This study of the practices and principles of a wide range of ancient scholars dealing with philosophical, scientific, biblical and other authors is an ...

The short treatise On the Cosmos, which most scholars believe to be not by Aristotle, has confidently been attributed to Aristotle by G. Reale and A. P. Bos. I do not wish to enter into their arguments for this attribution, because I believe it can be proved to be untenable.

In the Netherlands, in 2002, euthanasia became a legitimate medical act, only allowed when the due care criteria and procedural requirements are met. Legally, an Advanced Euthanasia Directive can replace direct communication if a patient can no longer express his own wishes. In the past decade, an exponential number of persons with dementia share a euthanasia request with their physician. The impact this on physicians, and the consequent support needs, remained unknown. Our objective was to gain more insight into the (...) experiences and needs of Dutch general practitioners and elderly care physicians when handling a euthanasia request from a person with dementia. We performed a qualitative interview study. Participants were recruited via purposive sampling. The interviews were transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using the conventional thematic content analysis. Eleven general practitioners and elderly care physicians with a variety of experience and different attitudes towards euthanasia for PWD were included. Euthanasia requests appeared to have a major impact on physicians. Difficulties they experienced were related to timing, workload, pressure from and expectations of relatives, society’s negative view of dementia in combination with the ‘right to die’ view, the interpretation of the law and AEDs, ethical considerations, and communication with PWD and relatives. To deal with these difficulties, participants need support from colleagues and other professionals. Although elderly care physicians appreciated moral deliberation and support by chaplains, this was hardly mentioned by GPs. Euthanasia requests in dementia seem to place an ethically and emotionally heavy burden on Dutch GPs and elderly care physicians. The awareness of, and access to, existing and new support mechanisms needs further exploration. (shrink)

Peter Hall introduced the concept of paradigm shifts into the public policy discourse. His account explains the seismic transition the world experienced in the 1980s. With this neoliberal paradigm...

While engineering ethics usually addresses the responsibility of engineers in rare cases of whistle blowing, the authors broach the question to what extent engineers can be held responsible in normal practice. For this purpose, they define the conditions under which individuals can be imputable as they prevail in ethics and common sense. From outcomes of science and technology studies research, the authors conclude that these conditions are seldom met in modern technoscientific research practice. By examining such practice in a case (...) study and comparing the results with perceptions of engineers on social responsibility as expressed in interviews, the authors are able to demonstrate that a change in structural characteristics of this practice, such as funding rules, stimulates engineers to attune the inner politics of science to wider societal policies and concerns, and it helps them to overcome the shifting of social responsibility to others as a consequence of the lack of agency they usually perceive. (shrink)

Rule-applying legal arguments are traditionally treated as a kind of syllogism. Such a treatment overlooks the fact that legal principles and rules are not statements which describe the world, but rather means by which humans impose structure on the world. Legal rules create legal consequences, they do not describe them. This has consequences for the logic of rule- and principle-applying arguments, the most important of which may be that such arguments are defeasible. This book offers an extensive analysis of the (...) role of rules and principles in legal reasoning, which focuses on the close relationship between rules, principles, and reasons. Moreover, it describes a logical theory which assigns a central place to the notion of reasons for and against a conclusion, and which is especially suited to deal with rules and principles. (shrink)

In the near future, robots will function in social roles and attempt to influence the user’s behavior and / or thinking. The current contribution analyses how to influence robot influence: Persuasive robots can be personalized to make them more effective. We present an overview of (1) the user characteristics to which persuasive robots can be personalized, (2) considering the specific current situation of a user; and (3) the robot characteristics that can be personalized. Thereby, we give an overview of how (...) the persuasive robot’s physical appearance, behavior, (perceived) cognition and affect can be influenced to characteristics of the user (personalized) in order to make the robot more persuasive and thereby to understand better how the persuasive power of an embodied artificial social entity can be influenced. (shrink)

This paper examines how expertise is treated as a separable domain of epistemics by looking at simulated intensive care shift-handovers between resident physicians. In these handovers, medical information about a patient is transferred from an outgoing physician to an incoming physician. These handovers contain different interactional activities, such as discussing the patient identifiers, giving a clinical impression, and discussing tasks and focus points. We found that with respect to knowledge about the patient, the OPs display an orientation to a knowledge (...) imbalance, but with respect to procedures, reasoning, and activities, they display an orientation to a knowledge balance. We use ‘expertise’ to refer to this latter type of knowledge. ‘Expertise’ differs from, and adds to, how knowledge is often treated in epistemics in that it is concerned with professional competence or ‘knowing how’. In terms of epistemics, the participants in the handovers orient to a steep epistemic or knowledge gradient when it concerns the patient, while simultaneously displaying an orientation to a horizontal expertise gradient. (shrink)

Classroom discussion is frequently proposes as an essential part of democratic citizenship education. Literature, however, pays little attention to what kind of discussion is most effective and how teachers can facilitate a discussion. This study aims to contribute to the development of a framework for analysing the characteristics of classroom discussions and the different roles teachers can adopt in guiding a discussion on controversial issues. In addition, we investigated how the way teachers guide the discussion is related to the structure (...) and content features of the discussion. The framework was used to analyse five classroom discussions in secondary education. Our framework appeared to be useful for revealing differences in the structure and content features of the classroom discussions and in the way teachers guide the discussion. The results also indicated that a high degree of teacher regulation was related to high content quality and more participation from students. A high degree of stu... (shrink)

v. 1. The sources -- v. 2., pt. 2. The compendium -- v. 3. Studies in the doxographical traditions of ancient philosophy.

