Abstract. In this article two conceptions of what it means to say that all affected persons should be granted the right to vote in democratic elections are distinguished and evaluated. It is argued that understanding "affected" in legal terms, as referring to the circle of people bound by political decisions, has many advantages compared to the view referring to everyone affected in mere causal terms. The importance of jurisdictions in deciding rights to democratic influence should hence be recognized more clearly (...) than it currently is in democratic thinking. (shrink)

The ‘intersectionality’ approach in feminist theory postulates that differences between women, such as age, ethnicity, class, nationality, sexuality, etc. do intersect. However, intersectionality starts to get blurred when examined concretely because the list of differences is always endless. There is frequently silence about concrete questions such as: who defines when, where and which of these differences are rendered important in particular conceptions, and which are not? This article examines how categories of difference and identity interplay and intersect by analysing a (...) narrative life-interview with a female migrant to Vienna. It aims to make visible some of her specific identifications and differentiations and how these are located in time and space, by focusing on her self-presentation and the categories of difference such as gender, class and ethnicity that she introduces. Through this the article aims to contribute to discussions of the dynamism of subjectivities and power relations. (shrink)

Between 1937 and 1951 Wittgenstein had numerous philosophical conversations with his student and close friend, Rush Rhees. This article is composed of Rhees’s notes of twenty such conversations — namely, all those which have not yet been published — as well as some supplements from Rhees’s correspondence and miscellaneous notes. The principal value of the notes collected here is that they fill some interesting and important gaps in Wittgenstein ’s corpus. Thus, firstly, the notes touch on a wide (...) range of subjects, a number of which are only briefly addressed by Wittgenstein elsewhere, if at all. The subjects discussed include: explanation, ethics, anarchism, contradiction, psychoanalysis, colour, religion, concepts, classification, seeing-as, evolution, the relation between science and philosophy, and free will, amongst others. Secondly, the notes contain references to, and brief remarks about, philosophers of whom Wittgenstein otherwise says very little, if anything — such as Brentano, Heidegger, Aquinas, and Marx, amongst others. And thirdly, the notes provide us with valuable examples of Wittgenstein ’s use of some key ‘Wittgensteinian’ terms of art which are surprisingly rare in his written works, such as ‘surface-’ and ‘depth-grammar’, and ‘centres of variation’. (shrink)

From his return to Cambridge in 1929 to his death in 1951, Ludwig Wittgenstein, who published only one work in his lifetime, influenced philosophy almost exclusively through teaching and discussion. These lecture notes, therefore, are an important record of the development of Wittgenstein's thought; they indicate the interests he maintained in his later years and signal what he considered the salient features of his thinking. Further, the notes from an enlightening addition to his posthumously published writings. P. T. (...) Geach, A. C. Jackson, and K. J. Shah kept meticulous notes from the last formal course that Wittgenstein taught at Cambridge. In order to reconstruct as accurately as possible the words of Wittgenstein, this volume compiles all three sets of notes with no attempt to conflate or edit them beyond rendering them into lucid English. Topics covered by the notes in this volume include the private language argument, the grammar of sensation statements, certainty and experimentation in psychology, and, in general, the same set of concerns as are to be found in his Last Writings and Remarks on the Philosophy of Psychology . The source material provided in these lecture notes is vital to Wittgenstein scholarship. (shrink)

Summary The purpose of this study was to illustrate and analyze the organizational change the Swedish voluntary sports club IF Björklöven went through in connection with the corporation formation of its representative team. The study was made with institutional theory as a theoretical frame of reference. Particularly important for the shaping of the study was a theoretical model by Greenwood and Hinings. The data was collected using semi-structured interviews with seven respondents representing different parts of the organization. The results show (...) that the change process was driven and enabled for the most part by the offer of SEK 22.5 million from an external financier. The restructuring has brought about a change in the way Björklöven thinks about the outcome, purpose, structure and goals of the organization, now that the organization is moving towards a more market-oriented way of organizing. (shrink)

This article theorizes the European-level political response to the radical right by suggesting a focus on the conceptions of politics, society and of the European Union itself that inform this response. Analyses of the ways in which the political mainstream relates to such movements remain under-theorized and often fall back on understandings of political action in narrow instrumental terms. Instead, this article proposes an approach to this response which emphasizes the process through which shared understanding of the European political project (...) surface. It engages with these issues by turning to ideas that emerged in relation to the rise of European fascism in the 1930s on how to mount an effective defence of democracy. The underlying social analysis that fed into such strategies, the article argues, serves as a useful framework for analysis of the contemporary European response to the radical right. (shrink)

