BACKGROUND: There is a need for interdisciplinary research to better understand how pedagogical approaches in primary physical education (PE) can support the linked development of physical, cognitive and affective aspects of physical literacy and physical activity behaviours in young children. The Skill Acquisition Methods fostering Physical Literacy in Early-Physical Education (SAMPLE-PE) study aims to examine the efficacy of two different pedagogies for PE, underpinned by theories of motor learning, to foster physical literacy, especially for children living in disadvantaged areas. METHODS: (...) SAMPLE-PE will be evaluated through a cluster-randomised controlled trial targeting 5-6 year old children from schools located in areas of high deprivation in Merseyside, North-West England. Schools will be randomly allocated to one of three conditions: Linear Pedagogy, Nonlinear Pedagogy or Control. Nonlinear and Linear Pedagogy intervention primary schools will receive a PE curriculum delivered by trained coaches over 15 weeks, while control schools will follow their usual practice. Data will be collected at baseline (T0), immediately post-intervention (T1) and six months after the intervention has finished (T2). Children’s movement competence is the primary outcome in this trial. Secondary outcomes include physical activity, perceived competence, motivation, executive functions, and self-regulation. An extensive process evaluation will also examine implementation factors such as intervention context, reach, dose, fidelity and acceptability. DISCUSSION: The SAMPLE-PE project will enable better understanding surrounding how to operationalise physical literacy through enrichment of PE practices in early PE. The study will provide robust scientific evidence regarding the efficacy of underpinning PE pedagogy with theories of motor learning to promote the development of physical literacy. (shrink)

This book develops a textually grounded reconstruction of Kant’s argument in the Metaphysical Deduction. The argument proceeds in three steps, developing, first, a concept of judgment on which to base the table of logical functions, next a concept of synthesis of intuition that explains the content of the categories, and finally a concept of the understanding on which the categories belong a priori to the same faculty through which we judge. -/- The investigation presented here is an argumentative reconstruction of (...) Kant’s text. The text in question is the "Guiding Thread to the Discovery of all Pure Concepts of the Understanding" in both the 1781 (A) and 1787 (B) editions of the Critique of Pure Reason (A64-83/B89-113). To illuminate Kant’s reflections in this chapter, the reconstruction also draws on passages from elsewhere in the Critique, from Kant’s writings after the Critique, as well as notes from his Nachlass and student transcriptions of lectures he held during and subsequent to writing the Critique. Four passages, in particular, are of central importance: (i) the retrospective description of the task of the Metaphysical Deduction at B159, (ii) the retrospective description of the procedure of the "Guiding Thread" at A299/B355f., (iii) the section "On the A Priori Grounds for the Possibility of Experience" in the A-edition Transcendental Deduction of the Categories (A95-110), and (iv) §§15-21 in the B-edition Transcendental Deduction (B128-148). -/- The present interpretation of the Metaphysical Deduction thus emerges from a detailed and comprehensive analysis of the "Guiding Thread" that draws on related passages from the indicated portion of Kant’s corpus and, especially, on the aforementioned four passages from the Critique. Viewing these texts together and in a specific relation to one another suggests a reading which leaves little room for doubt. This sort of textually sensitive but charitable reconstruction helps to bring out the enduring force and interest of Kant’s philosophical position. [For Dennis Schulting's review for "Kantian Review" see under "External Links" below.] -/- -- -/- Wie hier durch textnahe und argumentative Rekonstruktion erstmals gezeigt wird, entwickelt Kant in der Metaphysischen Deduktion in drei Schritten: (i) einen Begriff des Urteils, auf dem die Tafel logischer Funktionen beruht; (ii) einen Begriff der Synthesis der Anschauung, der die Inhalte der Kategorien erklärt; und (iii) einen Begriff des Verstandes, demzufolge die Kategorien a priori zu demselben Vermögen gehören, durch das wir auch urteilen. -/- Die vorliegende Untersuchung ist eine argumentative Rekonstruktion von Kants Text. Der rekonstruierte Text ist der „Leitfaden der Entdeckung aller reinen Verstandesbegriffe" auf A 64 bis 83 / B 89 bis 113 der Kritik der reinen Vernunft in ihren beiden Auflagen von 1781 (A) und 1787 (B). Zudem werden andere, für ein Verständnis der Überlegungen in diesem Kapitel erforderliche oder zumindest erhellende Textstellen aus der Kritik herangezogen; aus Schriften, die Kant nach der Kritik geschrieben hat; sowie schließlich aus Kants Nachlass-Notizen und aus Nachschriften zu seinen Vorlesungen jeweils seit der Entstehungszeit der Kritik. Von entscheidender Bedeutung sind dabei vor allem vier weitere Passagen der Kritik selbst: i) die rückblickende Beschreibung der Aufgabe der Metaphysischen Deduktion auf B 159, ii) die rückblickende Beschreibung des Vorgehens im „Leitfaden" auf A 299/B 355 f., iii) der Abschnitt „Von den Gründen a priori zur Möglichkeit der Erfahrung" auf A 95 bis 110 der Transzendentalen Deduktion der Kategorien in der ersten Auflage und schließlich iv) die §§ 15 bis 21 auf B 128 bis 148 der Transzendentalen Deduktion der Kategorien in der zweiten Auflage der Kritik. -/- Vor dem Hintergrund einer umfassenden und detaillierten Analyse des „Leitfadens", bei Hinzuziehung verwandter Stellen aus dem umgrenzten Textbestand und nicht zuletzt bei Berücksichtigung des Verhältnisses des „Leitfadens" zu den genannten vier Passagen der Kritik legt sich eine Interpretation der Metaphysischen Deduktion nahe, die sich nur schwer bestreiten lässt, sobald diese Texte einmal gemeinsam betrachtet und auf eine bestimmte Weise zueinander ins Verhältnis gesetzt werden. Dabei kann eine durchgehend wohlwollende, argumentative Rekonstruktion dazu beitragen, auch die philosophische Überzeugungskraft der Position Kants deutlich zu machen. [Für Dennis Schultings Rezension für "Kantian Review" siehe unten unter "External Links".]. (shrink)

