In this article, the – in a double sense – problematic passages in the epithalamium for Stella and Violentilla and in thematically linked epigrams of Martial (especially in the epigram 6.21 whose subject likewise is their wedding, but also in the epigrams 5.11 and 5.12) are analyzed. These are the passages that, firstly, are difficult to interpret and, secondly, seem to cast a bad light on Stella and Violentilla in the form of explosive details and tactlessness. The guiding question in (...) this article will be whether and to what extent Martial’s and especially Statius’ portrayal of the wedding couple is not only idealizing but also ambivalent. (shrink)

According to Hempel’s influential theory of explanation, explaining why some a is G consists in showing that the truth that a is G follows from a law-like generalization to the effect that all Fs are G together with the initial condition that a is F. While Hempel’s overall account is now widely considered to be deeply flawed, the idea that some generalizations play the explanatory role that the account predicts is still often endorsed by contemporary philosophers of science. This idea, (...) however, conflicts with widely shared views in metaphysics according to which the generalization that all Fs are G is partially explained by the fact that a is G. I discuss two solutions to this conflict that have been proposed recently, argue that they are unsatisfactory, and offer an alternative. (shrink)

Many people think that if you're uncertain about which moral theory is correct, you ought to maximize the expected choice-worthiness of your actions. This idea presupposes that the strengths of our moral reasons are comparable across theories – for instance, that our reasons to create new people, according to total utilitarianism, can be stronger than our reasons to benefit an existing person, according to a person-affecting view. But how can we make sense of such comparisons? In this article, I introduce (...) a constructivist account of intertheoretic comparisons. On this account, such comparisons don't hold independently of facts about morally uncertain agents. They're simply the result of an ideal deliberation in terms of certain epistemic norms about what you ought to do in light of your uncertainty. If I'm right, this account is metaphysically more parsimonious than some existing proposals, and yet has plausible and strong implications. (shrink)

In this text I investigate the increasing usage of the Rights of Nature to approach the task of Stewardship for the Earth. The Ecuadorian constitution of 2008 introduces the indigenous concept of Pachamama and interpretes nature as a subject of rights. Reflecting the two 2017 cases of the Whanganui River and the Gangotri and Yamunotri Glaciers, my main argument is that, although the language of individual rights relies on modern subjectivity as well as the constitutionalism of the secular nation state, (...) it is obviously seen as a trans-cultural tool to justify Human Stewardship over the Earth in the Age of Anthropocene. I argue that the new Rights of Nature debate “provides” a straightforward justification of the Stewardship for the Earth and it includes two moments aimed to transcend European Modernity. The Rights Approach justifies obligations towards nature beyond human interests and it appeals to indigenous knowledge as an alternative sphere of argumentation. The relation of this endevor to the Anthropocene is twofold: The indigenous worldviews can now be translated into Rights of Nature because of the two core items of the Anthropocene that are gaining more and more acceptance: the idea of the Earth as a system and of history as a non-linear process. The scientific description of the Earth system offered by the Anthropocene supports holistic narratives of the Rights of Nature and facilitates the recognition of non-Western worldviews. At the same time the Rights of Nature help to clarify the normative claims implicit in the Anthropocene because the integrity of natural items and processes is presented as the explicit reason for a responsible human stewardship towards the Earth. (shrink)

This chapter contains section titled: Introduction General Scenario for the Transmission of Information and Its Application to Genetics Semiotic Dimensions of Biological Information Syntactic Dimension I: Measuring the Statistical Entropy of Signals and Messages Syntactic Dimension II: Estimating the Algorithmic Complexity of Signals and Messages Semantic Dimension: Classifying the Mutual Complexity of Transmitters and Receivers Acknowledgment References Further Reading.

What is life? A gathering consensus in anthropology, science studies, and philosophy of biology suggests that the theoretical object of biology, “life,” is today in transformation, if not dissolution. Proliferating reproductive technologies, along with genomic reshufflings of biomatter in such practices as cloning, have unwound the facts of life.

