the latter two research avenues posited. (shrink)

In the corporate social responsibility (CSR) literature, the principle of voluntarism is predominant and implies that responsible business activities are discretionary and reach beyond the rule of law. This principle fails to explain that governments have a great interest in CSR and exercise influence on firms’ CSR activities. Therefore, we argue in favour of a contingency approach on voluntarism in CSR. To this end, we analyse the academic literature to demonstrate how governments are part of the CSR debate. We selected (...) 703 papers where the impact of governments is mentioned from five journals in our field (BEER, BEQ, BSE, BAS, JBE) in the period 1982–2011. We studied the titles and abstracts of these papers and provide an overview of: (i) the geographical orientation of the reviewed studies; (ii) the variety of government levels involved; and (iii) the various subjects where governments appear to be involved. In addition, an in‐depth reading of a subsample of 39 articles offers more details on the role of governments in the CSR literature. Hence, we offer a structured overview on the discussion of CSR and governments while stimulating a contingent understanding of the voluntarism concept in CSR. (shrink)

Laudan's thesis that conceptual problem solving is at least as important as empirical problem solving in scientific research is given support by a study of the relation between the chromosome theory and the Mendelian research program. It will be shown that there existed a conceptual tension between the chromosome theory and the Mendelian program. This tension was to be resolved by changing the constraints of the Mendelian program. The relation between the chromosome theory and the Mendelian program is shown to (...) be a good illustration of the influence of science itself on the rational standards governing scientific development. (shrink)

In a recent article, Hayakawa and Keysar (2018) propose that mental imagery is less vivid when evoked in a foreign than in a native language. The authors argue that reduced mental imagery could even account for moral foreign language effects, whereby moral choices become more utilitarian when made in a foreign language. Here we demonstrate that Hayakawa and Keysar's (2018) key results are better explained by reduced language comprehension in a foreign language than by less vivid imagery. We argue that (...) the paradigm used in Hayakawa and Keysar (2018) does not provide a satisfactory test of reduced imagery and we discuss an alternative paradigm based on recent experimental developments. (shrink)

Recent developments in the domain of communication Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) technology have raised questions about the ability for communication BCIs to read minds. How those questions are answered depends on how we theorize the mind and mindreading in the first place. Thus, in this paper, I ask (1) what does it mean to read minds? (2) can a communication BCI do this? (3) what does this mean for potential users of this technology? and (4) what is at stake morally in (...) light of this? I show that current answers to these questions are conceptually unclear and committed to a Cartesian picture of the mind and its relation to the brain, questionably informing how debates about BCIs as mindreading devices are framed. I offer an alternative perspective on these questions by turning to an enactive perspective on mindedness. I argue that this perspective can offer conceptual as well as ethical clarification about what is at stake in the domain of communication BCIs. From this perspective, the concerns raised about BCIs as mindreading machines are demystified. Instead, concerns are raised about BCIs as enabling users to flourish as authentic communicators. (shrink)

In the struggle for breathable air amid pollution and climate change, both resistance and inspiration can be found in ‘atmospheric care practices’ (Vine 2019). In this article, I embed these practices in a more than human political approach (Puig de la Bellacasa 2017). More than human atmospheric care practices work to undo toxic harm both on a material and social level while intimately involving human beings with more than human worlds. In so doing, they are demonstrative of different kinds of (...) agency and political activity that open up alternative ways of relating and responding to climate change. (shrink)

When the modern reader and the ancient biblical text do not share the same cosmology, this may lead to gross misinterpretation of the text, or to a reduction in meaning. The term רוח אלהים [spirit of God] is used as an example to illustrate the possibility of such misinterpretation. It is argued that the term should be viewed as a case of polysemy (words with multiple senses, which are not trivially related to one another) and thus form a rich complex (...) of meaning. This implies that the so-called fallacy of ‘illegitimate totality transfer’ does not apply to polysemous words, because all the senses are activated in every context. The senses of spirit, breath and wind should therefore not be viewed as alternative meanings (as one would do in the case of homonyms), but as contributing to a rich complex meaning, which makes logical sense within the magico-mythical cosmology of the Old Testament. (shrink)

