Moritz Schulz explores counterfactual thought and language: what would have happened if things had gone a different way. Counterfactual questions may concern large scale derivations or small scale evaluations of minor derivations. A common impression, which receives a thorough defence in the book, is that oftentimes we find it impossible to know what would have happened. However, this does not mean that we are completely at a loss: we are typically capable of evaluating counterfactual questions probabilistically: we can say (...) what would have been likely or unlikely to happen. Schulz describes these probabilistic ways of evaluating counterfactual questions and turns the data into a novel account of the workings of counterfactual thought. (shrink)

This article is both an elaborated critique on the one-sided analysis of the misogynist nature of ballet as a cultural practice, and a contribution to a more embodied feminist theory. Based on empirical material, that was brought together by observing the body practices in ballet and listening to the life stories of dancers, the author explores the contradictions that the body in ballet provokes. In describing the embodied experiences ofprofessional ballet dancers she shows that ballet offers women the possibility to (...) transcend the discontinuity of body, mind and emotions. (shrink)

The authors discuss concepts of health and disease in Chinese medicine, new interpretative techniques in psychotherapy, concepts of culture and the notion of risk, Brecht's and Wallner's Verfremdung and Wallner's Constructive Realism compared to Glasersfeld's Radical Constructivism. The book shows the rare situation of philosophy becoming concrete.

Children posit unobserved causes when events appear to occur spontaneously. What about when events appear to occur probabilistically? Here toddlers saw arbitrary causal relationships in a fixed, alternating order. The relationships were then changed in one of two ways. In the Deterministic condition, the event order changed ; in the Probabilistic condition, the causal relationships changed. As intended, toddlers looked equally long at both changes. We then introduced a previously unseen candidate cause. Toddlers looked longer at the appearance of a (...) hand and novel agent in the Deterministic than the Probabilistic conditions, but looked equally long at novel non-agents, suggesting that by 2 years of age, toddlers connect probabilistic events with unobserved agents. (shrink)

This paper aims to provide an account of the relationship between self-esteem and moral experience. In particular, drawing on feminist and phenomenological accounts of affectivity and ethics, I argue that self-esteem has a primary role in moral epistemology and moral action. I start by providing a characterization of self-esteem, suggesting in particular that it can be best understood through the phenomenological notion of “existential feeling.” Examining the dynamics characteristic of the so-called “impostor phenomenon” and the experience of women who are (...) involved in abusive relationships, I then claim that self-esteem fundamentally shapes the way in which self and others are conceived, and the ethical demands and obligations to which they are considered to be subjected. More specifically, I argue that low self-esteem—which in the experience of women may be rooted in particular assumptions regarding gender roles and stereotyping—can hinder autonomy, make it difficult to question other people's evaluative perspectives and behaviors, and attribute to others responsibility for their actions. (shrink)

Canonical Propositional Gentzen-type systems are systems which in addition to the standard axioms and structural rules have only pure logical rules with the sub-formula property, in which exactly one occurrence of a connective is introduced in the conclusion, and no other occurrence of any connective is mentioned anywhere else. In this paper we considerably generalize the notion of a “canonical system” to first-order languages and beyond. We extend the Propositional coherence criterion for the non-triviality of such systems to rules with (...) unary quantifiers and show that it remains constructive. Then we provide semantics for such canonical systems using 2-valued non-deterministic matrices extended to languages with quantifiers, and prove that the following properties are equivalent for a canonical system G: (1) G admits Cut-Elimination, (2) G is coherent, and (3) G has a characteristic 2-valued non-deterministic matrix. (shrink)

In this paper, we address the larger notion of cooperation in interaction and its underlying dimensions as defined in Conversation Analysis: alignment and affiliation. Focusing on three cases from three different languages we investigate a specific practice, that of anticipatory completions, in a particular context, that of storytelling, and show that the practice of completing another speaker’s turn in an anticipatory manner is not de facto definable as either an aligning or non-aligning action, nor can it be said to be (...) either affiliating or non-affiliating. Through our analyses, we aim to distinguish and illustrate the manifold layers of and perspectives to alignment and affiliation and argue for their relevance for studies of interactional phenomena. We conclude that the notion of cooperation and its implementation through affiliating and/or aligning actions is a multi-layered and complex issue, the intricacies of which are best understood and captured through detailed sequential analyses. (shrink)

Volume 19, Issue 6, June 2019, Page 41-42.

