The paper argues against the assumption that citizens of industrialized countries bear responsibility for greenhouse emissions in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. An array of arguments for such a historic responsibility is refuted. The crucial role of the assumption of a liability for bona fide misappropriation in a state of nature (Lockean strict liability) is pointed out.

Kant distinguishes sharply between a juridical and an ethical assessment of lies. For the latter, his Doctrine of Virtue establishes the immorality of maxims of lying. However, not all acts of lying have to result from maxims of lying. It will be shown that Kant’s conception of moral weakness extends to lies caused by fear. A morally weak person need not have an immoral character or lose her dignity. Therefore, the inhuman implications of Kant’s strict prohibition of lying can be (...) considerably mitigated if the possibility of fear-induced lies is taken into account. If a person follows the modern planner’s motto failure is not an option and excludes lies from her plans of action, she can satisfy the demands of Kant’s doctrine of virtue even if fear causes her to lie under some circumstances. (shrink)

This paper aims to show that there are certain basic structural similarities between modern decision theory and medieval approaches to decision making under conditions of incertitude. Modern decision theory as well as its medieval ancestor distinguish between two kinds of incertitude for which there are different decision rules. Modern decision theory distinguishes between risk and uncertainty, whereas in medieval decision theory, the balance or imbalance of a "scale of reasons" correspond to different kinds of incertitude. In the case of uncertainty (...) or a balance of reasons, both paradigms favor risk-avoidance, which is no coincidence since there is a demonstrable historical link between modern and medieval rules of risk-avoidance. (shrink)

Direct doxastic voluntarism claims that human beings can voluntarily decide what to believe in exactly the same way as they decide to raise an arm. Aquinas is often regarded as a proponent of this doctrine, which is widely rejected by modern philosophers. Modern defenders of Aquinas try to show that he in fact accepted a less problematic indirect doxastic voluntarism. However, some early modern scholastics ascribed more than an indirect doxastic voluntarism to Aquinas. The present article discusses these scholastic interpretations (...) and argues that Aquinas held a direct voluntarism of passing or suspending judgment on probable propositions in addition to an indirect doxastic voluntarism. None of these voluntarisms amount to a form of direct doxastic voluntarism in the modern sense. (shrink)

For over fifty years, Rudolf J. Siebert (b.1927) has developed his Critical Theory of Religion and Society out of the Critical Theory of the Institute for Social Research, commonly known as the "Frankfurt School." Born from the World War II ruins of his hometown in Frankfurt, Germany, Siebert's Hegelian thought has developed in conversation with Christian theology, German Idealism, comparative religion, political-economy, sociology, psychology, and history. Also known as Dialectical Religiology, Siebert's literary corpus is saturated with the dialectics of (...) Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831), especially Hegel's philosophy of right, history, religion, as well as Hegel's theodicy, which lays at the core of the enlightener's work. This volume has collected Siebert's most important works on Hegel and the Hegelian influence on his Critical Theory of Religion and Society, some of which have never been published before. The articles contained in this volume represent over five decades worth of Siebert's engagements with Hegel, and his application of his dialectical critique to a variety of subjects, including secularization, theology, rebellion and revolution, civil society and the family, war and peace, the future of the West, and many other important subjects. As philosophers frequently return to Hegel, especially within the troubling conditions of modernity, this collection of Siebert's articles will serve as a foundational source for the study of Hegelian thought and its relevance to the contemporary moment well into the 21st century and beyond. (shrink)

"Ist der Mensch in seinem Denken und Handeln ein geistig freies Wesen oder steht er unter dem Zwange einer rein naturgesetzlichen ehernen Notwendigkeit? Auf wenige Fragen ist so viel Scharfsinn gewendet worden als auf diese. Die Idee der Freiheit des menschlichen Willens hat warme Anhänger wie hartnäckige Gegner in reicher Zahl gefunden. Ein und dasselbe Ding wird hier gleich oft für das kostbarste Gut der Menschheit wie für die ärgste Illusion erklärt." Rudolf Steiner (Gröls-Klassiker - Edition Werke der Weltliteratur).

