This paper argues that Adolf Gr nbaum's evaluation of the scientific status of psychoanalysis is marred by its failure to locate Freud's notion of natural science. Contrary to his claims, Griinbaum does not assess Freud's theory on Freud's own terms. The presuppositions that Griinbaum brings to the question of the scientific status of psychoanalysis are problematic and his criticisms and methodological restrictions may not be defensible when psychoanalysis is taken to develop methodologically out of medical science rather than out (...) of physics. I question the adequacy of the epistemological and methodological norms that Griinbaum brings to his analysis and I examine his arguments against the scientific credibility of Freud's theoretical claims. I argue that Griinbaum fails to consider the tension between clinical practice and psychoanalytic theory, ignores the evolution of Freud's thought and distorts and simplifies the complexity of the domain under investigation. Therefore his conclusions regarding the scientific credibility and evaluation of psychoanalysis are questionable. (shrink)

Grünbaum characterizes the foundations of psychoanalysis as consisting primarily of two assertions ? (1) only psychoanalysis can give correct insight into the unconscious causes of neurosis, and (2) only such correct insight can cure neurosis. Grünbaum infers from these that therapeutic success is the only evidence of the correctness of psychoanalytic theories. It is obvious that the two passages in Freud on which Grünbaum relies do not justify his interpretation. Furthermore, Freud thought of therapeutic success as by no means the (...) only kind of relevant and available evidence for psychoanalytic theory. In a discussion of Grünbaum's critique of Freud's theory concerning the causation of slips of the tongue, it is argued that Grünbaum is committed to mistaken views on the nature of causation in psychology and wholly neglects the important role of analogical thinking not only in psychology but in science generally. (shrink)

It is argued that Grøn's criticism of our treatment of the rotating disk in special relativity is incorrect: Our results pertain to an acceleration program different from his but physically no less legitimate.

Leibniz’s question “why is there something rather than nothing?”, also known as the Primordial Existential Question, has often been the focus of intense philosophical controversy. While some authors take it to pose a profound metaphysical puzzle, others denounce the alleged lack of meaning or the inconceivability of the idea of nothingness. In a series of articles, Adolf Grünbaum develops an empirically informed critique with the aim to demonstrate that the Primordial Existential Question poses a “non-issue” which does not require (...) explanation. Grünbaum’s critique prompted heated debates in the recent literature. In this paper, I examine each step of Grünbaum’s reasoning and argue that it fails to show that the Primordial Existential Question is ill-founded. Moreover, I identify and rebut several strategies that one may employ to amend Grünbaum’s critique. In doing so, I address various issues related to the Primordial Existential Question, including the alleged need for its proponents to rely on contentious metaphysical presuppositions and the purported availability of empirical evidence which answers or dissolves such a question. (shrink)

Womit beschäftigt sich die medizinische Wissenschaft? Ich verstehe ja natürlich nichts davon, aber sie beschäftigt sich doch mit dem Menschen. Und die Juristerei, die Gesetzgebung und Rechtsprechung? Auch mit dem Menschen.

On October 18-19, 2002, the Center for Philosophical Education at Santa Barbara City College hosted a symposium honoring Professor Adolf Grünbaum’s contributions to contemporary philosophy. This work, an outgrowth of that symposium, contains essays by leading philosophers on Grünbaum's vast influence on philosophy of religion and philosophy of science. The symposium participants have either significantly reworked their original papers or written entirely new ones for this special publication. A reprint of Grünbaum’s "The Poverty of Theistic Cosmology" further enriches the (...) book. A highlight of the present volume is an extended "Autobiographical-Philosophical Narrative" in which Grünbaum traces his intellectual journey, beginning with a poignant account of his early experiences with anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany and his initial queries about religious belief, continuing through the major milestones of his career, and concluding with his current interests. Also of great value is a complete bibliography of Grünbaum's published works. Besides Grünbaum, the contributors include Nancy Murphy, Bas C. van Fraassen, Michael Tooley, Steven Humphrey, Nancy Cartwright, and Edward Erwin. (shrink)

Notes on the life of Adolf Lindenbaum, a complete bibliography of his published works, and selected references to his unpublished results.

