Emotion can be communicated through multiple distinct modalities. However, an often-ignored channel of communication is posture. Recent research indicates that bodily posture plays an important role in the perception of emotion. However, research examining postural communication of emotion is limited by the variety of validated emotion poses and unknown cohesion of categorical and dimensional ratings. The present study addressed these limitations. Specifically, we examined individuals’ (1) categorization of emotion postures depicting 5 discrete emotions (joy, sadness, fear, anger, and disgust), (2) (...) categorization of different poses depicting the same discrete emotion, and (3) ratings of valence and arousal for each emotion pose. Findings revealed that participants successfully categorized each posture as the target emotion, including disgust. Moreover, participants accurately identified multiple distinct poses within each emotion category. In addition to the categorical responses, dimensional ratings of valence and arousal revealed interesting overlap and distinctions between and within emotion categories. These findings provide the first evidence of an identifiable posture for disgust and instantiate the principle of equifinality of emotional communication through the inclusion of distinct poses within emotion categories. Additionally, the dimensional ratings corroborated the categorical data and provide further granularity for future researchers to consider in examining how distinct emotion poses are perceived. (shrink)

Infants use statistical information in their environment, as well as others’ emotional communication, to understand the intentions of social partners. However, rarely do researchers consider these two sources of social information in tandem. This study assessed 2-year-olds’ attributions of intentionality from non-random sampling events and subsequent discrete emotion reactions. Infants observed an experimenter remove five objects from either the non-random minority (18%) or random majority (82%) of a sample and express either joy, disgust, or sadness after each selection. Two-year-olds inferred (...) the experimenter’s intentionality by giving her the object that she had previously selected when she expressed joy or disgust after non-random sampling events, but not when she expressed sadness or sampled at random. These findings demonstrate that infants use both statistical regularities and discrete emotion communication to infer an agent’s intentions. In particular, the present findings show that 2-year-olds infer that an agent can intentionally select a preferred or an undesired object from a sample as a function of the discrete emotion. Implications for the development of inferring intentionality from statistical sampling events and discrete emotion communication are discussed. (shrink)

BackgroundTo assess ethical concerns associated with participation in a financial incentive programme to help adolescents with type 1 diabetes improve diabetes self-management.MethodsFocus groups with 46 adolescents with type 1 diabetes ages 12–17 and 38 of their parents were conducted in the Seattle, Washington metropolitan area. Semistructured focus group guides addressed ethical concerns related to the use of FI to promote change in diabetes self-management. Qualitative data were analysed and emergent themes identified.ResultsWe identified three themes related to the ethical issues adolescents (...) and parents anticipated with FI programme participation. First, FI programmes may variably change pressure and conflict in different families in ways that are not necessarily problematic. Second, the pressure to share FIs in some families and how FI payments are structured may lead to unfairness in some cases. Third, some adolescents may be likely to fabricate information in any circumstances, not simply because of FIs, but this could compromise the integrity of FI programmes relying on measures that cannot be externally verified.ConclusionsMany adolescents with type 1 diabetes and their parents see positive potential of FIs to help adolescents improve their self-management. However, ethical concerns about unfairness, potentially harmful increases in conflict/pressure and dishonesty should be addressed in the design and evaluation of FI programmes. (shrink)

One of the most pressing points in the philosophy of sport is the question of a definition of sport. Approaches towards sport vary based on a paradigm and position of a particular author. This article attempts to analyse and critically evaluates a recent definition of sport presented by Jim Parry in the context of argument that e-sports are not sports. Despite some innovations, his conclusions are in many ways traditional and build on the previous positions. His research, rooted in the (...) conceptual analysis, starts with a stipulation that sport is paradigmatically Olympic sport. He defines it then as an ‘institutionalised, rule-governed contest of human physical skill’ i.e., identifies six necessary elements of sport: human (not animals), physical (not chess), skill (not jogging), contest (not mountaineering), rule-governed (not ‘field sports’), institutionalized (not hula-hooping). Our claim is that this definition, despite its methodological clarity, is not accurate and does not sufficiently represent sport outside the Olympic context. First, to say for something to be a sport it is necessary to be a contest leads to a narrow concept of sport. Secondly, Parry’s account lacks the emphasis on game and play-like structures that are inherently present in sport (even in the Olympic sport), namely non-necessity, non-ordinariness, arbitrariness and gratuitousness. We try to direct the attention precisely on these structures and offer an alternative account of sport understood as a modern ‘hard core’ sport that nevertheless reaches important congruences with Parry’s definition. The originality of this contribution lies in presenting the essential qualities of modern ‘hard core’ sports, which, although sometimes hidden in the modern emphasis on high level performances, competition, and results, play an important role in the question how sport ought to be played and approached. (shrink)

Throughout the greater part of the twentieth century, both in the analytic and continental traditions, metaphysics was deemed to be passé. The last few decades, however, have witnessed a remarkable growth of interest among analytic philosophers in various traditional metaphysical topics, such as modality, truth, causality, etc. which resulted in the emergence of various forms of analytic metaphysics. The new forms of metaphysics differ from its traditional forms mostly in their methodology and in the range of proposed solutions to particular (...) problems. Besides these and other differences, however, there are also many similarities and there are even some who intentionally develop traditional metaphysical themes using the contemporary analytical methods. All these developments call for detailed exploration, which is the general goal of the present publication Metaphysics: Aristotelian, Scholastic, Analytic. The publication is the fruit of the conference which took place in Prague in 2010 and which had for its aim to bring together those willing to explore relations between the traditional and contemporary concerns, both from among the leading analytic philosophers working in metaphysics and the historians of philosophy devoted to the study of the metaphysical tradition. The specific focus of the conference was a re-examination of topics such as categories, metaphysical structure, substance and accident, existence, modalities, and predication. (shrink)