Kant’s Metaphysical Deduction of the Categories justifies their apriority, i.e. that their contents originate in the understanding itself, while the Transcendental Deduction justifies their objectivity, both in that they purport to represent objects of experience and that they do so successfully. The apriority of the categories, as explained in terms of acts of synthesis required for having sensible intuitions of objects, is justified by establishing their generic identity with logical functions of judgment, i.e. acts of judgment required for referring concepts (...) to objects. The objective purport of the categories is justified by establishing that sensible intuitions fall under them. To finally justify that the categories represent successfully, i.e. that the objects of our intuitions fall under them, it is established that the representations of space and time do, namely by showing that the features addressed in their Metaphysical Expositions, too, are to be explained in terms of acts of synthesis. (shrink)

There is a long tradition of the value of using film as a pedagogical tool. Such use spans a variety of business disciplines including organizational behavior (Smith 2009), accounting (Bay & Felton 2012), business ethics (Fisher, Grant & Palmer 2015) and cultural competency (Greene, Barden, Richardson & Hall 2014). Presented here is a recently developed course, Business in Film, which engages students in deep reflection on business issues with an emphasis on ethics and values. The course is structured around a (...) weekly film (mix of dramas and documentaries), 15 weeks, 15 films covering approximately 40 years. For each film, students prepare a 2-3 page reflection paper. Student feedback has been consistently positive, with comments along the themes of a greater appreciation of the intersection between business and the human experience, bringing to life ethical considerations, and a greater appreciation of the historical context of business events. (shrink)

The transfer of tasks with sometimes far-reaching implications to autonomous systems raises a number of ethical questions. In addition to fundamental questions about the moral agency of these systems, behavioral issues arise. We investigate the empirically accessible question of whether the imposition of harm by an agent is systematically judged differently when the agent is artificial and not human. The results of a laboratory experiment suggest that decision-makers can actually avoid punishment more easily by delegating to machines than by delegating (...) to other people. Our results imply that the availability of artificial agents could provide stronger incentives for decision-makers to delegate sensitive decisions. (shrink)

Kaum eine andere künstlerische Strategie prägte das Wertesystem der Kunst des 20. Jahrhunderts wie die Wiederholung. Sie lässt sich als wesentliches Moment ausmachen, neue Wahrnehmungsweisen zu ermöglichen, Kritik an Formen der Repräsentation zu üben und neuen Sinn zu produzieren. Der Band nimmt eine kritische Revision des Phänomens für die zeitgenössische Kunst vor und eröffnet anhand bildnerischer, skulpturaler, performativer, technisch-medialer wie auch kuratorischer Wiederholungen in der Kunst eine Perspektive auf die Wiederholung als Grundbegriff des Ästhetischen.

