Ideas about heredity and evolution are undergoing a revolutionary change. New findings in molecular biology challenge the gene-centered version of Darwinian theory according to which adaptation occurs only through natural selection of chance DNA variations. In Evolution in Four Dimensions, Eva Jablonka and Marion Lamb argue that there is more to heredity than genes. They trace four "dimensions" in evolution -- four inheritance systems that play a role in evolution: genetic, epigenetic, behavioral, and symbolic. These systems, they argue, can all (...) provide variations on which natural selection can act. Evolution in Four Dimensions offers a richer, more complex view of evolution than the gene-based, one-dimensional view held by many today. The new synthesis advanced by Jablonka and Lamb makes clear that induced and acquired changes also play a role in evolution.After discussing each of the four inheritance systems in detail, Jablonka and Lamb "put Humpty Dumpty together again" by showing how all of these systems interact. They consider how each may have originated and guided evolutionary history and they discuss the social and philosophical implications of the four-dimensional view of evolution. Each chapter ends with a dialogue in which the authors engage the contrarieties of the fictional "I.M.," or Ifcha Mistabra -- Aramaic for "the opposite conjecture" -- refining their arguments against I.M.'s vigorous counterarguments. The lucid and accessible text is accompanied by artist-physician Anna Zeligowski's lively drawings, which humorously and effectively illustrate the authors' points. (shrink)

Proponents of the reasoning view analyze normative reasons as premises of good reasoning and explain the normativity of reasons by appeal to their role as premises of good reasoning. The aim of this paper is to cast doubt on the reasoning view by providing counterexamples to the proposed analysis of reasons, counterexamples in which premises of good reasoning towards φ‐ing are not reasons to φ.

Das folgende Essay erläutert, warum der Tod Gottes sowohl in einem konsequent theistischen System als auch bei atheistischen Denkern unausweichlich ist. Zur Beantwortung der Frage, wie Gott gestorben ist, werden hauptsächlich Autoren wie Friedrich W. Schelling , Friedrich Nietzsche und Peter Sloterdijk herangezogen. Da die Rede vom Tod Gottes den Verdacht erweckt, metaphorisch zu sein, werden wir mit Apoptose und Nekrose auch zwei unterschiedliche Metaphern anwenden, um den vorliegenden Sachverhalt zu beschreiben . Das letzte Kapitel fragt dann nach den Konsequenzen (...) von Gottes Tod für die heutige Ethik.The following essay describes the death of god as unavoidable in a consequent theistic as well as in an atheistic system. To answer the question: how god died, philosophers like Friedrich W. Schelling , Friedrich Nietzsche und Peter Sloterdijk were taken into consideration. For the matter of god’s death is suggestive of being metaphorical, we use two different metaphors to discuss the issue – apoptosis and necrosis . Finally the last chapter asks for the consequences of god’s death concerning nowadays ethics. (shrink)

According to orthodoxy, there are two basic moods of supposition: indicative and subjunctive. The most popular formalizations of the corresponding norms of suppositional judgement are given by Bayesian conditionalization and Lewisian imaging, respectively. It is well known that Bayesian conditionalization can be generalized (via Jeffrey conditionalization) to provide a model for the norms of partial indicative supposition. This raises the question of whether imaging can likewise be generalized to model the norms of ‘partial subjunctive supposition’. The present article casts doubt (...) on whether the most natural generalizations of imaging are able to provide a plausible account of the norms of partial subjunctive supposition. (shrink)

