Masaryk’s philosophical approach to reality is largely characterised by its orientation towards the positivism of Auguste Comte, which Masaryk sought to offset with the psychologism of J. S. Mill. The combination of these positivist approaches became the positive starting point for Masaryk’s ethics. But that was not the only influence on his ethics. Masaryk’s German translation of Hume’s book, titled Eine Untersuchung über die Prinzipien der Moral von David Hume (1883), reveals that the main stimuli that shaped Masaryk’s ideas about (...) ethics came from David Hume. Although the need for scientific evidence became a fundamental principle of Masaryk’s thought, the need to objectively anchor ethics in rational theism necessitated in this area a departure from his positivist outlook. Masaryk’s lectures on practical philosophy attest to this fact. The reason for his departure from a positivist stance was due to the metaphysical nature of his concept of psychology. (shrink)

According to metaphysical coherentism, grounding relations form an interconnected system in which things ground each other and nothing is ungrounded. This potentially viable view’s logical territory remains largely unexplored. In this paper, I describe that territory by articulating four varieties of metaphysical coherentism. I do not argue for any variety in particular. Rather, I aim to show that not all issues which might be raised against coherentism will be equally problematic for all the versions of that view, which features far (...) more nuance and diversity than is typically ascribed to it. (shrink)

Neither in theory nor in practice does there exist a single model of decision making. It is very difficult to identify a model, or models, which would be most useful during and after a disaster. Within the disaster timeframe (a difficult and complex situation), specific moral dilemmas arise. All the decision making theories tend to be associated with different assumptions about human nature, the quality of the decisions made and the manner in which they are made. Different assumptions may result (...) in different tools being used and subsequently different consequences. The paper will provide a general introduction to the ethical decision making model, and will suggest two ways in which decisions in ethics might be made. The paper will try to deepen the discussion, and suggest answers to questions such as which type of ethical decision making is better in a specific situation such as a disaster? Is there any need to use a different decision making model (from an ethical point of view) in a disaster than in another event? Nonetheless, the article does not provide explicit solutions to these questions, since providing them would require further investigation than is the aim of this paper. (shrink)

The development of early childhood care, education, and development programs in Indonesia suggests unexpected linkages between democratization, empowerment, and neoliberal policy regimes. Despite the shift to grassroots organizing and to empowerment as a goal of development, in Indonesia there is tremendous continuity in the use of women's work to provide social welfare at the community level. Ethnographic research illuminates the impact on women's work and their own interpretation of programs to empower children.

This paper considers whether Marx's views about communism change significantly during his lifetime. According to the ‘standard story’, as Marx got older he dropped the vision of self-realization in labour that he spoke of in his early writings, and adopted a more pessimistic account of labour, where real freedom is achieved outside the working-day, in leisure. Other commentators, however, have argued that there is no pessimistic shift in Marx's thought on this matter. This paper offers a different reading of this (...) debate. It argues that there are two visions of the good life in Marx. However, it suggests that these two visions cannot be understood in terms of a simple shift between a ‘young’ and ‘mature’ Marx. Rather, it claims that Marx moves between these two visions throughout his writings. In this way, it suggests that Marx's intellectual development on this issue is best understood as an oscillation rather than a shift. Once this interpretive claim is advanced, the paper then moves on to consider some potential causes and implications of Marx's life-long oscillation between two different conceptions of the good life. (shrink)

Der Band enthält Beiträge von Medizinern, Juristen, Philosophen und Naturwissenschaftlern aus Estland, Polen, den Niederlanden und Deutschland zu Themen der Ethik und Wissenschaftstheorie der Medizin. Diese Beiträge sind im Rahmen des «Arbeitskreises für Ethik und Wissenschaftstheorie der Medizin in Ostmitteleuropa» entstanden, der auf einer Kooperationsvereinbarung des Interdisziplinären Zentrums für Ethik der Europa-Universität Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder) und des Instituts für Geschichte und Ethik der Medizin der Universität Halle-Wittenberg beruht. Sie befassen sich u. a. mit der Gesundheitsreform in Polen, Tschechien und Ungarn, (...) mit ethischen Problemen bei Abtreibung, HIV-Infektion, Drogenkonsum, Sterbehilfe und Gentechnik sowie dem Theorie-Praxis-Verhältnis in der Medizin. (shrink)

