Excerpt from Aristoteles: Grundlegung Einer Geschichte Seiner Entwicklung Die Art des vorliegenden Buches, das zugleich Gesamtbild und Untersuchung ist, erfordert ein kurzes Geleitwort. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, (...) such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. (shrink)

This paper explores the possibility of finding wisdom in nature. For a compassionate relationship with the natural world to make sense, the author proposes nothing less than a paradigm change within science. Science must adopt the view that intelligence is not only reserved for living systems but that a minimal kind of consciousness is present at all levels, especially at the level of quanta. This is called quantum animism. Utilizing insights from system theory, cybernetics, and theory of complexity the author (...) further suggests that the process of Collective Orchestration explains how natural systems advance to higher complexity. Thus Collective Orchestration could close the gap between Micro and Macro evolution. In the growing debate about intelligent design versus evolution Collective Orchestration could be the missing link that explains evolution as an ongoing process of self organization at all levels, eliminating the need for intelligent design. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Toward a Dialectics of Emptiness: Overcoming Nihilism and Combatting Mechanization in Nishitani Keiji’s Postwar ThoughtGriffin WernerIn his postwar writings on nihilism in modernity, Nishitani Keiji (1900–90) does not explicitly articulate the structure of the relationship between the mechanization of the world and nihilism. Instead, he discusses mechanization with respect to his critique of modern worldviews such as atheism, scientism, and liberalism and how they have contributed to the advent (...) of nihilism and the loss of human autonomy in modern Europe and Japan.1 According to Nishitani, before the advent of scientism and the subsequent progression of unfettered technological development, pre-Western-Enlightenment and pre-Meiji-period worldviews consisted of a fundamental embodied connection between a people or culture and their spiritual traditions. In Europe’s case, due to the death of God and the subsequent shift from a Christian worldview to an atheistic and scientistic one, a historical period of nihilism began. Modern mechanistic worldviews like Descartes’s, Nishitani argues, present the world as consisting of dead matter that is fundamentally separated from the indubitable ego. No longer is the world considered to be “alive” in the sense of there being a fundamental connection between human life and the living, breathing world around it. Rather, from the perspective of the ego, the modern world is simply a cold and lifeless world of dead machines.As discussed in Religion and Nothingness, the development of structurally Cartesian worldviews led to or caused the advent of nihilism in Europe. Consequently, European culture lost its cultural ground in Christianity and individuals lost their foundational meaning which supported their understanding of themselves in relation [End Page 129] to others, the world, and a transcendent God. As Japan began to modernize, or, arguably, “Westernize,” it inherited a Cartesian-like worldview and, over time, subsequently lost touch with its traditional philosophical and religious ground as well. As a result, the modern period of nihilism began in both Europe and Japan as both peoples lost touch with the traditional meaning that supported them.While this description between mechanization and nihilism implies a causal relationship, I argue that the relationship between nihilism and the mechanization of the world can be more accurately articulated in terms of a dialectical relationship. In the modern context, not only does the mechanization of the world lead to or exacerbate a culture’s plunge into nihilism or an individual’s confrontation with the abyss of nihility, but nihilism also reinforces and exacerbates the mechanization of the world. As partners in this dialectical oscillation, each reinforces the other as one (culture or person) continuously spirals deeper and deeper into meaninglessness, ultimately to the culminating point that Nishitani calls the “mechanization of man.”2Just as Nishitani argues that the problem of nihilism can only be solved by way of radicalizing nihilism to the “field of emptiness,” the structural oscillation between nihilism and mechanization will continue at the levels of the individual and the culture unless nihilism and mechanization are overcome. However, rather than only overcoming nihilism to reach emptiness in the individual, and that leading to social and political change, I argue that overcoming the dialectical tension between nihilism and mechanization will require a “dialectics of emptiness.” Such a dialectic will combat nihilism and mechanization with a mutually reinforcing tension between personal transformation, which overcomes nihilism by way of stepping back to the field of emptiness, and socio-political transformation by way of a politics of emptiness. Solving the problem of nihilism in modernity—insofar as it is always already in relation to mechanization—will require more than individual existential confrontation and transformation. Through one’s individual overcoming of nihilism, one must also aim to “empty” those institutions which contribute to the mechanization of the world. While Nishitani highlights the individual’s religious quest as the impetus for the social and political change necessary to overcome the problem of nihilism at the cultural level, an analysis of how that might be done and what [End Page 130] may be politically necessary in order to do so is missing from his thought.As such, my aim in this article is twofold: I attempt to shed light on the structure of nihilism and... (shrink)

