In 1966 the Brazilian physicist Klaus Tausk (b. 1927) circulated a preprint from the International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste, Italy, criticizing Adriana Daneri, Angelo Loinger, and Giovanni Maria Prosperi`s theory of 1962 on the measurement problem in quantum mechanics. A heated controversy ensued between two opposing camps within the orthodox interpretation of quantum theory, represented by Leon Rosenfeld and Eugene P. Wigner. The controversy went well beyond the strictly scientific issues, however, reflecting philosophical and political commitments within the (...) context of the Cold War, the relationship between science in developed and Third World countries, the importance of social skills, and personal idiosyncrasies. (shrink)

Este trabalho analisa idéias e atividades de Karl Popper referentes à controvérsia sobre interpretações e fundamentos da mecânica quântica. Atenção especial será dedicada às relações entre Popper e o físico italiano Franco Selleri, ao longo da década de 1980. A interpretação proposta por Popper para os enunciados probabilísticos como propensões, bem como seu ponto de vista realista, contribuíram para estabelecer uma ponte entre suas investigações filosóficas e a pesquisa física em mecânica quântica, ainda que sua idéia sobre as propensões tenha (...) tido uma pequena repercussão entre físicos, matemáticos e filósofos. Argumentaremos neste trabalho que a influência de Popper na física foi possível devido à legitimação, a partir de 1970, da controvérsia sobre os fundamentos da teoria quântica como uma genuína controvérsia científica com implicações filosóficas. Popper foi beneficiado por essa legitimação, mas ele também contribuiu para fazer aquela controvérsia chegar a um público mais amplo que aquele dos físicos envolvidos na própria controvérsia.I intend to present in this paper Karl Popper’s ideas and activities concerning the controversy about the interpretations and foundations of quantum mechanics. I will pay special attention to Popper’s relationship with the Italian physicist Franco Selleri, during the 1980s. Popper’s ideas of propensity and realism contributed to build a bridge between his philosophy and physical research in quantum mechanics, even if his idea of propensity has had a weak reception among physicists, mathematicians and philosophers. I will argue that Popper’s contributions to physics were possible due to the legitimization in the 1970s of the controversy about the foundations of quantum mechanics, a process which permitted a trading zone between physics and philosophy. Popper was benefited by that process, but he also contributed to give to that controversy a larger audience thanthat of the physicists involved in that controversy. (shrink)

This paper offers a contribution to debates around integrative aspects of systems biology and engages with issues related to the circumstances under which physicists look at biological problems. We use oral history as one of the methodological tools to gather the empirical material, conducting interviews with physicists working in systems biology. The interviews were conducted at several institutions in Brazil, Germany, Israel and the U.S. Biological research has been increasingly dependent on computational methods, high-throughput technologies, and multidisciplinary skills. Quantitative scientists (...) are joining biological departments and collaborations between physicists and biologists are particularly vigorous. This state of affairs raises a number of questions, such as: What are the circumstances under which physicists approach biological problems in systems biology? What kind of interdisciplinary challenges must be tackled? The paper suggests that, concerning physicists’ move to work on biological systems, there are common reasons to move, the transition must be understood in terms of degrees, physicists have a rationale for simplifying systems, and distinct conceptions of model and modeling strategies are recurrent. We identified problems regarding linguistic clarity and integration of epistemological aims. We conclude that cultural unconformities within the systems biology community have important consequences to the flow of scientific knowledge. (shrink)

This paper offers a contribution to debates around integrative aspects of systems biology and engages with issues related to the circumstances under which physicists look at biological problems. We use oral history as one of the methodological tools to gather the empirical material, conducting interviews with physicists working in systems biology. The interviews were conducted at several institutions in Brazil, Germany, Israel and the U.S. Biological research has been increasingly dependent on computational methods, high-throughput technologies, and multidisciplinary skills. Quantitative scientists (...) are joining biological departments and collaborations between physicists and biologists are particularly vigorous. This state of affairs raises a number of questions, such as: What are the circumstances under which physicists approach biological problems in systems biology? What kind of interdisciplinary challenges must be tackled? The paper suggests that, concerning physicists’ move to work on biological systems, there are common reasons to move, the transition must be understood in terms of degrees, physicists have a rationale for simplifying systems, and distinct conceptions of model and modeling strategies are recurrent. We identified problems regarding linguistic clarity and integration of epistemological aims. We conclude that cultural unconformities within the systems biology community have important consequences to the flow of scientific knowledge. (shrink)