Pluripotent stem cells have gained special attraction because of their almost unlimited proliferation and differentiation capacity in vitro. These properties substantiate the potential of pluripotent stem cells in basic research and regenerative medicine. Here three types of in vitro‐cultured pluripotent stem cells (embryonic carcinoma, embryonic stem and induced pluripotent stem cells) are compared in their historical context with respect to their different origin and properties. It became evident that tumourigenicity is an inherent property of pluripotent cells based on p53 down‐regulation, (...) expression of tumour‐related genes and high telomerase activity that allow unlimited proliferation. In addition, culture‐adapted genetic and epigenetic changes may induce tumourigenicity of pluripotent cells. The use of stem cells in regenerative medicine, however, requires non‐malignant cell types and strategies that circumvent stages of malignancy. Reprogramming strategies of adult somatic cells that avoid the tumourigenic state of pluripotency may offer alternatives for future biomedical application. (shrink)

The project of critical management theory is based on a view of a theorist who intervenes in the activity of managers and employees aiming at their emancipation. It involves an image of subjectivity governed by structural determinants that render the subject incapable of freeing himself without a scholar's involvement. In the discussion that follows, I seek to explain how this image has been developed and how it paved the way to ethical–methodological necessity, which obliges the theorist to intervene in the (...) realities of the objects of their study. I contrast this with a view of subjectivity provided by Søren Kierkegaard. I explain how he theorizes its relationship with the ethical and the limitations in generating knowledge claims about the morality of the other. (shrink)

The article reviews the book Orthodox Readings of Aquinas, by Marcus Plested.

Patients are usually granted autonomy rights, including the right to consent to or refuse treatment. These rights are commonly attributed to patients if they fulfil certain conditions. For example, a patient must sufficiently understand the information given to them before making a treatment decision. On the one hand, there is a large group of patients who meet these conditions. On the other hand, there is a group that clearly does not meet these conditions, including comatose patients or patients in the (...) late stages of Alzheimer’s disease. Then there is a group of patients who fall into the range in between. At the lower end of this range are so-called ‘marginal agents,’ which include young children and patients in the middle stages of Alzheimer’s disease. They also do not meet the typical requirements for autonomy, which is why they are usually granted fewer autonomy rights. However, some of them are capable of ‘pre-forms’ of autonomy that express what is important to them. These pre-forms differ from mere desires and reflect the identification/authenticity condition of autonomy. They have something in common with autonomous attitudes, choices, and actions – namely, they express the _value_ of autonomy. As I will argue, autonomy is a value worthy of protection and promotion – even in its non-reflexive forms. Against this background, it becomes clear _why_ we have autonomy duties, more precisely positive, autonomy-enabling duties, towards marginal agents and why we should give them as much attention as autonomy duties towards competent patients. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This paper investigates from a phenomenological perspective the origins of self-illness ambiguity. Drawing on phenomenological theories of affectivity and selfhood, I argue that, as a phenomenon which concerns primarily the ‘personal self’, self-illness ambiguity is dependent on distinct alterations of affective background orientations. I start by illustrating how personhood is anchored in the experience of a specific set of non-intentional affects – i.e. moods or existential feelings – alterations of which are often present in mental ill-health. Also through the (...) exploration of the phenomenology of acute and long-term anxiety, I suggest that self-illness ambiguity originates in the presence of moods or existential feelings that are in tension with the ones that structure the person’s experience prior to the onset of the illness or when its symptoms are not experienced. More specifically, I claim that due to their ability to ‘block’ or ‘suspend’ some of the person’s affective and cognitive responses, such affective orientations may unsettle one’s self-defining evaluative perspective, leading to uncertainty and doubting about one’s personal self. (shrink)

