Following thinkers of the archive such as Derrida, Foucault and Groys, among others, one of the ethical functions of the archive is to enable differentiation: to do archival work is to unlock difference. Yet how is one to deem the archival content outside of those moments in which we deliberately engage with it? More specifically, how is one to think the spectatorial relation to images that, assigned to the sequestered space of the archive, remain most of the time without spectators? (...) In approaching the archival mode through the philosophical lens of sublation and its Hegelian precursor of Aufhebung that performs alteration through preservation-as-cancellation, this essay sets out to articulate a phenomenology of the archived photograph as an image of, or in, sublation. Exploring the fragile dynamics at stake between the archived and its non-archived outside, emphasis is laid on the critical contradictions inherent in the logics of archivization: seeking to preserve its documents, the archive cannot do so without also provoking further differentiation. (shrink)

Im ersten Teil des Werkes untersucht Mertian (1766-1843) die Beziehungen zwischen Sprache und den Operationen des Verstandes. Wahrend er hier Condillac und Leibniz verpflichtet ist, enthalt der zweite Teil seine eigentliche Leistung: den Versuch einer angemessenen Definition der 'Urbegriffe' (grammatische Kategorien), die sich auf die Natur der Sprache selbst grundet. Diese Bemuhungen um die grammatischen Universalien und deren pragnante metasprachliche Bezeichnung sichern dem Werk einen Platz auch in der sprachtheoretischen Diskussion der Gegenwart.

Social epistemologists should be well-equipped to explain and evaluate the growing vulnerabilities associated with filter bubbles, echo chambers, and group polarization in social media. However, almost all social epistemology has been built for social contexts that involve merely a speaker-hearer dyad. Filter bubbles, echo chambers, and group polarization all presuppose much larger and more complex network structures. In this paper, we lay the groundwork for a properly social epistemology that gives the role and structure of networks their due. In particular, (...) we formally define epistemic constructs that quantify the structural epistemic position of each node within an interconnected network. We argue for the epistemic value of a structure that we call the (m,k)-observer. We then present empirical evidence that (m,k)-observers are rare in social media discussions of controversial topics, which suggests that people suffer from serious problems of epistemic vulnerability. We conclude by arguing that social epistemologists and computer scientists should work together to develop minimal interventions that improve the structure of epistemic networks. (shrink)

In this paper, we explain and showcase the promising methodology of testimonial network analysis and visualization for experimental epistemology, arguing that it can be used to gain insights and answer philosophical questions in social epistemology. Our use case is the epistemic community that discusses vaccine safety primarily in English on Twitter. In two studies, we show, using both statistical analysis and exploratory data visualization, that there is almost no neutral or ambivalent discussion of vaccine safety on Twitter. Roughly half the (...) accounts engaging with this topic are pro-vaccine, while the other half are con-vaccine. We also show that these two camps rarely engage with one another, and that the con-vaccine camp has greater epistemic reach and receptivity than the pro-vaccine camp. In light of these findings, we question whether testimonial networks as they are currently constituted on popular fora such as Twitter are living up to their promise of delivering the wisdom of crowds. We conclude by pointing to directions for further research in digital social epistemology. (shrink)

Schon als Schüler erlernte Ignaz von Döllinger so hervorragend die englische Sprache, dass ihn später viele seiner britischen Korrespondenzpartner und Freunde für einen native speaker hielten. Seine ausgezeichneten Englisch-Kenntnisse ermöglichten dem Münchner Kirchenhistoriker und Präsidenten der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften nicht nur eine intensive Wahrnehmung und Lektüre englischsprachiger Publikationen, darunter auch politischer Zeitungen und Zeitschriften, sondern auch eine sehr genaue Beobachtungen der kirchenpolitischen Auseinandersetzungen in der Church of England, die er als die faszinierendste aller nachreformatorischen Kirchenbildungen hoch schätzte. Der (...) Beitrag macht zunächst an Döllingers The Church and the Churches aus dem Jahre 1861, sodann an den kurz nach der deutschen Reichsgründung, 1872 gehaltenen Lectures on the Reunion of the Churches, weiterhin an den von Döllinger initiierten Bonner Unionskonferenzen 1874/75 und kurz auch an The History of Religious Freedom die wachsende Sympathie Döllingers für den anglikanischen Kirchentypus deutlich. Zwar litter stark unter Edward B. Puseys Ablehnung der Bonner Konsensgespräche. Aber langfristig bereitete Döllinger mit seinen zahlreichen ökumenischen Initiativen den Weg für die 1931 vereinbarte Abendmahlsgemeinschaft zwischen Anglikanern und Altkatholiken. (shrink)

The article discusses the reception of Grotius by Catholic lawyers at the university of Prague. It focuses on the Grotius commentary by Nicolaus Ignaz Königsmann, which was meant as a response to the discussion of Central European Catholic lawyers on questions of toleration and permissions in law. I argue that Königsmann agreed with Grotius because his conception could be combined with the Catholic belief in free will and dictamen sanae rationis. He grounded natural law in rational human nature and (...) rejected attempts to derive natural law from the highest principle. (shrink)

