The aim of this paper is to vindicate the Cartesian quest for certainty by arguing that to aim at certainty is a constitutive feature of cognition. My argument hinges on three observations concerning the nature of doubt and judgment: first, it is always possible to have a doubt as to whether p in so far as one takes the truth of p to be uncertain; second, in so far as one takes the truth of p to be certain, one is (...) no longer able to genuinely wonder whether p is true; third, to ask the question whether p is to desire to receive a true answer. On this ground I clarify in what sense certainty is the aim of cognition. I then argue that in judging that p we commit ourselves to p’s being certain and that certainty is the constitutive norm of judgment. The paper as a whole provides a picture of the interplay between doubt and judgment that aims at vindicating the traditional insight that our ability to doubt testifies our aspiration to know with absolute certainty. (shrink)

In this paper I discuss a new kind of hinge epistemology which is called transcendental hinge epistemology. According to this view, hinges are immune from doubt because it is impossible to doubt them coherently, and this impossibility arises because any attempt to doubt them will presuppose their truth. Such an immunity is possessed only by inescapable hinges, that is, hinges that must be presupposed in every inquiry. I will argue that current hinge epistemologies fail to provide a satisfactory anti-sceptical strategy (...) because they focus on escapable hinges, that is, hinges with respect to which one can entertain coherent doubts. (shrink)

The goal of this paper is to review and critically discuss the philosophical aspects of probabilistic seismic hazard analysis (PSHA). Given that estimates of seismic hazard are typically riddled with uncertainty, diferent epistemic values (related to the pursuit of scientifc knowledge) compete in the selection of seismic hazard models, in a context infuenced by non-epistemic values (related to practical goals and aims) as well. We frst distinguish between the diferent types of uncertainty in PSHA. We claim that epistemic and nonepistemic (...) considerations are closely related in the selection of the appropriate estimate of seismic hazard by the experts. Finally, we argue that the division of scientifc responsibility among the experts can lead to responsibility gaps. This raises a problem for the ownership of the results (“no one’s model” problem) similar to the “problem of many hands” in the ethics of technology. We conclude with a plea for a close collaboration between philosophy and engineering. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to clarify under what conditions a philosophical problem arises. I will describe two ways in which we might perceive a question as a problem. First, when we fnd ourselves inclined to believe in propositions that appear incompatible with each other. Second, when we fnd ourselves inclined to believe in propositions that seem incompatible with our desires. I will discuss both of these cases and articulate a didactic strategy – the Clash Strategy – which can (...) be used in order to plan and facilitate dialogic inquiry in the classroom. This strategy suggests introducing stimuli that will help students appreciate the clash that drives the philosophical question to be explored during the dialogue. In summary, this paper aims to ofer insights to all teachers interested in promoting dialogic inquiry, whether philosophical or otherwise, in education. (shrink)

Epistemic uncertainties are included in probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) as second-order probabilities that represent the degrees of belief of the scientists that a model is correct. In this article, I propose an alternative approach that incorporates the scientist’s confidence in a probability set for a given quantity. First, I give some arguments against the use of precise probabilities to estimate scientific uncertainty in risk analysis. I then extend the “confidence approach” developed by Brian Hill and Richard Bradley to PRA. Finally, (...) I claim that this approach represents model uncertainty better than the standard (Bayesian) model does. (shrink)

Contemporary views of truth-directedness endorse what I shall call the Common-Element Argument. According to this argument, there is something in common between judgment and other attitudes like assumption and imagination: they all regard their contents as true. Since this regarding-as-true feature is not distinctive of judgment - the argument goes - it can’t explain its truth-directedness. On this ground, theorists have been motivated to endorse an inflationary view that tries to capture truth-directedness by appealing to some further feature: intentions, second-order (...) representations, sub-personal mechanisms, or subjugation to norms are the most discussed candidates for fulfilling this role. In this paper I will argue that the Common-Element Argument is unsound. It rests on a false premise, namely that there is some common element such as a regarding-as-true component between judgment and other cognitive attitudes. I shall reject Velleman’s and Railton’s defenses of the Common-Element-Argument. Then I will discuss three influential inflationary accounts of truth-directedness: Railton’s account, Velleman’s teleological account, and Shah and Velleman’s conceptualist account. I shall argue that they all face a phenomenological and an explanatory challenge. Finally, I shall sketch a deflationary view of truth-directedness that evades these challenges. (shrink)

