Leibniz’s treatment of contingency proceeds by degrees and develops in parallel to the systematizations of his thought. In the time about the Confessio Philosophi, he sustains the idea of contingency on the possible as such, in the hypothetical necessity and in the divine creation. In the years previous to the systematization of the Discours de Métaphysique(1680-1686), Leibniz defends the idea of contingency through the following factors: the complete notion of substance, the infinite analysis of the truths and the first decree (...) of the divine will. (shrink)

This book seeks to work out which commitments are minimally sufficient to obtain an ontology of the natural world that matches all of today’s well-established physical theories. We propose an ontology of the natural world that is defined only by two axioms: (1) There are distance relations that individuate simple objects, namely matter points. (2) The matter points are permanent, with the distances between them changing. Everything else comes in as a means to represent the change in the distance (...) relations in a manner that is both as simple and as informative as possible. The book works this minimalist ontology out in philosophical as well as mathematical terms and shows how one can understand classical mechanics, quantum field theory and relativistic physics on the basis of this ontology. Along the way, we seek to achieve four subsidiary aims: (a) to make a case for a holistic individuation of the basic objects (ontic structural realism); (b) to work out a new version of Humeanism, dubbed Super-Humeanism, that does without natural properties; (c) to set out an ontology of quantum physics that is an alternative to quantum state realism and that avoids any ontological dualism of particles and fields; (d) to vindicate a relationalist ontology based on point objects also in the domain of relativistic physics. (shrink)

The central point of this essay is to demonstrate the incommensurability of ‘Darwinian fitness’ with the numeric values associated with reproductive rates used in population genetics. While sometimes both are called ‘fitness’, they are distinct concepts coming from distinct explanatory schemes. Further, we try to outline a possible answer to the following question: from the natural properties of organisms and a knowledge of their environment, can we construct an algorithm for a particular kind of organismic life-history pattern that itself will (...) allow us to predict whether a type in the population will increase or decrease relative to other types? 1. Introduction2. Darwinian fitness3. Reproductive fitness and genetical models of evolution4. The models of reproductive fitness4.1 The Standard Viability Model4.2 Frequency-dependent selection4.3 Fertility models4.4 Overlapping generations5. Fitness as outcome5.1 Fitness as actual increase in type5.2 Fitness as expected increase in type5.2.1 Expected increase within a generation5.2.2 Expected increase between generations5.2.3 Postponed reproductive fitness effects6. The book-keeping problem7. Conclusion. (shrink)

In a globalizing world, cross-national differences in values and business culture and understanding these differences become increasingly central to a range of organizational issues and ethical questions. However, various concerns have been raised about extant empirical research on cross-national dissimilarities in the cultural values of managers (what we refer to as managerial values) and the development of a unified business culture. This paper seeks to address three such concerns with the literature on convergence versus divergence of cultural values. It develops (...) an empirical approach to the study of changing business cultures that revolves around birth cohorts and intergenerational values shifts and aims to advance empirical knowledge of the dynamics of cross-national differences in the cultural values of managers. We use time-series data covering 68,708 managers and are able to consider a sample of 32 countries that represent more than half of the cultural clusters recognized in the literature. Results reveal diverse shifts in managerial values across birth cohorts with cross-national dissimilarities waning for some basic cultural dimensions (“convergence”), remaining stable for other dimensions (“cultural stability”), and becoming more pronounced for other dimensions still (“divarication”). Moving beyond the standard convergence/divergence taxonomy, we conclude that a full-fledged convergence–stability–divarication perspective provides the best basis for thinking about the subtle ways in which business cultures are changing. (shrink)

The central point of this essay is to demonstrate the incommensurability of ‘Darwinian fitness’ with the numeric values associated with reproductive rates used in population genetics. While sometimes both are called ‘fitness’, they are distinct concepts coming from distinct explanatory schemes. Further, we try to outline a possible answer to the following question: from the natural properties of organisms and a knowledge of their environment, can we construct an algorithm for a particular kind of organismic life-history pattern that itself will (...) allow us to predict whether a type in the population will increase or decrease relative to other types? Introduction Darwinian fitness Reproductive fitness and genetical models of evolution The models of reproductive fitness 4.1 The Standard Viability Model 4.2 Frequency-dependent selection 4.3 Fertility models 4.4 Overlapping generations Fitness as outcome 5.1 Fitness as actual increase in type 5.2 Fitness as expected increase in type 5.2.1 Expected increase within a generation 5.2.2 Expected increase between generations 5.2.3 Postponed reproductive fitness effects The book-keeping problem Conclusion. (shrink)

The land has come Into its own. At last it has become the focus of great national problems which until now were evoked most frequently with regard to and for the benefit of cities, or even of metropolitan areas. Its very representation, until very recent ages held to be terribly abstract and reserved to technicians, today belongs to the public domain. Exhibitions bearing titles such as Maps and Illustrations of the Earth (Paris, 1980) or Landscape: Image and Reality (Bologna, 1981) (...) attract as many visitors as an Impressionist retrospective, not only because of the novelty of the theme, the rarity of certain documents or the beauty of most of them, as proven by the success of even more specialized events such as those dedicated to the 1730 Sardinian cadastre in Savoy or to the one of Maria-Theresa in Lombardy (Chambéry and Pavia, 1980). (shrink)

Since it implies a reduction in the quality and the quantity of the natural resources, environmental degradation is a present day problem that requires immediate solutions. This situation is driving firms to undertake an environmental transformation process with the purpose of reducing the negative externalities that come from their economic activities. Within this context, environmental marketing is an emerging business philosophy by which organizations can address sustainability issues. Moreover, environmental marketing and orientation are seen as valuable strategies to improve a (...) firm's competitiveness. However, the literature that has analyzed the link between environmental strategies and firms' results has been inconclusive and contradictory. In this study, we propose and test a model that analyses how the implementation of ecological issues within a firm's marketing strategy and orientation influences organizational results. Data were obtained through a survey sent to Spanish manufacturing firms. The results show that environmental marketing positively affects firms' operational and commercial performance and this improvement will influence their economic results. Moreover, environmental marketing is revealed as an excellent strategy to obtain competitive advantages in costs and in product differentiation. Thus, this study agrees with the researchers who affirm that environmental strategies positively affect firm's competitiveness while reducing environmental impact. (shrink)

