Epistemic trust is crucial for science. This article aims to identify the kinds of assumptions that are involved in epistemic trust as it is required for the successful operation of science as a collective epistemic enterprise. The relevant kind of reliance should involve working from the assumption that the epistemic endeavors of others are appropriately geared towards the truth, but the exact content of this assumption is more difficult to analyze than it might appear. The root of the problem is (...) that methodological decisions in science typically involve a complex trade-off between the reliability of positive results, the reliability of negative results, and the investigation's power. Which balance between these is the ‘correct’ one can only be determined in light of an evaluation of the consequences of all the different possible outcomes of the inquiry. What it means for the investigation to be ‘appropriately geared towards the truth’ thus depends on certain value judgments. I conclude that in the optimal case, trusting someone in her capacity as an information provider also involves a reliance on her having the right attitude towards the possible consequences of her epistemic work. 1 Introduction2 Epistemic Reliance within the Sciences3 Methodological Conventionalism4 Trust in Science5 Conclusions. (shrink)

When interests and preferences of researchers or their sponsors cause bias in experimental design, data interpretation or dissemination of research results, we normally think of it as an epistemic shortcoming. But as a result of the debate on science and values, the idea that all extra-scientific influences on research could be singled out and separated from pure science is now widely believed to be an illusion. I argue that nonetheless, there are cases in which research is rightfully regarded as epistemologically (...) deficient due to the influence of preferences on its outcomes. I present examples from biomedical research and offer an analysis in terms of social epistemology. (shrink)

This paper advocates for making epistemic interests a central object of philosophical analysis in epistemology and philosophy of science. It is argued that the importance of epistemic interests derives from their fundamental importance for the notion of objectivity. Epistemic interests are defined as individuated by a set of objectives, each of which represents a dimension of the search for truth. Among these dimensions, specificity, sensitivity, and productivity are discussed in detail. It is argued that the relevance of productivity is often (...) overlooked in debates about the ends and means of science. A definition of the objectivity of inquiry is proposed that takes the notion of epistemic interest as its starting point. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Verschiedene Studien zur Sportpartizipation zeigen auf, dass insbesondere Mädchen und Frauen mit Migrationshintergrund in Sportvereinen proportional untervertreten sind. Während die Ursachen für die geringe Teilhabe am organisierten Sport in zahlreichen Analysen auf Seiten der Mädchen und Frauen mit Migrationshintergrund verortet werden, wird hingegen die Integrationsfähigkeit von Sportvereinen bislang kaum differenziert betrachtet. Der vorliegende Beitrag nimmt darum den Sportverein in seinen spezifischen Organisationsstrukturen in den Blick. Auf der Grundlage eines organisationstheoretischen Zugangs werden die Strukturen von Sportvereinen dahingehend be­leuchtet, inwieweit diese (...) Integration überhaupt zulassen. Im Zuge dieser Analyse werden Barrieren identifiziert, die die Integration von Mädchen und Frauen mit Migrationshintergrund in den Verein stören, erschweren oder verhindern können. Gleichzeitig werden Möglichkeitsbedingungen für die Integration der Zielgruppe benannt und in der Organisationsstruktur von Sportvereinen verortet. (shrink)

A common complaint against the increasing privatization of research is that research that is conducted with the immediate purpose of producing applicable knowledge will not yield knowledge as valuable as that generated in more curiosity‐driven, academic settings. In this paper, I make this concern precise and reconstruct the rationale behind it. Subsequently, I examine the case of industry research on the giant magnetoresistance effect in the 1990s as a characteristic example of research undertaken under considerable pressure to produce applicable results. (...) The example permits one to arrive at a more optimistic assessment of the epistemic merits of private, application‐driven research. I attempt to specify the conditions that, in this case, advanced the production of interesting and reliable knowledge. (shrink)

In various debates about science, appeal is made to the freedom of scientific research. A rationale in favor of this freedom is rarely offered. In this paper, two major arguments are reconstructed that promise to lend support to a principle of scientific freedom. According to the epistemological argument, freedom of research is required in order to organize the collective cognitive effort we call science efficiently. According to the political argument, scientific knowledge needs to be generated in ways that are independent (...) of the major political powers because of the important role it plays for the citizens and their capacity to form well-informed political preferences. Both arguments are examined critically in order to identify their strengths and limitations. I argue that the scientific freedom established by both rests on a number of critical preconditions, and that the arguments’ force must be weighed against competing societal interests and values in each case of their application. Appeal to a principle of scientific freedom should therefore never mark the end, but rather the beginning of a public debate about the ends and means of science. (shrink)

This paper aims to give an insight into developments that contributed to the significance of the work of Jakob von Uexküll and stresses the importance of his occupation in Hamburg. A biographical survey pays tribute to the implication of the historical pretext and context. A scientific survey describes findings and ideas of Uexküll that proved important for the development of biology and the cognitive sciences. In addition, this paper sets out to reject the common notion that Uexküll’s concepts were ideas (...) of a purely theoretical and philosophical character. It confirms that in fact the central aims of his work were to sustain the empirical method in biology and to give biology a sound epistemological basis. Some examples show how historical and theoretical developments converged at Uexküll’s Institut für Umweltforschung in Hamburg and ignited a productive research activity. (shrink)

This book is a festschrift for Torsten Hagerstrand. "Through your work on migration, innovation diffusion, and time-geography you have helped demonstrate that geography's most profound insights are to be gained from the study of process rather than form.".

