Gegenstand dieser Studien ist eine moglichst umfassende Darstellung und Deutung des Naturrechtsgedankens bei Leibniz. Es wird versucht, unter Verzicht auf ein bestimmtes philosophisches Vorverstandnis Leibniz' Naturrechtsgedanken aus dem vorhandenen Quellenmaterial vom Text her zu erschliessen, zu ordnen und im historischen Zusammenhang zu verstehen.

Der Aufsatz reagiert auf Peter Bieris Kritik der analytischen Philosophie und plädiert dafür, die systematischen sprachphilosophischen Einsichten des späten Wittgenstein als dauerhaft und weiterführend anzusehen, was insbesondere für unser Verständnis des Mentalen weitere Fortschritte verspricht. Er wendet sich gegen rein ,therapeutische Lesarten' von Wittgenstein und gegen die Streichung des erkenntnistheoretischen Impulses aus der Sprachphilosophie.

Hans Peter Riegel zählt zu den wenigen Künstlern, die gleichzeitig als Autor tätig sind. Aus dieser Position schreibt er kenntnisreich und kritisch über den Kunstmarkt sowie Künstlerinnen und Künstler. Während der Recherchen zu seinen erfolgreichen Biographien über Joseph Beuys und Jörg Immendorff hat er viele Gespräche geführt, die bislang nur in Auszügen veröffentlicht wurden. Immer wieder hat er auch für namhafte Medien geschrieben, Künstler und Kreative interviewt. Jetzt hat Hans Peter Riegel eine Auswahl dieser Texte in (...) diesem Buch zusammengefasst. Unter anderem mit Beiträgen zu Marina Abramovic, Helge Achenbach, Joseph Beuys, Tina Brown, Jörg Immendorff und Eva Presenhuber sowie Interviews mit Jörg Immendorff, Diane Keaton, Marc Spiegler und Klaus Staeck. (shrink)

Giuseppe Franco hat mich mit süditalienischer Liebenswürdigkeit dazu eingeladen, einen kleinen Beitrag zum vorliegenden Hommage-Band zu schreiben, in dem ich von meiner „intellektuellen Beziehung“ zu Dir und „von der Bedeutung des Kritischen Rationalismus“ für meinen „eigenen Denkweg“ berichte. Kennengelernt haben wir einander vor inzwischen 53 Jahren kurz nach Deinem Dienstantritt an der Mannheimer Wirtschaftshochschule. Ich studierte damals in Wien, vor allem bei Bela Juhos, der in einer Art Dachkammer der Alten Universität seine Seminare, z. B. eines über „Wissenschaftstheorie und Quantenmechanik“ (...) mit maximal zehn älteren Studenten und bereits habilitierten Wissenschaftsphilosophen abhielt, sowie beim Altmeister Victor Kraft, dessen Privatissime-Veranstaltungen in seiner Wohnung in der Walfischgasse von noch weniger, handverlesenen Geistesschaffenden besucht wurden. (shrink)

SummaryThough Peter Gordon mentioned philosophical anthropology in his book Continental Divide, he has not yet realized how it works independently from Cassirer's and Heidegger's prejudices. The whole argument between them before, in and after Davos raged around the status of philosophical anthropology: How do the spiritualisation of life and the enlivening of the spirit come about? This was not just the central question for philosophical anthropology founded by Max Scheler, but also in Wilhelm Dilthey's life philosophy, which was systematized (...) by Georg Misch. Cassirer and Heidegger shared three shortcomings with respect to the Life-philosophical Anthropology. Neither had a philosophy of nature or a philosophy of sociaty or a philosophy of history. The insight into the unfathomability of humans is given a political edge in Helmuth Plessner's book Power and Human Nature. Elevating it to the principle of democratic equality with respect to the worth of all cultures one opens up the potential for a form of civil competition that might supersede ethnocentric wars. (shrink)

In the following the details of a state-of-affairs semantics for positive free logic are worked out, based on the models of common inner domain - outer domain semantics. Lambert's PFL system is proven to be weakly adequate (i.e., sound and complete) with respect to that semantics by demonstrating that the concept of logical truth definable therein coincides with that one of common truth-value semantics for PFL. Furthermore, this state-of-affairs semantics resists the challenges stemming from the slingshot argument since logically equivalent (...) statements do not always have the same extension according to it. Finally, it is argued that in such a semantics all statements of a certain language for PFL are state-of-affairs-related extensional as well as salva extensione extensional, even though their salva veritate extensionality fails. (shrink)

