Considering Kuhn’s emphasis on the community structure of science, this paper focuses on the scientific community to inquire whether the recent global financial crisis ushered paradigm change in economics. To appraise the nature and the extent of post-crisis change, we examine the methodological constitution of the dominant paradigm identified as New Consensus Macroeconomics, methodological commitments binding paradigm and scientific community, and assess the practice of the community, particularly the treatment of anomalies. Subsequently, an attempt is made to illuminate whether/how sociological (...) and institutional parameters in the community structure of the discipline bear upon prospects of change. Empirically, this research investigates, categorizes and evaluates post-crisis responses and perceptions of the scientific community. The overarching aim is to determine whether economics responded to a major anomaly with critical self-reflection on the adequacy of its methodological toolbox, leading to theory change, and to shed light on institutional aspects influence this process. (shrink)

The article proposes a renewed analysis of the texts in which Aristotle claims that the term ‘good’ is spoken of in many ways and more precisely in as many ways as there are categories. After a revision of the traditional interpretations, a new reading of the texts is advanced in the light of the theory of predication described in Top. 103 b20-38 and Metaph. 1017 a7-30. The conclusion is that in the Aristotelian passages on the multivocity of ‘good’, the word (...) ‘good’ should not be meant as the predicate of categorially distinct realities, and therefore as a qualifying adjective, but itself as the subject of the question what is it? (τί ἐστι;) In this way, it is possible to advance the hypothesis that the homonymous notion of ‘good’ performs a predicative function, useful to the formulation of practical and prescriptive propositions. (shrink)

On doit à l’économiste américain d’origine allemande, Richard A. Musgrave, la formulation des critères d’Équité Horizontale (ÉH) et d’Équité Verticale (ÉV). Étant donnée une base fiscale, l’ÉH veut que les égaux soient traités également, alors que l’ÉV exige que les inégaux soient traités inégalement (par exemple que les plus riches payent proportionnellement plus d’impôts). Musgrave opère en 1959 une redescription créative de considérations d’équité qui ont une longue histoire de Hobbes à Buchanan, en passant notamment par la fameuse maxime de (...) Adam Smith. La reconstruction généalogique montre que l’ÉV et l’ÉH relèvent de la justice distributive au sens aristotélicien du terme. Un critère purement formel, l’équité en matière d’impôt signifie l’égalité proportionnelle dans la répartition des charges communes à tous les individus membres d’une communauté politique. À défaut d’un consensus théorique sur la manière de conceptualiser les contribuables, l’ÉH conserve tout de même une valeur de principe régulateur dans le cadre non idéal de débats de réforme fiscale.Codes JEL : H20, B11, B12, B20, B40, D63. (shrink)

Kant-s use of the word -object- (Objekt or Gegenstand) is a potential source of much confusion and ambiguity. Sometimes he uses it in a broad sense, either nontechnically to refer to an ordinary - thing- encountered in imÂmediate experience, or technically to refer to anything which stands in some potential, actual or necessary relation to the knowing subject. At other times he uses it in a narrower sense to refer to an object in general as it is viewed at one (...) of several stages in the knowing process. Consequently, its meaning is not always evident when Kant uses it without a qualifying adjective [cf. B20: 76 and G12:778]. The first step to coping with this situation is to recÂognize that he explains the role of the object in his theory of knowledge (i.e., in systemt) primarily by implementing six technical -. (shrink)

in a scientific way, and takes the patient and his family into his confidence. Thus he learns something from the sufferer, and at the same time instructs the invalid to the best of his power. He does not give his prescriptions until he has won the patient's support, and when he has done so, he steadilY aims at producing complete restoration to health by persuading the sufferer in to compliance (Laws 4. 720 b-e, [28]). This passage shows the perennial nature (...) of the problems of treating the patient as a person. It shows as well the historical'depth of philosophical interest in medicine. The history of philosophy includes more reflections upon medical ethics than the casual reader might suspect. Many of these reflections are pertinent to contemporary issues such as abortion and population control. Plato, for example, recommends abortion in cases of incest (Republic 5. 461c); and Aristotle argues for letting seriously deformed children die, while forbidding infanticide as a means of popUlation control, suggesting instead the use of early abortions. 'As to the exposure in rearing of children, let there be a law that no deformed child shall live, but that on the ground of an excess in the number of children... let abortion be procured before sense and life have begun; what mayor may not be lawfully done in these cases depends on the question of life and sensation' (Politics VII, 16,335 b20-26, [4]). (shrink)