This article argues that it is possible to hold autonomous agents themselves, and not only their makers, users or owners, responsible for the acts of these agents. In this connection autonomous systems are computer programs that interact with the outside world without human interference. They include such systems as ‘intelligent’ weapons and self-driving cars. The argument is based on an analogy between human beings and autonomous agents and its main element asserts that if humans can be held responsible, so can, (...) in principle, autonomous agents, as humans are more like autonomous agents than is often assumed. (shrink)

This study investigated the relationship between the development of students? self-regulated learning and students? perceptions of the learning environment in terms of autonomy support, the emphasis on relevance and collaborative learning. In addition, we compared innovative learning environments that aim to enhance self-regulated learning with traditional learning environments. Questionnaires for measuring self-regulated learning and perceptions of the learning environment were administered by 648 students. Self-regulated learning was measured at the start of secondary education and again half way through the first (...) year. The results point to the importance of how students perceive the learning environment for self-regulated learning. There was a positive relationship between autonomy support and relevance and self-regulated learning. Furthermore, students in innovative environments perceived more autonomy support, more emphasis on relevance and more collaborative learning than those in traditional environments. Students in innovative environments, however, reported no more self-regulated learning than students in traditional environments. (shrink)

Du sommaire: Ambiguite et comprehension du langage (Paul Bogaards, Johan Rooryck). - Why pluralities don't mean a thing (Crit Cremers). - Aspects of interlingual ambiguity: polyglot punning (Dirk Delabastita). - Les feux de Saint-Antoine (Sjef Houppermans). - The semantics of Dutch moeten 'must, should, have to' from a typological and a relevance-theoretical perspective (Theo Janssen). - L'ambiguite en langue et en discours (Catherine Kerbrat-Orecchioni).".

In this article, Whitehead's transition from a Philosophy of Evolution to a Philosophy of Organism is studied primarily on the basis of the evidence provided by the first two volumes of The Harvard Lectures of Alfred North Whitehead, especially the second volume that deals with the period 1925–1927 and that is subtitled General Metaphysical Problems of Science.

Beginning in September of 1924, Alfred North Whitehead presented a regular course of 85 lectures which concluded in May of 1925. These represent the first ever philosophy lectures he gave and capture him working out the philosophical implications of the remarkable turns physics had taken in his lifetime. This volume finally recreates these lectures by transcribing notes by W.P. Bell, W.E. Hocking and Louise Heath taken at the time - many of which have only recently been discovered and including hundreds (...) of sketches of Whitehead's blackboard diagrams. This is a unique insight into the evolution of Whitehead's thought during the months when he was drafting his seminal work, Science and the Modern World. (shrink)

This paper deals with two issues in the field of reasoning by analogy in the law. The one issue is whether there exists such a thing as analogous rule application, or whether there is only the ‘normal’ application of a broadened rule. It is argued that if rules, as the entities made by a legislator, are distinguished from generalised solutions for cases, the idea of analogous application of rules makes sense. It is also shown how the so-called ‘reason-based model of (...) rule application’, in contrast to the traditional modus ponens or subsumption model, makes it easy to give a logical account of analogous rule application. The other issue is how to argue logically about whether two cases are sufficiently similar to adopt the outcome of the one case for the other case. Section 3 provides a general logical model to establish this. The model is based on the comparison of the reasons for and against a particular solution in the two cases. (shrink)

Why should interpretation of conceptual schemes and practices across traditions work at all? In this paper we present the following necessary conditions of possibility for interpretation in comparative and Chinese philosophy: the interpreter must presuppose that there are mutually recognizable human practices; the interpreter must presuppose that “the other” is, on the whole, sincere, consistent, and right; the interpreter must be committed to certain epistemic virtues. Some of these necessary conditions are consistent with the fact that interpretation is not thwarted (...) by the “danger” of relativism or of incommensurability. Some other conditions are suggestive of reorientations of methodologies of comparative and Chinese philosophy. (shrink)

The paper consists of three parts. In the first part five kinds of defeasibility are distinguished that is ontological, conceptual, epistemic, justification and logical defeasibility. In the second part it is argued that from these, justification defeat is the phenomenon that plays a role in legal reasoning. In the third part, the view is defended that non-monotonic logics are not necessary to model justification defeat, but that they are so to speak the natural way to model this phenomenon.

