Word learning is basic to foreign language acquisition, however time consuming and not always successful. Empirical studies have shown that traditional (visual) word learning can be enhanced by gestures. The gesture benefit has been attributed to depth of encoding. Gestures can lead to depth of encoding because they trigger semantic processing and sensorimotor enrichment of the novel word. However, the neural underpinning of depth of encoding is still unclear. Here, we combined an fMRI and a behavioral study to investigate word (...) encoding online. In the scanner, participants encoded 30 novel words of an artificial language created for experimental purposes and their translation into the subjects’ native language. Participants encoded the words three times visually, audiovisually, and by additionally observing semantically related gestures performed by an actress. Hemodynamic activity during word encoding revealed the recruitment of cortical areas involved in stimulus processing. In this study, depth of encoding can be spelt out in terms of sensorimotor brain networks that grow larger the more sensory modalities are linked to the novel word. Word retention outside the scanner documented a positive effect of gestures in a free recall test in the short-term. (shrink)

This book represents a considerable revision and expansion of Public Choice II. Six new chapters have been added, and several chapters from the previous edition have been extensively revised. The discussion of empirical work in public choice has been greatly expanded. As in the previous editions, all of the major topics of public choice are covered. These include: why the state exists, voting rules, federalism, the theory of clubs, two-party and multiparty electoral systems, rent seeking, bureaucracy, interest groups, dictatorship, the (...) size of government, voter participation, and political business cycles. Normative issues in public choice are also examined including a normative analysis of the simple majority rule, Bergson–Samuelson social welfare functions, the Arrow and Sen impossibility theorems, Rawls's social contract theory and the constitutional political economy of Buchanan and Tullock. (shrink)

Both early and later forms of Buddhism developed a set of arguments to demonstrate that the self is an illusion. This article begins with a brief review of some of the arguments but then proceeds to show that these arguments are not themselves sufficient to dispel the illusion. It analyzes three ways in which the illusion of self manifests itself – as wish fulfillment, as a cognitive illusion, and as a phenomenal illusion. With respect to this last, the article reviews (...) some recent developments in cognitive neuropsychology and neuroscience to discuss the way in which the phenomenal illusion of self is encoded within our brain processes. This article also considers the way in which the illusion of self is constructed through social interaction, by episodic memory, and by narrative construction. Finally, it focuses on how the illusion of self developed as an evolutionary necessity to make it possible for the human organism to navigate physical and social reality; and that it continues to be useful today. This poses a dilemma for the Buddhist soteriological project of extinguishing the illusion of self. Specifically, while it is possible to develop a non-self perspective though the continued practice of vipassanā, it is not possible to maintain it consistently. The article concludes that even fully enlightened individuals must sometimes oscillate between a non-self perspective and a self-perspective and suggests an analogy between this oscillation and what occurs in the Kanizsa square illusion. (shrink)

In the 21st century, we increasingly live in a Nietzschean world. What was once feared as ‘nihilism,’ the loss of all final certainties and absolutes, or ‘relativism,’ that everything relates to a standpoint, has become a lived reality for many people today. Especially younger generations have learned to affirm the living conditions of uncertainty and temporality by eclectically adopting ways of life, routines, and orientations in individual ways for only certain periods of time. Digital technologies, especially the smart phone, have (...) widened our horizons permitting immediate access to different cultures and orientation worlds. Never before have we lived in a world that is as multi-perspectival, fast-paced, and uncertain, while never before have there been so many opportunities for actions. At the same time, people increasingly orient themselves in similar ways to a dominant morality that abbreviates reality and narrows down opportunities of action according to the guiding values of equality and reciprocity, as Nietzsche predicted it. Under these conditions, Nietzsche’s art of living is particularly relevant in many orientation worlds today, especially those of entrepreneurship, business, and our everyday life. -/- This contribution focuses on three aspects of Nietzsche’s art of living that have become relevant today especially in the United States (but not only here): first, regarding some facets of the economic-political conditions of any contemporary art of living; second, the widespread adoption of Nietzsche’s notion of self-overcoming and artistic self-design in entrepreneurship and individual’s lives; and third, how his notion of ‘incorporation’ has been further developed in current approaches to habit design. Eventually I will show via the example of Anthony Robbins that some notions of Nietzsche’s art of living have become most popular outside of academia, namely in the commercial industries of what has been called ‘self-growth’ or ‘self-development.’. (shrink)

