This book discusses in dialogue form the basic principles of mathematics and its applications including the question: What is mathematics? What does its specific method consist of? What is its relation to the sciences and humanities? What can it offer to specialists in different fields? How can it be applied in practice and in discovering the laws of nature? Dramatized by the dialogue form and shown in the historical movements in which they originated, these questions are discussed in their full (...) complexity, yet are easily comprehended. The first dialogue, whose chief actor is Socrates, leads the reader to the source of modern mathematics in Athens in the 5th Century BC. The second dialogue, featuring Archimedes, takes place during the siege of Syracuse in 212 BC and shows the birth of applied mathematics. The third dialogue occurs in the year 1633 in Rome, its chief character being Galileo Galilei who fully realized the central importance of the mathematical method in discovering the laws of nature. Intended as supplemental reading for philosophy of mathematics courses at the high school or college level it will be of interest to both specialists and non-specialists in mathematics. Alfréd Rényi was born in Budapest Hungary in 1921. He studied mathematics and physics at the University of Budapest and received his Ph. D. from the University of Szaged in 1945. Since 1950 he has been Director of the Mathematical Research Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and since 1952 a professor at the University of Budapest. Dr. Renyi was a visiting professor at Michigan State University in 1961, at the University of Michigan in 1964 and at Stanford University in 1966. His main fields of research are probability theory, mathematical statistics and information theory, and he has also worked in analytic number theory as well as in various branches of analysis, combinatorial analysis and geometry. (shrink)

The cultural rise of “big data” in the recent years has pressured a number of occupations to make an epistemological shift toward data-driven science. Though expressed as a professional move, this article argues that the push incorporates gendered assumptions that disadvantage women. Using the human resource occupation as an example, I demonstrate how normative perceptions of feminine “soft skills” are seen as irreconcilable with the masculine “hard numbers” of a data-driven epistemology. The history of human resources reflects how assumptions of (...) a biological fit with an occupation limit what women can convincingly describe as her skillsets. However, challenging this cannot stay within the confines of the occupation itself. To undo sexist thinking, it is necessary to understand the broader networks of patriarchal power that dictate how value is defined in corporate environments, especially within other high status professions in business. (shrink)

Sentimentalists believe that values are crucially dependent on emotions. Epistemic sentimentalists subscribe to what I call the final-court-of-appeal view: emotional experience is ultimately necessary and can be sufficient for the justification of evaluative beliefs. This paper rejects this view defending a moderate version of rationalism that steers clear of the excesses of both “Stoic” rationalism and epistemic sentimentalism. We should grant that emotions play a significant epistemic role in justifying evaluations. At the same time, evaluative justification is not uniquely or (...) especially dependent on emotions. The anti-sentimentalist argument developed in this paper is based on the indeterminacy thesis. The thesis states that the evaluative properties picked out by our emotional responses are too indeterminate to play a central role in our evaluative practices. I argue that while the indeterminacy thesis undermines the final-court-of-appeal view it supports the claim that emotional responses can provide prima facie justification for evaluative beliefs. (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)

This paper argues that emotions can play an epistemic role as justifiers of evaluative beliefs. It also presents the heuristics theory of emotion as an empirically informed explanation of how emotions can play such a role and why they in practice usefully complement non-affective evaluative judgments. As such, the heuristics theory represents a form of moderate rationalism: it acknowledges that emotions can be epistemically valuable, even privileged in some sense, but denies that they would be uniquely privileged. I argue that (...) judgments and emotional responses pick out different but correlated kinds of evaluative properties and therefore emotional responses and non-affective evaluative judgments play mutually complementary rather than mutually exclusive roles. It follows that emotional responses can be legitimately drawn upon to support evaluative beliefs, but they lack supreme epistemic authority. (shrink)

Recent research has revealed several developmental aspects of Machiavellianism. In this study, we explored the potential relationship between perceived parentification in the family of origin and Machiavellianism in adulthood. Three hundred and ninety five Hungarian adults completed self-report measures of parentification and Machiavellianism. Results showed that emotional parentification and children’s unacknowledged efforts to contribute to the well-being of their families were associated with Machiavellianism - but only in men. Machiavellian tactics and worldview are proposed as possible coping mechanisms with the (...) neglectful and unpredictable family environment. Gender differences in the results are explained in terms of gender role socialization and men’s and women’s different susceptibility for different forms of psychopathology. (shrink)

