Written in the 1960s, TRUTH AND METHOD is Gadamer's magnum opus.

Émile Durkheim remains one of the most controversial, and deeply misunderstood, classics of social theory. His work differs from the dominant version of sociology that has essentially accepted the modernist self-description of contemporary societies; and it contradicts the individualism that has come to dominate the social sciences. For everybody who is interested in constructing theoretical alternatives to this individualism, Durkheim's sociology can be a useful inspiration - not only because of the solutions it suggests, but already because of the questions (...) it asks. Making use of the theoretical possibilities offered by the Durkheimian tradition, however, requires going beyond the familiar appropriations. The Oxford Handbook of Émile Durkheim takes stock of the different recent debates on Durkheimian sociology, and makes them accessible to a wide audience spanning various disciplines; this includes crucial debates that, due to language barriers, are not easily accessible for an English-reading public. The handbook's chapters elucidate the controversial key concepts of Durkheimian sociology; situate them within the contemporary political and theoretical debates they were originally responding to; offer surveys of empirical research that uses Durkheimian concepts (on topics that were already central for Durkheim's own work as well as on topics that Durkheim hardly touched upon), thus demonstrating the possibilities of a Durkheimian sociology; bring out the divergent, and competing, ways in which Durkheim's ideas have been appropriated and reformulated within more recent theoretical developments in the social sciences. In doing so, this volume is an important resource for all scholars and students looking to understand Durkheimian sociology. (shrink)

Religious and Ethical Perspectives on Global Migration examines the complicated social ethics of migration in today's world. Editors Elizabeth W. Collier and Charles R. Strain bring the perspectives of an international group of scholars toward a theory of justice and ethical understanding for the nearly two hundred million migrants who have left their homes seeking asylum from political persecution, greater freedom and safety, economic opportunity, or reunion with family members.

Reprinted 1999 by The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd. LCCN 98-32334. ISBN 1-886363-74-9. Cloth. $95. * Reprint of the first edition.

This book both consummates and demonstrates the basic thrust of Jonas's thought: the inseparability of ethics and metaphysics, the reality of values at the ...

Change, Choice and Inference develops logical theories that are necessary both for the understanding of adaptable human reasoning and for the design of intelligent systems. The book shows that reasoning processes - the drawing on inferences and changing one's beliefs - can be viewed as belonging to the realm of practical reason by embedding logical theories into the broader context of the theory of rational choice. The book unifies lively and significant strands of research in logic, philosophy, economics and artificial (...) intelligence. It elaborates on the relevant theories and provides a mathematically precise foundation for the thesis that large parts of theoretical reason can be subsumed under practical reason. (shrink)

This article concerns itself with the relationship between implicit moral cognitions and decisions in the realm of business ethics. Traditionally, business ethics research emphasized the effects of overt or explicit attitudes on ethical decision-making and neglected intuitive or implicit attitudes. Therefore, based on an implicit social cognition approach it is important to know whether implicit moral attitudes may have a substantial impact on managerial ethical decision-making processes. To test this thesis, a study with 50 participants was conducted. In this study (...) the participants were asked to work on a deliberative managerial ethical decision-making task, in which they had to decide on one of two options. Implicit moral attitudes towards the two options were measured using the implicit association test (IAT). A semantic differential scale was used to diagnose explicit moral attitudes towards the two options. Each step taken within the deliberative decision-making process, as well the decision itself, was assessed using a scoring model-based decision analysis and a decision-making questionnaire. The results of this study show that implicit moral attitude has a great influence on the deliberative ethical decision-making process. The derived conclusion is that complex and deliberative decision-making processes in the context of business ethics can be affected by implicit social cognitions such as implicit moral attitudes. (shrink)

This article examines the relationship between implicit mental processes and ethical decisions made by managers. Based on the dual-process view in social and cognitive psychology, it is argued that social cognition (e.g., moral judgments) can rely on two different modes of information processing. On one hand, moral judgments reflect explicit, conscious, and extensive cognitive processes, which are attributed to explicit attitude. On the other hand, moral judgments may also be based on implicit, automatic, and effortless processes referring to implicit attitude. (...) To test this thesis, a study involving 182 participants was conducted. The results support the thesis. (shrink)