This edited volume is the first specialized book in English about the Swiss zoologist and anthropologist Adolf Portmann. It provides a clarification and update of Portmann’s theoretical approach to the phenomenon of life, characterized by terms such as “inwardness” and “self-presentation.” Portmann’s concepts of secondary altriciality and the social uterus have become foundational in philosophical anthropology, providing a benchmark of the difference between humans and animals. In its content, this book brings together two approaches: historical and philosophical analysis of (...) Portmann’s studies in the life sciences and application of Portmann’s thought in the fields of biology, anthropology, and biosemiotics. Significant attention is also paid to the methodological implications of his intended reform of biology. Besides contributions from contemporary biologists, philosophers, and historians of science, this volume also includes a translation of an original essay by Portmann and a previously unpublished manuscript from his most remarkable English-speaking interpreter, philosopher Marjorie Grene. Portmann’s conception of life is unique in its focus on the phenomenal appearance of organisms. Confronted with the enormous amount of scientific knowledge being produced today, it is even clearer than it was during Portmann’s lifetime that although biologists employ physical and chemical methods, biology itself is not physics and chemistry. These exact methods must be applied according to what has meaning for living beings. If biology seeks to understand organisms as autonomous agents, it needs to take display and the interpretation of appearances as basic characteristics of life. The topic of this book is significantly relevant to the disciplines of theoretical biology, philosophy, philosophical anthropology, and biosemiotics. The recent epigenetic turn in biology, acknowledging the interconnections between organismal development, morphology and communication, presents an opportunity to revisit Portmann’s work and to reconsider and update his primary ideas in the contemporary context. (shrink)

Adolf Meyer-Abich spent his career as one of the most vigorous and varied advocates in the biological sciences. Primarily a philosophical proponent of holistic thought in biology, he also sought through collaboration with empirically oriented colleagues in biology, medicine, and even physics to develop arguments against mechanistic and reductionistic positions in the life sciences, and to integrate them into a newly disciplinary theoretical biology. He participated in major publishing efforts including the founding of Acta Biotheoretica. He also sought international (...) contacts and worked for long stretches in Chile, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, and the United States. His career straddled the Nazi period, which led him into a complex dance of support for and resistance to the regime. Despite the relative failure of his conceptual innovations to catch on, his ideas and writings sit squarely within the trajectory of thought and argument that has led to today’s reinvigoration of thought about conceptual integration in evolutionary developmental biology. (shrink)

During the early twentieth century, the Swiss Zoologist Adolf Naef (1883–1949) established himself as a leader in German comparative anatomy and higher level systematics. He is generally labeled an ‘idealistic morphologist’, although he himself called his research program ‘systematic morphology’. The idealistic morphology that flourished in German biology during the first half of the twentieth century was a rather heterogeneous movement, within which Adolf Naef worked out a special theoretical system of his own. Following a biographical sketch, we (...) present an English translation of a previously unpublished typescript from Naef’s estate, which Naef intended as the introduction to a textbook on Comparative Anatomy for which he was unable to find a publisher before his sudden death in 1949. The typescript contains Naef’s mature thoughts with unprecedented conciseness, focus, and clarity. The density of Naef’s text warrants a historical and contextual explication of its content. (shrink)

Adolf Lindenbaum Adolf Lindenbaum was a Polish mathematician and logician who worked in topology, set theory, metalogic, general metamathematics and the foundations of mathematics. He represented an attitude typical of the Polish Mathematical School, consisting of using all admissible methods, independently of whether they were finitary. For example, the axiom of choice was freely applied, … Continue reading Lindenbaum, Adolf →.

Born a slave, but later earning his freedom and founding a school for teaching Stoicism to the sons of Roman noblemen, Epictetus has been a popular source of Stoic philosophy for centuries. Originally published in 1894 by the German scholar Adolf Bonhoeffer and here translated into English for the first time, this work remains the most systematic and detailed study of Epictetus' ethics. The basis, content, and acquisition of virtue are methodically described, while important related points in Stoic ethics (...) are discussed in an extensive appendix. Epictetus is compared throughout with the other late Stoics, Cicero, the early Stoics, and Christian moral thought. This approach shows that Stoic ethics continues to have great practical and pedagogical value. (shrink)

