This article provides an analysis of moral emotions from an attributional point of view, guided by the metaphors of man as a naïve scientist (Heider, 1958) and as a moral judge (Weiner, 2006). The theoretical analysis focuses on three concepts: (a) The distinction between the actor and the observer, (b) the functional quality of moral emotions, and (c) the perceived controllability of the causes of events. Moral emotions are identified (admiration, anger, awe, contempt, disgust, elevation, embarrassment, envy, gratitude, guilt, indignation, (...) jealousy, pity, pride, rage, regret, remorse, resentment, respect, schadenfreude, scorn, shame, and sympathy). A classification of these moral emotions is suggested and the empirical evidence briefly summarized. In discussing our results, we identify unresolved issues awaiting further analyses and research. (shrink)

Despite the opening of the market and partial privatization of state‐owned companies in China, the state still represents the controlling shareholder in larger companies. By analyzing the weaknesses of Chinese corporate governance we illustrate the framework for harmful corruption. China is characterized by a weak legal system and strong influences of traditions such as guanxi. In this article we analyze the influence of guanxi on the Chinese corporate governance system. We find that guanxi is in general a double‐edged sword, but (...) business‐to‐government guanxi in particular can harm the weak Chinese corporate governance system and hamper its further economic development and growth. (shrink)

This paper makes a conceptual inquiry into the notion of ‘publics’, and forwards an understanding of this notion that allows more responsible forms of decision-making with regards to technologies that have localized impacts, such as wind parks, hydrogen stations or flood barriers. The outcome of this inquiry is that the acceptability of a decision is to be assessed by a plurality of ‘publics’, including that of a local community. Even though a plurality of ‘publics’ might create competing normative demands, its (...) acknowledgment is necessary to withstand the monopolization of the process of technology appraisal. The paper presents four ways in which such an appropriation of publicness takes place. The creation of dedicated ‘local publics’, in contrast, helps to overcome these problems and allows for more responsible forms of decision-making. We describe ‘local publics’ as those in which stakeholders from the different publics that are related to the process of technology implementation are brought together, and in which concerns and issues from these publics are deliberated upon. The paper will present eight conditions for increasing the effectiveness of such ‘local publics’. (shrink)

Emotions are often met with suspicion in political debates about risky technologies, because they are seen as contrary to rational decision making. However, recent emotion research rejects such a dichotomous view of reason and emotion, by seeing emotions as an important source of moral insight. Moral emotions such as compassion and feelings of responsibility and justice can play an important role in judging ethical aspects of technological risks, such as justice, fairness, and autonomy. This article discusses how this idea can (...) be integrated into approaches for political decision making about risk. The article starts with an analysis of the dichotomous view of reason and emotion in risk theory, in approaches to participatory risk assessment as well as in relevant approaches to political philosophy. This article then presents alternative approaches in political philosophy and political theory that do explicitly endorse the importance of emotions. Based on these insights, a procedural approach for policy making is presented, in which emotional responses to technological risks, and the ethical concerns that lie behind them, are taken seriously. This approach allows for morally better political decisions about risky technologies and a better understanding between experts and laypeople. (shrink)

Knowing that technologies are inherently value-laden and systemically interwoven with society, the question is how individual engineers can take up the challenge of accepting the responsibility for their work? This paper will argue that engineers have no institutional structure at the level of society that allows them to recognize, reflect upon, and actively integrate the value-laden character of their designs. Instead, engineers have to tap on the different institutional realms of market, science, and state, making their work a ‘hybrid’ activity (...) combining elements from the different institutional realms. To deal with this institutional hybridity, engineers develop routines and heuristics in their professional network, which do not allow societal values to be expressed in a satisfactory manner. To allow forms of ‘active’ responsibility, there have to be so-called ‘accountability forums’ that guide moral reflections of individual actors. The paper will subsequently look at the methodologies of value-sensitive design and constructive technology assessment and explore whether and how these methodologies allow engineers to integrate societal values into the design technological artifacts and systems. As VSD and CTA are methodologies that look at the process of technological design, whereas the focus of this paper is on the designer, they can only be used indirectly, namely as frameworks which help to identify the contours of a framework for active responsibility of engineers. (shrink)

