Indeterminacy in its various forms has been the focus of a great deal of philosophical attention in recent years. Much of this discussion has focused on the status of vague predicates such as ‘tall’, ‘bald’, and ‘heap’. It is determinately the case that a seven-foot person is tall and that a five-foot person is not tall. However, it seems difficult to pick out any determinate height at which someone becomes tall. How best to account for this phenomenon is, of course, (...) a controversial matter. For example, some (such as Sorensen (2001) and Williamson (2002)) maintain that there is a precise height at which someone becomes tall and such apparent cases of indeterminacy merely reflects our ignorance of this fact. Others maintain that there is some genuine – and not merely epistemic – indeterminacy present is such cases and offer various accounts of how best to account for it. Supervaluationists (such as Keefe (2008)), for example, claim that the indeterminacy with respect to vague terms lies in their not having a single definite extension. Rather, each term is associated with a range of possible precise extensions or precisifications such that it is semantically unsettled which is the correct extension. One precisification of ‘tall’ might allow that anyone over five feet ten inches is tall, whereas another would only allow those over six foot to qualify; but no precisification will take someone who is five foot to be tall, and someone who is seven foot will count as tall on all precisifications. Thus – while someone who is seven foot will be determinately tall and someone who is five foot determinately not so – it will be indeterminate whether someone who stands at five foot eleven inches is tall. -/- Yet, it is important to stress that putative cases of indeterminacy are not limited to vague predicates of this kind. Philosophers have invoked indeterminacy in discussions of topics as diverse as moral responsibility (Bernstein (forthcoming)), identity over time (Williams (2014)), and the status of the future (Barnes and Cameron (2009)). In this paper, we focus on two areas where discussion of various kinds of indeterminacy has been commonplace: physics and fiction. We propose a new model for understanding indeterminacy across these domains and argue that it has some notable advantages when compared to earlier accounts. Treating physics and fiction cases univocally also indicates an interesting connection between indeterminacy in these two areas. (shrink)

Antike Noëtik und moderne Subjektivität / Helmut Kuhn -- Die platonische Idee des Guten und das sokratische Paradox bei Kierkegaard / Wilhelm Anz -- Der Herakliteer in Platons Theätet / Uvo Hölscher -- Antike und moderne Ethik / Ernst Tugendhat.

Humans have developed various practices to confront the indeterminacy of their existence. Roughly speaking, there are two types of such practices. On the one hand are those through which humans control the uncertainty that permeates their actions and choices. These are practices of self-reassurance and risk reduc- tion. On the other hand are practices in which humans welcome or search out uncertainty, practices that are explicitly open to the risk of failure. One particu- larly remarkable example of the latter set (...) is art. Art is a practice that embraces the uncertainty of human existence in a special way. Generally speaking, art- works do not aim to reassure. Rather, they are open to uncertainty. Thus, art represents a special mode of reflecting on a constitutive feature of human exis- tence, namely, the possibility of failure. What does it mean that art is, in princi- ple, always susceptible to failure? The present article explores this question. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Frühmittelalterliche Studien Jahrgang: 50 Heft: 1 Seiten: 315-328.

The excellent commentaries to our target paper hint upon three main issues, spatiotemporal neuroscience; neuro-mental relationship; and mind, brain, and world relationship. We therefore discuss briefly the history of Spatiotemporal Neuroscience. Distinguishing it from Cognitive Neuroscience and related branches, Spatiotemporal Neuroscience can be characterized by focus on brain activity, spatiotemporal relationship, and structure. Taken in this sense, Spatiotemporal Neuro-science allows one to conceive the neuro-mental relationship in dynamic spatiotemporal terms that complement and extend their cognitive characterization. Finally, more philosophical issues (...) like the need to dissolve the mind-body problem and the question for different levels of time including their nestedness are discussed. (shrink)

The book discusses contemporary metaphysics of science and deals with the central question which ontology fits best with our knowledge of the world. Two competing positions in today's metaphysics of science are analysed: Humeanism and dispositionalism. There are physical and metaphysical arguments to show that orthodox Humeanism is in trouble. The unorthodox metaphysical turn consists in taking the fundamental properties to be relations rather than intrinsic properties. The book spells out in detail what an unorthodox version of Humeanism amounts to (...) and shows that in turning unorthodox Humeanism offers a competitive metaphysical framework for science without commitment to irreducible causation. (shrink)

Georg Simmel developed a "form" method for the newly revived field of sociology, drawing on the subjectivity/objectivity dialectic. While his book's organization differs from that of contemporary texts, his method remains implicit in the field to this day.

An important short study of Nietzsche by the famed European critic. Included are selections from the Brandes-Nietzsche correspondence.