Ethical scandals in business are all too common. Due to the increased public awareness of the transgressions of business executives and the potential costs associated with these transgressions, ethical leadership is among the top qualities sought by organizations as they hire and promote managers. This search for ethical leaders intersects with a labor force that is becoming more racially diverse than ever before. In this paper, we propose that the ethical leadership qualities of business leaders may be perceived differently depending (...) upon the race of the leader. Using two experimental studies in the USA, we examine the difference in ethical leadership perceptions between a Black hypocritical CEO and an ethical CEO. Next, we consider a Black ethically ambiguous CEO and an ethical CEO. The findings indicate that a Black leader faces larger negative impact in hypocritical and ambiguous conditions than a similar White leader. There were no significant race effects in the ethical conditions in which a leader demonstrated a personal commitment to ethics through words or actions. We discuss the implications of these findings. (shrink)

In 1890 C. S. Peirce wrote a review of A. C. Fraser’s recent book on Locke, published to coincide with the bicentennial of Locke’s Essay. Peirce remarked that “Locke’s grand work was substantially this: Men must think for themselves, and genuine thought is an act of perception…. We cannot fail to acknowledge a superior element of truth in the practicality of Locke’s thought, which on the whole should place him nearly upon a level with Descartes.” This estimate of Locke was (...) not the common opinion in England during the nineteenth century. This opinion was reflected in Fraser’s book which, Peirce remarked, could not “be said to be a sympathetic account of [Locke]. The biographer seems to see no charm in his hero, and is perpetually speaking of his want of imagination; which only means he was not given to unpractical dreaming.” Locke had his knowledgeable critics and defenders—for instance Dugald Stewart and John Stuart Mill—but the common opinion ranged from extreme hostility and contempt to condescending criticism of isolated minor points. His style was deplored, his philosophy was called unoriginal and a mere unacknowledged plagiarism of Gassendi and Hobbes; he was said to have so thoroughly misunderstood Descartes that he had merely repeated him with new errors; he was said to owe his philosophical reputation entirely to his advocacy of the popular argument for political freedom or merely to the intellectual circumstances of his time; he was held accountable for Condillac’s rejection of reflection and reason; he was knocked down with a few bare sentences loosely drawn from Leibniz; he was said to have made the mind a puny, passive, mechanical thing. He was called a sensualist, a materialist, a sceptic, an atheist, and a utilitarian though at the same time—and not without contradiction—he was generally, especially by his critics, styled a “great lover of truth,” a plain and simple, well-meaning and religious man. To the nineteenth century Locke meant the Essay, and the history of the Essay was in large measure the history of modern thought, of the eighteenth century. Precisely for this reason there was something nearly sinister about him, in spite of his good personal character. “Locke, himself a clear, humble-minded, patient, reverent, nay, religious man,” said Carlyle, “had paved the way for banishing religion from the world.”. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In the present study, we examined how the perceived attainability and relatability of moral exemplars predicted moral elevation and pleasantness among both adult and college student participants. Data collected from two experiments were analyzed with Bayesian multilevel modeling to explore which factors significantly predicted outcome variables at the story level. The analysis results demonstrated that the main effect of perceived relatability and the interaction effect between attainability and relatability shall be included in the best prediction model, and thus, were (...) deemed to predict the outcome variables significantly. The main effect of relatability as well as its interaction with attainability positively predicted elevation and pleasantness. We discussed educational implications of the findings in terms of how relatability may be the first point of emphasis for moral educators to focus on and attainability can then bolster the effectiveness. These relatable and attainable moral exemplars can be sources for moral elevation and pleasantness, which promote motivation to emulate moral behavior presented by the exemplars. (shrink)

Written in the 1960s, TRUTH AND METHOD is Gadamer's magnum opus. Looking behind the self-consciousness of science, he discusses the tense relationship between truth and methodology. In examining the different experiences of truth, he aims to "present the hermeneutic phenomenon in its fullest extent.

This essay argues that Pufendorf conceived the principles of natural law against the rationalism and innatism of the 17th century, and that Condillac similarly formulated a conception of the human origin of language, both of them thus securing open and human foundations for the two primal institutions of law and language, and also making all citizens free agents in the ordering of communal living.

Ethical leadership is an important construct in the literature on behavioral ethics in organizations, given its link with employee attitudes and behaviors. What remains unclear, however, is what leader characteristics are associated directly with ethical leader perceptions and indirectly with employee unethical behavior. In this paper, we use a socio-cognitive lens to integrate goal orientation theory with the literature on ethical behavior in organizations. Specifically, we propose that certain patterns of managers’ goal-oriented behavior provide signals and cues to employees about (...) their managers’ ethical leadership, which then relates to employee displays of more unethical behavior. Using a sample of 265 manager–employee dyads, our findings largely support our claims. We found that leader performance-avoid goal orientation was negatively related to perceptions of ethical leadership and positively related to employee unethical behavior. Moderated mediation tests indicated that the positive indirect effect of leader performance-avoid goal orientation on employee unethical behavior through perceptions of ethical leadership was attenuated by higher levels of leader learning goal orientation. Taken together, these findings suggest that when leaders emphasize avoiding failure while downplaying the importance of personal learning and development, employees perceive them as less ethical and are more willing to engage in ethical misconduct. We discuss implications of our findings for both theory and practice. (shrink)

Exploring all of the central themes of Wittgenstein's "oeuvre," this volume includes discussion of core topics such as meaning and use, rule following, the ...