M.J. Langeveld (1905-1989) behoort tot de grootste Nederlandse pedagogen van de twintigste eeuw. Dit is de biografie van deze beroemde opvoedkundige, die tevens een gevreesde autoriteit was en een fenomenoloog van internationaal formaat.

This paper describes a model of legal reasoning and a logic for reasoning with rules, principles and goals that is especially suited to this model of legal reasoning. The paper consists of three parts. The first part describes a model of legal reasoning based on a two-layered view of the law. The first layer consists of principles and goals that express fundamental ideas of a legal system. The second layer contains legal rules which in a sense summarise the outcome of (...) the interaction of the principles and goals for a number of case types. Both principles, goals and rules can be used in legal arguments, but their logical roles are different. One characteristic of the model of legal reasoning described in the first part of the paper is that it takes these logical differences into account. Another characteristic is that it pays serious attention to the phenomena of reasoning about the validity and acceptance of rules, respectively principles and goals, and about the application of legal rules, and the implications of these arguments for the use of rules, principles and goals in deriving legal conclusions for concrete cases.The second part of the paper first describes a logic (Reason-Based Logic) that is especially suited to deal with legal arguments as described in terms of the previously discussed model. The facilities of the logic are illustrated by means of examples that correspond to the several aspects of the model. (shrink)

This article will explore whether there are arguments for Aristotle's concept mixis which can aid our current discussions within the philosophy of chemistry. We remain troubled by the way and extent to which chemical substance in bulk can be identified with or reduced to the stability and structure of molecules, and whether these in turn can be identified with or reduced to elemental atoms and the quantum theoretical characterization of their electrons. Aristotle was as determined as we are to think (...) through the implications of substances comprised of constituents and to question their status in chemical compounds. (shrink)

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Dialogues and dialectics have come to playan important role in the field of ArtificialIntelligence and Law. This paper describes thelegal-theoretical and logical background of this role,and discusses the different services into whichdialogues are put. These services include:characterising logical operators, modelling thedefeasibility of legal reasoning, providing the basisfor legal justification and identifying legal issues,and establishing the law in concrete cases. Specialattention is given to the requirements oflaw-establishing dialogues.

This paper develops the theory that a set ofrules is consistent if it is not possible that (1)the conditions of the rules in the set are allsatisfied, (2) there is no exception to either one ofthe rules, and (3) the consequences of the rules areincompatible. To this purpose the notion ofconsistency is generalised to make it cover rulesand is relativised to some background of constraints.This theory is formalised by means of Rule Logic, inwhich rules are treated as constraints on thepossible (...) worlds in which they exist. Rule Logicitself is introduced by giving a model-theory forit. It is characterised by means of constraints onworlds that are possible according to Rule Logic. (shrink)

This commentary discusses several problems with the target article by Ceci et al. First, the results admit of an alternative interpretation that undercuts the conclusion drawn. In addition, at a number of points, the research should be supplemented by examining situations in which there is no tenure-granting policy. Finally, 60% of the questions are concerned with whistle-blowing, but the issues involved in such cases make them much less relevant to the assessment of tenure than the authors suppose. (Published Online February (...) 8 2007). (shrink)

Albert (von) Szent-Györgyi started his studies on biological oxidation processes - which also resulted in the discovery of vitamin C, for which he received the Nobel Price in 1937 - in the Laboratory of Physiology of the University in Groningen in 1922-1926. These studies were later continued in Cambridge (UK) and Szeged (Hungary). When he had already received the invitation as well as the financial means to come and work in Cambridge, he still did experiments in Groningen to find out (...) whether the adrenal extract, isolated by him and later found to be a major source of vitamin C, contained the hormone essential for the survival of cats whose adrenals were removed. He was rather upset by the negative results of this experiment, judging by the recollections of a former student of his. This history constitutes an interesting example of the difference between serendipitous discovery and planned invention. (shrink)

This article describes how the facts in social reality take an intermediate position between objective facts and purely subjective ‘facts’. In turn, these social facts can be subdivided into constructivist and non-constructivist facts. The defining difference is that non-constructivist facts are completely determined by an approximate consensus between the members of a social group, while constructivist facts are founded in such a consensus but can nevertheless be questioned. Ought fact are such constructivist facts. Because they are founded in social reality, (...) a naturalistic theory of ought facts is attractive. Because constructivist facts are always open to questioning, we can explain why the facts in social reality may found ought facts but are nevertheless not the final word about them. (shrink)

The short treatise On the Cosmos, which most scholars believe to be not by Aristotle, has confidently been attributed to Aristotle by G. Reale and A. P. Bos. I do not wish to enter into their arguments for this attribution, because I believe it can be proved to be untenable.

I argue for the interpretation of Anaximander's world as an unstable system. The inconsistency found by scholars in Theophrastus/Simplicius' text disappears when it is realized that the elemental forces of nature do not change into each other. They are in the Infinite in time as well as in space. To some extent preference is given to Aristotle's evidence over the doxographical vulgate habitually derived from Theophrastus, though of course the Theophrastean passage containing the verbatim quotation remains the primary witness.