Nous examinons les conditions de vérité pour des attributions de savoir dans le cas des connaissances mathématiques. La disposition d’une démonstration formalisable semble être un critère naturel :(*) X sait que p est vrai si et seulement si X en principe dispose d’une démonstration formalisable pour p.La formalisabilité pourtant ne joue pas un grand rôle dans la pratique mathématique effective. Nous présentons des résultats d’une recherche empirique qui indiquent que les mathématiciens n’employent pas certaines spécifications de (*) quand ils attribuent (...) du savoir. De plus, nous montrons que le concept de savoir mathématique qui est à la base de l’emploi effectif du mot « savoir » de la pratique mathématique est tout à fait compatible avec certaines intuitions philosophiques mais apparaît comme différent des concepts philosophiques formant la base de (*). (shrink)

Nous examinons les conditions de vérité pour des attributions de savoir dans le cas des connaissances mathématiques. La disposition d’une démonstration formalisable semble être un critère naturel :(*) X sait que p est vrai si et seulement si X en principe dispose d’une démonstration formalisable pour p.La formalisabilité pourtant ne joue pas un grand rôle dans la pratique mathématique effective. Nous présentons des résultats d’une recherche empirique qui indiquent que les mathématiciens n’employent pas certaines spécifications de (*) quand ils attribuent (...) du savoir. De plus, nous montrons que le concept de savoir mathématique qui est à la base de l’emploi effectif du mot « savoir » de la pratique mathématique est tout à fait compatible avec certaines intuitions philosophiques mais apparaît comme différent des concepts philosophiques formant la base de (*). (shrink)

One of the most famous critiques of the Leibnitian calculus is contained in the essay “The Analyst” written by George Berkeley in 1734. His key argument is those on compensating errors. In this article, we reconstruct Berkeley's argument from a systematical point of view showing that the argument is neither circular nor trivial, as some modern historians think. In spite of this well-founded argument, the critique of Berkeley is with respect to the calculus not a fundamental one. Nevertheless, it highlights (...) central aspects of the calculus that are characteristic of modern scientific theories. (shrink)

Skyphoi with painted dedications from the Artemision of Epidamnos-Dyrrhachion Among the most abundant material collected in 1970-1971 on the hill of Dautë at Dürres, ancient Epidamnos-Dyrrhachion, there has recently been recognized two inscribed sherds : rims of large skyphoi, carrying dedications respectively to Artemis and to Hekate, painted in a monumental way in an original technique – red figure emphasized in red outline. These inscriptions confirm the recently proposed identification of the sanctuary on the Dautë hill as the (...) Artemision situated at the gates of the city mentio<< ned by Appian (II. 60), a major fix-point for the topography of Epidamnos-Dyrrhachion. To these sherds are compared some further examples of dedications painted in an ostentatious manner, a very rare practice, but which provides precious indications regarding the commissioning of vases destined to be offered as ex-votos. (shrink)

What does philosophy mean when it uses the terms light and darkness? In this study, the author claims that these are not simply metaphors but genuine philosophical figures of thought for affirmativity and negativity which essentially determine philosophy in its conflict between these two ways of thinking"--From publisher's website.

In an important and widely cited paper, Zerilli, Knott, Maclaurin, and Gavaghan (2019) argue that opaque AI decision makers are at least as transparent as human decision makers and therefore the concern that opaque AI is not sufficiently transparent is mistaken. I argue that the concern about opaque AI should not be understood as the concern that such AI fails to be transparent in a way that humans are transparent. Rather, the concern is that the way in which opaque AI (...) is opaque is very different than the way in which humans are opaque. What matters is the degree to which the opaque processes of a class of decision makers are stable, uniform, and safe. The degree to which such processes have these features in humans is higher than the degree to which such processes have these features in opaque AI. And therefore we should require AI to be more transparent than humans. (shrink)

Considered by many to be Abraham Robinson's magnum opus, this book offers an explanation of the development and applications of non-standard analysis by the mathematician who founded the subject. Non-standard analysis grew out of Robinson's attempt to resolve the contradictions posed by infinitesimals within calculus. He introduced this new subject in a seminar at Princeton in 1960, and it remains as controversial today as it was then. This paperback reprint of the 1974 revised edition is indispensable reading for anyone interested (...) in non-standard analysis. It treats in rich detail many areas of application, including topology, functions of a real variable, functions of a complex variable, and normed linear spaces, together with problems of boundary layer flow of viscous fluids and rederivations of Saint-Venant's hypothesis concerning the distribution of stresses in an elastic body. (shrink)

