Philosophie ist der Versuch, durch überzeugendes und durchsichtiges Argumentieren bestimmte Fragen zu lösen. Philosophische Grundthemen sind Fragen nach dem Verständnis der Welt im Ganzen und unserer Stellung in ihr. Diese Fragen können prinzipiell nur kontrovers beantwortet werden. Die Reihe Grundthemen Philosophie möchte der Diskussion solcher philosophischen Grundthemen einen Ort geben. Anstelle einer umfassenden einführenden Darstellung werden in den einzelnen Bänden in Auseinandersetzung mit ausgewählten historischen Positionen die jeweiligen Probleme analysiert und Lösungsmöglichkeiten diskutiert. Dabei setzt der Verfasser/die Verfasserin eigene Akzente und (...) bezieht Stellung, so dass sich nicht bloß ein Blick auf die Geschichte der Philosophie, sondern zugleich auch ein systematischer Beitrag zur Problemdiskussion ergibt. Zur Zeit sind weitere Bände zu den Themen Beziehungen, Kultur, Wissenschaft und Moralbegründung geplant. Die Bände der Reihe richten sich gleichermaßen an Studierende der Philosophie und anderer Fächer sowie an professionelle Philosophen. Außerdem wendet sich die Reihe an alle, die an Grundthemen der Philosophie interessiert sind. (shrink)

Der Risikobegriff ist in modernen Gesellschaften allgegenwärtig. Risiken bzw. risikobehaftete Handlungen sind ganz selbstverständlich Bestandteil der alltäglichen Praxis. Ein Blick in die Begriffsgeschichte verdeutlicht, dass dies nicht immer der Fall war, sondern dass ›Risiko‹ bzw.

What moral reasons, if any, do we have to ensure the long-term survival of humanity? This article contrastively explores two answers to this question: according to the first, we should ensure the survival of humanity because we have reason to maximize the number of happy lives that are ever lived, all else equal. According to the second, seeking to sustain humanity into the future is the appropriate response to the final value of humanity itself. Along the way, the article discusses (...) various issues in population axiology, particularly the so-called Intuition of Neutrality and John Broome’s ‘greediness objection’ to this intuition. (shrink)

This important new book by a major voice in the Social Imaginaries movement offers the most systematic attempt to establish conceptual and historical links between the idea of modernity as a new civilization and the notion of multiple modernities. Arnason demonstrates a theory of globalization that is still compatible with the emphasis on unity and diversity of modernity as a civilization.

Relying on data collected by the Zurich Survey of Academics, a unique representative online survey among academics in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, this paper replicates Johann and Mayer's :175–196, 2019) analysis of researchers' perceptions of scientific authorship and expands their scope. The primary goals of the study at hand are to learn more about country differences in perceptions of scientific authorship, as well as the influence of perceived publication pressure on authorship perceptions. The results indicate that academics in Switzerland (...) interpret scientific authorship more leniently than their colleagues in Germany and Austria. The findings further indicate that, as perceived pressure to publish increases, researchers are more likely to belong to a group of academics who hold the view that any type of contribution/task justifies co-authorship, including even those contributions/tasks that do not justify co-authorship according to most authorship guidelines. In summary, the present study suggests that action is required to harmonize regulations for scientific authorship and to improve the research culture. (shrink)

Contents \t\t\t\t\t \tTRANSLATOR'S INTRODUCTION \t\t1 \t \tNOTE ON THE TRANSLATION \t\t39 \t OBSERVATIONS ON THE FEELING OF THE BEAUTIFUL AND SUBLIME \t\t\t\t\t \tSECTION ONE: \t\t\t\t \t\tOf the Distinct Objects of the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime \t\t45 \tSECTION TWO: \t\t\t\t \t\tOf the Attributes of the Beautiful and Sublime.

