The first few years of driving is a critical period when driving skills develop and the driving style is established. While the actual driving skills improve during the first few years of driving, a novice driver’s view of himself/herself as a safe and/or skilful driver also develops rapidly. The aim of this study was to investigate self-evaluated driver safety and perceptual-motor skills among different age groups of young drivers, along with the relationships between self-evaluated skills and driving behaviour. The sample (...) consisted of a stratified random sample of 18–25-year-old drivers from the Finnish driving licence register. The questionnaires, which included the Driver Skill Inventory, Driver Behaviour Questionnaire and background information, were completed and returned by a total of 1,058 participants. While female drivers assessed their safety skills to be higher than their perceptual-motor skills, the opposite was true for males. In both sexes, perceptual-motor skills increased, and safety skills decreased with experience. Perceptual-motor skills correlated negatively with safety skills, lapses and errors, but positively with aggressive and ordinary violations. Safety skills correlated negatively with all DBQ variables. Safety orientation seems to be most clearly reflected in deliberate aberrant driving behaviours. Sex differences were observed in the development of behaviours and skills, perceptual-motor skills only increased with age among males, while safety skills decreased through experience among both men and women. Results showed that driving experience was strongly related to both driving style and the drivers’ view of their skills, highlighting the importance of the first few years of driving. (shrink)

Europe’s affluent democracies adopted different policy strategies to buffer their labor markets from the effects of the worldwide recession that followed the financial crisis in 2007. This article offers a sociologically anchored historical institutionalist explanation to account for this divergence. Reviewing the politics of employment policymaking before, during, and after the crisis in the United Kingdom, Germany, and Denmark, the article traces partisan actors’ tactics of maneuvering within the constraints of institutionally embedded mass preferences to legitimate their policies and improve (...) their electoral performance. The analysis moves beyond contemporary treatments of path-dependent institutional evolution in two important ways. Rather than focusing on how arrangements at the work-welfare nexus provide actors with particular functional benefits and differential power resources, it examines institutions’ ideational effects on the construction of electorates’ interests. Moreover, it illuminates partisan politicians’ room for strategic agency, breaking with interpretations that view government responses as the product of particular producer group coalitions. (shrink)

This paper reviews the research done in Finland on medical ethics in the last three years and published in four leading journals. The general characteristics of this area are discussed and some comments on its most conspicuous representatives are offered. The conclusion reached is that medical ethics in Finland is still in a rather embryonic stage of development, and that more systematic and theoretically sophisticated approaches are required. However, since many physicians have become interested in ethical questions, it can be (...) reasonably assumed that a more lively and theoretically grounded discussion will ensue in the near future. (shrink)

In commenting on our earlier article in IPhilosophiaD, J P Day raises four issues: those concerning (1) the correct interpretation of the concept of "conditional offers," (2) the relationship of hard conditional offers to liberty, (3) the role of preferences in distinguishing offers from threats, and (4) the moral wrongness of some forms of offering. Two of these points, the second and the third, give rise to some further argument.

Berkeley's Siris is a chain of arguments which ends in God. First God is a metaphysical principle causally regulating the world or Macrocosm. But in the final paragraphs of Siris, God is treated in a theological perspective. This is to say that Berkeley introduces the idea of the Trinity and relates it to the rest of his chain argument. He says that Father, Son, and Spirit correspond to the philosophical notions of sun, light, and heat. I study the final theological (...) paragraphs of Siris and try to relate them to the preceding arguments of this book, especially the corpuscular theory of light. La Siris est une série d'arguments qui aboutit à Dieu. D'abord, Dieu est un principe métaphysique qui, par causalité, régit le monde, ou macrocosme. Mais les paragraphes terminaux de la Siris traitent de Dieu dans une perspective théologique : Berkeley introduit la notion de Trinité et la relie à ses raisonnements antérieurs. Il dit que le Père, le Fils et l'Esprit correspondent aux notions philosophiques de soleil, de lumière et de chaleur. J'étudie ces paragraphes théologiques et leur articulation avec ce qui, dans les développements antérieurs, concerne plus particulièrement la théorie corpusculaire de la lumière. (shrink)

