We discuss the scientific task of historical reconstruction and the problem of epistemic access. We argue that strong epistemic support for historical claims consists in the consilience of multiple independent lines of evidence, and analyze the impact hypothesis for the End-Cretaceous mass extinction to illustrate the accrual of epistemic support. Although there are elements of the impact hypothesis that enjoy strong epistemic support, the general conditions for this are strict, and help to clarify the difficulties associated with (...) reconstructing the deep past. (shrink)

In this paper I sketch a reconstruction of the basic psychoanalytic conception of the mind in terms of two historical resources: the conception of the subject developed in post-Kantian idealism, and Spinoza's laws of the affects in Part Three of the Ethics. The former, I suggest, supplies the conceptual basis for the psychoanalytic notion of the unconscious, while the latter defines the type of psychological causality of psychoanalytic explanations. The imperfect fit between these two elements, I claim, is (...) reflected in familiar conceptual difficulties surrounding psychoanalytic theory and explanation. (shrink)

This chapter examines historical reconstruction and literary structures of rabbinic texts using the Leviticus Rabbah as an example. It explains that Leviticus Rabbah is a commentary on the Book of Leviticus which now forms part of Midrash Rabbah. It proposes ten theses about the special problems which the literary structures of rabbinic texts pose for the historian and analyses a section of the amoraic work of Leviticus Rabbah to describe some of those literary structures. The findings suggest that (...) it is impossible to explain how the textuality of rabbinic sources worked and that many rabbinic works fill the same functional position in a text more than once. (shrink)

This essay focuses on the topic of the emergence of Christianity and Judaism as related but distinct religious traditions, as an example of a process of religious and cultural change, which has had an enormous impact on Western and other societies around the world. At the heart of this question lies what appear to be contradictions between normative practices in antiquity and those we know of today, leading us to consider the historical and hermeneutical issue of continuity and change (...) over time; its how, when and why. Rejecting the idea that theological differences between Judaism and Christianity necessitated a ‘parting of ways’ between them, it is argued that social, political and colonial decision-making was essential to this process, and that, furthermore, a historical focus on institutional realities in the ancient Mediterranean world, including in Jewish society, will challenge many long-held assumptions about the origins not only of Christianity but also of Judaism. The general historical reconstruction offered is then applied to a specific archaeological site, Capernaum, showing how traces of the larger pattern of development from the first to the fifth century CE may be seen in the histories of two buildings in this town. (shrink)

RESUMEN El objetivo del presente trabajo es estudiar la reformulación de los criterios normativos de la Teoría Crítica realizada por Axel Honneth. Para ello, se defiende que el proyecto de Honneth ha sufrido un giro desde sus primeros textos, donde operaba con lo que llamaremos "anticipación contrafáctica de la sociedad emancipada", hasta la actualidad, que utiliza la estrategia llamada "reconstrucción normativa". Para probar esta tesis expondremos, primero, el problema de la fundamentación normativa tal y como aparece en la Teoría Crítica. (...) Tras ello, reconstruiremos el primer modelo de fundamentación normativa empleado por Honneth y, finalmente, localizaremos y explicaremos el tránsito hacia el segundo modelo. ABSTRACT The aim of this paper is to study Axel Honneth's reformulation of the normative criteria of the Critical Theory. To this end, we advocate that Honneth's project has changed from his earlier work, in which he adopted what we will call "counterfactual anticipation of the emancipated society", to the present day, when he adopts the approach called "normative reconstruction". To support this idea, first, we will expose the issue ofthe normative foundation as it appears in the Critical Theory. After doing so, we will reconstruct the first model of normative foundation used by Honneth. Finally, we will locate and explain the transition to the second model. (shrink)

Contribution to a Book Forum on Bence Nanay's Aesthetics as Philosophy of Perception (includes Nanay's response).

An assessment in historical context of how and what filmmakers, logicians and philosophers could have learned from one another about the rudiments of their crafts.

