This essay has two goals. The first is to define the behavioristic study of natural events and to classify behavior. The second is to stress the importance of the concept of purpose.Given any object, relatively abstracted from its surroundings for study, the behavioristic approach consists in the examination of the output of the object and of the relations of this output to the input. By output is meant any change produced in the surroundings by the object. By input, conversely, is (...) meant any event external to the object that modifies this object in any manner. (shrink)

The intention and the result of a scientific inquiry is to obtain an understanding and a control of some part of the universe. This statement implies a dualistic attitude on the part of scientists. Indeed, science does and should proceed from this dualistic basis. But even though the scientist behaves dualistically, his dualism is operational and does not necessarily imply strict dualistic metaphysics.

In a recent essay Professor Taylor criticizes the criteria used by Rosenblueth, Wiener and Bigelow in 1943 to distinguish purposeful from non-purposeful behavior. He also criticizes our definition of behavior, our concept of the vague as opposed to the general, our use of the word correlation, and our statement that a system may reach a final condition. Indeed, there seems to be little, if anything, in our paper to which he does not emphatically object.He maintains that the notions of purpose (...) and teleology are not only useless for the understanding of mechanical behavior, but wholly incongruous when applied to this behavior. He further affirms that our use of the term purpose “bears no similarity whatever to the meaning which is ordinarily attached to it.” He does not state, however, his own notions of purpose and teleology; and the meaning which he considers to be ordinarily attached to the term purpose. This omission weakens his criticism considerably. (shrink)

Why are human rights considered inviolable norms of justice although more than hundred countries around the globe violate them? This paradox seems reducible to the discrepancy between idealism and reality in humanitarian affairs, but Imagining Human Rights complicates this picture by offering interdisciplinary perspectives on the imaginary status of human rights on their power and limitation alike.".

Inevitably, digitization and the increasing use of intelligent programs and machines have fundamentally changed the world of work. Moreover, it is to be expected that trends will continue in the near future and that other far-reaching changes will occur. Work is such an essential part in the lives of most members of society. It is not only the primary source of income but also crucial for one’s self-fulfillment, identification, and the achievement of social recognition. Therefore, from a societal, legal, and (...) political perspective, there is a need to understand the imminent changes, to critically reflect on them, and to draft alternative proposals to shape the future in order to provide normative guidance. (shrink)

This paper is divided into three sections. In the first section we offer a retooling of some traditional concepts, namely icons and symbols, which allows us to describe an evolutionary continuum of communication systems. The second section consists of an argument from theoretical biology. In it we explore the advantages and disadvantages of phenotypic plasticity. We argue that a range of the conditions that selectively favor phenotypic plasticity also favor a nongenetic transmission system that would allow for the inheritance of (...) acquired characters. The first two sections are independent, the third depends on both of them. In it we offer an argument that human natural languages have just the features required of an ideal transmission mechanism under the conditions described in section 2. (shrink)

Translated from German. Includes bibliographical references. Includes index.

Der Begriff „Globalisierung“ wird zunehmend nicht nur in den Disziplinen der Ökonomie und der Kommunikationswissenschaft diskutiert, sondern auch in den Gesellschafts- und Erziehungswissenschaften sowie insbesondere in der Interkulturellen Philosophie. Der Diskurs über Globalisierung verläuft dabei teilweise analog demjenigen über Inter- und Multikulturalität. Die Beiträge dieses Bandes geben ein breites Spektrum wieder. Sie reichen von der Konstatierung der Globalisierung als einer Rahmenbedingung, zu der man sich als Wissenschaftler reflexiv oder reaktiv zu verhalten habe, über die Analyse diverser Teilaspekte und über visionäre (...) Einforderungen utopischer Globalisierungsauslegungen bis zur Negierung ihrer erkenntnistheoretischen Bedeutung. Das Gemeinsame dieser Vielfältigkeit ist die Bestimmung des Globalen als eines Szenarios der Begegnung. (shrink)

In this compelling volume, ten distinguished thinkers -- William G. Lycan, Galen Strawson, Jeffrey Poland, Georges Rey, Frances Egan, Paul Horwich, Peter Ludlow, Paul Pietroski, Alison Gopnik, and Ruth Millikan -- address a variety of conceptual issues raised in Noam Chomsky's work. Distinguished list of critics: William G. Lycan, Galen Strawson, Jeffrey Poland, Georges Rey, Frances Egan, Paul Horwich, Peter Ludlow, Paul Pietroski, Alison Gopnik, and Ruth Millikan. Includes Chomsky's substantial new replies and responses to each essay. The best critical (...) introduction to Chomsky's thought as a whole. (shrink)

Elias wrote in both English and German, and in all his work runs to 14 books and around 90 other essays, along with poems and numerous interviews. The 18 volumes of the collected works contain many writings not previously published in English, and a small number never published before. All of the texts have thoroughly checked and revised, by editors who have a deep knowledge of Elia's thinking; they have inserted many clarifications, cross-references and explanatory notes.