In our current climate of rapid technological progress, it seems counterintuitive to think that modern science can learn anything of ethical value from the dark recesses of the nineteenth century or earlier. However, this happens to be quite true, with plenty of knowledge and wisdom to be gleaned by studying our scientific predecessors. Presently, our journals are flooded with original concepts and potential breakthroughs, a continuous stream of ideas pushing the frontiers of knowledge ever forward. Some ideas flourish while others (...) flounder; but what sets the two apart? The distinguishing feature between success and failure within this context is the ability to discern the appropriate time to accept an innovation with open arms, versus when to take a more cautious approach. And the primary arbiters for whether an idea will catch on or not are the professional audience. I illustrate this concept by comparing the initial reception of two innovative ideas from Medicine’s past: sterile technique, and prefrontal lobotomy. Sterile technique was first introduced by Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis and was initially ridiculed and rejected, with Semmelweis eventually dying in exile. Conversely, lobotomy was accepted and lauded and its inventor, Dr. Egas Moniz, won the Nobel Prize for his “discovery”. This begs the question: why was a technique with the potential to save millions of lives initially rejected, whereas paradoxically, one that compromised and sometimes destroyed lives, accepted? Here I explore and analyze the potential reasons why, suggest how we can learn from these mistakes of the past and apply new insight to some current ethical dilemmas. (shrink)

M. Hayri Kırbasoglu is researcher who studies in the field of ḥadīth. Kırbasoglu’s latest work was on the famous orientalist Ignaz Goldziher, and in his book Understanding Goldziher, he claimed that Goldziher, who was criticized by Muslim researchers, was not understood correctly, a hate and smear campaign was carried out against him, and he suffered a great injustice. The reason for writing this article is to analyze the defense of Goldziher put forward by Kırbasoglu in the aforementioned study and (...) to evaluate whether he is right in his opinions and determinations. As a result of our research, it was seen that there was no other study that was critical of Kırbasoglu’s defense of Goldziher, and it was decided to write this article. The article is limited to Kırbasoglu’s aforementioned work, and it is aimed to introduce both him and Goldziher correctly, based on Kırbasoglu’s views here. At the end of the article, it was concluded that Kırbasoglu’s evaluations about the Jewish orientalist Goldziher were subjective, one-sided, biased, reactive, far from objectivity and superficial, in addition, it was concluded that most of his analyzes related to Goldziher do not correspond to the facts. (shrink)

In this article, I compare two varieties of abduction as reconstructive models for analysing discovery. The first is 'Hansonian abduction', which is based on N. R. Hanson's formulations of abduction. The other is 'Harmanian abduction', the Inference to the Best Explanation (IBE) model, formulated especially by Gilbert Harman. Peter Lipton has analysed processes of discovery on the basis of his developed form of Harmanian abduction. I argue that Hansonian abduction would, however, be a more apt model for this purpose. As (...) an example, I reconstruct, in a Hansonian manner, Ignaz Semmelweis's research on childbed fever and compare it to the IBE reconstruction of Lipton. I argue that Hansonian abduction is in accordance with Lipton's aim of taking into account the distinction between actual and potential explanations on the one hand, and between likely and lovely explanations on the other. I maintain that a developed version of Hansonian abduction combined with loveliness gives an important, new conceptual means for analysing processes of discovery. (shrink)

This paper undertakes a philosophical analysis of the speech given by the German writer Martin Walser when the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade was awarded to him in 1998. I reconstruct Walser's infamous claims about the Holocaust and his critique against its presence in the media and discuss Walser's proclamation of a right for disregarding his claims about German normality and his views about private commemoration.

Peter Lipton argues that inference to the best explanation involves the selection of a hypothesis on the basis of its loveliness. I argue that in optimal cases of IBE we may be able to eliminate all but one of the hypotheses. In such cases we have a form of eliminative induction takes place, which I call ‘Holmesian inference’. I argue that Lipton’s example in which Ignaz Semmelweis identified a cause of puerperal fever better illustrates Holmesian inference than Liptonian IBE. (...) I consider in detail the conditions under which Holmesian inference is possible and conclude by considering the epistemological relations between Holmesian inference and Liptonian IBE.Keywords: Inference to the best explanation; Peter Lipton; Abduction; Holmesian inference; Eliminative induction. (shrink)

In his seminal Inference to the Best Explanation, Peter Lipton adopted a causal view of explanation and a broadly Millian view of how causal knowledge is obtained. This made his account vulnerable to critics who charged that Inference to the Best Explanation is merely a dressed-up version of Mill’s methods, which in the critics’ view do the real inductive work. Lipton advanced two arguments to protect Inference to the Best Explanation against this line of criticism: the problem of multiple differences (...) and the problem of inferred differences. Lipton claimed that these two problems show Mill’s method of difference to be largely unworkable unless it is embedded in an explanationist framework. Here I consider both arguments as well as the best Millian defense against them. Since the existing Millian defense is only partially successful, I will develop a new and improved account. As an integral part of the argument, I show that my solutions to the problems of multiple and inferred differences offer new insight into Lipton’s main case study: Ignaz Semmelweis’s discovery of the cause of childbed fever. I conclude that the method of difference can overcome Lipton’s challenges outside an explanationist framework. (shrink)