Marx’s theory of ground rent has been widely used to help understand the trinity of land, labor, and capital. However, limited attention has been paid to the role of water within the Marxian rent framework. This lack of attention proves troubling due to the role of surface waters as an essential means of production throughout capitalism. Here I restate Marxian ground rent in the form of water rent and discuss the function of water-rent in the two dominant surface water rights (...) doctrines of the United States—the riparian doctrine and the doctrine of prior appropriation. In doing so, I revise the distinction between differential rent 1 and differential rent 2 to provide more analytically useful categories. Paying special attention to issues of drought and scarcity, I fully articulate the function of Marxian rent and its four forms for both surface water rights doctrines, while clearly stating where they do and do not differ. (shrink)

Wie können Freiheit und Widerstand innerhalb von Foucaults Theorie der Macht und Subjektivierung konzipiert werden? Karsten Schubert liefert die erste systematische Rekonstruktion der sozialphilosophischen Debatte um Freiheit bei Foucault und eine neue Lösung für das Freiheitsproblem: Freiheit als die Fähigkeit zur reflexiven Kritik der eigenen Subjektivierung - kurz: Freiheit als Kritik - ist das Resultat von freiheitlicher Subjektivierung in politischen Institutionen. Der Band zeigt so die Konsequenzen von Foucaults Freiheitsdenken für die Demokratietheorie und die allgemeine sozialphilosophische Freiheitsdiskussion auf.

Band 1. Bücher 1, 3, 7 und 8 -- Band 2. Bücher 2, 4, 5 und 6.

Das neue Versorgungsrecht für Beamte, Richter und Pensionäre Erhebliche Kostensteigerungen der öffentlichen Haushalte, die zunehmende Zahl der Versorgungsempfänger und deren längere Lebensdauer, aber auch die politische Fortentwicklung der Beamtenversorgung im Einklang mit dem Rentenrecht haben zu zahlreichen und gravierenden Änderungen - aus der Sicht der Beamten und Pensionäre meist Verschlechterungen - des für alle Dienstherrn in Bund und Ländern einheitlichen Rechts der Beamtenversorgung geführt. Dieser Praxiskommentar enthält zahlreiche Anwendungshilfen, Beispiele und Modellrechnungen. Bestens geeignet für jeden Beamten, insbesondere für die mit (...) der Beamtenversorgung befassten Personalleiter und Sachbearbeiter sowie Gewerkschaften des öffentlichen Dienstes. (shrink)

The basic hypothesis of this book is that linguistic reference to kinds should be seen as reference to sortal concepts, i.e. cognitive categories for identifying and classifying objects. Viewed that way, kinds serve as the interface between the conceptual system and the grammatical system. Kind-level predicates differ as to whether they presuppose (e.g. to be extinct) or entail (e.g. to invent) the existence of objects, with crucial consequences for the interpretation of indefinite argument noun phrases. Moreover, object reference always involves (...) underlying kind reference, but kind reference does not always involve object reference. This asymmetry, once recognized, proves useful in solving otherwise puzzling problems in semantic composition. (shrink)

This book comprises a series of essays exploring the transformative insights of Fichte, Herder, Humboldt and the Romantics into the seminal role of language and imagination in shaping human experience and art, including how language, self-consciousness and understanding arise through speech. Along with topics concerning the literary work of art, the philosophy of history, German humanities, philology, and semiotics, the author also discusses the place of phenomenology and the concept of interpretation in literary theory. In highlighting ideas from A. W. (...) Vico, F. Schlegel, Novalis, Germaine de Staël, and Schleiermacher, the author also elucidates romantic poetics, translation, discourse and cultural transfer themes. Das vorliegende Werk umfasst eine Reihe hermeneutischer Abhandlungen des Autors, in deren Fokus die Deutung der Sprachauffassungen Fichtes, Herders, Humboldts und der Romantiker steht. Der Autor untersucht dabei die Formierung von Erfahrung und Kunst durch Sprache und Einbildungskraft sowie die Entstehung von Sprache, Selbstbewusstsein und Verstehen in der Rede. Desgleichen behandelt er Semiotik, Philologie und Philosophie der Geschichte, sowie die Rolle der Phänomenologie und des Interpretationsbegriffs in der Literaturkritik. Im Besonderen hebt der Autor die Auffassungen von Vico, A.W. und F. Schlegel, Novalis, Germaine de Staël, F. Schleiermacher hervor und beleuchtet Übersetzungs-, Diskurs- und Kulturtransfertheorien sowie die Poetik der Romantiker. (shrink)