This study evaluated the effects of an exergame program combined with traditional tennis training on autonomic regulation, tennis technique, gross motor skills, clinical reaction time, and cognitive inhibitory control in children. Sixty-three children were randomized into four groups and compared at baseline, 6-month immediately post intervention and at 1-year follow-up post intervention. At 6-month post intervention the combined exergame and regular training sessions revealed: higher breathing frequency, heart rate and lower skin conductance levels during exergaming; additional benefits in the point (...) of contact and kinetic chain elements of the tennis forehand and backhand technique ; negative impact on the shot preparation and the follow-through elements ; higher ball skills ; higher percentages of clinical reaction time improvement and cognitive inhibitory control improvement in both congruent and incongruent trials. The 1-year follow-up test showed no differences in the tennis technique, clinical reaction time and cognitive inhibitory control improvement between groups with the same number of trainings per week. The findings support exergaming as an additional training tool, aimed to improve important cognitive-motor tennis skills by adding dynamics to the standardized training process. Caution should be placed to planning this training, e.g., in a mesocycle, since exergaming might decrease the improvement of specific tennis technique parts of the trainees.. (shrink)

This paper is a Philosophical Interview with Prof. Stanislav Sousedík.

Functionalism about kinds is still the dominant style of thought in the special sciences, like economics, psychology, and biology. Generally construed, functionalism is the view that states or processes can be individuated based on what role they play rather than what they are constituted of or realized by. Recently, Weiskopf has posited a reformulation of functionalism on the model-based approach to explanation. We refer to this reformulation as ‘new functionalism’. In this paper, we seek to defend new functionalism and to (...) recast it in light of the concrete explanatory aims of the special sciences. In particular, we argue that the assessment of the explanatory legitimacy of a functional kind needs to take into account the explanatory purpose of the model in which the functional kind is employed. We aim at demonstrating this by appealing to model-based explanations from the social and behavioral sciences. Specifically, we focus on preferences and signals as functional kinds. Our argument is intended to have the double impact of deflecting criticisms against new functionalism from the perspective of mechanistic decomposition while also expanding the scope of new functionalism to encompass the social and behavioral sciences. (shrink)

This article reviews the effects of malnutrition on early brain development using data generated from animal experiments and human clinical studies. Three related processes, each with their own functional consequences, are implicated in the alteration of brain development. (1) Maternal undernutrition at the start of pregnancy results in reduced transfer of nutrients across the placenta, allowing the conservation of effort for future reproductive episodes. (2) Differential allocation to growing organs by the fetus in response to nutritional stress spares the brain (...) to a large though still limited degree, reflecting the organ’s relative contribution to survival and reproductive success. (3) Prenatal malnutrition disrupts developing neurotransmitter systems, which results in the expression of specific cognitive and affective traits. It is argued that the increasing size and therefore cost of the brain, in conjunction with increasing ecological instability and marginality, reinforced selection for maternally controlled growth suppression of offspring, reallocation of organ growth rates by offspring, and behavioral changes related to development of neurotransmitter systems. (shrink)

Despite on-going debates in philosophy and cognitive science, dual process theory (DPT) remains a popular framework for theorizing about human cognition. Its central hypothesis is that cognitive processing can be subsumed under two generic types. In this paper, we argue that the putative success and popularity of this framework remains overstated and gives rise to certain misunderstandings. If DPT has predictive and/or explanatory power, it is through offering descriptions of cognitive phenomena via functional analysis. But functional descriptions require an individuation (...) strategy. To date, there has been no systematic exploration of how Type 1 and Type 2 are functionally individuated. Following recent debates in philosophy of cognitive science, we consider three individuation strategies (i.e., abstraction, reification, fictionalization) and assess the legitimacy of each in relation to DPT. This leads us to the verdict that the most viable route for justifying DPT is to construe Type 1 and Type 2 processes as reifications. We conclude that, construed as reifications, the common rationales offered by proponents of DPT for demarcating Type 1 and Type 2 processes do not escape criticism and require further theoretical justification. (shrink)

Explication usually plays the role of the method of language revision. The paper sticks to the Carnapian project of explication and develops some of the formal requirements imposed on the explicatum. However, it departs from Carnap’s view when it comes to how to construe the simplicity condition. It is suggested that in some cases the simplicity condition, which in the Carnapian project plays the derived role with respect to the other three conditions—the similarity, exactness, and fruitfulness conditions—may be substantive for (...) the overall evaluation of explications. Based on a case study of three different explications of the H-D concept of confirmation :391–437, 1991; Erkenntnis 41:183–188, 1994; Gemes in Philos Sci 60:477–487, 1993; Erkenntnis 49:1–20, 1998; Sprenger in Philos Compass 6:497–508, 2011), we show that there are cases where competing explicata of a common explicandum satisfy the first three conditions equally well. In those cases, then, the simplicity condition is supposed to make the difference. However, instead of using Carnap’s construal of simplicity, we suggest a Principle of instrumental simplicity according to which, ceteris paribus, the simpler the explicatum is, the more likely is its ‘survival’ in competition with other explicata. Moreover, it is suggested that whereas the similarity, exactness and fruitfulness conditions are, in some sense, formal criteria, the simplicity condition is rather tested empirically. (shrink)