The brief life of the Accademia del Cimento (1657–1667), the first known society with a purely experimental programme,1 is entangled with the most surprising advancements in the history of scientific instruments of that century, from the telescope to the microscope, the thermometer to the barometer, the hygrometer to the pendulum as a time-regulator, and more. The making of instruments at the Florentine court shows the interaction of princely, scholarly and artisanal actors. This paper explores this collaboration and shows how the (...) supposed “invisibility’ of artisans depended on their proximity to the academicians and princes, who mainly communicated verbally with them, directly or through middlemen. The visibility of artisans increases proportionally to their physical distance from the Court. In this essay I unveil the identity of the artisans of the Cimento and, finally, attempt to attribute five instruments (some lost and others still extant) to specific makers, shedding light also on relations between the artisan and his patron. (shrink)

In diesem aufsatz erortert der verfasser die grundlegenden heideggerschen begriffe der "befindlichkeit" und des "verstehens," und auf diese weise bestimmt er sein eigenes verhaltnis zu heidegger. ausgehend von der heideggerschen these uber die destruktion der metaphysik stellt er in diesem zusammenhang die frage nach der destruktion dieser destruktion, namlich der destruktion der vernunft-losigkeit der moderne, um dadurch eine neue stellung zur philosophie und ihrer tradition zu gewinnen.

Karen McCarthy Brown Mama Lola:. Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991. ISBN 0‐520‐07073‐9. Hardcover, $24.95. Pp. x+405.

The present article aims at analyzing the social and ontological effects of listening music online, with particular attention to the artistic practice of improvisation. In the first paragraph, I will briefly explain the essential concepts which ontology of music has traditionally counted on, and I will suggest an alternative theoretical approach, that I define as ontology of musical act. Then I will investigate the relation between recording practices and improvisation. In the final paragraph I will compare some features of musical (...) recordings with those of technological devices that allow us to listen music online. (shrink)

According to constitutivism, we can justify the authority of aims and norms on the ground that they are inescapable. Constitutivist views divide between ambitious and modest ones. According to ambitious constitutivism, the inescapability of aims grounds their unconditional authority, whereas according to modest constitutivism, the inescapability of aims only grounds their conditional authority. Either way, both forms of constitutivism share the assumption that inescapability grounds authority, which in turn presupposes that at the foundation of normativity we find aims and norms (...) that can be evaluated as having or lacking authority. In this paper I shall defend a form of constitutivism that rejects this assumption. According to this view, which I shall call Hinge Constitutivism, at the foundation of epistemic normativity we find an aim, the truth-aim, that is altogether beyond the evaluation in terms of the ordinary notion of authority. Moreover, I shall argue that to aim at truth is a condition of possibility for justifying the authority of any other aims or norms. In this sense, to aim at truth is a hinge of deliberation. (shrink)

Leonid Pitamic was convinced that law could not be understood and explored by a single method aiming at a pure object of enquiry. He argued that it was necessary to employ other methods besides the normative one (especially the sociological and axiological methods), which, however, should not be confounded. Methodological syncretism can be avoided by clearly distinguishing between different aspects of law and by allowing the methods to support each other. By following this guideline, and by arguing according to a (...) clear method, we can also open up a space for dialogue and for the juxtaposition of contrasting points of view. (shrink)