Since it implies a reduction in the quality and the quantity of the natural resources, environmental degradation is a present day problem that requires immediate solutions. This situation is driving firms to undertake an environmental transformation process with the purpose of reducing the negative externalities that come from their economic activities. Within this context, environmental marketing is an emerging business philosophy by which organizations can address sustainability issues. Moreover, environmental marketing and orientation are seen as valuable strategies to improve a (...) firm's competitiveness. However, the literature that has analyzed the link between environmental strategies and firms' results has been inconclusive and contradictory. In this study, we propose and test a model that analyses how the implementation of ecological issues within a firm's marketing strategy and orientation influences organizational results. Data were obtained through a survey sent to Spanish manufacturing firms. The results show that environmental marketing positively affects firms' operational and commercial performance and this improvement will influence their economic results. Moreover, environmental marketing is revealed as an excellent strategy to obtain competitive advantages in costs and in product differentiation. Thus, this study agrees with the researchers who affirm that environmental strategies positively affect firm's competitiveness while reducing environmental impact. (shrink)

Final value accrues to objects that are good for their own sakes, while instrumental value accrues to objects that are good for the sake of their effects. The following paper aims to show that this distinction cuts across some surprising areas of the evaluative domain. This means that there may be some unexpected types of value that can come in a final or instrumental form. The argument proceeds by looking at two prominent types of value, namely kind-value and personal value. (...) The former accrues to objects that are good as the kinds of things that they are, while the latter accrues to objects that are good for someone. Substantive examples are offered in support of the idea that these types of value can come in final or instrumental form. The substantive examples are then given additional support by considering the structure and behavior of fitting attitudes. (shrink)

When we talk about Presocratic philosophy, we are speaking about the origins of Greek philosophy and Western rationality itself. But what exactly does it mean to talk about “Presocratic philosophy” in the first place? How did early Greek thinkers come to be considered collectively as Presocratic philosophers? In this brief book, André Laks provides a history of the influential idea of Presocratic philosophy, tracing its historical and philosophical significance and consequences, from its ancient antecedents to its full crystallization in the (...) modern period and its continuing effects today. Laks examines ancient Greek and Roman views about the birth of philosophy before turning to the eighteenth-century emergence of the term “Presocratics” and the debates about it that spanned the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He analyzes the intellectual circumstances that led to the idea of Presocratic philosophy—and what was and is at stake in the construction of the notion. The book closes by comparing two models of the history of philosophy—the phenomenological, represented by Hans-Georg Gadamer, and the rationalist, represented by Ernst Cassirer—and their implications for Presocratic philosophy, as well as other categories of philosophical history. Other figures discussed include Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Diogenes Laertius, Schleiermacher, Hegel, Nietzsche, Max Weber, and J.-P. Vernant. Challenging standard histories of Presocratic philosophy, the book calls for a reconsideration of the conventional story of early Greek philosophy and Western rationality. (shrink)

El testimonio es nuestra mayor fuente de creencias. La gran mayoría de nuestras creencias han sido adquiridas a partir de las palabras de otros y no a través de la observación directa del mundo. Una de las peculiaridades de la mayor parte de las creencias testimoniales es que son aceptadas sin ninguna deliberación consciente. Mientras el testimonio sea consistente con nuestras creencias y la fuente sea confiable, la reacción más corriente es la aceptación automática de la información (Thagard 2004, 2005). (...) Nuestra confianza en el testimonio de los demás es un requisito no sólo para la construcción colectiva del conocimiento (Hardwig 1985, 1991), sino también para la interacción social en general. Sin embargo existen contextos en los que la aceptación apresurada de un testimonio falso puede tener consecuencias nefastas. En contextos científicos, legales, políticos y financieros, entre otros, se toman decisiones importantes y se implementan políticas cruciales a partir de las afirmaciones de otros. En estos contextos la aceptación de un testimonio debe ser el resultado de un proceso de decisión basado en criterios objetivos de justificación. Sin embargo, existen dos objeciones al intento de justificar la aceptación de un testimonio (Coady 1973, 1992). La primera es que cualquier justificación será irremediablemente circular puesto que la inmensa mayoría de testimonios obtienen su justificación, al menos en parte, de evidencia de tipo testimonial. La segunda es que nuestras inferencias acerca de la confiabilidad de ciertos tipos de testimonio nunca tendrán un apoyo inductivo lo suficientemente fuerte debido a que los casos en los que un tipo de testimonio puede ser verificado directamente en la experiencia nunca serán lo suficientemente numerosos. En este ensayo presento una solución al problema de cómo decidir racionalmente si un testimonio puede ser aceptado como evidencia probatoria en una investigación. Mi propuesta, que está basada en la teoría de revisión de creencias desarrollada por Levi (1984, 1991), muestra que la aceptación justificada de un testimonio está basada en exactamente los mismos mecanismos de adquisición de creencias que operan en el caso de evidencias no testimoniales; al mismo tiempo, la propuesta da cuenta de las particularidades que se presentan en el proceso de evaluación de una evidencia testimonial. Mi tesis es que la decisión de aceptar un testimonio es un proceso que se cumple en dos etapas. En la primera se busca una justificación pare el testimonio buscando todos los hechos que aumenten la probabilidad de que el testimonio sea verdadero, es decir, de que el testigo o declarante esté reportando verídicamente un hecho. La aceptación de estos hechos y de su relación probabilística positiva con respecto al testimonio está basada en la búsqueda de un equilibrio entre su credibilidad y su valor informativo. En la segunda etapa, se determina si la justificación obtenida en la primera es suficiente para la aceptación del testimonio, de nuevo buscando encontrar un equilibrio entre su credibilidad y la utilidad de la información que contiene en promover los intereses y metas cognitivas del investigador. (shrink)

I defend the view that circular definitions can be useful and illuminating by focusing on the fitting-attitudes analysis of value. This definition states that an item has value if and only if it is a fitting target of attitudes. Good items are the fitting targets of positive attitudes, and bad items are the fitting targets of negative ones. I shall argue that a circular version of this definition, defended by Rabinowicz and Rønnow-Rasmussen (2006), is preferable to its non-circular counterpart and (...) upholds reasonable standards of acceptability. The standards I will be discussing come from Humberstone (1997), who claims that definitions cannot be informative as long as they are inferentially circular. (shrink)

In this paper I work through an Antipodean phenomenon; the prevalence of copying or mimesis in processes of organising. Rejecting claims for a more authentically Antipodean way of organising, I argue that we need to properly understand the weight of the copy through philosophical inquiry into mimesis. I begin this inquiry with neo-institutional theoretical insights into mimesis. I then sketch out a short history of the emergence of the original and the copy. This Platonic distinction is then elaborated upon to (...) open up the copy with reference to Nietzsche’s concept of the eternal return, Benjamin’s analysis of the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction, and Taussig’s analysis of mimesis. I draw these together to argue that processes of copying are singular and in fact central to the continual coming into being of organisation. (shrink)