The paper deals with the New Riddle of Induction set forth by N. Goodman in his Fact, Fiction, and Forecast. The problem is introduced through the definition of grue-predicate. The relation between the grue-hypothesis and empirical evidence is examined. Goodman’s underlying thesis about the neutrality of empirical evidence is undermined. The intelligibility of the idea that disjunctive properties such as Grue can be observed and seen is questioned. A solution of Goodman’s riddle is outlined by means of the definition of (...) the identity of empirical properties and further deve- loped through postulating of the necessary condition of induction executability which prohibits the inference from “Some a, b, c, d emeralds are green” to the hypothesis “All emeralds are grue”. (shrink)

V rámci filosofie věd panuje široká shoda na tom, že druhá polovina 20. století složila „labutí píseň" pozitivismu. Milton Friedman a Paul Samuelson, dva klíčoví autoři k metodologii ekonomie v daném časovém období, přitom tento vývoj ve filosofii vědy prý nikdy nereflektovali. Pozitivistická východiska - v prvé řadě v podobě redukcioni- stického přístupu - jsou tudíž stále přítomna ve vlivných teoretických konceptech rozvinutých ekonomy hlavního proudu. Značný počet autorů však v současnosti sdílí náhled, že tyto koncepty v nezanedbatelné míře přispěly (...) k vývoji, jenž ústil ve finanční krizi, vrcholící v letech 2008 a 2009. Předkládaný článek se proto táže, zda to byla právě krize - v níž mnozí spatřují empirické zamítnutí řady pozitivistických konceptů - která napsala „labutí píseň" pozitivismu v ekonomii hlavního proudu. (shrink)

According to intentionalism, a demonstrative d refers to an object o only if the speaker intends d to refer to o. Intentionalism is a popular view in metasemantics, but Gauker has recently argued that it is circular. We defend intentionalism against this objection, by showing that Gauker’s argument rests on a misconstrual of the aim of metasemantics. We then introduce two related, but distinct circularity objections: the worry that intentionalism is uninformative, and the problem of intentional bootstrapping, according to which (...) it is impossible to have referential intentions. We also show how intentionalists could respond to these new objections. (shrink)

L’objet de la présente contribution est d’examiner les relations qu’établissent plusieurs auteurs entre l’amélioration de l’homme, la nature humaine et l’humanisme. Après avoir défini un sens faible et un sens fort du transhumanisme, nous y avons opposé deux critiques, celle de J. Habermas et de M. Sandel, en prenant l’exemple le plus discuté dans la littérature : la possibilité d’améliorer génétiquement son enfant et avons montré qu’elles ne sont pas convaincantes : le recours au concept de la nature humaine à (...) lui seul n’aide pas à répondre à la question de savoir si l’amélioration génétique d’un enfant est morale ou non. Il en est de même de la caractérisation de l’amélioration de l’homme en terme d’humanisme. Loin d’être une justification, il peut aussi s’appliquer à toute position dite bioconservatrice : le transhumanisme peut être humaniste dans le sens heideggérien critique de la technique comme métaphysique. (shrink)

Le problème du sujet ou de l'intersubjectivité représente, sans aucun doute, une des questions les plus importantes de la philosophie politique et juridique contemporaine. C'est ce que confirme le retour de l'éthique dans nos sociétés démocratiques ainsi que les remises en question de tout concept de subjectivité. Ces dernières pourraient bien servir de fil conducteur à une reconstruction de l'histoire des différents projets modernes de la philosophie. A cette possibilité de reconstruction s'ajouteraient non seulement les différentes tentatives de repenser l'intersubjectivité (...) telles que les ont menées des penseurs comme Husserl, mais encore ses déconstructions opérées par Nietzsche, Heidegger et le heideggerianisme français d'une part, ainsi que les reconstructions entreprises au sein de l'éthique de la discussion (Karl-Otto Apel et Jürgen Habermas). Même le débat, devenu emblématique, de la philosophie politique et juridique anglo-américaine entre libéraux et communautariens tourne autour de la notion de subjectivité. Les théories féministes contemporaines réussiront, elles aussi, à la raviver, à la polariser autour de deux éléments sexuellement différents : le "sujet mâle de la raison" et le "sujet féminin essentiellement caractérisé par la tendance à la sollicitude"? Les théories féministes n'ont-elles pas repris à leur compte le slogan de la fin de l'homme, l'une des plus importantes déclarations de guerre des déconstructions postmodernes de la métaphysique occidentale, notamment des théories modernes? N'ont-elles pas trouvé dans cette déclaration un écho favorable à leur cause, dès lors que l'homme s'identifie au "sujet mâle de la raison", propriétaire chrétien et blanc"? L'importance des problèmes soulevés par le concept de la subjectivité, sa place dans la philosophie contemporaine sans parler des controverses qu'il génère expliquent et imposent ce nouvel investissement auquel nous consentons. (shrink)

