Classifying accounts of institutionalized social norms that rely on individual rule-following as ‘sociological’ and accounts based on individual opportunity-seeking behavior as ‘economic’, the paper rejects purely economic accounts on theoretical grounds. Explaining the realworkings of institutionalized social norms and social order exclusively in terms of self-regarding opportunityseeking individual behavior is impossible. An integrated sociological approach to the so-called Hobbesian problem of social order that incorporates opportunityseeking along with rule-following behavior is necessary. Such an approach emerges on the horizon if economic (...) methods are put to good sociological use on the basis of recent experimental economic findings on rule-following behavior. (shrink)

Hartmut Rosa advances an account of the temporal structure of society from the perspective of critical theory. He identifies three categories of change in the tempo of modern social life: technological acceleration, evident in transportation, communication, and production; the acceleration of social change, reflected in cultural knowledge, social institutions, and personal relationships; and acceleration in the pace of life, which happens despite the expectation that technological change should increase an individual's free time. According to Rosa, both the structural and (...) cultural aspects of our institutions and practices are marked by the "shrinking of the present," a decreasing time period during which expectations based on past experience reliably match the future. When this phenomenon combines with technological acceleration and the increasing pace of life, time seems to flow ever faster, making our relationships to each other and the world fluid and problematic. It is as if we are standing on "slipping slopes," a steep social terrain that is itself in motion and in turn demands faster lives and technology. As Rosa deftly shows, this self-reinforcing feedback loop fundamentally determines the character of modern life. (shrink)

Contemporary theory of international politics faces a twofold problem: the critical engagement with legacies of national power politics in connection to 20th Century International Relations and the regeneration of notions of humanity. This book contributes to this engagement by a genealogy of thoughts on war, peace, and ethics"--Provided by publisher.

The historian and religious scholar Ernst Ludwig Ehrlich (1921-2007) was among the most influential minds in the post-Shoah German-speaking Jewish world. In 1943, with the help of Christian friends, he escaped from Berlin to Switzerland, where as a student, he became a spokesman in Jewish-Christian dialogue. Hartmut Bomhoff narrates how despite the experience of expulsion, life in the underground, and flight, Ehrlich became a bridge-builder.

Democratic conceptions of politics are tacitly or explicitly predicated upon a functioning arena for the formation of public opinion in an associated media-space. Policy-making thus requires a reliable connection to processes of ‘public’ will formation. These processes formed the focus for Habermas’s influential study on the public sphere. This contribution presents a look at more recent ‘structural transformation’, the causes of which are by no means limited to social media communication, and examines its consequences. It proceeds in three steps: 1) (...) in some proximity to Habermas, but also by means of the theory of resonance, it seeks to determine the kind of public sphere that a democratic polity requires; 2) an analysis of problems within the contemporary public sphere will feed into 3) a discussion of the conditions for the restoration of a ‘functioning political public sphere’. These include changes in the realms of participation, representation and spaces of encounter. (shrink)

Ordinary clocks do not measure time in the common and Newtonian sense, and there is a similar problem for spatial measurements due to effects of motion and gravitation. Einstein’s theories of relativity are based on the denial of the possibility of the ‘absolute’ measurements that would be required. Nevertheless, here it is shown how such measurements can be performed. For this purpose, a “light clock” (or equivalent) is linked with a “space-time odometer” that counts the zero crossings in the field (...) of the cosmic microwave background radiation. The readings of these two instruments allow to calculate the time interval and the length of their path in Euclidean space even in the presence of local variations in gravitational potential. (shrink)

The greatest risks of Covid-19 are not arising from its direct effects on morbidity and mortality but from exaggerated aspirations to control such effects politically. A swift transformation from an epidemic to an endemic state of affairs may in case of a disease with comparatively low and unequally distributed mortality like covid-19 be an option, too. This needs to be laid out but it is not the task of science to plead for this or any other option.

Name der Zeitschrift: Klio Jahrgang: 100 Heft: 2 Seiten: 540-544.

