In 1638, the Jesuit, poet, preacher, and historianJohannes Bisselius published the first volume of his seasonal poem Deliciae Veris, Pleasures of Spring. The subtly composed, stylistically unique cycle is presented here for the first time in a modern edition with a German translation and insightful commentary, including an introduction to each poem.".

This essay examines relativist and fideist challenges to Alasdair MacIntyre’s theory of rationality by reading some of MacIntyre’s more recent works in thecontext of his earlier work in the philosophy of religion, Marxism, and the philosophy of the social sciences.

According to ordinary language philosophy (OLP), philosophical problems can be solved by investigating ordinary language, often because the problems stem from its misuse. According to ideal language philosophy (ILP), on the other hand, philosophical problems exist because ordinary language is flawed and has to be improved or replaced by constructed languages that do not exhibit these flaws. OLP and ILP together make up linguistic philosophy, the view that philosophical problems are problems of language. Linguistic philosophy is opposed to what may (...) be called, for lack of a better word, ‘traditional philosophy’ (TP), the view that philosophical problems can be solved by discovering non-linguistic facts. In the following, OLP, ILP, and TP are taken to be methodologies, that is, frameworks in which to interpret and evaluate different philosophical methods (i.e., argumentative strategies). The two linguistic methodologies are discussed separately with TP as a foil, and then used to interpret the status of different philosophical methods. While each of the methods discussed here finds a plausible interpretation in each methodology, there are other arguments for and against linguistic philosophy in general, and for and against ILP and OLP in particular. As none of these arguments is decisive, I conclude with a superficial moral about peaceful co-existence. (shrink)

_sciousness called ‘neurophenomenology’ (Varela 1996) and illustrates it with a_ _recent pilot study (Lutz et al., 2002). At a theoretical level, neurophenomenology_ _pursues an embodied and large-scale dynamical approach to the_ _neurophysiology of consciousness (Varela 1995; Thompson and Varela 2001;_ _Varela and Thompson 2003). At a methodological level, the neurophenomeno-_ _logical strategy is to make rigorous and extensive use of first-person data about_ _subjective experience as a heuristic to describe and quantify the large-scale_ _neurodynamics of consciousness (Lutz 2002). (...) The paper foocuses on_ _neurophenomenology in relation to three challenging methodological issues_ _about incorporating first-person data into cognitive neuroscience: (i) first-person_ _reports can be biased or inaccurate; (ii) the process of generating first-person_ _reports about an experience can modify that experience; and (iii) there is an ‘ex-_ _planatory gap’ in our understanding of how to relate first-person, phenomeno-_ _logical data to third-person, biobehavioural data._. (shrink)

This paper analyzes an explicit instantiation of the program of “neurophenomenology” in a neuroscientific protocol. Neurophenomenology takes seriously the importance of linking the scientific study of consciousness to the careful examination of experience with a specific first-person methodology. My first claim is that such strategy is a fruitful heuristic because it produces new data and illuminates their relation to subjective experience. My second claim is that the approach could open the door to a natural account of the structure of human (...) experience as it is mobilized in itself in such methodology. In this view, generative passages define the type of circulation which explicitly roots the active and disciplined insight the subject has about his/her experience in a biological emergent process. (shrink)

I show that extant attempts to capture and generalize empirical adequacy in terms of partial structures fail. Indeed, the motivations for the generalizations in the partial structures approach are better met by the generalizations via approximation sets developed in “Generalizing Empirical Adequacy I”. Approximation sets also generalize partial structures.

Evolutionary Debunking Arguments purport to show that our moral beliefs do not amount to knowledge because these beliefs are “debunked” by the fact that our moral beliefs are, in some way, the product of evolutionary forces. But there is a substantial gap in this argument between its main evolutionary premise and the skeptical conclusion. What is it, exactly, about the evolutionary origins of moral beliefs that would create problems for realist views in metaethics? I argue that evolutionary debunking arguments are (...) best understood as offering up defeaters for our moral beliefs. Moreover, the defeater in question is a paradigmatic instance of undercutting defeat. If anything is an undercutting defeater, then learning about the evolutionary origins of our moral beliefs is a defeater for those beliefs. (shrink)

In a recent paper, Appley and Stoutenburg present two new objections to Explanationist Evidentialism : the Regress Objection and the Threshold Objection. In this paper, I develop a version of EE that is independently plausible and empirically grounded, and show that it can meet Appley and Stoutenburg’s objections.