La Siris est une série d’arguments qui aboutit à Dieu. D’abord, Dieu est un principe métaphysique qui, par causalité, régit le monde, ou macrocosme. Mais les paragraphes terminaux de la Siris traitent de Dieu dans une perspective théologique : Berkeley introduit la notion de Trinité et la relie à ses raisonnements antérieurs. Il dit que le Père, le Fils et l’Esprit correspondent aux notions philosophiques de soleil, de lumière et de chaleur. J’étudie ces paragraphes théologiques et leur articulation avec ce (...) qui, dans les développements antérieurs, concerne plus particulièrement la théorie corpusculaire de la lumière.Berkeley’s Siris is a chain of arguments which ends in God. First God is a metaphysical principle causally regulating the world or Macrocosm. But in the final paragraphs of Siris, God is treated in a theological perspective. This is to say that Berkeley introduces the idea of the Trinity and relates it to the rest of his chain argument. He says that Father, Son, and Spirit correspond to the philosophical notions of sun, light, and heat. I study the final theological paragraphs of Siris and try to relate them to the preceding arguments of this book, especially the corpuscular theory of light. (shrink)

Contents: IDEALIZATION, APPROXIMATION AND COUNTERFACTUALS IN THE STRUCTURALIST FRAMEWORK. Theo A.F. KUIPERS: The Refined Structure of Theories. C. ULISES and Reinhold STRAUB: Approximation and Idealization from the Structuralist Point of View. Ilkka A. KIESEPPÄ: A Note on the Structuralist Account of Approximation. C. ULISES MOULINES and Reinhold STRAUB: A Reply to Kieseppä. Wolfgang BALZER and Gerhard ZOUBEK: Structuralist Aspects of Idealization. Andoni IBARRA and Thomas MORMANN: Counterfactual Deformation and Idealization in a Structuralist Framework. Ilkka A. KIESEPPÄ: Assessing the Structuralist Theory (...) of Verisimilitude. IDEALIZATION, APPROXIMATION AND THEORY FORMATION. Leszek NOWAK: Remarks on the Nature of Galileo's Methodological Revolution. Ilkka NIINILUOTO: Approximation in Applied Science. Elke HEISE, Peter GERJETS and Rainer WESTERMANN: Idealized Action Phases. A Concise Rubicon Theory. Klaus G. TROITZSCH: Modelling, Simulation, and Structuralism. Veikko RANTALA and Tere VADÉN: Idealization in Cognitive Science. A Study in Counterfactual Correspondence. Matti SINTONEN and Mika KIIKERI: Idealization in Evolutionary Biology. Timo TUOMIVAARA: On Idealization in Ecology. Martti KUOKKANEN and Matti HÄYRY: Early Utilitarianism and Its Idealizations from a Systematic Point of View. IDEALIZATION, APPROXIMATION AND MEASUREMENT. Rainer WESTERMANN: Measurement-Theoretical Idealizations and Empirical Research Practice. Uwe KONERDING: Probability as an Idealization of Relative Frequency. A Case Study by Means of BTL-Model. Reinhard SUCK and Joachim WIENÖBST: The Empirical Claim of Probability Statements, Idealized Bernoulli Experiments and their Approximate Version. Pekka J. LAHTI: Idealizations in Quantum Theory of Measurement. (shrink)

We introduce a framework for a graph-theoretic analysis of the semantic paradoxes. Similar frameworks have been recently developed for infinitary propositional languages by Cook and Rabern, Rabern, and Macauley. Our focus, however, will be on the language of first-order arithmetic augmented with a primitive truth predicate. Using Leitgeb’s notion of semantic dependence, we assign reference graphs (rfgs) to the sentences of this language and define a notion of paradoxicality in terms of acceptable decorations of rfgs with truth values. It is (...) shown that this notion of paradoxicality coincides with that of Kripke. In order to track down the structural components of an rfg that are responsible for paradoxicality, we show that any decoration can be obtained in a three-stage process: first, the rfg is unfolded into a tree, second, the tree is decorated with truth values (yielding a dependence tree in the sense of Yablo), and third, the decorated tree is re-collapsed onto the rfg. We show that paradoxicality enters the picture only at stage three. Due to this we can isolate two basic patterns necessary for paradoxicality. Moreover, we conjecture a solution to the characterization problem for dangerous rfgs that amounts to the claim that basically the Liar- and the Yablo graph are the only paradoxical rfgs. Furthermore, we develop signed rfgs that allow us to distinguish between ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ reference and obtain more fine-grained versions of our results for unsigned rfgs. (shrink)

In biosemiotics, living beings are not conceived of as the passive result of anonymous selection pressures acted upon through the course of evolution. Rather, organisms are considered active participants that influence, shape and re-shape other organisms, the surrounding environment, and eventually also their own constitutional and functional integrity. The traditional Darwinian division between natural and sexual selection seems insufficient to encompass the richness of these processes, particularly in light of recent knowledge on communicational processes in the realm of life. Here, (...) we introduce the concepts of semiotic selection and semiotic co-option which in part represent a reinterpretation of classical biological terms and, at the same time, keep explanations sensitive to semiosic processes taking place in living nature. We introduce the term ‘semiotic selection’ to emphasize the fact that actions of different semiotic subjects (selectors) will produce qualitatively different selection pressures. Thereafter, ‘semiotic co-option’ explains how semiotic selection may shape appearance in animals through remodelling existing forms and relations. Considering the event of co-option followed by the process of semiotic selection enables us to describe the evolution of semantic organs. (shrink)