O trabalho pretende mostrar como a filosofia da idéia de infinito em Levinas se articula com a concepção da temporalidade diacrônica. A referência filosófica mais explícita e recorrente da idéia de infinito em Levinas é o pensamento cartesiano da Terceira Meditação, porém outras influências muito relevantes para este tema provêm dos textos talmúdicos. Procuramos aproximar as duas fontes do pensamento levinasiano, filosofia e judaísmo, pela análise de dois conceitos fundamentais da obra de Levinas, infinito e temporalidade. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Infinito. Temporalidade. (...) Ética. ABSTRACT The article seeks to show how the philosophy of the idea of infinite in Levinas is articuled with the conception of diachronic temporality. The more explicit and recurrent philosophical reference of the idea of infinity in Levinas’s thinking is the Cartesian proposition of the Third Meditation; however, other very important influences concerning this theme come from the Talmudic Lectures. We try to approximate the two sources of the Levinasian thinking through the analysis of two fundamental concepts of his work, infinity and temporality. KEY WORDS – Infinity. Temporality. Ethics. (shrink)

As Paul Griffiths [2002] puts it, “innateness” is associated with different clusters of related ideas where each cluster depends on different historical, cultural and intellectual contexts. In psychology innateness is typically opposed to learning while the biological opposite of innate is ‘acquired’. ‘Acquired’ and ‘learned’ have different extensions. Learning is one way to acquire a character but there are others. Cuts and scratches are unlearned yet acquired; if we could acquire languages by popping a pill, then languages would be unlearned (...) yet acquired according to the wide biological application of the term [Sober, 1998]. Further, in psychology and philosophy innateness is often associated with both “universality” (or species-specificity), and, relatedely, innate traits are often thought to be “fixed” or “unmodifiable”. But, biologists recognize a range of developmental patterns that a specific trait may take. Some are universal, but others are not, as in the case of innate diseases. Some are “fixed” in the sense that once we develop them we have them for the rest of our lives; some innate diseases are like this, but others, are modifiable. Sober [1998] cites a case of an Egyptian vulture that when first confronted with an ostrich egg and a stone, will break the egg with the stone, but if the vulture repeatedly comes to find broken eggs to be empty, it will eventually stop breaking eggs. These examples lend support to Griffiths’s thesis, since the concept of innateness in psychology appears to be in several ways distinct from the concept of innateness in biology. (shrink)

We have argued elsewhere that: (A) Natural selection is not a cause of evolution. (B) A resolution-of-forces (or vector addition) model does not provide us with a proper understanding of how natural selection combines with other evolutionary influences. These propositions have come in for criticism recently, and here we clarify and defend them. We do so within the broad framework of our own “hierarchical realization model” of how evolutionary influences combine.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:PEACE EDUCATION AND THE NORTHERN IRISH CONFLICT André Lascaris Dominican Theological Center, Nijmegen The Northern Irish conflict can be interpreted as an anachronism. This is true in many aspects. However, in the last ten years we were confronted with many "anachronistic" conflicts: in former Yugoslavia, in Rwanda, Algeria, Colombia, and Afghanistan, to mention only some. In our postmodern times the division of the world into two rather neat halves (...) with two centers of power has gone, the nation state is weakening and in many societies the social glue seems to be losing its cohesive force. We have to live together in pluralistic societies in which we are all a minority at times. Wars between states become less likely, butcivil wars are on the increase. Terrorism becomes a power against which the traditional armies and their weapons are quite useless in spite of many technological developments. The ancient laws concerningthe protection of women and children in wartime are becoming obsolete. Women are invited to get involved in the armed forces. The child soldier is a well-known phenomenon. In our western society a child's world, which exists in isolation from the adult world, is no longer a possibility. Some lessons learned in dealing with theNorthern Irish conflict might turn out to be worthwhile taking up in other situations. In this essay, I reflect with the help ofthe mimetic theory on peace work done by some Dutch people on behalfofNorthern Ireland between 1973 and 1992. The Northern Irish conflict as such is not the subject ofthis paper; the mimetic interpretation of this conflict was admirably covered by people such as Duncan Morrow and the late Frank Wright to which I refer the reader in my bibliography. I will concentrate on the educational aspects ofDutch peace work done in the Northern Irish context. Here it suffices to say that the 136André Lascaris Northern Irish conflict is not a religious one, though religious labels are being used. It is aconflict between two cultures, an Irish one and an AngloSaxon or British one. I. Dutch peace work on behalf ofNorthern Ireland A. A short history In 1973 I was invited to become a member of staff of a conference for influential Northern Irishmen in the Netherlands. Glenn Williams, then secretary general of the KEK (Conference of European Churches) had asked the Dutch Council ofChurches whether it could do something on behalf of Northern Ireland. After some consultation Williams asked the Dutch adult education center 'De Haaf to accommodate "mixed Roman Catholic and Protestant Irish groups in a quiet and spiritual atmosphere." The director of this center, Aat van Rhijn, a Presbyterian minister, asked me to participate in the conference because he wanted a Catholic priest to make the Roman Catholic Northern Irishmen feel represented on the staff. A laywoman, Hermine Keuning, was the third member of the staff. The Dutch Reformed Church provided money. In April 1973 a visit was made to Belfast and contact was established with the Irish Council ofChurches; it soon became our Northern Irish counterpart. In Septembera firstconference was held, quickly followed by a second one. From participants of the first conference a new request for a conference was made and after this one even more conferences were organized, altogether 18 between 1973 and 1983. We worked with neighborhood groups, politicians, paramilitaries, social workers, police officers, adult educators, social workers, journalists and editors, Catholic and Protestant clergymen. In the conferences ofthe protestant politicians and the clergy it was not possible to have a mixed group; we had to be content with having some either Catholic or Protestant "observers" at the conference. Inthe late seventiesthesecurity situation inNorthern Ireland improved. The necessity oftraveling to the Netherlands to have a conference became less evident. Because our work remained in demand, we organized weekends in Northern Ireland itself from 1981 onwards, mainly in Corrymeela, an ecumenical adult education center near Ballycastle. Money was coming from several sources, but mainly from the Dutch Reformed Church. To handle the money well we decided in 1975 to become a trust: the "Dutch Northern Irish Advisory Committee." It was typical ofthis trustthat its constitution stipulated that no conference or any Peace Education andthe Northern Irish Conflict137 other activity... (shrink)

As a number of philosophers have observed, our knowledge of what is passing through our own minds appears to be quite different to our knowledge of other things. I do not, it seems, need to accumulate evidence in order to know what psychological states I am in. 1 Without relying on evidence I am able to effortlessly attribute to myself beliefs, desires, intentions, hopes, fears, and a host of other psychological states. The distinctive knowledge we have of our own psychological (...) states is sometimes labeled privileged access. If ’privileged access’ means knowledge that is not evidentially based we certainly seem to have privileged access to some psychological states including those exhibiting intentionality.2 Nevertheless, some have questioned whether we do enjoy privileged access to our intentional states. One reason for doing so derives from the findings of psychologists. The time honored thesis that we have privileged access to our own psychological states is threatened by such findings (see especially Nesbitt and Wilson, 1977). Moreover, there is threat to privileged access from a different direction. It comes from a philosophical thesis commonly referred to as externalism. Externalism is the view that the content of an intentional state such as a belief is fixed by the environment external to the believer. Some externalists deny that externalism conflicts with privileged access. Donald Davidson and Tyler Bürge in particular have developed what might be called a minimalist account of privileged access which, they would claim, reconciles privileged access with externalism. An interesting feature of their account is that it suggests a defense of privileged access in the light of the psychological findings mentioned above. However, that is a topic for another paper. Here I will confine myself to assessing the Davidson Burge account of privileged access, and its implications for the relationship between privileged access and externalism. (shrink)