In this article, I discuss manuscript material written by Petrus van Musschenbroek (1692–1761) related to his first experiments with the Leiden jar. Despite the importance of the discovery of the Leiden jar for the history of electricity and the questions that still surround its discovery, a detailed treatment of this manuscript material is lacking in the literature. The main aim of this paper is to provide an outline of the manuscript material and to contextualize van Musschenbroek’s first experiments with (...) the Leiden jar. I show how the experiment fits within his research program on electricity and I discuss van Musschenbroek’s initial reactions to and analysis of the phenomenon. Before doing so, I first provide a short overview of the treatment of the early history of the Leiden jar in the secondary literature. After that, I discuss van Musschenbroek’s treatment of the topic of electricity in the textbooks he published in the years before the discovery of the device. Van Musschenbroek repeatedly emphasized that not enough experimental results were available for an informed theoretical treatment of the phenomenon of electricity to be possible. I then turn to the manuscript material, where I give a general description of the contents of the manuscript and van Musschenbroek’s experimental practice. The manuscript material further confirms recent work on the Leiden jar by Silva and Heering, and provides new insights into the way van Musschenbroek himself reacted to the discovery. (shrink)

The Netherdutch Reformed Church finds itself in a precarious situation. It could be described as a watershed moment in the life of this denomination. The impasse developed due to various factors such as the loss of membership, the economic situation, ecumenical isolation and various other influences, which eventually resulted in a strong institutionalised organisation. Institutionalisation necessarily resulted in a shift of focus from the essence of being Church towards institutional continuation. As a result, the organic growth of the church suffered. (...) This article investigates the institutionalism of the Netherdutch Reformed Church from an open systems perspective, thereby identifying the dysfunctionality between form and function and ending with certain perspectives in respect of a change in focus by the church to realise the true essence of being Church of Jesus Christ. (shrink)

In this article, I discuss Petrus van Musschenbroek's research on the strength of materials in relation to his methodological views. In the latter, van Musschenbroek emphasizes the importance of repeating and varying experiments. This is related to his views on the complexity of nature, which play a role in his views onmathematics, laws of nature, causes, and experimental method. In each case, the construction of an (experimental) history is presented as a first step in experimental philosophy, necessary to deal (...) with the complexity of nature. The experimental research on the strength ofmaterials can likewise be seen as aimed at the construction of an (experimental) history. His experimental practice takes the form of a systematic variation of parameters and the performance of an extensive series of experiments on different kinds of substances. In his experimental reports, van Musschenbroek repeatedly points to the utility of his experimental results. This utilitarian attitude is typical for the experimental history literature as discussed by Klein. Van Musschenbroek himself also presents his work as an experimental history. However, unlike the examples discussed by Klein, van Musschenbroek's experimental history is characterized by a systematic experimental method. I argue that this method can be seen as an example of exploratory experimentation in Steinle's sense. Finally, I suggest that with its emphasis on the nature and properties of specific materials, it could be fruitful to read van Musschenbroek's experimental history in light of the emergence of engineering as a discipline in the eighteenth century. (shrink)

Johann Christoph Sturm’s natural philosophy, with which Leibniz engages in “De ipsa natura”, as well as Petrus van Musschenbroek’s epistemology, constitute important steps in the process of the speciation of physics. In this case, speciation is understood as the process through which the explanation of natural phenomena via empirical regularities comes to define the whole domain of the newly established niche of physics, to the exclusion both of teleology and efficient causality.

In this article an attempt is made to develop a concept: the teenwoordige-So, which has a two-fold nature. On the one hand it grows from the philosophical dimensions of the work of Breyten Breytenbach, and on the other, once it is identified it can be used as a method for reading his work. But in order to determine the “environment” of the concept three main elements are investigated in this article. The first is the notion of the rhizome, the second (...) element is identified in/as the Zen Buddhist concept of Tathata or suchness, and the third revolves around an investigation of Jean-Luc Nancy's treatment of the notion of presence in his work The birth to presence. It is argued that both these concepts portray something of a condition of continuous birth or becoming and that this “sense” of the world finds specific expression in the literary work of Breyten Breytenbach. It is also proposed that the expression Breytenbach gives to the condition of presence and suchness opens a nomadic territory, or nomadic understanding of the world which has a political meaning. (shrink)

In this essay, I will bring several hitherto neglected sources, which pertain to Petrus van Musschenbroek’s unpublished manuscripts, to the fore. The folios at hand show that Musschenbroek read and actively engaged with Spinoza’s Ethica. More precisely, it will be shown that Musschenbroek held clear-cut anti-Spinozistic convictions.