What is justice? -- The idea of justice in the Holy Scriptures -- Platonic justice -- Aristotle's doctrine of justice -- The natural-law doctrine before the tribunal of science -- A "dynamic" theory of natural law -- Absolutism and relativism in philosophy and politics -- Value judgments in the science of law -- The law as a specific social technique -- Why should the law be obeyed? -- The pure theory of the law and analytical jurisprudence -- Law, state, and (...) justice in the pure theory of law -- Causality and retribution -- Causality and imputation -- Science and politics. (shrink)

This article examines the dynamics that have turned a recent Marian apparition on the window of a bank in Clearwater, Florida, from a local into a global phenomenon. Drawing from theories of globalization, we show how the apparition exemplifies what sociologist Roland Robertson refers to as the mutually implicative `universalization of particularism and the particularization of universalism'. Among the factors analyzed are global pilgrimage, transnational migration, mediascapes and the Vatican's New Evangelization initiative. On the basis of this case study, the (...) article argues for the need to go beyond secularization theory - the dominant modernist approach to religion and social change - and to adopt a flexible, polymethodological framework that takes into account the complex, and often contradictory, relations between the local and the global and the mediating roles religion plays. (shrink)

We must restrict to mere probability not only statements of comparatively great uncertainty, like predictions about the weather, where we would cautiously ...

Since the beginning of the 20th century, philosophers of science have asked, "what kind of thing is a scientific theory?" The logical positivists answered: a scientific theory is a mathematical theory, plus an empirical interpretation of that theory. Moreover, they assumed that a mathematical theory is specified by a set of axioms in a formal language. Later 20th century philosophers questioned this account, arguing instead that a scientific theory need not include a mathematical component; or that the mathematical component need (...) not be specified by a set of axioms in a formal language. We survey various accounts of scientific theories entertained in the 20th century -- removing some misconceptions, and clearing a path for future research. (shrink)

In seinem 1960 erschienenen Hauptwerk "Wahrheit und Methode" nimmt Gadamer die bis in die Antike zuruckreichende hermeneutische Tradition auf, um vor allem im Anschluss an Hegel und Heidegger eine philosophische Hermeneutik zu begrunden. Das Buch brachte seinem Autor internationalen Ruhm, und die philosophische Hermeneutik ist eine der massgeblichen Konzeptionen der neueren Philosophie geworden. Nach wie vor bildet "Wahrheit und Methode" den Ausgangspunkt fur eine philosophische Klarung des Verstehens und seiner von Gadamer behandelten Auspragungen in Kunst, Geschichte und Sprache. Der vorliegende (...) Band rekonstruiert und diskutiert in Form eines kooperativen Kommentars, der Gliederung des Werkes folgend, Gadamers Gedankengang, zeigt aber auch die Perspektiven einer Philosophie auf, die sich gegenuber ihrem eigenen hermeneutischen Charakter nicht verschliesst.". (shrink)

According to a venerable tradition in philosophy and linguistics, expressions have meaning through being subject to conventions or rules. This claim has become a central topic of contemporary philosophy of language and mind in the wake of Wittgenstein and Kripke, largely because the normativity of meaning is regarded as a serious challenge to naturalism. One reaction to this challenge is to deny that the normativity of meaning is genuine. While there are ‘semantic principles’ specifying conditions for the correct application of (...) expressions, these are either not genuinely normative or they are not in fact constitutive of meaning. But this dilemma can be defused if one distinguishes different dimensions of semantic normativity and pays attention to different types of mistakes that can afflict linguistic behavior. In particular, one needs to keep apart norms of truth and norms of meaning, regulative, and constitutive rules, and to appreciate the normative dimensions of the notion of correctness. The final section discusses the role of communally shared rules or conventions for language, in particular the age-old problem of circularity: how could such conventions be essential to language, given that the latter appears prerequisite for establishing and communicating conventions in the first place. (shrink)