Metaphern beeinflussen unser Denken, unsere alltägliche und auch wissenschaftliche Sprache. Sie lassen Ähnlichkeiten erkennen und schaffen neues Wissen. Da unsere Kultur, unser Denken und Handeln aber zunehmend von Bildern geprägt ist, muss es dann nicht auch visuelle Metaphern geben? Und welche Bedeutung misst man ihnen bei? Till Julian Huss arbeitet erstmals die historischen und systematischen Grundlagen einer Theorie der visuellen Metapher aus. Indem das Spannungsverhältnis zwischen Metapher und Begriff sowie Sprache und Bild in den Kontext einer allgemeinen Ästhetik der (...) Metapher gestellt wird, nimmt die Metapher eine Schlüsselfunktion zwischen Sprache, Anschauung und Denken ein. (shrink)

We introduce a new metric for interdisciplinarity, based on co-author publication history. A published article that has co-authors with quite different publication histories can be deemed relatively “interdisciplinary,” in that the article reflects a convergence of previous research in distinct sets of publication outlets. In recent work, we have shown that this interdisciplinarity metric can predict citations. Here, we show that the journal Cognitive Science tends to contain collaborations that are relatively high on this interdisciplinarity metric, at about the 80th (...) percentile of all journals across both social and natural sciences. Following on Goldstone and Leydesdorff, we describe how scientometric tools provide a valuable means of assessing the role of cognitive science in broader scientific work, and also as a tool to investigate teamwork and distributed cognition. We describe how data-driven metrics of this kind may facilitate this exploration without relying upon rapidly changing discipline and topic keywords associated with publications. (shrink)

ArgumentIn the decades following World War II, the Cowles Commission for Research in Economics came to represent new technical standards that informed most advances in economic theory. The public emergence of this community was manifest at a conference held in June 1949 titledActivity Analysis of Production and Allocation. New ideas in optimization theory, linked to linear programming, developed from the conference's papers. The authors’ history of this event situates the Cowles Commission among the institutions of postwar science in-between National Laboratories (...) and the supreme discipline of Cold War academia, mathematics. Although the conference created the conditions under which economics, as a discipline, would transform itself, the participants themselves had little concern for the intellectual battles that had defined prewar university economics departments. The authors argue that the conference signaled the birth of a new intellectual culture in economic science based on shared scientific norms and techniques un-interrogated by conflicting notions of the meaning of either science or economics. (shrink)

The development of new effective but expensive medical treatments leads to discussions about whether and how such treatments should be funded in solidarity-based healthcare systems. Solidarity is often seen as an elusive concept; it appears to be used to refer to different sets of concerns, and its interrelations with the concept of justice are not well understood. This paper provides a conceptual analysis of the concept of solidarity as it is used in discussions on the allocation of healthcare resources and (...) the funding of expensive treatments. It contributes to the clarification of the concept of solidarity by identifying in the literature and discussing four uses of the concept: (1) assisting patients in need, (2) upholding the solidarity-based healthcare system, (3) willingness to contribute and (4) promoting equality. It distinguishes normative and descriptive uses of the concept and outlines the overlap and differences between solidarity and justice. Our analysis shows that the various uses of the concept of solidarity point to different, even conflicting, ethical stances on whether and how access to effective, expensive treatments should be provided. We conclude that the concept of solidarity has a role to play in discussions on the accessibility and funding of newly approved medical treatments. It requires, for instance, that healthcare policies promote and maintain both societal willingness to contribute to the care of others and the value of providing care to vulnerable patients through public funding. (shrink)

We study logic translations from an abstract perspective, without any commitment to the structure of sentences and the nature of logical entailment, which also means that we cover both proof- theoretic and model-theoretic entailment. We show how logic translations induce notions of logical expressiveness, consistency strength and sublogic, leading to an explanation of paradoxes that have been described in the literature. Connectives and quantifiers, although not present in the definition of logic and logic translation, can be recovered by their abstract (...) properties and are preserved and reflected by translations under suitable conditions. (shrink)

