A study of the philosophical programmes, problems and perspectives of socio-biology, examining the question of evolutionary ethics. Socio-biology works from the premiss that the biological categories of Darwinist evolutionary theory are a necessary prerequisite and perhaps adequate to explain "social" behaviour (primarily in animals, but then with reference to humans).

Gegenstand der Erörterung ist die Offenlegung des faktischen und potentiellen Ethikbezugs von Technik. Grundlegend für jede Ethik ist ein je bestimmtes Verständnis des Menschen und seiner Wirklichkeit. Diese prinzipielle Positionalität ist gegenüber diskurs- und verfahrensethischen Ansätzen ebenso festzuhalten wie gegenüber utilitaristischen Nivellierungen grundlagentheoretischer Fragen. Die vorliegende Untersuchung aus evangelischer Perspektive zeigt anhand der Analyse zweier technikphilosophischer Konzeptionen der Gegenwart (G. Ropohl, W. Ch. Zimmerli) die Relevanz von Technikethik nicht nur für Techniker, sondern bezüglich menschlichen Handelns im allgemeinen.

The sociology of knowledge is faced with a problem of historical temporality that it has carefully avoided up until now. The subject has been avoided or ignored because a discussion of it in depth would run the risk of questioning all modern scientific thought. The problem is that of the concept of absolute time as it is used in evolutionist theory. In this category of theory I include not only social evolutionism, abused for a long time and recently reanimated by (...) the “socio-biologists,” but also biological, paleontological, geological and other types of evolutionism, that is, those qualified as “scientific.”. (shrink)

Research agendas and academic evaluation are inevitably linked. By means of economic incentives, promotion, research funding, and reputation academic evaluation is a powerful influence on the production of knowledge; moreover, it is often conceived as a universal instrument without consideration of the context in which it is applied. Evaluation systems are social constructions in dispute, being the current focus of international debates regarding criteria, indicators, and their associated methods. A universalist type of productivity indicators is gaining centrality in academic evaluation (...) with profound effects on the content of research that is conducted everywhere. Specifically, evaluation systems based on this type of indicators are sending negative signals to scientists willing to conduct research on contextualized agendas, particularly those negotiated with non scientists. On the basis of theoretical and empirical studies documented on the specialized literature and extensive personal engagement with university research policy in Uruguay, we argue that the consolidation of evaluation practices of alleged universal validity deteriorates and discourages a type of research which is undeniably important in developing contexts. (shrink)

Wie kann Versohnung geschaffen werden, wenn sich Menschen, Familien, Gruppen, Parteien, Nationen oder Religionsgemeinschaften getrennt oder verfeindet haben? Wahrend das Gegeneinander, der Streit, die Entzweiung oder der Krieg Folgen von Sprachlosigkeit sind, ist Versohnung nur mit Sprache und durch Sprache moglich. Solange Menschen miteinander sprechen, sind sie auf einem Weg der gegenseitigen Verstandigung. Stephan Gratzel zeigt, wie es mit einem dialogischen Verstandnis von Sprache gelingt, Gemeinsamkeiten zu stiften und Konflikte zu losen. Der dialogische Weg ermoglicht jedoch nicht nur die Versohnung (...) zwischen Menschen, sondern fuhrt auch zur Versohnung des Menschen mit sich selbst. (shrink)

We examine whether and when socially oriented shareholder activists use firms’ corporate social performance (CSP) to identify them as attractive targets for their activism. We build on the research in social movements theory and stakeholder theory to theorize how firms’ engagement with primary and secondary stakeholders reflected in their technical and institutional CSP respectively allows socially oriented shareholder activists to identify targets. We develop a theoretical model by identifying corporate targets’ degree of (1) receptivity to and (2) need to comply (...) with activist demands as two key dimensions of their corporate opportunity structure that explains the variance in firms’ attractiveness as targets for activist demands. We show that a firm’s technical and institutional CSP independently affect the likelihood of activists targeting the firm. We also show that our model has greater explanatory power at firms with high resource slack and from activists not identifying as socially responsible investment funds. Analysis of CSP and shareholder proposals data of 992 U.S. public firms over an 8-year window of observation largely supports our theory. (shrink)

John Bell showed that a big class of local hidden-variable models stands in conflict with quantum mechanics and experiment. Recently, there were suggestions that empirically adequate hidden-variable models might exist which presuppose a weaker notion of local causality. We will show that a Bell-type inequality can be derived also from these weaker assumptions.

