It seems evident that only »civil« culture is able to release the promethean powers of mankind. This process, going on for 200 years, is closely related to money as a socio-cultural device. Simmel is the first theoretician who revealed the indissoluble relationship between money and modern culture. In contrast, economics abstracts from culture in order to comply with the norms of »natural« sciences, therefore failing to integrate the essential category of economics – money – in its theory. Simmel's approach could (...) be a rescue device to economic sciences caught up in their naturalistic web. (shrink)

Written in political exile during the Second World War and first published in 1945, Karl Popper's The Open Society and Its Enemiesis one of the most influential books of the twentieth century. Hailed by Bertrand Russell as a 'vigorous and profound defence of democracy', its now legendary attack on the philosophies of Plato, Hegel and Marx exposed the dangers inherent in centrally planned political systems. Popper's highly accessible style, his erudite and lucid explanations of the thought of great philosophers and (...) the recent resurgence of totalitarian regimes around the world are just three of the reasons for the enduring popularity of The Open Society and Its Enemies, and for why it demands to be read both today and in years to come. This is the second of two volumes of The Open Society and Its Enemies. (shrink)

Informed consent is a central concept for empirical and theoretical research concerning pregnancy management decisions and is often taken to be one of the more fundamental goals of the profession of genetic counseling. Tellingly, this concept has been seen by disability communities as salutary, despite longstanding critiques made by disability activists, advocates, and scholars concerning practices involved in genetic counseling more generally. In this chapter, we show that the widespread faith in informed consent is misleading and can be detrimental to (...) the practice of genetic counseling as guided by concerns of justice and equity. We proceed in two steps. First, we explain how informed consent is flawed as a practical concept. Second, we show how the inadequacy of informed consent illuminates the animating core of disability critiques of genetic counseling: the issue of ableism. We argue that the problem of ableism cannot be solved with informed consent because it is not merely a problem of information, but also of epistemic schemas. We suggest that what we call critically informed consent is better suited to move genetic counseling from being aware of the problem of ableism to becoming actively anti-ableist. (shrink)

This paper offers an account of recognition and its relation to knowledge. One important observation is that while ‘know’ is a stative verb, ‘recognize’ is an achievement verb. A second is that ‘recognize’ is knowledge entailing, both when combined with a complementizer phrase and when combined with a noun phrase. The behavior of the latter kind of construction is particularly subtle and is the main focus of this paper. This paper ends with an interesting puzzle about object recognition.

In diesem Buch geht es um die Frage der Erkennbarkeit der Wahrheit und ihre theologische Relevanz. Welche Bedeutung hat der Skeptizismus in seiner antiken - und zugleich reifsten Form - fur Augustin, Descartes und Hegel? Welche Bedeutung hat die Auseinandersetzung Luthers mit Erasmus (1518-25) im Blick auf anthropologische Grundfragen wie z.B. die der Willensfreiheit? Welche Funktion kommt der Skepsis in den theologischen Entwurfen von v. Frank, Ihmels und Karl Heim (dieser ausgehend von Kant und Einstein) zu? Welche Rolle spielen Kierkegaard (...) und Nietzsche im Blick auf die cartesianisch-neuzeitliche These -De omnibus dubitandum est-? Inwiefern leistet die moderne Sprachphilosophie im 20. Jahrhundert einen Beitrag zum Thema der Gewissheit (Wittgenstein 1949/51, gegen G.E. Moore) und wie lasst sich der Beitrag der Transzendentalpragmatik (J. Habermas, K.-O. Apel, W. Kuhlmann) zur Uberwindung des Skeptizismus einstufen? Diese Fragen werden so behandelt, dass die verschiedenen Strange der Skeptizismus-Debatte fur sich dargestellt und in ihrer philosophischen sowie theologischen Bedeutung interpretiert werden. Das Buch versteht sich somit als Beitrag zu einer fundamentaltheologischen Grundsatzfrage, die losgelost von der philosophischen Debatte nicht stringent zu beantworten ist.". (shrink)

Sexualpolitik ist eine Machttechnik. Sie reguliert Verhaltensweisen oder schliesst Gruppen aus - das Feld Sexualität ist dabei besonders skandalisierbar. Angeblich problematische Sexualitäten werden nicht nur mit Geschlecht, sondern auch mit Ethnizität und Religion verflochten. Gabriele Dietze diskutiert diesen Zusammenhang in historischer, theoretischer und gegenwartsanalytischer Perspektive von feministischen Orientalismen der Ersten Frauenbewegung bis hin zu den Ereignissen von Köln in der Silvesternacht 2015.