This paper examines the role of normative ideals in contemporary critiques of the university. It begins by suggesting that the normative ideal of the university advanced by Immanuel Kant in The Conflict of the Faculties is particularly relevant to current critiques, as exemplified by a manifesto produced at the University of Aberdeen entitled ‘Reclaiming our University’. The second portion of the paper notes that such critiques cannot however encompass all aspects of the modern university. The paper thus concludes that a (...) Kantian framework enables a narrower, but more powerful critique of New Public Management, which foregrounds issues of legitimate conflict within the university and its institutional reproduction over time instead of speaking to broader concerns about the university's civic/humanist origins. (shrink)

This study aims to analyse La Peyrère’s traditionally denied or under-estimated influence on Vico’s universal historiography. While Vico criticized La Peyrère’s impiety, his description of the cultural exchange between sacred and profane history, represented by the Jews and the Gentiles, corresponded with La Peyrère’s thoughts. Thus, one could interpret Vico’s criticism of La Peyrère as a strategy for saving his major work from the suspicion of heterodoxy. Vico refuted the existence of pre-Adamites, but accepted La Peyrère’s idea of the double (...) creation and transformed it into that of multiple creations and the origins of civilizations. This allowed him to arrive at the innovative concept of the plurality of history. Thus, La Peyrère’s hypothesis was a starting point for Vico’s innovations in historical reconstruction. (shrink)

Finding a scientific, third-person explanation of subjective experience or phenomenal content is commonly called the “hard problem” of consciousness. There has recently been a surge in neuropsychological research on meditation in general and long-term meditators in particular. These experimental subjects are allegedly capable of generating a stable state of consciousness over a prolonged period of time, which makes experimentation with them an interesting paradigm for consciousness research. This perspective article starts out with a historical reconstruction of the “hard (...) problem,” tracing it back to Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and Emil du Bois-Reymond in the 18th and 19th century, respectively, and the problem of introspection as already acknowledged by Wilhelm Wundt in the 19th century. It then discusses the prospects of research on long-term meditators from a contemporary perspective and with respect to the neurophenomenological research program already advocated by Francisco J. Varela. (shrink)

Over time, Mark Blaug became increasingly sceptical of the merits of the approach to the history of economics that we find in his magnum opus, Economic theory in retrospect, first published in 1962, and increasingly leaned to favour 'historical' over 'rational' reconstructions. In this essay, I discuss Blaug's shifting historiographical position, and the changing terms of historiographical debate. I do so against the background of Blaug's personal life history and the increasingly beleaguered position the history of economic thought found (...) itself in after the Second World War. I argue that Blaug never resolved the tensions between historical and rational reconstructions, partly because he never fleshed out a viable notion of historical reconstruction. I trace Blaug's difficulty in doing so to his firm conviction that the history of economics should speak to economists, a conviction clearly present in his 2001 essay: "No history of ideas, please, we're economists". (shrink)

How different were the claims of Assyrian royal inscriptions from actual Neo-Assyrian practice? This essay explores this question by examining two unusual claims made by Sargon II in relation to his rule of Samaria. The first claim, which appears both in the Khorsabad annals and in a Nimrud prism, should be translated “I again settled Samaria, more than previously.” Based on the historical reconstruction derived from archaeological data, I argue that this phrase refers to the movement of exiles (...) into areas in the western part of the province of Samaria. These areas in the western part of the province, around the sites of Aphek, Hadid, and Gezer, experienced significant population increases in the Assyrian period. The second passage, in Sargon’s Great Display Inscription from Khorsabad, refers to Sargon’s treatment of non-deported Samaritans. It should be translated “I trained the remnant in their crafts.” The historical reality behind this claim is the shift in agricultural techniques and activities in Samaria as a result of the Assyrian conquest. The Assyrian domination of Samaria required the production of grain surpluses, which needed to be made available in the Aphek-Gezer region in the western part of the province of Samaria. In each of the claims from the royal inscriptions examined in this essay, we see that the royal inscriptions credit the king with activities performed by the provincial governor. They change the description of the activity to make it “fit for royalty.”. (shrink)

The far west in Hesiod's world is confused, and probably reflects a dim knowledge drawn from the Phoenicians in Sicily, where the Greeks bought Tartessian silver. Beneath myths and traditions we may discern a few historical facts: the dynasty of the Tartessian kings, the Phoenician wars with King Geron of Tartessos , followed by the ‘Phoenician Thalassocracy’ and a Tartessian attempt to establish direct commercial relations with Sardinia.