Institute of Theoretical Physics, Exact Sciences Sidlerstrasse 5, University of Bern, CH-3012 Bern Switzerland portmann{at}itp.unibe.ch' + u + '@' + d + ''//--> awuethr{at}itp.unibe.ch' + u + '@' + d + ''//--> John Bell showed that a big class of local hidden-variable models stands in conflict with quantum mechanics and experiment. Recently, there were suggestions that empirically adequate hidden-variable models might exist which presuppose a weaker notion of local causality. We will show that a Bell-type inequality can be derived also (...) from these weaker assumptions. Introduction The EPR-Bohm experiment Local causality Bell's inequality from separate common causes 4.1 A weak screening-off principle 4.2 Perfect correlation and ‘determinism’ 4.3 A minimal theory for spins 4.4 No conspiracy Discussion. (shrink)

The information technological progress that has been achieved over the last decades has also given the humanities the opportunity to expand their methodological toolbox. This paper explores how recent advancements in natural language processing may be used for research in the history of ideas so as to overcome traditional scholarship's inevitably selective approach to historical sources. By employing two machine learning techniques whose potential for the analysis of conceptual continuities and innovations has never been considered before, we aim to determine (...) the extent to which they can enhance conventional research methods. It will amount to a critical evaluation of how the advantages of computational in-breadth analysis could be combined with the merits of traditional in-depth analysis in a philosophically fruitful way. After a brief technical description, the approach will be applied to an example: the conceptual (dis)continuity between medieval and early modern philosophy. All the challenges encountered during development and application will be carefully evaluated. We will then be able to assess whether these tools and techniques present promising extensions to the methodological toolbox of traditional scholarship, or whether they do not yet have the potential for a task as complex as the analysis of philosophical literature. The present investigation can thus be seen as an experiment on how far one can go with current machine-learning techniques in this area of research. In doing so, it provides important insights and guidance for future advances in the field. (shrink)

Spanish has a series of evidential discourse markers that combine the lexical semantics of visual perception with reference to inference or hearsay, for example, evidentemente ‘evidently’, por lo visto ‘visibly, seemingly’, al parecer ‘seemingly’ and se ve ‘one sees that, apparently’. The main aim of this article is to examine the grammatical, semantic and interactional properties of these four evidential discourse markers in informal and formal spoken Spanish. From a semantic point of view, we study the evidential values expressed by (...) these markers and discuss the correlations between them. From a functional point of view, we analyse the evidential markers on the basis of discourse-interactional criteria such as illocutionary force, position in the turn and kind of turn. From a grammatical point of view, we address the preferences in terms of person and Tense/aspect/modality experienced by these evidential markers in discourse. The main result of our analysis is that, as far as the semantic and discourse properties are concerned, evidentemente differs from por lo visto, al parecer and se ve que. The former seems to refer primarily to shared thoughts, developing a reading that goes beyond any of the traditionally distinguished evidential values. The three other markers, by contrast, refer to indirect evidence, often combining the evidential values of reported knowledge and inference. In talk-in-interaction, the two types of markers behave differently: evidentemente does not enhance turn-taking, whereas the other markers leave room for the co-participant to give his or her view of the state of affairs. (shrink)

Falsification no longer is the cornerstone of philosophy of science; but it still looms widely that scientists ought to drop an explanatory hypothesis in view of negative results. We shall argue that, to the contrary, negative empirical results are unable to disqualify causally explanatory hypotheses—not because of the shielding effect of auxiliary assumptions but because of the fact that the causal irrelevance of a factor cannot empirically be established. This perspective is elaborated at a case study taken from the history (...) of plant physiology: the formaldehyde model of photosynthesis, which for about sixty years dominated the field—despite the fact that in these sixty years all the attempts to conclusively demonstrate even the presence of formaldehyde in plants failed. (shrink)