The writings of Napoleon I and his contemporaries' testimonies reveal the image of a statesman more taken up with action than theories and whom circonstances have made go through different stages in his political convictions. During his youth, he takes up all the ideas of the eighteenth century, even to their contradictions, though the temper of the leader to come, sometimes shows through already. During the Consulate - a time of dissimulation - he tries to conciliate around him the most (...) antagonistic ideas in order to strengthen his popular dictatorship. When at the height of his glory - about 1808-1811 - he longs to enter the «European Concert» white building a universal Empire, and he thinks of reviving the old regime society, white not admitting any intermediary between the Nation and himself. Defeated, then deported, he clearly analyses the causes of his failure and makes the most of future by reappealing to the ideas of the Revolution. (shrink)

In opposition to the natural view that observer perspective memory is bound to be inauthentic, McCarroll argues for the surprising conclusion that memories in which the subject sees himself in the remembered scene are, in many cases, true to the subject’s original experience of the scene. By means of a careful reconstruction of his argument, this paper shows that McCarroll does not succeed in establishing his conclusion. It shows, in fact, that we ought to come to the opposed conclusion that, (...) while it may be possible in principle for observer perspective memory to be authentic, this is unlikely ever to happen in practice. The natural view, in short, is more or less right. (shrink)

Charles Darwin’s theory of species evolution by means of natural selection is known largely because of the impact it had on biology and other natural sciences in general; this is hardly a surprising fact. Thus, it could strike certain readers –those accustomed to a philosophical discourse– as odd to speak of “Darwinian ethics.” However, Darwin’s theory of evolution has not been unknown to other areas and disciplines of thought, philosophy among them. Just as with other ‘destroyers’ of the ideas present (...) in their time –such as Nietzsche or Freud–, the impact of Darwin’s thought was felt as a deadly blow to some of the staple ideas and suppositions he weld concerning human life, nature and our place in it. Therefore, it is certainly relevant to discuss, as philosophers, the possibility of an ethic that is purely based on Darwin’s ideas. With this in mind, what I intend to do in the following article is to offer a brief exposition of Darwinian ethics, its main aspects as well as some of the problems and criticisms it has faced since its inception. It would certainly not be possible to speak of one single approach to Darwinian ethics; on the contrary, the theory has been reviewed and reinterpreted a great number of times, and not only by Darwin himself but also by many subsequent thinkers. Among these new reinterpretations, it has come to my attention the one offered by Darwinian metaethics, and to this approach I personally subscribe. Next I will consider diverse positions regarding the issue of Darwinian ethics, and will try to explain why metaethics offer the correct approach to it. (shrink)

En 1978, une loi a institué en France l'un des premiers dispositifs de protection des données personnelles. Trente ans d'application de la loi permettent aujourd'hui d'évaluer, à grands traits, la régulation que la Commission nationale de l'informatique et des libertés , au centre de ce dispositif, a réussi à établir et les difficultés qu'elle a rencontrées dans cette tâche. Des secteurs d'activité se sont montrés réfractaires à la nouvelle culture; le pouvoir politique est intervenu à partir du milieu des années (...) 1990, pour abaisser le niveau de protection; l'opinion publique s'est peu mobilisée pour faire valoir ses droits et les représentations sociales ont appréhendé les techniques d'information de manière de plus en plus positive.In 1978, one of the first systems for the protection of personal data was established under French law. Thirty years on, the time has come for a broad assessment of how far the CNIL, the French data protection authority at the core of the system, has succeeded in regulating the use of personal data, but also of the main difficulties it has encountered. Some branches of industry proved recalcitrant, politics intervened from the mid-1990s to lower the level of protection, public opinion slowly began to lay claim to data protection rights, while social representations of information processes became increasingly positive. (shrink)

Résumé — En relisant l’Essay sceptique et en suivant le cours, souvent désordonné, de ses arguments, nous avons voulu marquer comment le scepticisme de Jean-Pierre Camus a opéré dans la suite de son œuvre. Dans les romans à fonction édifiante, comme dans la théologie mystique, il développe, de façon explicite ou implicite, une sorte d’anthropologie qui réduit l’illusion de maîtrise du sujet. Une théorie du singulier, de l’événement et de la situation s’oppose à la représentation d’un universel abstrait. Le thème (...) du dessaisissement du sujet et la réflexion sur les rapports entre activité et passivité accompagne, sans la subvertir, la visée apologétique et moralisatrice.— While reading the Essay sceptique and following the course of his arguments, we aim at showing how Jean-Pierre Camus’s scepticism has been at work in his future books. He’s developing, if not always officially, in his novels for edification as well as in mystical theology, a kind of anthropology which tends to lower the illusion of mastering a subject. Far from representing an abstract universal, a theory of singularity, of the event and situation opposes it. The robbing of a subject’s attributes and the reflexion on intercourses between activity and passivity comes along with an apologetic design, without undoing it. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:André Cadieux THE JUNGLE OF DIONYSUS: THE SELF IN MANN AND NIETZSCHE "nphe self," wrote Kierkegaard, "is a relation which relates itself to A its own self." From this cryptic saying we may at least infer that to be a self is to be self-conscious. But the human self has always resisted its reflexive scrutiny, and thus remains mysterious to itself. "What—on the assumption that it has one—is its (...) essence?" "Of what moral nature is that essence?" "What possibilities of self-transcendence does the self contain?" These questions are, or ought to be insofar as we pride ourselves on being reflective, central questions for us all. They were surely central to Friedrich Nietzsche and Thomas Mann, but it is the burden of this article to argue that these men were united, at least at a certain point in the career of each, in their answers as well as in their questions. If we accept this claim, then we must either find dubious Mann's assertion about Nietzsche, "I took nothing literally, I believed him hardly at all,"1 or accept it on pain of believing in the occurrence of an extraordinary coincidence. For (I submit) a full understanding of Aschenbach's fate in Death in Venice yields a vision of human life and the self that is identical to that of Nietzsche in The Birth of Tragedy. Mann's central symbol is thejungle; it is, in fact, thejungle of Nietzsche's Dionysus. I When death, in the person of the gaunt stranger with the vertical furrows in his brow (pp. 4-5),3 comes to lead Aschenbach on his last journey, our sense of symmetry disposes us to find in the story some symbol of life as well. And initially it looks as if, in Aschenbach's vision of the jungle "thick with incredible bloom" (pp. 5-6), we have it. But if we follow Mann into the psyche of Gustave Aschenbach, we shall see that the matter is not so simple. Aschenbach, at the height of 53 54Philosophy and Literature his powers—a nobleman at fifty, whose prose is by now a textbook paradigm (p. 14)—is declining, suffering from a "growing fatigue, which no one must suspect," and longs to travel because travel will remove him from "the spot which was the daily theatre of a rigid, cold, and passionate service" (p. 7), a service which he finds it increasingly difficult to maintain. But why the difficulty? He was not naturally robust—which made his efforts of will "the more morally valiant" (p. 9); but what is there in the writer's art that should demand such stamina? Aschenbach had himself said "that almost everything conspicuously great is great in despite," and of the truth of that saying his own life was an exemplar (p. 1 1). But in despite of what? The text mentions mundane obstructions and afflictions, but these are superficial. We must look for our answer in that force against which Aschenbach has most strenuously set himself. That force, it emerges, is knowledge. The conspicuously great is great in despite of its temptation by knowledge. Knowledge is for Aschenbach, strangely, a "sharp and bitter irritant" which blunts the mind, and because it had for him this property he "turned his back on the realm of knowledge, and passed it by with averted face" (pp. 12-13). He renounces sympathy with this "abyss," and in its place achieves "the miracle of regained detachment," which issues in a style of "lofty purity, symmetry, and simplicity, which gave his productions a stamp of the classic" (p. 13). But what is this dread knowledge, why is it dreaded, and what is the detachment sought in its stead? It is knowledge, we must conclude, of the human soul. Aschenbach's great novel, The Abject, is to be interpreted as "a rebuke to the excesses of a psychology-ridden age," excesses which stand condemned because they issue in "the flabby humanitarianism" expressed in Madame de StaëPs maxim that to understand all is to forgive all (p. 13). Aschenbach, in short, rejects knowledge of the true self because it leads to the self's acceptance of the self... (shrink)