This essay examines relativist and fideist challenges to Alasdair MacIntyre’s theory of rationality by reading some of MacIntyre’s more recent works in thecontext of his earlier work in the philosophy of religion, Marxism, and the philosophy of the social sciences.

The paper presents a research programme for the neuroscience of consciousness called 'neurophenomenology' and illustrates it with a recent pilot study . At a theoretical level, neurophenomenology pursues an embodied and large-scale dynamical approach to the neurophysiology of consciousness . At a methodological level, the neurophenomenological strategy is to make rigorous and extensive use of first-person data about subjective experience as a heuristic to describe and quantify the large-scale neurodynamics of consciousness . The paper focuses on neurophenomenology in relation to (...) three challenging methodological issues about incorporating first-person data into cognitive neuroscience: first-person reports can be biased or inaccurate; the process of generating first-person reports about an experience can modify that experience; and there is an 'explanatory gap' in our understanding of how to relate first-person, phenomenological data to third-person, biobehavioural data. (shrink)

In this paper, I provide a novel explanationist framework for thinking about peer disagreement that solves many of the puzzles regarding disagreement that have troubled epistemologists over the last two decades. Explanationism is the view that a subject is justified in believing a proposition just in case that proposition is part of the best explanation of that subject’s total evidence. Applying explanationism to the problem of peer disagreement yields the following principle: in cases of peer disagreement, the thing that the (...) subjects ought to believe is the thing that is the best explanation of their total evidence, where part of their evidence is the fact that they happen to find themselves in disagreement with an epistemic peer. In what follows, I show how to understand and apply this core idea. (shrink)

The Reliability Challenge to moral non-naturalism has received substantial attention recently in the literature on moral epistemology. While the popularity of this particular challenge is a recent development, the challenge has a long history, as the form of this challenge can be traced back to a skeptical challenge in the philosophy of mathematics raised by Paul Benacerraf. The current Reliability Challenge is widely regarded as the most sophisticated way to develop this skeptical line of thinking, making the Reliability Challenge the (...) strongest epistemic challenge to normative nonnaturalism. In this paper, I argue that the innovations that have occurred since Benacerraf’s statement of the challenge are misconceived and confused in a number of ways. The Reliability Challenge is not the most potent epistemic challenge to moral non-naturalism. The most potent challenge comes from the fact that there is a causal condition on knowledge – or, more precisely, a becaual condition – that non-natural moral facts cannot satisfy. (shrink)

Laboratoire de Neurosciences Cognitives et Imagerie Ce´re´brale (LENA), Hoˆpital de La Salpeˆtrie`re, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS).

I defend the Received View on scientific theories as developed by Carnap, Hempel, and Feigl against a number of criticisms based on misconceptions. First, I dispute the claim that the Received View demands axiomatizations in first order logic, and the further claim that these axiomatizations must include axioms for the mathematics used in the scientific theories. Next, I contend that models are important according to the Received View. Finally, I argue against the claim that the Received View is intended to (...) make the concept of a theory more precise. Rather, it is meant as a generalizable framework for explicating specific theories. (shrink)

In recent years, the full text of papers are increasingly available electronically which opens up the possibility of quantitatively investigating citation contexts in more detail. In this study, we introduce a new form of citation analysis, which we call citation concept analysis (CCA). CCA is intended to reveal the cognitive impact certain concepts—published in a highly-cited landmark publication—have on the citing authors. It counts the number of times the concepts are mentioned (cited) in the citation context of citing publications. We (...) demonstrate the method using three classical highly cited books: (1) The structure of scientific revolutions by Thomas S. Kuhn, (2) The logic of scientific discovery—Logik der Forschung: Zur Erkenntnistheorie der modernen Naturwissenschaft in German—, and (3) Conjectures and refutations: the growth of scientific knowledge by Karl R. Popper. It is not surprising—as our results show—that Kuhn’s “paradigm” concept seems to have had a significant impact. What is surprising is that our results indicate a much larger impact of the concept “paradigm” than Kuhn’s other concepts, e.g., “scientific revolution”. The paradigm concept accounts for about 40% of the concept-related citations to Kuhn’s work, and its impact is resilient across all disciplines and over time. With respect to Popper, “falsification” is the most used concept derived from his books. Falsification is the cornerstone of Popper’s critical rationalism. (shrink)

