How does thinking affect doing? There is a widely held view that thinking about what you are doing, as you are doing it, hinders performance. Once you have acquired the ability to putt a golf ball, play an arpeggio on the piano, or parallel-park, reflecting on your actions leads to inaccuracies, blunders, and sometimes even utter paralysis--that's what is widely believed. But is it true? After exploring some of the contemporary and historical manifestations of the idea, Barbara Gail Montero (...) develops a theory of expertise which emphasizes the role of the conscious mind in expert action. She aims to dispel various myths about experts who proceed without any understanding of what guides their action, and she analyzes research in both philosophy and psychology that is taken to show that conscious control and explicit monitoring of one's movements impedes well practiced skills. Montero explores a wide range of real-life examples of optimal performance, in sports, the performing arts, healthcare, the military, and other fields, and draws from psychology, neuroscience, and literature to offer a refreshing and persuasive view of expertise, according to which expert action generally is and ought to be thoughtful, effortful, and reflective. (shrink)

This book examines the birth of the scientific understanding of motion. It investigates which logical tools and methodological principles had to be in place to give a consistent account of motion, and which mathematical notions were introduced to gain control over conceptual problems of motion. It shows how the idea of motion raised two fundamental problems in the 5th and 4th century BCE: bringing together being and non-being, and bringing together time and space. The first problem leads to the exclusion (...) of motion from the realm of rational investigation in Parmenides, the second to Zeno's paradoxes of motion. Methodological and logical developments reacting to these puzzles are shown to be present implicitly in the atomists, and explicitly in Plato who also employs mathematical structures to make motion intelligible. With Aristotle we finally see the first outline of the fundamental framework with which we conceptualise motion today. (shrink)

Previous studies show evidence of double standards in terms of individuals being more tolerant of questionable consumer practices than of similar business practices. However, whether these double standards are necessarily due to the fact that one party is a business company while the other is a consumer was not addressed. The results of our two experimental studies, conducted among 277 (Study 1) and 264 (Study 2) participants from a Western European country by means of an anonymous self-administered online survey, demonstrate (...) that the respondents were not only harsher in their judgments of unethical business (vs. consumer) behavior, but also harsher in their judgments of unethical behavior by prosperous (vs. non-prosperous) consumers and prosperous (vs. non-prosperous) business companies (Study 1). Further, they were also less tolerant of unethical behavior by consumers (vs. one's best friend) and business companies with which they have a less than good (vs. a good) relationship (Study 2). These results indicate that double standards are due to differences in perceived wealth between subjects and in the individual's relationship with subjects. These two factors imply that double standards are not strictly reserved to consumer-business relations, but might also be used in business-business and consumer-consumer relations. Further, these results indicate that companies need to be aware of the fact that good financial figures may backfire as they might lead individuals to be more critical of a company's deceptive practices. Moreover, these findings point to the importance of businesses investing resources-and to keep investing resources-in developing a good relationship with stakeholders as these good relationships lead to stakeholders being less prone to make moral condemnations. (shrink)

This chapter focuses on one of the common fallacies in Western philosophy, appeal to ridicule. An appeal to ridicule is closely related to an ad hominem argument because both attack the person. There is a similarity between an appeal to ridicule and an appeal to emotion in that both attempt to bypass rational assessment of a point of view and elicit an emotional reaction from the audience. An appeal to ridicule may be an attempt to elicit humor at another's expense, (...) or it may be an attempt to elicit enmity, playing on the fears and prejudices of the group. The difference between a reductio ad absurdum and an appeal to ridicule is that the former uses good evidence while the latter does not. Perhaps the best way to avoid this fallacy is to cultivate an attitude of respect for other points of view. (shrink)