The Inherent inseparability of psychopathology and phenomenology is generally a known fact, established and popularised by Karl Jaspers in Allgemeine Psychopathologie. In the following paper, I will show the development of interdisciplinary methodology initiated by Jaspers, and discuss it by combining M. Merleau Ponty`s theory of embodiment, R. D. Laing`s existential-phenomenological approach, and T. Fuchs` concept of brain resonance and integral causality with the hermeneutical thoughts of Paul Ricœur regarding the notion of selfhood. The main thesis proposes that fusion of (...) hermeneutics and phenomenology with psychiatry can play a significant methodological role in the approach to diagnosis and treatment of the psychotic disorders spectre, especially regarding the most complex yet inaccurately defined and evaluated mental disorder – schizophrenia. Due to the fundamental interpretative capacity of both disciplines regarding the understanding of the displacement (translocation) of subject, disembodiment, delusions and consciousness, I am considering them as a prerequisite for the effective expansion of psychiatric practice. (shrink)

Background: Although convolutional neural networks (CNNs) achieve high diagnostic accuracy for detecting Alzheimer’s disease (AD) dementia based on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans, they are not yet applied in clinical routine. One important reason for this is a lack of model comprehensibility. Recently developed visualization methods for deriving CNN relevance maps may help to fill this gap as they allow the visualization of key input image features that drive the decision of the model. We investigated whether models with higher accuracy (...) also rely more on discriminative brain regions predefined by prior knowledge. Methods: We trained a CNN for the detection of AD in N = 663 T1-weighted MRI scans of patients with dementia and amnestic mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and verified the accuracy of the models via cross-validation and in three independent samples including in total N = 1655 cases. We evaluated the association of relevance scores and hippocampus volume to validate the clinical utility of this approach. To improve model comprehensibility, we implemented an interactive visualization of 3D CNN relevance maps, thereby allowing intuitive model inspection. Results: Across the three independent datasets, group separation showed high accuracy for AD dementia versus controls (AUC ≥ 0.91) and moderate accuracy for amnestic MCI versus controls (AUC ≈ 0.74). Relevance maps indicated that hippocampal atrophy was considered the most informative factor for AD detection, with additional contributions from atrophy in other cortical and subcortical regions. Relevance scores within the hippocampus were highly correlated with hippocampal volumes (Pearson’s r ≈ −0.86, p < 0.001). Conclusion: The relevance maps highlighted atrophy in regions that we had hypothesized a priori. This strengthens the comprehensibility of the CNN models, which were trained in a purely data-driven manner based on the scans and diagnosis labels. The high hippocampus relevance scores as well as the high performance achieved in independent samples support the validity of the CNN models in the detection of AD-related MRI abnormalities. The presented data-driven and hypothesis-free CNN modeling approach might provide a useful tool to automatically derive discriminative features for complex diagnostic tasks where clear clinical criteria are still missing, for instance for the differential diagnosis between various types of dementia. (shrink)

There is no clear answer as to why there are more employed male philosophers than female philosophers in most universities. The first part analyses the problem of the historical under-education of women – which may be a simple explanation for the absence of women in the history of philosophy. Today, however, the situation in the humanities, including philosophy, is different, as there are often more female than male students, but this does not lead to a significant balance of men and (...) women in higher academic positions. Therefore, the first part of the paper also discusses fifteen hypotheses about the causes of this state of affairs, some of which have been rejected, some of which are highly probable, while further research is needed to confirm or reject some. The second part addresses the problem of the idea that traditional philosophy needs “the feminine” as “the other”, which it defines negatively. This position can be rejected with similar arguments that can also be used to reject essentialism. (shrink)

P. Sousedík and D. Svoboda, in their paper “Různá pojetí matematiky u vybraných autorů od antiky po raný novověk: Je matematika teoretická věda nebo pouhá technika?”, proposed an interpretation of Aquinas’s understanding of the nature of mathematics which the author regards as unsatisfactory. The purpose of this review article is to point out its problems and to suggest in its stead an adequate interpretation of Aquinas’s mind, on the basis of a detailed analysis of his texts. The author shows that (...) Aquinas was by no means an instrumentalist in mathematics but considered mathematical truths to be directly applicable to “physical matter”. Such an application takes place in sciences like astronomy, harmonics or optics, which, although sometimes subsumed under mathematics broadly conceived, nevertheless form a special category qua the so-called “middle sciences” (viz. situated between mathematics and physics) and are thus no true species of mathematics. The fact that these sciences are also regarded as “arts” does not preclude their scientific character at all, since the two categories are not mutually exclusive, according to St. Thomas. (shrink)

How is it possible that works of art exist? How do we become receptive aesthetic subjects? The Specificity of the Aesthetic extends these fundamental ontological and phenomenological questions around which Georg Lukács's theory of art was organised. This late work of aesthetics seeks to solve a puzzle that neither philosophy nor socialist politics was able to: the fundamental ethical question of what individuals and humanity as a whole ought to do. Art offers Lukács the already-existing means through which the damaged (...) edifice of Marxism might be reconstructed on a durable basis on which to rest the philosophy, politics, and ethics of a non-Soviet-style Marxism. Erik M. Bachman, Ph.D. (2011), University of California at Santa Cruz, is a Lecturer at that university. Author of Literary Obscenities: U.S. Case Law and Naturalism after Modernism (2018), he has also published numerous essays on modernism, film, and Lukács. Tyrus Miller, Ph.D. (1994), Stanford University, is the Dean of the School of Humanities at the University of California at Irvine. He has published and edited many notable monographs and essays on modernism, critical theory, and the avant-garde. (shrink)