Syntactic approaches in the philosophy of science, which are based on formalizations in predicate logic, are often considered in principle inferior to semantic approaches, which are based on formalizations with the help of structures. To compare the two kinds of approach, I identify some ambiguities in common semantic accounts and explicate the concept of a structure in a way that avoids hidden references to a specific vocabulary. From there, I argue that contrary to common opinion (i) unintended models do not (...) pose a significant problem for syntactic approaches to scientific theories, (ii) syntactic approaches can be at least as language-independent as semantic ones, and (iii) in syntactic approaches, scientific theories can be as well connected to the world as in semantic ones. Based on these results, I argue that syntactic and semantic approaches fare equally well when it comes to (iv) ease of application, (v) accommodating the use of models in the sciences, and (vi) capturing the theory-observation relation. (shrink)

in Cambridge Handbook of Consciousness edited by Zelazo P., Moscovitch M. and Thompson E. (2007).

PLoS ONE 3(3): e1897. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.

Carnap suggests that philosophy can be construed as being engaged solely in conceptual engineering. I argue that since many results of the sciences can be construed as stemming from conceptual engineering as well, Carnap’s account of philosophy can be methodologically naturalistic. This is also how he conceived of his account. That the sciences can be construed as relying heavily on conceptual engineering is supported by empirical investigations into scientific methodology, but also by a number of conceptual considerations. I present a (...) new conceptual consideration that generalizes Carnap’s conditions of adequacy for analytic–synthetic distinctions and thus widens the realm in which conceptual engineering can be used to choose analytic sentences. I apply these generalized conditions of adequacy to a recent analysis of scientific theories and defend the relevance of the analytic–synthetic distinction against criticisms by Quine, Demopoulos, and Papineau. (shrink)

Error theorists hold that, although our first-order moral thought and discourse commits us to the existence of moral truths, there are no such truths. Holding this position in metaethics puts the error theorist in an uncomfortable position regarding first-order morality. When it comes to our pre-theoretic moral commitments, what should the error theorist think? What should she say? What should she do? I call this the ‘Now What’ Problem for error theory. This paper suggests a framework for evaluating different approaches (...) to the ‘Now What’ Problem, and goes on to evaluate the three most common responses to this problem. All three are found to have noteworthy problems. Finally, I present my own solution, and argue that it presents the most appealing solution to the ‘Now What’ Problem. (shrink)

Aristotle earns the distinction of having put forward the first comprehensive philosophical theory of justice. After the end of the antique world, St. Thomas Aquinas was the first philosopher and theologian to return to Aristotles theory of justice. This will be followed by a summary of the core aspects of Aquinass treatise on law and political theory, and explicated accordingly.

The debate between critics of syntactic and semantic approaches to the formalization of scientific theories has been going on for over 50 years. I structure the debate in light of a recent exchange between Hans Halvorson, Clark Glymour, and Bas van Fraassen and argue that the only remaining disagreement concerns the alleged difference in the dependence of syntactic and semantic approaches on languages of predicate logic. This difference turns out to be illusory.

