Descartes' works were not allowed to be read at Leiden University, even his name could not be pronounced. Read the compelling story about how his pupil Johannes de Raey has had the opportunity to preach Descartes fully in philosophy, but also in medicine, in a hostile anti-Cartesian climate during 20 years (1647-1668). This book is not only meant for philosophers and medical historians, but for all who want to take a look at the extensive menu of Cartesian cuisine. The 17th-century (...) philosopher René Descartes turned established science upside down by doubting all certainties. His critical mind rejected statements that could not be proven by the Ratio. The Ratio was the metaphor for the roots, the physics for the trunk and the medicine for the branches and leaves of the Cartesian tree. This premise was directly opposed to the established aristotelian theory in which observation formed the basis of knowledge. De Raey, who once called Descartes his best student, synthesized a hybrid model of the old Aristotelian and the new Cartesian concept. From 1658 to 1662 he gave private lessons in medicine at Leiden University and tried to use his model as a basis for explaining human physiology. Until now, nothing was known about the content of these lectures. The author recently found a dispute. It is a new dish on the Cartesian menu. (shrink)

An architect and architectural philosopher, Berlage created a series of buildings and a body of writings that probed the problems and possibilities of Modernism. His principal texts, given here in English for the first time, present a vital chapter in the history of European Modernism.

Conflicts in Interpretation applies novel methods of constraint interaction, derived from connectionist theories and implemented in linguistics within the framework of Optimality Theory, to core semantic and pragmatic issues such as polysemy, negation, (in) definiteness, focus, anaphora, and rhetorical structure. It explores the hypothesis that a natural language grammar is a set of potentially conflicting constraints on forms and meanings. Moreover, it hypothesizes that competent language users not only optimize from an input form to the optimal output meaning for this (...) form, or vice versa, but also consider the opposite direction of optimization, thus taking into account the speaker as a hearer and taking into account the hearer as a speaker. The book aims to show that such a bidirectional constraint-based grammar sheds new light on the relation between form and meaning, within a sentence as well as across sentence boundaries, within a single language as well as across languages, and within competent adult language users as well as during language development. An important dimension of the book is the structured investigation of issues at the interface of semantics with syntax and pragmatics, such as the effects of distinguishing between speaker's perspective and hearer's perspective in comprehension and production, stable and instable patterns of form and meaning across languages, and the development of a coherent pattern of form and meaning in children. Conflicts in Interpretation will be of interest to any researcher or advanced student in linguistics, cognitive science, language typology, or psycholinguistics who is interested in the capacity of our human mind to map meaning onto form, and form onto meaning. (shrink)

Hendrik Lorenz presents a comprehensive study of Plato's and Aristotle's conceptions of non-rational desire. They see this as something that humans share with animals, and which aims primarily at the pleasures of food, drink, and sex. Lorenz explores the cognitive resources that both philosophers make available for the explanation of such desires, and what they take rationality to add to the motivational structure of human beings. In doing so, he finds conceptions of the mind that are coherent and deeply (...) integrated with both philosophers' views about such topics as the relation between body and soul, or the nature of the virtues. (shrink)

Ancient philosophical theories of soul are in many respects sensitive to ways of speaking and thinking about the soul psuchê] that are not specifically philosophical or theoretical. We therefore begin with what the word ‘soul’ meant to speakers of Classical Greek, and what it would have been natural to think about and associate with the soul. We then turn to various Presocratic thinkers, and to the philosophical theories that are our primary concern, those of Plato (first in the Phaedo, then (...) in the Republic), Aristotle (in the De Anima or On the Soul ), Epicurus, and the Stoics. These are by far the most carefully worked out theories of soul in ancient philosophy. Later theoretical developments — for instance, in the writings of Plotinus and other Platonists, as well as the Church Fathers — are best studied against the background of the classical theories, from which, in large part, they derive. (shrink)

In this paper, we first classify different types of second opinions and evaluate the ethical and epistemological implications of providing those in a clinical context. Second, we discuss the issue of how artificial intelligent could replace the human cognitive labour of providing such second opinion and find that several AI reach the levels of accuracy and efficiency needed to clarify their use an urgent ethical issue. Third, we outline the normative conditions of how AI may be used as second opinion (...) in clinical processes, weighing the benefits of its efficiency against concerns of responsibility attribution. Fourth, we provide a ‘rule of disagreement’ that fulfils these conditions while retaining some of the benefits of expanding the use of AI-based decision support systems in clinical contexts. This is because the rule of disagreement proposes to use AI as much as possible, but retain the ability to use human second opinions to resolve disagreements between AI and physician-in-charge. Fifth, we discuss some counterarguments. (shrink)

This festschrift collects a number of insightful essays by a group of accomplished Christian scholars, all of who have either worked with or studied under Hendrik Hart during his 35-year tenure as Senior Member in Systematic Philosophy at the Institute for Christian Studies, Toronto, Canada.