This review article situates the work Black Flame within a capita selecta of earlier publications on anarchism-syndicalism and radical thought. Schmidt and Van der Walt's contribution (2009) is a recent addition to political thought, theory and socio-economic practice within the broad stream of anarcho-syndicalism. Its treatment of anarchism and anarchist syndicalist groups in the workplace within an international context since the middle 1800s and the attempt to situate the debate in contemporary society are some notable features. The authors engage with (...) the past relevance of anarcho-syndicalism and implications for the future given current discontent with (global) politics. As an ongoing discourse on social philosophy, references are made to areas of agreement and differences between Anarchist and Marxist discourse. The latter versus one ‘grand narrative’ conjectures that liberal-capitalism on a global scale is bringing about an ‘End of History’ and that we have entered a post-industrial or even post-modern condition on the globe. However, theories-put-into-practice around the implosion of history and a ‘clash of civilisations’ result in deep inequality and the rise of absolute poverty. The work invites reflection and critical engagement. (shrink)

In this article, we discuss the development of the concept of a ‘law’ (of nature) in the work of the Dutch natural philosopher and experimenter Petrus van Musschenbroek (1692–1761). Since Van Musschenbroek is commonly described as one of the first ‘Newtonians’ on the Continent in the secondary literature, we focus more specifically on its relation to Newton’s views on this issue. Although he was certainly indebted to Newton for his thinking on laws (of nature), Van Musschenbroek’s views can be (...) seen to diverge from Newton’s on crucial points. We show, moreover, how his thinking on laws of nature was shaped by both international and local factors. We start with a brief discussion of Newton’s concept of ‘laws of nature’ in order to set the stage for Van Musschenbroek’s. We then document the development of Van Musschenbroek’s views on laws of nature in chronological order. We demonstrate how his thinking on laws of nature was tied to institutional, theological and scientific factors. We conclude by pointing to the broader significance of this case study for our understanding of the development of the concept ‘law of nature’ during the eighteenth century. (shrink)

In the early eighteenth century Newtonianism became popular in the Netherlands both in academic and non-academic circles. The ‘Book of Nature’ was interpreted with the help of Newton’s natural philosophy and his ideas about a providential deity, thereby greatly enhancing the attractiveness of physico-theology in the eighteenth-century United Provinces. Like other Europeans the Dutch welcomed physico-theology as a strategic means in their battle against irreligion and atheism. Bernard Nieuwentijt, Johan Lulofs, Petrus Camper, and Johannes Florentius Martinet were prominent experts (...) in the field. Combining Newtonian notions with Leibnizian optimism and romanticist trends, physico-theology remained popular in the Netherlands well into the nineteenth century.Author Keywords: Apologetics; Dutch Enlightenment; Physico-theology; Prophetic theology; Argument from design; Empiricism. (shrink)

SUMMARYThis article explores how writers from the Dutch Golden Age thought about human contact with that which is elevated far above everyday life. The Dutch Republic offers an interesting context because of the strikingly early use there by seventeenth-century humanists of the Greek concept ὕψος, from Longinus, to discuss how writers, artists and their audiences were able to surpass human limitations thanks to an intense imagination which transported them to supreme heights. Dutch poets also used the Latin sublimis to discuss (...) how mankind constantly aims at that which is far above it, but, despite this, can never entirely be a part of it. Thirdly, protestant writers discuss the concept of the Fear of God by explaining that elevated contact with God should be accompanied by the contrasting emotions of attraction and fear. With reference to the humanist Franciscus Junius, poet Joost van den Vondel and preacher Petrus Wittewrongel, I will discuss how these artistic, literary and religious discourses concerning contact with the sublime are related to one another. (shrink)

This monograph explains how, in the aftermath of the battle over René Descartes' philosophy, Newton's natural philosophy found fertile ground at the University of Leiden. Newton's natural philosophical views and methods, along with their underlying distinctions, seamlessly aligned with the University of Leiden's institutional-religious policy, which urged professors and students to separate theology from philosophy. Additionally, these views supported the natural philosophical agendas of Herman Boerhaave, Willem Jacob's Gravesande, and Petrus van Musschenbroek. Newton's natural philosophical program was especially useful (...) in the three Leiden professors' project of reforming existing disciplines and providing them with epistemic legitimacy. (shrink)

This paper discusses the connection between epistemic virtues and chemistry in the eighteenth century Dutch Republic. It does so in two ways. First, it presents the virtue epistemology of three Dutch university professors and natural philosophers: Herman Boerhaave, Petrus van Musschenbroek, and Johannes David Hahn. It shows how their criticism of a priori philosophy and their defence of experimental natural philosophy is connected to a specific virtue epistemology. Four epistemic virtues are central for these authors: intellectual patience, diligence and (...) humility, and impartiality. This virtue epistemology informs their presentation of chemistry as an exemplary discipline. The practice of chemistry instils these key epistemic virtues in its practitioners. Second, the article shows how these epistemic virtues also play a role in later debates regarding the reception of Lavoisier’s work in the Dutch Republic. This article hopes to provide an example of what Ian Kidd has called a ‘deep conception of epistemic vice [and virtue]’. It also argues for the fruitfulness of applying a virtue epistemic framework to the study of the Chemical Revolution. (shrink)