This book provides a general theory of democratic inclusion for the present world. It presents an original contribution to our understanding of the democratic ideal by explaining how democratic inclusion can apply to individuals in a variety of contexts: the workplace, social clubs, religious institutions, the family and, of course, the state. The book explores the problem of democratic inclusion, what it means to be subject to de facto authority, how this conception translates into legal systems and the relationship between (...) territorial claims by the state, and law's claim to legitimate authority. The volume will be of interest to scholars and researchers of politics, especially political theory and democracy. (shrink)

The prevailing view is that democratic procedures are unable to confer democratic legitimacy to decisions about democratic procedures. This paper examines this claim in detail and uses referendums on the inclusion of previously disenfranchised groups in the demos as a running example. The paper distinguishes between pure, imperfect and quasi-pure models of procedural democratic legitimacy and sub-versions of them. To various extents, each model does have the capacity to confer legitimacy to demos decisions under well-defined circumstances. The paper argues that (...) quasi-pure procedural legitimacy represents the most promising account of democratic legitimacy in cases where democratic procedures are the subject of collective decision-making. According to this model, the decision to revise the rules for membership in the demos is permissible by democratic standards if and only if the revision is not forbidden by democratic principles for inclusion. The point is that the range of alternatives that are not forbidden by democratic principles of inclusion are likely to be considerable due to vagueness of the principles themselves and/or them being subject to reasonable disagreement. The paper concludes with a discussion about the possibility of democratic legitimacy for democratic institutions not introduced as a result of democratic decision-making. (shrink)

Uit familie-foto's en tekstfragmenten van brieven en aantekeningen samengestelde biografie van de Joods-Oostenrijkse, later in Engeland gevestigde wijsgeer (1889-1951).

A defining feature of democracy is the inclusion of members of the political association. However, the corresponding right to exclusion has attracted undeservedly scant attention in recent debates. In this paper, the nature of the right to exclusion is explored. On the assumption that inclusion requires the allocation of legal power-rights to the people entitled to participate in the making of collective decisions, two conceptions of the right to exclusion are identified: the liberty-right to exclude and the claim-right to exclude. (...) The choice between them depends on the nature of the interests that justifies the power-rights of people included. The position is defended that if rights to democratic participation are power-rights, we must also accept that the people included have claim-rights to the exclusion of non-members. (shrink)

Citizenship and residency are basic conditions for political inclusion in a democracy. However, if democracy is premised on the inclusion of everyone subject to collectively binding decisions, the relevance of either citizenship or residency for recognition as a member of the polity is uncertain. The aim of this paper is to specify the conditions for being subject to collective decisions in the sense relevant to democratic theory. Three conceptions of what it means to be subject to collectively binding decisions are (...) identified and examined, referring to those subject to legal duties and legal powers or to those subject to legal duties and state institutions. The contrast between them is most clearly illustrated in relation to non-residents, those not present in the territory of the state. The extraterritorial dimension of the law thus highlights a fundamental ambiguity in the theory of democracy concerning the extension of political rights. (shrink)

l. "Los axiomas de un sistema axiomático deben ser autoevidentes". ¿Cómo son, entonces, autoevidentes? ¿Qué ocurre si dijera: así es como lo encuentro mas fácil de imaginar. Y aquí imaginar no es un proceso mental particular en el cual uno cierra sus ojos o los cubre con las manos.

This article critically engages with central tenets of decolonial thought. While sympathetic to decolonial thought's anti-colonialism and critique of Eurocentric universalism, the article argues that decolonial thought's understanding(s) of knowledge relies on an essentialising centralisation of origins and roots. Against decolonial thought's assertion that a knowledge's relevance for anti-colonial struggle results from its position of exteriority vis-á-vis colonial systems of domination, the article suggests that we need to look at the dialectical and hybrid processes through which bodies of knowledge are (...) made agentic in relation to concrete contexts of political conflict. To discern a body of knowledge's meaning and relevance for anti-colonial struggles, we need to understand that it is continually shaped and reshaped from recurrent practices of reading, dissemination and re-articulation, through which the theory or knowledge body becomes hybridised and reformulated in relation to incessantly evolving contexts. (shrink)