The paper presents a set of games of competition between two or three players in which reward is jointly determined by a stochastic biased mechanism and players’ choices. More specifically, a resource can be found with unequal probabilities in one of two locations. The first agent is rewarded only if it finds the resource and avoids being found by the next agent in line; the latter is rewarded only if it finds the former. Five benchmarks, based on different psychological and (...) game-theoretic assumptions are derived and their predictions compared to actual behavior of 120, 40, and 48 participants playing repeatedly. Of the five benchmarks—the unique (Nash) equilibrium, reinforcement learning, trust-based efficiency, maximum unpredictability, and regret-based (Impulse Balance) equilibrium—regret for missed opportunities best accounts for the qualitative aspect of participants’ behavior and regret attenuated by randomization best accounts for the quantitative aspect of behavior. (shrink)

The chromosomes which segregate in anaphase I of meiosis are usually physically bound together through chiasmata. This association is necessary for proper segregation, since univalents sort independently from one another in the first meiotic division and this frequently leads to genetically unbalanced offspring. There are, however, a number of species where genetic exchanges in the form of meiotic cross‐overs, the prerequisite of the formation of chiasmata, are routinely missing in one sex or between specific chromosomes. These species nevertheless manage to (...) segregate these non‐exchange chromosomes. There are four direct modes for associating achiasmatic chromosomes: (a) modified SC, (b) adhesion of chromatids comparable to somatic pairing, (c) ‘stickiness’ of heterochromatin or (d) specific ‘segregation bodies’, consisting of material structurally different from chromatin. There is also the possibility that the spindlepossibly joining forces with the kinetochores‐carries out the faithful segregation of univalents which are not directly physically attached to one another. Finally, amphitelic orientation of univalents in metaphase I and pairing of the chromatids in meiosis II appear to ensure correct segregation as well. (shrink)

This systematic literature review contributes to the increasing interest regarding corporate social responsibility (CSR) in family firms—a research field that has developed considerably in the last few years. It now provides the opportunity to take a holistic view on the relationship dynamics—i.e., drivers, activities, outcomes, and contextual influences—of family firms with CSR, thus enabling a more coherent organization of current research and a sounder understanding of the phenomenon. To conceptualize the research field, we analyzed 122 peer-reviewed articles published in highly (...) ranked journals identifying the main issues examined. The results clearly show a lack of research regarding CSR outcomes in family firms. Although considered increasingly crucial in family firm research, a study investigating family outcomes (e.g., family community status, family emotional well-being), as opposed to firm outcomes, is missing. This literature review outlines the current state of research and contributes to the actual debate on CSR in family firms by discussing how family firms can use CSR activities as strategic management tools. Moreover, our analysis shows a black box indicating how CSR links different antecedents and outcomes. The black box is significant since firms generally need to know where to allocate their scarce resources to generate the best outcomes. We identify nine research questions based on these findings, which we hope will inspire future research. (shrink)

In the original publication of this article, the equally contributed article note was missed.

This volume has its already distant or1g1n in an inter national conference on Evolutionary Epistemology the editors organized at the University of Ghent in November 1984. This conference aimed to follow up the endeavor started at the ERISS (Epistemologically Relevant Internalist Sociology of Science) conference organized by Don Campbell and Alex Rosen berg at Cazenovia Lake, New York, in June 1981, whilst in jecting the gist of certain current continental intellectual developments into a debate whose focus, we thought, was in (...) danger of being narrowed too much, considering the still underdeveloped state of affairs in the field. Broadly speaking, evolutionary epistemology today con sists of two interrelated, yet qualitatively distinct inves tigative efforts. Both are drawing on Darwinian concepts, which may explain why many people have failed to discriminate them. One is the study of the evolution of the cognitive apparatus of living organisms, which is first and foremost the province of biologists and psychologists (H. C. Plotkin, Ed. , Learning, Development, and Culture: Essays in Evolu tionary Epistemology, New York, Wiley, 1984), although quite a few philosophers - professional or vocational - have also felt the need to express themselves on this vast subject (F. M. Wuketits, Ed. , Conce ts and Approaches in Evolutionary Epistemology, Dordrecht Boston, Reidel, 1984). The other approach deals with the evolution of science, and has been dominated hitherto by (allegedly) 'naturalized' philosophers; no book-length survey of this literature is available at present. (shrink)