During its century-long unfolding, spreading in numerous directions, Husserlian phenomenology while loosening inner articulations, has nevertheless maintained a somewhat consistent profile. As we see in this collection, the numerous conceptions and theories advanced in the various phases of reinterpretations have remained identifiable with phenomenology. What conveys this consistency in virtue of which innumerable types of inquiry-scientific, social, artistic, literary – may consider themselves phenomenological? Is it not the quintessence of the phenomenological quest, namely our seeking to reach the very foundations (...) of reality at all its constitutive levels by pursuing its logos? Inquiring into the logos of the phenomenological quest we discover, indeed, all the main constitutive spheres of reality and of the human subject involved in it, and concurrently, the logos itself comes to light in the radiation of its force (Tymieniecka). Papers by: Kristana Arp, Gary Backhaus, Mafalda Blanc, Piotr Blaszczyk, Manuel Bremer, Jonathan Lahey Dronsfield, Peter Abumhenre Egbe, Jesus Adrian Escudero, Wayne Froman, Jorge Garcia-Gomez, David Grunberg, Dasuke Kamei, Arion Kelkel, Filip Kolen, Tze-wan Kwan, Leonard Lawlor, Grahame Lock, Nancy Mardas, Nikolay Milkov, Cezary J. Olbromski, Helena De Preester, Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka, Gertrudis Van de Vijver, Luca Vanzago, Anatoly Zotov. (shrink)

This study of the Sicilian Questions of the philosopher and mystic Ibn Sabٴ īn of Murcia interprets the structure and sources of the text as a reflection of intellectual life in the late Almohad Arab West.

In the paper we are analyzing the Polish ART market. It can be noticed that the lack of legal regulation has resulted in many discrepancies among the policies adopted by various ART agencies. The social acceptance of ART procedures available mostly in private clinics led to growing commercialization of the Polish ART market. Additionally, the language of gift and altruistic rhetoric that are overwhelmingly employed by ART agencies reveals hypocrisy of the Polish ART market.

An overview of core phenomena and processes leading to Freud’s establishing his psycho-analytic method and early metatheoretical concepts is followed by the author’s revision of his topographical model into a seamless biosemiotic theory of mind and human communication. A careful methodological analysis of the semantic/referential scope; speech/listening processes, and semiotic features, of a dialogue designed to make the unconscious conscious, reveals an epistemological bridge between psychoanalytic methodology and the biosemiotic agenda within a unifying inter-penetrative paradigm.

L’heure est à la commémoration du mouvement de 1968, en Allemagne comme ailleurs. On considère que 1968 est à l’origine des nouveaux mouvements sociaux des années 1970 et 1980, dont le mouvement des femmes. Premier d’une série de mouvements sociaux, le « nouveau mouvement des femmes » émerge en Allemagne en 1971 au cours du processus de mobilisation contre la loi sur l’avortement (article 218 du code pénal). L’engagement des femmes est moins visible dans les mouvements protestataires de la f...

Immanuel Kant offers definitions of “sexual desire” and “sexual use” in the Metaphysics of Morals that occasion an inconsistency within his moral system, for they entail that sexual desire, as a natural inclination that is conditionally good, is also categorically objectifying, and thus per se immoral according to the second formulation of the Categorical Imperative. Following Alan Soble, various attempts to resolve the inconsistency are here criticized before more suitable, and suitably Kantian, definitions of these terms are offered. It is (...) argued that these new definitions resolve the inconsistency. (shrink)

Lysander, who defeated Athens in 404 BC, polarized not only Greece, but also Sparta, where his room for maneuver was sometimes extended, and sometimes curtailed by the political bodies and protagonists. In the Gerousia Lysander’s supporters were mostly in the majority and made sure that his opponents were convicted and that he himself was protected from lawsuits and penalties. Perhaps these Gerontes not only stood behind Lysander’s imperialist post-war order, but also behind his plan to make the kingship elective. This (...) collaboration would be astonishing because the Gerousia has been considered as conservative since antiquity; but it would be perhaps less a sign of audacity than of a will to create. The extent of the resistance to such a policy can be gauged from the pamphlet of King Pausanias, which can be understood as a knee-jerk defense of the hereditary monarchy. (shrink)

This article is an attempt to analyze and criticize, both positively and negatively. Whitehead's concept of progress. Whitehead's progressive cosmology is critically examined, as is the relationship between technology and moral progress. The fragility of progress is emphasized.