In seinen Vorlesungen über die Ästhetik hat Hegel einen der wichtigsten und wirkmächtigsten Beiträge zur Ästhetik und Philosophie der Kunst entwickelt. Von der systematischen Klärung der Idee des Schönen über die geschichtliche Unterscheidung der symbolischen, klassischen und romantischen Kunstform bis hin zur Darstellung der einzelnen Künste (Architektur, Skulptur, Malerei, Musik, Poesie) werden alle relevanten Aspekte entfaltet und miteinander vernetzt. Eindrucksvoll ist nicht nur Hegels plastischer Zugriff auf die Fülle konkreten Materials. Bedeutsam ist vor allem sein kulturphilosophischer Ansatz, der die Kunst (...) auf dem Rang des "absoluten Geistes" als zentrales Medium menschlicher Selbstverständigung begreift. Die vieldiskutierte These vom "Ende der Kunst" in der Moderne hängt damit direkt zusammen. Hegel hat seine vier Berliner Ästhetik-Kollegien nicht selbst publiziert. Dieser Kommentarband orientiert sich an der Edition des Hegel-Schülers H.G. Hotho und zieht ergänzend die Nachschriften, insbes. des letzten Kollegs von 1828/29 hinzu. In dieser Form wird Hegels Ästhetik auf dem aktuellen Forschungsstand für ein breites philosophisches und kulturwissenschaftliches Interessenfeld erschlossen. Mit Beiträgen von B. Collenberg-Plotnikov, N. Hebing, G. Hindrichs, S. Houlgate, W. Jaeschke, R. Pippin, B. Sandkaulen, U. Seeberg, M. Seel, A. Speight u. J. Stolzenberg. (shrink)

This book presents the most important problems of reference and considers their solution. It presupposes no technical knowledge, presents analyses from first principles, illustrates every stage with examples, and is written with verve and clarity. This is the ideal introduction to reference for students of linguistics and philosophy of language.

Patient requests for “inappropriate” medical treatment based on religious beliefs should have special standing. Nevertheless, not all such requests should be honored, because some are morally disturbing. The trouble lies in deciding which ones count. This paper proposes criteria that would qualify a religious belief as medically valid to help physicians decide which requests to respect. The four conditions suggested are that the belief is shared by a community, is deeply held, would pass the test of a religious interpreter and (...) does not harm others. (shrink)

To what extent are artists and sitters (or researchers and “objects” of investigation) implicated in their representations of others? How implicated are we when we identify with the way different cultures or perspectives represent ourselves? Understanding how specific forms of representation reveal differently authored perceptions of the individual is a critical concern. My overarching concern, as an artist, is to start mapping contemporary practices of identity formation and expression through the investigation of specific non- Western and subcultural modes that prioritise (...) different codes and social processes of cultural production – modes that do not privilege the gaze. Crucially, the case studies operate a strategic reversal of the classical artistic and scientific approaches: both sides in this dialogue of interpretation and representation involving the artist/researcher and the cultural actor are equally subject and object. The resulting artworks present distinct cultural practices as new possibilities for portrayal, and acts of selection, interpretation and definition as forms of cultural production. (shrink)

Philosophers have long distinguished between appearance and reality, and the opposition between a supposedly deceptive surface and a more profound truth is deeply rooted in Western culture. At a time of obsession with self-representation, when politics is enmeshed with spectacle and social and economic forces are intensely aestheticized, philosophy remains moored in traditional dichotomies: being versus appearing, interiority versus exteriority, authenticity versus alienation. Might there be more to appearance than meets the eye? In this strikingly original book, Barbara Carnevali (...) offers a philosophical examination of the roles that appearances play in social life. While Western metaphysics and morals have predominantly disdained appearances and expelled them from their domain, Carnevali invites us to look at society, ancient to contemporary, as an aesthetic phenomenon. The ways in which we appear in public and the impressions we make in terms of images, sounds, smells, and sensations are discerned by other people's senses and assessed according to their taste; this helps shape our ways of being and the world around us. Carnevali shows that an understanding of appearances is necessary to grasp the dynamics of interaction, recognition, and power in which we live-and to avoid being dominated by them. Anchored in philosophy and traversing sociology, art history, literature, and popular culture, Social Appearances develops new theoretical and conceptual tools for today's most urgent critical tasks. (shrink)

This book is an introduction to the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer, written in a lively, personal style.

This volume explores the cross-linguistic diversity, and possibly inconsistency, of the span of linguistic means that signal reported speech and thought. The integration of broad linguistic (viewpoint in conversation and narrative) and cognitive (theory of mind and understanding the inner life and thought of others) strategies for handling mixed points of view will be considered.