These selections provide a brief but comprehensive introduction to Fichte’s philosophical system and his place in the history of German Idealism. In addition to some of Fichte’s most influential texts, such as the First and Second Introductions to the Wissenschaftslehre and The Basis of Our Belief in a Divine Governance of the World, Breazeale has translated, for the first time into English, several other writings from the same period, including Attempt at a New Presentation of the Wissenschaftslehre, Other short essays, (...) including Fichte’s replies to the charge of atheism, extend the discussions of the Introductions and respond to criticisms. Breazeale’s substantial Introduction supplies the context needed for a sound appreciation of Fichte’s enterprise and achievement. (shrink)

In this book, a world-leading Ricoeur scholar examines Ricoeur's philosophy in relation to other major figures in contemporary French philosophy including Bourdieu, Derrida, Deleuze, Foucault, and Castoriadis.

This article provides an original reappraisal of the notion of Minnemystik in the work of the 13th-century Flemish beguine Hadewijch of Antwerp, with specific reference to its Trinitarian and Christological orientations. After an introduction to the nature and origins of Hadewijch’s work, relating to the discovery of four extant manuscripts in Belgium in 1838, followed by an elucidation of the experience-driven epistemology of the Victorians Richard of St Victor and Hugo of St Victor as her key early scholastic influences, Hadewijch’s (...) Minnemystik is distinguished from Wesenmystik, as encountered in the mystical work of her French contemporary and beguine counterpart, Marguerite Porete. From this discursive basis, Hadewijch’s Minnemystik is reassessed and represented as pertinently Trinitarian and Christological in orientation, and therefore as a theological presentation from the 13th century. (shrink)

Now this is disastrous, not only because the richest and most profound aspect of being is lost, but also because such an approach cannot avoid falsifying our understanding of the real. For only in the concrete experience of self--not a knowledge of a certain object that might be so designated, but as the absolutely incom- municable presence of the I --can the significance of being as an absolute and unconditioned value, which at the same time founds a radical plurality whose (...) unique terms resist absorption into a common denominator, be properly grasped. The idea of being envelopes the value of what is most intimate in the subject; the I who thinks being, and the act by which I think it, and my liberty which takes its stand in its presence, and whatever is most interior and most singular in my personal attitude--all this is being, and in being. And instead of relegating the subject to the investigations of some other branch of study, the self, we must insist, occupies a privileged place in metaphysics. It is the manifestation par excellence in which being presents itself to us as an absolute value and first reveals what it means really to exist. (shrink)

Bd. 1. 1791-1794.--Bd. 2. 1793-1795.--Bd. 3.--1794-1796.--Bd. 4. 1797-1798.--Bd. 5. 1798-1799.--Bd. 6. 1799-1800.--Bd. 7. 1800-1801.--Bd. 8. 1801-1806.--Bd. 9. 1806-1807.--Bd. 10. 1808-1812.

Authority is an important feature of military life. Political and military superiors claim the power to give binding orders to their subordinates. If they have the authority they claim (and that many citizens and soldiers take them to possess), then the subordinates are morally required to do as commanded. Tadros’ To Do, To Die, To Reason Why challenges the authority claims that political and military superiors make in giving orders: the kinds of considerations ordinarily thought to underpin their authority – (...) in particular, the instrumental benefits of authoritative decision-making in politics and military life – cannot justify it. Tadros’ claim is not that subordinates are never required to do what their superiors order. Trivially, superiors may order subordinates to do what they are anyway required to do. (The captain orders the privates not to kill the prisoners.) Less trivially, superiors’ orders may change the subordinates’ factual or epistemic circumstances, which results in their having duties that they would otherwise have lacked. (The captain orders a private to jump into the sea. His order startles a child on the shore so it loses its balance and plunges into the water. The private may now have a duty to jump in to save the child, and he may have that duty because the superior gave the order.) Yet this way of changing the subordinates’ duties is not, for Tadros, a genuine exercise of authority: authority brings about normative change directly, rather than by changing the subordinate’s factual or epistemic circumstances. It is authority so understood that, according to Tadros, military and political superiors claim and yet lack. Tadros offers two complementary arguments for this anarchist conclusion. First, he argues that superiors have practical authority over subordinates only if the subordinates have duties to obey (or follow) the superiors’ orders, rather than merely to conform with them (by doing something which happens to be what they were ordered to do). There must be a suitable link between order and action. But, Tadros argues, soldiers don’t have a duty to obey their superiors’ orders. (Call this the Obedience Claim.) So military superiors lack practical authority vis-à-vis their subordinates. (Call this the Authority Claim.) Second, Tadros argues that authority is either unjustified or otiose. Exercises of practical authority, by imposing duties, restrict their subjects’ freedom. Moral duties are difficult to justify precisely because they are freedom-restricting in this way; and only certain kinds of considerations suffice to make an action morally obligatory. Tadros argues that there are sufficient reasons for a superior to have and exercise the power to make ving morally obligatory by issuing a directive only if there are already sufficient reasons for ving being independently morally obligatory. (We call this the No Duty, No Authority Claim.) We challenge both arguments. Sections 2 and 3 show that, even if the Obedience Claim is true, it does not entail the Authority Claim. Section 4 casts doubt on the No Duty, No Authority Claim. (shrink)