In 2009, Tennie et al. proposed the theory of the Zone of Latent Solutions, defined as the range of behaviors an individual of a species can invent independently, i.e., which it can acquire without any form of social learning. By definition, species limited to their ZLS are unable to innovate and/or transmit behavioral traits outside their ZLS, i.e., they lack traits which go beyond the level of the individual—traits resulting from a gradual cultural evolution over successive transmission events [“cumulative culture”, (...) Boyd and Richerson ]. However, this does not exclude an influence of social learning on the population frequency of these behaviors: social learning can facilitate the acquisition of latent solutions and thus speed up and consolidate their spread within a population. Cultures—defined as behaviors at least influenced by social learning—are therefore still possible. Here, we elaborate on the ZLS account and relate it to the theories of Vygotsky who studied the role of social learning in human culture. We argue that the ZLS is a missing phylogenetic “baseline” of Vygotsky’s Zone of Actual Development. Vygotsky’s neglect of a need for a human “baseline ZAD” may have been due to his interpretation of Köhler’s work on great ape behaviors: Köhler used his observations on individual chimpanzees to draw conclusions about the chimpanzee species as a whole, stating that chimpanzees can only copy what they could have invented themselves, thus coming close to the ZLS concept. Vygotsky—studying the range of behaviors individuals could achieve independently—seemingly did not see that Köhler was suggesting a species “baseline”, upon which Vygotsky’s idea of an individual’s ZAD could develop. As a result, Vygotsky also did not see the need for a ZLS for his own study subjects: humans. Yet, there is no reason to assume that humans lack a ZLS, and in fact we present evidence for a human ZLS for tool-use behaviors. (shrink)

In this comment we take up two points made by Douglas Hollan in his article “Emerging Issues in the Cross-Cultural Study of Empathy,” and discuss their possible philosophical implications. Hollan‘s concept of complex empathy may give rise to the idea that we can learn about other people’s beliefs via empathy, which is something we do not believe is possible. Furthermore, Hollan’s description of possible negative effects of empathy, such as manipulations of a person on the basis of knowledge about their (...) emotions, might pose a problem for proponents of care ethics, who generally start from the assumption that empathy fosters altruistic behavior. (shrink)

We introduce a very weak language L M on p-adic fields K, which is just rich enough to have exactly the same definable subsets of the line K that one has using the ring language. (In our context, definable always means definable with parameters.) We prove that the only definable functions in the language L M are trivial functions. We also give a definitional expansion $L\begin{array}{*{20}{c}} ' \\ M \\ \end{array} $ of L M in which K has quantifier elimination, (...) and we obtain a cell decomposition result for L M -definable sets. Our language L M can serve as a p-adic analogue of the very weak language (<) on the real numbers, to define a notion of minimality on the field of p-adic numbers and on related valued fields. These fields are not necessarily Henselian and may have positive characteristic. (shrink)

Why is it that some business managers appear to behave differently in private and at work? How, if at all, are the decisions managers make affected by the nature of their organisations? What impact do organisational values have on the moral autonomy of managers? A research project into these questions is now under way in three disparate Australian business firms and this paper sets out the premise underlying it. For purposes of research the general premise is that the moral character (...) of a business influences the moral judgements and actions of its members. More specifically, it is suggested that the economic paradigm renders a business organisation amoral rather than moral or immoral, and as a result moral responsibility comes to be assigned to individual members. However, the socio-cultural nature of such firms interferes with the ability of managers to exercise moral autonomy. Governed as it is by the market or laws of economics, the amoral organisation is likely to transform its members into individuals without moral standards. (shrink)

We study a reduct ${\mathcal{L}_*}$ of the ring language where multiplication is restricted to a neighbourhood of zero. The language is chosen such that for p-adically closed fields K, the ${\mathcal{L}_*}$ -definable subsets of K coincide with the semi-algebraic subsets of K. Hence structures (K, ${\mathcal{L}_*}$ ) can be seen as the p-adic counterpart of the o-minimal structure of semibounded sets. We show that in this language, p-adically closed fields admit cell decomposition, using cells similar to p-adic semi-algebraic cells. From (...) this we can derive quantifier-elimination, and give a characterization of definable functions. In particular, we conclude that multiplication can only be defined on bounded sets, and we consider the existence of definable Skolem functions. (shrink)

Bodies in China uses Chinese philosophy to reframe Western scholarship on gender, body, and aesthetics. Does Confucianism rule out the capacity of women as moral subjects and hence as aesthetic subjects? Do forms of Chinese philosophy contribute or correspond to patriarchal Confucian culture? Can Chinese philosophy provide alternative perspectives for Western feminist scholars? The first section considers theoretical and philosophical discussions of Western traditions and how the ideas offered by Confucians and Daoists can provide alternative body ontologies for critical feminist (...) practices. The second section reviews female aesthetical representations ranging from The Book of Songs to the work of the controversial body artist He Chengyao. The third section traces changing perceptions of femininity from imperial to its current cosmopolitan era using a range of case studies including Ming dynasty literature, Hong Kong women's fashion in the 1960s, and the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. Overall, this book discusses new conceptual models that feminist scholars are using to displace dualism and emancipate notions of the body from Cartesian models and metaphors. (shrink)

