Many have claimed that epistemic rationality sometimes requires us to have imprecise credal states (i.e. credal states representable only by sets of credence functions) rather than precise ones (i.e. credal states representable by single credence functions). Some writers have recently argued that this claim conflicts with accuracy-centered epistemology, i.e., the project of justifying epistemic norms by appealing solely to the overall accuracy of the doxastic states they recommend. But these arguments are far from decisive. In this essay, we prove some (...) new results, which show that there is little hope for reconciling the rationality of credal imprecision with accuracy-centered epistemology. (shrink)

This paper addresses the ongoing debate over the relation between belief and credence. A proposal is made to reverse the currently predominant order of analysis, by taking belief as conceptually basic and credence as the phenomenon to be clarified. In brief, the proposal is to explicate an agent’s credence in a proposition P as the agent’s tendency toward believing P. Platitudinous as this reduction may seem, it runs counter to all of the major positions in the debate, including the Threshold (...) View, the Certainty View as conventionally understood, Dualism, Eliminativism, as well as Credence Primitivism. Section 1 gives an overview on the current state of the debate. Section 2 considers unsuccessful predecessors of the proposed belief-first approach to credence. Section 3 motivates and lays out the basics of a conceptual framework for thinking about doxastic states that characterizes such states in terms of two formally independent dimensions, one pertaining to the agent’s tendency toward believing P, the other to the level of resilience with which the agent manifests that tendency. Against this backdrop, it is argued in Sect. 4 that the present reduction satisfies a set of standard, theoretically neutral criteria of adequacy for theories of credence, at least once they are purged of a quite common conflation of tendency and resilience. Section 5 argues against all of the above competing accounts. (shrink)

Student relativism is a widespread phenomenon in philosophy classes. While the exact nature of student relativism is controversially discussed, many authors agree on two points: First, it is widely agreed that SR is a rather problematic phenomenon, because it potentially undermines the very purpose of doing philosophy—if there is no objective truth, arguing seems to be pointless. Second, it is widely agreed that there will be some close connection between SR and a tolerant attitude towards conflicting opinions. In this paper, (...) I will argue that if these two assumptions are true, then discussing some basic philosophical insights about the concept of tolerance with students will be a promising new strategy of dealing with SR. (shrink)

This study illuminates how a cross-sector social partnership legitimizes itself toward multiple internal and external stakeholders. Within a single-case study design, we collected retrospective and real time data on the partnership between Deutsche Post DHL and The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Within this partnership, Deutsche Post DHL provides corporate volunteers that support disaster response after natural disasters on a pro bono basis. The main objects that needed legitimacy as well as the audiences from which legitimacy (...) was mainly sought changed over time. In addition, we identified legitimation work as occurring across objects, audiences, and time. Thus, we introduce legitimation work as the purposeful effort of the legitimacy seeker to avoid certain issues while ensuring other issues that are of importance to the conferrer of legitimacy. These findings contribute to micro-level considerations within institutional theory which view legitimacy as socially constructed between legitimacy seeker and conferrer. Hence, we add another perspective on legitimation to the previously existing conceptualizations of legitimacy as a deterministic consequence of institutionalization. (shrink)

This paper discusses a scenario borrowed from Williamson (2000) and repurposes it to argue for the possibility of conflict between two prima facie categorical norms of epistemic rationality: the norm to respect one’s evidence and the norm to be coherent. It is argued, pace Williamson, that in the conflict defining the scenario, the evidence norm overrides the coherence norm; that a rational agent with our evidence would lack evidence about some of their own credences; and that for agents whose evidence (...) is limited in this way, incoherence fails to entail irrationality. The above possibility claim has also been defended by Worsnip (2018), albeit on a quite different premise set and in conjunction with a coherence-centered account of epistemic rationality that issues predictions incompatible with those licensed by the evidence-centered account recommended here, as illustrated towards the end of the paper. (shrink)

Consider where κ is an uncountable regular cardinal. By a result of Shelah's we have for almost all witnessing this. Here we consider the question if there could be a similar result for. We will discuss some basic facts implying that this cannot hold in general. We will use these facts to construct an interesting example of a pseudo Prikry forcing, answering a question of Sinapova.

In the past several years, observational entropy has been developed as both a quantum generalization of Boltzmann entropy, and as a rather general framework to encompass classical and quantum equilibrium and non-equilibrium coarse-grained entropy. In this paper we review the construction, interpretation, most important properties, and some applications of this framework. The treatment is self-contained and relatively pedagogical, aimed at a broad class of researchers.