Der Gottinger Philosoph, Politiker und Padagoge Leonard Nelson (1882-1927) entwickelte eine umfassende integrale Theorie, die sich von der philosophischen Grundlegung uber eine Gesellschaftsanalyse bis zu einer politischen Programmatik hin erstreckte.Mit diesem Werk liegt eine erste umfassende, auf neuen Quellen basierende kritische Gesamtdarstellung der politischen Theorie Nelsons vor. Neben der Darstellung der Biographie Nelsons entwickelt der Autor dessen neukantianische Philosophie. In der Gesellschaftstheorie wird die Auseinandersetzung mit Liberalismus, Sozialismus und Kommunismus deutlich.Die Monographie basiert auf ausfuhrlichen Quellenstudien und bezieht eine kritische analysierende (...) Grundposition.Sie richtet sich an Historiker und Philosophen ebenso wie Politologen und politisch Interessierte allgemein.Der Verfasser lehrt als Privatdozent fur Politikwissenschaft an der Universitat Dortmund und hat mehrere historisch-politische Studien veroffentlicht. (shrink)

Einleitung -- Kindheit und Jugend im grossbürgerlichen Ambiente in Kiel, Cuxhaven und Lübeck -- Student und politischer Aktivist in Tübingen -- Doktorand in Berlin und die Beziehungen zu Aussenminister Gustav Stresemann -- Polltische und berufliche Aktivitäten in den Krisenjahren der Republik -- Wirtschaftspolitischer Amtsträger im Dritten Reich -- In der Regierung von Württemberg-Hohenzollern -- Professor für Politikwissenschaft an der Universität Tübingen -- "Öffentlicher Professor" sowie interner Berater und Kritiker -- Lebensabend : Familiäres, Krankheiten und die Fron des Memoirenschreibens -- Epilog.

Dr. Udo Lenzig ist Schulreferent im Kirchenkreis Julich.

Apesar do que se lê comumente nas interpretações aferentes, a concepção rousseauana da educação de Sofia não é nem anômala, nem secundária nem puro reflexo da condição feminina em seu tempo. Rousseau concebe a educação de Sofia a partir de algumas teses antropológicas fundamentais, notadamente a de que a determinação do feminino não é trivial para uma concepção da natureza humana. Em particular, o elemento feminino do humano introduz na determinação deste último a característica de socialidade. A partir deste ponto, (...) torna-se inteligível um dos momentos cruciais do pensamento de Rousseau, a saber, o da conexão essencial de natureza e de socialidade no ser humano. (shrink)

New network technologies are framed as eliminating ‘transaction costs’, a notion first developed in economic theory that now drives the design of market systems. However, the actual promise of the elimination of transaction costs seems unfeasible, because of a cyclical pattern in which network technologies that make that promise create processes of institutionalization that create new forms transaction costs. Nonetheless, the promises legitimize the exemption of innovations of network technologies from critical scrutiny.

Some jurisdictions that have decriminalized assisted dying exclude psychiatric patients on the grounds that their condition cannot be determined to be irremediable, that they are vulnerable and in need of protection, or that they cannot be determined to be competent. We review each of these claims and find that none have been sufficiently well-supported to justify the differential treatment psychiatric patients experience with respect to assisted dying. We find bans on psychiatric patients’ access to this service amount to arbitrary discrimination. (...) Proponents of banning the practice ignore or overlook alternatives to their proposal, like an assisted dying regime with additional safeguards. Some authors have further criticized assisted dying for psychiatric patients by highlighting allegedly problematic practices in those countries which allow it. We address recent evidence from the Netherlands, showing that these problems are either misrepresented or have straightforward solutions. Even if one finds such evidence troubling despite our analysis, other jurisdictions need not adopt every feature of the Dutch system. (shrink)

