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)

The principles of responsible bioentrepreneurship are a call for multiple stakeholders to engage in a manifold discourse driving a solution-oriented innovation process.

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.

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)

Originally published in 1968, Karsten Harries's classic work provides a philosophical understanding of how modern art differs fundamentally from the art of earlier periods.

Journal of Philosophy of Education, EarlyView.

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)

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)

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.

This article will defend the centrality of empathy and simulation for our understanding of individual agency within the conceptual framework of folk psychology. It will situate this defense in the context of recent developments in the theory of mind debate. Moreover, the article will critically discuss narrativist conceptions of social cognition that conceive of themselves as alternatives to both simulation and theory theory.

This paper asks whether the genuine representation of future generations brings any added value that could not be achieved by institutions or procedures installed to supplement and support ordinary representative democracy. On this background, it reviews some arguments for genuine representation of future generations. The analysis reveals that they tend to overlook the democratic costs of such representation, while they seem to ignore the alternative of giving consideration to the interests of future generations within current democracy. It is concluded that (...) what really matters in terms of the democratic ideal is to ensure an impartial deliberation which takes the interests of all affected parties sufficiently into account. (shrink)

The Commission's recentinterpretation of the Precautionary Principleis used as starting point for an analysis ofthe moral foundation of this principle. ThePrecautionary Principle is shown to have theethical status of an amendment to a liberalprinciple to the effect that a state only mayrestrict a person's actions in order to preventunacceptable harm to others. The amendmentallows for restrictions being justified even incases where there is no conclusive scientificevidence for the risk of harmful effects.However, the liberal tradition has seriousproblems in determining when a (...) risk of harm isunacceptable. Nevertheless, reasonable liberalarguments in favor of precaution can be basedon considerations of irreversible harm andgeneral fear of harm. But it is unclear whenthere considerations can be overridden.Within the liberal framework, the Commissionadvocates a so-called proportional version ofthe Precautionary Principle. This should beclearly distinguished from a welfare-basedapproach to precaution based on risk-aversiveweighing up of expected costs and benefits.However, in the last resort, the Commissiondoes seem to make a covert appeal to suchconsiderations. (shrink)

That death is not a welfare issue appears to be a widespread view among animal welfare researchers. This paper demonstrates that this view is based on a mistaken assumption about harm, which is coupled to ‘welfare’ being conceived as ‘welfare at a time’. Assessments of welfare at a time ignore issues of longevity. In order to assess the welfare issue of death, it is necessary to structure welfare assessment as comparisons of possible lives of the animals. The paper also demonstrates (...) that excluding the welfare issues of being deprived of life from the ethical assessment of killing distorts the ethical considerations. (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)

In this article I will challenge a received orthodoxy in the philosophy of social science by showing that Collingwood was right in insisting that reenactment is epistemically central for historical explanations of individual agency. Situating Collingwood within the context of the debate between simulation theory and what has come to be called “theory theory” in contemporary philosophy of mind and psychology, I will develop two systematic arguments that attempt to show the essential importance of reenactment for our understanding of rational (...) agency. I will furthermore show that Gadamer’s influential critique of the reenactment model distinguishes insufficiently between the interpretation of certain types of texts and the explanation of individual actions. In providing an account of individual agency, we are committed to a realistic understanding of our ordinary scheme of actionexplanations and have thus to recognize the centrality of reenactment. Nevertheless, Collingwood’s emphasis on reenactment is certainly one-sided. I will demonstrate its limitations even for accounting for individual agency, and show how it has to be supplemented by various theoretical considerations, by analyzing the different explanatory strategies that Christopher Browning and Daniel Goldhagen use to explain the behavior of the ordinary men in Reserve Battalion 101 during World War II. (shrink)