Abstract“The Book of Secrets in the Results of Ideas”, usually called “The Book of Secrets” is a codex containing drawings and descriptions of thirty-one artifacts attributed to the engineer Alī Ibn Khalaf al-Murādī, who lived in Andalusia in southern Spain at the beginning of the 11th century. This manuscript is one of the first written testimonies that describe medieval mechanisms with complex precision. The aim of this work is to reconstruct and study from a historical and technological point of (...) view two of the ancient artifacts contained in the “Book of Secrets”, the “Fortress Demolisher” and the “Magic Well”. The “Fortress Demolisher” is a war machine designed to demolish the upper part of the walls or towers and consists of a battering ram mounted on a platform that can be raised several meters above the ground using a scissor mechanism. The “Magic Well” is a mechanism with several pulleys whose purpose is to raise water several meters from the bottom of a well by collecting a small portion of rope. To reconstruct the two artifacts, a digital model and a detailed study of the geometry and operation of the mechanisms, were first carried out. 3D printing, using the Fused Deposition Modelling technology, made the physical reproduction. The digitization and physical reproduction by 3D printing of the mechanisms represent an update of the traditional ways of transmitting knowledge. The use of these new technologies makes the knowledge more accessible, understandable and attractive. (shrink)

Judith Shklar has been invoked by contemporary realists as an example of how history is a better source of political knowledge than abstract philosophy. This emphasis on history challenges the predominant understanding of her political theory that stresses the universality of fear of cruelty. This contrast between history and moral universalism invites a serious investigation of Shklar's historical method. This article takes up this task by reconstructing a Shklarian historical method based on a tripartite relation between historical (...) memory, democratic citizenship, and historically minded political theory. This reconstructed historical method challenges the boundaries of Shklar's liberalism and broadens the possibilities that her political theory can offer. (shrink)

The problem of how to access and deploy the explanatory power of culture in historical accounts has long remained vexing. A recent approach, combining and transcending the "culture as structure"/ "culture as practice" divide among social historians, puts explanatory focus on the recursivity of meaning, agency, and structure in historical transformation. This article argues that meaning construction is at the nexus of culture, social structure, and social action, and must be the explicit target of investigation into the cultural (...) dimension of historical explanation. Through an empirical analysis of political alliance during the Irish Land War, 1879–1882, I demonstrate that historians can uncover meaning construction by analyzing the symbolic structures and practices of narrative discourse. (shrink)

Summary Several subdisciplines within historiography, most notably the arms and armour or martial arts studies, are interested in inferring physical qualities of historical material objects from historical sources. Scholars from these fields face serious deficiency of written accounts when it comes to various crucial information regarding their subject matter. Therefore, researchers’ attention is often drawn to iconographical sources, sometimes resulting in certain fascination with the material culture depicted in primary technical literature (Fachliteratur). This tendency seems particularly strong in (...) studies on HEMA which rely heavily on pre-modern combat treatises known as ‘fight books’ (Fechtbücher) and are tempted either to treat the available iconography as a faithful representation of its corresponding material reality or to interpret apparent mismatch between icono-graphical representations and their material source domain as evidence for the inferior skills of the illustrator. We would like to put forward that there is a fundamental oversight in such approach to Fachliteratur in general and fight books in particular, namely the lack of consideration for the artwork as a diagrammatic representation of the functional aspects of depicted embodied technique, where proportional ‘realism’ is of lesser priority. It may be fruitful to develop a more nuanced method of ‘reading’ such images. Our survey of select late-medieval fight books shows that equipment, and even body parts, are regularly distorted in their depictions in the fight books to better communicate the subject matter, especially where textual descriptions would be complicated. Interpreted in Gestalt terms, this phenomenon may serve as an example of historical pragmatic application of the cognitive principle of holism – that the whole is something different than the sum of its parts. (shrink)