Apoptosis is a physiological mechanism for the removal of unwanted or damaged cells. Apoptotic cells are rarely seen in living tissues, however, because of their rapid and efficient removal by phagocytosis. Phagocytotic cells such as macrophages or dendritic cells recognize apoptotic cells by specific changes of cell surface markers, which usually are not present on normal cells. One such event is the exposure of phosphatidylserine, which moves from the plasma membrane inner leaflet to the outer leaflet in preapoptotic cells. An (...) unresolved problem, however, was the nature of the phosphatidylserine receptor on the phagocytotic cells. In a recent issue of Nature, Fadok et al.(1) have reported the cloning of a phosphatidylserine receptor using an antibody raised against activated macrophages. Antibody treatment of these macrophages blocks this capacity to engulf. BioEssays 22:878–881, 2000. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

Dieser Band stellt Abhandlungen von Udo Müllges (1926-1985), Universitätsprofessor an der RWTH Aachen, vor, die in ihrer Gesamtheit ein pädagogisches Programm spiegeln, das auf der geisteswissenschaftlichen Tradition fußt und sich dieser verpflichtet weiß. Der Bogen ist von der konstitutiv-kritischen Frage nach dem Wissenschaftscharakter der Pädagogik bis hin zu aktuellen schulpolitischen Problemen gespannt. In ihrer Gesamtheit bieten die Beiträge einen Einblick in das breite Feld pädagogischer Forschung und eröffnen die Möglichkeit zur produktiven Auseinandersetzung mit den von Udo Müllges erarbeiteten Konzepten zur (...) Klärung gegenwärtiger theoretischer und praktischer Fragen. Das Buch bietet gleichermaßen Anregungen für Fachkollegen, Studierende und Praktiker des pädagogischen Bereiches. (shrink)

Explores the understanding of self-consciousness and personal identity - two fundamendtal features of human subjectivity - as it developed in early modern philosophy. Udo Thiel presents a critical evaluation of these features as they were conceived in the sevententh and eighteenth centuries. He explains the arguments of thinkers such as Descartes, Locke, Leibniz, Wolff, and Hume, as well as their early critics, followers, and other philosophical contemporaries, and situates them within their historical contexts. Interest in the issues of self-consciousness and (...) personal identity is in many ways characteristic [of] and even central to early modern thought, but Thiel argues here that this is also an interest that continues to this day, in a form still strongly influenced by the conceptual frameworks of early modern thought. In this book he attempts to broaden the scope of the treatment of these issues considerably, covering more than a hundred years of philosophical debate in France, Britain, and Germany while remaining attentive to the details of the arguments under scrutiny and discussing alternative interpretations in many cases"--Publisher's description, p. [4] of dust jacket. (shrink)

Anlässlich des 75-jährigen Jubiläums der Zeitschrift »Psyche« skizziert der Beitrag einen Überblick über die Geschichte seit ihrer Gründung 1947. Dargestellt und reflektiert werden einige der personellen Besonderheiten wie auch Debatten, die zum einen in der Zeitschrift geführt, zum anderen von der Zeitschrift angestoßen wurden.

Der Autor untersucht das Paar Repräsentation/Nichtrepräsentation über mehrere Sprachen (Deutsch, Englisch, Französisch) und verschiedene theoretische Perspektiven hinweg (u. a. Lacan, Laplanche, Botella, Levine). Dabei kommt er zu dem Ergebnis, dass es unangemessen ist, Freuds Psychoanalyse als eine »Theorie der Repräsentation« zu bezeichnen: Weder gibt es im Unbewussten Repräsentationen, noch lässt sich das Unbewusste selbst repräsentieren. Die Sphäre des Unbewussten und die der Repräsentation sind miteinander radikal inkompatibel. Für den Autor benennt Lacans Begriff des Realen jene Zone des Psychischen, in der (...) die Darstellungsmittel des psychischen Apparates an seine Grenze stoßen. Dies wird an mehreren Traumbeispielen gezeigt. (shrink)