Adolf Hölzel war nicht nur ein Kunstpädagoge von ungeheurer Bedeutung, sondern auch ein Pionier in der theoretischen Bestimmung der ungegenständlichen Kunst: 'Absolute Malerei' ist der Begriff, den Adolf Hölzel prägte. In zahlreichen Aufsätzen und auf 4000 überlieferten Schriftblättern aus dem sogenannten 'kunsttheoretischen Nachlass' entwickelt Adolf Hölzel seine Theorie, die allein an den Mitteln orientiert ist, die ein Bild konstituieren - unabhängig davon, ob etwas Gegenständliches dargestellt wird oder nicht. Denn jedes Bild ist, so Adolf Hölzel, allein (...) ein abstraktes Gebilde von Linien, Formen und Farben. Seine kunsttheoretischen Schriften sind nun kommentiert und in chronologischer Reihenfolge erstmals zugänglich, inklusive seiner zentralen Aufsätze und Schriften, bisher unpublizierter Manuskripte und ausgewählter Briefe des vielleicht wichtigsten Kunstpädagogen des 20. Jahrhunderts. (shrink)

This paper offers a refutation of P. Duhem's thesis that the falsifiability of an isolated empirical hypothesis H as an explanans is unavoidably inconclusive. Its central contentions are the following: 1. No general features of the logic of falsifiability can assure, for every isolated empirical hypothesis H and independently of the domain to which it pertains, that H can always be preserved as an explanans of any empirical findings O whatever by some modification of the auxiliary assumptions A in conjunction (...) with which H functions as an explanans. For Duhem cannot guarantee on any general logical grounds the deducibility of O from an explanans constituted by the conjunction of H and some revised non-trivial version R of A: the existence of the required set R of collateral assumptions must be demonstrated for each particular case. 2. The categorical form of the Duhemian thesis is not only a non-sequitur but actually false. This is shown by adducing the testing of physical geometry as a counterexample to Duhem in the form of a rebuttal to A. Einstein's geometrical articulation of Duhem's thesis. 3. The possibility of a quasi a priori choice of a physical geometry in the sense of Duhem must be clearly distinguished from the feasibility of a conventional adoption of such a geometry in the sense of H. Poincare. And the legitimacy of the latter cannot be invoked to save the Duhemian thesis from refutation by the foregoing considerations. (shrink)

According to some cosmologists, the big bang cosmogony and even the (now largely defunct) steady-state theory pose a scientifically insoluble problem of matter-energy creation. But I argue that the genuine problem of the origin of matter-energy or of the universe has been fallaciously transmuted into the pseudo-problem of creation by an external cause. A fortiori, it emerges that the initial "true" and "false" vacuum states of quantum cosmology do not vindicate biblical divine creation ex nihilo at all.

The ideas of creatio ex nihilo of the universe and creatio continua of new matter out of nothing entered the arena of natural science with the advent of the Big Bang and the steady‐state theories in the mid‐twentieth century. Adolf Grünbaum has tried to interpret the steady‐state theory in such a way, to show that the continuous formation of new matter out of nothing in this theory can be explained purely physically. In this paper, however, it will be shown (...) that Grünbaum's interpretation encounters at least three problems: not distinguishing between material and efficient causes, inconsistency, and misconceiving the law of density conservation. (shrink)

The theory of speech acts put forward by Adolf Reinach in his "The A Priori Foundations of the Civil Law" of 1913 rests on a systematic account of the ontological structures associated with various different sorts of language use. One of the most original features of Reinach's account lies in hIs demonstration of how the ontological structure of, say, an action of promising or of commanding, may be modified in different ways, yielding different sorts of non-standard instances of the (...) corresponding speech act varieties. The present paper is an attempt to apply this idea of standard and modified instances of ontological structures to the realm of judgement and cognition, and thereby to develop a Reinachian theory of how intentionality is mediated through language in acts of thinking and speaking. (shrink)

The theory of speech acts put forward by Adolf Reinach in his "The A Priori Foundations of the Civil Law" of 1913 rests on a systematic account of the ontological structures associated with various different sorts of language use. One of the most original features of Reinach's account lies in hIs demonstration of how the ontological structure of, say, an action of promising or of commanding, may be modified in different ways, yielding different sorts of non-standard instances of the (...) corresponding speech act varieties. The present paper is an attempt to apply this idea of standard and modified instances of ontological structures to the realm of judgement and cognition, and thereby to develop a Reinachian theory of how intentionality is mediated through language in acts of thinking and speaking. (shrink)