Nach Erläuterung der wesentlichen Begriffe wie „Emotion“ und „Gefühl“ stellt Eva-Maria Engelen die wichtigsten theoretischen Ansätze vor. Dabei spielen sowohl Theorien aus der Philosophie, der Psychologie als auch aus den Neurowissenschaften eine wichtige Rolle. Geklärt wird in weiteren Kapiteln das Verhältnis von Gefühlen und Emotionen zum Verstand, zum Bewusstsein und zu Werten.

The literature on sensory processing disorders in institutionalized infants highlights the impact of early deprivation on infant perception. Through a Merleau-Pontian, hyperdialectic analysis of the extraordinary development of infant perception under circumstances of severe deprivation the intimate link between environmental affordances and perceptual systems becomes apparent. This paper offers an updated reading of Merleau-Ponty’s late work as a philosophy of systems and outlines some fertile philosophical concepts and methods developed by Merleau-Ponty in The visible and the Invisible. Merleau-Ponty’s concept of (...) the chiasm, understood from a systems perspective, and his method of the hyperdialectic are applied in a child case study of an infant who suffered severe neglect in a Romanian orphanage. (shrink)

I review Elizabeth Barnes, The Minority Body very favorably. I argue as well that the substance of the work applies not only to minority bodies but also to “minority minds”. I also argue that the “dis” in disability should be understood as the precarious of maintaining a good life, not to the ability to have a good life. This may be due to both social and medical concerns.

Gibt es eine weibliche bzw. männliche Moral? Orientiert sich das Moralverhalten beider Geschlechter tatsächlich tendenziell an unterschiedlichen Wertvorstellungen? Diese in den letzten Jahren leidenschaftlich und äußerst kontrovers diskutierte Frage beantwortet Eva-Maria Schwickert aus der Perspektive der philosophischen Ethik. Im Blickpunkt des Interesses stehen die begriffliche Bestimmung und die moralische Legitimation beider Orientierungen. Den von Carol Gilligan erhobenen Vorwurf, die "männliche" Gerechtigkeitsmoral sei zu sehr auf Prinzipien konzentriert, findet die Autorin bestätigt und schlägt vor, das Defizit der Gerechtigkeits- durch die Fürsorgeethik (...) auszugleichen. Ziel des gesuchten Ausgleichs ist ein Vermittlungsmodell, das den berechtigten Einwänden Gilligans Rechnung trägt und dennoch nicht auf eine Prinzipienorientierung verzichtet. Das Ergebnis der Studie präsentiert sich als Brückenschlag zwischen der Kantischen Vernunftethik Kohlbergs einerseits und der Aristotelischen Wertethik Gilligans andererseits. Beide Ethiktypen – die der Gerechtigkeit und die der Fürsorge – fordern sich wechselseitig. Gemessen an diesem vertieften Ethikverständnis stellt sich das weibliche Zögern, ein moralisches Urteil zu fällen, nicht mehr als Ausdruck eines unzureichenden Prinzipienbewußtseins, sondern als das eines verantwortungsethisch reflektierten Urteilsvermögens dar. Die Untersuchung spannt einen Bogen zwischen hermeneutischen und ethischen ebenso wie zwischen historischen und systematischen Fragestellungen. Darüber hinaus bietet sie einen Einblick in die aktuelle Diskussion der Diskursethik. (shrink)

Recent policy reports documented that a growing group of students in secondary education could perform better given their expected performance. Studies showed that school performance is related to a range of social-emotional factors, including self-awareness, self-management, social awareness and responsible decision making. However, experimental studies in schools on the relation between these factors and school performance are scarce and results are mixed. This study used a randomized field experiment to examine whether self-reflection on school behavior of underperforming secondary school students (...) affected their school performance (GPA), school engagement and self-concept. The sample comprised 337 9th grade students (M = 15.74 years old; SD = 0.58) from 18 secondary schools in the Netherlands. The intervention was designed in co-creation with teachers, to be as close to school practice as possible. Underperformance was measured using achievement test scores from both primary and secondary school, supplemented with teacher and parental assessments. Different model specifications were estimated to perform the analyses, and test for robustness of findings. The results showed that for treatment compliance, students with higher school motivation were approximately 29 percent more likely to comply. Students who reported higher levels of self-concept of school tasks were 17 percent less likely to comply. No significant effects of the treatment were observed on students’ GPA, school motivation, hours spent on homework or self-concept of school tasks. The treatment showed a negative effect on self-concept of leadership skills. (shrink)