This paper offers a contribution to debates around integrative aspects of systems biology and engages with issues related to the circumstances under which physicists look at biological problems. We use oral history as one of the methodological tools to gather the empirical material, conducting interviews with physicists working in systems biology. The interviews were conducted at several institutions in Brazil, Germany, Israel and the U.S. Biological research has been increasingly dependent on computational methods, high-throughput technologies, and multidisciplinary skills. Quantitative scientists (...) are joining biological departments and collaborations between physicists and biologists are particularly vigorous. This state of affairs raises a number of questions, such as: What are the circumstances under which physicists approach biological problems in systems biology? What kind of interdisciplinary challenges must be tackled? The paper suggests that, concerning physicists’ move to work on biological systems, there are common reasons to move, the transition must be understood in terms of degrees, physicists have a rationale for simplifying systems, and distinct conceptions of model and modeling strategies are recurrent. We identified problems regarding linguistic clarity and integration of epistemological aims. We conclude that cultural unconformities within the systems biology community have important consequences to the flow of scientific knowledge. (shrink)

This essay explores how the doctrine of the Resurrection informs theological reflection on reconciliation in post‐Apartheid South Africa. It begins by establishing the fragile and liminal state of reconciliation, despite the efforts of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. It then argues that the Resurrection offers an ecstatic and relational understanding of the human, which in turn provides a basis for advancing claims regarding human dignity and well‐being. In conversation with the work of Oliver O'Donovan and James Alison on the Resurrection, (...) this view is further contextualized by incorporating insights from ubuntu and from the work of Judith Butler on grieving. The essay closes with proposals for how the church in post‐Apartheid South Africa can give witness to the Resurrection in its immediate life and work through advocacy and carrying on the politics of grieving. (shrink)

Im Zentrum des Werkes von Michael Oakeshott (1901-1990) steht die Frage nach der Vernunft der Praxis und der Praxis der Vernunft. Dieses klassische Thema der praktischen Philosophie, das heute im Hintergrund verschiedener Debatten in Philosophie und Politikwissenschaft steht, leitete Oakeshott in seiner Auseinandersetzung mit der modernen Politik. Die in dem Sammelband vereinigten Beitrage bieten einen Uberblick uber die internationale Forschungslage; ihr gemeinsamer Angelpunkt ist Oakeshotts Praxisbegriff: Diskutiert wird seine praktische Bedeutung im Durchgang durch die grundlegenden politischen und gesellschaftlichen Problemfragen der (...) Gegenwart, seine theoretische Leistungsfahigkeit ist Gegenstand vergleichender Perspektiven, die vor allem die deutschen Zeitgenossen wie H. Arendt, H.-G. Gadamer, G. Simmel oder L. Strauss einbeziehen. Der vorliegende Band unternimmt es, die seit mehr als zwei Jahrzehnten intensiv gefuhrte, vor allem angelsachsische Debatte um Oakeshotts Denken in die einschlagigen deutschen Diskussionen zu tragen und die Anknupfungspunkte sichtbar zu machen, die sein facettenreiches Werk fur die Verstandigung uber eine humane Praxis in den Konflikten des 21. Jahrhunderts bietet. Mit Beitragen von: Josiah Lee Auspitz, Michael Becker, Wendell John Coats Jr., Peter Finn, Jurgen Gebhardt, Steven A. Gerencser, Michael Grossheim, Michael Henkel, Hans Jorg Hennecke, Bart van Klink, Silviya Lechner, Oliver W. Lembcke, Kenneth B. McIntyre, Efraim Podoksik, Rainer Schmidt, Suvi Soininen, Judith A. Swanson, Martyn P. Thompson. (shrink)

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr, is considered by many to be the most influential American jurist. The voluminous literature devoted to his writings and legal thought, however, is diverse and inconsistent. In this study, Frederic R. Kellogg follows Holmes's intellectual path from his early writings through his judicial career. He offers a fresh perspective that addresses the views of Holmes's leading critics and explains his relevance to the controversy over judicial activism and restraint. Holmes is shown to be an original legal (...) theorist who reconceived common law as a theory of social inquiry and who applied his insights to constitutional law. From his empirical and naturalist perspective on law, with its roots in American pragmatism, emerged Holmes's distinctive judicial and constitutional restraint. Kellogg distinguishes Holmes from analytical legal positivism and contrasts him with a range of thinkers. (shrink)