This article considers the possibility of articulating a renewed understanding of the principle of political idealism on the basis of Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology. By taking its point of departure from one of the most interesting political applications of Husserl’s phenomenological method, the ordoliberal tradition of the so-called Freiburg School of Economics, the article raises the question of the normative implications of Husserl’s eidetic method. Contrary to the “static” idealism of the ordoliberal tradition, the article proposes that the phenomenological concept of (...) political idealism ought to be understood as a fundamentally dynamic principle. As opposed to the classical understanding of political idealism as the implementation of a particular normative model—political utopianism—the phenomenological reformulation of this idea denoted a radically critical principle of self-reflection that can only be realized on the basis of perpetual renewal. In order to illustrate this point, the article considers Husserl’s distinction between two types of ideals of perfection, the absolute and the relative, and argues for their relevance for political philosophy. (shrink)

Despite increasing pressure to deal with climate change, firms have been slow to respond with effective action. This article presents a multi-level framework for a better understanding of why many firms are failing to reduce their absolute greenhouse gas emissions, which contribute to climate change. The concepts of short-termism and uncertainty avoidance from research in psychology, sociology, and organization theory can explain the phenomenon of organizational inaction on climate change. Antecedents related to short-termism and uncertainty avoidance reinforce one another at (...) three levels—individual, organizational, and institutional—and result in organizational inaction on climate change. The article also discusses the implications of this multi-level framework for research on corporate sustainability. (shrink)

The role of uncertainty within an organization’s environment features prominently in the business ethics and management literature, but how corporate investment decisions should proceed in the face of uncertainties relating to the natural environment is less discussed. From the perspective of ecological economics, the salience of ecology-induced issues challenges management to address new types of uncertainties. These pertain to constraints within the natural environment as well as to institutional action aimed at conserving the natural environment. We derive six areas of (...) ecology-induced uncertainties and propose ecology-driven real options as a conceptual approach for systematically incorporating these uncertainties into strategic management. We combine our results in an integrative investment framework and illustrate its application with the case of carbon constraints. (shrink)

In this paper I criticise Axel Honneth's reactualization of reification as a concept in critical theory in his 2005 Tanner Lectures and argue that he ultimately fails on his own terms. His account is based on two premises: (1) reification is to be taken literally rather than metaphorically, and (2) it is not conceived of as a moral injury but as a social pathology. Honneth concludes that reification is ?forgetfulness of recognition?, more specifically, of antecedent recognition, an emphatic and engaged (...) relationship with oneself, others and the world, which precedes any more concrete relationship both genetically and categorially. I argue against this conception of reification on two grounds. (1) The two premises of Honneth's account cannot be squared with one another. It is not possible to literally take a person as a thing without this being a recognisable moral injury, and, therefore, I suggest that there are no cases of literal reification. (2) Honneth's account is essentially ahistorical, because it is based on an anthropological model of recognition that tacitly equates reification with autism. In conclusion, I suggest that any successful account of reification must (i) take reification metaphorically and (ii) offer a social-historical account of the origin(s) of reification. (shrink)

Throughout its history, the relationship of phenomenology to historical reflection has appeared ambiguous. On the one hand, phenomenology—with the help of its founding figures—gave a promise to return from the world-historical speculations of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to the phenomenon of lived historicity, that is, to the question of how historical time is experienced within the life of the individual. On the other hand, phenomenology could not resist the temptation to critically reconsider some of the fundamental historical narratives that (...) define our modern self-understanding—narratives that concerned the revolutionary effect of the natural sciences , the birth of the subject .. (shrink)

Ricoeur, Culture, and Recognition: A Hermeneutic of Cultural Subjectivity presents Ricoeur’s work from the beginning to its end in form of a cultural theory and proposes a cultural hermeneutic that clarifies the cultural facilitation in a person’s process of attaining a sense of being a human. This exploration of human being as profoundly formed and influenced by the cultural condition also enables a new understanding of intercultural questions by revealing the common human condition that the various cultures manifest.

