The pathogenic, Gram‐negative bacteria, Neisseria gon‐orrhoeae, Neisseria meningitidis and Haemophilus influenzae, secrete immunoglobulin A1 proteases into their extracellular surroundings. An extraordinary feature in the secretory pathway of these putative virulence factors is a self‐directed outer membrane transport step allowing the proteins to be secreted autonomously, even from foreign Gram‐negative host cells like Escherichia coli. Here we summarize recent achievements in the understanding of IgA protease outer membrane translocation.

Feeling moved or touched can be accompanied by tears, goosebumps, and sensations of warmth in the centre of the chest. The experience has been described frequently, but psychological science knows little about it. We propose that labelling one’s feeling as being moved or touched is a component of a social-relational emotion that we term kama muta. We hypothesise that it is caused by appraising an intensification of communal sharing relations. Here, we test this by investigating people’s moment-to-moment reports of feeling (...) moved and touched while watching six short videos. We compare these to six other sets of participants’ moment-to-moment responses watching the same videos: respectively, judgements of closeness, reports of weeping, goosebumps, warmth in the centre of the chest, happiness, and sadness. Our eighth time series is expert ratings of communal sharing. Time series analyses show strong and consistent cross-correlations of feeling moved and touched and closeness with each other and with each of the three physiological variables and expert-rated communal sharing – but distinctiveness from happiness and sadness. These results support our model. (shrink)

Some video games are said to be philosophical. Despite video games having received some attention in academic philosophy, that contention has not been sufficiently addressed. This paper investigates in what sense video games might be properly called “philosophical”. To this end, I utilize Wittgenstein’s distinction between saying and showing to get into view how some video games might be properly called philosophical. This leads to two senses of being philosophical: a conventional sense of expressing philosophy through propositions, i.e., through saying, (...) and a sense of being genuinely philosophical by expressing philosophical thought through showing. I argue that the conventional sense is not sufficient to call video games philosophical, leaving the question whether there are video games which satisfy the conditions of being genuinely philosophical. I furthermore contend that there are at least some examples of video games which qualify as being philosophical, e.g., Papers, Please and The Stanley Parable. (shrink)

Semantic theories account for the literal, conventional meanings of linguistic expressions, and they tend to do so by assigning them one or more semantic values: extensions, intensions, and characters. Lest semantics should be a cul-de-sac, at least some of these values must be interpretable from the outside. The semantic values, are supposed to figure in accounts of preconditions of utterances and their communicative effects, contributing aspects of their literal meaning. The semantic values are assigned to expressions, not to surface strings. (...) The disambiguation of surface strings usually shows in the part-whole structure of the underlying expressions. The semantically relevant parts of an expression need not be determined according to its surface structure. Rather, there is a specific level of syntactic analysis—sometimes called Logical Form —that defines the syntactic input to semantic analysis. The compositional treatment of an expression may call for otherwise unmotivated structuring. (shrink)

In this paper, I address the question of what the Developmental Systems Theory (DST) aims at explaining. I distinguish two lines of thought in DST, one which deals specifically with development, and tries to explain the development of the individual organism, and the other which presents itself as a reconceptualization of evolution, and tries to explain the evolution of populations of developmental systems (organism-environment units). I emphasize that, despite the claiming of the contrary by DST proponents, there are two very (...) different definitions of the ‘developmental system’, and therefore DST is not a unified theory of evolution and development. I show that the DST loses the most interesting aspects of its reconceptualization of development when it tries to reconceptualize evolutionary theory. I suggest that DST is about development per se, and that it fails at offering a new view on evolution. (shrink)