This study clarifies the need for a renewed account of the body in physiotherapy to fill sizable gaps between physiotherapeutical theory and practice. Physiotherapists are trained to approach bodily functioning from an objectivist perspective; however, their therapeutic interactions with patients are not limited to the provision of natural-scientific explanations. Physiotherapists’ practice corresponds well to theorisation of the body as the bearer of original bodily intentionality, as outlined by Merleau-Ponty and elaborated upon by enactivists. We clarify how physiotherapeutical practice corroborates Merleau-Ponty’s (...) critical arguments against objectivist interpretations of the body; particularly, his analyses demonstrate that norms of optimal corporeal functioning are highly individual and variable in time and thus do not directly depend on generic physiological structures. In practice, objectively measurable physical deviations rarely correspond to specific subjective difficulties and, similarly, patients’ reflective insights into their own motor deficiencies do not necessarily produce meaningful motor improvements. Physiotherapeutical procedures can be understood neither as mechanical manipulations of patients’ machine-like bodies by experts nor as a process of such manipulation by way of instructing patients’ explicit conscious awareness. Rather, physiotherapeutical practice and theory can benefit from the philosophical interpretation of motor disorders as modifications of bodily intentionality. Consequently, motor performances addressed in physiotherapy are interpreted as relational features of a living organism coupled with its environment, and motor disorders are approached as failures to optimally manage the motor requirements of a given situation owing to a relative loss of the capacity to structure one’s relation with their environment through motor action. Building on this, we argue that the process of physiotherapy is most effective when understood as a bodily interaction to guide patients towards discovering better ways of grasping a situation as meaningful through bodily postures and movements. (shrink)

This paper provides an analysis of the intrinsic/extrinsic distinction, as applied both to properties and to relations. In contrast to other accounts, the approach taken here locates the source of a property’s intrinsicality or extrinsicality in the manner in which that property is ‘logically constituted’, and thus – plausibly – in its nature or essence, rather than in e.g. its modal profile. Another respect in which the present proposal differs from many extant analyses lies in the fact that it does (...) not seek to analyse the ‘global’ distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic properties on the basis of the ‘local’ distinction between having a property intrinsically and having it extrinsically. Instead, the latter distinction is explicated on the basis of the former. (shrink)

Marx’s vision of unalienated production is often thought to be subject to decisive objections. This article argues that these objections rely on a misinterpretation of Marx’s position. It provides a new interpretation of Marx’s vision of unalienated production. Unlike another well-known account, it suggests that unalienated production involves realizing oneself through providing others with the goods and services they need for their self-realization. It argues that this view is appealing and that it offers a more successful response to objections than (...) previous interpretations. In doing so, it hopes to put Marx’s concern with alienation and nonalienation back on the table. (shrink)

This paper clarifies Merleau-Ponty’s original account of “higher-order” cognition as fundamentally embodied and enacted. Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy inspired theories that deemphasize overlaps between conceptual knowledge and motor intentionality or, on the contrary, focus exclusively on abstract thought. In contrast, this paper explores the link between Merleau-Ponty’s account of motor intentionality and his interpretations of our capacity to understand and interact productively with cultural symbolic systems. I develop my interpretation based on Merleau-Ponty’s analysis of two neuropathological modifications of motor intentionality, the case (...) of the brain-injured war veteran Schneider, and a neurological disorder known as Gerstmann’s syndrome. Building on my analysis of Schneider’s sensorimotor compensatory performances in relation to his limitations in the domains of algebra, geometry, and language usage, I demonstrate a strong continuity between the sense of embodiment and enaction at all these levels. Based on Merleau-Ponty’s interpretations, I argue that “higher-order” cognition is impaired in Schneider insofar as his injury limits his sensorimotor capacity to dynamically produce comparatively more complex differentiations of any given phenomenal structure. I then show how Merleau-Ponty develops and specifies his interpretation of Schneider’s intellectual difficulties in relation to the ambiguous role of the body, and in particular the hand, in Gerstmann’s syndrome. I explain how Merleau-Ponty defends the idea that sensorimotor and quasi-representational cognition are mutually irreducible, while maintaining that symbol-based cognition is a fundamentally enactive and embodied process. (shrink)

Dealing with conflicts seems to be a great challenge in society today. But not only in society. Higher education displays an air of resoluteness with certainty and security that disguises the conflicts and the fear of conflicts in a substantial number of subjects. If not in a state of denial, higher education avoids taking up conflicts over issues, for learning. The detailed investigation of Tagore’s pedagogical writings, with a focus on the importance of conflicts in education, reveals a genuine embrace (...) of conflicts for education. Conflicts are natural and necessary for the development and change of both the individual and society and the start of a ‘creative imagination’ to solve the problems we face in life. Contradictions in conflicts are not incompatible incongruities that are irreconcilable and mutually exclusive, but to the contrary, in need of each other. Contradictions do not represent different worlds but are substantial parts of one world: together they form a unity. Conflicting forces are necessary to create harmony. Creativity, imagination, love, art, and critical encounters are key elements in Tagore’s practical education aimed at finding similarities among people instead of emphasizing differences. Relations between people over the Identity of people. In other words, we need conflicts to become creative and imaginative human beings. The paper continues discussing conceptual and practical issues that seem necessary to get the teaching of conflicts in education off the ground. On the conceptual level, in particular our dealing with uncertainty and fear, the valuation of conflict and the need for uncertainty-researching education. On a practical level, I propose a certain teaching model, a supportive curriculum, a way of choosing genuine conflicts for education and finally, I argue for specific support and education of teachers, acknowledging the vital role teachers play in delivering the education that we need. (shrink)