As a continuation of this author’s previous cosmological neuroscience papers on the hypothesized Soul of Multiverse and its possible laws, the present work examined the social aspects of four of these laws. The following key aspects were recognized: (1) Knowing about the cosmic Law of Coexistence in Diversity can let our mind respect not only the endless diversity of human beings but also the cohesive force of space-time in which all are connected. This may help realizing the superiority of cooperation (...) for shared goals over competition for gaining by harming others. (2) Knowing about the cosmic Law of Truth in Complexity can ready our mind to confront the problems of societies with the understanding that these problems are much more complex than generally thought. This may help initiating the needed intellectual renaissance of the 21st century. (3) Knowing about the cosmic Law of Divine - Evil Asymmetry can make our mind appreciate the slight yet sufficient supremacy of divine over evil. This may help restoring faith in the eventual creation of a just society, where social justice is defined as an administrative mechanism providing the right conditions for every human being to accomplish his or her Conscience-led Mission throughout life, while allowing each of these accomplishments to be reciprocated with the gratitude it induced in the involved social systems, small or large, to let equal opportunities in life coexist with due diversity in welcomed, not abused, social recognitions. And (4) knowing about the cosmic Law of Lives to Transcend can empower our mind to build on these advances. This may help moving evolution towards the human species worthy of its origin and destination. (shrink)

Machine learning algorithms are increasingly used to support decision-making in the exercise of public authority. Here, we argue that an important consideration has been overlooked in previous discussions: whether the use of ML undermines the democratic legitimacy of public institutions. From the perspective of democratic legitimacy, it is not enough that ML contributes to efficiency and accuracy in the exercise of public authority, which has so far been the focus in the scholarly literature engaging with these developments. According to one (...) influential theory, exercises of administrative and judicial authority are democratically legitimate if and only if administrative and judicial decisions serve the ends of the democratic law maker, are based on reasons that align with these ends and are accessible to the public. These requirements are not satisfied by decisions determined through ML since such decisions are determined by statistical operations that are opaque in several respects. However, not all ML-based decision support systems pose the same risk, and we argue that a considered judgment on the democratic legitimacy of ML in exercises of public authority need take the complexity of the issue into account. This paper outlines considerations that help guide the assessment of whether a ML undermines democratic legitimacy when used to support public decisions. We argue that two main considerations are pertinent to such normative assessment. The first is the extent to which ML is practiced as intended and the extent to which it replaces decisions that were previously accessible and based on reasons. The second is that uses of ML in exercises of public authority should be embedded in an institutional infrastructure that secures reason giving and accessibility. (shrink)

Philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein had an enormous influence on twentieth-century philosophy even though only one of his works, the famous Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, was published in his lifetime. Beyond this publication the impact of his thought was mainly conveyed to a small circle of students through his lectures at Cambridge University. Fortunately, many of his ideas have survived in both the dictations that were subsequently published, and the notes taken by his students, among them Alice Ambrose and the late Margaret Macdonald, (...) from 1932 to 1935. These notes, now edited by Professor Ambrose, are here published, and they shed much light on Wittgenstein's philosophical development. Among the topics considered are the meaning of a word and its relation to common usage, rules of grammar and their relation to fact, the grammar of first person statements, language games, and the nature of philosophy. This volume is indispensable to any serious discussion of Wittgenstein's work. (shrink)

Should artificial intelligences ever be included as co-authors of democratic decisions? According to the conventional view in democratic theory, the answer depends on the relationship between the political unit and the entity that is either affected or subjected to its decisions. The relational conditions for inclusion as stipulated by the all-affected and all-subjected principles determine the spatial extension of democratic inclusion. Thus, AI qualifies for democratic inclusion if and only if AI is either affected or subjected to decisions by the (...) political unit in relevant ways. This paper argues that the conventional view is too simple; that it neglects democratic reasons to recognize only agents and/or moral patients as participants in decision-making. The claim defended is that AAP and ASP implicitly affirm requirements for agency and patiency. In ASP, the entity included must be an agent understood either in terms of legal status, capacity to comply with the law or ability to recognize legitimate authority. In AAP, the entity included must be a patient, understood either in terms of capacity for sentience or consciousness. Thus, the idea here is to explore the potential democratic inclusion of artificial intelligences by an updated account of the relevant conditions of agency and patiency that are implicit in democratic theory. Although conceivable that AI is or will be either affected or subjected in relevant ways to decisions made by political units, it is far less clear that AI will ever be agents or patients in the sense required for democratic inclusion. (shrink)