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Christopher S. Hill argues that perceptual experience constitutively involves representations of worldly items, and that the relevant form of representation can be explained in broadly biological terms. He then maintains that the representational contents of perceptual experiences are perceptual appearances, (...) interpreted as relational, viewpoint-dependent properties of external objects. There is also a complementary explanation of how the objects that possess these properties are represented. Hill maintains that perceptual phenomenology can be explained reductively in terms of the representational contents of experiences, and uses this doctrine to undercut the traditional arguments for dualism. This treatment of perceptual phenomenology is expanded to encompass cognitive phenomenology, the phenomenology of moods and emotions, and the phenomenology of pain. Hill also offers accounts of the various forms of consciousness that perceptual experiences can possess. One aim is to argue that phenomenology is metaphysically independent of these forms of consciousness, and another is to de-mystify the form known as phenomenal consciousness. The book concludes by discussing the relations of various kinds that perceptual experiences bear to higher-level cognitive states, including relations of format, content, and justification or support. (shrink)

If critique does not want to be more than just a ‘passion of the head’ it has to engage in dialogue with the worst-off in society. However, there are several mechanisms that hinder the excluded from giving words to their suffering. Furthermore, there are processes of invisibilization that impede even the perception of the excluded and their critique in the public space. The aim of this article is to conceptually explore the mechanisms of formulating critique by the excluded and of (...) understanding critique in the public space. Therefore, I first provide a brief overview on the meaning of critique before then presenting suffering as a language of critique. In a third step, I explore the multiple mechanisms that hinder suffering from becoming visible and end up discussing some (fragmented) solutions for overcoming these invisibilities. Although the excluded is hindered in formulating public critique in linguistic form, the suffering of the excluded can be understood as the ground for a powerful form of social critique. (shrink)

Most people who are regular consumers of psychoactive drugs are not drug addicts, nor will they ever become addicts. In neurobiological theories, non-addictive drug consumption is acknowledged only as a “necessary” prerequisite for addiction, but not as a stable and widespread behavior in its own right. This target article proposes a new neurobiological framework theory for non-addictive psychoactive drug consumption, introducing the concept of “drug instrumentalization.” Psychoactive drugs are consumed for their effects on mental states. Humans are able to learn (...) that mental states can be changed on purpose by drugs, in order to facilitate other, non-drug-related behaviors. We discuss specific “instrumentalization goals” and outline neurobiological mechanisms of how major classes of psychoactive drugs change mental states and serve non-drug-related behaviors. We argue that drug instrumentalization behavior may provide a functional adaptation to modern environments based on a historical selection for learning mechanisms that allow the dynamic modification of consummatory behavior. It is assumed that in order to effectively instrumentalize psychoactive drugs, the establishment of and retrieval from a drug memory is required. Here, we propose a new classification of different drug memory subtypes and discuss how they interact during drug instrumentalization learning and retrieval. Understanding the everyday utility and the learning mechanisms of non-addictive psychotropic drug use may help to prevent abuse and the transition to drug addiction in the future. (shrink)

Public extension services play a key role in the implementation of strategies for rural development based on the sustainable management of natural resources. However, the sector suffers from restricted financial and human resources. Using experiences from participatory action research, a strategy for rural extension in the Amazon was defined to increase the efficiency and the relevance of external support for local resource users. This strategy considered activities initiated and coordinated by local people. Short-term facilitation visits provided continuous external support for (...) the purpose of establishing locally based planning and learning mechanisms. In collaboration with the municipality of Muaná in the Eastern Amazon, the strategy was tested in two traditional communities – Monte Moriat and Boa Esperança. Both communities recognized as most important the need to reduce their dependence on açaí (Euterpe oleracea Mart.), the principal source of food and income. This forest resource has been overexploited, seriously affecting açaí stands and diminishing the forest benefits fundamental for survival. Two local groups decided to raise chickens as a way to reduce nutritional problems and as an alternative source of income. Supported by monthly, short-term planning and evaluation visits, the groups managed to achieve significant progress in their endeavor. The groups identified (1) the control of decision-making and information, and (2) the absence of external obligations to be the greatest advantages of the development initiative. The study confirmed the potential of participatory strategies for public extension in the Amazon. Special attention was given to realistically define the role of forests for local development. However, drastic measures are necessary to smooth the way for real participation in governmental and non-governmental organizations acting in the Brazilian Amazon. (shrink)