The article presents a detailed consideration of the arguments from the symposium “Verifiability”, which was held on July 14, 1945 in London, proposed by Scottish philosopher and theologian Donald MacKinnon, Austrian logician and mathematician Friedrich Waismann and English logician and philosopher of science William Kneale. MacKinnon’s approach to verifiability was based on the metaphysics of fact, while Waismann and Kneale’s approach was based on the semantic specificity of empirical concepts (“open texture” and context of use) and on the truth-values of (...) empirical propositions. The symposium in question is interesting primarily because it is the last meaningful discussion on the concept of verifiability in the form in which it was understood by the Vienna Circle. Despite the fact that, in the coming years, this concept received a completely different interpretation, which stands away from the original source, the 1945 symposium could be rightfully treated as a canonical discussion on verifiability in the sense that nothing like this has ever happened in the philosophy after. (shrink)

The authors of this book reconstruct the philosophical, methodological and theoretical assumptions of non-Marxian historical materialism, a theory of historical process authored by Leszek Nowak (1943-2009), a co-founder of the Poznań School of Methodology. In the first part of the book, philosophical assumptions of this theory are compared with the concepts of Robert Nozick, Immanuel Wallerstein, André Gunder Frank and analytical Marxism. In the second part, non-Marxian historical materialism is compared with the concepts of Eva Etzioni-Halevy, Andrzej (...) Falkiewicz, Robert Michels, Vilfredo Pareto, Theda Skocpol and Karl August Wittfogel. (shrink)

In Giddens view, there is historical materialism "reductionism", "evolution" and "functional theory" three defects. "Reductionism," manifested in historical materialism and the complex social relations of human history is about productivity, economic relations and class struggle, etc., as its reconstruction, Giddens proposed to "extend the level of time and space" as the division of social types of new standards; "evolution" of human performance in the history of historical materialism as a lower stage to higher evolving process, as (...) its reconstruction, Giddens made ​​from "pieces" and "time edge" perspective to explain social reproduction and social change as a process of its reconstruction, Giddens proposed a "random social change" model of the new point of view. Giddens reflection of historical materialism and the "reconstruction" has some inspiration, but there are obvious flaws. According to the viewpoint of Anthony Giddens, Historical Materialism ham three main deficiencies: "Reductionism", "Evolutionism" and "Functionalism". "Reductionism" exhibits on the Historical Materialism's reducing the complicated human history and social relationships into the forces of production, economic relationships, class struggles, etc. As an alternation of it, Giddens advances the notion of "level of time-space distanciation", which serves as the new standard for dividing the societal types. "Evolutionism" exhibits on the Historical Materialism's regarding the human history as a process which continuously evolutes from the lower stages to the upper ones. As a reconstruction of it, Giddens brings forward two concepts of "episode" and "time-space edge", which serves as the new criteria for identifying the general outline of the human history. "Functionalism" exhibits on the Historical Materialism's describing the societal reproduction and social change from the viewpoints of "need" and "function". As a revision of it, Giddens puts forward the new model of "contingent social change" . Giddens' endeavors have certain significance in understanding Historical Materialism, but his limitations are also obvious. (shrink)