Cursory review of the reception of Adorno's unfinished Aesthetic Theory up to the present suggests that an introduction to the book's major concerns, its structure (or lack thereof), and its concepts is missing to this date. Going back to Fredric Jameson's watershed contribution Late Marxism: Adorno, Or, the Persistence of the Dialectic (1990), the article attempts to provide the introduction missing to date. It is organized around key concepts of Adorno's Aesthetic Theory, beginning with the guiding juxtaposition of Kant's formalist (...) aesthetics vs. Hegel's content aesthetics and the various notions of the End of Art, followed by two sections on art and its respective others (from the culture industry and art appreciation to nature and natural beauty), and concluding with the axiom of suffering and its impact on the key notions of semblance, expression, and mimesis. (shrink)

This article explores Southern Saami reindeer herders’ experiences and contestations over state consultation and corporate dialogue during a conflict over the Øyfjellet wind energy project in Norway. Informed by a committed research approach and juxtaposition with findings from Indigenous peoples' territorial struggles in Latin-America, the article provides critical perspectives on governance practices in a Nordic-Saami green colonial context. The research draws on ethnography from a consultation meeting between Jillen Njaarke, the impacted reindeer herding community, and state authorities, as well as (...) diverse written material. The study suggests that the state- and corporate-led “dialogues” displaced the root cause of the conflict, revealed epistemic miscommunication, and perpetuated relations of domination which limited emancipatory effects for Jillen Njaarke. The premises and discourses underpinning the “dialogues” further reproduced racist notions which devalue ancestral Saami reindeer herding knowledges, practices, and landscape relations. These findings challenge dialogue as prescription of good governance and conflict resolution in a context where democracy and compliance with Indigenous peoples’ rights are perceived as high. (shrink)

With its provocative title, Blumenthal-Barby’s (2024) Target Article is an important addition to the critical work on using ‘personhood’ in bioethics. I suggest it bears on any philosophical discus...

zur fundierenden Rolle des Gefühls bei den Leistungen der Vernunft Eva-Maria Engelen. Eva-Maria Engelen Erkenntnis und Liebe Zur fundierenden Rolle des Gefühls bei den Leistungen der Vernunft Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Eva-Maria ...

This volume addresses whether, how, and where laws (variously defined) teach values and shape moral character in late modern liberal societies. Each author recognizes the essential value of state law in fostering peace, security, health, education, charity, trade, democracy, constitutionalism, justice, and human rights, among many other moral goods. Each author also recognizes, however, the grave betrayals of law in supporting fascism, slavery, apartheid, genocide, persecution, violence, racism, and other forms of immorality and injustice. They thus call for state laws (...) that set a basic civil morality of duty for society and for robust freedoms that protect private individuals and private groups to cultivate a higher morality of aspiration"--Back cover. (shrink)

O propósito deste artigo é o de examinar o ceticismo sobre a moral e as leis tal como abordado e respondido por Guy de Brués nos seus Diálogos contra os Novos Acadêmicos (1557). Proponho que, para uma apreciação adequada desse tema, é preciso distinguir dois níveis em que essa filosofia se apresenta na obra: aquele em que ela é exposta na fala dos personagens incumbidos de defendê-la (sustentando diferentes versões da tese de que “tudo é opinião”) e aquele que é (...) discernível através de alguns pontos de acordo ao longo das discussões, no qual revela-se antes uma afinidade entre os interlocutores com a Nova Academia. Esta situação aparentemente paradoxal pode ser melhor compreendida se cotejamos os Diálogos com a declamatio paradoxal ou o diálogo filosófico de matriz ciceroniana. De modo mais geral, sugerimos que o papel da filosofia da Nova Academia, especialmente em sua dimensão moral e política, é maior do que usualmenre reconhecido na redescoberta do ceticismo na França do século XVI. (shrink)