Le présent livre a pour objet la "renaissance du pragmatisme" dans la philosophie contemporaine, qu'il tente d'éclairer en analysant les relations systématiques entre le concept de pratique et celui d'intersubjectivité. Il est le résultat de l'effort collectif de chercheurs issus de plusieurs pays, formés dans des traditions philosophiques différentes, et désireux de surmonter par le dialogue l'opposition entre philosophie anglo-américaine et philosophie continentale..

Until recently, the method of professional ethics has been largely principle-based. But the failure of this approach to take into sufficient account the character of professionals has led to a revival of virtue ethics. The kind of professional virtue ethics that I am concerned with in this paper is teleological in that it relates the virtues of a profession to the ends of this profession. My aim is to show how empirical research can be used to develop virtue-based accounts of (...) professional ethics, and that such empirically well-informed approaches are more convincing than traditional kinds of professional virtue ethics. The paper is divided into four sections. In the first, I outline the structure of a teleological approach to virtue ethics. In Section 2, I show that empirical research can play an essential role in professional ethics by emphasizing the difference between conceptual and empirical matters. Section 3 demonstrates the relevance of virtues in professional life; and the last section is concerned with some meta-ethical issues that are raised by a teleological account of professional virtues. (shrink)

Based on Fichte's conception of international law from the Grundlage des Naturrechts the article examines to what extent a League of nations is compatible with the sovereignty of a nation state. Fichte's concept of sovereignty refers to a republican notion of a state which guaranties the congruence of power and right. This principle leads to an internal tension, for the League presupposes the existence of sovereign states and in the same time curtails their competences. It manifests an instance of power (...) without the legitimation of the singular nations. Fichte avoids the paradoxes of the Kantian vision of a perpetual peace, because he develops a more complex concept of political power, but it remains to be a contradictory construction. In the Rechtslehre of 1812 however, Fichte follows consistently the principle of popular sovereignty and therefore waives an explicit contract among states. He thus meets the ideal of congruence of power and right and also outlines the requirements for a realistic conception of the legalization of relations between states.Ausgehend von Fichtes Grundriss des Völkerrechts, dem Abschluss der Grundlage des Naturrechts nach Principien der Wissenschaftslehre wird untersucht, inwiefern ein Völkerbund mit der Idee staatlicher Souveränität vereinbar ist. Fichtes Konzeption der Souveränität basiert auf einem republikanischen Staatsverständnis, das im Idealfall die Koinzidenz von Macht und Recht garantiert. Dieses Prinzip führt zu internen Spannungen, denn ein Bund setzt einerseits die Existenz souveräner Staaten voraus, greift aber andererseits in die Kompetenzen der Einzelstaaten ein, bildet also selbst eine Machtinstanz, ohne wie die Einzelstaaten über eine entsprechende Legitimation zu verfügen. Zwar vermeidet Fichte die Aporien der Kantischen Vision eines ewigen Friedens, weil er über einen komplexeren Machtbegriff verfügt, doch bleibt seine Konstruktion widersprüchlich. In der Rechtslehre von 1812 hält Fichte dann jedoch konsequent am Prinzip der Volkssouveränität fest und verzichtet deshalb auf einen expliziten Vertrag der Staaten untereinander. Damit trägt er dem Ideal der Kongruenz von Macht und Recht Rechnung und skizziert zugleich die Voraussetzungen für eine realistische Konzeption der Verrechtlichung der Verhältnisse zwischen den Staaten. (shrink)

Loss of consciousness -- Consciousness -- Self -- Depression and the mind-brain problem -- Feeling the world -- World-brain disruption in schizophrenia -- Identity and time.

Keine ausführliche Beschreibung für "Leibhafter Sinn" verfügbar.

While neuroscience has made enormous progress in understanding the brain, the implications of these empirical findings for ontological questions in philosophy including the mind–body problem remain yet unclear. In the first paper, I discussed the model of brain that as implied and supported by the empirical data. This leads me now to the question of an empirically plausible ontology of brain. Therefore, the aim in this second paper is the ontological characterization of the brain in terms of a process-based ontology (...) that avoids what Whitehead described as “simple location” and “fallacy of misplaced concreteness”. The discussion of the model of the brain is complemented by developing a process-based ontological characterization of the brain. Specifically, as based on Whitehead, I argue that “simple location” of the brain as thing or object in time and space amounts to nothing but an abstraction rendering what Whitehead described as “fallacy of misplaced concreteness”. Instead of describing the brain as static, non-temporal and isolated thing or object, I characterize the brain ontologically by dynamic, temporal, and relational processes. This leads me to a process-based ontology of brain which may be specified in spatiotemporal terms. Since the world’s larger spatiotemporal range or scale contains, e.g., nests, the smaller one of the brain, I characterize their ontological relationship by “spatiotemporal nestedness” and “spatiotemporal directedness”. Such spatiotemporal relationship between world and brain precludes the confusion between the world as whole and the brain as part, e.g., “mereological confusion”. I conclude that process-based or better, more specifically, spatiotemporal ontology of the brain and its relationship to the world may offer novel views on the question for the ontological relationship between mind and brain, e.g., the mind–brain problem, by converting or reformulating it as “world-brain problem”. (shrink)