Wright claims that “the epistemology of good abstraction principles should be assimilated to that of basic principles of logical inference”. In this paper I follow Wright’s recommendation, but I consider a different epistemology of logic, namely anti-exceptionalism. Anti-exceptionalism’s main contention is that logic is not a priori, and that the choice between rival logics should be based on abductive criteria such as simplicity, adequacy to the data, strength, fruitfulness, and consistency. This paper’s goal is to lay down the foundations for (...) an application of the anti-exceptionalist methodology to abstraction principles. In Sect. 1 I outline my strategy. I show that anti-exceptionalism has a bearing on the so-called Bad Company problem, and explore some versions of anti-exceptionalism about abstraction. I then consider new criteria for choosing between rival abstraction principles, and, in particular, between consistent revisions of Frege’s Basic Law V. I finally consider how the abstractionist can compare between competing criteria, and argue that anti-exceptionalists should be pluralists about abstraction. (shrink)

Abstraction principles and grounding can be combined in a natural way Modality: metaphysics, logic, and epistemology, Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 109–136, 2010; Schwartzkopff in Grazer philosophische studien 82:353–373, 2011). However, some ground-theoretic abstraction principles entail that there are circles of partial ground :775–801, 2017). I call this problem auto-abstraction. In this paper I sketch a solution. Sections 1 and 2 are introductory. In Sect. 3 I start comparing different solutions to the problem. In Sect. 4 I contend that the (...) thesis that the right-hand side of an abstraction principle is prior to its left-hand side motivates an independence constraint, and that this constraint leads to predicative restrictions on the acceptable instances of ground-theoretic abstraction principles. In Sect. 5 I argue that auto-abstraction is acceptable unless the left-hand side is essentially grounded by the right-hand side. In Sect. 6 I highlight several parallelisms between auto-abstraction and the puzzles of ground. I finally compare my solution with the strategies listed in Sect. 3. (shrink)

Esse artigo examina a crítica de Hans Jonas à utopia marxista, questionando os limites ecológicos existentes para se atingir o ideal de uma sociedade de abundância e afirma que sua concepção de uma vida módica e respeitadora daqueles limites coincide com as tendências e propostas mais avançadas que surgiram nos últimos tempos como alternativas ao crescimento e ao desenvolvimento.

Wenn eine Kultur etwas als Erfindung akzeptiert, dann hat dieses Etwas bereits den Status einer Tatsache erhalten, die vorhanden ist und auf ihren Nutzen oder auf ihre Funktion hin befragt werden kann. Was aber geschieht davor? Wie gewinnt das Erfundene Wirklichkeit? Wie in der Kunst, wie im Theater, wie in der Literatur und Musik, wie in der Wissenschaft? Und mit welchen Folgen? Die Beiträge in diesem Band beschäftigen sich alle mit einem Moment oder einem bestimmten Modell der Invention. Ausgehend von (...) den jeweils involvierten Medien wird der Versuch unternommen, diese Momente und Modelle zu rekonstruieren. Um etwas über die entsprechenden Inventionen in Erfahrung bringen zu können, werden diese als Ergebnisse oder Effekte von Improvisationsprozessen begriffen: Improvisationen in dem Sinne, dass von einem grundsätzlich offenen Zukunftsspielraum ausgegangen wird, gleichzeitig aber auch davon, dass es ein Umgebungs- und Verfahrenswissen gibt, das im Einzelfall beschrieben werden kann. (shrink)

In 1994, the European Parliament published a resolution on the right of humanitarian intervention. Interestingly, the declaration maintains that such intervention is not in contradiction with international law, although it formulates the concept of right in a way that is translatable into the vocabulary of individual rights. I analyze some implications of the resolution for the mutual duties of states. I thereby focus my attention on two possible applications: by way of Rawls's duty of assistance and by way of the (...) cosmopolitan theory of global distributive justice. I conclude that the latter theory promises better results for protecting individuals' basic rights, but I also show that it is at the cost of a strongly interventionist structure requiring a powerful supranational institution. Finally, I envision the conditions under which such an increase of interventionism in favor of human rights can be acceptable. (shrink)

