The Other Perennial Philosophy: A Metaphysical Dialectic seeks to synthesize the many fields within science, philosophy, and religion to achieve the most comprehensive picture ever constructed to incorporate universally held beliefs about God, man, and the universe. This book attempts to accomplish several interrelated purposes: to describe the Perennial Philosophy in its depth; to analyze the critical elements contained within such a body of thought; to bring to light the vast literature of views which are oppositional, at least on some (...) level, to those contained in the Perennial Philosophy; to synthesize these seemingly discordant thoughts into a new vision of the nature of reality; to dissect the implications of this new model; and lastly and perhaps most importantly, to demonstrate that intellect has no innate constraints. This book rigorously explores the connections to be made by weaving together the threads of philosophy, religious theology, mysticism, mythology, mathematics, physics, and biochemistry. In this study is both a critique and an homage to Perennial Philosophy. In evoking a new vision of reality, which is at the same time a modernized version of an old image, The Other Perennial Philosophy: A Metaphysical Dialectic seeks to entice readers to rethink their own views on a subject of crucial importance to all. This book will appeal to anyone interested in philosophy and religion. (shrink)

(1992). The rituals of science: Comments on Abir‐Am (with response) Social Epistemology: Vol. 6, The Historical Ethnography of Scientific Rituals, pp. 373-387.

[1] ʻAl ʻinyene ḥinukh ha-banim ṿeha-banot ṿi-yeme ha-baḥarut-- [2] ʻAl ʻinyene derekh ha-Ḥasidut lesayeaʻ le-zulato be-ruḥaniyut ṿe-nilṿeh elaṿ mikhteve ḳodesh be-ʻinyan zeh.

a single life-span. Philosophers, then, do not see more or know more, and they do not see less or know less. They aim to see less detail and more of the abstract. Their details, if you like, are abstractions. Walking on God’s earth as a pedestrian, as a farmer working his fields or as a passer-by, one’s picture of one’s surroundings is every bit as intelligent as that of the pilot riding the sky. The views of the field are radically (...) different, however. One sees only a specific field and in all lively detail: the exact pattern of the land, or even the exact outline of a given leaf, grasshopper, grain of sand even. Acquaintance with minute detail is not without its price: details may stand in the way of conjuring the big picture. It may be difficult to compare whichever field one happens to be in with far off fields, with respect to their size or shape or any other quality. One may wish to inquire if far off fields were already planted, harvested, or even if they exist. A pedestrian may find it hard or even impossible to do so. The pedestrian view contains fine points that the pilot’s map never would, but it does not necessarily contain more information, for it lacks the general context. After all, there are only so many items that one can observe and account for at a single glance, a single map, a single book, a single life-span. (shrink)

Die vorliegende Untersuchung zeigt, warum es vielversprechend ist, das Projekt einer kritischen Gesellschaftstheorie in der Tradition der Frankfurter Schule auf der Grundlage einer Theorie der Anerkennung durchzuführen. Die Kategorie der Anerkennung hat in diesem Zusammenhang besonderen Wert, weil sich mit ihr soziale Verhältnisse sowohl analysieren als auch kritisieren lassen. Als Anerkennungstheorie vermag die Kritische Theorie wesentliche Ziele in den Bereichen der Sozialtheorie und der Sozialkritik zu erreichen. Anhand einer neuen Interpretation einiger klassischer philosophischer und sozialwissenschaftlicher Texte zeigt die vorliegende Untersuchung, (...) warum Hegels Praktische Philosophie das Projekt einer kritischen Gesellschaftstheorie in der Tradition der Frankfurter Schule stärker bereichern kann, als bisher angenommen wurde. Darüber hinaus bietetdas Buch,,Anerkennung" als Prinzip der Kritischen Theorie eine gründliche Rekonstruktion und kritische Erörterung der anerkennungsbezogenen Überlegungen des jungen Marx. In ihr steht die Auseinandersetzung mit klassischen Texten unter systematischen Fragestellungen. (shrink)

A thorough academic discussion of Jordan Peterson’s work has been conspicuously absent—until now. Despite being addressed to an academic audience, Myth, Meaning, and Antifragile Individualism, by Marc Champagne, is written in a well-crafted, straightforward style accessible to the informed layperson. The book’s first part offers an invaluable introduction to Peterson’s work within an academic framework. The second part offers critiques of Peterson’s work, some of which are prudent and others of which are weaker. The book is an essential contribution to (...) anyone who wants to better understand Peterson’s ideas and scrutinize them in a rational context. (shrink)