This essay builds on recent work by Susan Haack to suggest that Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.’s conception of the common law was influenced by Darwinian evolution and classical pragmatism. This is no small claim: perceptions of what the common law is and does within the constitutional framework of the United States continue to be heavily debated. Holmes’s paradigm for the common law both revised and extended the models set forth by Sir Edward Coke, Thomas Hobbes, Sir Matthew Hale, and Sir (...) William Blackstone. Adding additional substance to Haack’s argument by pointing out passages in Holmes’s opinions and in his only book, The Common Law, that corroborate her claims about the particular features of Holmes’s pragmatism, this essay concludes by suggesting that, because of his connections with the classical pragmatists and his reverence for Emerson, Holmes is the best place to begin answering the famous question formulated by Stanley Cavell: “What’s the Use in Calling Emerson a Pragmatist?”. (shrink)

This book explores the cultures of philosophy and the law as they interact with neuroscience and biology, through the perspective of American jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes’ Jr., and the pragmatist tradition of John Dewey. Schulkin proposes that human problem solving and the law are tied to a naturalistic, realistic and an anthropological understanding of the human condition. The situated character of legal reasoning, given its complexity, like reasoning in neuroscience, can be notoriously fallible. Legal and scientific reasoning is to be (...) understood within a broader context in order to emphasize both the continuity and the porous relationship between the two. Some facts of neuroscience fit easily into discussions of human experience and the law. However, it is important not to oversell neuroscience: a meeting of law and neuroscience is unlikely to prove persuasive in the courtroom any time soon. Nevertheless, as knowledge of neuroscience becomes more reliable and more easily accepted by both the larger legislative community and in the wider public, through which neuroscience filters into epistemic and judicial reliability, the two will ultimately find themselves in front of a judge. A pragmatist view of neuroscience will aid and underlie these events. (shrink)

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. is, arguably, the most important American jurist of the twentieth century, and his essay The Path of the Law, first published in 1898, is the seminal work in American legal theory. In it, Holmes detailed his radical break with legal formalism and created the foundation for the leading contemporary schools of American legal thought. He was the dominant source of inspiration for the school of legal realism, and his insistence on a practical approach to law and (...) legal analysis laid the basis for the realists' later concentration upon the pragmatic and empirical aspects of law and legal procedures. This volume brings together some of the most distinguished legal scholars from the United States and Canada to examine competing understandings of The Path of the Law and its implications for contemporary American jurisprudence. For the reader's convenience, the essay is republished in an Appendix. (shrink)

The Pragmatism and Prejudice of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. examines the varied categories scholars have used to describe the philosophy of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. These include, “Jobbist,” Nihilist, Realist, Social Darwinist, Utilitarian, Positivist, Natural Law Theorist, and Pragmatist.

By any measure, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., led a full and remarkable life. He was tall and exceptionally attractive, especially as he aged, with piercing eyes, a shock of white hair, and prominent moustache. He was the son of a famous father, a thrice-wounded veteran of the Civil War, a Harvard-educated member of Brahmin Boston, the acquaintance of Longfellow, Lowell, and Emerson, and for a time a close friend of William James. He wrote one of the classic works of American (...) legal scholarship, The Common Law, and he served with distinction on the Supreme Court of the United States. He was actively involved in the Court's work into his nineties. In Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, G. Edward White, the acclaimed biographer of Earl Warren and one of America's most esteemed legal scholars, provides a rounded portrait of this remarkable jurist. We see Holmes's early life in Boston and at Harvard, his ambivalent relationship with his father, and his harrowing service during the Civil War. White examines Holmes's curious, childless marriage and he includes new information on Holmes's relationship with Clare Castletown. White not only provides a vivid portrait of Holmes's life, but examines in depth the inner life and thought of this preeminent legal figure. There is a full chapter devoted to The Common Law, for instance, and throughout the book, there is astute commentary on Holmes's legal writings. Indeed, White reveals that some of the themes that have dominated 20th-century American jurisprudence--including protection for free speech and the belief that "judges make the law"--originated in Holmes's work. Perhaps most important, White suggests that understanding Holmes's life is crucial to understanding his work, and he continually stresses the connections between Holmes's legal career and his personal life. For instance, his desire to distinguish himself from his father and from the "soft" literary culture of his father's generation drove him to legal scholarship of a particularly demanding kind. White's biography of Earl Warren was hailed by Anthony Lewis on the cover of The New York Times Book Review as "serious and fascinating," and The Los Angeles Times noted that "White has gone beyond the labels and given us the man." In Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, White has produced an equally serious and fascinating biography, one that again goes beyond the labels and gives us the man himself. (shrink)