This paper aims to elucidate a kind of ignorance that is more fundamental than a momentary lack of information, but also not a kind of ignorance that is built into the subject’s cognitive apparatus such that the subject can’t do anything about it. The paper sets forth the notion of cognitive confinement, which is a contingent, yet relatively stable state of being structurally or systematically unable to gain information from an environment, determined by patterns of interaction between the subject and (...) the world. In order to unpack the idea of cognitive confinement the paper discusses niche construction theory, and then, in greater detail, the notion of cognitive niche once proposed by John Tooby and Irven DeVore. Cognitive confinement is here imagined as a pathologized form of cognitive niche. This posit is substantiated by referring to a case that has come to the fore in recent years and raised debate around the world: the rise of so-called filter bubbles. They turn out to be instantiations of a more general phenomenon of cognitive confinement. (shrink)

First Published in 1998. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Keine ausführliche Beschreibung für "Die bürgerliche Welt" verfügbar.

The qualitative and quantitative properties of color sensations and neuronal color coding are discussed in relation to physiological color exchanges and their evolutionary constraints. Based on the identity mind/matter thesis, additional physical measurements on color sensations are described that will allow us, at least in principle, to compare the qualitative properties of color sensations in different brains.

Posings as such form part of hierarchic thinking and prevailing practices and are thus subsumed in negativity. Idle talk, seemingly dimming one's view, has been replaced by hallucination, dreams, and illusions. It is so very difficult to see through them and to realize that there is nothing there but them.

In a recent article published in this journal, Kris McDaniel proposes a variant of Peter van Inwagen’s argument against the principle of sufficient reason that makes crucial use of plural grounding. In this response paper I object to McDaniel’s argument. I argue that there is no notion of plural grounding available that is both irreflexive in the sense required for the argument to go through and general enough to formulate the principle of sufficient reason as proposed by McDaniel.

In this paper, I argue for two principles to determine the temporal interpretation of modal sentences in English, given a theory in which modals are interpreted against double conversational backgrounds and an ontology in which possible worlds branch towards the future, The Disparity Principle requires that a modal sentence makes distinctions between worlds in the modal base. The Non- disparity Principle requires that a modal sentence does not make distinctions on the basis of facts settled at speech time. Selection of (...) the modal base will set these principles against each other, or allow for their cooperative interaction. For a root modal base, there is a conflict and disparity wins. The resulting interpretation is future. For a non-root modal base, the principles cooperate. Non-disparity determines a non-future interpretation and disparity requires the sentence to go beyond what is known by the speaker. (shrink)

In dieser Arbeit werden Chisholms Konzeption des Analytischen und des synthetischen Apriori sowie die damit zusammenhängenden Aspekte der Chisholmschen Eigenschaftstheorie diskutiert; es wird zu zeigen versucht, daß dieser Versuch zur Explikation des von Kant herkommenden Begriffspaares in Schwierigkeiten führt, die seine Einbettung in den ontologischen Rahmen einer Eigenschaftstheorie, wie sie Chisholm vertritt, als undurchführbar erscheinen lassen.

Es wird versucht, einige Aspekte von Carnaps Werk Der logische Auflyau der Welt vor dem Hintergrund des Kantianismus zu betrachten, insbesondere die Strukturalismusthese, das Verhältnis von Gegebenem und Konstruiertem und den Wirklichkeitsbegriff; das Ergebnis geht dahin, daß sich mehr Gemeinsamkeiten mit der kantianischen Tradition zeigen als es von einem klassischen Werk des Neopositivismus zu erwarten wäre.

Dans la recherche jusqu'à présent la théorie de la „respublica optima” a été totalement négligée. C'est pourquoi on présente ici une reconstruction de cette théorie sous ses différents aspects. À cette fin la fonction et la portée de cette idée viennent brièvement exposées aussi bien que son développement historique. De cette analyse résulte la question d'un impact possible de cette construction particulière et personelle sur la réalité politique.

In The Structure of Science, Ernest Nagel finds fault with Werner Heisenberg’s explication of the uncertainty principle. Nagel’s complaint is that this principle does not follow from the impossibility of measuring with precision both the position and the momentum of a particle, as Heisenberg intimates, rather it is the other way around. Recent developments in theoretical physics have shown that Nagel’s argument is more substantial than he could have envisaged. In particular it has become clear that there are in (...) fact two uncertainty principles; as a result, there are four pairs of quantities to examine, whereas Heisenberg considers only one. These findings throw new light on Nagel’s criticism. They enable us to see that his intuition was surprisingly apposite, but also make clear where his argument misses the mark. (shrink)