Epistemische Tugenden sind Eigenschaften des forschenden Subjekts, die in wissenschaftlichen Kulturen als Bedingung fur die Produktion, Vermittlung oder den Erwerb von Wissen angesehen werden. Sie lassen sich nicht auf ein abstraktes Sollen reduzieren, wie es oft von Ethikkommissionen oder politischen Bewegungen an die Wissenschaft herangetragen wird. Die methodische Erzeugung von Wissen ware kaum moglich, wenn es nicht erkenntnisfordernde Tugenden wie Geduld, Aufmerksamkeit, Genauigkeit, Intuition, Wahrhaftigkeit, Neugierde, Strenge oder Zuverlassigkeit gabe, die den an sich prekaren Erkenntnisprozess stabilisieren und in eine bestimmte (...) Richtung lenken. Die Beitrage dieses Sammelbandes befassen sich mit epistemischen Tugenden aus (wissenschafts-)historischer, philosophischer, medien- und literaturwissenschaftlicher Perspektive. Ein Schwerpunkt liegt dabei auf dem Verhaltnis von wissenschaftlichen und soziokulturellen beziehungsweise moralischen Normen. Mit Beitragen von: Lorraine Daston, Martin Doll, Andreas Gelhard, Raymond Geuss, Ruben Hackler, Michael Hagner, Jens Kertscher, Markus Krajewski, Marcel Lepper, Martin Mulsow, Oliver Nievergelt, Tanja Paulitz, Robert Proctor, Katja Sabisch, Sandro Zanetti, Cornelia Zumbusch. (shrink)

Abstract“Equality” is a notion about which disagreement arises not simply due to lack of clarity and precision (or intellectual dishonesty and bad faith). Rather, equality is an idea that implies and implicates some form of disagreement as a constitutive possibility of its horizon of discussion. This, in my view, is both a problem and an opportunity. I submit that equality is a plural notion: There are only equalities, practices aimed at removing situated circumstances of inequality and discrimination.

Der Begriff ‚Kompromiss‘ hat seine Wurzeln im lateinischen Kompositum compromissum, compromittere („sich gegenseitig versprechen, eine Entscheidung dem Schiedsrichter zu überlassen“). Spätestens Anfang des 17. Jahrhunderts ist der Kompromiss nicht mehr an den Schiedsspruch eines Dritten gebunden. An dessen Stelle tritt eine pragmatische Vereinbarung zwischen streitenden Parteien. Was die Merkmale des Kompromisses sind und welches sein Verhältnis zu ähnlichen Begriffen wie Schmutzige Hände oder Modus Vivendi ist, wird im Artikel geklärt.

Dans ce livre riche et foisonnant, Nahema Hanafi articule les questionnements de traditions historiographiques diverses. À la jonction entre histoire des savoirs et des pratiques de santé et histoire des femmes et du genre, son étude mobilise les études sur les écrits du for privé, l’histoire de la famille et de la parenté ou celle des élites. L’auteure construit une polyphonie à partir du dépouillement de quelque 3000 lettres écrites par une vingtaine de femmes des élites socio-économiques...

Ratio Juris, Volume 35, Issue 1, Page 30-37, March 2022.

Children ask existential questions, that is, questions about death, the meaning of existence, free will, God, the origin of everything, and kindred questions. P4/wC has the aspiration to give to children the occasion to discover and explore their questions in a safe environment, the community of inquiry. Thus, existential questioning should be possible in a community of inquiry. However, it is unclear whether the pedagogy of the community of inquiry can accommodate existential questioning. The chief trouble is that existential questioning (...) might be a cause of suffering: children might be unable to contain the emotional intensity that is experienced when we inquire about topics like death and the meaning of existence. In a community of inquiry, the emphasis over the community and the autonomy that children experience in choosing the questions for their inquiry might create occasions of suffering: some children might not be prepared to discuss existential issues or might be troubled by the candidate answers they explore and eventually end up to endorse. In this paper I highlight some of the main challenges that we need to face if we want to make room for existential questioning in the community of inquiry. (shrink)