Translation:Hendrik Josephus POS, „Phénoménologie et linguistique.“ In: Keur uit de verspreide geschrift en van Dr. H. J. Pos. Vol. I. Assen: Van Loghum Slaterus 1957, p. 131–141.

ABSTRACT:I argue that there are, according to Aristotle, two importantly different kinds of goals or ends in the domain of human agency and that one of these two kinds has been frequently, though not universally, overlooked. Apart from psychological goals, goals that agents adopt as their purposes, there are also, I submit, goals that actions have by being the kinds of actions they are and, in some cases, by occurring in the circumstances in which they do. These latter goals belong (...) to suitable actions whether or not agents adopt them as purposes and whether or not agents are aware of them. There is evidence both in Aristotle's ethical writings and in his discussion of chance and luck in Physics II.4–6 that he recognizes goals of this latter kind. (shrink)

The revised edition contains a new chapter which provides an elegant description of the semantics. The various classes of lambda calculus models are described in a uniform manner. Some didactical improvements have been made to this edition. An example of a simple model is given and then the general theory (of categorical models) is developed. Indications are given of those parts of the book which can be used to form a coherent course.

""Catching Ourselves in the Act" is no less than an attempt to explain intelligence. Delightful how the author dismantles traditional views in.

Mit Fragen der Formgebung und Zeitorganisation einerseits, der Nähe von Rhythmus und Körper andererseits lassen sich zwei Schwerpunkte gegenwärtiger Debatten über rhythmische Phänomene ausmachen, deren Konstellierung auf die Umbrüche der Rhythmusdiskurse um 1900 zurückverweist. Der Beitrag diskutiert das Verhältnis der beiden Diskussionsstränge und dessen Rekonfiguration in Musils Überlegungen zum Rhythmus; im Zentrum stehen dabei Musils Notizen zu den Experimentaluntersuchungen Kurt Koffkas.

Inleiding tot de Duitse filosoof (1724-1804).

Democracy is one of the most used and misinterpreted terms of our time. In public discussions concerning the subject it is tacitly assumed that everyone is aware of the meaning of democracy and the implications it carries. In reality democratic ideals and practices take on various forms in various countries. Frank Hendriks sheds light on this subject matter in a comprehensible manner. He distinguishes four ground forms of democracy, which are inherent to democratic forms everywhere. Along with “consensus democracy”, Hendriks (...) compares “pendulum democracy”, “voter democracy” and “participatory democracy”, at national as well as subnational levels of governance. Hendriks concludes in his studies that contrary to popular belief, not one model is superior to the others and calls for a realistic approach to a democracy that is sensitive to the context in which democracy must prove and sustain itself. (shrink)

We analyze investors’ perception and long-term effects of board gender diversity on firms’ stock market performance in an international setting. Our results, controlling for the endogenous nature of board compositions, indicate that female board representation neither improves nor reduces firms’ long-term stock performance. Hence, we argue that it is imperative to go beyond the conventional thinking in terms of the business case for gender diversity and broaden the perspective also to incorporate societal and ethical aspects in the strive to board (...) gender equality. Even more so, as our results show that it does not entail reduced shareholder value, which the literature on mandatory gender quotas commonly seems to suggest. (shrink)

This paper explores the role and resolution of disagreements between physicians and their diagnostic AI-based decision support systems. With an ever-growing number of applications for these independently operating diagnostic tools, it becomes less and less clear what a physician ought to do in case their diagnosis is in faultless conflict with the results of the DSS. The consequences of such uncertainty can ultimately lead to effects detrimental to the intended purpose of such machines, e.g. by shifting the burden of proof (...) towards a physician. Thus, we require normative clarity for integrating these machines without affecting established, trusted, and relied upon workflows. In reconstructing different causes of conflicts between physicians and their AI-based tools—inspired by the approach of “meaningful human control” over autonomous systems and the challenges to resolve them—we will delineate normative conditions for “meaningful disagreements”. These incorporate the potential of DSS to take on more tasks and outline how the moral responsibility of a physician can be preserved in an increasingly automated clinical work environment. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to elucidate the processes that characterize natural language interpretation. The basic hypothesis is that natural language interpretation can be characterized as an optimization problem. This innovative view on interpretation is shown to account for the crucial role of contextual information while avoiding certain well-known problems associated with compositionality. This will become particularly clear in the context of incomplete expressions. Our approach takes as a point of departure total freedom of interpretation in combination with the (...) parallel application of soft constraints on possible interpretations. These constraints can be contextual, intonational or syntactic in nature. The integration of pragmatic and syntactic/semantic information in a system of ranked constraints is proposed to correctly derive the optimal interpretations in cases of nominal anaphorization, determiner quantification and elliptical comparatives. (shrink)