This discussion article is a critique of the theory of “rational compatibilism”, as presented in D. Peroutka’s eponymous article. The author raises the following nine objections against Peroutka’s conception: (1) Peroutka’s notion of liberty is ill-defined; (2) Peroutka’s argument “from growing probability” suffers from the confusion of logical and epistemic probability; (3) the charge of “irrationality” raised against the libertarian analysis of choice is either unsubstantiated or innocuous; (4) assigning the determining force to a final (rather than efficient) cause makes (...) no difference with regard to freedom; (5) it is inexplicable in Peroutka’s conception why only a rational (as opposed to sensual) good can determine the will in a “compatibilist” way, i.e. without thereby compromising freedom; (6) Peroutka’s conception reduces “libertarian” situations to “perplexed” or “dilemmatic” situations, and so reduces all moral evil to evil “from ignorance”, leaving no room for evil “from weakness” and “from malice”; (7) the “asymmetry” in Peroutka’s conception (only evil acts have to be libertarian) only arises because the possibility of superrogatory acts has been ignored; (8) Peroutka’s conception turns libertarian freedom into an unjustifiable evil; and finally, (9) in his reply to Sartre Peroutka upholds Sartre’s proton pseudos: viz. the confusion of logical and deontic modality (viz. necessity and obligation). In an appendix the author shows that although Peroutka’s conception of rational compatibilism shares some points with Aquinas’s theory, as a whole it cannot be ascribed to him. (shrink)

Face à la nouvelle sensibilité de l'homme contemporain envers les questions écologiques, à l’importance qu’il accorde au soin de la planète, et dans le sillage de la publication de Laudato Si’, la vision de Teilhard de Chardin apparaît à nouveau actuelle. Bien que les questions et l’état des sciences aient changé considérablement depuis sa mort en 1955, la portée cosmologique de la christologie teilhardienne fait de la perspective du jésuite paléontologue une source inespérée pour une pratique chrétienne adaptée aux exigences (...) du monde moderne. À partir de sa notion d’Église en tant que Corps cosmique du Christ, où toutes les créatures de notre vaste univers sont englobées au sein de la sphère ecclésiale elle-même, la communion entre les êtres s’étend au-delà des êtres humains, fondant un profond respect pour toutes les créatures. Le présent ouvrage cherche à préciser et à justifier, d’un côté, l’insertion de Teilhard au sein de la tradition chrétienne et à envisager, d’un autre, les conséquences pratiques de cette ecclésiologie écologique, notamment dans la spiritualité, l’éthique et la liturgie. Andreas Gonçalves Lind est un prêtre jésuite luso-allemand qui, pour le moment, fait une thèse doctorale sur la phénoménologie henryenne de la Vie à l’Université de Namur comme boursier de la FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (Portugal). (shrink)

Résumé: L’interprétation des concepts clefs de saint Paul à partir des intuitions fondamentales de la phénoménologie de la vie cherche surtout à nous faire saisir l’intersubjectivité possible dans l’immanence de la chair acosmique. Le corps mystique du Christ correspond, ainsi, à cette intersubjectivité acosmique qui peut d’ailleurs fonder, en tant que communauté transcendantale, une inter- subjectivité intramondaine qui se veut pacifique. Il nous semble que, de cette façon, une nouvelle ontologie sociale émerge dans l’appropriation que Henry fait de l’ecclésiologie paulinienne. (...) Il s’agit d’une ontologie qui, pour respecter la singularité de chaque individu n’a pas besoin de l’isoler ou de le concevoir par le biais d’une abstraction totalement séparée d’une quelconque relation aux autres egos. Ce faisant, Henry élabore une ontologie sociale qui n’est réfléchie ni par l’idée de contrat social des philosophes libéraux ni par les vues des communautariens, pour qui l’individu est socialement produit comme être essentiellement déjà-au-monde. Mots-clés: Michel Henry. Corps mystique. Chair. Intersubjectivité. (shrink)

John Venn is remembered today as the inventor of the famous "Venn diagram." The postmortem fame of the namesake diagram has until now eclipsed Venn's own status as one of the most accomplished logicians in his day. Praised by John Stuart Mill as a "highly successful thinker" with much "power of original thought," Venn profoundly influenced nineteenth-century philosophers, ranging from Mill and Henry Sidgwick to Charles Sanders Peirce. Venn was heir to a clerical, Evangelical dynasty but religious doubts led him (...) to resign Holy Orders and instead turn to an academic life, writing influential textbooks on probability theory and logic and advocating for education reform, including for women's education. Venn also collaborated with Francis Galton in the unofficial Anthropometrical Laboratory, and, through his writing and teaching, a direct line can be traced from Venn and his circle to the development of analytic philosophy in the work of W. E. Johnson, G. E. Moore, Bertrand Russell, and C. D. Broad. Through family descent, Venn was connected to eminent Victorians like Leslie Stephen and Virginia Woolf. This essential book explores Venn's life and work in context, taking readers on his journey from Evangelical son to Cambridge don. The picture that emerges of Venn, the person, is of a man with many sympathies-sometimes mutually reinforcing and at other times outwardly contradictory. (shrink)