The following paper discusses Schiller’s interpretation of the German concept of Bildung. Bildung appears to be a central term in Germany’s culture, especially (but not limited to) the educational realm. As Bildung underwent massive transformations and has been re-interpreted multiple times throughout German history, this paper will start with a definitory exercise trying to organize the dynamics surrounding the term. Secondly, a two-fold historical context – firstly regarding the wider political and social dynamics of the time and secondly, a more (...) biographical approach focusing on Schiller – will be provided. These contextualizing efforts will be succeeded by elaborations on Schiller’s concept of Herzensbildung. The paper closes with a summary of key insights and further potential endeavors. (shrink)

The German Democratic Republic was in existence for 41 years. A single generation spent its whole professional life there – namely those born in the early 1930s who carried this state’s hopes. With Karl Mannheim’s notion of generations as a unit in the sociology of knowledge in mind, this article describes this generation’s typical experiences from the point of view of a particularly telling group: economists at the Humboldt University of Berlin. I present their socialization in Nazi Germany, their formative (...) years in the aftermath of the Second World War that led to their choice of a politically driven profession, their studies during the first years of the GDR, when Stalinism was still the dominating dogma, and their commitment to a state career when writing their dissertations and habilitations. Ready to shoulder Honecker’s regime, their daily lives as professors were characterized by continuing attempts to reform teaching and research. In 1989 the ultimate reform transpired, and it encompassed the end of the state as well as of their professional careers. This narrative historicizes, on an experiential level, a tension often noted in GDR research, that between the ideological and productive functions of knowledge in socialism, that is, between loyalty and relevance. (shrink)

Recent research on agricultural innovation has outlined social networks’ role in diffusing agricultural knowledge; however, so far, it has broadly neglected the socio-spatial dimensions of innovation processes. Against this backdrop, we apply a spatially explicit translocal network perspective in order to investigate the role of migration-related translocal networks for adaptive change in a small-scale farming community in Northeast Thailand. By means of formal social network analysis we map the socio-spatial patterns of advice sharing regarding changes in sugarcane and rice farming (...) over a period of five years. We find that, in translocally connected and mobile rural communities, a substantial share of advice originates from translocal levels. Translocal advice is dominantly provided through weak and formal ties with extension agencies and shared by few highly central larger-scale farmers within sparse local networks. This draws the picture of top-down translocal innovation flows driven by extension agencies and brokered through elite farmers. A closer look on institutional context and key actors of particular changes, however, suggests the potential of migration-related translocal networks and migration experience in fostering bottom-up innovations. Migration-related innovations transfers can promote adaptive capacity also among less favorably connected actors, especially if changes are geared towards limited household resources and are compatible with social practices of small-scale farming. We conclude that a translocal network perspective is instructive for research and extension interested in leveraging more inclusive agricultural innovation. (shrink)

Recent scientific and technological developments enable the generation of increasingly sophisticated organoids: three-dimensional, lab-grown stem cell-based entities that model human organs anatomi...

This paper offers a new account of Kant`s metaphysical deduction of the categories in the Critique of Pure Reason. This is accomplished by way of a new interpretation of Kant`s notion of function and his theory of mental activity, which is presented in terms of a logic and theory of intentional reference. A detailed discussion of the definition and use of the notion of function in the “Leading Thread” leads to an interpretation of the notion of function as a complex, (...) triparted unity of intentional reference. Kant´s thesis that the unity of judgment and the unity of intuition rest on the very same function is thus explained as the thesis of the structural identity of analysis and synthesis. The presented interpretation of the notion of function and the corresponding theory of intentional reference make it possible to deduce the titles of quality, quantity, and relation of the tables of judgments and the categories, and to justify their necessity. The conception of a logic of reference to particulars then establishes the respective three moments of these titles. The title and the moments of modality finally are grounded in the cognitive constitution of finite beings. Thus Kant`s claim for completeness of the tables of judgments and the categories can be elucidated as well as justified. -- Die vorliegende Abhandlung bietet einen neuen Zugang zu Kants metaphysischer Deduktion der Kategorien in der Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Erreicht wird dieser vermittels einer Neuinterpretation von Kants Begriff der Funktion sowie seiner Theorie mentaler Aktivität, die als eine Logik und Theorie intentionalen Bezugs dargestellt wird. Eine detaillierte Untersuchung der Definition und Verwendung des Begriffs der Funktion im „Leitfaden“ führt zu einer Interpretation des Begriffs der Funktion als komplexe, dreiteilige Einheit intentionalen Bezugs. Kants These, dass die Einheit des Urteils und die Einheit der Anschauung auf derselben Funktion beruhen , wird auf diese Weise als die These der strukturellen Identität von Analysis und Synthesis verständlich gemacht. Die vorgelegte Interpretation des Funktionsbegriffs sowie die entsprechende Theorie intentionalen Bezugs ermöglichen es, die Titel der Qualität, Quantität und Relation der Urteils- und Kategorientafel herzuleiten und ihre Notwendigkeit zu rechtfertigen. Die Konzeption einer Logik des Bezugs auf Einzeldinge begründet dann die jeweils drei Momente dieser Titel. Der Titel und die Momente der Modalität schließlich haben ihren Grund in der kognitiven Verfasstheit endlicher Wesen. Auf diese Weise kann Kants Anspruch der Vollständigkeit der Urteils- und Kategorientafel sowohl verständlich gemacht als auch begründet werden. (shrink)