The reliability of clinical practice guidelines has been disputed because guideline panel members are often burdened with financial conflicts of interest. Current recommendations for COI regulation advise not only detailed declaration but also active management of conflicts. To continuously assess COI declaration and management in German guidelines we established the public database LeitlinienWatch. We analyzed all German guidelines at the highest methodological level that included recommendations for pharmacological therapy according to five criteria: declaration and assessment of COI, composition of the (...) guideline development group, independence of the coordinators and lead authors, imposed abstentions because of COI and public external review. Each criterion was assessed using predefined outcome categories. Most guidelines contained a detailed declaration of COI. However, none of the guidelines provided full transparency of COI assessment results. The guideline group was composed of a majority of participants with COI in 55% of the guidelines, no guideline was free of participants with COI. Only 9% of guidelines had coordinators and lead authors without any financial COI. Most guidelines did not provide a rule for abstentions for participants with COI. In 21% of guidelines there was a rule, but abstentions were either not practiced or not documented, whereas in 7% partial abstentions and in 2% complete abstentions were documented. Two thirds of the guideline drafts were not externally reviewed via a public website. COI are usually documented in detail in German guidelines of the highest methodological level. However, considerable improvement is needed regarding active management of COI, including recruitment of independent experts for guideline projects, abstention from voting for participants with COI and external review of the guideline draft. We assume that the publicly available ratings on GuidelineWatch will improve the handling of conflicts of interest in guideline development. (shrink)

The target article presents a model for schizophrenia extending four levels of abstraction: molecules, cells, cognition, and syndrome. An important notion in the model is that of coordination, applicable to both the level of cells and of cognition. The molecular level provides an “implementation” of the coordination at the cellular level, which in turn underlies the coordination at the cognitive level, giving rise to the clinical symptoms.

Vital Democracy outlines an innovative new theory of democracy in action.

Scholars in the past have signalled the almost complete absence of Paul – as a cypher for the Pauline letters and tradition(s) – in Africa. The apparent lack of use or deliberate ignoring of Paul in Black, African and Liberation Theologies on the continent in all its pluralist variety and richness is generally taken as testimony to the perceived strangeness of the apostle in Africa. However, even if Paul’s strangeness does not equate with his absence, at least not altogether, Paul’s (...) profiles in Africa include dimensions such as Paul as a stranger, as an unwelcome guest, as a conquering traveller and as a victim of tradition. I argue that Paul’s absence from as well as strangeness in Africa may be more apparent than real, and that hermeneutical patterns and practices more than epistolary content may have played a stronger role in the construal of Paul in Africa. Contribution: Evaluating a range of entrenched interpretive profiles of Paul in Africa exposed certain hermeneutical tendencies that offer the potential for reinterpretation and reassessment of the use of Pauline materials on the continent and elsewhere. (shrink)

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Aristotle takes practical wisdom and arts or crafts to be forms of knowledge which, we argue, can usefully be thought of as ‘empiricist’. This empiricism has two key features: knowledge does not rest on grasping unobservable natures or essences; and knowledge does not rest on grasping logical relations that hold among propositions. Instead, knowledge rests on observation, memory, experience and everyday uses of reason. While Aristotle’s conception of theoretical knowledge does require grasping unobservable essences and logical relations that hold among (...) suitable propositions, his conception of practical and productive knowledge avoids such requirements and is consistent with empiricism. (shrink)

With special attention being paid to recent developments in Artificial Intelligence and the Law, specifically related to evidentiary reasoning, this book ...

This article explores the interface between public deliberation and interest politics. It empirically examines how and when actors with vested interests support and oppose processes of direct citizen deliberation, such as citizens’ juries. An analysis of four cases finds that interest groups and activists respond to citizen deliberation in a variety of ways from cooperative engagement to disruptive disengagement. The research suggests that partisan actors are most likely to support citizens’ forums when the ideational and political context offers instrumental reasons (...) to go public. The article explores what this strategic approach to public deliberation implies for the practice and theory of deliberative democracy. (shrink)