David Enoch has argued that we can be justified in believing in irreducibly normative reasons on the grounds that such reasons are deliberatively indispensable. This deliberative indispensability argument has been attacked from a variety of angles and is generally held to be rather weak. In this paper, I argue that existing criticisms of the deliberative indispensability argument do not touch the core of Enoch's argument. Properly understood, the deliberative indispensability argument is much stronger than its critics allege. It deserves to (...) be taken seriously. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:The extant literature on cross-national differences in approaches to corporate social responsibility (CSR) has mostly focused on developed countries. Instead, we offer two inter-related studies into corporate codes of conduct issued by developing country multinational enterprises (DMNEs). First, we analyse code adoption rates and code content through a mixed methods design. Second, we use multilevel analyses to examine country-level drivers of differences in code content—specifically, elements of a country’s National Business System (NBS). We find that DMNEs are much more likely (...) to adopt a code of conduct than their domestic counterparts; however, this does not translate into greater code comprehensiveness. We also find support for the ‘substitute view’ of CSR in developing countries, i.e. that MNEs from poorer countries and from countries with lower governance effectiveness tend to express more comprehensive commitments. However, this dynamic does not extend to a country’s labour system; instead, CSR appears here to match the efficiency of a country’s labour market, thus reflecting the ‘mirror view’ of CSR. (shrink)

Ralph Cudworth's (1617-1688) True Intellectual System of the Universe is considered the high point of philosophical production by the Cambridge Platonists. In this work, Cudworth compresses all of his era's core problems in natural philosophy and theology and attempts to find a comprehensive solution to broadly explain how God acts in nature. For the first time, the present work presents the complete story of how Cudworth developed his Neoplatonic system using a compatible combination of text form and content, and along (...) the way, it also unfolds a panoramic view of ancient classical philosophy. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Animals in the World: Five Essays on Aristotle’s Biology by Pierre PellegrinChristopher LutzPELLEGRIN, Pierre. Animals in the World: Five Essays on Aristotle’s Biology. Translated by Anthony Preus. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2023. vi + 324 pp. Cloth, $95.00; paper, $35.95This book explores two broad questions that have for decades been driving Pierre Pellegrin’s contributions to the so-called biological turn in Aristotle studies: whether and in (...) what sense Aristotle actually has a biology; the degree to which Aristotle’s teleological commitments lead him to characterize living things and the world that they inhabit as perfect. By analyzing various interplays that the zoological treatises posit between, on the one hand, the form and end of each species and, on the other hand, its material and efficient causes, Pellegrin reveals the astounding depth of Aristotle’s affinity with modern biology.In consideration of the millennia-spanning distance between Aristotle and the emergence of modern biology in the nineteenth century, Pellegrin first of all seeks to establish that he may call Aristotle a biologist without committing anachronism. Chapter 1 identifies two teleological notions that connect Parts of Animals and Generation of Animals to nineteenth-century conceptions of biology: Using organic function as the primary organizational principle in comparative anatomy relates Aristotle to Cuvier, and the concept of adaptation relates Aristotle to Darwin. Citing the profound influence of History of Animals on Cuvier (and thus on nineteenth-century biology), Pellegrin argues that its chief biological [End Page 357] innovation lies in the suggestion that observation is epistemically useful even when we are unable to explain that which we have observed.Chapter 2 emphasizes the role that mechanistic (that is, material and efficient) causality plays within the teleological explanations in Aristotle’s studies of animals. After a lengthy discussion of hypothetical necessity, Pellegrin uses PA 1.1’s distinction between formal nature and material nature to suggest that Aristotle recognizes an “ontological autonomy” of material nature, by which he seems to mean that matter has certain properties independent of any form. Linking Aristotle to Darwin, he argues that for Aristotle the perfection of each species consists in its fitness for (everlasting) survival. The end-directed formal nature of the species must negotiate with its autonomous material nature in order to secure for it an advantageous condition that guarantees its permanence but inevitably comes at the expense of certain disadvantages. For example, birds have no ears because they need extra matter for feathers (see PA 2.12).Shifting the focus to a crucial difference between Aristotle and modern biology, chapter 3 investigates the unity of Aristotelian natural science and biology’s place within it. Pellegrin finds analogies between Aristotle’s explanations of sexual reproduction, spontaneous generation, and Meteorology ’s account of the formation of inanimate homoiomerous matter (for example, metals, minerals). Sexual reproduction (clearly involving a material, formal, efficient, and final cause) is more causally complex than spontaneous generation (which according to Pellegrin has no preexisting final cause and only a quasi-formal cause), yet we understand spontaneous generation only by analogy with sexual reproduction, which is for Aristotle explanatorily prior. Spontaneous generation, in turn, is marginally more complex than the formation of homoiomerous matter (which also has only a quasi-formal cause and, further, no final cause at all), yet we understand the latter only by analogy with spontaneous generation and sexual reproduction. Pellegrin concludes that all natural science is united insofar as “material-efficient causality concerns all natural realities,” living and nonliving alike; however, because Aristotle in each case explains the less complex by analogy with the more complex, the teleological study of fully developed living things is explanatorily primary within his natural science. In this way, Aristotle stands in stark contrast to modern natural science, in which biology is explanatorily posterior to chemistry and physics.Chapter 4 qualifies the explanatory priority of complex organisms by challenging any notion of an Aristotelian scala naturae. Pellegrin works to show that the recognition of irreducible diversity is present in Aristotle’s very definition of an animal, arguing that in animals the nutritive faculty is neither ontologically nor developmentally prior to the sensitive and motive... (shrink)