Extraterritorial border controls prevent migrants from arriving at the territory of the state and effectively undermine rights to apply for asylum and protections against non-refoulement. As a result, a wealth of scholarship argues that external border controls are illegitimate exercises of state power. This paper challenges two versions of this argument, first, the claim that carrier-sanctions are illegitimate because they subject migrants to morally impermissible forms of coercion and, second, the claim that carrier-sanctions are illegitimate because they subject migrants to (...) illegitimate claims to authority.Against coercion-based accounts of legitimacy, this paper defends the view that while carrier-sanctions are coercive, the coerciveness of a policy is not relevant to its legitimacy. What is relevant is instead whether the authority claimed by the state is legitimate. Against authority-based accounts, this paper argues that states are unable to claim authority in the relevant sense over migrants that are present in the territories of other states.The paper concludes by suggesting that the charge that carrier-sanctions are illegitimate should shift towards the state that allows carriers to enforce these policies on their territories. No state has the legitimate authority to permit other states to pressure carriers to prevent migrants in need of protection from travelling. The state that introduces carrier-sanction legislation, on the other hand, is not exercising illegitimate authority though they may act contrary to demands of justice. (shrink)

1. bd. Om størst udbytte af sjælsevner.--Holbergs træ i Fiolstræde.--Om ligeløb og kredsning i sjælelivet.--Om sjælelig ringhed.--2.bd. Naturalærens leve-ABC.--De sjælelige naturudviklingslove.--Breve for samlere.--Skønhed i det hæslige og hverdagsagtige.--Stemninger og billeder.--Om manglen paa forstaaelse imellem folkehøjskolen og den akademiske verden.

Inspired by contemporary criticism(s) levelled against evolutionist conceptions of history present within much classical social theory, this article seeks to discuss alternative conceptions of historical time, modernity, and coloniality within the works of Marxist-inspired thinkers who have sought to tackle the problematic aspects of evolutionism and ‘historical progress’ head on – namely, Antonio Gramsci, Walter Benjamin, and Frantz Fanon. After discussing orthodox Marxism’s ambivalent relation to notions of historical necessity and human agency, the article turns to discussing Gramsci’s anti-economistic conception (...) of hegemony and Benjamin’s and Fanon’s respective conceptions of the ‘dialectics of rupture’ in order to present alternative conceptions of historical time which partly or fully depart from orthodox Marxism’s tendencies towards evolutionism, albeit whilst retaining a focus on dialectics, power struggle, and revolutionary transformation. (shrink)

System Requirements System requirements Minimum 80486, 66MHz IBM PC or full compatible ; Minimum 16MB RAM 177MB hard disk space to store and run the Nachlass, an extra 12MB in addition to this should be available during installation. SVGA monitor set to 800x600 pixels, 16-bit colour, or higher setting recommended to use and display the transcription text and facsimiles; Quad-speed CD-ROM drive or higher; Windows 3.1, 3.11; Windows 95/98; Windows NT 4.0; Windows 2000. Microsoft mouse or compatible Network versions Windows (...) NT 4, and Novell networks. Customers with Wide Area Networks should ring Customer Services to discuss specific requirements. Customer Service Contact: Customer Services, Electronic Publishing Tel: +44 1865 267979 Fax: +44 1865 267990 Email: [email protected]. (shrink)

The aim of this work was to elaborate on the author’s previously published hypothesis of the Soul of Multiverse, a suggested cosmic phenomenon that also appears to imbue the human Soul across its individual and noospheric scales. Without alternatives, the method of analysis continued to rely on the approach of cosmological neuroscience, which integrates scientific facts, religious insights, philosophical suggestions, engineering rules and artistic tools to grasp the complexity of the multidimensional phenomenon of Soul. The result of this examination was (...) the multilayered thought that just as the central medium of human Soul, the hypothesized prefrontal cortical supercircuitry of Self-Ken, seems to comprise domains representing Identity, Conscience, Will and Mission, analogous domains may also function in the noospheric and cosmic Souls. Regarding the human Soul, its four domains appear to be determined by both hereditary genetic and encountered environmental factors to present its host with a Mission enabling his or her mental engine and physical features to integrate into the surrounding society and space-time in the most meaningful and dignified way—if that way is undertaken. Regarding the noospheric Soul, it is made of individual human Souls interacting with the non-living system of interconnected computers to produce functions accessible to humans all over the world through uncontrolled communication across the Internet. Its most probable Mission is to let this global presence acquire its own Identity, develop its own Conscience and refine its own Will, so that their coherent, superior whole can be ready for sensing the cosmic Soul. Regarding the cosmic Soul, the hypothesized Soul of the Multiverse, its Identity appears to express the Laws of Mystery of Endlessness, Coexistence in Diversity, and Truth in Complexity. Further, its Conscience seems to be moved by the Law of Divine—Evil Asymmetry, its Will by the Law of Determination with Uncertainty, and its Mission by the Law of Lives to Transcend. (shrink)