Prompted by the "Panel Discussion of Grünbaum's Philosophy of Science" (Philosophy of Science 36, December, 1969) and other recent literature, this essay ranges over major issues in the philosophy of space, time and space-time as well as over problems in the logic of ascertaining the falsity of a scientific hypothesis. The author's philosophy of geometry has recently been challenged along three main distinct lines as follows: (i) The Panel article by G. J. Massey calls for a more precise and more (...) coherent account of the Riemannian conception of an intrinsic as opposed to an extrinsic metric, which the author has invoked as his basis for the distinction between non-conventional and convention-laden ascriptions of metrical equality and inequality; (ii) the latter distinction has been claimed to suffer from the liabilities of the so-called "standard conception" of scientific theories [36]; and (iii) pursuant to H. Putnam's "An Examination of Grünbaum's Philosophy of Geometry" [56], J. Earman [16, 17] and R. Swinburne [65] have contended that the difference between intrinsic and extrinsic metrics is scientifically unilluminating, and that the associated distinction between non-conventional and convention-laden metrical comparisons does not have the kind of relevance to extant scientific theories that the author has claimed for it. The essay consists of two installments. The present installment, comprising the Introduction and Part A, is devoted to the clarification, correction and further development of the author's prior writings on the philosophy of geometry. Its main objective is constructive elaboration rather than offering polemics. But rebuttals to Earman, [16, 17], Swinburne [65] and Demopoulos [13] are included, because their inclusion conduced to clarity in giving the new exposition. Part B is to appear in a subsequent issue and will be devoted to replies to critiques contained in the Panel Discussion and in other recent literature. It will range over issues in the philosophy of geometry and in the logic of ascertaining the falsity of a scientific hypothesis. By way of merely elliptical anticipation of much more precise statements given in Part A, section 3(ii), the Introduction dissociates the notion of convention-ladenness developed in Part A from the quite different notion integral to the so-called "standard conception" of scientific theories. Thereby, the Introduction prepares the ground for seeing, as a corollary to Part A, section 3(ii), that the notion advocated in the present essay has nothing to fear from the following fact, noted by C. G. Hempel ([36]; cf. also his 1970 Carus Lectures): "even though a sentence may originally be introduced as true by stipulation, it soon joins the club of all other member-statements of the theory and becomes subject to revision in response to further empirical findings and theoretical developments." Part A, which begins with a fairly detailed table of contents, endeavors to meet the aforementioned three-fold challenge to the author's philosophy of geometry. Massey's call for the provision of clear and detailed characterizations of intrinsic and extrinsic metrics is answered with the invaluable aid rendered personally by Massey himself. These characterizations are shown to permit a precise explication of the portions of Riemann's Inaugural Dissertation relevant to (1) Riemann's brilliant anticipation of Einstein's dynamical conception of physical geometry, and (2) the author's philosophical characterization of the metrics and geometries of space, time, and space-time {section 2(c)}. A byproduct of the analysis is to raise two major philosophical doubts concerning Clifford's sketch of a so-called "space-theory of matter" as elaborated in J. A. Wheeler's relativistic geometrodynamics. That theory's vision of understanding matter as a manifestation of empty curved space is questioned in regard to (1) the existence of an intra-geometrodynamic basis for individuating the metrically homogeneous world points of its space-time manifold {section 1(a)}, and (2) the compatibility of the theory with the Riemannian metrical philosophy apparently espoused by its proponents {section 2(c)(i)}. (shrink)

Ever since its appearance in 1913, Reinach's work on a The A Priori Foundations of the Civil Law has served as the principal representative of phenomenological, aprioristic and ontological/realist approaches to the philosophy of law. This annotated bibliography provides an overview of the reception of Reinach's thinking, which has been of influence also in the realm of speech act theory.