In this paper I show that Rawls’s contract apparatus in A Theory of Justice depends on a particular presumption that is in conflict with the goal of conserving environmental resources. He presumes that parties in the original position want as many resources as possible. I challenge Rawls’s approach by introducing a rational alternative to maximising. The strategy of satisficing merely goes for what is good enough. However, it seems that under conditions of scarcity Rawls’s maximising strategy is the only rational (...) alternative. I therefore scrutinise the common account of scarcity. I distinguish between absolute and relative scarcity in order to show that scarcity is influenced by our decisions. If we would not accept the claim to as much as possible without further legitimisation, like Rawls does, then scarcity might not be as severe a problem. Finally, I reject Rawls’s proposed solution for dealing with problems of sustainability, namely his idea of the just savings principle. I conclude that Rawlsian Justice as Fairness is bad for the environment. (shrink)

Thomas Erne entfaltet im Anschluss an Schleiermachers Ästhetik das Verhältnis von Kunst und Religion. Dabei nimmt er über Schleiermacher hinaus auch die moderne, autonome Kunst in Blick. Im Dialog mit exemplarischen Kunstwerken der Gegenwart fragt er nach Transzendenzerfahrungen in der Gegenwartskunst, in der die Kunstwerke selbst zu,,autonomen Sinndomänen" werden. Der Band dokumentiert die Schleiermacher-Lecture 2019 an der Theologischen Fakultät der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Im Rahmen dieser Reihe sollen ausgewählte Aspekte von Schleiermachers Werk mit Fragen und Problemkonstellationen der Gegenwart in (...) Beziehung gesetzt werden. (shrink)

This essay accomplishes two goals. First, contra accepted interpretations, I reveal that the early Husserl executed valuable and extensive investigations of wishes—specifically in manuscripts from _Studies concerning the Structures of Consciousness_. In these manuscripts, Husserl examines two ‘kinds’ of wishes. He describes wish _drives_ as feelings of lack. He also dissects wish _intentions_ to uncover previously obscured partial acts, including nullifying consciousness, an existentially oriented act, and a preferring. Second, I reveal how these insights from _Studies_ partially prefigure Husserl’s mature (...) genetic phenomenology of drives and wish intentions. The mature Husserl develops his previous observation, that _drives_ are experiences of lack, by describing these drives as having two moments: impulse and movement. Husserl also comes to new insights about wish acts, when he juxtaposes these intentions—as pure feelings that have no power to reach a telos—to drives, which he now conceives of as volitional doings. (shrink)

In Civic Liberalism, prominent political theorist Thomas A. Spragens, Jr. asserts that most versions of democratic ideals—libertarianism, liberal egalitarianism, difference liberalism, and the liberalism of fear—lead our polity significantly astray. Spragens offers another alternative. He argues that we should recover the multiple and complex aspirations found within the tradition of democratic liberalism and integrate them into a more compelling public philosophy for our time—or what he calls civic liberalism.

Una violación de los derechos humanos implica un no cumplimiento de los derechos humanos y una relación causal activa entre agentes humanos y tal incumplimiento. Esta relación causal puede ser de interacción, pero también puede ser institucional, como cuando los agentes colaboran en el diseño y la imposición de arreglos institucionales que de manera previsible y evitable causan el no cumplimiento de los derechos humanos. Cierta evidencia de fácil acceso sugiere que (a) derechos humanos sociales y económicos básicos siguen siendo (...) incumplidos en casi la mitad de la población del mundo y (b) que el diseño de arreglos institucionales supranacionales juega un papel decisivo en la explicación de por qué la mitad más pobre de la humanidad está sufriendo un rápido descenso en su participación (ahora por debajo de tres por ciento) en el ingreso doméstico global. Se puede, entonces, argumentar con plausibilidad que ciudadanos como yo –ciudadanos pudientes de estados influyentes– violan colaborativamente los derechos humanos de los pobres del mundo a una escala masiva. (shrink)

This Bible quotation can be understood as a rudimentary conception of personal morality, affirming that the moral assessment of your life depends, in part, upon your conduct toward your least fortunate neighbors. But a conception of personal morality does not capture all that matters morally about our lives - we must also consider our social institutions. These may be morally flawed; for example, they may define positions of utter dependence. And such flaws are not natural or necessary. Social institutions are (...) created, perpetuated, and changed by human beings, who may then bear some responsibility for such flaws. Thus morality may demand more than to treat the oppressed with kindness and charity: It may require efforts toward institutional reform. And such a requirement presupposes a further moral conception: for the assessment of social institutions. (shrink)

The American Journal of Bioethics, Volume 11, Issue 8, Page 56-58, August 2011.