This article discusses the role of communication research in the Cold War, moving from a US-centered to a comparative-transnational point of view. It examines research on prop-aganda and mass communication in the United States and the Soviet Union, focusing not only on the similarities and differences, but also on mutual perceptions and transnational entanglements. In both countries, communication scientists conducted their research with its benefits for propaganda practitioners and waging the Cold War in mind. It has been suggested that after (...) an initial period of close cooperation between politics and communication science, early expectations of the potential of systematic research for controlling the hearts and minds of people through propaganda started to fade. On both sides of the Iron Curtain, communication research eventually became a ‘normal’ scholarly discipline. (shrink)

A monumental work on the flow of time, from the universe's creation to "Now," by the best-selling author of Physics for Future Presidents. "Now" is a simple concept--you're reading this sentence now. Yet a real definition of "now" has eluded even the great Einstein. We know that time stretches and is affected by gravity and velocity. Yet, as eminent physicist Richard A. Muller points out, it is only today that we have all the physics at hand--relativity, entropy, entanglement, antimatter, and (...) the Big Bang--to explain the flow of time. With these building blocks in place, Muller reaches a startling conclusion: our expanding universe is continuously creating not only new space but also new time. The front edge of this new time is what we call "now," and this moment is truly unique--it is the only moment in which we can exercise our free will. Muller's thought-provoking vision is a powerful counter to established theories in science and philosophy, and his arguments will spark major debate about the most fundamental assumptions of our universe. (shrink)

Excluded and/or marginalized social groups frequently face problems involving representation in the public sphere. Moreover, the very notion of exclusion typically refers to communicatively or discursively produced mechanisms of being considered irrelevant in public processes of communication. Exclusion and marginalization, understood as processes of silencing or invisibilizing social groups, are particularly serious in cases involving social suffering, i.e. socially produced suffering and/or suffering that can be eliminated or alleviated socially. Making silence heard, giving voice to the silenced and bringing the (...) invisibilized back into the public domain are therefore fundamental tasks of solidarity in reaching a higher degree of social integration. The main aim of this article is to reveal how it is possible to disclose and understand the social grammar of the normative claims of silenced and invisibilized social groups. Therefore, grounded in Axel Honneth’s Theory of Recognition, I first develop a theoretic model of criticism that elucidates silent and invisible suffering as universal normative language. Next, I develop a typology of silencing and invisibilizing that allows research attention to be directed towards specific fields of normative claims with different validity claims. Finally, I offer some general advice with regard to performing empirical research aimed at normative social criticism that considers the grammar of the silenced and invisible language of suffering. (shrink)

The "natural law" worldview developed over the course of almost two thousand years beginning with Plato and Aristotle and culminating with St. Thomas Aquinas in the thirteenth century. This tradition holds that the world is ordered, intelligible and good, that there are objective moral truths which we can know and that human beings can achieve true happiness only by following our inborn nature, which draws us toward our own perfection. Most accounts of the natural law are based on a God-centered (...) understanding of the world. After the Natural Law traces this tradition from Plato and Aristotle to Thomas Aquinas and then describes how and why modern philosophers such as Descartes, Locke and Hobbes began to chip away at this foundation. The book argues that natural law is a necessary foundation for our most important moral and political values – freedom, human rights, equality, responsibility and human dignity, among others. Without a theory of natural law, these values lose their coherence: we literally cannot make sense of them given the assumptions of modern philosophy. Part I of the book traces the development of natural law theory from Plato and Aristotle through the crowning achievement of Thomas Aquinas. Part II explores how modern philosophers have systematically chipped away at the only coherent foundation for these values. As a result, our most important moral and political ideals today are incoherent. Modern political and moral thinkers have been led either to dilute the meaning of such terms as freedom or the moral good – or abandon these ideas altogether. Thus, modern philosophy and political thought are leading us either toward anarchy or totalitarianism. The conclusion, entitled "Why God Matters", shows how even the philosophical assumptions of the natural law depend on a personal God. (shrink)