In developed economies, powerful legislative and regulatory frameworks, for people with disability over the last five decades, have provided major motivation for business compliance with disability in the workplaces. However, developing economy like India is marked by emergent disability legislation, weak institutional enforcement and an evolving disability rights movement. In the absence of strong institutional expectations, the private sector’s role in mainstreaming the disability agenda has been largely an act of voluntary participation. Drawing upon an in-depth, multilevel, cross-functional qualitative study (...) of four Indian information technology sector companies, this paper explores why these companies engage in pro-social corporate behaviour in favour of disability. The study locates itself in the context of conceptualization of PWD as employee stakeholders and the literature on strategic CSR. The findings reveal that strategic factors promote voluntary business engagement with disability at workplaces and contribute to understanding of workplace integration of minority employees. (shrink)

This essay is one more attempt of understanding the non-dual philosophical position of Abhinavagupta viz-a-viz the problem of reflection. Since when my first essay on ‘Abhinavagupta on Reflection’ appeared in JIP, I have once again focused on the non-dual Śaiva theory of reflection (_pratibimbavāda_) (3.1-65) as discussed by Abhinavagupta (_fl.c._ 975-1025 CE) in the _Tantrāloka_ and his commentator Jayaratha (_fl.c._ 1225-1275 CE). The present attempt is to understand their philosophical position in the context of Nyāya realism where a reflection is (...) simply caused by an erroneous apprehension of an entity. For Naiyāyikas, according to both Abhinavagupta and Jayaratha, a reflection (_pratibimba_) does not have a real existence at all. There are only two ways of looking at a reflection: it can either simply be an original image (_bimba_) or an illusion (_bhrānti_). There is no scope for any third entity apart from something being an error or a non-error. In contrast to this, establishing a Śaiva theory of reflection, Abhinavagupta is corroborating a valid ontological status for the seemingly illusory objects of perception or imagined objects, such as, to use Abhinavagupta’s own language, ‘an elephant with five trunks and four tusks who is running in the sky’. In other words, he is pleading for the valid cognition of objects which are otherwise deemed to be an error or external to consciousness. While Abhinavagupta’s system has generally been referred to as ‘idealism’, I argue that by establishing the dynamism of reflective awareness that is deemed to be absolutely real, his system should be referred to as ‘dynamic realism’ i.e., the ‘dynamism’ that is common to both ‘real’ and ‘ideal’. This is why he uses the metaphor _consciousness-as-mirror_ (_ciddarpaṇa_) in establishing a non-erroneous ontological status for otherwise illusive idea of reflection. (shrink)

In the celebrated tantric manual, the Tantrāloka, Abhinavagupta and his commentator Jayaratha establish a non-dual Śaiva theory of reflection using the key metaphors of light and reflective awareness. This paper attempts to explain the philosophical problem of reflection from the standpoint of these non-dual Śaivas. It also evaluates the problem in its hermeneutical context, analysing multiple layers of meaning and interpretation. Is the metaphor of reflection only a way of explaining the particular currents of the Śaiva phenomenology represented by the (...) concepts of prakāśa and vimarśa? What philosophical problem does Abhinavagupta seek to solve by complicating the category of reflection and giving it a quasi-paradoxical status? Why does he use the model of the subtle elements to explain the theory of reflection? What does the ‘untaintedness of the mirror of consciousness’ mean for his system? These questions form the focus of this paper. (shrink)

It is possible to be ‘irrational’ without being ‘uneconomic’? What is the link between ‘Value’ and ‘values’? What do economists do when they ‘explain’? We live in times when the economic logic has become unquestionable and all-powerful so that our quotidian economic experiences are defined by their scientific construal. This book is the result of a multifaceted investigation into the nature of knowledge produced by economics, and the construction of the category that is termed ‘economic’ with its implied exclusions. It (...) is an attempt to think economics Otherwise, that is, a questioning of economics as if difference mattered. Nitasha Kaul re-examines certain understood ways of thinking about economics as a discipline, especially in elation to questions of identity and difference. This book explores the notion that economics is not a timeless, universal, objective science but a changing response to the problems of knowledge and administration. The epistemological inheritance of economics is ‘rooted’ in the enlightenment, and it also inherits the liberal paradoxes of that age. Kaul argues that the juxtaposition of identity with economic is essential, and can only be achieved by critiquing establishment economists’ discourse on identity, and taking feminist poststructural and postcolonial work seriously. The author challenges the assumption that there is a simple linkage between the category economic, the entity economy and the study of economics. She envisions an economics in the plural: contextual, social, political—econo-mixes. The book brings together some of the most urgent topics of the day—the power of economics as a discipline, the questions of difference and the politics of identity, and feminist perspectives on this. It will be particularly relevant to heterodox economists, feminist theorists, postcolonial studies scholars, social and cultural theorists, philosophers and history of ideas or intellectual history of thought scholars. (shrink)

