This is a “metacritical” engagement from a Confucian perspective with the legacy of Kantian ethics. The first and longest part of this essay deals with the European West and Kant, especially the categorical imperative. The second part hearkens back to East Asian antiquity, especially Ancient China, as it briefly explores Kongzi’s Golden Rule and Mengzi’s compassion.

Expecting the imminent triumph of religious and political absolutism Locke tries, in »A Letter concerning Toleration«, to define the true Christian and the true church. He invites his readers to differentiale between civil goverment and religious communities. A church is a voluntary association, the members of which are hold together by the common hope of salvation. In this association there is no need for power and force, which are necessary in civil government. Pursuing this theme in a subtile way Locke (...) develops the reformatorical doctrine of the two kingdoms. (shrink)

Der Beitrag erörtert das diffizile Verhältnis von Staat und Religion in Hegels Enzyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften. Systematischer Ausgangspunkt ist die alternative Zuordnung des Themas zur Sphäre des absoluten und der des objektiven Geistes in der ersten bzw. zweiten Fassung der Berliner Enzyklopädie. Der Beitrag will zeigen, daß die doppelte systematische Verortung der Verhältnisbestimmung von Staat und Religion in der Berliner Enzyklopädie Hegels komplexe Einschätzung des modernen Staates als von der modernen Religion sowohl getrennt als auch ihr systematisch zugehörig wiederspiegelt. Zu (...) diesem Zweck behandelt der Beitrag zunächst den systemarchitektonischen Grundcharakter von Hegels enzyklopädischem Projekt, sodann die sukzessive Entwicklung einer im spezifischen Sinne modernen Konzeption von Sittlichkeit in den Nürnberger, Heidelberger und Berliner Fassungen der Enzyklopädie und schließlich die systematische Annäherung der Sittlichkeit des modernen Staates an die Geistigkeit der modernen Religion in den beiden Berliner Fassungen der Enzyklopädie. (shrink)

1. Jugendschriften 1835-1841. Mit einem Essay "Zum Verständnis der Texte," Erläuterungen und Bibliographie hrsg. von G. Hillmann. DM 3.80 (GDB 66-A49-92)--2. Pariser Manuskripte 1844.--3. Der Mensch in Arbeit und Kooperation (Aus den Grundrissen der Kritik der politischen Ökonomie, 1857/58).

Testing assumptions proposed by Frenzel’s reciprocal model of teacher emotions (e.g., Frenzel, 2014 ), this study explored relations between teachers’ appraisals concerning the attainment and importance of their teaching goals, and their emotions. Specifically, we addressed teachers’ goals of high student performance, motivation, discipline, and high-quality teacher–student relationship and three key discrete emotions, namely, enjoyment, anger, and anxiety, during teaching. We had 244 secondary school teachers (70.1% female) self-report their goal attainment and importance appraisals and emotional experiences with (...) respect to up to three different classes they currently taught. Results from single- and two-level multivariate multiple regression analyses largely supported the relevance of the goal attainment appraisals for teachers’ emotions both on the between-person and the within-person level. Goal importance appraisals proved to be of secondary relevance. On the between-person level, those teachers who positively appraised the attainment of motivation, discipline, and teacher–student relationship quality proved to report more enjoyment and less anxiety and anger. On the within-person level, teachers reported enjoying teaching those classes more, which they perceived as better performing, more motivated and disciplined, and with whom they had a better relationship. Anger and anxiety were negatively linked to appraisals pertaining to the attainment of discipline and teacher–student relationship quality. Across both analysis perspectives, teacher–student relationship quality attainment showed particularly strong links with all three emotions. Because teachers’ subjective evaluations regarding student behaviors were shown to be highly relevant for their emotions, we conclude that teachers could be supported in modifying their emotional experiences through cognitive reappraisal. Interventions targeting teachers’ relationships with students, and their cognitive judgments thereof, seem particularly promising. (shrink)

Against the background of the current debate in Germany, the paper explains and discusses ethical aspects of alternative consent systems for post-mortem organ donation. The focus is on opt-out and prompted choice solutions. The authors explain why libertarian paternalism might favour a prompted choice.

Figal has long been recognized as one of the most insightful interpreters working in the tradition of philosophical hermeneutics and its leading themes concerned with ancient Greek thought, art, language, and history. With this book, Figal presses this tradition of philosophical hermeneutics in new directions. In his effort to forge philosophical hermeneutics into a hermeneutical philosophy, Figal develops an original critique of the objectification of the world that emerges in modernity as the first stage in his systematic treatment of the (...) elements of experience hermeneutically understood. Breaking through the prejudices of modernity, but not sacrificing the importance and challenge of the objective world that confronts us and is in need of interpretation, Figal reorients how it is that philosophy should take up some of its most longstanding and stubborn questions. World, object, space, language, freedom, time, and life are refreshed as philosophical notions here since they are each regarded as elements of human life engaged in the task assigned to each of us—the task of understanding ourselves and our world. (shrink)

Research on the effectiveness of case studies in teaching engineering ethics in higher education is underdeveloped. To add to our knowledge, we have systematically compared the outcomes of two case approaches to an undergraduate course on the ethics of technology: a detached approach using real-life cases and a challenge-based learning approach with students and stakeholders acting as co-creators. We first developed a practical typology of case-study approaches and subsequently tested an evaluation method to assess the students’ learning experiences and outcomes (...) and staff interpretations and operationalizations, seeking to answer three questions: Do students in the CBL approach report higher basic needs, motivation and competence development compared to their peers in the detached approach? What is the relationship between student-perceived co-creation and their basic needs, motivation and competence development? And what are the implications of CBL/CC for engineering-ethics teaching and learning? Our mixed methods analysis favored CBL as it best supported teaching and research goals while satisfying the students’ basic needs and promoting intrinsic motivation and communication competences. Competence progress in other areas did not differ between approaches, and motivation in terms of identified regulation was lower for CBL, with staff perceiving a higher workload. We propose that our case typology model is useful and that as a method to engage students as co-creators, CBL certainly merits further development and evaluation, as does our effectiveness analysis for engineering ethics instruction in general and for case-study approaches in particular. (shrink)

" Because characters and the conception of characters are central to all studies of evolution, and because evolution is the central organizing principle of biology, this book will appeal to a wide cross-section of biologists.

I. Allgemeine Betrachtungen.--II. Die Erfahrung.--III. Kausalität, Hypothesen.--IV. Fortsetzung.--V. Naturwissenschaftliche prinzipe.--VI. Die Erkenntnis.