If one takes seriously the idea that a scientific language must be extensional, and accepts Quine’s notion of truth-value-related extensionality, and also recognizes that a scientific language must allow for singular terms that do not refer to existing objects, then there is a problem, since this combination of assumptions must be inconsistent. I will argue for a particular solution to the problem, namely, changing what is meant by the word ‘extensionality’, so that it would not be the truth-value that had (...) to be preserved under the substitution of co-extensional expressions, but the state of affairs that the sentence described. The question is whether or not elementary sentences containing empty singular terms, such as ‘Vulcan rotates’, are extensional in the substitutivity sense. Five conditions are specified under which extensionality in the substitutivity sense of such sentences can be secured. It is demonstrated that such sentences are state-of-affairs-as-extension-related extensional. This implies that such sentences are also truth-value-related extensional in Quine’s sense, but not truth-value-as-extension-related extensional. (shrink)

The search for the extensions of sentences can be guided by Frege’s “principle of compositionality of extension”, according to which the extension of a composed expression depends only on its logical form and the extensions of its parts capable of having extensions. By means of this principle, a strict criterion for the admissibility of objects as extensions of sentences can be derived: every object is admissible as the extension of a sentence that is preserved under the substitution of co-extensional expressions. (...) The question is: what are the extensions of elementary sentences containing empty singular terms, like ‘Vulcan rotates’. It can be demonstrated that in such sentences, states of affairs as structured objects (but not truth-values) are preserved under the substitution of co-extensional expressions. Hence, such states of affairs are admissible (while truth-values are not) as extensions of elementary sentences containing empty singular terms. (shrink)

Der Band führt die Beiträge einer Reihe namhafter soziologischer Theoretiker zusammen, die sich mit dem Werk über die "Grundlagen der Sozialtheorie" von James S. Coleman auseinandersetzten. Die Edition dokumentiert die Vielzahl der Themen, denen Colemans Theorieentwurf neue und wichtige Anregungen verdankt. Besonders nachdrücklich diskutieren die Kommentatoren Colemans Bedeutung für die Weiterentwicklung der Theorien sozialer Normen, der Mikro-Makro-Problematik, der Theorie des Vertrauens, der Herrschaft und der Erziehung. Alle Beiträge nehmen Stellung zur Theorie rationalen Wahlhandelns, die James Coleman zur Fundierung seiner Handlungssystemanalysen (...) benutzt und die in jüngster Zeit zunehmend Raum und Beachtung gewinnt. (shrink)

IntroductionAlthough a few studies suggest that young overweight to obese children and adolescents may have impaired postural control compared to young normal-weight peers, little information exists about how these two groups differ in the quality of the underlying balance strategies employed. Hence, the aim of the present study was a first comprehensive examination of the structural complexity of postural sways in these two cohorts during quiet bilateral standing.MethodsNineteen YO secondary school students were carefully matched to YN controls for age, sex, (...) height, and school. Mediolateral and anteriorposterior acceleration signals were recorded with an inertial measurement unit positioned at the trunk while standing barefoot in two conditions: firm and foam support surface. The magnitude of postural fluctuations was obtained using the root mean square. The temporal structure of the signals was analyzed via sample entropy, largest Lyapunov exponent, and detrended fluctuation analysis algorithm. Reliability was assessed using a test–retest design.ResultsIn both groups, foam standing caused higher postural fluctuations and reduced structural complexity. In comparison to YN, YO exhibited a higher RMSAP. Especially in ML direction, the acceleration signals of the YO had higher repeatability, greater long-range correlations, and lower local stability. However, these observations were largely independent of the task difficulty. Except for α-DFAAP, the IMU approach proved reliable to characterize posture control.DiscussionOur outcomes confirm postural control deficits in YO compared to their YN peers and indicate impaired regulatory mechanisms reflected as rigidity. Such less complex patterns usually reflect diverse pathologies, are detrimental to compensate for internal or external perturbations, and are attributed to lower adaptability and task performance. Without targeted balance stimuli, YO likely end in a lifelong vicious circle of mutually dependent poor balance regulation and low physical activity. (shrink)

Gödel’s slingshot-argument proceeds from a referential theory of definite descriptions and from the principle of compositionality for reference. It outlines a metasemantic proof of Frege’s thesis that all true sentences refer to the same object—as well as all false ones. Whereas Frege drew from this the conclusion that sentences refer to truth-values, Gödel rejected a referential theory of definite descriptions. By formalising Gödel’s argument, it is possible to reconstruct all premises that are needed for the derivation of Frege’s thesis. For (...) this purpose, a reference-theoretical semantics for a language of first-order predicate logic with identity and referentially treated definite descriptions will be defined. Some of the premises of Gödel’s argument will be proven by such a reference-theoretical semantics, whereas others can only be postulated. For example, the principle that logically equivalent sentences refer to the same object cannot be proven but must be assumed in order to derive Frege’s thesis. However, different true (or false) sentences can refer to different states of affairs if the latter principle is rejected and the other two premises are maintained. This is shown using an identity criterion for states of affairs according to which two states of affairs are identical if and only if they involve the same objects and have the same necessary and sufficient condition for obtaining. (shrink)