Este escrito plantea la complejidad sistémica del concepto crisis moral aplicada en la sociedad contemporánea, especialmente en el caso latinoamericano, lo que exige un estudio interdisciplinario para abordar el asunto. Ahora bien, se alude a una complejidad sistémica de la crisis moral por cuatro aspectos. En primer lugar, porque la moral, al ser un sistema normativo basado en el deseo de una sociedad mejor, nunca se sentirá satisfecha de la sociedad en la que se enmarca, lo que provoca un permanente (...) malestar. En segundo lugar, porque una crisis moral indica que no hay un acoplamiento entre la realidad de lo que se tiene con lo que se quiere, por lo que el acoplamiento deseado supone interrelacionar diversas variables sistémicas para que pueda suceder realmente un desarrollo moral (para lo cual se seguirá, con algunas correcciones, el modelo de desarrollo moral de Kohlberg), variables que son más complejas de lo que el sistema político cree o quiere hacer creer. En tercer lugar, porque afirmar la existencia de una crisis moral y, por tanto, la necesidad de acciones tendientes a resolverla, no implica que haya consenso sobre cuál es la moral que debe aceptarse ni sobre el camino a seguir para lograr dicho fin, para empezar porque es relativamente común que los agentes acusados de ser los causantes de la actual “crisis moral de la sociedad y del derecho” en las sociedades contemporáneas suelen ser los agentes que denuncian, como free riders, la misma crisis. Y, en cuarto lugar, porque un cambio sistémico que posibilite un salto en el desarrollo moral debe ser significativamente fuerte, y las medidas que suelen enunciarse para afrontarlo, además de no ser claras, suelen ser insuficientes o ingenuas (tales como pedir la creación o el fortalecimiento de una asignatura de ética en los planes de estudio de los futuros ciudadanos en general y abogados en especial). Finalmente, se propondrá partir de este diagnóstico sistémico e interdisciplinario para potencializar las respuestas que puedan darse para enfrentar la crisis; de lo contrario, lo rechazado permanecerá. (shrink)

This paper defends the claim that private associations might be legitimately constrained by a requirement of reasonableness. I present a list of goods that freedom of association protect, and argue that the limits to associational freedom have to be sensitive to the nature of these goods. In defending this claim, I cast doubt on two popular liberal arguments: One is that attitudes cultivated in the private sphere are not likely to spill over into the public arena. The other is that (...) governmental intervention into the inner life of private associations will jeopardise attaining some associational goods. I challenge these assertions in two ways: First, I argue that the value of associations cannot be measured only in terms of the effects it has on their members. We should also pay attention to the long-term effects on society. Second, I argue that imposing some constraints on the sorts of activities associations might pursue does not necessarily threaten any associational good. These challenges are backed up by research coming from social psychology that suggests that an important part of human behaviour is automatic. I focus on the automaticity of social stereotypes and their causal effectiveness in producing behaviour. The upshot of the argument is that spillover effects are likely to happen. I argue that this is problematic for liberalism because citizens have an interest in exercising a sense of justice. The fact that racist or sexist attitudes cultivated in private spills over the public sphere provides weighty reasons to intervene in those associations. (shrink)

In many contexts, such as business, science and law, it is essential to determine whether a company, a product or a person in fact has the reputation attributed to it, regardless of whether that reputation has been rightly earned. In this paper I offer two necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for the attribution of a reputation to a subject within a social group. The first one concerns the way in which reputational information is spread among the members of the relevant (...) social group; the second is the existence, in most members of the group, of a disposition to interpret and evaluate a reputational object in a manner molded by reputational information. Reputational claims generate expectations that are tested every time a member of the group comes in contact with the reputational object. In many cases, the preferential search for behavioral evidence consistent with those expectations will result in a distorted evaluation of the reputational object. (shrink)

This book examines the human ability to participate in moments of joint feeling. It presents an answer to the question concerning the nature of our faculty to share in what might be called episodes of collective affective intentionality. The proposal develops the claim that our capacity to participate in such episodes is grounded in an ability central to our human condition: our capacity to care with one another about certain things. The author provides a phenomenologically adequate account of collective affective (...) intentionality that takes seriously the idea that feelings are at the core of our emotional relation to the world. He details a form of group emotional orientation that relies on the fact that the participating individuals have come to share a number of concerns. Readers will learn that at the heart of a collective affective intentional episode, one does not merely find a set of shared concerns, but also a particular mode of caring. In the end, the argument presented in this monograph makes plausible the idea that the emotions through which humans participate in moments of affective intentional community express our nature. In addition, it shows that the debate on collective affective intentionality also permits us to better understand the relationship between two conflicting philosophical pictures of ourselves: the idea that we are essentially social beings and the claim that we are creatures for whom our personal existence is an issue. Thus, aiming at an elucidation of the nature of our ability to feel together, the book offers a detailed account of what it is to situationally express our human nature by caring about something in a properly joint manner. (shrink)