This chapter lays out what we take to be the main types of justice and ethical challenges concerning those adverse effects of climate change leading to climate-related Loss and Damage (L&D). We argue that it is essential to clearly differentiate between the challenges concerning mitigation and adaptation and those ethical issues exclusively relevant for L&D in order to address the ethical aspects pertaining to L&D in international climate policy. First, we show that depending on how mitigation and adaptation are distinguished (...) from L&D, the primary focus of policy measures and their ethical implications will vary. Second, we distinguish between a distributive justice framework and a compensatory justice scheme for delivering L&D measures. Third, in order to understand the differentiated remedial responsibilities concerning L&D, we categorise the measures and policy approaches available. Fourth, depending on the kind of L&D and which remedies are possible, we explain the difference between remedial and outcome responsibilities of different actors. [Open access]. (shrink)

Trajectoire de la modernité retrace le parcours philosophique d'Alain Renaut. Précédées par un court texte d'Alain Renaut lui-même, les trois grandes parties de l'ouvrage se composent de contributions historiques et systématiques. Il présente le chemin parcouru par le philosophe de Heidegger à Kant, et comporte quelques notes critiques des travaux de Renaut. Il décline ensuite les aspects constitutifs de l'humanisme dans les différents travaux du philosophe, et s'étend de la pensée de l'Europe à des réflexions sur la démocratie, en passant (...) par la pensée de la différence individuelle ou de groupe, comme l'expression d'une demande de justice sociale et politique sans laquelle l'humanisme demeurerait inachevé. Il regroupe enfin un ensemble d'articles consacrés au tournant d'Alain Renaut vers les problèmes de philosophie politique appliquée, comme la conception de la notion de philosophie politique appliquée, mais encore des sujets qui ont dominé ses dernières années d'enseignement accentuant l'autre dimension négative, souvent oblitérée, de la pensée de l'humanisme moderne."--Page 4 of cover. (shrink)

L'idée de rassembler en un seul volume des textes sur Sartre, Lukacs et Althusser aurait relevé, il n'y a pas si longtemps, de la gageure. Aujourd'hui même, elle n'a rien d'une évidence, tant sont encore présentes dans les esprits les querelles et polémiques qui ont vu s'opposer les trois penseurs ici choisis. Histoire passée? Sans doute, à condition toutefois de la penser. Sartre, Lukacs ou Althusser représentent pourtant des moments majeurs du travail que quelque chose qui s'est nommé " le (...) " marxisme a pu mener en philosophie au cours du siècle. A ceux qui voudraient l'oublier, et tenter de nous entraîner dans ce refoulement, il convient également de rappeler qu'ils en incarnent autant de versions résolument hérétiques. Et c'est dans le sens de cette entreprise, communément partagée et diversement menée, d'une critique radicale de l'orthodoxie se réclamant de Marx, que la discussion sur leur apport respectif peut véritablement commencer. S'il en est ainsi, alors Sartre, Lukacs et Althusser représentent autant de tentatives de réaction à la transformation du marxisme en grand récit métaphysique au service des appareils politiques issus de la révolution fondatrice du " court XXe siècle " mais aussi de son involution, qui conduisit finalement à l'implosion et à la défaite. Nous pensons que les études regroupées dans ce volume, par la diversité de leurs approches et de leurs problématiques, vont contribuer à engager précisément ce débat. (shrink)

Lukács est classé parmi les penseurs marxistes. Lui-même a décrit son « chemin vers Marx ». Mais quel genre de marxiste était-il? Certains le trouvent trop hégélien, d’autres déplorent son « orthodoxie sectaire »... Les essais qui constituent ce livre sont réunis par le même souci : tenter, par des voies différentes, de déterminer quel révolutionnaire il était, notamment à travers l’étude détaillée de l’évolution de sa pensée durant son séjour de dix ans, en Autriche, à l’époque de l’austro-marxisme appliqué (...) de « Vienne-la-Rouge » et par une recherche sur la signification lukacsienne du personnage de Naphta dans « La Montagne magique » de Thomas Mann. À la fin du livre est retranscrite la dernière interview au cours de laquelle Lukács critique, en particulier, d’un point de vue marxiste, les dysfonctions bureaucratiques des régimes socialistes. À travers les figures contrastées et problématiques de Lukács, parfois dissimulé sous le masque stalinien, apparaît le personnage compliqué du grand philosophe hongrois et, en pointillé, celui qu’il aurait pu être. (shrink)

L’ouvrage de Lukas Gschwend s’inscrit dans la lignée de la nouvelle littérature sur Nietzsche qui se veut une réhabilitation philosophique de son œuvre. Dans cette étude, Gschwend se propose de reconstruire la philosophie nietzschéenne du droit. C’est une tâche difficile, comme tout exposé systématique de cette pensée qui se présente de façon non systématique, voire «chaotique» ainsi que le dira Gschwend. Notre auteur s’attaque donc au corpus nietzschéen pour en extraire les éléments qui relèvent d’une philosophie du droit. Il (...) fait judicieusement appel tant aux œuvres publiées par Nietzsche lui-même qu’à celles qui parurent après sa mort, le fameux Nachlaß, ne privilégiant aucune période au détriment d’une autre. Une bibliographie systématique et imposante et qui peut être fort utile à quiconque souhaite pousser plus loin son investigation sur la philosophie du droit chez Nietzsche est présentée en début d’ouvrage. (shrink)

"Éltem--és ebbe más is belehalt már."--Egy élet szenvedélye.--Vád és valóság.--József Attila társadalmi helyzete és kritikai fogadtatása.--Lukács György szellemi Odüsszeiája.--A marxista esztétika kérdőjelei.--Életpraxis és elvontság.--A manipulált manipuláció. -- Értékmonopólium vagy értékhierarchia.--Normatív történelem vagy történelmi normák.--Tudományos igényű tárgyilagosság.--A történelem dimenziól és az emberi dimenziók.--A mai kulturális politika elveinek összefoglalása.--Az egydimenziójú esztétika.--A fantasztikum lehetőségei és a szatíra.--Nem középiskolás fokon.--Párbeszéd Assisiban. 38.00Ft.

