This book has been published in the series Trends in Logic (Studia Logica Library) and is dedicated to Karl R. Popper’s work, namely, his writings on deductive logic and its foundations, which are...

Marx was barely 25 when he produced this astonishing rich body of work-including economic and Philosophical Manuscripts and On the Jewish Question.

Providing a gateway to a new history of modern aesthetics, this book challenges conventional views of how art's significance developed in society. -/- The 18th century is often said to have involved a radical transformation in the concept of art: from the understanding that it has a practical purpose to the modern belief that it is intrinsically valuable. By exploring the ground between these notions of art's function, Karl Axelsson reveals how scholars of culture made taste, morals and a (...) politically stable society integral to their claims about the experience of nature and art. -/- Focusing on writings by two of the most prolific men of letters in the 18th century, Joseph Addison (1672–1719) and the third Earl of Shaftesbury (1671–1713), Axelsson contests the conviction that modern aesthetic autonomy reoriented the criticism and philosophy originally prompted by these two key figures in the history of aesthetics. -/- By re-examining the political relevance of Addison and Shaftesbury's theories of taste, Axelsson shows that first and foremost they sought to fortify a natural link between aesthetic experience and modern political society. (shrink)

In this essay, I propose a novel way of thinking about Kant’s philosophical methodology during the critical period. According to this interpretation, the critical Kant can generally be understood as operating within a “capacities‐first” philosophical framework – that is, within a framework in which our basic rational or cognitive capacities play both an explanatorily and epistemically fundamental role in philosophy – or, at least, in the sort of philosophy that limited creatures like us are capable of. In discussing this idea, (...) I consider the complicated relationship between the explanatory and epistemic roles that such capacities play in Kant. I also sketch how this way of thinking about Kant’s methodology can illuminate the foundations of both his theoretical and his practical philosophy, before discussing some of Kant’s reasons for finding this approach to philosophy attractive. I close with a brief discussion of the contemporary relevance of this approach. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain (...) in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

The transcendental turn, when defined methodologically as a determination of the necessary structures of experience, can be distinguished from transcendental idealism when the latter is understood as a metaphysical thesis about the non-unconditioned status of the forms of experience. It is tempting to resist holding to this kind of distinction and to reduce Kant’s transcendental idealism to his transcendental turn in order to escape the allegedly absurd consequences of a metaphysical reading of his idealism. This chapter argues that such consequences (...) can be avoided with a moderate metaphysical interpretation of Kant’s idealism. On this interpretation, the assertion of an in itself level of reality does not imply a demoting of empirical reality to an illusion. Arguments are offered that this interpretation can make sense of Kantian texts that can seem to be ’absurd doubletalk’ even to generally sympathetic readers. (shrink)

An argument with roots in ancient Greek philosophy claims that only humans are capable of a certain class of thought termed conceptual, as opposed to perceptual thought, which is common to humans, the higher animals, and some machines. We outline the most detailed modern version of this argument due to Mortimer Adler, who in the 1960s argued for the uniqueness of the human power of conceptual thought. He also admitted that if conceptual thought were ever manifested by machines, such an (...) achievement would contradict his conclusion. We revisit Adler’s criterion in the light of the past five decades of artificial-intelligence research, and refine it in view of the classical definitions of perceptual and conceptual thought. We then examine two well-publicized examples of creative works produced by AI systems and show that evidence for conceptual thought appears to be lacking in them. Although clearer evidence for conceptual thought on the part of AI systems may arise in the near future, especially if the global neuronal workspace theory of consciousness prevails over its rival, integrated information theory, the question of whether AI systems can engage in conceptual thought appears to be still open. (shrink)

TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE: From 1808 to 1816, Hegel served as professor of philosophy and headmaster of a gymnasium in Nuremberg. He lectured on a wide variety of subjects - from logic and ethics to phenomenology and metaphysics - and prepared a series of notebooks which he used as the basis of his lectures. Students made their individual transcriptions of his oral dictations, and Hegel would revise these, in a steady stream of redactive work over the years. In 1838, seven years after (...) Hegel’s death, the notebooks-cum-transcriptions were found by Karl Rosenkranz, who edited and put them together for publication as Hegel’s Philosophische Propaedeutik. This became Volume 18 of Hegel’s Werke. Rosenkranz wrote a lively foreword to the volume, discussing Hegel’s approach to teaching and his views on the role of philosophy in secondary-school education. To this, Rosenkranz added his own views on the function of philosophy in culture as a whole - and one cannot help feeling that the biting piquancy of his language on these issues carries echoes of numerous talks with Hegel. This translation of the Rosenkranz essay will be incorporated into the text of the first English translation of Hegel’s Philosophical Propaedeutic, now completed and under consideration by a university press. (shrink)