This article investigates the palimpsest reception of Pseudo-Dionysius (ca. 500) in the metaphysics of Nicholas of Cusa (1401–1464). The article covers Cusa’s political theory and metaphysics, which are intertwined. Reading Cusa against the backdrop of an analysis of Pseudo-Dionysius’ metaphysics in a preceding article, the author, in a synthetic conclusion, isolates seven Dionysic ‘trails’ (S1 to S7) in Cusa’s metaphysics: the interpretation of transcendence as bound to immanence; the affirmation of God’s transcendence in the world (or a metaphysics of ‘creation (...) as teophany’); the radical transcendence and simultaneous radical immanence of God (that is, God as ‘Beingness’); fundamental restrictions of language and the analogical ‘Naming’ of God; creation as a system of dialectical symbols about God; the analogical participation of the subject in creation; and unification (reditus, the ‘flowing of things back to God’). The Dionysic trails in Cusa’s metaphysics are described as a noteworthy, if not important, palimpsest in the corpus of late Medieval philosophy and is indicative of what the author puts forward as ‘discursive memory’, which is presented as a modern-critical concept. (shrink)

Both, bioconservatives and bioliberals, should seek a discussion about ideas of human perfection, making explicit their underlying assumptions about what makes for a good human life. This is relevant, because these basic, and often implicit ideas, inform and influence judgements and choices about human enhancement interventions. Both neglect, and polemical but inconsistent use of the complex ideas of perfection are leading to confusion within the ethical debate about human enhancement interventions, that can be avoided by tackling the notion of perfection (...) directly. In the recent debates, bioconservatives have prominently argued against the ‘pursuit of perfection’ by biotechnological means. In the first part of this paper, we show that—paradoxically—bioconservatives themselves explicitly embrace specific conceptions of human perfection and perfectionist assumptions about the good human life in order to argue against the use of enhancement technologies. Yet, we argue that the bioconservative position contains an untenable ambiguity between criticising and endorsing ideas of human perfection. Hence, they stand in need of clarifying their stance on human perfection. In the second part of the paper, we ask whether bioliberals in fact (implicitly) advocate a particular conception of perfection, or whether they are right in holding that they do not, and that discussing perfection is obsolete anyway. We show that bioliberals also rely on a specific idea of human perfection, based on the idea of autonomy. Hence, their denial of the relevance of perfection in the debate is unconvincing and has to be revised. (shrink)

A presente tradução que ora se apresenta ao público brasileiro, realizou-se no seio do Projeto de Investigação «A recepção da Revolução Francesa pela Filosofia Alemã do final do século XVIII e início do século XIX», financiado pela Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia de Portugal, e fora realizada pela equipe de investigação composta por: Prof. Carlos Morujão, Profa. Inês Bolinhas, Prof. Miguel Santos Silva, Profa. Cláudia Oliveira e Profa. Teresa Pedro. Indicamos, entre parêntesis rectos, a paginação da edição da Gesamtausgabe (...) de Fichte, Tomo I/1.. Email de contato: [email protected]. (shrink)

T. 1. Logicam ontologiam et cosmologiam generalem complectens. pars 1. Discursus praeliminaris de philosophia in genere logica. pars 2. Ontologia cosmologia generalis -- T. 2. Psychologias, empiricam atqve rationalem, nec non theologiam natvralem complectens. pars 1. Psychologia empirica, psychologia rationalis. pars 2. Theologia naturalis.