It seems impossible to completely cover the field indicated by the title of this report because of the many contributions of individual physicians and non-physicians to problems of the philosophy of medicine in Austria, and to their solution. The main trends are rooted in historic developments and in the current problems of medicine and health care, which are similar world-wide. In Austria famous names like empress Maria Theresia or the physician Ignaz Semmelweis have to be mentioned in connection with (...) the development of the ideas of a philosophy of medicine. In recent times again influential and well-known persons in related fields of medicine and health care are Austrians. However, the main line of new developments goes mostly unseen by the public: activities in medical ethics with the goal to humanize health care, carried on by groups of young physicians, biomedical engineers and students. (shrink)

1534 yılında Ignacio de Loyala (Ignaz von Loyola) tarafından kurulan, aslında Kudüs merkezli bir tarikat olması düşünülürken fiziki ve siyasi şartların el vermemesi nedeniyle Avrupa’da yayılan ve faaliyet alanlarını genellikle misyonerlik ve eğitim kurumları üzerinde yoğunlaştıran Cizvit Hristiyan tarikatı, kısaca “SJ” (Societas Jesu- İsa’nın topluluğu) olarak isimlendirilmiştir. Ancak bu kısaltma halk arasında “Schlaue Jungs” (Akıllı Adamlar) şeklinde telaffuz edilmiştir. Zira söz konusu tarikat üyelerinin geneli Din Bilimlerinin yanı sıra ikinci bir alanda da eğitimlerini tamamlayarak söz sahibi olmuşlardır. 1551 yılından (...) itibaren Avusturya’da da yayılmaya başlayan Cizvit tarikatı, kurdukları kolejler ve eğitim kurumları sayesinde oldukça popüler hale gelmiş ve birçok devlet adamı ve kralların çocuklarına öğretmenlik yaparak devlet yönetiminde söz sahibi olmuşlardır. Ayrıca kendi mezunlarını devletin önemli pozisyonlarına yerleştirerek bürokrasiye de hâkim olan bu tarikat, sonraları güç zehirlenmesi yaşayarak Papa ve Avrupalı idarecilerle ters düşmüş ve 1773 yılında tarikatın haklarına sınırlama getirilerek eğitim kurumlarına ve mal varlıklarına el konulmuştur. Bu nedenle bu tarikatın eğitim faaliyetlerini izlemek aynı zamanda Avrupa’nın siyasi ve dini tarihini daha yakından tanımak anlamına geleceğinden, çalışmada özellikle Habsburg imparatorluğunun merkezi Avusturya seçilmiştir. Ancak çalışmanın sınırlarını muhafaza edebilmek için sadece Cizvitlerin lise eğitim sistemi üzerinde durulmuş ve bu eğitime karşı olan tepkiler aktarılmıştır. Söz konusu tepkiler de genellikle 18. ve 19. yüzyıllar arasında yazılan Almanca eserlerle ortaya konulmaya çalışılmış ve çalışmanın zaman dilimi olarak da 16.ve 19. yüzyıllar arasında olması uygun bulunmuştur. (shrink)

Ein Hauptthema des 18. Bandes mit Briefen von November 1751 bis April 1752 ist die Sorge um den prominenten katholischen Theologen Franz Ignaz Rothfischer, der im November 1751 in Leipzig zur lutherischen Konfession konvertierte. In enger Abstimmung mit dem Reichsgrafen Friedrich Heinrich von Seckendorff bemühte sich Gottsched um dessen beruflichen Neustart, Rothfischer wurde Professor in Helmstedt. Gottscheds vertraute Korrespondenten Flottwell, Scheyb und Brucker berichten aus Königsberg, Wien und Augsburg wie gewohnt über ihre Projekte und Ereignisse aus ihrem Umfeld. Christoph (...) Otto von Schönaich verfolgte die öffentliche Resonanz auf sein Epos Hermann und sandte Gottsched bereits Umdichtungen für die Neuauflage. 1751 begann die Korrespondenz mit dem Dichter Magnus Gottfried Lichtwer, nachdem Gottsched Lichtwers Fabeln glänzend rezensiert hatte. Zu den 19 neuen Korrespondenten gehörte auch Jean-Jacques Dortous de Mairan, Mitglied zahlreicher europäischer Akademien. Er reagierte auf das Angebot, eine deutsche Übersetzung seiner Arbeit über das Eis anzufertigen, deren eminenten Wert Gottsched in einer seiner seltenen Rezensionen naturwissenschaftlicher Publikationen herausgestellt hatte. (shrink)