Translated by Henrik Rosenmeier, _A History of Ancient Philosophy_ charts the origins and development of ancient philosophical thought. For easy reference, the book is divided chronologically into six main parts. The sections are further divided into philosophers and philosophical movements: *Pre-Socratic Philosophy, including mythology, the Pythagoreans and Parmenides *The Great Century of Athens, including the Sophists and Socrates *Plato, including The Republic, The Symposium and The Timaeus *Aristotle, including The Physics, The Metaphysics and The Poetics *Hellenistic Philosophy, including the Sceptics, (...) the Stoics, the Epicureans and Cicero *Late Antiquity, including Neoplatonism, Origen and St Augustine. This comprehensive and meticulously documented book is structured to make ancient philosophical thought and ancient thinkers accessible. It contains: *full references to primary sources *detailed interpretations of key philosophical passages, including surveys of previous philosophical readings *an overview of the development of ancient philosophical thought *discussions of the relationships between philosophers and their ideas *analyses of key philosophical concepts and ideologies including ontology, epistemology, logic, semantics, moral and political philosophy, theology and aesthetics *explanations of Greek philosophical terminology. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Die deutschsprachige Religionswissenschaft setzt sich zunehmend mit den Grenzen des religiösen Feldes auseinander. Vor diesem Hintergrund möchte der vorliegende Artikel Religionswissenschaftlerinnen und Religionswissenschaftler dazu einladen, die Beschäftigung mit Meso-Phänomenen an den Grenzen des religiösen Feldes weiter zu systematisieren. In Auseinandersetzung mit Pierre Bourdieu schlägt der Autor dabei vor, Grenzen nicht als einfach Demarkationslinien zwischen ‚dem Religiösen‘ und ‚dem Säkularen‘ zu greifen, sondern als komplexe und dynamische Grenzstreifen zwischen unterschiedlichen Feldern. Am Beispiel des Menschenrechtsdiskurses in der religiös affiliierten Nichtregierungsorganisation Pax (...) Romana entwickelt der Artikel ein komplexes Konzept von Grenzstreifen, welches das Augenmerk auf die vielfältigen empirischen Prozesse auf den Grenzstreifen des religiösen Feldes lenkt. Besonders richtet er den Blick auf Sedimentierungsprozesse und ihre Konsequenzen für die kulturellen Tiefenstrukturen des religiösen Feldes. (shrink)

Wissenschaftsfreiheit wird vorherrschend als Freiheit der Wissenschaft von politischer Einmischung verstanden. Der Artikel kritisiert dieses negative Verständnis von Wissenschaftsfreiheit anhand einer Analyse seines prominentesten Vertreters, dem Netzwerk Wissenschaftsfreiheit, das damit eine Politisierung einseitig den Vertreter*innen gesellschaftskritischer Ansätze zuschreibt, während es die eigene Position als ‚rein wissenschaftlich‘ und politisch neutral dargestellt. Demgegenüber schlägt der Artikel ein kritisches Verständnis von Wissenschaftsfreiheit vor, das seine Politizität reflektiert. Ausgehend von der Analyse, dass starre Macht- und Privilegienstrukturen das zentrale Hindernis für die gemeinsame Arbeit an (...) wissenschaftlicher Objektivität sind, geht es beim kritischen Begriff der Wissenschaftsfreiheit um die Reflexion und Transformation des Verhältnisses von Wissenschaft und Politik. Dabei steht die Diversifizierung von Zugangschancen und Standpunkten innerhalb der Wissenschaft im Mittelpunkt – also die Neuverteilung von Macht und Privilegien. Der Artikel entwickelt dieses Verständnis aus einer Diskussion des Verhältnisses von Wissenschaft und Politik in zwei philosophischen Begründungsmöglichkeiten der Wissenschaftsfreiheit und aus einer Rekonstruktion der kritischen politischen Theorie, insbesondere der foucaultschen Machttheorie und der feministischen Standpunkttheorie. Er zeigt auf dieser Grundlage, dass drei verschiedene Arten der Diversifizierung der Wissenschaft – intern, extern-institutionell und extern-aktivistisch –, die vom vor dem Hintergrund des negativen Begriffs als Einschränkung der Wissenschaftsfreiheit verstanden werden, tatsächlich zu ihrer Verbesserung beitragen. -/- . (shrink)

This article will defend the centrality of empathy and simulation for our understanding of individual agency within the conceptual framework of folk psychology. It will situate this defense in the context of recent developments in the theory of mind debate. Moreover, the article will critically discuss narrativist conceptions of social cognition that conceive of themselves as alternatives to both simulation and theory theory.