In Introduction to a Phenomenology of Life, renowned French philosopher Renaud Barbaras aims to construct the basis for a phenomenology of life. Called an introduction because it has to deal with philosophical limits and presuppositions, it is much more, as Barbaras investigates life in its phenomenological senses, approached through the duality of its intransitive and transitive senses. Originally published in French (Introduction à une phénoménologie de la vie) Introduction to a Phenomenology of Life first defines the problem of life phenomenologically, (...) then studies the failures of the phenomenological movement to adequately think about life, and finally elaborates a new, original, and productive approach to the problem. He engages "object-oriented" philosophies with this approach and concludes that they are far more phenomenological than previously believed. Combining original interpretations and expert readings of philosophers such as Kant and Husserl and contemporary thinkers such as Bergson, Badiou, and Deleuze, Barbaras offers here a powerful and important contribution to phenomenology and continental thought. (shrink)

Barbara Herman argues for a radical shift in the way we perceive Kant's ethics. She convincingly reinterprets the key texts, at once allowing Kant to mean what he says while showing that what Kant says makes good moral sense. She urges us to abandon the tradition that describes Kantian ethics as a deontology, a moral system of rules of duty. She finds the central idea of Kantian ethics not in duty but in practical rationality as a norm of unconditioned (...) goodness. This book both clarifies Kant's own theory and adds programmatic vitality to modern moral philosophy. (shrink)

After so many decades dominated by molecular biology, it is important to remember that scientists have also devoted much attention to entire living organisms and ecosystems. In this spirit, Sharon...

As a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of decentralized clinical trials, trials conducted in whole or in part at locations other than traditional clinical trial sites, significantly increased. While these trials have the potential advantage of access, participant centricity, convenience, lower costs, and efficiency, they also raise a number of important ethical and practical concerns. Here we focus on a number of those concerns, including participant safety, privacy and confidentiality, remote consent, digital access and proficiency, and trial oversight. (...) Awareness of these ethical complexities will help foster the development of processes and cooperative solutions to promote safe, ethical trials going forward, optimized to decrease burden and increase access for all participants. (shrink)

The ancient history of flamenco is pure hypothesis, partly owing to the “ Dark Ages “ which shrouded the folk expression of a large portion of Andalusia from soon after the victory of the Catholic Kings at Granada in 1492 until the emancipation laws of Charles III in 1783. Although flamenco as such is a product of the nineteenth century, the hypothesis may be taken right back to pre-Iberian days when there was a flourishing civilization in the south of Spain, (...) with its capital, Tartessos, more or less where Seville—or Cadiz—is now, perhaps the first Empire in the West. The Iberians inhabited the north and the east but the towns along the Andalusian coast were founded by Phoenicians from Tyre (Cadiz) and Phocaeans from Asia Minor (Málaga). During the Celtic invasions the south was held by Carthage until Andalusia finally became Roman as a result of the Punic wars. (shrink)

Is the neurophysiology of pain all there is to pain? How do words and mental pictures come to represent things in the world? Do computers think, and if so, are their thought processes significantly similar to our thought processes? Or is there something distinctive about human thought thatprecludes replication in a computer? These are some of the puzzles that motivate the philosophical discipline called "philosophy of mind," a central area of philosophy.This Very Short Introduction introduces the philosophy of mind, and (...) looks at some of the most interesting and important topics in this fascinating field, including the mind-body problem and dualism. Barbara Montero also discusses minds other than our own, and the problems associated with definingconsciousness in animals, aliens and machines. Considering these and other such thorny issues such as physicalism and intentionality, she demonstrates how questions of the philosophy of mind also infiltrate disciplines outside of philosophy, including psychology, neuroscience, economics,evolutionary biology, and linguistics. As she observes, most everyone, at some time or another, has ruminated over the relation between mind and matter.ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, andenthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable. (shrink)