This paper develops an account of how economic and political institutions can limit the applicability of principles of justice even in non-relational cosmopolitan conceptions. It shows that fundamental principles of justice underdetermine fair distributive shares as well as justice -based requirements. It argues that institutions partially constitute the content of justice by determining distributive shares and by resolving indeterminacies about justice -based requirements resulting from strategic interaction and disagreement. In the absence of existing institutions principles of justice might not be (...) applicable for assessing distributions or guiding individual action and institutional design. Hence, accepting a specific cosmopolitan conception of justice is insufficient to settle global distributive questions. (shrink)

An aesthetic sense—a taste for the creation and/or appreciation of that which strikes one as, e.g., attractive or awesome—is often assumed to be a distinctively H. sapiens phenomenon. However, recent paleoanthropological research is revealing its archaeologically visible, deeper roots. The sensorimotor/perceptual and cognitive capacities underpinning aesthetic activities are a major focus of evolutionary aesthetics. Here we take a diachronic, evolutionary perspective and assess ongoing scepticism regarding whether, and to what extent, aesthetic capacity extends to our evolutionary cousins, the Neanderthals. The (...) goal of this article is twofold. First, it serves as a defence of the attribution of Neanderthal aesthetic capacity by marshalling archaeological data best explained by positing a Neanderthal aesthetic sense. Second, it offers an opportunity to make progress on understanding some epistemically relevant features of the wider debate in evolutionary aesthetics. First, we outline and analyse a range of distinct ‘sceptical arguments’ derived from attitudes and claims found in the literature and broader debate that aim to dial down the case for Neanderthal aesthetic capacity. We show that these arguments not only miss their target, they divert the debate away from more compelling questions. We then consider the case for protoaesthetic capacities and sensitivities in the Acheulean stone tool industry and argue that Neanderthals likely inherited the protoaesthetic package from ancient ancestors that they shared with H. sapiens. Finally, we sketch and defend a research agenda for framing Neanderthal aesthetic niche(s) beyond H. sapiens-derived standards, which we see as a priority for future archaeological, cognitive, and philosophical research. While we resist sceptical arguments and the often-implied inferiority of Neanderthals to humans, we also deny that Neanderthals and ancient humans were indistinguishable. Understanding the differences is an important goal of interpretation, and we apply this line of reasoning to the case of aesthetics. (shrink)

Neanderthal extinction is a matter of intense debate. It has been suggested that demography (as opposed to environment or competition) could alone provide a sufficient explanation for the phenomenon. We argue that demography cannot be a ‘stand-alone’ or ‘alternative’ explanation of token extinctions as demographic features are entangled with competitive and environmental factors, and further because demography should not be conflated with neutrality.

People seem to differ in their visual search performance involving emotionally expressive faces when these expressions are seen on faces of others close to their age compared to faces of non-peers, known as the own-age bias. This study sought to compare search advantages in angry and happy faces detected on faces of adults and children on a pool of children and adults. The goals of this study were to examine the developmental trajectory of expression recognition and examine the development of (...) an OAB. Participants were asked to find a target face displaying an emotional expression among eight neutral faces. Results showed that children and adults found happy faces significantly faster than angry and fearful faces regardless of it being present on the faces of peers or non-peers. Adults responded faster to the faces of peers regardless of the expression. Furthermore, while children detected angry faces significantly faster compared to fearful ones, we found no such difference in adults. In contrast, adults detected all expressions significantly faster when they appeared on the faces of other adults compared to the faces of children. In sum, we found evidence for development in detecting facial expressions and also an age-dependent increase in OAB. We suggest that the happy face could have an advantage in visual processing due to its importance in social situations and its overall higher frequency compared to other emotional expressions. Although we only found some evidence on the OAB, using peer or non-peer faces should be a theoretical consideration of future research because the same emotion displayed on non-peers’ compared to peers’ faces may have different implications and meanings to the perceiver. (shrink)