Em conformidade com a questão do "sentido" ou da "abertura do ser", Heidegger reconheceu que a consciência moral abre ao Dasein o seu próprio ser, a "existência". Ela é um fenómeno "existencial", pois pertence às estruturas constitutivas da abertura ekstática do Dasein ao seu próprio ser. Fazendo irrupção no Dasein perdido no "ser impróprio (uneigentliches Sein)" da "gente", o apelo da consciência abre ao Dasein o seu próprio poder ser-no-mundo (a sua existência) como investido, também ele, de facticidade. Por outras (...) palavras, a dimensão da "gente" abre ao ser humano a partir da impotência do seu ser-lançado – o qual constitui o seu "estar-em-falta (Schuldigsein)" fundamental – o inevitável estar-em-falta do projecto do seu poder-estar-no-mundo. É aí que aparece o conceito existencial do ser-em-falta do Dasein, que ultrapassa todo o conceito ôntico-metafísico de "falta (Schuld)", reduzindo esta ao agir carente de realizar um valor. Na medida em que o Dasein está à escuta deste apelo e, libertando-se da esfera da "gente", projecta-se sobre o seu próprio poder-ser, a "abertura (Erschlossenheit)" do ser do Dasein modaliza-se em "resolução (Entschlossenheit)". E na medida em que ele se projecta mesmo até ao seu poder ser mais próprio (a morte), esta modaliza-se em "resolução anticipante (vorlaufende Entschlossenheit)". Esta última é então a abertura ou a "verdade (alétheia)" mais original do ser do Dasein. Deste modo, para a autora do artigo, a interpretação existencial do apelo da consciência constitui um prelúdio ao pensamento do ser como Ereignis do Heidegger tardio, segundo a qual a linguagem é constitutiva da abertura ou da "verdade (aletheia)" do próprio ser. /// In accordance with his question about the "sense," or "openness," of being, Heidegger acknowledged that moral conscience opens Dasein to its own being, i.e., "existence." Moral conscience is an "existential" phenomenon, belonging to the constitutive structures of Dasein's ecstatic openness to its very being. Breaking into Dasein, lost in "improper being-in-the-word (uneigenliches Sein)" of the neutral "one," the appeal, or call, of the conscience opens Dasein to what is indeed proper to it (eigenliches being-in-the-world)". It comes about from what Dasein has factually always been; it opens to its very power to be-in-the-world as also invested with facticity. Otherwise said, its openness stems from the non-power of its being-thrown, constituting its "being-in-fault (Schuldigsein)." It is precisely in this existential concept of Dasein's "being-in-fault" that surpasses all ontico-metaphysical concepts of "fault (Schuld)" which is finally reduced to an action incapable of realizing a value. To the extent that Dasein is attentively hearing this appeal, it frees itself from the "one," projecting itself onto its power-to-be, i.e., its openness to being (Erschlossenheit). Thus, Dasein adopts the mode of "resolution (Entschlossenheit)," which coincides with its most proper powerto-be, or death. The latter in turn adopts the mode of anticipatory resolution (vorlaufende Entschlossenheit). This last is then the openness, or truth (aletheia), the most original of Dasein's being. So, the existential interpretation of the appeal of the conscience constitutes a prelude to the thought of being as Ereignis of the latter Heidegger, according to whom language is constitutive of the very opening, or truth, of being. (shrink)

In this illuminating study of Kant's theory of imagination and its role in interpretation, Rudolf A. Makkreel argues against the commonly held notion that Kant's transcendental philosophy is incompatible with hermeneutics. The charge that Kant's foundational philosophy is inadequate to the task of interpretation can be rebutted, explains Makkreel, if we fully understand the role of imagination in his work. In identifying this role, Makkreel also reevaluates the relationship among Kant's discussions of the feeling of life, common sense, and (...) the purposiveness of history. (shrink)

From the contents: Philosophie, Politik und Wissenschaftliche Weltauffassung: zur Frage der Philosophie in Osterreich und Deutschland (B. Smith). - Facts, truths and the ontology of logical realism (H. Hochberg). - Franz Brentano und die Wiederentdeckung der Intentionalitat Richtigstellung herkommlicher Missverstandnisse und Missdeutungen (M. Antonelli). - Erneuerung der Philosophia Perennis: uber die ersten vier Habilitationsthesen Brentanos (W. Sauer). - Confessions of a Meinongian logician (D. Jacquette). - Lewis and Sylvan on noneism (A. Witherall). - What is it to compose a musical (...) work (M.E. Reicher).". (shrink)

In dieser Marburger Vorlesung aus dem Wintersemester 1924/25 stellt sich Heidegger die Aufgabe, Platons Spatdialog "Sophistes" im Ausgang von Aristoteles verstandlich zu machen. Zentrum des einleitenden Aristoteles-Teils ist die Folge der dianoethischen Tugenden im VI. Buch der "Nikomachischen Ethik", in der Heidegger die sich aufsteigernde Stufenfolge eines Entbergens erkennt und demgemass den Primat der "Physis" aus der Uberlegenheit ihres Entbergens begrundet. Damit legt Heidegger die Zusammengehorigkeit von Sein und Wahrheit als Horizont des aristotelisch-griechischen Philosophierens frei und gewinnt so den "Boden", (...) aus dem die platonische Seinsforschung, wie sie im "Sophistes" vorliegt, erwachsen ist. Dementsprechend stellt sich Heidegger im Hauptteil die Aufgabe, in fortlaufender Interpretation des "Sophistes" konkret zu zeigen, dass und wie Platons Ontologie aus dem Entbergen erwachsen ist. Die Vorlesung bezeugt, dass Heidegger die in seinem fruhen Hauptwerk "Sein und Zeit" gestellte Frage nach dem "Sinn von Sein", d.h. nach der Un-verborgenheit des Seins in der Auseinandersetzung mit der philosophischen Uberlieferung gewonnen hat. (shrink)

A portrait of scholastic approaches to a qualified disagreement of opinions, focusing on the antagonism of scholastic probabilism and anti-probabilism in the early modern era.