This article reinvigorates a key question in publication ethics: Is there research that it is permissible to conduct but that ought not to be published? The article raises the question in relation to two recent medical studies. It is argued that the publication of these studies may cause significant harm to individuals, that editors of medical journals have a moral responsibility for such harm, that denial of publication is inadequate as an instrument to fulfil this moral responsibility and that internationally (...) acknowledged publication ethics codes should incorporate this aspect of editors’ moral responsibility. (shrink)

As frequently pointed out in this discussion, one of the most characteristic features of Mayr's approach to the history of biology stems from the fact that he is dealing to a considerable degree with his own professional history. Furthermore, his main criterion for the selection of historical episodes is their relevance for modern biological theory. As W. F. Bynum and others have noted, the general impression of his reviewers is that “one of the towering figures of evolutionary biology has now (...) written a towering history of his discipline.”138 Bynum is here referring to The Growth of Biological Thought, but this observation holds equally true for Mayr's other historical writings: One must surely read this book [One Long Argument] not only for its content in itself, but for what it tells of its author. And certainly as one does so, one comes away full-handed. Many, if not all, of the disputes and controversies that have driven Mayr through his long intellectual life reappear, stated as forcefully and elegantly as ever.139Up to this point, most reviewers agree; the bone of contention is, rather, how to evaluate Mayr's historical work, considering this observation. The two related characteristics of his work-I will call them subjectivity and presentism-stand in opposition to a widespread approach in the history of science exemplified by Kuhn's suggestion that “insofar as possible..., the historian should set aside the science that he knows. His science should be learned from the textbooks and journals of the period he studies.”140 There are, however, historians who consider the close connection between Mayr and the subject matter of his historical studies to be an advantage.141On the other hand, it is assumed that the connection between past and present must result in a distortion of the historical truth and lead to a historiographical fallacy, commonly referred to as “Whig history”. Herbert Butterfield, who in 1931 gave the term its now generally accepted meaning, believed that “real historical understanding is not achieved by the subordination of the past to the present, but rather by our making the past our present and attempting to see life with the eyes of another century than our own”142. Unfortunately, Butterfield's definition of what he considers Whig history remains somewhat vague, and modern authors have emphasized what they consider most important. Butterfield's “subordination of the past to the present” is referred to in respect to the selection of subjects (there are more biographies of Charles Darwin than of, let's say, Louis Agassiz),143 to the evaluation of historical authors,144 or, more generally, to all kinds of histories “with one eye, so to speak, upon the present.”145 The underlying tendency of Whig historians is to produce a “historical account told from the viewpoint of those in power,”146 leading to a “glorification of the present.”147 It is obvious that Mayr's strongly presentist approach to the history of biology can be called Whiggish, if we apply the criteria of “selection” or “reference.” However, it might be worth mentioning that the program of writing a strictly historicist account of the history of science is challenged by various authors.148 For Mayr, it is not only legitimate but necessary to compare the present situation with the past. “Whiggish” is only the evaluation of an author in terms of our time.149I cannot discuss the Whit/anti-Whig controversy in any detail here, apart from saying that Mayr has defended himself rather extensively against the charges of being Whiggish.150 Nevertheless, it may be useful to touch on some of the criticisms that are predominant in reviews of his writings. First, we encounter the notion that historians can write a true and convincing historical account only if they have no personal interest or interpretation of their own; Mayr, on the other hand, because he “has such strong interpretations of his own, ... cannot possibly convince everyone that he is right about everything.”151 It makes one wonder, what historian has ever been able to convince everyone that he or she is right about everything? But apart from this peculiar idea, it unquestionably poses certain dangers if the subject matter of historical scrutiny and the author are identical. At the same time, this identity brings certain advantages with