Karsten M. Thiel interpretiert die Genealogie der Moral neu. Er rückt Nietzsches Kritik an der Geschichtsschreibung ins Zentrum der Betrachtung und nimmt so seiner Moralkritik alles Schrille, das ihr gewöhnlich anhaftet. Für Nietzsche muss die Geschichtsschreibung über einen belastbaren Begriff von Vergangenheit verfügen. Doch wie konnte es zu einer Geschichtsschreibung ohne einen solchen Begriff überhaupt kommen? Nietzsches Antwort ist verblüffend. Für ihn war Geschichtsschreibung bisher fast immer teleologisch, ausgerichtet auf ein Ideal statt auf die Vergangenheit. Sein Gegenmodell ist die (...) Genealogie: Sinn vergeht, indem er von späterem Sinn "überschrieben" wird. In der Genealogie der Moral ist ein solches Überschreiben mehrfach zu beobachten. die Sklavenmoral erobert den Sinn der Herrenmoral, der archaische Vertrag zwischen Schuldner und Gläubiger wird immer wieder neu ausgelegt, wird zu Gerechtigkeit, schlechtem Gewissen und Schuld. (shrink)

To be a prisoner either in Plato's cave or in the Beast's castle is a form of existence no one would desire. And yet the story of Disney's Beauty and the Beast – in particular, the spell that imprisoned the Beast and his servants – is a tale as old as time. It is one's common human experience: one's recognition that he/she is shackled by ignorance and unfulfilled potential, and his/her desperate desire to escape. Unfortunately, however, breaking the chains and (...) ending the spell is no easy feat. For just as the Beast and his household companions represent a cave‐like imprisonment, Belle represents in her person the two ideals necessary to break the spell: love (which drew her to the castle to find her father) and beauty (which can compel the love of another). Love never happens without an encounter with beauty. (shrink)

Der Tagungsband beinhaltet fünfzehn Beiträge einer interdisziplinären Tagung des wissenschaftlichen, bildungsorientierten und gemeinnützigen Arbeitskreises philosophierender Ingenieure und Naturwissenschaftler (APHIN) e.V. Der Band umfasst Aufsätze aus dem Spannungsfeld von Philosophie, Ingenieur- und Naturwissenschaften und Aufsätze, die diesen Bereich transzendieren. Alle Beiträge spiegeln die Neugierde und Freude wider, über den eigenen fachlichen Tellerrand hinauszuschauen. Und sie zeigen, dass der Philosophie hierbei eine Schlüsselrolle zukommt. Das Selbstverständnis von APHIN – die Offenheit für die Fragen und Probleme der jeweils anderen – ist damit in (...) allen Beiträgen gegenwärtig. (shrink)

The case describes the developments of an ethics code observed in the local government of Suffolk County, New York, USA. In Suffolk County, there is now a dedicated Board of Ethics Agency (“Board”) within the local government to ensure that business operations and government operations run as ethically compliant as possible. This Board was created in 2012 in order to follow compliance with a law that established a replacement for the Ethics Commission (previously existing within Suffolk County) because this Ethics (...) Commission had been involved in a serious controversy. The former County Executive, Steve Levy, was found guilty of compromising the “integrity of an ethics commission”. Suffolk County government prescribed various measures in order to ensure that the citizens of Suffolk County were protected from business ethical violations. The Board also preemptively created laws that discouraged businesses from acting unethically. (shrink)

