Philosophy needs History of Science needs History of Philosophy. The purpose of this essay is to identify why history of science and philosophy of science have lost their former alliance. Reasons include, among others, structural elements in funding, e.g. a run‐down version of interdisciplinarity that encourages philosophy and history to work with the sciences rather than with each other. Moreover, the disciplinary assemblage in terms of cultural studies (German: Kulturwissenschaften) has eroded the continental concept of ‘Geisteswissenschaft’ to which history and (...) philosophy traditionally belong. In consequence, both disciplines face a loss of knowledge in historical terminologies and related inquiries. Above all, these matter for shaping and understanding concepts and ideas; not last for the conceptualization of history and philosophy of science themselves. (shrink)

Spiel und Arbeit gelten oft als Gegensätze: Das Spiel als freie Betätigung menschlicher Vermögen, die Arbeit als deren Subordination unter einen äußeren Zweck. Die Festlegung des Spiels auf konsequenzlose Wiederholbarkeit hat ihm den Ruf des Unernsten eingetragen, während das Abzwecken der Arbeit auf die Nützlichkeit ihres Resultats im Bund mit der Sorge ums Dasein steht. Auf einen zweiten Blick scheint dieser Gegensatz jedoch, gerade in den hochentwickeltsten Ausprägungen beider Tätigkeitsformen, zu verschwinden. So kann eine hochgradige Rationalisierung von Spielpraktiken in Arbeit (...) umschlagen, wie etwa im Leistungssport, oder ein komplexer Arbeitsvorgang selbstzweckhafte Momente und Eigendynamiken gewinnen, die ihm Spielcharakter verleihen. Auch andere technologische Entwicklungen geben Anlass dazu, das Verhältnis von Spiel und Arbeit noch einmal grundsätzlich zu bedenken, etwa im Hinblick auf: adaptive Systeme in der Robotik, serious games, Kreativitätstechniken in Unternehmenskulturen, wissenschaftliche Experimentalanordnungen, Online-Rollenspiele oder die Kommodifizierung nicht-zweckrationaler Lebensvollzüge, die traditionell vom Begriff produktiver Arbeit ausgeschlossen waren – einschließlich der Spielräume, die durch neue Umwelt- und Biotechniken erschlossen werden. Die Beschaffenheit der jeweils zum Einsatz kommenden Mittel und Verfahren sowie die Setzung, Variation oder Preisgabe von Zwecken können den Charakter von Spiel und Arbeit sowie ihr Verhältnis zueinander bestimmen oder verändern. Mit Beiträgen von Francesco Amigoni, Andreas Brenneis, Petra Gehring, Armin Grunwald, Florian Heßdörfer, Wolfram Ette, Christoph Hubig, Andreas Kaminski, Nicole C. Karafyllis, Christian Klager, Alexander Kluge, Uwe Küster, Oliver Laas, Hildrun Lampe, Pieter Lemmens, Stefan Meißner, Alfred Nordmann, Felix Raczkowski, Markus Rautzenberg, Michael Resch, Nicole J. Saam, Viola Schiaffonati, Alexander Schmidl, Jan C. Schmidt und G. Günter Voß. (shrink)

This article presents evidence supporting the claim that ethical reasoning is a skill that can be taught and assessed. We propose a working definition of ethical reasoning as 1) the ability to identify, analyze, and weigh moral aspects of a particular situation, and 2) to make decisions that are informed and warranted by the moral investigation. The evidence consists of a description of an ethical reasoning education program—Ethical Reasoning in Action —designed to increase ethical reasoning skills in a variety of (...) situations and areas of life. ERiA is housed at a public, major comprehensive U.S. university—James Madison University—and assessment of the program focuses on interventions delivered prior to and during orientation for incoming first-year students. Findings indicate that the interventions measurably enhance the ability of undergraduate students to reason ethically. ERiA’s competency-targeted program and positive student learning outcomes offers a promising model for higher education ethics programs seeking to connect classroom learning in ethics to decision-making in everyday life. (shrink)