This paper presents a holistic, contextualised case study of reintegration and trust repair at a UK utilities firm in the wake of its fraud and data manipulation scandal. Drawing upon conceptual frameworks of reintegration and organizational trust repair, we analyze the decisions and actions taken by the company in its efforts to restore trust with its stakeholders. The analysis reveals seven themes on the merits of proposed approaches for reintegration after an integrity violation , and novel insights on the role (...) of organizational identity, “changing of the guard” and cultural reforms alongside procedural modifications. The case further supports the dynamic nature of stakeholder salience across the reintegration process. The study both supports propositions from existing frameworks and suggests novel theoretical extensions for future research. (shrink)

Compassionate care: a moral dimension of nursingThis paper focuses on the concept of compassion and its meaning for nursing practice. Compassion is often considered to be an essential component of nursing care; however, it is difficult to identify what exactly comprises compassionate care. To begin with, there is a general discussion of the meaning of compassion and an examination of its common usage. An argument then is presented that compassion is more than just a natural response to suffering, rather that (...) it is a moral choice. The paper outlines the extent to which this concept has implications for nursing care, highlighting some of the obstacles that nurses need to overcome in order to maintain this essential moral value of the caring role. (shrink)

My target is the epistemological dimension of the realism debate. After establishing a stance voluntarist framework with a Jamesian background, drawing mostly on Wylie, Chakravarty, and van Fraassen, I argue that current voluntarists are too permissive. I show that especially various anti-realist stances but also some realist and selective realist stances block themselves from refutation by the history of science. I argue that such stances should be rejected. Finally, I propose that any disagreement that cannot be resolved by this strategy (...) frequently boils down to an epistemic value disagreement about balancing the truth-goal. (shrink)

Reinhold Niebuhr's concept of ideology, a synthesis of the doctrine of sin and sociology of knowledge, denotes any claim to absolute truth with reilsvested interests. Tolerance, its anonym, is based on an acknowledgement of one's own fallibity and need for forgiveness. Niebuhr thus intertwines Luther's two »realms«, without mixing them up. His theory is deemed a major contribution to both theology and political science.

There is now a significant body of literature on consequentialist ethics that propose satisficing instead of maximizing accounts. Even though epistemology recently witnessed a widespread discussion of teleological and consequentialist theories, a satisficing account is surprisingly not developed yet. The aim of this paper is to do just that. The rough idea is that epistemic rules are justified if and only if they satisfice the epistemic good, i.e., reach some threshold of epistemic value (which varies with practical context), and believing (...) is justified if and only if it follows said rules.I argue that this alternative to the implicitly established way of thinking in maximizing terms has significant advantages. First, maximizing epistemic value can be unreasonably demanding; second, a satisficing theory can make finding reasonable rules for belief formation and sustenance much more accessible; and third, a satisficing approach is a better alternative to both general subjectivist and maximizing objectivist attempts to spell out epistemic blame. (shrink)

Seven unknown letters from 1823 to 1831 are published. The famous discoverer of the mammal's egg and founder of the modern embryology Karl Ernst von Baer (1792–1876), born as a German in Estonia and then anatomist and zoologist at Königsberg University, wrote them to his publisher Ludwig F. Froriep in Weimar and his son and successor. Robert F. Baer offered his co-work with a dictionary of natural history (which he criticized), he proposed a map of all research voyages everywhere in (...) the world, and he sent a few small papers about local birds. To Robert F. Baer gave some recommendations concerning his career; he asked for details of a death elephant, and he told that they were awaiting the cholera. (shrink)

Wenn von protestantischer Widerstandstheorie die Rede ist, wird wohl in erster Linie an die französisch-hugenottischen sogenannten 'Monarchomachen' gedacht, die auf die Massaker der 'Bartholomäus-Nacht' reagierten. 1 Diese hugenottische Widerstandstheorie hat aber eine weniger bekannte Vorgeschichte, die in England bzw. in englischen Exilkreisen der Zeit Mary Tudors spielt und sich in der Bewegung zur Absetzung und Verurteilung Mary Stuarts von Schottland fortsetzt. Hier ist beabsichtigt, die wichtigsten Autoren dieser britischen Bewegung zu diskutieren, an denen sich, bei internen Differenzen, der Durchbruch älterer (...) Theorien und Traditionen legitimen Widerstandes zur These der Volkssouveränität aufzeigen läßt. (shrink)