Foucault's theory of power and subjectification challenges common concepts of freedom in social philosophy and expands them through the concept of 'freedom as critique': Freedom can be defined as the capability to critically reflect one's own subjectification, and the conditions of possibility for this critical capacity lie in political and social institutions. The article develops this concept through a critical discussion of the standard response by Foucault interpreters to the standard objection that Foucault's thinking obscures freedom. The standard response interprets (...) Fou-cault's later works, especially The Subject and Power, as a solution to the problem of freedom. It is mistaken, because it conflates different concepts of freedom that are present in Foucault's work. By differentiating these concepts, this paper proposes a new institutionalist approach to solve the problem of freedom that breaks with the partly anarchist underpinnings of Foucault scholarship: As freedom as critique is not given, but itself a result of subjectification, it entails a demand for 'modal robustness' and must therefore be institutionalized. This approach helps to draw out the consequences of Foucault's thinking on freedom for postfoundationalist democratic theory and the general social-philosophical discussion on freedom. (shrink)

Der demographische Wandel, die Veränderung von Akteurskonstellationen und Besitzverhältnissen, Suburbanisierungsprozesse, die Energiewende sowie neue private und öffentliche Nutzungsansprüche an Raum und Landschaft schaffen neue kulturelle, soziale, ökonomische, ökologische und politische Herausforderungen. Architektonische und planerische Disziplinen sind daher zur Zusammenarbeit aufgerufen, um die Herausforderungen der Zukunft bei der nachhaltigen Gestaltung, Nutzung und Schonung einer weiterhin bewohnbaren Welt annehmen, begleiten und mitsteuern zu können. Die Beiträge dieses Bandes gehen daher der Frage nach, ob und wie das wissenschaftstheoretische Konzept der Transdisziplinarität so genutzt (...) werden kann, dass die aspekthaften Ergebnisse der vielen Landschaftsforschungen und die ausserwissenschaftlichen Ansprüche lebensweltlicher Akteure wieder zusammengeführt und auf gemeinsame Forschungsperspektiven und Anwendungskontexte hin organisiert werden können. (shrink)

Die 'Musica' ist in Weltvorstellungen des Mittelalters und der Frühen Neuzeit oft nicht nur ein Bestandteil des Wissens neben vielen anderen, sondern stellt ein übergeordnetes Ordnungsprinzip dar. Erstmals untersucht dieses Buch die genaue Stellung von Musik innerhalb der universalen Ordnung der Dinge, wie sie sich in enzyklopädischen Texten auch jenseits des fachdisziplinären Diskurses darstellt. Anhand zentraler Leitthemen wie Produktivität, Kombinatorik und Kosmologie führt die Untersuchung von der mittelalterlichen Logik Ramon Llulls über zahlreiche Stationen bis hin zur Weltkonzeption Athanasius Kirchers. Noch (...) im 17. Jahrhundert, so wird deutlich, kann die Rolle der Musik nur vor dem Hintergrund der anhaltenden Wirksamkeit mystischer, magischer und kosmologischer Denkweisen verstanden werden. (shrink)

"Examines Western culture's... alienation from nature by focusing on the relationship between people and salmon--weaving together key narratives about the Norwegian salmon industry as well as wild salmon in indigenous cultures of the Pacific Northwest"--Amazon.com.

While readers of Euripides' Hippolytus have long regarded Phaedra's deltos as a mechanism of punitive revenge, I argue here that the tablet models itself on a judicial curse (defixio) and that its main function is to ensure victory for Phaedra in the upcoming “trial” over her reputation. In support of my thesis I examine three interrelated phenomena: first, Hippolytus' infamous assertion that his tongue swore an oath while his mind remains unsworn (612); second, Phaedra's status as a biaiothanatos; and third, (...) Phaedra's claim that Hippolytus “will learn sophrosune” (731), a speech act that, I conclude, anticipates the silencing effect on Hippolytus of Phaedra's death and her writing. (shrink)