Band I der zweibändigen Nietzsche-Interpretationen enthält sowohl bisher unveröffentlichte wie auch ergänzte und stark erweiterte Abhandlungen zu dieser zentralen Thematik in Nietzsches Philosophie. In ihnen werden die wichtigsten Schritte der vom Verfasser vertretenen und viel diskutierten Interpretation des "Willens zur Macht" sichtbar. Die Prozesse "der" Willen zur Macht konstituieren den "absoluten Fluß" des Werdens; im Ja-sagen zu dessen ewiger Wiederkunft vollendet sich auch Nietzsches "Philosophie der Macht". Die Deutung des Werdens als "Wille zur Macht" ist entscheidend von der Nachlaß-Kompilation der (...) Schwester Nietzsches beeinflußt worden. Der letzte Beitrag des Bandes geht der Geschichte dieser Wirkung und den mit ihr verbundenen Mißverständnissen nach. (shrink)

Selbst wenn die traditionellen Beweise der immateriellen Seele (von Platon bis Descartes) zu wünschen übrig lassen, muss uns das nicht davon abhalten, sie mit den Mitteln der modernen analytischen Philosophie neu zu fassen und wasserdicht zu machen. Ich werde (ohne eigene Diskussion der bereits vorliegenden Beweise) eine neue Version vorschlagen, die von Swinburne angeregt wurde, sich an wesentlichen Stellen von seinem Ansatz unterscheidet und auf zwei verblüffend schwachen Prämissen beruht: Einerseits auf der konsistenten Vorstellbarkeit von Gedankenspielen, in die irgend eine (...) beliebige Wahrheit über meine augenblickliche Situation integriert ist und denen zufolge ich meinen Tod seelisch, aber ohne Körper überlebe; diese Prämisse ergibt sich der virtuosen Macht unseres Möglichkeitssinns. Andererseits beruht der Beweis auf einer Voraussetzung, die sich (ohne exegetische Garantie) als Echo aristotelischer Substanz-Konzeptionen verstehen, aber ohne großen ontologischen Überbau begründen lässt – dem zufolge folgt aus der materialistischen Analyse meiner augenblicklichen Situation, dass diese Analyse während meiner gesamten Existenz gilt (einmal Körper, immer Körper). Die Logik des Beweises ist bodenständig und setzt keine strittigen modallogischen Prinzipien voraus. Und die Konklusion des Beweises besagt, dass ich jetzt eine immaterielle Seele habe, aber nichts über deren Unsterblichkeit. (shrink)

Arguments against inflicting violence on people to defend animal rights have relied on the view that inflicting violence is always wrong. But these arguments end up prohibiting too much, as defensive violence should be permissible in certain extreme cases. We argue that considerations about the counterproductiveness of defensive violence are better at distinguishing permissible and impermissible instances of animal rights violence than a blanket rejection of violence. We respond to the objection that assuming violence to be counterproductive is ad hoc, (...) discussing real-world and fictional examples of animal rights violence. We argue that defensive violence on behalf of animals should almost always be assumed to be counterproductive because it threatens to trigger self-reinforcing reactions on the part of the socio-technical regimes that violate animal rights in the first place. (shrink)

In two pre-registered online studies during the COVID-19 pandemic and the early 2020 lockdown (one of which with a UK representative sample) we elicit risk-tolerance for 1,254 UK residents using four of the most widely applied risk-taking tasks in behavioral economics and psychology. Specifically, participants completed the incentive-compatible Balloon Analog Risk Task (BART) and the Binswanger-Eckel-Grossman (BEG) multiple lotteries task, as well as the Domain-Specific Risk-Taking Task (DOSPERT) and the self-reported questions for risk-taking used in the German Socio-economic Panel (SOEP) (...) study. In addition, participants in the UK representative sample answered a range of questions about COVID-19-related risky behaviors selected from the UCL COVID-19 Social Survey and the ICL-YouGov survey on COVID-19 behaviors. Consistently with pre-COVID-19 times, we find that risk tolerance during the UK lockdown (i) was higher in men than in women and (ii) decreased with age. Undocumented in pre-COVID-19 times, we find some evidence for healthier participants displaying significantly higher risk-tolerance for self-reported risk measures. We find no systematic nor robust patterns of association between the COVID-19 risky behaviors and the four risk-taking tasks in our study. Moreover, we find no evidence in support of the so-called “risk compensation” hypothesis. If anything, it appears that participants who took greater risk in real-life COVID-19-relevant risky behaviors (e.g., isolating or taking precautions) also exhibited higher risk-tolerance in our experimental and self-reported risk-taking measures. (shrink)

I defend the view that moral properties are identical to properties that can be expressed without using moral vocabulary.