The Derveni papyrus is the oldest literary papyrus ever found, and one of the very few from Greece itself, which makes it one of the most interesting new texts from the ancient Greek world to have been discovered this century. The eschatological doctrines and an allegorical commentary on an Orphic theogony in terms of Presocratic physics which it contains make it a uniquely important document for the history of ancient Greek religion, philosophy, and literary criticism. This book is the first (...) to have been published on the text. It includes a full and reliable translation of the Papyrus together with a range of articles by leading European and American classicists who are internationally recognised experts in Greek religion and philosophy. Professor K. Tsantsanoglou, who will publish the papyrus when work on it is complete, presents important new material and has checked all the articles against the Papyrus. Thus for the first time, material is provided which will authorize scholarship upon the Papyrus in a way hitherto impossible, will stimulate further work on it, and will make the book a standard reference work on the subject for years to come. (shrink)

Paul Hirst’s idea of moral education is distinctive in the central role it attributes to social practices. For him, ethical principles and virtues should not be seen as abstract entities theoretically derived and then applied in education so that students learn to reason from those principles or live by those virtues. Instead, Hirst’s moral education incorporates an initiation into social practices and comes back to them by means of situated critical reflection from within those practices themselves. Embracing Hirst’s proposed (...) central role of social practices, this paper spells out the key role that emotions play in moral education so understood and their relations with social practices. As emotions materialize our deeply held values, incorporated into lived experience, their cultivation will not simply be a matter of deliberation, but rather of the practical exploration of social practices that can nurture and sustain them. (shrink)

This paper explores the relationship between a prominent version of the relational view of memory and recent work on forms of unsuccessful remembering or memory errors. I argue that unsuccessful remembering poses an important challenge for the relational view. Unsuccessful remembering can be divided into two kinds: misremembering and confabulating. I discuss each of these cases in light of a recent relational account, according to which remembering is characterized by an experiential relation to past events, and I argue that experiential (...) relations do not adequately distinguish between remembering and unsuccessful remembering. This is because there are, on the one hand, cases of remembering that do not instantiate the relevant experiential relations, and, on the other hand, cases of confabulation and misremembering that do instantiate the relevant experiential relations. I conclude by suggesting that any successful relationalist attempt to explain remembering needs to come to grips with unsuccessful remembering. (shrink)

Sāṃkhya and yoga are normally discussed either as topics in philosophy or as subjects of historical and philological inquiry. In this paper, I will attempt to demonstrate that, before separate developments appeared in the areas of both sāṃkhya and yoga, at least some brahmins seemed to have espoused the idea that any physical exertion or harnessing to a specific task had to be preceded by an intellectual approach to reality and possibly by a thorough enumeration of its principles. I come (...) at this question from three different angles. I first analyze Kapila’s actions in the Sagara episode. The double presence of a yogācārya and a sāṃkhyācārya in certain cosmogonies provides a second approach to the question. The third angle will be a study of the significance of a coordinated emphasis on kratu and dakṣa in the Vedic context. These apparently disconnected themes actually point in a single direction, and they contribute to an understanding of sāṃkhya and yoga as linked together as a binary pair of complementary attitudes. (shrink)

It is well known that when it comes to perception in the De anima, Aristotle uses affection-related vocabulary with extreme caution. This has given rise to a debate between interpreters who hold that in Aristotle’s account, the act of sense-perception nevertheless involves the physiological alteration of the sense organ (Richard Sorabji), and those think, with Myles Burnyeat, that for Aristotle, perception does not involve any material process, so that an Aristotelian physics of sense-perception is a “physics of forms alone”. (...) The present article suggests that the dematerialisation of Aristotle’s theory of perception, which has a long story from Alexander of Aphrodisias to Brentano, may be in fact traced back to Theophrastus’ exegesis of Aristotle’s relevant passages in the De anima in his Physics, as we can reconstruct it on the basis of Priscian’s Metaphrasis in Theophrastum and Simplicius’ commentary of Aristotle’s De Anima. The reconstruction also provides a scholastic-theoretical frame to Theophrastus’ critical exposition of ancient theories about sense perception in his De sensibus, whether or not the discussion originally belonged to Theophrastus’ Physics. (shrink)

This paper supports the contention that the general rules introduced by Hume in the Treatise on Human Nature (THN 1.3.15) are a selection mechanism for inductive inferences, which rejects two sources of inefficiency : (i) from emotional origin, which would reduce the uneasiness coming from a possible failure in the uniformity of nature ; (ii) from cognitive origin, which would tolerate the possible overflow of the imagination on judgment. A growing consensus in recent decades, which distinguishes between two kinds of (...) rules — extensive and corrective — is at the basis of this device. Whereas the extensive rules allow us to go beyond a singular experience and derive a wider range of inferences, the corrective rules, whose command opposes the philosopher to the vulgar, control and rectify the effects of extensive rules alone, so as to eliminate emotional and cognitive inefficiencies, and to make inferences that, borrowing the expression to Peirce, we will designate as abductive. (shrink)

There inevitably comes a time when even the best informed minds are tempted to yield to the lure of binarism: when we are no longer concerned with the details of a system, but rather with our vision of the relationship between man and the world. Without going any further it can already be said that the problem of existence is presented to us in terms of a man/world duality, as though we were unable to exceed our subjective vision of (...) things so as to assess their intrinsic reality.When linguists discovered that they could isolate discrete units called phonemes, they were tempted to oppose the discontinuity of these phonemes – reflecting the underlying discontinuity of the signifiers – to a continuum of prelinguistic experience, a continuum that is not arranged as discrete elements except with reference to any significant units of the language selected for the purpose of communicating this experience to others. At the outset we have nothing but a nebulous mass where only the application of a linguistic grid allows us to discern identifiable units. Even if, in the final analysis, it will prove necessary to doubt the universal validity of this vision of things, we must recognize its usefulness in concretizing a concept of linguistic facts – a concept that has for some time played a beneficent role in research. At least for some of us, this vision should reflect the manner in which the world is gradually organized in our minds each time a perceptible reality is isolated from its context at the instant it receives a name. Allow me to introduce an illustration from personal experience. It was the last day of July in 1914. In our little village in the Savoy the international tension – which would eventually end in general mobilization – was very perceptible; our classes were idle, and teachers and pupils had settled down in a field near the school. I was six. Sitting on the grass, my attention was attracted by a plant with large flat leaves. At that moment someone said the word plantain “plantain.” The plant had not been heretofore exactly unknown to me; it didn't strike me, at that moment, as a discovery; but it acquired a distinct existence only at that instant in the green carpet of the field when a signifier had definitively isolated it. It was most assuredly the gravity of the hour that engraved this incident in my memory. (shrink)