In this timely and wide-ranging study, Karsten Stueber argues that empathy is epistemically central for our folk-psychological understanding of other agents--that it is something we cannot do without in order to gain understanding of other minds. Setting his argument in the context of contemporary philosophy of mind and the interdisciplinary debate about the nature of our mindreading abilities, Stueber counters objections raised by some in the philosophy of social science and argues that it is time to rehabilitate the empathy (...) thesis.Empathy, regarded at the beginning of the twentieth century as the fundamental method of gaining knowledge of other minds, has suffered a century of philosophical neglect. Stueber addresses the plausible philosophical misgivings about empathy that have been responsible for its failure to gain widespread philosophical acceptance.Crucial in this context is his defense of the assumption, very much contested in contemporary philosophy of mind, that the notion of rational agency is at the core of folk psychology. Stueber then discusses the contemporary debate between simulation theorists--who defend various forms of the empathy thesis--and theory theorists. In distinguishing between basic and reenactive empathy, he provides a new interpretive framework for the investigation into our mindreading capacities. Finally, he considers epistemic objections to empathy raised by the philosophy of social science that have been insufficiently discussed in contemporary debates. Empathy theorists, Stueber writes, should be prepared to admit that, although empathy can be regarded as the central default mode for understanding other agents, there are certain limitations in its ability to make sense of other agents; and there are supplemental theoretical strategies available to overcome these limitations. (shrink)

ArgumentIn 1877, a young mathematician named Joseph Boussinesq presented amémoireto theAcadémiedes sciences which demonstrated that some differential equations may have more than one solution. Boussinesq linked this fact to indeterminism and to a possible solution to the free will versus determinism debate. Boussinesq's main interest was to reconcile his philosophical and religious views with science by showing that matter and motion do not suffice to explain all there is in the world. His argument received mixed criticism that addressed both his (...) philosophical views and the scientific content of his work, pointing to the physical “realisticness” of multiple solutions. While Boussinesq proved to be able to face the philosophical criticism, the scientific objections became a serious problem, thus slowly moving the focus of the debate from the philosophical plane to the scientific one. This change of perspective implied a wide discussion on topics such as instability, the sensitivity to initial conditions, and the conservation of energy. The Boussinesq debate is an example of a philosophically motivated debate that transforms into a scientific one, an example of the influence of philosophy on the development of science. (shrink)

Ethical evaluation of deep brain stimulation as a treatment for Parkinson’s disease is complicated by results that can be described as involving changes in the patient’s identity. The risk of becoming another person following surgery is alarming for patients, caregivers and clinicians alike. It is one of the most urgent conceptual and ethical problems facing deep brain stimulation in Parkinson’s disease at this time. In our paper we take issue with this problem on two accounts. First, we elucidate what is (...) meant by “becoming another person” from a conceptual point of view. After critically discussing two broad approaches we concentrate on the notion of “individual identity” which centers on the idea of “core attitudes”. Subsequently we discuss several approaches to determine what distinguishes core attitudes from those that are more peripheral. We argue for a “foundational-function model” highlighting the importance of specific dependency relations between these attitudes. Our second aim is to comment on the possibility to empirically measure changes in individual identity and argue that many of the instruments now commonly used in selecting and monitoring DBS-patients are inappropriate for this purpose. Future research in this area is advised combining a conceptual and an empirical approach as a basis of sound ethical appraisal. (shrink)

The content of a work of literature, Walter Benjamin reminds us in “The Author as Producer,” is inextricably bound up with its form. Hence, it is hardly astounding that much critical attention has been focused on the proper generic classification of Harriet E. Wilson’s Our Nig . This task, though, has not been easy. Henry Louis Gates, rediscoverer and earliest critic of Our Nig, for example, goes to great length discussing parallels between Wilson’s work and Nina Baym’s ‘overplot’ of the (...) ‘women’s novel,’ before settling on reading it as a new form of distinctly African-American lit- erature that combines “conventions of the sentimental novel with certain key conventions of the slave narratives” . Elizabeth Ammons, by contrast, places Our Nig squarely in the feminist tradition of the sentimental novel and argues that “the ideal of mother love explicit in Uncle Tom’s Cabin operates implicitly in Our Nig.” 4 2 3 Contesting Ammons’ claim, Eric Gardner asserts that Our Nig is not a ‘novel of abolition’ but “a novel about Northern racial issues, a young black woman’s bildungsroman, and, as such, is far from Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” 5 Echoing some of Gardner’s points, Elizabeth Breau contends that Our Nig “is actually satiric” and therefore gives an overly “bleak picture of northern antebellum society.” Foregrounding neither Bildung nor “ironic inversions” but the “politics of rage at work in Wilson’s tale,” Julia Stern argues that Our Nig “used the sentimental form to mask a gothic message.” 7 Rejecting Gates’ attempt to posit Our Nig as “a significant beginning of an African-American literary mode, a distinctive first in a century of firsts,” John Ernest wants to read Wilson’s work as a traditional “blend of autobiography and fiction,” hoping to ‘re-place’ it “within the racial, gender, and economic matrix of secular history.” R.J. Ellis, while accepting Gates’ assessment that Our Nig “draw[s] on the genres of sentimental fiction and abolitionist slave narrative,” stresses the ways in which the ‘hybrid’ work “fractures generic boundaries” in order to provide a “full retrieval of Frado’s pain, her experience of body politics.” Lastly, offering a reading that links Our Nig to the Puritan tradition, Elizabeth West argues that Our Nig “manipulates well-known trappings of the conversion narrative” by telling “the story of the heroine’s failed initiation into the community of earthly saints.”. (shrink)