This volume is dedicated to Barbara Skarga -- her works, profile and biography. It is a unique character in the Polish intellectual life, but also virtually unknown abroad, except a meager milieu of her reeadership in France. Dubbed 'the first lady of Polish philosophy' for a good reason, she contributed not only to [the] shape of Polish philosophy but to the style of public debate too. The problem areas initiating her philosophy stemmed from the group of scholars called the (...) Warsaw school of history of ideas' with its flagship names such as Leszek Kolakowski, Brinisław Baczko, or Andrzej Walicki. On the other hand, her output originates from the extraordinary and dramatic events of her life. The philosophical outpout of Barbara Skarga is thus a proof of continuity and longevity of an important tradition of the 20th century Polish Philosophy. (shrink)

Trois dates ponctuent le présent volume, composé d'un ensemble d'inédits, d'un dossier, d'études et de lectures critiques, et donnent ainsi à Bergson sa place dans le XXe siècle philosophique. 1902, il y a cent ans exactement : c'est la date du cours inédit au Collège de France dont on lira ici les premières leçons et qui prépare L'introduction à la métaphysique publiée l'année suivante. Dans ce cours intégralement sténographié pour Péguy, on entend Bergson exposer comment le réel se donne et (...) se retire immédiatement à nous, se donne dans un contact absolu, sympathie ou intuition, se retire pour les besoins de l'action et par la force des signes, et doit être reconquis par la métaphysique, dès lors introduite avec sa différence dans le jeu philosophique du siècle. L dossier présenté ici porte ensuite sur Les Deux Sources de la morale et de la religion, publiées trente ans plus tard, en 1932. Il témoigne d'un impressionnant renouveau d'intérêt pour cet ouvrage trop vite et trop exclusivement situé dans l'itinéraire spirituel de son auteur, les querelles religieuses de son époque, les enjeux immédiats des années 1930. Tous ces enjeux sont aussi présents ici, à travers un inédit de Bergson et des articles de chercheurs français et étrangers, mais à travers aussi des perspectives anthropologiques, sociologiques, philosophiques, entièrement nouvelles. 1960 enfin : telle est la date du cours inédit de Victor Goldschsnidt, plus connu comme lecteur de Platon, des stoïciens ou de Rousseau, que nous présentons ici, qui porte sur le premier chapitre de Matière et mémoire et la notion de "champ transcendantal", et qui introduit aussi au dossier sur le livre que ce cours a inspiré en 1964 au philosophe brésilien Bento Prado Jr, récemment traduit. Cet ensemble conduit à réévaluer entièrement la place de Bergson dans le moment philosophique des années 1960 : elle est centrale, aussi bien en elle-même qu'à travers Merleau-Ponty ou Deleuze. Aujourd'hui enfin, à travers les études générales également rassemblées, et l'ensemble de ce volume qui en appelle d'autres, nous pouvons réaccéder à Bergson à la fois pour lui-même, dans le débat avec les moments principaux du siècle, et pour aller plus loin. (shrink)

The present booklet contains ten short philosophical writings, which are not so much intended for a narrow circle of people, by education of philosophers, but by a wider readership. Specifically, they are for the homeless, the (long-term) unemployed, the elderly, people with mental health problems, people with special needs and so on, as well as for the general public in general. So they are for people who are not close to philosophy, especially for those who need the help of others (...) the most. The red thread of the collection is an attempt to answer the question of why philosophy for them. The records collected here were created in the period 2015-2019 and were also published in newspapers or magazines.--Publisher's website. (shrink)