it, especially firsthand experiences of the period in discussion. Whether these personal memories ultimately result in a distorted picture of the past has to be decided in every particular instance. The notion that a scientific study can be conducted by a completely detached observer from a neutral standpoint has been shown to be impossible in physics, and it is also an illusion in historiography. The question is not whether, but which kind of interest are the underlying motivation for a historian. At this point, Mayr is ahead of his critics when he suggests that our understanding of the past always has a subjective component: The main reason, however, why histories are in constant need of revision is that at any given time they merely reflect the present state of understanding; they depend on how the author interpreted the current zeitgeist of biology and on his own conceptual framework and background. Thus, by necessity the writing of history is subjective and ephemeral.152Second, the temporal proximity between the event and the historical analysis makes difficulties inevitable and will finally result in certain false assessments. But this applies to all historians when they discuss recent problems, regardless of whether they are personally involved or not: As long as the battle between Darwinism and Lamarckism was raging, it was quite impossible to undertake an unbiased evaluation of Lamarck. ...[The] definite refutation of Lamarck's theory of evolutionary causation clears the air. We can now study him without bias and emotion and give him the attention that this major figure in the history of biology clearly deserves.153Third, Mayr is primarily interested in biological problems and not, for instance, historiographical, sociological, or psychological questions. Several authors have remarked that since the beginning of the professionalization of the history of science in the 1960s, a rift between two groups has developed, resulting from the heterogeneous professional backgrounds and interests of the people involved: the authors who were originally biologists and became interested in the history of their discipline only later on, and the authors who were trained as historians.154 Whereas the first group, the “biologists,” tend to be laymen in history proper, the “historians” are in most cases laymen in biology. Different professional backgrounds obviously shape the historical perspective in both groups, but neither approach is necessarily superior. The great number of important books in the history of biology written by “biologist” documents how valuable this point of view can be. On the other hand, it cannot be denied that the writings of biologists in the history of science tend to have a strong “internalist” tendency and often neglect the professional, cultural, and political context of science. Mayr's approach is that of a “biologist”; it is “internalist,” and typical for scientists who turn to the history of their discipline.I want to conclude my analysis with a quotation from a review by Douglas J. Futuyma, which gives a perceptive glimpse of Mayr's personality and style: One cannot help standing in awe of the germanic capacity for vast, allembracing synthesis: consider the lifelong devotion of Goethe to Faust, or Wagner's integration of the arts into a Gesamtkunstwerk in which all of human history and experience is wrought into epic myth. It is perhaps in this tradition that Ernst Mayr's The Growth of Biological Thought stands: a history of all of biology, a Ring des Nibelungen complete with leitmotivs such as the failures of reductionism, the struggle of biology for independence from physics, and the liberation of population thinking from the bounds of essentialism.155 Within this style of thinking Mayr has “to offer...nothing less than a vision of biology that places neodarwinian evolutionary theory firmly at the centre.”156 There may be other visions of biology, but few of them have as indefatigable and able representatives as Darwinism has in Ernst Mayr. (shrink)

In der neueren Erkenntnistheorie wird der Bayesianismus immer populärer. In diesem Ansatz werden Überzeugungen mit Glaubensgraden versehen. Dazu möchte ich der Frage nachgehen, ob wir den klassischen Ansatz in der Erkennnistheorie mit seinen kategorischen Überzeugungen komplett durch einen bayesianischen mit einem probabilistischen Überzeugungssystem ersetzen könnten. Um das zu klären, rekonstruiere ich zunächst beide Modelle unserer Überzeugungssysteme und vergleiche sie dann im Hinblick darauf, wie leistungsfähig sie jeweils dafür sind, erkenntnistheoretische Probleme zu lösen und als Grundlage für Entscheidungen zu dienen. Dabei (...) zeigt sich eine gewisse Inkommensurabilität der beiden Ansätze und außerdem erweist sich keine der Konzeptionen als eindeutig überlegen. Deshalb argumentiere ich schließlich für eine bestimmte Hybridkonzeption aus beiden Ansätzen, die die Vorteile beider Konzeptionen vereinen kann. (shrink)