Quine’s philosophy comprises a bewildering set of views whose integrating principle is his "confirmed extensionalism". The paper offers a historical as well as an intellectual reconstruction of extensionalism. Traditional extensionalism (Boole) freed logic from Aristotelian essentialism that had inhibited the development of logic. Quine’s confirmed extensionalism is the acceptance, as a matter of course, of the validity of Frege’s criticism of [Boole’s] extensionalism. His confirmed extensionalism is a generalized version of the philosophy of science known as conventionalism. As such, it (...) places the advancement of science outside the province of science proper. It is, thus, at odds with Quine’s repeated expressions of alliance with the Popperian (hypothetico-deductive) model of science. (shrink)

Innerhalb der Kritischen Theorie der Frankfurter Schule hatten anerkennungsbezogene Überlegungen lange Zeit eine randständige Existenz. Geprägt wurde die Arbeit der Schule zunächst durch marxistische Theoreme und später durch Theorien der sozialen Evolution, die vor allem auf Fragen der kommunikativen Rationalisierung und der systemischen Steuerung bezogen waren. Umso bemerkenswerter ist es, dass sowohl Max Horkheimer als auch Jürgen Habermas weitreichende anerkennungsbezogene Überlegungen entwickelt haben. Diese Überlegungen werden in den ersten beiden Hauptteilen der vorliegenden Untersuchung erörtert. Im Anschluss daran wird die von (...) Axel Honneth vorgenommene Neuausrichtung der Kritischen Theorie, mit der „Anerkennung“ zu dem zentralen Konzept der Frankfurter Schule wird, rekonstruiert und in ihren Folgen diskutiert. (shrink)

Nach unserer Auffassung ist der Begriff der Arbeit als „das (disseitige) sich zum Dinge/Gegenstande machen" ein leistungsstarkes Konzept, auf dessen Grundlage in der Philosophie des Geistes von 1805/06 eine aus heutiger Sicht aufschlußreiche Analyse und Kritik der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft entwickelt wird. Der Nachweis dieser These ist der Gegenstand der vorliegenden Untersuchung. Zu diesem Zweck wird eine eingehende Analyse der diesbezüglich relevanten Textstellen aus der Philosophie des Geistes vorgenommen.

(1992). The rituals of science: Comments on Abir‐Am (with response) Social Epistemology: Vol. 6, The Historical Ethnography of Scientific Rituals, pp. 373-387.

In dem vorliegenden Beitrag rekonstruiere ich die linkslibertaristische Kritik des Rechts zu vererben, die Hillel Steiner ausgearbeitet hat, und prüfe, ob diese Kritik zufriedenstellend ist. Ich komme zu dem Ergebnis, dass Steiner in dem von ihm angelegten rechtstheoretischen Rahmen die von vielen Philosophen und Rechtswissenschaftlern angenommene rechtliche Gleichartigkeit des Vererbens und des Verschenkens mit überzeugenden Argumenten in Frage stellt, seinerseits aber das Recht zu vererben mit einer Theorie kritisiert, die gerechtigkeitstheoretische und sozialtheoretische Bedenken hervorruft. Wie ich abschließend darlege, geben die (...) erzielten Untersuchungsergebnisse Aufschluss über das ontologische Profil des Rechts zu vererben und die Eigentümlichkeit dieser Art der Eigentumsübertragung; sie eignen sich deshalb als Ausgangspunkt einer philosophischen Theorie des Erbrechts. (shrink)

In his last book, Agassi reiterates Critical Rationalism as a full-fledged philosophy of life. He criticizes Paternalism and Relativism as degenerative, and even pathological, attempts to grant life a meaning, and suggests, in their place, that fallibilism is the minimal condition for a meaningful life.

This volume collects original, cutting-edge essays on the philosophy of recognition by international scholars eminent in the field. By considering the topic of recognition as addressed by both classical and contemporary authors, the volume explores the connections between historical and contemporary recognition research and makes substantive contributions to the further development of contemporary theories of recognition.