Prior to the advent of whole-genome sequencing in ancient humans, the likelihood that Homo sapiens and Neanderthals admixed has long been debated, mostly on the basis of phenotypic assessments alone. Today, evidence for archaic hominin admixture is being documented in an increasing number of studies, expanding the evidential basis of the debate on whether Homo sapiens and Neanderthals merit separate specific taxonomic status. Here we argue that while new evidence has provided us with a finer-grained picture of ancient intra- and (...) intergroup demographic dynamics, it does not yet justify merging the Neanderthals in an expanded concept of Homo sapiens or abandoning specific taxonomies. We approach this issue and the apparent conflict between molecular and morphology-based taxonomies from a diachronic perspective on lineage divergence, highlighting how different taxonomic properties are expected to arise at different points in time, and from an integrative perspective on different species conceptions and delimitation criteria. We argue that in light of similar “invasions” of the genome among other animal taxa, full reproductive isolation as the final, litmus test for distinct species status should be rather considered a biologically misplaced expectation. Therefore, we suggest that specific nomenclature should not be perceived with embarrassment but rather be justifiably applied in human paleogenomic publications, maintaining congruence with zoological literature. We then briefly consider and problematize recent suggestions that human evolutionary diversification should now be best represented by a ‘braided stream” or a network. We conclude by putting our paleoanthropological case study in the broader context of species delimitation in the genomic era. (shrink)

Many believe that values are crucially dependent on emotions. This paper focuses on epistemic aspects of the putative link between emotions and value by asking two related questions. First, how exactly are emotions supposed to latch onto or track values? And second, how well suited are emotions to detecting or learning about values? To answer the first question, the paper develops the heuristics-model of emotions. This approach models emotions as sui generis heuristics of value. The empirical plausibility of the heuristics-model (...) is demonstrated using evidence from experimental psychology, evolutionary anthropology and neuroscience. The model is used then to answer the second question. If emotions are indeed heuristics of value, then it follows that emotions can be an important and useful source of information about value. However, emotions will not be epistemically superior in the sense of being the highest court of appeal for the justification of axiological beliefs (the latter view is referred to as the Epistemic Dependence Thesis, or EDT for short). The paper applies the heuristics-model to celebrated cases from the philosophy of emotions literature arguing that while the heuristics-model offers a good explanation of typical patterns of emotional reactions in such cases, advocates of EDT will have a hard time accounting for these patterns. The paper also shows that the conclusions drawn from special cases generalize. The paper ends by arguing that skepticism about the metaethical significance of emotions is compatible with a commitment to the importance of emotions in first-order normative ethics. (shrink)

Abstract‘Behavioural modernity’ isn’t what it used to be. Once conceived as an integrated package of traits demarcated by a clear archaeological signal in a specific time and place, it is now disparate, archaeologically equivocal, and temporally and spatially spread. In this paper we trace behavioural modernity’s empirical and theoretical developments over the last three decades, as surprising discoveries in the material record, as well the reappraisal of old evidence, drove increasingly sophisticated demographic, social and cultural models of behavioural modernity. We (...) argue, however, that some approaches to identifying and categorizing modernity have not kept up with this new picture. This is due to what we term ‘Rubicon expectations’: classificatory and interpretive practices which look for or assume clear demarcations in behavioural and cultural processes. We develop a philosophical account of ‘investigative disintegration’ to capture how our understanding of behavioural modernity has changed, and how Rubicon-based practices have become inadequate. Disintegration, in the form we analyse, occurs when scientists’ conception of a phenomenon shifts sufficiently to reshape an investigation’s epistemic structure. For behavioural modernity, the explanatory weight which once lay on identifying ‘switch-points’ in the innate suite of hominin cognitive capacities, lies now in understanding the social and demographic environments that were capable of sustaining and nourishing more complex material cultures. Finally, we argue that the phenomenon itself has not disintegrated to the point that we are left with no interesting explanandum: for all its mosaic, disparate nature, there are still good reasons for behavioural modernity to retain its central place in investigation of our species' origins. (shrink)