Dass das Verständnis von und die kritische Auseinandersetzung mit argumentativen Zusammenhängen für den Philosophie- und Ethikunterricht von besonderer Bedeutung ist, ist unumstritten. Ebenso unumstritten ist es, dass es sich bei der schulischen Vermittlung von Argumentationskompetenzen um keinen Selbstzweck handelt, sondern dass Lernende vor dem Hintergrund der erworbenen Fähigkeiten und Kenntnisse zu einer fundierten Meinungsbildung befähigt werden sollen. In diesem Artikel argumentiere ich vor dem Hintergrund neuerer Ergebnisse der erkenntnistheoretischen Forschung dafür, dass das soeben skizzierte Bild jedoch einer grundlegenden Ergänzung bedarf, (...) da im spezifischen Kontext des Philosophie- und Ethikunterrichts nicht die Bildung, sondern vielmehr die Aufgabe eines eigenen Urteils das epistemisch wünschenswerte Ergebnis darstellt. (shrink)

In dem vorliegenden Beitrag möchte ich an aktuelle argumentationsdidaktische Überlegungen anknüpfen und einen spezifischen Aspekt genauer untersuchen, der von der philosophiedidaktischen Forschung bisher ein Stück weit vernachlässigt worden ist. Dieser Aspekt betrifft die Vermittlung sogenannter argumentativer Metakompetenzen, worunter ich grob gesprochen Fähigkeiten des angemessenen Gebrauchs bzw. der verantwortungsvollen Regulation von argumentativen Kompetenzen verstehe. Die grundlegende Idee ist in diesem Zusammenhang, dass die Ausbildung basaler argumentativer Fähigkeiten zwar grundsätzlich durchaus wichtig und wünschenswert ist, dass aber gleichzeitig ein Einsatz dieser Fähigkeiten in (...) unterschiedlichen Situationen ganz unterschiedliche Funktionen erfüllt. Dementsprechend müssen Lernende nicht nur mit argumentativen Kompetenzen ausgestattet, sondern darüber hinaus auch zu einem reflektierten und situativ angemessenen Gebrauch dieser Kompetenzen befähigt werden. (shrink)

The files that have just recently been made available from Roman archives make it possible to shed new light on and relativize the often asserted,,Pope's silence." It can be seen, that there was no agreement within the Vatican on how to deal with National Socialism. Recent publications have constructed an antagonism between Cardinal Secretary Eugenio Pacelli and Alois Hudal, the politically active principal of the Collegio Santa Maria dell'Anima and supposedly a representative of,appeasement'. However, it can be shown that both (...) men initially agreed in principle with their assessment of National Socialism, even though they pursued different strategies. Hudal insisted on the public denunciation of National Socialism, on a clear positioning of the school, yet without success. Pacelli, a diplomat by training, was the one who thwarted nearly all of the Vatican's public proclamations against National Socialism. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that there are significant instances of educational injustice in the context of philosophy teaching that can be effectively reduced by an increased implementation of digital technologies. More specifically, I show that there are good reasons to believe that testimonial injustices constitute serious instances of educational injustice that will frequently occur in philosophy classes. Using digital tools to anonymize student contributions opens up a promising way of dealing with these injustices. If convincing, my arguments give reason (...) to perceive epistemic injustices in educational settings as a serious threat to educational justice and to reconsider the implications of increased digitalization for issues of educational justice. (shrink)

Toleranz – eine Haltung, die in westlichen Gesellschaften wie kaum eine andere mit Nachdruck gefordert und mit Vehemenz verteidigt wird. Insbesondere eine tolerante Haltung gegenüber fremden Ansichten, Standpunkten und Überzeugungen wird von vielen als unverzichtbare Bedingung für das Gelingen eines demokratischen Miteinanders angesehen. Gleichzeitig wird kontrovers diskutiert, wo eigentlich die Grenzen einer toleranten Pluralität verschiedener Meinungen gezogen werden sollen. Welche Ansichten sind noch tolerabel, und welche nicht? Mit Blick auf aktuelle gesellschaftliche Diskurse und vor dem Hintergrund umfassender Kenntnisse der philosophischen (...) Toleranzforschung überprüft Dominik Balg kontrovers diskutierte Minderheitenpositionen auf ihre Tolerierbarkeit und entwickelt vor diesem Hintergrund einen klaren Kriterienkatalog, mit Hilfe dessen sich die Grenzen einer toleranten Haltung sinnvoll ziehen lassen. Darüber hinaus widmet er sich der Frage, was eigentlich jenseits unserer Toleranzgrenzen liegen sollte und wie man verantwortungsvoll mit Positionen umgehen kann, die nicht mehr tolerabel sind. (shrink)