In his Geography, Ptolemy recorded the geographical coordinates of more than 6,300 toponyms of the known oikoumenē. This study presents the type of geographical information that was used by Ptolemy as well as the methods he applied to derive his geographical coordinates. A new methodological approach was developed in order to analyse the characteristic deviations of Ptolemy’s data from their reconstructed reference locations. The clusters of displacement vectors establish that Ptolemy did not obtain his coordinates from astronomical observations at each (...) geographical location. The characteristic displacement vectors reveal how Ptolemy derived the coordinates: he constructed locations on maps using a compass and ruler, for which he employed a small amount of astronomical reference data and geographical distance information; he made schematic drawings of coastlines, based on textual descriptions of coastal formations; and he situated additional locations within the established framework using reports of travel itineraries. (shrink)

Die Arbeit verfolgt die Entwicklung einer Theorie der Wirtschaftskrisen bei Marx und in der politischen Ökonomie des 19. Jahrhunderts. Marx hat die großen Krisen seiner Zeit und ihre Verläufe in umfangreichen, erst jüngst veröffentlichten Studienheften erforscht und in ökonomischen Manuskripten theoretisch verarbeitet. Er wollte die Wiederkehr der Krisen erklären und auch verstehen, wie sie die Welt verändern und was sie über diese aussagen.

Proceedings of 2 international conferences held at the University of Mainz and at Fudan University/Shanghai.

LLe terme ' évaluation ' est porteur d'une ambiguïté dès l'origine car son contenu sémantique est double : donner un prix, ou une mesure, mais aussi ' donner une valeur ' entendu d'un point de vue éthique, la valeur dont parle Weber. Or la fascination pour la mesure occulte le fait que le choix des éléments à mesurer est subjectif et qu'en aucun cas la scientificité ne vient directement de l'observation de l'objet. Cette caractéristique subjective est tout simplement ignorée dans (...) le domaine de l'évaluation des effets induits par le développement technologique. Le mode de fonctionnement de ce sophisme scientifique qu'est l'évaluation est très différent suivant la catégorie d'objets mesurés. Je vais donc dégager trois grandes catégories qui nous font passer du plus concret au plus abstrait, du plus simple au plus compliqué dans le sophisem: la description du ' progrès ' technique à parti de l'évolution d'objets simples, couteau et automobile, l'histoire quantitative d'un fait naturel, le réchauffement climatique, la chronique d'un indicateur qui est lui-même un concept, l'empreinte écologique. Chacune de ces catégories pose un problème d'interprétation spécifique. (shrink)

Résumé La fascination pour la mesure, que représente l’évaluation quantitative dans le domaine écologique, occulte le fait que le choix des éléments à mesurer est subjectif et qu’en aucun cas la scientificité ne vient directement de l’observation de l’objet. J’en donnerai la preuve dans trois catégories qui regroupent l’ensemble du sophisme scientifique que constitue l’évaluation : le suivi d’un objet technique simple, avec l’exemple du progrès mesuré dans l’évolution du couteau et d’autres objets, l’histoire quantitative d’un fait naturel, le réchauffement (...) climatique, la chronique d’un indicateur qui est lui-même un concept, l’empreinte écologique. L’évaluation est bien un mode privilégié de connaissance de la technocratie « info-com ». Et la question environnementale a mis ce mode au centre du débat. Fondée sur la recherche obsessionnelle de la mesure, elle fait partie des instruments de connaissance qui nous enferment dans le monde techno-scientifique et participe à la fabrication de la modernité dans toute sa puissance aliénante, celle de l’hypersauvage contemporain. (shrink)

Cet article examine la question de l'innovation comme l'expression de pratiques et de discours se mettant en scène au sein d'un jeu d'acteurs dans le contexte particulier des industries musicales. Nous nous attachons à montrer que les possibilités liées à la numérisation des contenus et des outils permettent la diffusion d'innovations « ascendantes» et de pratiques subvertissant certains fondamentaux. Néanmoins, ces développements liés au numérique participent de processus de légitimation et de valorisation de certains objets musicaux, via des tentatives de (...) réappropriation et de redistribution de la valeur des objets, qui perpétuent des logiques anciennes.This article examines the issue of innovation as an expression of practices and discourses starring in a set of actors in the particular context of the music industry. We strive to show the possibilities related to the digitization of content and tools allow the diffusion of innovations 'upstream' and subverting some basic practices. Nevertheless, these developments related to digital part of the legitimation process and recovery of certain musical objects, through attempts to reappropriate and redistribution of the value of objects that perpetuate old logic. (shrink)