Though the last decade has seen a growing interest in pragmatic approaches to scientific explanation, the question as to the real nature of these attempts has not been answered as yet. Three possibilities are investigated: 1. the pragmatic turn is a kind of linguistic turn where "pragmatic" refers to linguistic pragmatics; 2. the pragmatic turn is a semiotic turn in that the term "pragmatic" should be understood in the sense of semiotic pragmatics; 3. the pragmatic turn is in fact a (...) methodological turn and thus does not consist in relativizing explanations to linguistic situations or interpreters, but it manifests itself in applying a well known but in the theory of science unusual way of model-formation. Assumption is argued for by contrasting two possible senses of the concept "model". As a result, the dividing line must not be drawn between "pragmatic" and "non-pragmatic" accounts of scientific explanation, but between models which constitute necessary and sufficient conditions for correct explanations, and abstract analogical models which use knowledge about a certain fragment of natural language to infer new information about the structure of explanations. The role of pragmatics in the latter type of models is characterized by referring to recent results concerning the question-answer relationship. Finally, the properties of abstract analogical models seem to suggest that the methodological-pragmatic turn is possibly progressive with respect to the special theory of science. (shrink)

Enth.: Die philosophische Aktualität des Leninismus / Andras Gedö. Zur Aktualität der Leninschen Positivismus-Kritik / Manfred Buhr. Positivistische "Philosophie der Wissenschaft" im Lichte der Wissenschaft / Vladimir Ruml.

Starting from an overview of approaches to naturalized epistemology, the paper shows, firstly, that Quine's programme yields a sceptical paradox. This means that Quine's attempt to defeat scepticism itself yields a rather strong argument for scepticism and thus against his own programme of naturalized epistemology. Secondly, it is shown that this paradox can be solved by an approach called reflexive-heuristic naturalism. Finally, the paper also raises some fundamental problems which the solution proposed has to leave open.

The prevailing justification for constitutional institutions is that such institutions reflect and enable rational solutions to social problems. However, constitutions are constructed through emotionally driven processes that reflect both the public sentiments of the day and, at least to some extent, basic moral emotions. Historical examples from France and the United States demonstrate the role of such emotional processes in shaping the design of liberal constitutionalism. Further, constitutional law both sets and regulates emotional display rules; favors or disfavors certain emotional (...) commitments; and, particularly through the formulation of fundamental human rights, reflects and shapes emotional moral judgments. The emotional contributors to constitutional design and interpretation may be called “constitutional sentiments.”. (shrink)

A simple inductive argument shows natural languages to have infinitly many sentences, but workers in the field have uncovered clear evidence of a diverse group of ‘exceptional’ languages from Proto-Uralic to Dyirbal and most recently, Pirahã, that appear to lack recursive devices entirely. We argue that in an information-theoretic setting non-recursive natural languages appear neither exceptional nor functionally inferior to the recursive majority.

As regards the question of what matters in survival two views have been identified: on the one hand, we have the view that what matters is identity (the so-called ?commonsense view?) and, on the other hand, we have the view that what matters is the holding of certain psychological connections between various mental states over time (the relation R). Several attempts have tried to reconcile these two views involving the so-called ?multiple occupancy view? or ?cohabitation thesis?. Even if the latter (...) comes in several formulations, common elements are, positing the appropriateness of a description of the fission case according to which the post-fission persons existed prior to fission and also, that what determines that two persons who exist at a certain time are distinct can be facts about what is the case at other times. The paper discusses three of the most influential formulations of the multiple occupancy view, which intend to reconcile identity with what matters, and argues that for various reasons these at least do not work in this regard. (shrink)

« Dem Namenlosen fühl ich mich vertrauter… »R. M. Rilke : Fortschritt Bien que les fragments des Âges du monde, promesses pour toujours inaccomplies d’un chef-d’œuvre de la période médiane de F. W. J. von Schelling, comptent parmi les écrits les plus populaires du philosophe de Leonberg, leur puissance philosophique et, par suite, leur importance dans la formation de la pensée schellingienne sont souvent sous-estimées par l’historiographie philosophique en général et par la réception francoph...