The practice of early modern natural history depended on the collective collecting activities of a great variety of people. Among them, artisans played a major role in acquiring and distributing knowledge about the natural world and they contributed significantly to the scholarly labour in natural history. This distributed labour was both acknowledged by contemporaries as well as hidden from sight, reflecting the period′s dominant norms for class and gender. By combining an interpretation of the visual representation of labour in European (...) insect studies with an examination of written sources about natural history practices from about 1680 to 1810, this article decodes the often‐codified frontispieces and other more symbolic illustrations to offer new insights into the labour of natural history. Those who identified as scholars and artisans (or both) conceptualised their own intellectual and practical engagement with natural history within the semantic field of work. Some seemed to have even envisioned a new social role for academics as well as artisans. This article analyses the diversity of the “productive forces” in insect studies as they changed over time and it reconstructs what I will call the social imaginaries of participation. (shrink)

In diesem Beitrag möchte ich die These vertreten, dass die Vermittlung moralischen Wissens, also Wissen über den moralischen Status von Handlungen, ein zentrales Ziel moralischer Bildungsprozesse darstellen sollte. Vor dem Hintergrund einer genaueren Erläuterung dieser These werde ich zunächst drei naheliegende Einwände diskutieren und zurückweisen, um so die grundsätzliche Idee einer unterrichtlichen Vermittlung moralischen Wissens auf einer theoretischen Ebene zu plausibilieren. Hieran anschließend werde ich dann einige unterrichtspraktische Implikationen dieser Idee skizzieren.

Die Welt ist alles, was wir in unseren naturwissenschaftlichen Theorien beschreiben können – so eine weit verbreitete Überzeugung, die seit den Tagen des Positivismus unser Weltbild bestimmt. Aber reicht das tatsächlich schon aus? Wer sich am Ideal der wissenschaftlichen Erkenntnis orientiert, neigt dazu, viele nicht-begriffliche Erfahrungsformen zu unterschlagen, die uns aus dem Alltag vertraut sind: Symbolsysteme wie Musik, Literatur oder Bilder, Instanzen der unmittelbaren Erfahrung wie Anschauung, Wahrnehmung oder Gefühl und den Bereich des praktischen Könnens. In der Regel sind wir (...) nicht in der Lage, den Gehalt dieser Phänomene vollständig begrifflich wiederzugeben. Dennoch ist das weite Feld des Nichtbegrifflichen eine unverzichtbare Voraussetzung unserer Sätze und Gedanken: Ohne Kunst, Wahrnehmung und Handeln gibt es kein Denken, keine Wissenschaft, keine Philosophie. Der Band geht der Vielfalt des Nicht-Begrifflichen in ästhetischen, symboltheoretischen und semantischen Untersuchungen nach. Aus ihnen ergibt sich ein umfassender systematischer Überblick über eines der spannendsten und offensten Problemfelder der aktuellen philosophischen Debatte. Mit Beiträgen von: Andreas Bartels, Uwe Baumann, Volker Beeh, Gottfried Boehm, Olaf Breidbach, Joachim Bromand, Gottfried Gabriel, Markus Gabriel, Ernest Wolf Gazo, Annemarie Gethmann-Siefert, Jürgen Goldstein, Jens Halfwassen, Thomas Sören Hoffmann, Wolfgang Harms, Jochen Hörisch, Peter Janich, Guilherme F. R. Kisteumacher, Jakub Kloc-Konkolowicz, Imi Knoebel, Theo Kobusch, Klaus-M. Kodalle, Sibylle Krämer, Guido Kreis, Wolfgang Kubin, Sönke Lorenz, Antonio Cota Marçal, Aliasghar Mosleh, Theodoros Penolidis, Dominik Perler, Hans-Joachim Pieper, Andrzej Przylebski, Birgit Sandkaulen, Matthias Schmoeckel, Oswald Schwemmer, Josef Simon, Pirmin Stekeler-Weithofer, Dieter Teichert, Kai Vogeley, Gottfried Willems und Gereon Wolters. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Das Mittelalter Jahrgang: 22 Heft: 2 Seiten: 456-461.