In this paper I will discuss Kims powerful explanatory exclusion argument against the causal efficacy of mental properties. Baker and Burge misconstrue Kims challenge if they understand it as being based on a purely metaphysical understanding of causation that has no grounding in an epistemological analysis of our successful scientific practices. As I will show, the emphasis on explanatory practices can only be effective in answering Kim if it is understood as being part of the dual-explanandum strategy. Furthermore, a fundamental (...) problem of the contemporary debate about mental causation consists in the fact that all sides take very different examples to be paradigmatic for the relation between psychological and neurobiological explanations. Even if we should expect some alignment in the explanatory scope of neurobiology and psychology/folk-psychology, there is no reason to expect that all mental explanations are exempted by physical explanations, since they do not in general explain the same phenomena. (shrink)

As shown through an inventory of the procedures used in diverse forms of qualitative content analysis projects, the logic of qualitative procedures is in most cases not standardized. Often researchers pay little or no attention to the procedures which they apply. This contribution presents and discusses a procedure for interpretive content analysis which was applied in an empirical study into trans-border news coverage in the Dutch-German Euregion Rhine-Waal. First, we will describe the study on the portrayal of the Dutch and (...) German people as well as their respective countries, The Netherlands and Germany, in the four main regional newspapers of this region. Secondly, basic principles of qualitative methodology are discussed and, thirdly, the procedure of the applied method based on these principles is presented and illustrated by means of exemplary material. Finally, after a brief presentation of some empirical results, the applied procedure of interpretive content analysis is discussed. (shrink)

This study explored in what way and to what extent people's occupational position corresponds with the consumption of news and the exposure to political content offered by the traditional mass media TV, radio, and newspaper, using survey data. The influence of occupational position in general and perceived amount of public social capital on especially consumption of news as well as the exposure to political media content, was evident. Findings are in line with the central assumptions on ‘audience activity’ of audience-centered (...) models in communication research in general and the ‘media use as social action’ approach especially. The subjectively perceived social context, indicated by occupational position as well as the subjectively held structure of relevancies is a central predictor of media use. (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)

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 upon 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 Foucault’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 article 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 about freedom. (shrink)

Can architecture help us find our place and way in today's complex world? Can it return individuals to a whole, to a world, to a community? Developing Giedion's claim that contemporary architecture's main task is to interpret a way of life valid for our time, philosopher Karsten Harries answers that architecture should serve a common ethos. But if architecture is to meet that task, it first has to free itself from the dominant formalist approach, and get beyond the notion (...) that its purpose is to produce endless variations of the decorated shed. In a series of cogent and balanced arguments, Harries questions the premises on which architects and theorists have long relied—premises which have contributed to architecture's current identity crisis and marginalization. He first criticizes the aesthetic approach, focusing on the problems of decoration and ornament. He then turns to the language of architecture. If the main task of architecture is indeed interpretation, in just what sense can it be said to speak, and what should it be speaking about? Expanding upon suggestions made by Martin Heidegger, Harries also considers the relationship of building to the idea and meaning of dwelling. Architecture, Harries observes, has a responsibility to community; but its ethical function is inevitably also political. He concludes by examining these seemingly paradoxical functions. (shrink)

Translated by Henrik Rosenmeier, A History of Ancient Philosophy charts the origins and development of ancient philosophical thought. For easy reference, the book is divided chronologically into six main parts. The sections are further divided into philosophers and philosophical movements: *Pre-Socratic Philosophy, including mythology, the Pythagoreans and Parmenides *The Great Century of Athens, including the Sophists and Socrates *Plato, including The Republic, The Symposium and The Timaeus *Aristotle, including The Physics, The Metaphysics and The Poetics *Hellenistic Philosophy, including the Sceptics, (...) the Stoics, the Epicureans and Cicero *Late Antiquity, including Neoplatonism, Origen and St Augustine. This comprehensive and meticulously documented book is structured to make ancient philosophical thought and ancient thinkers accessible. It contains: *full references to primary sources *detailed interpretations of key philosophical passages, including surveys of previous philosophical readings *an overview of the development of ancient philosophical thought *discussions of the relationships between philosophers and their ideas *analyses of key philosophical concepts and ideologies including ontology, epistemology, logic, semantics, moral and political philosophy, theology and aesthetics *explanations of Greek philosophical terminology. (shrink)