Bioeconomy solutions potentially reduce the utilization demand of natural resources, and therefore, represent steps towards circular economy, but are not per se equivalent to sustainability. Thus, production may remain to be achieved against losses in natural resources or at other environmental costs, and materials produced by bioeconomy are not necessarily biodegradable. As a consequence, the assumption that emerging bioeconomy by itself provides an environmentally sustainable economy is not justified, as technologies do not necessarily become sustainable merely through their conversion to (...) using renewable resources for their production. A source of the above assumption is that the utility of bioeconomy is mostly assessed in interaction between technology developers and economists, resulting in biased assessment with private commercial technology benefits being included, but environmental costs, especially longer term ones, not being sufficiently considered in the economic models. A possible solution to this conceptual contradiction may come from bioethics, as a strong concept in environmental ethics is that no technological intervention can be imposed on nature beyond its receptive capacity. To achieve a better balanced analysis of bioeconomy, environmental and ecological, as well as non-economic social aspects, need to be included in the overall assessment. (shrink)

The thirty year long friendship between Imre Lakatos and the classic scholar and historian of mathematics Árpád Szabó had a considerable influence on the ideas, scholarly career and personal life of both scholars. After recalling some relevant facts from their lives, this paper will investigate Szabó's works about the history of pre-Euclidean mathematics and its philosophy. We can find many similarities with Lakatos' philosophy of mathematics and science, both in the self-interpretation of early axiomatic Greek mathematics as Szabó reconstructs it, (...) and in the general overview Szabó provides us about the turn from the intuitive methods of Greek mathematicians to the strict axiomatic method of Euclid's Elements. As a conclusion, I will argue that the correct explanation of these similarities is that in their main works they developed ideas they had in common from the period of intimate intellectual contact in Hungarian academic life in the mid-twentieth century. In closing, I will recall some relevant features of this background that deserve further research. (shrink)

Why did Kierkegaard prefer to write his masterpieces under different pseudonyms and what was the theatrical logic behind the constant playfulness of an author otherwise doomed to melancholy? What were the reasons of his ongoing philosophical, theological and aesthetic hide-and-seek that he did not want to finish until the very last, nearly tragic phase of his authorship? How much inspiration did Kierkegaard receive from theatrical performances, from playwrights and even from actors and actresses of 19th-century Copenhagen, which seemed to be (...) sometimes stronger than the influence exercised on him by his professors, masters and theologians of Denmark’s “Golden Age”? Can the difference between direct and indirect communication that basically characterized Kierkegaard’s oeuvre be described in theatrical terms or even to approach it as an ongoing dramatic dialogue? Should we rather call it a “polylogue” as different actors are present throughout the texts that were often polemic with each other, simultaneously reflecting certain issues from different angles and finally Kierkegaard denying that any of those were written by him? Could his own name be a pseudonym, as his brother suggested when giving the eulogy on the prodigal son, who learned to doubt from Socrates and from Descartes, yet could not give up his intention to question even the final axioms of human existence? The author tries to find answers to these questions by reconstructing the very special Kierkegaardian method, so familiar from the stage, in the spiritual, cultural and theatrical context of Kierkegaard’s Denmark. (shrink)

Individualists hold that moral responsibility can be ascribed to single human beings only. An important collectivist objection is that individualism is morally deficient because it leaves a normative residue. Without attributing responsibility to collectives there remains a “deficit in the accounting books” (Pettit). This collectivist strategy often uses judgment aggregation paradoxes to show that the collective can be responsible when no individual is. I argue that we do not need collectivism to handle such cases because the individualist analysis leaves no (...) responsibility-deficit. Harm suffered in such situations can have only two sources. Harm is either due to culpable wrongdoing by individuals. Harm is then redressed by holding these individuals responsible. Or harm does not result from culpable wrongdoing. Such harm may have to be redressed too, but not because anyone is responsible for it. Therefore, the charge of moral insensitivity against individualist accounts can be rejected. Furthermore, in the last section of the chapter I will show that collectivist talk about moral responsibility can be used for ethically questionable purposes as well. Collectivists cannot claim the moral high ground. (shrink)

If the task of constitutional theory is to set out a language in which the discourse of constitutional law may be grounded, a question of the utmost importance is how this terminology is created, defined and interpreted. In this groundbreaking new work, András Jakab maps out and analyses the grammar and vocabulary on which the core European traditions of constitutional theory are based. He suggests understanding key constitutional concepts as responses to historical and present day challenges experienced by European societies. (...) Drawing together a great and diverse range of literature, much of which has never before been touched upon by scholarship in the English language, Jakab reconceptualises and argues for a new understanding of European constitutional law discourse. In so doing he shines new light on what constitutes its distinctively European nature. This remarkable book is essential reading for all scholars and students of constitutional theory in Europe and beyond. (shrink)