While the impact of norms on post-conflict statebuilding operations has been well-explored in the literature, the ways in which the same normative frameworks affect the exit practices of such operations has so far remained unaddressed. To fill this gap, this paper examines the impact of the liberal-democratic norms governing statebuilding operations on the timing and process of exit of post-conflict international transitional administrations. To that end, it first examines the concept of exit, arguing that exit is best considered as a (...) process rather than an event. The second section outlines the normative framework that has shaped postconflict statebuilding activities since the end of the cold war, and proposes three ways in which norms can affect exit: first, that norms act as blueprints for statebuilding and can thereby shape benchmarks for exit; second, that norms create “zones of permissibility” that explicitly commit statebuilders to a transitional presence and make exit central to the legitimacy of statebuilding operations; and third, that local actors strategically use norms, in particular those of self-determination and the taboo of permanent control of a territory, to push for an early exit of statebuilding operations. The third section explores both the scope and limitations of the three functions of norms with regard to exit in the context of a brief case study of UNMIK's exit from Kosovo. The article concludes with some observations about the impact of the findings for exit strategies of international actors from statebuilding operations. (shrink)

The present article develops a new approach to intellectual history and sociology of knowledge. Its point of departure is to investigate the conditions under which social thinkers assume the iconic reputation. What does it take to become ‘a founding father’ of a humanistic discipline? How do social thinkers achieve the status of a trans-disciplinary star? Why some intellectuals attract tremendous attention and ‘go down in history’ despite personal and professional failures, while others enjoy only limited recognition or simply sink into (...) oblivion, even if they have met all the standards of their day? Quite a few sociologists have tackled this elusive issue. Pierre Bourdieu, Michele Lamont and Randall Collins are among those who fleshed out strong explanatory frameworks. This project adds to this body of knowledge by emphasizing cultural factors that these authors downplayed in their seminal accounts, despite being aware of their significance. By showing why these underdeveloped aspects of their works need to be incorporated into the debate and how this can be achieved, this article introduces a new theorization of the iconic, lasting intellectual reputation substantiated by evidence from the lifeworks of Bronisław Malinowski and Michel Foucault. As such, it aims, minimally, to make sociology of knowledge decisively ‘cultural’. Maximally, it seeks to demonstrate that the iconic success of intellectual intervention in social theory depends on carefully performed and contingently mediated engagement with the binary systems of symbolic classification. (shrink)

The influence of Latin texts on Greek literature of the Imperial period remains somewhat understudied. However, there are some Greek texts that seem to depend from a Latin pretext, from works of Vergil in particular. This article discusses an epigram by Apollonides (Anth. Gr. 6.239), in which an old beekeeper named Kleiton is presented in much the same way as the old Corycian in Vergil’s “Georgics” (4.116-148). Vergil’s famous digression might therefore be a pretext for Apollonides’ poem. Moreover, Apollonides apparently (...) alludes to an epigram by Leonidas of Tarentum (Anth. Gr. 6.226) which features another old farmer named Kleiton. Apollonides’ poem could thus serve as an ‘appendix’ to Leonidas’ epigram based on the model of Vergil’s senex Corycius. (shrink)

How should political leaders address the emerging climate crisis if citizens are reluctant to accept costly but necessary climate action? In this article, I address this question by harnessing insights from the realist tradition in political theory. I propose that the realist legitimacy framework provides action guidance by offering two broadly applicable heuristics for political agents: responsibility and responsiveness. These heuristics collide if citizens are unwilling to accept policies designed to secure a nation's long-term stability. Faced with this problem, some (...) authors make the supposedly realist argument that policymakers in liberal democracies should prioritise responsibility over responsiveness and embrace eco-authoritarianism to address the climate emergency. Against this line of argument, I maintain that the realist legitimacy framework entails no such commitment. Instead, realists must emphasise that responsible climate action entails a sufficient degree of responsiveness. I conclude by sketching how this insight may guide democratic leaders and climate activists in the future. (shrink)

Although bees are a frequent motif in ancient literature, the people who work with bees are often left in the background. An exception is the motif of the older man on his – usually small – farm who lives from and with his bees. The article shows that this motif is a topos that appears in various texts of Greek and Latin literature of the imperial period. Depending on the intention behind these representations, different elements of the motif may be (...) emphasised or omitted. These variations, and how the motif develops, are here shown through the example of different passages. (shrink)