A one-of-a-kind reference to the international vocabulary of the humanities This is an encyclopedic dictionary of close to 400 important philosophical, literary, and political terms and concepts that defy easy—or any—translation from one language and culture to another. Drawn from more than a dozen languages, terms such as Dasein (German), pravda (Russian), saudade (Portuguese), and stato (Italian) are thoroughly examined in all their cross-linguistic and cross-cultural complexities. Spanning the classical, medieval, early modern, modern, and contemporary periods, these are terms that (...) influence thinking across the humanities. The entries, written by more than 150 distinguished scholars, describe the origins and meanings of each term, the history and context of its usage, its translations into other languages, and its use in notable texts. The dictionary also includes essays on the special characteristics of particular languages—English, French, German, Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish. Originally published in French, this one-of-a-kind reference work is now available in English for the first time, with new contributions from Judith Butler, Daniel Heller-Roazen, Ben Kafka, Kevin McLaughlin, Kenneth Reinhard, Stella Sandford, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Jane Tylus, Anthony Vidler, Susan Wolfson, Robert J. C. Young, and many more.The result is an invaluable reference for students, scholars, and general readers interested in the multilingual lives of some of our most influential words and ideas. Covers close to 400 important philosophical, literary, and political terms that defy easy translation between languages and cultures Includes terms from more than a dozen languages Entries written by more than 150 distinguished thinkers Available in English for the first time, with new contributions by Judith Butler, Daniel Heller-Roazen, Ben Kafka, Kevin McLaughlin, Kenneth Reinhard, Stella Sandford, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Jane Tylus, Anthony Vidler, Susan Wolfson, Robert J. C. Young, and many more Contains extensive cross-references and bibliographies An invaluable resource for students and scholars across the humanities. (shrink)

This book provides a variety of diverse perspectives related to the ethics of anger, some more analytical in nature, others focused on practical issues, some in defense of anger, and others arguing against its necessity. This book is an essential resource for scholars who want to reflect critically on the place of anger in contemporary life.

This chapter contains sections titled: Mark's Story: ‘It was like Line Dancing for the First Time’ Carl's Story: ‘Everyone Avoids the Front and Center in Class’ Jake's Story: ‘The only Judging going on is in my Own Head’ Competing against their own Bodies (but is it More than a Workout?) Competing against other People (perhaps the Real Competition is within Yourself) Competing against their Own Egos (Playing Nice with your Ego).

The exchange between the Borg and Captain Jean‐Luc Picard illustrates what's truly horrifying about the Borg. In philosophical terms, the Borg strips the assimilated of their autonomy. Choice is essential to autonomy, but autonomy means more than the freedom to act on whims. Autonomous can be applied to two different sorts of things: there are autonomous beings and autonomous actions. Beings that can rationally deliberate in the face of amoral choice are called autonomous, and many of their actions display autonomy. (...) Autonomous actions are done intentionally, with understanding, and without controlling influences that determine. As crucial as the idea of autonomy seems to be to the moral life, it is also been criticized for relying on a highly individualistic and overly rationalistic notion of humanity. Autonomy is a good thing that we can encourage in others by helping them develop deliberative skills and by interacting with them during decision making. (shrink)

The knowledge representation and reasoning of both humans and artificial systems often involves conditionals. A conditional connects a consequence which holds given a precondition. It can be easily recognized in natural languages with certain key words, like “if” in English. A vast amount of literature in both fields, both artificial intelligence and psychology, deals with the questions of how such conditionals can be best represented and how these conditionals can model human reasoning. On the other hand, findings in the psychology (...) of reasoning, such as those in the Suppression Task, have led to a paradigm shift from the monotonicity assumptions in human inferences towards nonmonotonic reasoning. Nonmonotonic reasoning is sensitive for information change, that is, inferences are drawn cautiously such that retraction of previous information is not required with the addition of new information. While many formalisms of nonmonotonic reasoning have been proposed in the field of Artificial Intelligence, their capability to model properties of human reasoning has not yet been extensively investigated. In this paper, we analyzed systematically from both a formal and an empirical perspective the power of formal nonmonotonic systems to model possible explicit defeaters, as in the Suppression Task, and more implicit conditional rules that trigger nonmonotonic reasoning by the keywords in such rules. The results indicated that the classical evaluation for the correctness of inferences has to be extended in the three major aspects regarding the inference system, the knowledge base, and possible assumed exceptions for the rule. (shrink)

We study for each computably bounded $\Pi ^0_1$ class P the set of degrees of c.e. paths in P. We show, amongst other results, that for every c.e. degree a there is a perfect $\Pi ^0_1$ class where all c.e. members have degree a. We also show that every $\Pi ^0_1$ set of c.e. indices is realized in some perfect $\Pi ^0_1$ class, and classify the sets of c.e. degrees which can be realized in some $\Pi ^0_1$ class as exactly (...) those with a computable representation. (shrink)