Marx admirait grandement Aristote. En aurait-il pour autant accepté l'étrange réactualisation de l'ontologie, cette proto-science de "l'être en tant qu'être"? Toute son oeuvre atteste au contraire qu'elle relevait à ses yeux de "l'ancienne philosophie", conçue à une époque où se confondaient encore toutes les branches du savoir et dont il fallait "sortir d'un bond". L'élaboration par lui et ses continuateurs de cette logique supérieure qu'est la dialectique matérialiste offrait désormais la clé d'une connaissance positive d'un monde s'expliquant par lui-même, sans (...) adjonction d'aucune sorte. On peut s'étonner qu'au soir de sa vie, Georges Lukacs (1885-1971), une des figures les plus marquantes du marxisme contemporain, se soit lancé dans l'impossible tentative de réanimer cette antiquité philosophique. Riche en développements sur le travail et l'aliénation, sa monumentale Ontologie de l'être social n'en révèle pas moins un significatif écartèlement entre le penseur marxiste et l'homme de la Mitteleuropa qu'il ne dépouilla sans doute jamais complètement en lui. (shrink)

Reedition of papers in English spanning from 1986 to 2009 /// Historical background -- An imposed legacy -- Twentieth century contemporaneity -- Appendix: The philosophy of teaching legal philosophy in Hungary /// HISTORICAL BACKGROUND -- PHILOSOPHY OF LAW IN CENTRAL & EASTERN EUROPE: A SKETCH OF HISTORY [1999] 11–21 // PHILOSOPHISING ON LAW IN THE TURMOIL OF COMMUNIST TAKEOVER IN HUNGARY (TWO PORTRAITS, INTERWAR AND POSTWAR: JULIUS MOÓR & ISTVÁN LOSONCZY) [2001–2002] 23–39: Julius Moór 23 / István Losonczy 29 // (...) ON THE SURVIVAL OF ILMAR TAMMELO’S LETTER AND MANUSCRIPT ADDRESSED TO PROFESSOR MOÓR [2009] 41–44 // PROFESSIONAL DISTRESS AND SCARCITY: ALEXANDER HORVÁTH AND THE LEGACY OF NATURAL LAW IN HUNGARY [2005] 45–50 // HUNGARIAN LEGAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE 20TH CENTURY [2011] 51–72: I. The Pre-war Period [1. Bódog (Felix) Somló (1871–1920) 52] / II. The Inter-war Period [2. Gyula (Julius) Moór (1888–1950) 54 / 3. Barna Horváth (1896–1973) 55 / 4. József Szabó (1909–1992) 57 / 5. István Bibó (1911–1979) 58 / 6. Tibor Vas (1911–1983) 59 / 7. István Losonczy (1918–1980) 60] III. The Post-war Period (Communism) 61 [8. Imre Szabó (1912–1991) 62 / 9. Vilmos Peschka (1929–2006) 63 / 10. Kálmán Kulcsár (1928–2010) 65] IV. Contemporary Trends and Perspectives 66 [11. Csaba Varga (b. 1941) 66 / 12. András Sajó (b. 1949) 69 / 13. Béla Pokol (b. 1950) 70] V. Our Understanding of the Law Today 71 --- AN IMPOSED LEGACY -- LOOKING BACK [1999] 75–94: 1. On Ideologies and Marxism in general 75 / 2. Life of an Intellectual in Communism 79 / 3. On Marxism and its Socialist Cultivation in Particular 82 / 4. Legal Philosophising [4.1. Approaches to Law 87 / 4.2. Arriving at a Legal Ontology 91] 5. Conclusion 94 // LEGAL PHILOSOPHY OF THE MARXISM OF SOCIALISM: HUNGARIAN OVERVIEW IN AN INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVE [2003] 95–151: I. Development and Balance of Marxist Philosophising on Law in Hungary [1. Preliminaries (until 1948) 96 / 2. Stalinism (from the Soviet Occupation on) {a) Liquidation of the »Residues« 98 / b) Soviet-type Uniformisation [Gleichschaltung] 99 / c) Denial of the Past, with a Dual Effect 99 / d) »Socialist Legality«, Drawn from the Progressive Past of Western Europe 103 / e) Search for the Germs of Scholarly Evolution 103} 3. Institutionalisation Accompanied by Relaxation (from the 1960s) [a) Epigonism Becoming the Scholarly Ideal 104 / b) Stalinism in a Critical Self-perspective 105 / c) Disciples Diversified Launching their own Trends 107 / d) Comparatism 110 / e) (Re)discovery of the Western Legal Philosophy as a Competitor 112 / f) A Leading Mediatory Role within the »Socialist World Order« 114} 4. Disintegration (in the 1980s) {a) Attempt at Laying New Foundations for Marxism with Epigonism Exhausted 115 / b) Competitive Trends Becoming Exclusive 115 / c) Western Legal Philosophy Acknowledged as a Fellow-traveller within the Socialist Orbit Proper 116 / d) Hungarian Legal Theory Transforming into a National Corpus 118 / e) The Practical Promotion of Some Balance 119} 5. End-game for a Substitute State Religion (in the 1990s) 120] II. Marxist Legal Philosophising in an International Perspective [Ad 1: To the