Intelligent agents are often faced with the problem of trying to combine possibly conflicting pieces of information obtained from different sources into a coherent view of the world. We propose a framework for the modelling of such combination operations with roots in the work of Spohn [Spo88, Spo91]. We construct a number of combination operations and we measure them against various properties that such operations ought to satisfy. We conclude by discussing the connection between combination operations and the use of (...) infobases [Mey99, MLH00]. (shrink)

Described both as "the Hobbes of our age" and as "the philosophical godfather of Nazism," Carl Schmitt was a brilliant and controversial political theorist whose doctrine of political leadership and critique of liberal democratic ideals distinguish him as one of the most original contributors to modern political theory.The Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy offers a powerful criticism of the inconsistencies of representative democracy. First published in 1923, it has often been viewed as an attempt to destroy parliamentarism; in fact, it was (...) Schmitt's attempt to defend the Weimar constitution. The introduction to this new translation places the book in proper historical context and provides a useful guide to several aspects of Weimar political culture.The Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy is included in the series Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought, edited by Thomas McCarthy. (shrink)

The logical theory of branching space-times, which is intended to provide a framework for studying objective indeterminism, remains at a certain distance from the discussion of space-time theories in the philosophy of physics. In a welcome attempt to clarify the connection, Earman has recently found fault with the branching approach and suggested ``pruning some branches from branching space-time''. The present note identifies the different---order theoretic vs. topological---points of view of both discussion as a reason for certain misunderstandings, and tries to (...) remove them. Most importantly, we give a novel, topological criterion of modal consistency that usefully generalizes the order-theoretic criterion of directedness, and we introduce a differential-geometrical version of BST based on the theory of non-Hausdorff manifolds. (shrink)

According to Zurek, the emergence of a classical world from a quantum substrate could result from a long selection process that privileges the classical bases according to a principle of optimal information. We investigate the consequences of this principle in a simple case, when the system and the environment are two interacting scalar particles supposedly in a pure state. We show that then the classical regime corresponds to a situation for which the entanglement between the particles (the system and the (...) environment) disappears. We describe in which circumstances this factorisability condition is fulfilled, in the case that the particles interact via position-dependent potentials, and also describe in appendix the tools necessary for understanding our results (entanglement, Bell inequalities and so on). (shrink)

As a response to Gooskens’ article , this paper offers some further comments on the ethics of violent or immoral video games. After arguing that the appeal of such games actually presupposes an awareness of moral transgression, it considers the desensitization thesis, the argument from catharsis, and the relevance of human flourishing.Although this brief analysis does not provide any clear-cut answer to the question of whether or not such games ought to be frowned upon, it does reveal some possible sources (...) of discomfort. (shrink)

Ancient moral philosophers, especially Aristotle and his followers, typically shared the assumption that ethics is primarily concerned with how to achieve the final end for human beings, a life of “happiness” or “human flourishing.” This final end was not a subjective condition, such as contentment or the satisfaction of our preferences, but a life that could be objectively determined to be appropriate to our nature as human beings. Character traits were treated as moral virtues because they contributed well toward this (...) ideal life, either as means to it or as constitutive aspects of it. Traits that tended to prevent a “happy” life were considered vices, even if they contributed to a life that was pleasant and what a person most wanted. The idea of “happiness” was central, then, in philosophical efforts to specify what we ought to do, what sort of persons we should try to become, and what sort of life a wise person would hope for. (shrink)

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