The process [by which any individual settles into new opinions] is always the same. The individual has a stock of old opinions already, but he meets a new experience that puts them to a strain…. The result is an inward trouble to which his mind till then had been a stranger, and from which he seeks to escape by modifying his previous mass of opinions. He saves as much of it as he can, for in this matter of belief we (...) are all extreme conservatives. So he tries to change first this opinion, and then that (for they resist change very variously), until at last some new idea comes up which he can graft upon the ancient stock with a minimum of disturbance of the latter, some idea that mediates between the stock and the new experience and runs them into one most felicitously and expediently.The new idea is then adopted as the true one. It preserves the older stock of truths with a minimum of modification, stretching them just enough to make them admit the novelty, but conceiving that in ways as familiar as the case leaves possible. (William James, Lectures on Pragmatism, 1907). (shrink)

BackgroundCurrently, we are facing a demographic shift to an older population and its consequences worldwide: in the years to come, several older people will need nursing home care. The work culture is important for care quality in NHs. Some Norwegian municipalities have implemented the Joy of Life Nursing Home strategy, representing a resource-oriented health-promoting approach. Knowledge about how implementation of the JoLNH approach impacts the work culture is scarce.AimssWe hypothesized that the JoLNH strategy impacts positively on the work culture: when (...) comparing measurements at two time points and when comparing two municipalities, among which one has implemented the JoLNH and the other has not.MethodWith a 1-year interval, healthcare personnel in 43 NHs located in two large Norwegian municipalities responded to a survey in two waves. In total, 558 healthcare personnel participated at T1 and 515 at T2. Work culture was assessed by the Systematizing Person–Group Relations Instrument.FindingsThe municipality implementing the JOLNH strategy experienced significant increases in SPGR dimensions, representing positive orientations towards a better work culture, whereas those working in the non-JoLNH municipality reported an increase in SPGR dimensions, signifying a worsened work culture.DiscussionThe data indicate that the implemented JoLNH strategy has endorsed positive effects in the work culture. The JoLNH strategy emphasizes on the quality of patient care, which is what healthcare personnel, in general, are much concerned about. Furthermore, attention to task orientation and independent work seem to encourage a better work culture in NHs.ConclusionThis study suggests that the JoLNH strategy impacts positively on the work culture in Norwegian NHs. (shrink)

The Minos is a much neglected dialogue. The scholarly attention that has been given to it is unimaginative and general. Our discussion of the Minos remedies these scholarly deficits.We have read the dialogue closely and have concluded, on a textual basis, that Socrates intends an empirical investigation of νόμος insofar as νόμος is the product of tradition and the behavior it prescribes. Our investigation also has been especially sensitive to the dialogue’s etymological sophistication. Besides Plato’s Cratylus, no other dialogue (...) class='Hi'>comes close to mirroring the argument explored with its etymological foundations. This observation justifies the seriousness with which we have treated Socrates’ discussion of King Minos. In fact, it is Socrates’ discussion of King Minos that unifies the dialogue as a whole. Our hope is that the treatment contained in these pages of the Minos contributes to a scholarly reevaluation of this profound and complex dialogue. (shrink)

Catholic priests who sexually abused minors were transferred to other parishes without disclosing the actual reason for their transfer. Based on reports from Ireland, Germany, and the USA, and relying on Bourdieu’s concepts of field and habitus, this article demonstrates that first, the practices of denying and withholding information even to fellow priests are consequences of the repression of sexuality within the Catholic Church. The Church has not provided a legitimate language for priests to be able to engage openly about (...) sexuality. Sexual repression as a field structure is incorporated into the priests’ habitus, resulting in self-censorship when it comes to articulating the issue of sexual abuse. Secondly, the article accounts for the change within the Catholic field and the priest’s habitus, which has resulted in the facility to verbally express sexual matters in order that the undisclosed practice of transferring abusive priests finally stopped. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to investigate the meaning of politics as a practical science in Spinoza’s Political Treatise. First, we shall indicate how Spinoza recasts classical division between theoretical sciences, practical sciences and poietical sciences. The focus is on modern dissolution of abstract oppositions between theory and practice. Then we come to the question of poiesis to check how the arts of production are reconsidered by Spinoza from the new concept that stands in the unity between theory and (...) practices. Finally, we hope to contribute for further investigations about Spinoza’s politics as a “practical science”. (shrink)

This paper considers one of the most significant and controversial attempts to account for the meaning of pejoratives as lexical items, namely Hom and May’s. After outlining the theory, we pinpoint sets of pejorative sentences that come out true on their account and for which the question as to whether they are compatible with the view advocated by them (so-called Moral and Semantic Innocence) remains open. Helping ourselves to the standard model-theoretical framework Hom and May (presumably) work in, we prove (...) they are compatible with the view. Given that the issues of both the moral import of pejoratives and the practical effects of their utterance are not settled by the proof, we then highlight unwelcome moral and pragmatic implications for some of the pejorative sentences under scrutiny, thereby showing that the view, broadly understood, is not as morally and semantically innocuous as it is meant to be. (shrink)

In what is probably the most arresting of all the textual developments of the Saturnalian dialogues, the reader’s emotional identification with the voice of rage and thwarted rebellion is ever more thoroughly compelled by the structure and tone of succeeding works, at the same time that the dangers of that role, both for its bearer and for others, are ever more explicitly argued. Readers of Le Neveau de Rameau are not forced by the inner logic of the text to choose (...) between Moi and Lui, and they can find in each a welcome counterbalance to and relief from the demands of the other. But in Notes from Underground the “gentlemen-readers” have nothing left to offer us, and the novel makes it impossible to feel anything less than the same contempt for their platitudes that the Underground Man himself flaunts. The clearest index of the development I am tracing is the formal shift from Diderot’s dialogue proper to Dostoyevski’s first-person novel, but this mutation is itself already a consequence of a more indirect and disturbing cause. Dostoyevski, in the famous cry of The Possessed, was certain that “‘the fire is in the minds of men and not in the roofs of houses’”;9 he believed that only the prior corruption of Russia’s intelligentsia, their eager surrender to the lure of conspiracy and violence, could have led so many of them to the acts of senseless catastrophe, fueled by ressentiment, false pride, and incoherent utopian fantasies, marks all of his most important post-Siberia political and cultural writings.10 9. Dostoyevski, The Possessed, trans. Garnett , p. 533.10. In The Brothers Karamazov, Dostoyevski explicitly states that the future revolution will be made by the Smerdyakovs. In the chapter “Over the Brandy,” for example, Ivan tells his father that Smerdyakov is “a prime candidate” to initiate a revolutionary uprising . Michael André Bernstein is professor of English and comparative literature at the University of California, Berkeley. He is the author of The Tale of the Tribe: Ezra Pound and the Modern Verse Epic and a book of poetry. His most recent contribution to Critical Inquiry is “‘O Totiens Servus’: Saturnalia and Servitude in Augustan Rome”. (shrink)