Three basic political positions on embryo research will be identified as libertarian, conservative, and social-democratic. The Human Embryo Research Panel will be regarded as an expression of the social-democratic position. A taxonomy of the ethical issues addressed by the Panel will then be developed at the juncture of political and ethical modes of reflection. Among the arguments considered will be those for the separability of the abortion and embryo research debates; arguments against the possibility of the preembryo being a person, (...) especially arguments associated with totipotency and the significance of the primitive streak; and the various reasons for regulating embryo research, including those associated with respect for the preembryo, the protection of traditional views of human procreation, and the prevention of commercialization. (shrink)

In his 1841-2 Berlin lectures, Schelling critiques German idealism’s negative method of regressing from existence to its first principle, which is supposed to be intelligible without remainder. He sees existence as precisely its remainder since there could be nothing that exists. To solve this, Schelling enlists the positive method of progressing from the fact of existence to a proof of this principle’s reality. Since this proof faces the absurdity that there is anything rather than nothing, he concludes that this fact’s (...) constitution and this principle’s proof are mutually dependent, non-dischargeable tasks. I trace this reciprocal relation to one Kant establishes between the constitutive categories of experience and the experience that proves their applicability and argue that it adheres to Kant’s threefold criterion of proof. I do so by uncovering the Maimonian skeptical motivation—specifically, the need to answer what I call the question quid indicii—behind the qualified return to Kant on which Schelling’s critique of idealism relies. (shrink)

When seeing a jaguar, we can see all the spots on its mantle without seeing a determinate number, N, of spots on the mantle. How is this visual phenomenon possible? Philosophers have tried to provide a reliable answer to this question, by recruiting evidence from vision science about the way attention works. Here we push this idea forward, by suggesting that an alternative and less complex solution, with respect to the one proposed in the literature, is possible. In particular, we (...) argue that the puzzling visual phenomenon of 'seeing entities without seeing N-entities' strictly depends on the specific number of entities we are simultaneously attending to: a problematic scenario concerning this visual process arises only when the number of entities in the visual field exceeds a specific quantity. This depends, as we argue, on the fact that the nature of our visual content is modulated, in this perceptual scenario, by the limited way we can exercise visual attention on the properties of the objects of our perception. Differently from other accounts, our proposal allows us to properly define when and why such a problem arises, and explains why such a situation has traditionally been found to be so puzzling. Our idea is also well motivated by experimental results that so far have not been taken into account in the debate. (shrink)

Despite a growing number of models argument for the logical possibility of changing the past there continues to be resistance to and confusion surrounding the possibility of changing the past. In this paper I shall attempt to mitigate the resistance and alleviate at least some of the confusion by distinguishing changing the past from what Richard Hanley calls ‘annulling’ the past and distinguishing both from what I shall call ‘otherwising’ the past.

2011 Reprint of 1943 Edition. Full facsimile of the original edition, not reproduced with Optical Recognition Software. "St. Thomas Aquinas" is enriched by the author's unique ability to see the world through the saint's eyes, a fresh and animated view that shows us Aquinas as no other biography has. Acclaimed as the best book ever written on Aquinas by such outstanding Thomists as Jacques Maritain, Etienne Gilson, and Anton Pegis, this brilliant biography will completely capture the reader and leave him (...) desirous of reading Aquinas' own monumental work. (shrink)

This book offers the first comprehensive introduction to wave scattering in nonstationary materials. G. F. Roach's aim is to provide an accessible, self-contained resource for newcomers to this important field of research that has applications across a broad range of areas, including radar, sonar, diagnostics in engineering and manufacturing, geophysical prospecting, and ultrasonic medicine such as sonograms. New methods in recent years have been developed to assess the structure and properties of materials and surfaces. When light, sound, or some other (...) wave energy is directed at the material in question, "imperfections" in the resulting echo can reveal a tremendous amount of valuable diagnostic information. The mathematics behind such analysis is sophisticated and complex. However, while problems involving stationary materials are quite well understood, there is still much to learn about those in which the material is moving or changes over time. These so-called non-autonomous problems are the subject of this fascinating book. Roach develops practical strategies, techniques, and solutions for mathematicians and applied scientists working in or seeking entry into the field of modern scattering theory and its applications. Wave Scattering by Time-Dependent Perturbations is destined to become a classic in this rapidly evolving area of inquiry. (shrink)

Предназначено для представителей науки и образования, политических партий, общественных и религиозных организаций, органов государственного управления.