Nowadays the question of toleration is less related to an international clash of civilizations than to the clashes that take place within the states and polities themselves. The article addresses the sources of toleration in this new global scenario, starting from the following set of questions: Do the sources of toleration differ across time and space? Does toleration have different roots in different civilizational contexts, such as China, India or Islam? Or, is toleration the result of particular institutional frameworks and (...) designs? In this case, does the concept of toleration vary from one institutional setting to the other? Do empires, republics and democracies give rise to different forms of toleration? And last but not least, isn’t toleration rather a matter of individual morality, as many liberal theories sustain? The article distinguishes between three different sources of toleration: individuals, cultures and institutions. Kant and contemporary liberals, as John Rawls who follows him, situate t... (shrink)

As this book reveals, his vision was much more complex and interesting. He hoped that machines would release people from relentless and repetitive drudgery in order to achieve more creative pursuits.

This book is the result of a multifaceted investigation into the nature of knowledge produced by economics, and the construction of the category that is termed ...

Die Erforschung Kants ist langst zu einem weltumspannenden Unternehmen geworden. Welch reiche Frucht der Wissenschaft dadurch zufallt, zeigen die Beitrage dieser Festschrift, die dem Nestor der deutschen Kantforschung, Norbert Hinske, gewidmet ist. Bekannte Vertreter der italienischen, japanischen, russischen und deutschen Kantforschung kommen zu Wort. Von besonderer Bedeutung fur die - in diesem Punkt ganzlich neu zu schreibende - Lebens- und Entwicklungsgeschichte Kants ist ein neu entdeckter, erstmals im Faksimile abgedruckter Brief von J. E. Biester an J. N. Tetens, der (...) belegt, dass der preussische Kultusminister v. Zedlitz zunachst nicht etwa Kant, sondern Tetens nach Halle berufen hat. Hinskes vollstandige Bibliographie rundet den Band ab - und zeigt eindrucksvoll, wie viel die Kantforschung weltweit gerade ihm zu verdanken hat. The study of Kant has long been a global undertaking. The articles in this Festschrift for the leading German expert on Kant, Norbert Hinske, show how richly productive this has been for scholars. Leading Italian, Japanese, Russian and German representatives of research on Kant have provided contributions to it. What is particular significant for the history of Kant's life and development, which has to be completely rewritten in this regard, is a newly discovered letter, reprinted in facsimile for the first time, from J. E. Biester to J. N. Tetens, which proves that Prussian Minister of Culture v. Zedlitz initially did not appoint Kant but rather Tetens to the position in Halle. Hinske's complete bibliography is included in the volume and is impressive evidence of how much Kant research worldwide owes to him. (shrink)

In the first section of this paper I analyze the colonial origins of Jammu and Kashmir, in order to suggest that tehreeki politics, and such collective suffering, derive from a longer history of imperial expansion and feudal rule. Then, in the third section, I discuss the enormous violence that accompanied partition, whose afterlife continues to haunt the political imagination in India and Pakistan, and thus to limit discussions of Kashmiri self-determination within the narrow confines of self-righteous nationalisms. In the concluding (...) section, I return to the present moment in Kashmir, and leave the final word with another young Kashmiri poet. (shrink)

What is Sociology? presents in concise and provocative form the major ideas of a seminal thinker whose work--spanning more than four decades--is only now gaining the recognition here it has long had in Germany and France. Unlike other post-war sociologists, Norbert Elias has always held the concept of historical development among his central concerns; his dynamic theories of the evolution of modern man have remedied the historical and epistemological shortcomings of structualism and ethno-methodology. What is Sociology? refines the arguments (...) that were first found in Elias' massive work on the civilizing process, in which he formulated his major assertions about the interdependence of the making of modern man and modern society. It is Elias' contention that changes in personality structure--embodied in phenomena ranging from table manners and hygiene habits to rites of punishment and courtly love--inevitably reflect and mould patterns of control generated by new political and social instututions. Elias' rejection of a dichotomy between individual and society, and his use of psychoanalysis, political theory, and social history, help restore a fullness of resource to sociology. (shrink)

Study of four works of Sri Krishna Prem, 1898-1965, a Vaishnavite teacher; includes a bibliographical sketch.