Knapp sechs Jahre nach Rudolf Heinz' sechzigstem Geburtstag und dem auf dieses Ereignis ausgerichteten Erscheinen der Festschrift "Kontiguitäten. Texte-Festival für Rudolf Heinz" (Christoph Weismüller [Hg.] unter Mitarbeit von Ralf Bohn, Wien: Passagen 1997) folgt die Nachbearbeitung der "Kontiguitäten" und deren Produktion. Die Post-Skripts zum Texte-Festival für Rudolf Heinz setzen ein mit den Dokumenten der Feierlichkeit der Festschriftüberreichung: Laudatio, Geburtstagskomposition - inklusive Audio-CD -, Photographien der Festschriftübergabe. Unter dem topos Festschrift-Mechané folgt diesen Initialien die Korrespondenz von Heide Heinz (...) und Christoph Weismüller nebst notwendigen Paraphrasen und Hinweisen. Die Après nehmen einschlägige Kontiguitäts-Effekte auf, die mit der Fertigstellung der Festschrift, der Feierlichkeit der Übergabe, ihrer Distribution und ersten Nachbearbeitungen ihrer Konstitution einhergingen oder diesen folgten. Die Katamnese von Heide Heinz und Rudolf Heinz sowie weitere Korrespondenzen - Heide Heinz mit Ralf Bohn, Doris Dorner, Axel Schünemann; Rudolf Heinz mit Manfred Pohlen - finden sich als Zuträge ein. (shrink)

Definition of the problem The present article focuses on the current international ethical debate on “responsible implementation” of expanded carrier screening to public healthcare systems. Expanded carrier screening is a novel genetic test which aims to provide information to couples about whether both partners carry a genetic variation for the same recessively inherited condition. It was introduced to the market by commercial laboratories in the U.S. in 2010; since about 2015, however, international debates have emerged on how and why to (...) offer the screening as a public health service. Arguments It is shown that, initially, enhancement of couples’ reproductive autonomy, not prevention of recessive disorders, has been established as the ethically well-founded aim and guiding principle of responsible implementation. Recently, however, in 2019, three well-known Dutch bioethicists argued that this aim has been embraced without much reflection and should therefore be replaced with the guiding principle of “responsible parenthood”. According to the latter, autonomous reproductive decision-making of couples or women is morally acceptable solely when carrier screening is done only during pregnancy. Before pregnancy, by contrast, couples are held to have a moral duty to take preventive measures if their future children are at risk of being affected by one of the “worst” recessive conditions. In the present paper, both of these conflicting ethical framings of expanded carrier screening are critically examined. Conclusions While the aim of reproductive autonomy also has problematic aspects, the notion of “responsible parenthood” is much more objectionable since it challenges voluntary participation in carrier screening, argues for directive genetic counseling, limits reproductive self-determination of women and couples, and introduces dubious concepts to the debate. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be (...) preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

This “excellent translation” of Heidegger’s writings on Hegel shows an essential engagement between two of the foundational thinkers of phenomenology (Phenomenological Reviews). While Martin Heidegger’s writings on Hegel are notoriously difficult, this volume provides a clear and careful translation of two important texts—a treatise on negativity, and a penetrating reading of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit. In these stimulating works, Heidegger relates his interpretation of Hegel to his own thought on the event, taking up themes developed in Contributions to Philosophy. While (...) many parts of the text are fragmentary in nature, these interpretations are considered some of the most significant as they bring Hegel into Heidegger’s philosophical trajectory. (shrink)

Into the central theme of necessity, chance, and providence, Steiner introduces a fascinating description of the nature spirits, particularly the gnomes.

From the contents: Philosophie, Politik und Wissenschaftliche Weltauffassung: zur Frage der Philosophie in Osterreich und Deutschland (B. Smith). - Facts, truths and the ontology of logical realism (H. Hochberg). - Franz Brentano und die Wiederentdeckung der Intentionalitat Richtigstellung herkommlicher Missverstandnisse und Missdeutungen (M. Antonelli). - Erneuerung der Philosophia Perennis: uber die ersten vier Habilitationsthesen Brentanos (W. Sauer). - Confessions of a Meinongian logician (D. Jacquette). - Lewis and Sylvan on noneism (A. Witherall). - What is it to compose a musical (...) work (M.E. Reicher).". (shrink)

Excerpt from Einführung in eine Philosophie des Geisteslebens 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)