Preliminaries 122 / Ad 2: To Stalinism 124 / Ad 3: To Institutionalisation Accompanied by Relaxation {a) Late Separation from Vishinskiy’s Theory 125 / b) From Ideological Self-closure to an Apparently Scholarly Openness 127 / c) From Political Ideology to Genuine Scholarship 130 / d) International Recognition of Socialist Jurisprudence as an Independent Trend 135 / e) Together with Western Trends 137} Ad 4: To Disintegration {a) Loss of Attraction as Mere Epigonism 139 / b) Exclusivity of Competing Trends 139 / c) Fellowship with »Bourgeois« Trends 140 / d) An own Trend, Internationally Recognised 141 / e) A yet Progressive Role 142} Ad 5: To the Present state 143] III. A Temporary Balance 145 // AUTONOMY AND INSTRUMENTALITY OF LAW IN A SUPERSTRUCTURAL PERSPECTIVE [1986] 151–175: 1. The Strange Fate of Concepts 151 / I. A Relational Category 2. Basis and Superstructure: The Genuine Meaning 154 / 3. Exerting Social Influence as a Conceptual Minimum 156 / 4. Relationships within the Prevailing Totality 158 / 5. Attempts at Interpretation in Hungary 159 / 6. The Lukácsian Stand 162 / 7. Lukács’s Recognitions 168 / 8. Some Criticism 169 / II. The Law’s Understanding 171 / 9. Law Interpreted as Superstructure 171 / 10. Conclusions Drawn for the Law’s Understanding 173 // LEGAL THEORY IN TRANSITION (A PREFACE FROM HUNGARY) [2000] 177–186 // DEVELOPMENT OF THEORETICAL LEGAL THOUGHT IN HUNGARY AT THE TURN OF THE MILLENNIUM [2006] 187–215: 1. International Environment 188 / 2. The Situation in Hungary 190 / 3. Outlook I: The Historical-comparative Study of Legal Cultures and of the Lawyerly Way of Thinking 203 / 4. Outlook II: The Paradigmatic Enigma of the Transition to Rule of Law 207 / 5. Incongruity in Practice 213 / 6. Perspectives 214 --- TWENTIETH CENTURY CONTEMPORANEITY -- CHANGE OF PARADIGMS IN LEGAL RECONSTRUCTION: CARL SCHMITT AND THE TEMPTATION TO FINALLY REACH A SYNTHESIS [2002] 219–234: 1. Dangers of Intellectualism 219 / 2. Schmitt in Facts 221 / 3. Schmitt and Kelsen 222 / 4. On Bordering Conditions 226 / 5. With Kelsen in Transubstantiation 230 / 6. Polarisation as the Path of Theoretical Development 232 // KELSENIAN DOCUMENTS IN HUNGARY: CHAPTERS ON CONTACTS, INCLUDING THE GENESIS OF AUTOBIOGRAPHY [2006] 235–243: 1. Preludes 235 / 2. The Search for Moór’s Bequeath 235 / 3. Moór’s Collegiality 238 / 4. Bibó as a Disciple Translating 241 // THE »HART-PHENOMENON« [2002] 245–267: I. The Hart-miracle 246 [1. The Scene of Britain at the Time 247 / 2. The Personal Career 250 / 3. The Opus’ Career 252 / 4. Verbal Sociologism 255 / 5. Growing into the British Pattern 259] II. The Hart-phenomenon 260 [6. Origination of a Strange Orthodoxy 261 / 7. Mastering Periods of the 20th Century 263 / 8. Raising the Issue of Reception in Hungary 365] // LITERATURE? A SUBSTITUTE FOR LEGAL PHILOSOPHY? [2007] 269–287: 1. The Enigma of Law and its Study 269 / 2. “Law and Literature” 271 / 3. Varieties of “Law and Literature” 274 / 4. The German Study of Artistic Representations 280 / 5. Some Literary Reconsiderations 285 / 6. Conclusion 287 --- APPENDIX -- THE PHILOSOPHY OF TEACHING LEGAL PHILOSOPHY IN HUNGARY [2007] 291–320: I. Why and How to Philosophise in Law? 291 / II. The State of Teaching Legal Philosophy 294 / III. The Philosophy of Teaching Legal Philosophy 296 / IV. Programme at the Catholic University of Hungary 300 [1. Graduate Studies 300 {a) Basic Subjects 301 / b) Facultative Seminars 305 / c) Closing Subjects 309 / d) Written Memoranda and the Thesis 312} 2. Postgraduate Studies 313 / 3. Conclusion 317] V. Perspectives 318 /// Index of Subjects 321 / Index of Normative Materials 328 / Index of Names 329 . (shrink)

The cosmology proposed by Stephen Hawking has been understood as support for an atheistic stance, due mainly to its view of the nature of time in combination with the absence of explicit boundary conditions. Against such a view, this article argues that one might develop a theistic understanding of the Universe in the context of Hawking's cosmology. In addition, the quantum cosmologies of Andrej Linde and Roger Penrose are presented. The coexistence of different research programs and their implicit metaphysical (...) views about the nature of quantum reality and time may have profound implications for philosophy and theology. (shrink)