'What is real?' has been one of the key questions of philosophy since its beginning in antiquity. But it is not just a question that philosophers ask. This Very Short Introduction discusses what reality is by looking at a variety of arguments, theories, and thought-experiments from philosophy, physics, and cognitive science.

This paper is my commentary on Raymond Tallis’ book Freedom: An Impossible Reality (2021). Tallis argues that the laws described by science are dependent on human agency which extracts them from nature. Consequently, human agency cannot be explained as an effect of natural laws. I agree with Tallis’ main argument and I appreciate that he helps us understand the systematic importance of a human-scale breadth of view regarding any theoretical investigation. In the main part of the paper, I critically comment (...) on Tallis’ interpretation of several more loosely associated topics from a phenomenological perspective. Firstly, I reconsider Tallis’ account of intentionality as a factor that opens a distance between the cognizer and the world. Whereas Tallis emphasizes that agency requisitions aspects of the world to achieve its goals, I point out that agency does not determine the meaning of things unidirectionally and independently of all context. A self-controlled agency is provisionally reached through a process of ‘deindexicalization’ of our passive intentional capacities, that is, by creating and maintaining new, different worldly contexts. Subsequently, I analyze Tallis’ description of our intentional relation to spatiotemporally distant possibilities. In my view, Tallis underestimates the extent to which our intentional relation to possibilities is pre-reflexive and pre-predicative and hence independent of propositional attitudes. Finally, I consider Tallis’ interpretation of nature and show that it is deeply influenced by the sciences of nature. In contrast, I argue that agency can be properly described only if we understand it as an intervention in a lifeworld already imbued with sense, not merely a physical or material nature. (shrink)

Review of Martijn Konings Capital and Time: For a New Critique of Neoliberal Reason. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

The volume deals with _historical ontology_ from several angles: _the historicity of understanding_ (Françoise Dastur, Arbogast Schmitt, Samuel Weber), _the limits of making_ (Emil Angehrn, Nicholas Davey, Jan-Ivar Lindén) and _the future of memory_ (Jayne Svenungsson, Christoph Türcke, Bernhard Waldenfels).

The Czech philosopher Jan Patocka (1907-1977), who studied with Husserl and Heidegger, is widely recognized as the most influential thinker to come from postwar Eastern Europe. Refusing to join the Communist party after World War II, he was banned from academia and publication for the rest of his life, except for a brief time following the liberalizations of the Prague spring of 1968. Joining Vaclav Havel and Jiri Hajek as a spokesman for the Chart 77 human-rights declaration of 1977, Patocka (...) was harassed by authorities, arrested, and finally died of a heart attack during prolonged interrogation. Plato and Europe, arguably Patocka’s most important book, consists of a series of lectures delivered in the homes of friends after his last banishment from the academy just three years before his death. Here, he presents his most mature ideas about the history of Western philosophy, arguing that the idea of the care of the soul is fundamental to the philosophical tradition beginning with the Greeks. Explaining how the care of the soul is elaborated as the problem of how human beings may make their world one of truth and justice, Patocka develops this thesis through a treatment of Plato, Democritus, and Aristotle, showing how considerations about the soul are of central importance in their writings. He demonstrates in vivid fashion how this idea forms the spiritual heritage of Europe. (shrink)

Overzicht van ideeën en opvattingen m.b.t. het begrip tijd, vanuit diverseinvalshoeken.

_Seeking Understanding: The Lifelong Pursuit to Build the Scientific Mind_ explores the multiple ways in which the human mind grows in understanding of the self and the world as an essential dimension of transformative learning along the lifespan.

Should Marxists support universal basic income (UBI), i.e., a regular cash income paid to all without a means test or work requirement? This paper considers one important argument that they should, namely that UBI would be instrumentally effective in helping to bring about communism. It argues that previous answers to this question have paid insufficient attention to a logically prior question: what is Marx’s account of communism? In reply, it distinguishes two different accounts: a left-libertarian version that associates communism with (...) the freedom to live and work how one wants, and a perfectionist version that associates communism with the overcoming of alienated labour and self-realisation in work. It argues that UBI would make steps towards the left-libertarian account but not the perfectionist account. Ultimately, then, the question “should Marxists support basic income?” is shown to partly depend on which account of communism Marxists want to bring about. (shrink)