The Making of the Economy uses Husserl's critique of formalism in natural science in The Crisis of the European Sciences work as the template for an analogous critique of formalism in economic science. The historical narrative focuses on the emergence of formal economic analysis out of a series of successive life-worlds, or concrete historical situations. This generates new substantive understanding of both the historical material and the current discourse of crisis surrounding economics. It will appeal to historians and philosophers of (...) economics, as well as scholars of history, philosophy, and sociology. (shrink)

This article reviews the academic literature that emerged under value sensitive design. It investigates those VSD projects that employed the tripartite methodology, examining the use of VSD methodological elements, and illustrating common practices and identifying shortcomings. The article provides advice for VSD researchers on how to complete and enhance their methodological approach as the research community moves forward.

Actor-Network-Theory (ANT) offers an ‘infra-language’ of the social that allows one to trace social relations very dynamically, while at the same time dissolving human agency, thus providing a flat and de-centred way into sociology. However, ANT struggles with its theoretical design that may lead us to reduce agency to causation and to conceptualize actor-networks as homogeneous ontologies of force. This article proposes to regard ANT’s inability to conceptualize reflexivity and the interrelatedness of different ontologies as the fundamental problem of the (...) theory. Drawing on Günther, it offers an ‘infra-language’ of reflexive relations while maintaining ANT’s de-centred approach. This would enable us to conceptualize actor-networks as non-homogeneous, dynamic and connecting different societal rationales while maintaining the main strengths of ANT. (shrink)

Jean Dieudonné, the spokesman of the group of French mathematicians named Bourbaki, called mathematics the music of reason. This metaphor invites a phenomenological account of the affective, in contrast to the epistemic and discursive, nature of mathematics: What constitutes its charm? Mathematical reasoning is described as a perceptual experience, which in Husserl’s late philosophy would be a case of passive synthesis. Like a melody, a mathematical proof is manifest in an affective identity of a temporal object. Rather than an exercise (...) for its own sake, this account sheds a different light on both the epistemic limitation of mathematical science, and the discursive problem of social responsibility in mathematics – two issues at the heart of Husserl’s critique of science as well as of mid-20th century mathematics, for which Nicolas Bourbaki stands as a monument of rigor. (shrink)

When reassessing the role of Debreu’s axiomatic method ineconomics, one has to explain both its success and unpopularity; onehas to explain the “bright shadow” Debreu cast on the discipline:sheltering, threatening, and difficult to pin down. Debreu himself didnot expect to have such an influence. Before he received the Bank ofSweden Prize in 1983 he had never openly engaged with themethodology or politics of mathematical economics. When in severalspeeches he later rigorously distinguished mathematical form fromeconomic content and claimed this as the (...) virtue of mathematicaleconomics, he did both: he defended mathematical reasoning againstthe theoretical innovations since the 1970s and expressed remorse forhaving promised too much because it cannot support claims abouteconomic content. The analysis of this twofold role of Debreu’saxiomatic method raises issues of the social and political responsibilityof economists over and above standard epistemic issues. (shrink)