ABSTRACT:Drawing a framework from strategic stakeholder theory and using 1999 to 2010 panel data from the United Kingdom’s (UK) non-life insurance industry, we examine the effect of reinsurance on the decisions to donate to charities, and the amount given. We find that reinsurance substitutes for charitable giving as it optimizes the interests of multiple stakeholders. We further note that corporate giving is directly related to the size and age of insurers, proportion of female directorships and insider ownership, but generally inhibited (...) by chief executive officer (CEO) bonus plans, dominant shareholders, and financial experts on the board. Interestingly, when reinsurance interacts with board-level variables we find that the donations decision is positively related to CEO bonus plans, and negatively linked with inside ownership and the proportion of female board members. Our research results could have important implications for stakeholders. (shrink)

Die Verfassung von Ecuador enthält als weltweit erste Rechte der Natur. Natur wird neben Menschen und Körperschaften als Rechtsträger benannt. Ihr wird ein Recht auf Existenz und Regeneration zugesprochen, das unabhängig von menschlichen Rechten gilt und von allen Menschen weltweit eingeklagt werden darf. Die Verfassung stützt sich auf den indigenen Naturbegriff Pachamama und erläutert deren Schutzanspruch durch das andine Konzept des Guten Lebens. Die Umweltethik bezeichnet ein holisitisches Naturverständnis als „Ökozentrismus“, wenn der Natur als überindividueller Ganzheit ein irreduzibler Schutzstatus zugesprochen (...) wird. Der umweltethische Ökozentrismus der Verfassung von Ecuador lässt sich erfolgreich gegen drei Kritiken verteidigen. Ökozentrische Positionen seien, 1) unvereinbar mit dem methodischen Individualismus der Menschenrechte. Ökosysteme selbst seien 2) „bloß“ vom menschlichen Beobachter abhängige Entitäten, die 3) über kein inhärentes Kriterium für Schädigungen verfügten. Die Konkretisierung des Ökozentrismus in Bezug auf die Verfassung von Ecuador erlaubt drei Thesen: 1) Der Schutz der Natur als überindividueller Ganzheit darf nicht als alleiniges ethisches Prinzip missverstanden werden. Innerhalb eines pluralistischen Holismus besitzt der Ökozentrismus nicht per se Vorrang gegenüber den Interessen individueller Naturwesen und juristischer Personen. 2) Da Ökosysteme im Gegensatz zu individuellen Naturwesen keine ontologisch selbstständigen Entitäten sind, lassen sich deren Rechte nicht analog zu denen natürlicher Personen begründen. Die Environmental Personhood ist gemäß der Association Theory der Rechtspersönlichkeit als ein menschliches Konstrukt zu verstehen. 3) Der Maßstab für die Schädigung von Ökosystemen kann nicht als ein der Natur inhärentes, objektives Kriterium „aufgefunden“ werden. Ökologische Schäden an der „Integrität, Stabilität und Schönheit“ der Natur sind vielmehr Schäden an menschlichen Werten. Als solche entspringen sie im Falle der ecuadorianischen Verfassung vor allem nichtinstrumentellen menschlichen Bezugnahmen auf die Natur. Der Natur wird hierbei eudaimonistischer Wert und moralischer Selbstwert zugeschrieben. (shrink)

Can private companies legitimately regulate sharing markets, and if yes, how? Whereas scholars have either criticized sharing platforms for expanding into private and public arenas or welcomed them to counterbalance encroaching government regulations, studies document their unbridled popularity. On the basis of a special version of social contracts theory pioneered by James Buchanan, we develop a heuristics that helps guide reasoning about the legitimacy of the sharing economy’s regulatory function. First, we discuss the conditions under which free and responsible individuals (...) deliberately subject themselves to rules without their prior direct participation, that is, exit, voice, and constitutional limits. Second, we suggest sharing platforms can use novel ordo-responsibilities to establish a sharing constitution that takes these conditions into account. Third, we argue that sharing platforms can legitimately do so within an enabling institutional environment in society, the provision of which relies on the joint efforts of sharing platforms, political actors, and civil society. (shrink)