In order to reconnect Quine's views to the current debate on scientific realism, I reframe Quine's scientific realism into a semantic, a metaphysical, and an epistemological dimension. With this conceptual background, I review the historical development of Quine's scientific realism from the late 1940s until his death in 2000. I challenge Soames's view that Quine is a phenomenalist at the time of “Two Dogmas of Empiricism” (1951) and show that he remains agnostic between a realist and an anti‐realist conceptual scheme (...) instead. I also argue that Quine's early views on regimentation are incompatible with a strong formulation of semantic realism. I proceed in reconstructing how he becomes a metaphysical and epistemological realist in the mid‐1950s and argue against the view of Keskinen and Fogelin that interprets Quine as being a metaphysical anti‐realist. Contrary to Davidson, I defend the view that he never gave up normative epistemology and really is a proper epistemological realist. Finally, I discuss how he tries to reconcile his realism with his thesis of ontological relativity and how this necessitates the switch to a stronger form of semantic realism. (shrink)

The beginning of the English Reformation in the 1530s was foremost a process of subjecting the ‚Church in England‘ to the crown, which was fuelled by protestant motives, primarily, however, by a critique of the worldly powers of the church and the english canon law and church courts. This is shown in writings by the protestants Simon Fish and William Tyndale, and in texts of the common lawyer Christopher Saint German, who elaborated a theoretical justification for the subjection of the (...) ecclesiastical jurisdiction to the common law. Their counterpart was Thomas More, who had written against Luther and the english protestants since 1523 and who defended the ecclesiastical heresy-jurisdiction against Saint German. The outcome, after Henry VIII was declared to be ‚Head of the Church of England‘ by parliament, was uncertainty as to where the supremacy over the church resided: in the crown alone, or in the sovereignty of the ‚King-in-Parliament‘ as advocated by Saint German. (shrink)

This paper examines the intense experience of long-distance seafaring and maritime exploration as a major incentive in the development of Greek ethnography. Already in Homer’s Odyssey we find a particular way of asking questions, of categorization and of sophisticated comparison of foreign ethnic groups. The epic represents the way of thinking of seafaring landowners (basileis) that becomes visible in particular in those scenes that describe the first contacts at foreign shore and island. Moreover, Homer provides geographic-ethnographic macro patterns that turned (...) into a paradigm for centuries to come. (shrink)

In virtue of what do we enjoy episodes of pleasure? According to the phenomenological theory of pleasure, we enjoy pleasures in virtue of having certain kinds of phenomenal experiences. According to the attitude theory of pleasure, we enjoy pleasures in virtue of having a certain kind of pro-attitude. In this chapter, we show that the attitude theory faces a dilemma. The attitude that is relevant to pleasure—the desire, liking, or favoring—is either necessarily co-instantiated with certain phenomenology, or not. If the (...) attitude theorist denies that the relevant attitudes are phenomenologically enriched in this sense, then their theory has the problematic implication that pleasure can come radically apart from phenomenology. This leads to a *problem of hedonic inversion*. If the attitude theorist instead affirms that the relevant attitudes are phenomenologically enriched, then they undermine their main objection to the phenomenological theory of pleasure. This is the so-called *heterogeneity problem*, according to which pleasures do not feel alike. Either way, the attitudinal theorist faces a difficult challenge in their ongoing debate with phenomenological theorists. (shrink)

This paper connects veritistic teleological epistemology, VTE, with the epistemological dimension of the scientific realism debate. VTE sees our epistemic activities as a tradeoff between believing truths and avoiding error. I argue that van Fraassen’s epistemology is not suited to give a justification for a crucial presupposition of his Bad Lot objection to inference to the best explanation (IBE), the presupposition that believing that p is linked to p being more likely to be true. This makes him vulnerable to a (...) counterargument, tailored after Musgrave’s defense of IBE, which would result in a stalemate between them about presuppositions of rationality. I will, however, show that switching to VTE can justify van Fraassen’s presupposition. This leads to a dismissal of common IBE arguments for realism as presented by Boyd and Musgrave, but I also argue that a more cautious version of realism can be rescued from the Bad Lot objection. Finally, I raise some worries about epistemic risk-attitude consistency for constructive empiricists and develop an alternative anti-realist position.1. (shrink)

Thomas Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions, which examines paradigm theory as it relates to philosophy of science, is among the most widely read--and debated--books in the history and philosophy of science. In Paradigms Explained, the author examines both the contributions and limitations of Kuhn's work on paradigm theory. Von Dietze's accessible writing style and thought-provoking exploration of Kuhn's impact on scientific, philosophical, and social thought engage the reader and offer new insights into the problematic yet influential ideas of one of (...) the most prominent philosophers of science. (shrink)

Described by the philosopher A.J. Ayer as a work of 'great originality and power', this book revolutionized contemporary thinking on science and knowledge. Ideas such as the now legendary doctrine of 'falsificationism' electrified the scientific community, influencing even working scientists, as well as post-war philosophy. This astonishing work ranks alongside The Open Society and Its Enemies as one of Popper's most enduring books and contains insights and arguments that demand to be read to this day.