English summary: The degree of law will determine how goods are distributed and balanced in legal relationships. The selected essays take up the question of how to understand law, and especially how to behave within the extent of the law. The lawyer is always confronted with the righteousness within and of the law. Justice within the law is not his work. If the lawyer is not satisfied with this kind of justice, he can respond as a moral personality. Justice before (...) the law offers some leeway in which one can make decisions. Therein lies the appeal of the work of the lawyer, and also his considerable responsibility. The legal decision is closely related to legal ethics. This builds on solid traditional values, which must necessarily expand in terms of affairs of time and space, as well as towards the responsibility of future generations. The German and English writings reprinted here are divided into six groups: (I) The equitable allocation as the core of law, (II) probation of law and rule of law, (III) responsible legal decisionmaking, (IV) the correlativity of justice, (V) dialogical nature of jurisprudence, and (VI) from the Slovenian tradition of thought. German and English text. German description: Vom Mass des Rechts hangt es ab, wie die Gueter und Lasten in Rechtverhaltnissen verteilt und ausgeglichen werden. Die ausgewahlten Abhandlungen stellen sich der Frage, wie man Recht verstehen soll - und besonders, wie man sich gegenueber dem Mass des Rechts verhalten soll.Der Jurist ist immer mit der Gerechtigkeit im Gesetz und vor dem Gesetz konfrontiert. Die Gerechtigkeit im Gesetz ist nicht sein Werk. Wenn der Jurist mit dieser Art der Gerechtigkeit nicht einverstanden ist, kann er als Moralpersonlichkeit reagieren. Die Gerechtigkeit vor dem Gesetz bietet einen Spielraum, in dem man Entscheidungen trifft. Darin liegt der Reiz der Arbeit des Juristen und auch seine betrachtliche Verantwortung.Das juristische Entscheiden ist eng mit der Rechtsethik verbunden. Diese baut auf einer festen Wertetradition auf, die sie notwendigerweise im Hinblick auf das Zeit- und Raumgeschehen und auf die Verantwortung gegenueber kuenftigen Generationen erganzen und ausbauen muss.Die hier wieder abgedruckten deutschen und englischen Schriften sind in sechs Gruppen unterteilt: (I) Die gerechte Zurechnung als Kern des Rechts, (II) Bewahrung von Recht und Rechtsstaatlichkeit, (III) Verantwortliches Rechtsentscheiden, (IV) Die Korrelativitat des Rechts, (V) Dialogische Natur der Jurisprudenz und (VI) Aus der slowenischen Denktradition. (shrink)

Law is a system of legal rules and legal principles. The distinction between them is a relative one. Always such definite major and minor premises are to be formed that the case can be subsumed under the rule and a conclusion, which includes the decision, can be drawn. This applies to legal principles that are operationalised by legal rules as well as to statutory forms of legal rules, which are often open as to their meaning and/or contain definitions that comprise (...) elements of principles. The basic characteristic of legal principles is that they are value measures directing the definition of legal rules as to their contents, the understanding of the rules, and the manner of their application. Legal principles aim at a goal, have weight, and define the scope of the meaning within which the legal rules move. The operationalisation of legal principles is the _ratio decidendi_ that the court has to achieve in order to be able to decide in a concrete case. Legal principles live through the rules that are the reasons for the decision in a concrete case. New cases can be solved by a new operationalisation of legal principles or by analogous application of precedents if the new cases, in their essential elements, correspond to cases that have already been decided. (shrink)

The basic question is whether and in what sense it is possible to speak about gaps in the law. If we disagree with Kelsen’s thesis that the nature of gaps in the law is that of an ideological formula, then we have to define them legally and to find the criteria regarding how they can be filled. It is also important that incompletenesses as regards contents - Hart treats them as “open texture” - are organic parts of laws. The Slovene (...) Courts Act is in accord with this thesis and for that very reason provides - the provision was written by the author of this paper - that “the judge has to decide in such a way as if he had in front of him an indefinite number of equal cases”. (shrink)