This paper is an attempt to re-consider the aesthetics of tragedy in the work of the seventeenth-century dramatist Jean Racine. The purpose of the essay is twofold. On the one hand, the intention is to re-invigorate the reading of a dramatist whose work is too easily buried beneath labels such as “French Classicism.” On the other, an attempt is made to use this re-reading to cast new light on some of the central questions of representation, pleasure and tragedy that were (...) to become fundamental to later developments in aesthetic theory in the century that followed. We could cast Racine’s rejection of his mentor Pierre Nicole in familiar terms, describing it as the rejection of a repressive theological moralizing in favor of a hard-won “expressive freedom.” However, a closer examination of both Nicole’s aesthetics and Racine’s dramatic art reveals a different picture. As this paper will show, Nicole’s critique of seventeenth-century aesthetic practice is complex, nuanced, and trenchant. It is a critique that succeeds in posing significant questions about representation, self and other, and about the mechanics of “tragic pleasure.” In turn, Racine’s more private reflections (in his notes on Aristotle) as well as the development of his dramatic practice, indicate not a rejection, but a serious attempt to appropriate this critique, and transform his own dramatic practice in response to it. (shrink)

Why has the global West (North America, Europe) handled the covid-19 pandemic and the corresponding economic crisis so much worse than the global East (East Asia)? The crises demonstrate the degree to which the West is shaped by its forms of competition and the East by its forms of cooperation. In the West, we have become habitualised to American neoliberalism over the last two generations. In the East, varieties of neo-Confucianism and neo-Buddhism have been transformed into national cultures. The way (...) humans understand their position in the world intellectually and react to crises according to corresponding habit makes an effective difference. The present comparison between global East and West makes use of Hannah Arendt’s conception ofpoliticsand theshared worldas well as of Helmuth Plessner’s conception ofmediated immediacyin forms ofmodern biopower. The pandemic is a catalyst within the decline of the West and the rise of the East. (shrink)

Johann Heinrich Lambert (1728–1777) galt schon den Zeitgenossen als Universalgenie von europäischem Rang. Tatsächlich forschte und publizierte Lambert als Mathematiker und Philosoph, und zwar vor allem zur Logik und Metaphysik, zur Erkenntnis- und Sprachtheorie, als Astronom und Physiker. Seinem Aufklärungsverständnis gemäß wirkte er nicht nur mit einer Vielzahl von Publikationen in die Wissenschaften, sondern als Popularphilosoph darüber hinaus auch in die sich ent- wickelnde Gesellschaft und den Staat der Aufklärung hinein. Dass Lambert vor dem Hintergrund dieses Selbstverständnisses als Aufklärer auch (...) Gedichte verfasste, überrascht dabei nicht. Der Band versammelt erstmals Studien zu allen Werkteilen des Berliner Gelehrten. (shrink)

Talking of „democracy as a way of life“ is not as clear-cut as it immediately appears. Democracy is a form of a state. To what extent can it then also be called a form of life? The expression seems to apply to the whole life of people and thus not only to a form of state. In the sense of Wittgenstein‘s talk of the form of life or forms of life (vgl. Grosshans 2013, 183-9), democracy as a form of life (...) would then be understood as a specific cultural context of life with which a whole series of general attitudes to life are connected. The hallmark of modern - in the sense of today‘s - democracies, however, is the plurality of social systems (in the sense of Luhmann’s sociology) in the states in which we live. Political philosophy has also devoted itself extensively in recent decades to the question of how the ideological, cultural and religious plurality of citizens in democracies should be present in the public space in which the general will of the people is discursively determined. Against this background, the paper will present some aspects of the relationship of Christianity to democracy. First, some problems that arise with a formal understanding of democracy will be presented. Then, fundamental problems that traditional constellations of Christianity entail for democracy will be discussed. This is followed by reflections on a constructive relationship of Christianity to political law on the background of Protestant theology, which are then turned against currently present forms of religious politics. Finally, the relevance of human rights for democracy and the rule of law is discussed, again from the perspective of Protestant theology. (shrink)