This book is both a history of philosophy of logic told from the Kantian viewpoint and a reconstruction of Kant’s theory of logic from a historical perspective. Kant’s theory represents a turning point in a history of philosophical debates over the following questions. (1) Is logic a science, instrument, standard of assessment, or mixture of these? (2) If logic is a science, what is the subject matter that differentiates it from other sciences, particularly metaphysics? (3) If logic is (...) a necessary instrument to all philosophical inquiries, how is it so entitled? (4) If logic is both a science and an instrument, how are these two roles related? Kant’s official answer to these questions centers on three distinctions: general versus particular logic; pure versus applied logic; pure general logic versus transcendental logic. The true meaning and significance of each distinction becomes clear, I argue, only if we consider two factors. First, Kant was mindful of various historical views on how logic relates to other branches of philosophy (viz. metaphysics and physics) and to the workings of common human understanding. Second, he first coined ‘transcendental logic’ while struggling to secure metaphysics as a proper “science,” and this conceptual innovation would in turn have profound implications for his mature theory of logic. Against this backdrop, I reassess the place of Kant’s theory in the history of philosophy of logic and highlight certain issues that are still debated today, such as normativity of logic and the challenges posed by logical pluralism. In Chapter 1, “Kant and a Philosophical History of Logic – Methodological Reflections,” I discuss certain exegetical challenges posed by Kant’s logic corpus and argue for a “history of philosophical problems” method by which to reconstruct a Kantian theory of logic. In Chapter 2, “The Nature and Place of Logic – A History of Controversies,” I construct a partial history of philosophy of logic that revolves around the (supposedly) scientific status of logic on the one hand and its value or utility on the other. In Chapter 3, “The Making of a Scientific Logic from Bacon to Wolff,” I examine how four representative early modern philosophers – Francis Bacon, John Locke, G.W. Leibniz, and Christian Wolff – approached the four questions mentioned above. In Chapter 4, “Kant on the Way to His Own Philosophy of Logic,” I consider how Kant, in the decade between around mid-1760s and mid-1770s, navigated between existing accounts of logic until he finally found his own voice. I highlight the breakthroughs that would mark his critical departures from previous views and pave the way for the final articulation of his own view. In Chapter 5, “Logic and the Demands of Kantian ‘Science’,” I zero in on Kant’s official theory of logic in his monumental publication, Critique of Pure Reason. I foreground both what makes the theory original and what leaves it vulnerable to criticisms from post-Kantian thinkers. (shrink)

The article is devoted to the role of language, conceptual schemes, ontology and epistemic losses in the works of Thomas Hobbes. The author highlights two types of interpretive schemes: (1) emphasis on systematic unity and integrity in Hobbes's work, (2) consideration of Hobbes' works as a set of individual parts. Two ways of justifying the political philosophy of Thomas Hobbes are also investigated: based on prudence and definitive (scientific). The author justifies that philosophia prima is Hobbes's theory of experience and (...) that it is human experience that makes science possible. (shrink)

This stimulating book covers a wide range of topics concerning Kant and the history of logic, with the overall goal of specifying how Kant's various conceptions of logic developed out of that history. A first chapter on methodology argues that Kant is properly understood as negotiating a middle way between eclecticism and systematic philosophy. This is combined with the author's views on the proper method for our reconstruction of Kant's philosophy of logic, where her idea is that Kant's own (...) critical eclecticism will provide the key to the latter. One issue that is never addressed is why this is not a sort of category error: even if Kant's own views on methodology had featured a... (shrink)

Few philosophers of science have influenced as many readers as Thomas S. Kuhn. Yet no comprehensive study of his ideas has existed--until now. In this volume, Paul Hoyningen-Huene examines Kuhn's work over four decades, from the days before The Structure of Scientific Revolutions to the present, and puts Kuhn's philosophical development in a historical framework. Scholars from disciplines as diverse as political science and art history have offered widely differing interpretations of Kuhn's ideas, appropriating his notions of paradigm shifts (...) and revolutions to fit their own theories, however imperfectly. Hoyningen-Huene does not merely offer another interpretation--he brings Kuhn's work into focus with rigorous philosophical analysis. Through extended discussions with Kuhn and an encyclopedic reading of his work, Hoyningen-Huene looks at the problems and justifications of his claims and determines how his theories might be expanded. Most significantly, he discovers that The Structure of Scientific Revolutions can be understood only with reference to the historiographic foundation of Kuhn's philosophy. Discussing the concepts of paradigms, paradigm shifts, normal science, and scientific revolutions, Hoyningen-Huene traces their evolution to Kuhn's experience as a historian of contemporary science. From here, Hoyningen-Huene examines Kuhn's well-known thesis that scientists on opposite sides of a revolutionary divide "work in different worlds," explaining Kuhn's notion of a world-change during a scientific revolution. He even considers Kuhn's most controversial claims--his attack on the distinction between the contexts of discovery and justification and his notion of incommensurability--addressing both criticisms and defenses of these ideas. Destined to become the authoritative philosophical study of Kuhn's work, Reconstructing Scientific Revolutions both enriches our understanding of Kuhn and provides powerful interpretive tools for bridging Continental and Anglo-American philosophical traditions. (shrink)