This article discusses Leibniz's two letters to Hobbes. The first one was not passed on to Hobbes, whereas the second one remained an unfinished draft. In his letters, Leibniz defends Hobbes against attacks that make no distinction between the abstract, general content of his theory and its application to concrete cases. On the other hand, Leibniz criticizes Hobbes as well. Against Hobbes' psychology, Leibniz contends that the idea of sense perception as a reaction that lingers on in the body is (...) impossible without assuming the existence of a soul (which Hobbes denies). However, Leibniz misconstrues Hobbes' notion of reaction as actual motion instead of a tendency to motion, as Hobbes has it. Leibniz's further argument that material cohesion cannot be understood as a reaction to the impact of other bodies is also flawed since it only considers one body and not two, as is necessary for any reaction to take place. (shrink)

Diese Ausagabe macht Buchbesprechungen wieder zugänglich, die in verschiedenen Zeitschriften vom Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts verstreut erschienen sind und deswegen schwer erreichbar waren. Sie sammelt alle Dokumente, in denen von mehr oder minder bekannten Zeitgenossen Einwände gegen die Elementarphilosophie erhoben wurden, auf die Reinhold selbst in seinen Büchern antwortete. Auf diese Weise wird ein philosophischer Kontext geschildert, in dem einzelne Konstellationen deutlich werden, die sich wechselseitig widerrufen und widerlegen. Viele der zeitgenössischen Rezensionen beinhalten auBerdem einen Vergleich zwischen der Kantischen und (...) der Reinholdschen Philosophie; die vorliegende Ausgabe bringt insofern Bewertungen von Kants theoretischem Unternehmen zum Ausdruck, als dieses meistens per Kontraposition zur Elementarphilosophie, aber auch direkt beurteilt wird--Back cover. (shrink)

Alfred Stein, em memória de quem esse artigo é dedicado, mantinha, enquanto filósofo da história, a crença em valores absolutos como obsoletos bem como, enquanto filósofo da ética, o convencimento sobre a aleatoriedade relativista-cultural na valoração moral da ação humana. De uma tal valoração aparece indicado reconstruir a ação adequadamente, ou seja, compreendê-la intencionalmente e explicá-la por meio da causalidade. No decorrer desse compreender e desse explicar, se deve fazer uma referência a isso que Stern com, entre outros, Blaise Pascal, (...) chama de “a condição humana” (la condition humaine): o fato de que o humano é um ser consciente de si mesmo, de que ele é determinado por uma vontade de autopreservação, de que ele ama e odeia, de que ele sofre, busca escapar do sofrimento, de que ele sabe de sua mortalidade e, por fim, morre. De maneira semelhante à anthropéia physis de Thukydides, essas condições variantes resultam decorrer de ação bem diferentes e padrões de comportamento, de acordo com as especificidades da situação histórica – parecido com como um balão sobe, sob o efeito da mesma lei da gravidade, uma pedra, entretanto, cai ao chão. Seguindo essa construção compreensivo-explicativa da ação, vêm a sua valoração moral. Esta é, com Stein, guiada pelo princípio da liberdade como de um ser-livre de pressão e pelo princípio da maior minimização possível do sofrimento humano. (shrink)

Le besoin d'une ethique globale a son origine dans la situation humaine comme telle (l'hominisation nous a en effet eloignes de la securite naturelle des instincts animaux et nous a jetes dans l'etat de liberte) et specialement dans la situation presente de l'humanite. Celle-ci se caracterise par un accroissement extreme des defis externes a notre co-responsabilite. Ces defis sont poses par les resultats de la science naturelle, de la technologie, de la politique et de l'economie tandis que semblent bien marquer (...) les ressources internes de la raison ethique. Le present livre tente de montrer que l'approche pragmatico-transcendantale de l'ethique de la discussion est en mesure de reconstruire la genese de cette situation et de fournir une reponse rationnelle tant aux defis externes qu'aux defis internes auxquels une ethique globale est confrontee. (shrink)

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

Joseph Addison’s (1672--1719) essays in The Spectator occupy contradictory positions in the history of aesthetics. While they are generally considered central to the institution of aesthetics as a scholarly discipline, their reception has throughout history entailed a strong questioning of their philosophical and scholarly importance. In the following paper, I consider this dual feature as regards reception, and set out to clarify how this has come about. A re-examination of the arguments advanced by Addison makes clear that his role is (...) not that of a philosopher, but that of a public educator. As such he aims to raise the standard of general education of the British ‘middling orders’ in the early eighteenth century, and by using art for didactic purposes he seeks to contribute to the shaping of morally accomplished individuals. (shrink)