Überblicken wir noch einmal das ganze riesige Gebiet des Geistesgeschehens vor und nach der Jahrhundertwende, soweit es darwinistische Züge erkennen läßt, so können wir eines feststellen : Ausgenommen die Konservativen und die Kirchen, die beide angesichts des stürmischen Vorwärtsdrängens darwinistischer Gedankengänge in die Defensive gehen müssen, bedienen sich so gut wie alle geistigen Strömungen des Darwinismus: Die Sozialisten, weil Darwins "Naturtheorie" mit ihrer Gesetzlichkeit des biologischen Fortschritts Gewähr zu bieten scheint, daß auch im Gesellschaftlichen eherne Gesetze des Fortschritts walten, und (...) weil sie aus dem Darwinismus den Beweis für die Gleichheit aller Menschen herauslesen. Die Sozialdarwinisten, weil ihnen Darwins Lehre vom Kampf ums Dasein und von der Auslese der Lebensfähigsten angeblich den Beweis liefert für die Ungleichheit der Menschen und für die Notwendigkeit einer Menschenzucht. Nicht zufällig sprießen um 1890 so viele Zuchtvereine aus dem Boden, weil man in Charles Darwin den großen Pflanzen-, Tier- und Menschenzüchter sah. Die Atheisten, weil mit der Affenabstammung jegliches göttliche Wirken beim Werden des Menschengeschlechts widerlegt sei. Die pantheistischen Schwärmer von Friedrichshagen, weil sie ein Entwicklungsgesetz am Werk zu sehen glauben, das ganz folgerichtig zu immer Besserem, Edlerem, Vollkommnerem, Vergeistigterem führen müsse. Die Verteidiger einer "Leistungsaristokratie". (shrink)

We develop a theoretical model of network formation where actors are limitedly farsighted. In this way we extend current models with a new set of micro-foundations. Computer simulations are used to predict the stable network structures that are likely to emerge under the new assumptions. The co-author model by Jackson/wolinsky (1996) is used as an example. The co-author model formulates a tension between stability and efficiency when actors are myopic. Limitedly farsighted actors can overcome this tension but only if the (...) network is small enough. Thus, changing the micro-foundations of the network formation model leads to new implications at the macro-level in the sense that different networks are predicted to be stable than for existing micro-foundations. (shrink)

In this article, it will be argued that tolerance is not necessarily a political or ethical, but rather an abstract attitude that can be applied to many different dimensions of normative evaluation. More specifically, it will be argued that there are genuinely intellectual forms of tolerance that are epistemically motivated and that need to be assessed on purely epistemic grounds. To establish this claim, an abstract characterization of tolerance will be applied to the epistemic phenomenon of disagreement in order to (...) develop a specific conception of tolerance that picks out a genuinely intellectual attitude towards recognized disagreement. Since the attitude that is picked out by this conception is very popular and widespread, an epistemology of tolerance would be of great significance to our intellectual practice. (shrink)

In this article, it will be argued that tolerance is not necessarily a political or ethical, but rather an abstract attitude that can be applied to many different dimensions of normative evaluation. More specifically, it will be argued that there are genuinely intellectual forms of tolerance that are epistemically motivated and that need to be assessed on purely epistemic grounds. To establish this claim, an abstract characterization of tolerance will be applied to the epistemic phenomenon of disagreement in order to (...) develop a specific conception of tolerance that picks out a genuinely intellectual attitude towards recognized disagreement. Since the attitude that is picked out by this conception is very popular and widespread, an epistemology of tolerance would be of great significance to our intellectual practice. (shrink)

In this paper, I discuss the effects of using thought experiments for the purpose of conceptual clarification on students’ hermeneutical abilities. On the one hand, by providing opportunities to explore the scope of normatively loaded concepts, thought experiments can effectively help students to interpret their social and moral reality more adequately, which in some cases might even help to reduce existing hermeneutical injustices. On the other hand, given their notorious susceptibility to distorting factors that are philosophically irrelevant, they can also (...) push students into accepting idiosyncratic intuitions that they don’t really share and thereby further impair their hermeneutical abilities. After setting out this dilemma in more detail, I will propose various strategies for facilitating the safe use of thought experiments that instructors can use to effectively exploit the empowering potential of thought experiments. (shrink)