本书以马克思历史观的基本观点为研究对象，以当代实践、科学和哲学本身的发展为基础，对“自然历史过程论”、历史决定论和意识反映论等已经成为“常识”的基本观点进行新的阐述；对实践是人的生存本体、社会生活的本 质以及意识形态批判理论等过去被忽视、“遗忘”的基本观点进行深入探讨；对社会的自然与自然的社会、“从后思索”、时间是人的发展的空间等一些马克思有所论述、但末充分展开，同时又具有重大现实意义的观点，进行充 分展开和详尽论证。?

Through the case of the New Right movement in South Korea in the early 2000s, this article explores how history has become a battleground on which the Right tried to regain its political legitimacy in the postauthoritarian context. Analyzing disputes over historiography in recent decades, this article argues that conservative intellectuals—academics, journalists, and writers—play a pivotal role in constructing conservative historical narratives and building an identity for right-wing movements. By contesting what they viewed as “distorted” leftist views and promoting (...) national pride, New Right intellectuals positioned themselves as the guardians of “liberal democracy” in the Republic of Korea. Existing studies of the Far Right pay little attention to intellectual circles and their engagement in civil society. By examining how right-wing intellectuals appropriated the past and shaped triumphalist national imagery, this study aims to better understand the dynamics of ideational contestation and knowledge production in Far Right activism. (shrink)

Shang juan. Li shi juan = The volume of historical institutions -- xia juan. Jing shen juan = The volume of ethical spirit.

Perhaps the most influential historian of science of the last century, Alexandre Koyré, famously argued that the icon of modern science, Galileo Galilei, was a Platonist who had hardly performed experiments. Koyré has been followed by other historians and philosophers of science. In addition, it is not difficult to find examples of Platonists in contemporary science, in particular in the physical sciences. A famous example is the icon of twenty century physics, Albert Einstein. This paper addresses two questions related to (...) the Platonism of modern physical science. The first is: How is Galileo’s Platonism compatible with the fact that he did perform experiments? The solution to this apparent paradox can be found in Plato’s late dialogue Timaeus. In the dialogue the world has been created by a divine craftsman according to an original plan. The task of the scientist is not primarily to describe the material world, but to reconstruct the original plan. This view has later been known as “God’s Eye View”. The second question is: If a God’s Eye View is unattainable, how is it possible to give a “rational reconstruction” of Galileo’s Platonism? The key-word is idealisation. It is further argued that idealisation is intimately related to technology. Technology is required to realize ideal experimental conditions, and the results are in its turn implemented in technology. The implication is that the quest for unity in science, based on physics as the basic science, should be replaced by the recognition of the diversity of the sciences. (shrink)

"A modern classic. Dewey's lectures have lost none of their vigor...The historical approach, which underlay the central argument, is beautifully exemplified in his treatments of the origin of philosophy."-- Philosophy and Phenomenological Research "It was with this book that Dewey fully launched his campaign for experimental philosophy."-- The New Republic Written by an eminent philosopher shortly after the shattering effects of World War I, this volume offers an insightful introduction to the concept of pragmatic humanism. Dewey presents persuasive arguments (...) against traditional philosophical constructs, suggesting their basis in self-justification. He proposes, instead, an examination of core values in terms of their ultimate effects on the self and others. This experimental philosophy was received with both outrage and acclaim for daring to mingle ethics and science. Delivered in 1919 as a series of lectures, Dewey's landmark work appears here in an enlarged edition that features an informative introduction by the author, written more than 25 years after the book's initial publication. (shrink)

What belongs to quantum theory is no more than what is needed for its derivation. Keeping to this maxim, we record a paradigmatic shift in the foundations of quantum mechanics, where the focus has recently moved from interpreting to reconstructing quantum theory. Several historic and contemporary reconstructions are analyzed, including the work of Hardy, Rovelli, and Clifton, Bub and Halvorson. We conclude by discussing the importance of a novel concept of intentionally incomplete reconstruction.