1. Weltanschauung, Naturerkenntnis, Erkenntnistheorie.--2. Philosophie der Tat, Emanzipation, Utopie.

"Philosophy and Economics I," treats "Methods and Models" of "Economic Philosophy." "Philosophy and Economics II" deals with "Morals." In both cases an effort to integrate many strands of modern philosophy and economics via decision theoretic language is made. Regardless of this decision theoretic background the treatment is non-technical. The aspiration is to sketch some tools that may be used in search of what philosophers call a "wide reflective equilibrium" on foundational matters of economics as well as of philosophy. The presentation (...) will enable an advanced undergraduate or beginning graduate student from fields like, philosophy, economics, law, political science and sociology to use the tools, arguments and paradigm examples provided to search for her or his own reflective equilibrium on matters of economic philosophy. Specialists from the aforementioned fields may find the text useful, too, as an accessible account of an increasingly elaborate intellectual discourse on "philosophy, politics and economics.". (shrink)

The Convention on Biological Diversity opens the possibility to negotiate a legally binding Biosafety Protocol to assess and minimize risks in the field of transboundary transfer, handling, and use of organisms modified by genetic engineering. Two principles— the Precautionary Principle and the Principle of Familiarity—guiding the risk assessment as basis of import decisions on such organisms are discussed. Developing and European industrialized countries favor the Precautionary Principle. The U.S., Australia, Japan, and some others call for the Principle of Familiarity. These (...) two principles exhibit opposite effects on scientific progress in general and on scientific methodology of risk assessment in particular. With the example of risk assessment by the U.S. company Monsanto discussed below, it could be illustrated that the Principle of Familiarity opens the way for superficial evaluations based on citing arbitrary references while the Precautionary Principle is an incentive for developing and applying sound methodology in experimental risk assessment. on the transboundary transfer of such LMOs, for example, on the international exchange of and trade with transgenic seeds, grains, animals, or bacteria. The negotiations are based on Articles 19.3 and 8(g) of the Convention on Biological Diversity, elaborated during the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1992, and on Decision II/5 of the Second Conference of the Parties to this Convention in Jakarta, Indonesia, in 1995 (see the appendix; for more documents, see www.biodiv.org). Until the Fourth Conference of the Parties in 1998, 172 states ratified this convention. This conference decided to finish the Biosafety Protocol in February 1999. In 1998, transgenic crops were allowed to be planted in eight (75%) countries of the world. As the country with the largest acreage of transgenic crops and as the main trader of LMOs, the United States cannot become a member of the protocol until it has ratified the Convention on Biological Diversity. (shrink)

Für eine ethische Beurteilung des Einsatzes moderner Informations- und Kommunikationstechnologien sowie autonomer Assistenzsysteme im Berufsfeld Pflege empfiehlt es sich zunächst, empirische Informationen über Wirkungen und Folgen dieser Technologien aus unterschiedlichen Perspektiven einzuholen. Allerdings ist die Studienlage erweiterungsbedürftig. Auch wenn die Diskussion eher tentativ auf der Grundlage von vorsichtigen Annahmen geführt werden kann, so schälen sich dennoch in der internationalen pflegewissenschaftlichen Debatte sehr ambivalente Bewertungen heraus. Eine der Kontroversen betrifft die Frage, inwieweit und in welchem Maße Pflege als Beziehungsarbeit technisch substituiert (...) werden kann oder darf; inwieweit sich dadurch nicht nur Strukturen der Wahrnehmung und Aufmerksamkeit wandeln, sondern soziokulturelle Bedingungen von Hilfe, Unterstützung und Befähigung grundlegend verändern. Assistenztechnologien werden nicht nur das widersprüchliche Verhältnis von Sicherheit, Überwachung, Kontrolle und Entmündigung verschärfen. Unter dem Einfluss moderner Informationstechnologien wird sich auch der Status professionellen Wissens wandeln. Von erheblichem Gewicht ist schließlich, ob möglicherweise sozialanthropologische Grundannahmen wie beispielsweise die der leiblichen Responsivität und personalen Authentizität obsolet werden. Die ethische Beurteilung erfolgt aus verschiedenen Bewertungsperspektiven. Aus deontologischer Sicht hat sich die Akzeptanz neuer Technologien daran zu bemessen, inwieweit deren Wirkungen mit normativen Ansprüchen und Integritätsinteressen (Selbstbestimmung, Sicherheit) betroffener Personen vereinbar sind. Aus Sicht einer Ethics of Care wird es darum gehen, inwieweit durch den Einsatz von Assistenztechnologien nicht nur psychophysische Entlastungen (Pflegepersonal, Patient*innen, ältere Menschen), nicht nur bessere Informationsflüsse bewirkt werden können. Nicht weniger bedeutsam ist die Frage, ob soziale Netzwerke entwickelt, Möglichkeiten der Teilhabe verbessert und kreative Potenziale der Selbstorganisation und der Selbstwirksamkeit gefördert werden können. (shrink)