This book examines the human ability to participate in moments of joint feeling. It presents an answer to the question concerning the nature of our faculty to share in what might be called episodes of collective affective intentionality. The proposal develops the claim that our capacity to participate in such episodes is grounded in an ability central to our human condition: our capacity to care with one another about certain things. The author provides a phenomenologically adequate account of collective affective (...) intentionality that takes seriously the idea that feelings are at the core of our emotional relation to the world. He details a form of group emotional orientation that relies on the fact that the participating individuals have come to share a number of concerns. Readers will learn that at the heart of a collective affective intentional episode, one does not merely find a set of shared concerns, but also a particular mode of caring. In the end, the argument presented in this monograph makes plausible the idea that the emotions through which humans participate in moments of affective intentional community express our nature. In addition, it shows that the debate on collective affective intentionality also permits us to better understand the relationship between two conflicting philosophical pictures of ourselves: the idea that we are essentially social beings and the claim that we are creatures for whom our personal existence is an issue. Thus, aiming at an elucidation of the nature of our ability to feel together, the book offers a detailed account of what it is to situationally express our human nature by caring about something in a properly joint manner. (shrink)

The idea that the ethical values of professionals in finance have played a role in the global financial crisis is widespread. The crisis-of-ethics debate is important, concerning one of the main policy challenges of our times, but is based on popular lore and anecdotes rather than systematic evidence. We analyze the self-enhancement and self-transcendence values of PIFs vis-à-vis the general population and test for patterns of variation that are consistent with the idea of a crisis of values, meaning patterns of (...) variation that would implicate PIFs’ values in the GFC. Employing pre-crisis data allows for an unbiased assessment. Results reveal only minor differences in values between PIFs and the general population, too small to support the idea of a crisis of ethical values by objective standards. Extensive robustness checks confirm these findings, sometimes actually revealing values differences counter to the crisis of ethical values idea. We conclude that the financial system would not have fared better had we had a different breed of PIFs. Rather, situational forces can induce severe disregard for the welfare of others, also in people with ordinary, decent values. Hence, if anything, the GFC shows that the financial services industry has been providing an environment highly conducive to unethical behavior. The practical implication is that fixes to the financial system can only come from improved regulatory design. (shrink)

In a globalizing world, cross-national differences in values and business culture and understanding these differences become increasingly central to a range of organizational issues and ethical questions. However, various concerns have been raised about extant empirical research on cross-national dissimilarities in the cultural values of managers and the development of a unified business culture. This paper seeks to address three such concerns with the literature on convergence versus divergence of cultural values. It develops an empirical approach to the study of (...) changing business cultures that revolves around birth cohorts and intergenerational values shifts and aims to advance empirical knowledge of the dynamics of cross-national differences in the cultural values of managers. We use time-series data covering 68,708 managers and are able to consider a sample of 32 countries that represent more than half of the cultural clusters recognized in the literature. Results reveal diverse shifts in managerial values across birth cohorts with cross-national dissimilarities waning for some basic cultural dimensions, remaining stable for other dimensions, and becoming more pronounced for other dimensions still. Moving beyond the standard convergence/divergence taxonomy, we conclude that a full-fledged convergence–stability–divarication perspective provides the best basis for thinking about the subtle ways in which business cultures are changing. (shrink)

One determining characteristic of contemporary sociopolitical systems is their power over increasingly large and diverse populations. This raises questions about power relations between heterogeneous individuals and increasingly dominant and homogenizing system objectives. This article crosses epistemic boundaries by integrating computer engineering and a historicalphilosophical approach making the general organization of individuals within large-scale systems and corresponding individual homogenization intelligible. From a versatile archeological-genealogical perspective, an analysis of computer and social architectures is conducted that reinterprets Foucault’s disciplines and political anatomy to (...) establish the notion of politics for a purely technical system. This permits an understanding of system organization as modern technology with application to technical and social systems alike. Connecting to Heidegger’s notions of the enframing (Gestell) and a more primal truth (anfänglicheren Wahrheit), the recognition of politics in differently developing systems then challenges the immutability of contemporary organization. Following this critique of modernity and within the conceptualization of system organization, Derrida’s democracy to come (à venir) is then reformulated more abstractly as organizations to come. Through the integration of the discussed concepts, the framework of Large-Scale Systems Composed of Homogeneous Individuals (LSSCHI) is proposed, problematizing the relationships between individuals, structure, activity, and power within large-scale systems. The LSSCHI framework highlights the conflict of homogenizing system-level objectives and individual heterogeneity, and outlines power relations and mechanisms of control shared across different social and technical systems. (shrink)

Theories related to cognitive sciences, Human-in-the-loop Cyber-physical systems, data analysis for decision-making, and computational ethics make clear the need to create transdisciplinary learning, research, and application strategies to bring coherence to the paradigm of a truly human-oriented technology. Autonomous objects assume more responsibilities for individual and collective phenomena, they have gradually filtered into routines and require the incorporation of ethical practice into the professions related to the development, modeling, and design of algorithms. To make this possible, it is pertinent and (...) urgent to bring them closer to the problems and approaches of the humanities. Increasingly transdisciplinary research must be part of the construction of systems that provide developers and scientists with the necessary bases to understand the ethical debate and therefore their commitment to society. This article considers two theories as articulating axes: Blumenberg’s, coming from the field of philosophy, for whom the process of technification and especially the implementation of mathematical models in their algorithmic form leads to an emptying of meaning and therefore makes programmers who implement their functions to be alien to the concerns that gave them origin; Daston’s, belonging to the field of the history of science and according to which the division of labor in the processes of technification of the calculation implies a kind of subordination in which those who implement the inventions of a small group of privileged mathematicians ignore the procedures that put them into operation. Given these two theories, the black box models prevalent in AI development, and the urgency of establishing explanatory frameworks for the development of computational ethics, this article exposes the need to give a voice to the cultural history of consciousness for promoting the discussions around the implementation of mathematical algorithms. The paper takes as a reference the different points of view that have emerged around the study of technological ethics, its applicability, management, and design. It criticizes the current state of studies from a humanistic perspective and explains how the historical perspective allows promoting the training of software engineers, developers and creators so that they assume intuitions and moral values in the development of their work. Specifically, it aims to expose how cultural history, applied to the study of consciousness and its phenomena, makes those involved in this technological revolution aware of the effect that they, through their algorithms, have on society in general and on human beings in particular. (shrink)