In Germany the question whether to uphold or repeal the judicial prohibition on Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis is being debated from quite different standpoints. This paper differentiates the major arguments according to their reasons as a) moral, b) evaluative , and c) legal. The arguments for and against PGD can be divided by content into three groups: arguments relating to the status of the embryo, focusing on individual actions in the implementation of PGD, and relating to the foreseeable or probable consequences (...) of PGD.In Germany, from a legal perspective, the status of the embryo does not permit the intervention of PGD; from a purely moral perspective, a prohibition on PGD does not appear defensible. It remains an open question, however, whether the moral argument permitting PGD should be restricted for evaluative reasons. The paper discusses the species-ethical reasons, for which Jürgen Habermas sees worrisome consequences in the wake of PGD to the extent that we comprehend it as the forerunner of a ‘positive eugenics’. It would so disrupt the natural preconditions of our universal morality. The question of whether to prohibit or allow PGD is not merely a question of simple moral and/or legal arguments, but demands a choice between evaluative, moral and species-ethical arguments, and the question remains open. (shrink)

What is time? Is time real, or a mere illusion? We seem to feel the passage of time in our consciousness but are doomed to encounter great difficulty when trying to get a deeper grip on the nature of time. As Augustine famously remarked, "if no one asks me about what time is, I know what it is, but if I wish to explain it to him who asks, I do not know". The present essay does not aim so much (...) at giving a complete answer to this intricate and difficult question as to focus on Zhuangzi to excavate the idea of time inherent in his philosophical writings. A second aim is to show how it relates to some of the contemporary concerns about time. More specifically, our concern is not about... (shrink)

In 1889, Danish literary critic Georg Brandes published "Aristocratic Radicalism: An Essay on Friedrich Nietzsche," which transformed the as-yet-unknown German-Swiss philosopher into a European, and ultimately global, phenomenon. The article sparked a furious public debate between Brandes and a fellow Dane, philosopher Harald Høffding, who swiftly issued a rebuttal, "Democratic Radicalism: An Objection." What began as a scholarly disagreement over Nietzsche's philosophy rapidly spiraled into a sprawling contest of competing visions of society's future, one radically aristocratic and the other (...) radically democratic. Marking the moment at which the uniquely Nordic concept of social democratic welfare was first contested in the public sphere, this debate provides insights into not only Nietzschean philosophy and its immediate reception but also the foundational concept of modern Scandinavian social, cultural, and political organization. This volume presents, for the first time in any language other than Danish, the debate in its entirety: three essays by Brandes and three by Høffding. A critical introduction by editor and translator William Banks explores the exchange in its context and convincingly argues that the principles contested by the two Danish luminaries still very much resonate in Western society today. (shrink)

Offering the only anthology of Hegel's religious thought, Vanderbilt University's Professor Peter C. Hodgson provides sympathetic and clear entree to the German philosopher's religious achievement through his major relevant texts starting with early theological writings and culminating with Hegel's1824 lectures on the philosophy of religion.

Pirckmayer, G. Verfrühte Demokratie.--Klein, R. Lebenswege.--Pirckmayer, G. Utopie und die Pragmatik des Bestehenden.--Ficker, L. von, Heer, F. Kommentare.--Pirckmayer, G. Das Recht der gleichen Chance.--Glaner, M. Zur ideologischen Einordnung.--Winter, E. F. Einladung zur Diskussion.--Pirckmayer, G. Das Recht der gleichen Chance, heute.--Pirckmayer, G. Entwurf eines Modellschulwerkes im Sinne des Rechtes der gleichen Chance.--Pirckmayer, G. Das Prinzip.--Pirckmayer, G. Das Exercise.--Zusanek, H. Anmerkungen zum Prinzip.--Pirckmayer, G. Das Prinzip, heute.--Pirckmayer, G. Entwurf eines Modellschulwerkes im Sinne des Prinzips.--Orel, A. Über den Komponisten Georg Pirckmayer.--Scholz, G. (...) Werkstattgespräche mit dem Komponisten. (shrink)