Studies into corporate social responsibility (CSR) in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have suggested that small businesses are different to the large companies on which CSR research usually focusses. Extending this argument, this article raises the question what differences in approaches to CSR there are within the SME category. Analysing the CSR strategy and performance of a medium-sized fashion retailer in the United Kingdom through manager interviews as well as customer and employee surveys, the article develops an analytical framework of (...) CSR in small, medium and large firms. The argument is developed that medium-sized firms occupy a transition stage, where some CSR features that are reminiscent of small enterprises are still important but get overlaid with aspects that are more typical of large companies. (shrink)

In contrast to the recent rise to economic importance of offshore finance centres (OFCs), the topic of taxation has so far created little interest among scholars of corporate social responsibility (CSR). This paper makes two contributions to addressing this lacuna. Applying a range of influential normative theories of ethics, it first offers an ethical evaluation of tax havens. Second, the paper examines what use large firms that are headquartered in two OFCs—Bermuda and the Cayman Islands—make of formal CSR tools. The (...) emerging duplicity in tax havenbased companies professing social responsibility highlights once more the political nature of CSR, where at least some firms and/or industries can successfully limit government power to enact regulation as well as shape the discourse around CSR. The study of CSR in OFC-based firms thus calls into question the usefulness of the often quoted definition of CSR as going beyond the law. (shrink)

Proponents of linguistic philosophy hold that all non-empirical philosophical problems can be solved by either analyzing ordinary language or developing an ideal one. I review the debates on linguistic philosophy and between ordinary and ideal language philosophy. Using arguments from these debates, I argue that the results of experimental philosophy on intuitions support linguistic philosophy. Within linguistic philosophy, these experimental results support and complement ideal language philosophy. I argue further that some of the critiques of experimental philosophy are in fact (...) defenses of ideal language philosophy. Finally, I show how much of the current debate about experimental philosophy is anticipated in the debates about and within linguistic philosophy. Specifically, arguments by ideal language philosophers support experimental philosophy. (shrink)

I show that the central notion of Constructive Empiricism, empirical adequacy, can be expressed syntactically and specifically in the Received View of the logical empiricists. The formalization shows that the Received View is superior to Constructive Empiricism in the treatment of theories involving constants or functions from observable to unobservable objects. It also suggests a formalization of ‘full empirical informativeness’ in Constructive Empiricism.

We discuss various ways, which have been plainly justified in the secondhalf of the twentieth century, to introduce infinitesimals, and we considerthe new style of reasoning in mathematical analysis that they allow.