This paper presents an introduction to Arne Grøn’s existential hermeneutics as a philosophical method, while also attempting to indicate how Grøn’s work contributes to and engages in a number of crucial topics in modern continental philosophy. The first section of the paper shows how Grøn draws on Paul Ricoeur and Michael Theunissen to rethink the concept of existence through a reading of Kierkegaard that uncouples this concept from the self-evident status it attained in twenty-century existentialism. The second section of the (...) paper argues that Grøn proposes an existential ethics that takes the Kierkegaardian notion that humans are inherently normative beings and uses this as a basis for a critique of ethics, as well as for establishing an ethics of vision inspired by Kierkegaard. The third section of the paper presents a reading of Grøn’s notion of religion as an inextricable part of human existence. (shrink)

It is a commonplace in the analytic geometry of physical space-time that an extended straight line segment, having positive length, is treated as “consisting of” unextended points, each of which has zero length. Analogously, time intervals of positive duration are resolved into instants, each of which has zero duration.

Ellis and Bowman's account of nonstandard signal synchronizations is examined as a prolegomenon to this paper. Attention is called to some consequences of an important ambiguity in their account of the transitivity of nonstandard synchrony. Then an analysis is given of the principle of relativity to assess E & B's claim that this principle either restricts nonstandard signal synchronisms or rules them out altogether. It is argued that the latitude for choices of nonstandard synchronisms is not circumscribed by the factual (...) content of the principle of relativity; instead, the exclusion of such synchronisms by this principle depends on a tacit appeal to the particular conventions implicit in certain formulations of the principle. Hence E & B's claim is rejected as an argument against the factual tenability of nonstandard synchronisms. (shrink)

Professor Buck has given an illuminating account of the logical status of reflexive predictions in the social sciences. He tells us that the classification of a prediction as reflexive is predicated on a tacit distinction between the “normal” and the “abnormal” or perturbed conditions under which it is made. This seems to me to be a perceptive and sound circumscription of the class of reflexive predictions as encountered in the social sciences. He goes on to show helpfully how the social (...) scientist can cope with the pitfalls of spurious disconfirmation and spurious confirmation which are created by “self-frustrating” and “self-fulfilling” predictions respectively. And Professor Buck then offers some searching doubts concerning the adequacy of regarding self-fulfilling predictions as the pattern of racial discrimination against minority groups. Finally, he presents objections to my critique of Robert Merton's claim that self-defeating and self-fulfilling predictions are endemic to the domain of human affairs and are “not found among predictions about the world of nature.”. (shrink)

The last decade has witnessed the beginnings of a remarkable convergence of Husserlian phenonenology and analytic philosophy of language, and the present volumes provide original and important texts of the phenomenological philosophy of language. Powerfully influenced by the writings of the early Husserl, Reinach fashioned Husserl’s ideas into a rigorous analytical methodology of his own, which he applied in particular to problems in logic and the theory of knowledge, and to the philosophies of law and psychology. The central role of (...) the concept of state of affairs in Reinach’s philosophy will bring to mind immediately the formal ontology of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus. Reinach’s most significant contribution, however, is contained in his The a priori foundations of civil law (1913), above all in the detailed analysis of the a priori structure of the act of promising. This amounts to an elaborate phenomenological theory of speech acts which anticipates, and in some respects goes beyond, the later theories of Austin and Searle. The present edition is in two volumes. Volume 1, which includes a biographical and thematic introduction by the editors, contains critical editions of those pieces published by Reinach himself. Volume II is a collection of all those items in Reinach’s surviving Nachlass which are in publishable form, including a number of important pieces not hitherto obtainable on such themes as ethical predicates, speech acts (“soziale Akte”), perception and the theory of number, together with a comprehensive sketch of the problems in the theory of knowledge, logic and ethics. Appended to this is a text-critical apparatus which also contains extensive discussions of the origins and sources of the materials in question. (shrink)

Includes both German and English texts of "The Basic Concepts of Ethics", "The Basic Features of Ethics", "Reflection: Its Ethical and Legal Significance", with an introduction by James Smith.

Adolf Reinach was a German phenomenologist and legal theorist. This is a previously-unpublished translation of Reinach’s 1905 dissertation for his PhD earned under Theodor Lipps at the University of Munich, which was published as “Über den Ursachenbegriff im geltenden Strafrecht” , and reprinted in Adolf Reinach, Sämtliche Werke. Textkritische Ausgabe [Collected Works: Critical Edition], Karl Schuhmann & Barry Smith, eds., 2 vols. , pp. 1–43.