Nothing reveals the differences between an internal (i.e., inherently pedagogical) reflection on educational processes and an external (i.e., derived from a philosophical, sociological, psychological, theological or other perspective) more clearly than the differing attitudes towards alienation. Looked at from outside a pedagogical context, alienation appears only negative, deserving nothing but contempt and rejection; examined from inside a pedagogical framework, it proves to be a conditio sine qua non, the process through which transformative education is possible. This article juxtaposes both perspectives (...) in order to defend the conviction that within educational reflections, only an inherently pedagogical, i.e., positive, understanding of alienation is persuasive, whereas other approaches by definition either are outside of pedagogical reflections or belong to a kind of metaphysical thinking that nowadays seems rather outdated. This paper forms part of a Special Issue titled ‘Beyond Virtue and Vice: Education for a Darker Age’, in which the editors invited authors to engage in exercises of ‘transvaluation’. Certain apparently settled educational concepts (from agency and fulfilment to alienation and ignorance) can be radically reinterpreted such that virtues can be seen as vices, and vices as virtues. The editors encouraged authors to employ polemics and some occasional exaggeration to revalue the educational values that are too readily accepted within contemporary educational discourses. (shrink)

Nothing reveals the differences between an internal (i.e., inherently pedagogical) reflection on educational processes and an external (i.e., derived from a philosophical, sociological, psychological, theological or other perspective) more clearly than the differing attitudes towards alienation. Looked at from outside a pedagogical context, alienation appears only negative, deserving nothing but contempt and rejection; examined from inside a pedagogical framework, it proves to be a conditio sine qua non, the process through which transformative education is possible. This article juxtaposes both perspectives (...) in order to defend the conviction that within educational reflections, only an inherently pedagogical, i.e., positive, understanding of alienation is persuasive, whereas other approaches by definition either are outside of pedagogical reflections or belong to a kind of metaphysical thinking that nowadays seems rather outdated. This paper forms part of a Special Issue titled ‘Beyond Virtue and Vice: Education for a Darker Age’, in which the editors invited authors to engage in exercises of ‘transvaluation’. Certain apparently settled educational concepts (from agency and fulfilment to alienation and ignorance) can be radically reinterpreted such that virtues can be seen as vices, and vices as virtues. The editors encouraged authors to employ polemics and some occasional exaggeration to revalue the educational values that are too readily accepted within contemporary educational discourses. (shrink)

Translated by Henrik Rosenmeier, _A History of Ancient Philosophy_ charts the origins and development of ancient philosophical thought. For easy reference, the book is divided chronologically into six main parts. The sections are further divided into philosophers and philosophical movements: *Pre-Socratic Philosophy, including mythology, the Pythagoreans and Parmenides *The Great Century of Athens, including the Sophists and Socrates *Plato, including The Republic, The Symposium and The Timaeus *Aristotle, including The Physics, The Metaphysics and The Poetics *Hellenistic Philosophy, including the Sceptics, (...) the Stoics, the Epicureans and Cicero *Late Antiquity, including Neoplatonism, Origen and St Augustine. This comprehensive and meticulously documented book is structured to make ancient philosophical thought and ancient thinkers accessible. It contains: *full references to primary sources *detailed interpretations of key philosophical passages, including surveys of previous philosophical readings *an overview of the development of ancient philosophical thought *discussions of the relationships between philosophers and their ideas *analyses of key philosophical concepts and ideologies including ontology, epistemology, logic, semantics, moral and political philosophy, theology and aesthetics *explanations of Greek philosophical terminology. (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.