Zusammenfassung Die Überwindung von Theorie-Praxis-Differenzen wird entlang der Unterscheidung zwischen wissenschaftlicher Rigorosität und Relevanz geführt. Der direkte Übertrag von wissenschaftlichen Befunden in die Praxis könnte im Sport auch durch die Übernahme von Führungspositionen gelingen. Forschungen, in welchem Maße und warum WissenschaftlerInnen Führungspositionen im Sport parallel zu einer Position an der Hochschule begleiten, liegen bislang noch nicht vor. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass nur ein geringer Teil der Vorstandsämter in DOSB/dsb, Landessportbünden und olympischen Spitzenverbänden durch forschende WissenschaftlerInnen besetzt ist und diese bei (...) Amtsübernahme und -ausübung nicht die Lösung der Theorie-Praxis-Differenz priorisieren. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Entgegen häufig artikulierter Erwartungen ist die Erwerbstätigenquote in Sportvereinen noch immer gering und eine zunehmende Verberuflichung nicht zu beobachten. In Ergänzung vorliegender systemtheoretischer Erklärungsansätze wird ein produktionstheoretisches Modell entwickelt, das ehrenamtliche Arbeit als eine Form der Lohnspende auffasst und Entscheidungen des Sportvereins als Annäherung an eine minimale Kostenfunktion interpretiert. Aus dem Modell abgeleitete Hypothesen werden einer empirischen Prüfung aus den Daten einer Befragung aller rheinland-pfälzischen Sportvereine mit mehr als 750 Mitgliedern unterworfen. Es zeigt sich, dass sich die Hypothesen weitgehend (...) bewähren, sodass das Modell zur Erklärung geringer Ausbildungsintensität von Sportvereinen sowie zu den Bedingungen der Integration von Erwerbstätigkeit in die Produktionsfunktion von Sportvereinen beitragen kann. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Anhand empirischer Daten zum organisationalem Verhalten von Ganztagsschulen und Sportvereinen wird der Frage nachgegangen, welche allgemeine Organisationstheorie Ansätze zur Erklärung von Kooperationen zwischen Ganztagsschulen und Sportvereinen bereitstellen kann. Nach der kriteriengestützten Identifikation erkenntnisträchtiger Organisationstheorien erfolgt eine explorative hypothesengeleitete empirische Prüfung der Transaktionskostentheorie, der Evolutionstheorie sowie der Theorie der Strukturation mit Längsschnittdaten aus Rheinland-Pfalz. Es zeigt sich, dass der Transaktionskostenansatz das Kooperationsverhalten von Sportvereinen, jedoch nicht von Ganztagsschulen, erklären kann. Die Evolutionstheorie leistet Beiträge zur Erklärung von Stabilität in der Population (...) der Ganztagsschulen sowie zum Wandel bei einem Teil der Kooperationspartner. Das Kooperationsverhalten von Ganztagsschulen kann damit ebenso wie mit der Theorie der Strukturation nicht theoriekonform interpretiert werden. (shrink)

Our examination of the controversy surrounding the intentionalist conception of textual interpretation shows that the critics of this approach to questions of meaning and interpretation have so far failed to prove their case. The standard objections to intentionalism, on grounds of logical or empirical fallacy, cannot be maintained. We reconstruct the objections which have been raised in the literature against the intentional conception and discuss them as criticism of a conception hold to be inadequate with respect to the problem of (...) literary interpretation. In our evaluation of the intentional conception we conclude that it represents a perfectly ‘normal’ conception of meaning and interpretation, of a kind by no means inferior to other approaches adopted by the various disciplines concerned with interpreting texts. (shrink)

Narrative is increasingly being recognised as an important tool both to manage and understand organisations. In particular, narrative is recognised to have an important influence on the perception of environmental issues in business, a particularly contested area of modern management. Management literature is, however, only beginning to develop a framework for evaluating the quality and legitimacy of narratives. Due to the highly fluid nature of narratives, the traditional notion of truth as reflecting ' objective reality' is not useful here. In (...) this article, an alternative approach that evaluates a narrative in two stages is developed. First, a horizontal reading investigates the surface of the narrative, its textual features, instrumental devices and its integrity as a text, to assess the quality of a narrative. Second, a more philosophical or vertical reading makes explicit the underlying value assumptions that author and reader bring to the writing and reading of the narrative to assess the narrative's claim to legitimacy. The framework is then tested against a narrative on the relationship between business and environment as espoused by a supply chain manager of a UK-based manufacturing company. (shrink)

I provide an explicit formulation of empirical adequacy, the central concept of constructive empiricism, and point out a number of problems. Based on one of the inspirations for empirical adequacy, I generalize the notion of a theory to avoid implausible presumptions about the relation of theoretical concepts and observations, and generalize empirical adequacy with the help of approximation sets to allow for lack of knowledge, approximations, and successive gain of knowledge and precision. As a test case, I provide an application (...) of these generalizations to a simple interference phenomenon. (shrink)