Dass Edmund Husserl am Problem der Intersubjektivität gescheitert ist, gilt als ausgemacht - und ebenso, welche Konsequenzen daraus zu ziehen sind. Entgegen dem allenthalben pauschal erklärten `Abschied vom Subjekt' spricht aber vieles dafür, dass es in der gegenwärtigen Sozialtheorie eher um eine Reformulierung transzendentaler Subjektivität geht. Diese Interpretationsthese wirft ein neues Licht auf den sozialtheoretischen Diskurs, der im deutschen Sprachraum in den vergangenen dreissig Jahren vom Gegensatz von Jürgen Habermas' und Niklas Luhmanns Theorien bestimmt war: `Diskurs' und `System' erscheinen als (...) gegensätzliche Versuche, `Subjektivität' und `Interität' in ein theoretisch befriedigendes Verhältnis zu setzen. Wenn aber - so die kritische These dieses Buches - weder die Reformulierung von Subjektivität als `Interität' noch die Reformulierung von Subjektivität ohne `Interität' das Problem der Intersubjektivität überzeugend löst, ist dies ein Grund, neuerlich in eine direkte Auseinandersetzung mit Husserls Theorie transzendentaler Subjektivität einzutreten. Dabei stellt sich heraus, dass Husserls vielkritisierter und -skandalisierter Versuch, den Sinn `Anderer' im `Eigenen' zu fundieren, in der transzendentalphänomenologischen Subjekttheorie durch ein umgekehrtes Begründungsverhältnis konterkariert wird. Bei aller Problematik dieser Theorieanlage - welche nur in Gegenwendung zu den Gewohnheiten der Husserl-Interpretation, vor allem aber auch zu Husserls Selbstinterpretation in den Blick kommt - zeigt sich, dass der phänomenologische Begriff des transzendentalen Subjekts seinen Reformulierungen als Diskurs und als System in mancher Hinsicht überlegen ist. (shrink)

Undersøgelser af sammenhængen mellem tysk filosofi og nazismens teorier med særlig vægt på Martin Heidegger (1889-1976).

This chapter investigates the idea of collective epistemic commonality suggested by Charles Taylor's example, and contrasts it with a distributive notion of epistemic commonality. It describes a number of accounts of collective epistemic commonality, and then argues that, contrary to what Taylor suggests, conversation is not constitutive of collective epistemic commonality as such, but rather presupposes basic forms of collective epistemic commonality. Taylor's remarks indicate that understanding the consensus is insufficient as whatever proposition people rationally and openly accept in conversation. (...) It is suggested that joint attitudes are irreducible, relational, and pre-reflective, and that such attitudes are joint, in the respect that the participants are aware of themselves as a ‘we’. Highly inferential beliefs need some form of communication, and are probably really some form of joint commitment. (shrink)

This article reports an experimental study aimed at evaluating the change of cognitive processes in ethical decision making before and after business ethics training. An experimental design (Solomon Four-Group Design) was used to test the effectiveness of the training within a German university undergraduate business-oriented student sample. The cognitive processes in decision making (implicit and explicit moral attitudes, selective attention, moral awareness, moral judgment, moral intention, and moral behavior) were measured by using different direct instruments (e.g. questionnaire items for moral (...) judgments and explicit moral attitude scales) as well as indirect measures such as eye-tracking and the Implicit Association Test (IAT). The study yielded mixed results. On the one hand, significant changes in explicit attitudes, moral awareness, moral judgments, moral intention, and moral behavior in the pre-post-measurements of the training group have been revealed. On the other hand, there were no significant differences between the pre-post-measurements of the first training and control group as well as between the posttest-only-measures of the second training and control group. In addition, the implicit measures did not show any significant training effect. Implications with an emphasis on methodological aspects for future research on business ethics training are discussed. (shrink)

Through advances in production and treatment technologies, transparent glass has become an increasingly versatile material and a global hallmark of modern architecture. In the shape of invisible barriers, it defines spaces while simultaneously shaping their lighting, noise, and climate conditions. Despite these unique architectural qualities, little is known regarding the human experience with glass barriers. Is a material that has been described as being simultaneously there and not there from an architectural perspective, actually there and/or not there from perceptual, behavioral, (...) and social points of view? In this article, we review systematic observations and experimental studies that explore the impact of transparent barriers on human cognition and action. In doing so, the importance of empirical and multidisciplinary approaches to inform the use of glass in contemporary architecture is highlighted and key questions for future inquiry are identified. (shrink)

In this book, Hans Joas interweaves Mead's political and intellectual biography with the development of his theories.

Heidegger's Crisis shows not only how the Nazis exploited philosophical ideas and used philosophers to gain public acceptance, but also how German philosophers played into the hands of the Nazis. Hans Sluga describes the growth, from World War I onward, of a powerful right-wing movement in German philosophy, in which nationalistic, antisemitic, and antidemocratic ideas flourished.