ZusammenfassungIn diesem Aufsatz wird eine kommunikations- und medientheoretische Untersuchung ausgewählter Divinationspraktiken unternommen. Im Zentrum stehen hierbei das Giftorakel der zentralafrikanischen Zande sowie die arabisch-islamische Geomantie. Dieses Unternehmen hat den Zweck, drei Thesen bezüglich Medien religiöser Kommunikation zu erproben, die sich dem Autor aus der Auseinandersetzung mit Ritualen und speziell Divinationsformen aus unterschiedlichen soziokulturellen Kontexten ergeben haben:1) Divinationsmedien unterscheiden sich in frappierender Weise von Medien der Alltagskommunikation; 2) diese besonderen Medien ermöglichen eine Kommunikation zwischen Wirklichkeitsbereichen und verkörpern damit ein fundamentales „Dazwischen“; (...) 3) von einer Innenperspektive betrachtet, werden Divinationsmedien oft als aktive Kommunikationspartner konzipiert und wahrgenommen – selbst wenn diese aus einer Beobachterperspektive unbelebte Paraphernalia sind.Um eine Grundlage für die Plausibilisierung dieser Thesen zu schaffen, ist anfänglich von Kommunikation und Medien sowie den Besonderheiten religiöser Kommunikation und Medien religiöser Kommunikation die Rede. Auf die detaillierte Beschreibung der Divinationspraktiken folgen ihre kommunikationstheoretische Analyse sowie eine zeichen- und medientheoretische Deutung dieser Ergebnisse.Das Ziel dieses Aufsatzes liegt neben der Plausibilisierung seiner Thesen auch darin, Impulse für die religionswissenschaftliche Debatte um Medien, Materialität und Performanz zu liefern. Gerade in den Ergebnissen der Divinationsforschung sieht David Morgan, wie er jüngst in Material religion schrieb, ein ertragreiches Feld. (shrink)

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1979.

Organisms are self-producing and self-maintaining, or autopoietic systems. Therefore, the course of evolution and adaptation of an organism is strongly determined by its own internal properties, whatever role external selection may play. The internal properties may either act as constraints that preclude certain changes or they open new pathways: the organism canalizes its own evolution. As an example the evolution of feeding mechanisms in salamanders, especially in the lungless salamanders of the family Plethodontidae, is discussed. In this family a large (...) variety of different feeding mechanisms is found. The authors reconstruct this evolutionary process as a series of bifurcation points of either constraints or opportunities forming a sequence of preconditions for the formation of a high-speed projectile tongue characteristic of tropical salamanders. Furthermore, it is shown how parallel evolution of seemingly unrelated domains within an organism such as respiratory physiology, life history biology and pattern of ontogeny has rather direct relevance to the feeding biology, thus demonstrating that organisms always evolve as wholes. (shrink)

The theory of knowledge objectification, initially presented and developed by Luis Radford, has gained some traction in the field of mathematics education. As with any developing theory, its presentation contains statements that may contradict its stated intents; and these problems are exacerbated in its uptake into the work of other scholars. The purpose of this study is to articulate a Spinozist-Marxian approach, in which the objectification exists not in things—semiotic means that mediate interactions—but as real relation between people. As a (...) consequence, the concept of mediation is unnecessary and can be abandoned. A concrete classroom example from Radford’s own studies is used to exemplify and develop pertinent issues. In particular, the societal nature of the ideal—a synecdoche of relations between objects that reflect relations between people—should be added and the notion of mediation no longer is required. (shrink)

Immanuel Kant’s conception of ethics and aesthetics, including his philosophy of judgment and practical knowledge, are widely discussed today among scholars in various fields: philosophy, political science, aesthetics, educational science, and others. His ideas continue to inspire and encourage an ongoing interdisciplinary dialogue, leading to an increasing awareness of the interdependence between societies and people and a clearer sense of the challenges we face in cultivating ourselves as moral beings.Early on in his career, Cavell began to recognize the strong connection (...) between Kant’s aesthetics (as it finds its expression in the Critique of the Power of Judgment) and the claims of ordinary language.. (shrink)

The central philosophical issue confronting neurolaw is whether we can reconcile the conception of ourselves as free, responsible agents with the conception of ourselves as complex physical machines. This book develops and defends an account of free and responsible agency that shows how such reconciliation is possible.

In many-valued logics with the unit interval as the set of truth values, from the standard negation and the product (or, more generally, from any strict Frank t-norm) all measurable logical functions can be derived, provided that also operations with countable arity are allowed. The question remained open whether there are other t-norms with this property or whether all strict t-norms possess this property. We give a full solution to this problem (in the case of strict t-norms), together with convenient (...) sufficient conditions. We list several families of strict t-norms having this property and provide also counterexamples (the Hamacher product is one of them). Finally, we discuss the consequences of these results for the characterization of tribes based on strict t-norms. (shrink)

This volume brings the theories and methods of a range of disciplines to bear on the imaginative workings of the human mind. The distinguished contributors demonstrate their own imaginative flair in a fascinating and varied collection of essays about this most elusive and special human capacity.

Nietzsche is usually presumed to be an atheist because of his proclaimation that God is dead. This dissertation argues, however, that the death of God is not atheistic but theistic, for Nietzsche's concept of Dionysus, Will to Power itself, entails an implicit commitment to theism. ;Chapter One indicates the enigmatic and nuanced quality of Nietzsche's style. Nietzsche wears masks. In order to decipher these masks with respect to the problem of God, six criteria of the traditional theistic understanding of God (...) are established. These six criteria are: Dionysus is eternal. He is the creative source of the world and man. The world and man exemplify the presence of Dionysus and yet they are not exhaustive of Him. Therefore Dionysus, as more than the world, can be spoken of as "other" than man and the world. This "otherness" entails a relationship between Dionysus and man/world. This relationship is not determinative of Dionysus. Man and world are an experiment on Dionysus' behalf; one that may "terminate," although Dionysus himself will not. ;Chapter Two sets out to formulate and expound upon the first four criteria of theism. This sets down the basic ontology. ;Chapter Three sets forth the problem of nihilism. Nihilism is the result of the death of God. ;Chapter Four discusses the relation of nihilism to morality. For Nietzsche, the moralization of life, and in particular the moralization of God, has led to God's death. Thus this chapter indicates the fifth criterion of theism, i.e., man's relation to God. ;Chapter Five sets out to decode hermeneutically the various masks that Nietzsche wears in reference to the problem of atheism. This chapter demonstrates how Nietzsche's own overt atheistic statements are proclaimations of iconotrophy, not godlessness. ;Chapter Six explicates Nietzsche's positive philosophy of God. This philosophy of God is formulated in terms of The Text of the Divine, God as Non-evaluatable, God and Eschatology, God and the Problem of Causality. Accordingly, this chapter deliniates the sixth criterion of theism, i.e., God's relationship to man. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Nietzsche-Studien Jahrgang: 43 Heft: 1 Seiten: 331-346.

Medical and nursing personnel have an obligation to provide the medication necessary for every patient’s pain relief. This includes patients whose life-supporting mechanical ventilation is being removed, who may not exhibit traditional signs of pain or dyspnea. The purpose of this paper is not to argue a position on withdrawing life support. Rather, it argues that nurses and physicians have an obligation to provide pain-relieving medication, such as opiates, when life support is removed, to ensure that those entrusted to their (...) care do not experience pain or significant distress. This is based on the principle of double effect, by which two actions, one intended and one unintended, may be permissible if there is a proportionate reason. The goal in these situations is never to hasten death intentionally but to make patients’ pain and suffering tolerable as a matter of compassionate and loving care. (shrink)