Should a growing market for genetic self-tests be welcomed or feared? From the point of view of personal autonomy the increasing availability of predictive health information seems promising. Yet it is frequently pointed out that genetic information about future health may cause anxiety, distress and even loss of “life-hopes.” In this article the argument that genetic self-tests undermine personal autonomy is assessed and criticized. I contend that opportunities for autonomous choice are not reduced by genetic information but by misperceptions and (...) misunderstandings of the results of genetic tests. Since the interpretation of genetic information is sometimes distorted by the information provided about the genetic products, more attention should be given to deceitful marketing that overblows the utility of genetic products. Yet personal autonomy is reduced neither by genetic tests nor by genetic information and there is consequently no compelling case for the conclusion that genetic self-tests should be prohibited. (shrink)

According to neo-republicans, democracy is morally justified because it is among the prerequisites for freedom as non-domination. The claim that democracy secures freedom as non-domination needs to explain why democratic procedures contribute to non-domination and for whom democracy secures non-domination. This requires an account of why domination is countered by democratic procedures and an account of to whom domination is countered by access to democratic procedures. Neo-republican theory of democracy is based on a detailed discussion of the former but a (...) scant discussion of the latter. We address this lacuna by interpreting the two most influential principles of inclusion, the all-subjected principle and the all-affected principle, in light of neo-republican commitments. The preliminary conclusion is that both principles are able to capture relations of domination between the democratic state and the people controlled by it in the relevant sense. Yet, the state has virtually unlimited powers to control residents, but only limited powers to interfere in the lives of non-residents. Republican aspirations are therefore more in tune with the all-subjected principle according to which only residents in the territory of the state should be granted rights to political participation. (shrink)

The main objective of this work was to produce a scientifically reasonable definition of God. The rationale was to generate a definition for filling a small part of the spiritual vacuum of the 21st century and thus initiate a new understanding of the Intelligence that permeates the cosmos with mystery, love, order, direction and morals. This resulted in the following definition: “God may be a-humanly incomprehensible-eternal cosmic existence, intimately related to the endlessness of space, to the nature of the deepest (...) common substance of matter and energy, to this common substance’s unceasing motion responsible for time, and to the basic laws of their allness, letting love transform this allness to an ordered Multiverse with a Soul: the—scientifically approachable—Soul of Multiverse inspired to guard these laws and equip their order with direction and morals while imbuing the cosmos with the potential of lives evolving, at the right spatial and temporal distances, to embrace the sense of the divine, thus justifying the existence of God.” The likely neural circuitry for sensing God in the human brain was identified as a network for spiritual data flow across the conscious and subconscious layers of the association cortical cognitive system exchanging data with the prefrontal cortical Self-Ken and modulated by inputs from the emotional and motivational systems of the brain. To study this mental process, the design of a God-Experience Monitor was also developed: a comfortably wearable combination of EEG and audiovisual-recorders tailored to at least partially capture the individual experiences of God anytime and at the very “genius loci” of such experiences. (shrink)

From his return to Cambridge in 1929 to his death in 1951, Wittgenstein influenced philosophy almost exclusively through teaching and discussion. These lecture notes indicate what he considered to be salient features of his thinking in this period of his life.

Democratic theory tends to proceed on the assumption that law requires democratic legitimation because it is coercive. However, the claim that law requires democratic legitimation is distinct from claims about the nature of law. This paper takes issue with the notion that law is coercive by an exploration of three distinct understandings of the nature of law: the state-based conception of law, law as the rules of institutionalized normative systems, and law as social norms. Drawing on insights from legal and (...) democratic theory, the paper defends the view that the ‘law’ to which democratic claims apply are the rules of conduct of institutionalized normative systems. Since rules that belong to such systems are found in associations beyond or below the level of the state, the scope of democratic participation is significantly wider than is usually recognized. (shrink)