Despite its linguistic roots in ancient Greek, the concept of empathy is of recent intellectual heritage. Yet its history has been varied and colorful, a fact that is also mirrored in the multiplicity of definitions associated with the empathy concept in a number of different scientific and non-scientific discourses. In its philosophical heyday at the turn of the 19th to the 20th century, empathy had been hailed as the primary means for gaining knowledge of other minds and as the method (...) uniquely suited for the human sciences, only to be almost entirely neglected philosophically for the rest of the century. Only recently have philosophers become again interested in empathy in light of the debate about our folk psychological mindreading capacities. In the second half of the last century, the task of addressing empathy was mainly left to psychologists who thematized it as a psychological phenomenon and process to be studied by the method of the empirical sciences. Particularly, it has been studied by social psychologists as a phenomenon assumed to be causally involved in creating prosocial attitudes and behavior. Nevertheless, within psychology it is at times difficult to find agreement of how exactly one should understand empathy; a fact of which psychologists themselves have become increasingly aware. The purpose of this entry is to clarify the concept of empathy by surveying its history in various philosophical and psychological discussions and by indicating why empathy was and should be regarded to be of such central importance in understanding human agency in ordinary contexts, in the human sciences and for the constitution of ourselves as social and moral agents. (shrink)

This essay will defend a causal conception of action explanations in terms of an agent’s reasons by delineating a metaphysical and epistemic framework that allows us to view folk psychology as providing us with causal and autonomous explanatory strategies of accounting for individual agency. At the same time, I will calm philosophical concerns about the issue of causal deviance that have been at the center of the recent debates between causalist and noncausalist interpretations of action explanations. For that purpose, it (...) is important to realize that the domain of folk-psychological action explanation is also the domain of skillful and goal-directed bodily movements, a domain to which we have independent epistemic access. (shrink)

Ever since Aristotle, metaphor has been placed in the context of a mimetic theory of language and of art. Metaphors are in some sense about reality. The poet uses metaphor to help reveal what is. He, too, serves the truth, even if his service is essentially lacking in that "Metaphor consists in giving the thing a name that belongs to something else."1 Thus it is an improper naming. This impropriety invites a movement of interpretation that can come to rest only (...) when metaphorical has been replaced with a more proper speech. This is not to say, however, that such replacement is possible nor that interpretation can ever come to rest. What metaphor names may transcend human understanding so that our language cannot capture it. In that case, proper speech would be denied to man. But regardless of whether we seek proper speech with man, for example, with the philosopher, or locate it beyond man with God, or think it only an idea that cannot find adequate realization, as long as we understand metaphor as an improper naming, we place its telos beyond poetry. · 1. Aristotle Poetics 21. 1457b. 6-7. Karsten Harries, chairman of the department of philosophy at Yale University, is the author of several works on aesthetics, including The Meaning of Modern Art: A Philosophical Interpretation. He is currently writing a book on the Bavarian rococo church. See also: "On Thinking about Aristotle's 'Thought'" by James E. Ford in Vol. 4, No. 3. (shrink)

Philosophy is a radical inquiry whose task is to interrogate the fundamental assumptions of some given activity, discipline, or set of beliefs. In doing so, philosophical inquiry must attempt to delineate a problem and to develop a method for resolving that problem. However, to be true to its intention, philosophy must be able to examine not only the object of its inquiry but also its own method of interrogation. To accomplish this task, philosophical inquiry must be able to create a (...) distance not only from the assumptions under investigation but also from its own assumptions, which is to say, that it must be able to raise questions about its own method. This self-reflexivity requires that any given philosophical investigation must be examined from an alternative vantage point. Since the assumptions which inform the inquiry are deeply imbedded within a given culture, immanent critique is insufficient. The only way to step outside the boundaries of these cultural presuppositions is to reflect on the given problem from the vantage point of another culture's philosophical tradition. Thus, I argue that philosophical inquiry is unable to go beyond certain limits without being cross-cultural philosophy. I illustrate the way in which cross-cultural philosophy does this with respect to the problem of the self by placing the Western philosophical approach to this problem in dialogue with the Indian Hindu-Buddhist narrative. (shrink)

This essay develops a new account of the phenomenon of imaginative resistance. Imaginative resistance is best conceived of as a limited phenomenon. It occurs when we try to engage imaginatively with different moral worlds that are insufficiently articulated so that they do not allow us either to quarantine our imaginative engagement from our normal moral attitudes or to agree with the expressed moral judgment from the perspective of moral deliberation. Imaginative resistance thus reveals the central epistemic importance that empathy plays (...) for our understanding of rational agents in a context where we try to make sense of the moral appropriateness of their reasons for acting. Reflecting on the phenomenon of imaginative resistance allows us to recognize important features of the relationship between imaginative perspective taking and ordinary moral deliberation. (shrink)