The rising interest, in the late 20th century, in the foundations of quantum physics, a subject in which Franco Selleri has excelled, has suggested the fair question: how did it become so? The current answer says that experiments have allowed to bring into the laboratories some previous gedanken experiments, beginning with those about EPR and related to Bell’s inequalities. I want to explore an alternative view, by which there would have been, before Bell’s inequalities experimental tests, a change in the (...) views shared by physicists concerning the intellectual status of that issue. I will take three cases which will serve as the threads of our story: the connections between Bohm’s causal interpretation and Bell’s inequalities; Wigner’s ideas on the measurement problem; and finally Everett’s relative states formulation. In the end, I will discuss how those threads were gathered together by creating foundations of quantum physics as a field of research. (shrink)

Oliver Wendell Holmes jr was a survivor of the Civil War. Wounded three times and left for dead once, he survived endless pain and death for a war for which he believed more in the beginning of the virtues of the war than he did at the end. But it was this important experience that pervades his long life. And we now know how to think about how trauma turns to memory sculptured onto the brain. Holmes’ emphasized experience in adjudication (...) and context dependent problem solving or inquiry. Yet while he championed freedom, he had a rather limited view towards those for which the war was fought. (shrink)

Review of Frederic R. Kellogg, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., _Legal Theory And Judicial Restraint_ (Cambridge University Press 2007).

Neste artigo, analisamos os desafios historiográficos relacionados à produção de biografias no âmbito da História da Ciência. Em especial, discutimos as ideias apresentadas pelo historiador francês Jacques Le Goff em seu livro São Luís, publicado em 1996. Essa análise, de natureza teórica e metodológica, é cotejada com o esboço panorâmico da biografia do físico norte-americano David Bohm, recentemente publicada sob o título David Bohm – A Life Dedicated to Understanding the Quantum World. O tema tem relevância também para a história (...) da ciência no Brasil, uma vez que nosso personagem lecionou na Universidade de São Paulo entre fins de 1951 e início de 1955. (shrink)

The Reputation of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., one of the chief architects of twentieth century American law, has gone through a number of phases, changing from being altogether praiseworthy in the last years of his life and the first years after his death in 1935 to that of more sober evaluations. Writing at mid-century Henry Steele Commager offered the judgment that Holmes had had about him “much of the Olympian [and] something of the Mephistophelean.” The most useful account of (...) how the winds of change swept along Holmes' reputation is an article by G. Edward White, “The Rise and Fall of Justice Holmes,” which appeared in the University of Chicago Law Review in 1971. White examined the myth of Justice Holmes as it obtained from 1932 to 1940 and then proceeded to describe the demythologizing of Holmes from 1941 through 1949. (shrink)

The philosophy of medicine cum bioethics has become the socially recognized source for moral and epistemic direction in health-care decision-making. Over the last three decades, this field has been accepted politically as an authorized source of guidance for policy and law. The field's political actors have included the National Commission for the Protection of Human Subjects of Biomedical and Behavioral Research, the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, the President's Commission for the Study of Ethical Problems in Medicine and Biomedical (...) and Behavioral Research, the National Bioethics Advisory Commission, and the new Council on Bioethics; these groups and agencies have set forth rules on issues ranging from the role of humans in biomedical research to the production of human embryos for research, the definition of death, and the permissibility of human cloning. The members of the field are not just scholars and teachers in an academic realm directed to both theoretical and applied issues. They are, in addition, practitioners of a conceptual and moral trade that possesses a legal and political standing. This essay critically addresses the sudden emergence of bioethics as a societally recognized source of moral guidance, a source replete with authorized moral experts. Attention is directed to moral and conceptual assumptions that have led the philosophy of medicine, and especially bioethics, to acquire a quasi-juridical/political role in guiding clinical choices, framing health-care policy, and directing court holdings. (shrink)