In his final monograph, Barry Stroud argues that certain fundamental concepts, like the concept of causation, are not only indispensable to any thought of an objective, independent world, but that they are also, therefore, invulnerable to skeptical attack. Given some assumptions about thought and objectivity, this leads him into the following metaphysical aporia: We can neither metaphysically establish that the objective, independent world is as we must think of it nor that it is not that way. I will argue that (...) the source of this aporia is a notion of objectivity in terms of the complete independence from any relation to thought whatsoever. This is a notion never explicitly argued for, as Stroud does not identify its origin. I then argue that a Kantian notion of objectivity can both be justified by tracing it to its origin in what we understand thinking and perceiving to be and dissolve Stroud’s aporia. If there is a way we must think of the world, and if we conceive of this world as completely independent of any relation to thought, then it is indeed hard to see why the world would agree with the fundamental form of thought. But if the objective, independent world is instead conceived of in relation to thought rather than independently of it and in terms of the independence from subjects and acts of thinking and perceiving, then it becomes intelligible how the world in relation to thought can agree with our fundamental concepts, while the world independent of any relation to thought might not. (shrink)

Governance theories impact how corporations are run, which in turn impacts societal well-being. This dynamic is commonly accepted, as evidenced by the flood of articles exploring the links between corporate governance and corporate social responsibility. This article supplements current corporate governance theories with Catholic social thought to address burgeoning societal issues such as the increasing trust gap, income inequality, and an overemphasis on financial compensation as the primary way to motivate senior managers. The authors propose a shift away from agency (...) theory and stakeholder theory, both of which, with their limited depictions of the motivations of managers, have contributed to excessive executive compensation. Instead, the authors develop an alternative—justice stewardship theory—which integrates organizational justice theory, the principles of stewardship theory, and the insights of 150 years of CST. (shrink)

The development of new effective but expensive medical treatments leads to discussions about whether and how such treatments should be funded in solidarity-based healthcare systems. Solidarity is often seen as an elusive concept; it appears to be used to refer to different sets of concerns, and its interrelations with the concept of justice are not well understood. This paper provides a conceptual analysis of the concept of solidarity as it is used in discussions on the allocation of healthcare resources and (...) the funding of expensive treatments. It contributes to the clarification of the concept of solidarity by identifying in the literature and discussing four uses of the concept: (1) assisting patients in need, (2) upholding the solidarity-based healthcare system, (3) willingness to contribute and (4) promoting equality. It distinguishes normative and descriptive uses of the concept and outlines the overlap and differences between solidarity and justice. Our analysis shows that the various uses of the concept of solidarity point to different, even conflicting, ethical stances on whether and how access to effective, expensive treatments should be provided. We conclude that the concept of solidarity has a role to play in discussions on the accessibility and funding of newly approved medical treatments. It requires, for instance, that healthcare policies promote and maintain both societal willingness to contribute to the care of others and the value of providing care to vulnerable patients through public funding. (shrink)

This book gives a convincing philosophical explanation for the strong persistence of our diverse folk psychological intuitions about the self. For this purpose it introduces, on the one hand, the distinction between subject and self model as proposed by Metzinger, on the other hand, the distinction between a social/normative and a cognitive/organic perspective on the self. The book argues that one needs to take into account both distinctions, if one wants to answer notoriously difficult questions like the one that gives (...) the book its title: Is the self real? (shrink)

Die Metapher ist ein Grundbegriff der Designtheorie, der oftmals ohne hinreichende Bestimmung zu einem Gestaltungsprinzip ausformuliert wird. In der Designrhetorik ist die Metapher eine Figur der persuasiven Kommunikation; in Theorien des Designprozesses und gestalterischen Denkens wird sie hingegen als zentraler Aspekt der Kreativität und Erkenntnis angeführt; im Interfacedesign ist sie das konstitutive Element zur benutzerfreundlichen grafischen Aufbereitung der Computerprogramme. Der Beitrag stellt die verschiedenen theoretischen Grundlagen der Metapher in den jeweiligen Designdiskursen vor, um ihre Disparitäten und Gemeinplätze auszuweisen. Ziel ist (...) es dabei, die weitreichenden und bislang kaum ausgearbeiteten philosophischen Implikationen der designtheoretischen Begründung der Metapher aufzudecken. In der Analyse praxisorientierter Designtheorien werden die rhetorische, innovative, erkenntnistheoretische und ontologische Funktion der Metapher begründet. Die Ausarbeitung dieser verschiedenen Funktionen, so die zentrale These, eröffnet eine neue Perspektive auf grundlegende Fragen einer Philosophie des Designs. In dieser Hinsicht wird abschließend für die allgemein pragmatische Funktion der Metapher im Design argumentiert, um zwischen praxisorientierter Forschung, Ästhetik und auch Metapherntheorie zu vermitteln. (shrink)