Classical thinking on rationality regards it as an all-or-nothing affair. It thus fails to account for the fact that institutions are powerful social factors that frame the contexts within which rational agents supposedly exercise their ability to choose. This poses the classic dilemma: should social explanation refer to individual decisions or to institutions? Wettersten skillfully criticizes some of the most advanced solutions to it, and attempts to formulate a better explanatory unit for the social sciences: the partially rational individual. Since (...) the partially rational individual is also only partially an individual,Wettersten's methodological reconciliation between individualism and holism seems to have some ontological implications too, ones that he seems reluctant to embrace. His book is nevertheless an interesting contribution to the controversy regarding the limits to the explanatory power of social theories. (shrink)

Philosophy of the Social Sciences, Ahead of Print.

In this paper I offer a brief summary of Popper’s views on metaphysics. I then explain Agassi’s criticism of those views, and why I regard them as fruitful improvements.

Logic, Rhetoric and Argumentation Theory are more or less distinct attempts to approach the riddle of persuasion: what makes our reason tick? Moreover, how best can we study our ability to influence the reason of others so as to make them share our opinions? The three classical answers, then, are: (1) Logic, the theory of valid inference, is the best persuasion theory available. (2) Rhetoric, the theory of effective manipulation of others is the best persuasion theory available. Finally, (3) Argumentation (...) theory, the middle theory that recommends a mix of reasoning and manipulation, is the best persuasion theory available. In this article, I briefly explain the controversy between these three competing views and offer some comments upon its possible resolution. Since all forms of communication are performed on the spectrum between manipulation and the non-manipulative offering of contents, this controversy should interest all those who are intrigued by the miraculous possibility of human communication in the first place. (shrink)

This volume breaks new ground in the study of how national culture, disciplinary tradition, epistemological choice, and political expediency affect the construction of collective memory and, then, how historians work with—and sometimes against—those constructions. Essays focus on a variety of commemorative rites, ranging from the quincentennial of Copernicus to the centennials of Pasteur, Darwin, and Planck; from the tercentenary of Harvard to the half centennial of Los Alamos; from the centennial of evolutionary theory to anniversaries of research schools in molecular (...) biology. Contributors include Clark A. Elliott, Owen Gingerich, Dieter Hoffmann, Dominque Pestre, Robert W. Seidel, and V. Betty Smocovitis. (shrink)

In this text, I respond to a paper by Erik Thorstensen entitled “Public Involvement and Narrative Fallacies of Nanotechnologies.” In his paper, Thorstensen critically reviews a previous ELSA project on engagement and nanotechnology known by the acronym DEEPEN. While I agree that the ELSA community could benefit from the critical examination of earlier research, I believe the approach taken by Thorstensen is not a constructive one. My response deals with three main issues: the character of the paper, narrative theory, and (...) interdisciplinarity. (shrink)

Nach unserer Auffassung ist der Begriff der Arbeit als „das sich zum Dinge/Gegenstande machen" ein leistungsstarkes Konzept, auf dessen Grundlage in der Philosophie des Geistes von 1805/06 eine aus heutiger Sicht aufschlußreiche Analyse und Kritik der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft entwickelt wird. Der Nachweis dieser These ist der Gegenstand der vorliegenden Untersuchung. Zu diesem Zweck wird eine eingehende Analyse der diesbezüglich relevanten Textstellen aus der Philosophie des Geistes vorgenommen.

The aim of the present paper is to show that Hegel's concept of personal respect is of great interest to contemporary Critical Theory. The author first analyzes this notion as it appears in the Philosophy of Right and then offers a new interpretation of the conceptual relation between personal respect and the institutions of property and markets. In doing so, he shows why Hegel's concept of personal respect allows us to understand markets as possible institutionalizations of this kind of recognition, (...) and why it is compatible with a critique of neoliberal capitalism. He argues that due to these features Hegel's notion of personal respect is of great interest to theoreticians within the tradition of critical theory. (shrink)

Der vorliegende Artikel erläutert, warum das Verhältnis von Arbeit und Anerkennung erst spät zu einem Thema der Philosophie geworden ist, und legt dar, welche relevanten Eigenschaften dieses Verhältnis aus Sicht des Libertarismus, des politischen Liberalismus, der Kritischen Theorie, Hegels, Marx’, Kojèves sowie einiger feministischer und marxistischer Theorien hat.