Unter den Versuchen Fichtes, sein Denken allgemeinverständlich darzustellen, zählt diese 1800 erschienene Schrift zu den inhaltlich abgerundetsten und aufschlußreichsten; bei den Zeitgenossen stieß sie jedoch auf vehemente Kritik, Hegel sah in ihr gar einen besonders illustrativen Text für den Aufweis der Haltlosigkeit der von Fichte in der Wissenschaftslehre vertretenen Position einer auf das Ich als Tathandlung gegründeten Philosophie. Darum vermag allein schon die Lektüre von Fichtes Bestimmung des Menschen und ihrer kritischen Rezeption in Hegels Glauben und Wissen einen Einblick in (...) die Gründe zu vermitteln, warum bis ins 20. Jahrhundert die Philosophie Fichtes weitgehend als ein merkwürdiger Mosaikstein auf dem Wege "Von Kant bis Hegel" oder, im Hinblick auf den "Endpunkt" dieses Wegs wohl genauer, in der "Entwicklung des Spinozismus" betrachtet wurde. Deutlich wird einer neuen Lektüre aber auch, wieviel noch zu tun bleibt, um die wichtigen Erkenntnisse, die im Deutschen Idealismus auf so getrennten Bahnen gewonnen wurden, im Blick auf die gemeinsamen Grundprobleme einer "Ersten Philosophie" ohne Rückfall in die traditionellen Feindbilder wahrzunehmen und kritisch in die pluralistische Diskussion heutigen Philosophierens einzubringen. (shrink)

La limitation précisément de mon petit coin terrestre, l'aveuglement de mes regards, l'échec de mes desseins, l'énigme de mes penchants et de mes désirs, la défaite de mes forces qui ne sont faites que pour l'ensemble d'un jour, d'une année, d'une nation, d'un siècle - cela précisément me garantit que moi je ne suis rien, mais que l'ensemble est tout! Quelle œuvre, dont fait partie tant de groupes d'ombres de nations et d'époques, figures colossales presque dépourvues de point de vue (...) et de perspective, tant d'instruments aveugles qui tous agissent dans l'illusion de la liberté et pourtant ignorent ce qu'ils font et dans quel but ils agissent, dont le regard ne domine aucun ensemble et qui pourtant se joignent à l'action avec autant de zèle que si leur fourmilière était l'univers - quelle œuvre que cet ensemble! (shrink)

1. Wesensbetimmung, Grundprobleme und Disziplinen der Philosophie, von J. K. Mader, S 69.-.

This paper will bring Žižek’s divine violence as an Act, a means without end, into conversation with Derrida’s divine violence, différance and auto-deconstruction as the impossible possibility of justice. Although Žižek has, in his later works, conceded to his indebtedness to Derrida, there are certain important differences between the two thinkers. The paper will focus on their respective interpretations of divine violence and the link to minimal difference (Žižek) or différance (Derrida). Their respective interpretations of divine violence will be further (...) explored with regards to Derrida’s auto-deconstruction as a kind of Heideggerian Gelassenheit and Žižek’s interpretation of the Lacanian Act. Critchley criticises Žižek for being too Gelassen in his dream of patiently waiting for an absolute, divine, cataclysmic revolutionary act of divine violence. This patient waiting or non-violent violence will be read within the context of Derrida’s auto-deconstruction: a means (an Act/Event) without specific end. The second part of the paper will explore a re-reading or inter-textual reading of John’s Gospel within the context of the above conversation. The reading will specifically focus on the Christ-event, creating an alternative community to the Roman Empire as it transverses the primal fantasy of this empire. This will be translated into the context of the contemporary neo-liberal fantasy, namely John’s alternative Christian community as a community of subjects who enjoy their symptom. As such a community they present a non-violent violent transversion of the primal fantasy of for example neo-liberalism. Such a community could be interpreted as a community of non-action action with an auto-deconstructive ethos: the divine violence of the Christ-event. (shrink)