Derek Parfit defends the Imprecise Lexical View as a way to avoid the Repugnant Conclusion. Allowing for ‘imprecise equality’, Parfit argues, makes it possible to avoid some well-known problems for the Lexical View. It is demonstrated that the Lexical View has stronger implications than envisaged by Parfit; moreover, his assumption of Non-diminishing Marginal Value makes the Lexical View collapse into a much stronger view, which lets the two appear incompatible. Introducing imprecise equality does not address the latter problem. But it (...) does makes it possible for the Imprecise Lexical View to soften the discontinuities it would otherwise face, at the cost of blurring the difference between options.However, if Non-diminishing Marginal Value is rejected, the remaining complications for the resulting most plausible version of the Imprecise Lexical View, including a confrontation with Arrhenius’ Non-Elitism Condition, may be within a range where the view largely remains defensible. (shrink)

The pre-1932 writings of Otto Kirchheimer are often described by researchers as the work of a young ‘left-Schmittian’, a radical Marxist who gave the anti-liberal critique and theoretical apparatus of his Doktorvater Carl Schmitt a new purpose for different ‘political ends’. The danger of this approach is that fundamental divisions between the societal conceptualizations of both theoreticians are ignored in lieu of apparent terminological similarity. Through the lens of economy, it is therefore the intent of this article to continue in (...) the tradition of Alfons Söllner and Frank Schale, pushing against this assumed affinity and highlighting Otto Kirchheimer’s unique defense of liberal democracy. (shrink)

The fearful ape hypothesis revolves around our ability to express and perceive fearfulness. Here, we address these abilities from a social learning perspective which casts fearfulness in a slightly different light. Our commentary argues that any theory that characterizes a (human) social signal as being adaptive, needs to address the role of social learning as an alternative candidate explanation.

I shall argue that the solution to the ecological crisis will require a combined political-economic and psychological-spiritual approach. Specifically, I will argue that while there is no way to avoid eco-catastrophe within the framework of capitalism, ecosocialism understood as a political-economic construct focused wholly or even primarily on the survival and flourishing of our species is not a sufficient solution and could, in its anthropocentric and productivist form, exacerbate the problem. What is needed is an understanding of ecosocialism that is (...) both biocentric and ecocentric, an ecosocialism that is sensitive to the suffering and inherent value of the members of other species as well as to the inherent value of whole ecosystems. It will require a new radically different mode of being and a radically new sensibility. I will argue that Buddhism can make a valuable contribution both to the construction of such a society and to the political praxis necessary to achieve it. (shrink)

James Griffin has considered a form of superiority in value that is weaker than lexical priority as a possible remedy to the Repugnant Conclusion. In this article, I demonstrate that, in a context where value is additive, this weaker form collapses into the stronger form of superiority. And in a context where value is non-additive, weak superiority does not amount to a radical value difference at all. These results are applied on one of Larry Temkin's cases against transitivity. I demonstrate (...) that Temkin appeals to two conflicting notions of aggregation. I then spell out the consequences of these results for different interpretations of Griffin's suggestion regarding population ethics. None of them comes out very successful, but perhaps they nevertheless retain some interest. (shrink)