Johann Georg Hamann, a contemporary of Kant and Herder, was an important German philosopher of the 18th century, whose significance, however, is not sufficiently recognized today. His cryptic and short writings full of allusions and deep scholarship do not make him an easily accessible writer. He was a sharp critic of sophistry maskerading as philosophy, thus taking over the role of Socrates for his time, connecting a defense of Christian beliefs with a radical re-interpretation of enlightenment, thereby trying to enlighten (...) enlightenment about itself. Hamann's concept of reason as language is an important contribution to the understanding of human nature as such, stressing the concreteness and historicality of human reason. Contrary to earlier interpretations, though, Hamann is no irrationalist, but a thinker who ridicules the absurdities of enlightenment rationalism and proved to be an important source of inspiration for writers like Sören Kierkegaard and Ernst Jünger. (shrink)

Richard Rorty is rightly considered one of the most interesting authors in the field of intellectual pursuits. This vague formulation also indicates that Rorty’s thinking and writing cannot simply be classified as philosophy, although by and large they seem to be part and parcel of the pragmatist tradition. For Rorty clearly confronts a number of traditional problems of philosophy, even when he suggest getting rid of the problem by redescribing the issue or changing the perspective. There is...

The Canadian thinker George Grant offers a critique of modernity that tries to come to terms with the challenge of Heidegger to Plato. Against philosophical approaches which claim that any kind of metaphyics is obsolete and should be overcome, Grant attempted to think through what the rejection of metaphysics by important modern forms of philosophy means. Grant’s thought looked back to Plato for a conception of justice that he felt was endangered in the modern world. In particular, his philosophical thinking (...) could be said to engage the various forms of pragmatism that he regarded as emblematic of modernity’s emphasis on making and creating in contrast to the older virtue of contemplation. However, the ontological concern about the priority of conetmplation over action was, forGrant, also connected to problem of justice. Could one defend an understanding of justice that gives to man what is his due while accepting the pragmatism of modern philosophy? And does pragmatism succeed in eliminiating the question conerning God from the concerns of the philosopher? (shrink)

This paper explores the implications of mass migration and the conditions of hybridization for early 21st century Western societies in texts dealing with migrantexperiences. The novel Goodbye Lucille (2007) by the Afro-cosmopolitan writer Segun Afolabi will be explored with respect to the crucial problem of an ethics and politics of belonging, related to the recent controversies surrounding multiculturalism and issues of migration. This text deals with the “in-between world” of migrants and negotiates questions of identity, alienation and belonging in a (...) so-called transcultural/transnational context. The issues raised in Segun Afolabi's fiction are addressed by employing the ways of thinking developed in political philosophy, including recent phenomenological attempts to theorize the notion of “home” and “belonging” (e.g., by Karen Joisten, but also Martin Heidegger) in order to deal with the complexities of the issue. The question, “What constitutes the good life for the individual and the political community?”, needs to be considered by taking into account the current plurality of approaches to forging identitiesin the political sphere as well. The subtlety of literary accounts of this phenomenon – literature may indeed be one of the best diagnostic instrument for studying a society – sheds light, I suggest, on the conditions of politically relevant identity formations. A close reading of literary texts such as those by Afolabi offers an important contribution to a realistic, and therefore complex and complicating, account of our overall situation in the Western world with respect to the politics of belonging. (shrink)

The Canadian thinker George Grant offers a critique of modernity that tries to come to terms with the challenge of Heidegger to Plato. Against philosophical approaches which claim that any kind of metaphyics is obsolete and should be overcome, Grant attempted to think through what the rejection of metaphysics by important modern forms of philosophy means. Grant’s thought looked back to Plato for a conception of justice that he felt was endangered in the modern world. In particular, his philosophical thinking (...) could be said to engage the various forms of pragmatism that he regarded as emblematic of modernity’s emphasis on making and creating in contrast to the older virtue of contemplation. However, the ontological concern about the priority of conetmplation over action was, forGrant, also connected to problem of justice. Could one defend an understanding of justice that gives to man what is his due while accepting the pragmatism of modern philosophy? And does pragmatism succeed in eliminiating the question conerning God from the concerns of the philosopher? (shrink)