Growing ecological problems have raised the need for conceptual tools dedicated to studying semiotic processes in cultural-ecological systems. Departing from both ecosemiotics and cultural semiotics, the concept of an ecosemiosphere is proposed to denote the entire complex of semiosis in an ecosystem, including the involvement of human cultural semiosis. More specifically, the ecosemiosphere is a semiotic system comprising all species and their umwelts, alongside the diverse semiotic relations that they have in the given ecosystem, and also the material supporting structures (...) that enable the ecosemiosphere to thrive. Drawing parallels with Juri Lotman’s semiosphere concept, the ecosemiosphere is characterized by its heterogeneity, asymmetry, and boundedness. But unlike Lotman’s concept, the ecosemiosphere is not characterized by an overall boundedness, that is, by the presence of external binary boundaries and the shared identity arising from this unity. The involvement of human culture in the ecosemiosphere manifests in interspecies dialogues and semiotic engagements. We need to scrutinize what affordances and semiotic resources culture could offer to nonhuman species and how culture could, by semiotic means, raise the integrity, stability, and resiliency of the ecosystem. The ecosemiosphere is a grounded semiosphere. (shrink)

The concept of mimesis is not very often used in the contemporary semiotic dialogue. This article introduces several views on this concept, and on the basis of these, mimesis is comprehended as a phenomenon of communication. By highlighting different semantic dimensions of the concept, mimesis is seen as being composed of phases of communication and as such, it is connected with imitation, representation, iconicity and other semiotic concepts.

In Reinhart Koselleck's history of concepts, the general orientation that concepts are to be understood in their proper contexts is intertwined with the assumption that they are manifestations of particular political conflicts. The essay shows that the dense compound of context and conflict in Koselleck's thought springs from Carl Schmitt's political theory and also forms an important point of continuity between Koselleck's early work and his later methodological writings. The formalized assumption of conflict, somewhat problematically, binds Koselleckian conceptual history to (...) a particular conception of politics, one that sees politics ultimately as struggle and conflict. Once the historical-theoretical contingency of this conception is recognized, it becomes both possible and necessary to reassess the role of conflict in the methodology of conceptual history. (shrink)

J.S. Mill's plural voting proposal in Considerations on Representative Government presents political theorists with a puzzle: the elitist proposal that some individuals deserve a greater voice than others seems at odds with Mill's repeated arguments for the value of full participation in government. This essay looks at Mill's arguments for plural voting, arguing that, far from being motivated solely by elitism, Mill's account is actually driven by a commitment to both competence and participation. It goes on to argue that, for (...) Mill, much of the value of political participation lies in its unique ability to educate the participants. That ability to educate is not, however, a product of participation alone; rather, for Mill, the true educative benefits of participation obtain only when competence and participation work together in the political sphere. Plural voting, then, is a mechanism for allowing Mill to take advantage of the educative benefits that arise from the intersection of competence and participation. (shrink)

In the current debates about zoosemiotics its relations with the neighbouring disciplines are a relevant topic. The present article aims to analyse the complex relations between zoosemiotics and cognitive ethology with special attention to their establishers: Thomas A. Sebeok and Donald R. Griffin. It is argued that zoosemiotics and cognitive ethology have common roots in comparative studies of animal communication in the early 1960s. For supporting this claim Sebeok’s works are analysed, the classical and philosophical periods of his zoosemiotic views (...) are distinguished and the changing relations between zoosemiotics and cognitive ethology are described. The animal language controversy can be interpreted as the explicit point of divergence of the two paradigms, which, however, is a mere symptom of a deeper cleavage. The analysis brings out later critical differences between Sebeok’s and Griffin’s views on animal cognition and language. This disagreement has been the main reason for the critical reception and later neglect of Sebeok’s works in cognitive ethology. Sebeok’s position in this debate remains, however, paradigmatic, i.e. it proceeds from understanding of the contextualisation of semiotic processes that do not allow treating the animal mind as a distinct entity. As a peculiar parallel to Griffin’s metaphor of “animal mind”, Sebeok develops his understanding of “semiotic self” as a layered structure, characterised by an ability to make distinctions, foremost between itself and the surrounding environment. It appears that the history of zoosemiotics has two layers: in addition to the chronological history starting in 1963, when Sebeok proposed a name for the field, zoosemiotics is also philosophically rooted in Peircean semiotics and German biological philosophy. It is argued that the confrontation between zoosemiotics and cognitive ethology is related to different epistemological approaches and at least partly induced by underlying philosophical traditions. (shrink)

The same method that creates adversarial examples to fool image-classifiers can be used to generate counterfactual explanations that explain algorithmic decisions. This observation has led researchers to consider CEs as AEs by another name. We argue that the relationship to the true label and the tolerance with respect to proximity are two properties that formally distinguish CEs and AEs. Based on these arguments, we introduce CEs, AEs, and related concepts mathematically in a common framework. Furthermore, we show connections between current (...) methods for generating CEs and AEs, and estimate that the fields will merge more and more as the number of common use-cases grows. (shrink)