The principal task of Marxist ethics is not to formulate particular moral principles or to implement them but to describe and explain moral reality. Ethics is not a philosophical discipline although as a science of morals in its own rights it is based on philosophical premises of historical materialism. Trying to define the principal tasks of Marxist ethics in the socialist society the author contends that Marxist ethics should determine the contents, the forms and the ways in which the communist (...) morality develops and functions: in the analysis and scientific examination of the social reality it should reveal the causes of contradictions and moral conflicts in the socialist society, it should also identify favourable conditions for an extensive acceptance of the communist morality. (shrink)

Resumen Este artículo analiza si en la teoría de los cuatro ethe de la modernidad capitalista, desarrollada por Bolívar Echeverría, no está contenida una debilidad de principio. Se trata de saber si para arribar a sus más altas aportaciones, esta teoría no termina pagando un precio que debiera dar que pensar. ¿Acaso renuncia a la crítica de la ideología, por lo menos en la radicalidad realizada por los autores de la Teoría crítica, inspirados en este punto originalmente por Georg Lukács?This (...) article is analyzing if in the theory of the four ethe of capitalist modernity, developed by Bolívar Echeverría, isn’t included a basic weakness. It is about understanding if for to arrive to its highest contributions, this theory is not paying a too high prize. Does it possibly renounce to the critique of ideology, at least in the radicality fulfilled by the authors of Critical theory, inspired in this point originally by Georg Lukács? (shrink)

This article approaches social projectionism as an orientation within the new post-modern epistemologies, starting from its principles. At the same time, the author presents some phenomena generated by the post-modern perspectives opened by the new ideologies that produce new ethical orientations in social practice. These visions have made profound changes in the way the social services user is seen, the contextualisation of social practice, the volatility of social programmes and the development of the public-private partnership from the point of view (...) of social constructionism. The marketisation of social services has conditioned the development of equality relations between the public service providers and the private providers, the adaptation of programmes to the local needs and resources and a permanent change, giving up the illusion of progress, recognising and using to their full potential the multilinear evolutions of the existing situations. (shrink)

In contemporary theories of language it is common to appeal to propositions as expressed by utterances of sentences. The aim of this paper is to question this idea, for as I argue, the relationship between sentences and propositions cannot be worked out in any rewarding way.

In this essay, I develop a moderate hierarchical position about the moral status of animals that is based on two factors: on the level of mental development of a being who is affected and on the significance of the interests that are affected. I argue that this view accommodates two different sets of moral intuitions. On one hand, it explains why, in general, humans have the special moral standing that is typically attributed to us. On the other hand, it also (...) allows us to accommodate much of our intuition about how animals ought to be treated. In addition, this view is supported also by plausible general theoretical considerations. Subsequently, I explore some implications of this view for some real-life examples of our interactions with animals, especially, for the practice of raising them for food using industrial methods. I argue that this practice is morally wrong and that the correct approach is to adopt a (nearly) plant-based lifestyle. (shrink)

The SOPhiA conferences are intended to give young predoctoral philosophers the possibility to actively attend a professional conference, to tackle current, as well as classical, philosophical problems, and to discuss their own approaches with promising students from many dierent countries as well as with wellestablished experts. We are firmly convinced that this is a natural and necessary step for promoting the next generation of analytic philosophers and thus, strengthening analytic philosophy in general. Because we believe that the methods of analytic (...) philosophy can be fruitfully applied to all areas of philosophy, the SOPhiA conferences do not have a thematic focus; this is also reflected by the fact that the talks given at SOPhiA 2011 covered all areas of philosophy. (shrink)