The so called ‘Prose Edda’ or ‘Snorra Edda’, usually dated to the third decade of the 13th century, contains after a short prologue two substantial sections dealing mainly with mythography and poetics and a long concluding skaldic poem. In the extant medieval manuscripts from around 1300 and the beginning of the 14th century, additional material like genealogies, grammatical treatises, etc. is included. The present paper focuses on one of the earliest of these manuscripts, codex DG 11 4to, University Library Uppsala, (...) and analyses some central features of the specific way in which it presents different narrative layers. For the first time, this analysis combines a study of textual and visual aspects of the manuscript, and special attention is given to two of the many illustrations in this codex. Together with later scribal notes, the drawings contribute heavily to the process of framing, which is one of the main features of the ‘Prose Edda’. This process of creating potentially endless narrative and visual frames is part of the text‘s ambition to establish a distance to the traditional pagan myths and to facilitate new fictional possibilities. (shrink)

Deliberative democracy is now an influential approach to the study of democracy and political behaviour. Its key proposition is that, in politics, it is not only power that counts, but good discussions and arguments too. This book examines the interplay between the normative and empirical aspects of the deliberative model of democracy. Jürg Steiner presents the main normative controversies in the literature on deliberation, including self-interest, civility and truthfulness. He then summarizes the empirical literature on deliberation and proposes methods by (...) which the level of deliberation can be measured rather than just assumed. Steiner's empirical research is based in the work of various research groups, including experiments with ordinary citizens in the deeply divided societies of Colombia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Belgium, as well as Finland and the European Union. Steiner draws normative implications from a combination of both normative controversies and empirical findings. (shrink)

The paper explores the main paradigmatic failures of structural functionalism in anthropology. Structural functionalism explains institutions and social behavior by their contribution to the reproduction of social structure. Starting from Radcliffe-Brown and Malinowski, who represent two main variants of functionalism in anthropology, its main paradigmatic problems are discussed: its inability to analyze social conflict and change, its reducing of society to norms and values as well as its mode of explaining social facts. These failures are illustrated by two functional theories (...) of tribal wars, by Evans-Pritchard and by Rappaport. Various theoretical alternatives emerge from the decline of functionalism in anthropology. Conflict theory as well as game theory, new institutionalism, theories of collective action and evolutionary economics represent true alternatives. This again is illustrated by a theory of tribal war, explaining cooperation both within local groups and between allies against the background of the warlike social environment in which local groups are interacting. (shrink)

. We explore a connection between different ways of representing information in computer science. We show that relational databases, modules, algebraic specifications and constraint systems all satisfy the same ten axioms. A commutative semigroup together with a lattice satisfying these axioms is then called an “information algebra”. We show that any compact consequence operator satisfying the interpolation and the deduction property induces an information algebra. Conversely, each finitary information algebra can be obtained from a consequence operator in this way. Finally (...) we show that arbitrary (not necessarily finitary) information algebras can be represented as some kind of abstract relational database called a tuple system. (shrink)

'Deliberative politics' refers to the role of conversation and arguments in politics. Until recently discussion of deliberative politics took place almost exclusively among political philosophers, but many questions raised in this philosophical discussion cry out for empirical investigation. This book provides the first extended empirical study of deliberative politics, addressing, in particular, questions of the preconditions and consequences of high level deliberation. Using parliamentary debates in Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States as an empirical base, the authors (...) measure the level of deliberation by constructing a 'Discourse Quality Index'. As deliberative politics moves to the forefront of political theory, this book makes an important contribution to deliberative democracy. (shrink)

Sartori (1970) warned a long time ago of the danger of concept stretching for effective and cumulative theory building. Such concept stretching has happened with regard to deliberation, which has become a very faddish term. For theoretically well-founded empirical research it is better conceptually to distinguish clearly between strategic bargaining and deliberation, although in the empirical political world the two concepts are usually heavily intertwined. Keywords deliberation; concept stretching; strategic bargaining.

While previous studies have analyzed mean neurophysiological responses to musical stimuli, the current study aimed to identify specific time courses of electroencephalography (EEG) oscillations, which are associated with dynamic changes in the acoustic features of the musical stimulus. In addition, we were interested in whether these time courses change during a repeated presentation of the same musical piece. A total of 16 subjects repeatedly listened to the well-known aria “Nessun dorma,” sung by Paul Potts, while continuous 128-channel EEG and heart (...) rate, as well as electrodermal responses, were recorded. The time courses for the EEG oscillations were calculated using a time resolution of 1 second for several frequency bands, on the basis of individual alpha-peak frequencies (theta, low alpha-1, low alpha-2, upper alpha, and beta). For all frequency bands, we identified a more or less continuous increase in power relative to a baseline period, indicating strong event-related synchronization (ERS) during music listening. The ERS time courses, however, did not correlate strongly with the time courses of the acoustic features of the aria. In addition, we did not observe changes in EEG oscillations after repeated presentation of the same musical piece. Aside from this distinctive feature, we identified a remarkable variability in EEG oscillations, both within and between the repeated presentations of the aria. We interpret the continuous increase in ERS observed in all frequency bands during music listening as an indicator of a particular neurophysiological and psychological state evoked by music listening. We suggest that this state is characterized by increased internal attention (accompanied by reduced external attention), increased inhibition of brain networks not involved in the generation of this internal state, the maintenance of a particular level of general alertness, and a type of brain state that can be described as “mind wandering.” The overall state can be categorized as a psychological process that may be seen as a “drawing in” to the musical piece. However, this state is not stable and varies considerably throughout the music listening session and across subjects. Most important, however, is the finding that the neurophysiological activations occurring during music listening are dynamic and not stationary. (shrink)

How does affectivity contribute to moral judgment making? -- Normative dissonance vs. the order of argumentation -- Facing otherness as an ethical experiment -- The concepts of respect revisited -- What is universal? Between subjectivity and intersubjectivity -- Experimenting with values in legal contexts : Hegel and Radbruch -- Democracy begins in the mind. Developing democratic personality.

EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION The present volume belongs to the theory of historical process. That domain of science seems to be as made as all the theoretical ...

From the local level to international politics, deliberation helps to increase mutual understanding and trust, in order to arrive at political decisions of high epistemic value and legitimacy. This book gives deliberation a dynamic dimension, analysing how levels of deliberation rise and fall in group discussions, and introducing the concept of 'deliberative transformative moments' and how they can be applied to deeply divided societies, where deliberation is most needed but also most difficult to work. Discussions between ex-guerrillas and ex-paramilitaries in (...) Colombia, Serbs and Bosnjaks in Bosnia-Herzegovina, and police officers and locals in Brazilian favelas are used as case studies, with participants addressing how peace can be attained in their countries. Allowing access to the records and transcripts of the discussions opens an opportunity for practitioners of conflict resolution to apply this research to their work in trouble spots of the world, creating a link between the theory and practice of deliberation. (shrink)

This study examines the consequences of computerization for women who do information work. Syntheses of research findings from both the general social science literature and the business and management periodical literature are compared with each other. The two bodies of research results converge with respect to employment consequences and shifts in work, but differ markedly when it comes to control of the labor process and training. In contrast to social scientists, management researchers pay scant attention to differential gender effects of (...) microcomputer deployment. Similarities and differences between the two research traditions show that social science and business research, if combined, yield a better understanding of the changes prompted by new information technology. (shrink)

Quines These der Unterdeterminiertheit empirischer Theorien, der gemäß es in ihrem theoretischen Gehalt verschiedene, aber dennoch empirisch äquivalente Theorien geben kann, ist nach wie vor mit Unklarheiten behaftet. Eine genaue Analyse der entscheidenden Textstellen zeigt, daß die These offensichtiich nur auf nicht-kompakte Theorienformulierungen angewendet werden kann, daß aber das Kriterium der Kompaktheit recht schwer zu verstehen ist. Darüberhinaus erweist sich der Ausdruck „empirischer Gehalt" als ebenso klärungsbedürftig wie „theoretischer Gehalt". Beide Ausdrücke sind jedoch für das Verständnis der These von entscheidender (...) Bedeutung. Es zeigt sich, daß so dem Versuch einer befriedigenden Interpretation trotz der Modifikationen, die Quine seit der Lancierung der These in On Empirically Equivalent Systems of the World vorgenommmen hat, beträchtliche Schwierigkeiten im Wege stehen. (shrink)

Quines These der Unterdeterminiertheit empirischer Theorien, der gemäß es in ihrem theoretischen Gehalt verschiedene, aber dennoch empirisch äquivalente Theorien geben kann, ist nach wie vor mit Unklarheiten behaftet. Eine genaue Analyse der entscheidenden Textstellen zeigt, daß die These offensichtiich nur auf nicht-kompakte Theorienformulierungen angewendet werden kann, daß aber das Kriterium der Kompaktheit recht schwer zu verstehen ist. Darüberhinaus erweist sich der Ausdruck „empirischer Gehalt" als ebenso klärungsbedürftig wie „theoretischer Gehalt". Beide Ausdrücke sind jedoch für das Verständnis der These von entscheidender (...) Bedeutung. Es zeigt sich, daß so dem Versuch einer befriedigenden Interpretation trotz der Modifikationen, die Quine seit der Lancierung der These in On Empirically Equivalent Systems of the World vorgenommmen hat, beträchtliche Schwierigkeiten im Wege stehen. (shrink)

Questions of research ethics are raised when deliberative research is done in war situations.

On the basis of Swiss decision cases it is investigated to what extent politicians are guided by their conscience about the common good or political self interest.

We review a proposal of how to complete non-relativistic Quantum Mechanics to a physically meaningful, mathematically precise and logically coherent theory. This proposal has been dubbed ETH-Approach to Quantum Mechanics, “E” standing for “Events,” “T” for “Trees,” and “H” for “Histories.” The ETH-Approach supplies the last one of three pillars Quantum Mechanics can be constructed upon in such a way that its foundations are solid and stable. Two of these pillars are well known. The third one has been proposed quite (...) recently; it implies a general non-linear stochastic law for the time-evolution of states of individual physical systems. (shrink)

Authentic feelings like respect and similar moral emotions already start to develop in preverbal infants. However, our schooling systems offer only very few opportunities to train respectful behavior. Marsal, Dobashi, and Nowak introduce four interactive exercices in order to implement them in the moral and democratic education. All exercices are based on Martens’ Five Finger Method and on the didactic experiences made by authors in Germany, Japan, and Poland too.

Dans la formulation classique habermassienne du modèle délibératif, les arguments doivent être justifiés d’une façon rationnelle, reliant logiquement des raisons à des conclusions. Sur la base de données empiriques, il est montré que les histoires personnelles ont également un rôle à jouer pour une bonne délibération, créant l’empathie à l’égard des besoins des autres. Plus généralement, les émotions ne devraient pas être exclues de la délibération.