In recent years, a variety of philosophers have argued that the fundamental bearers of representational properties like truth are concrete particulars produced by cognitive agents—representational vehicles (“RVs”), as I will call them. This view apparently conflicts with other judgments that are part of our common sense understanding of truth. For instance, it is plausible that there are truths about the Milky Way that have and never will never be articulated by anyone. Whatever these truths are, it looks like they cannot (...) be RVs, because an RV is articulated just in case it exists. In this paper, I argue that it is consistent to hold that the fundamental truth-bearers are representational vehicles, while also acknowledging the existence of unarticulated truths. I argue that truth is a property that derivatively holds of kinds of RVs, that these provide the basis for our judgments that there are unarticulated truths, and I defend the view against putative counter-examples. (shrink)

Goldstein and Gigerenzer (2002) [Models of ecological rationality: The recognition heuristic. Psychological Review, 109 (1), 75–90] found evidence for the use of the recognition heuristic. For example, if an individual recognizes only one of two cities, they tend to infer that the recognized city has a larger population. A prediction that follows is that of the less‐is‐more effect: Recognizing fewer cities leads, under certain conditions, to more accurate inferences than recognizing more cities. We extend the recognition heuristic to group decision‐making (...) by developing majority and lexicographic models of how recognition information is used by groups. We formally show when the less‐is‐more effect is predicted in groups and we present a study where three‐member groups performed the population comparison task. Several aspects of our data indicate that members who can use the recognition heuristic are, not in all but in most cases, more influential in the group decision process than members who cannot use the heuristic. We also observed the less‐is‐more effect and found that models assuming that members who can use the recognition heuristic are more influential better predict when the effect occurs. (shrink)

State borders allocate access to basic goods, opportunities, rights, and protections along lines of nationality, race, and gender. However, the discriminatory effects of state borders rarely appear as an issue in the self-understanding of liberal-democratic societies and their political theorizing. In this paper, I explore how the category of nationality has been and continues to be used to exclude people who have been negatively racialized by European colonialism. I draw on a number of studies that reconstruct the colonial history of (...) states' claims to authority over people's movements and over the composition of their populations. The idea of territorial nationalities allowed nation-states, in particular those emerging from the settler colonies and metropoles of European empires, to continue practices of racial ordering without using explicit racial categories. With the help of these studies, I criticize liberal nationalists such as David Miller for appealing to the value of national identities to support a right of states to exclude would-be immigrants. I suggest that using genealogical and phenomenological methods allows us to undermine the default authority that is often accorded to the category of nationality. (shrink)

The late 19th century debate among German-speaking physicists about theoretical entities is often regarded as foreshadowing the scientific realism debate. This paper brings out differences between them by concentrating on the part of the earlier debate that was concerned with the conceptual consistency of the competing conceptions of matter—mainly, but not exclusively, of atomism. Philosophical antinomies of atomism were taken up by Emil Du Bois-Reymond in an influential lecture in 1872. Such challenges to the consistency of atomism had repercussions within (...) the physics community, as can be shown for the examples of Heinrich Hertz and Ludwig Boltzmann. The latter developed a series of counter-arguments, culminating in an ingenious attempt to turn the tables on the critics of atomism and prove the inconsistency of non-atomistic conceptions of nature. Underlying this controversy is a disagreement over specific goals of physical research which was considered crucially relevant to the further course of physical inquiry. It thereby exemplifies an attitude towards the realism issue that can be contrasted with a different, more neutral attitude of construing the realism issue as merely philosophical and indifferent with respect to concrete research programs in physics, which one also occasionally finds expressed in the 19th century controversy and which may be seen as the prevailing attitude of the 20th century debate. (shrink)

This article gives a brief introduction to the MacArthur Competence Assessment Tool-Treatment (MacCAT-T) and critically examines its theoretical presuppositions. On the basis of empirical, methodological and ethical critique it is emphasised that the cognitive bias that underlies the MacCAT-T assessment needs to be modified. On the one hand it has to be admitted that the operationalisation of competence in terms of value-free categories, e.g. rational decision abilities, guarantees objectivity to a great extent; but on the other hand it bears severe (...) problems. Firstly, the cognitive focus is in itself a normative convention in the process of anthropological value-attribution. Secondly, it misses the complexity of the decision process in real life. It is therefore suggested that values, emotions and other biographic and context specific aspects should be considered when interpreting the cognitive standards according to the MacArthur model. To fill the gap between cognitive and non-cognitive approaches the phenomenological theory of personal constructs is briefly introduced. In conclusion some main demands for further research to develop a multi-step model of competence assessment are outlined. (shrink)

As nation-states make greater efforts to regulate the flow of people on the move—refugees, economic migrants, and international travelers alike—advocates of DNA profiling technologies claim DNA testing provides a reliable and objective way of revealing a person’s true identity for immigration procedures. This article examines the use of DNA testing for family reunification in immigration cases in Finland, Germany, and the United States—the first transatlantic analysis of such cases—to explore the relationship between technology, the meaning of family, and immigration. Drawing (...) on our analyses of archival records, government documents, and interviews with immigration stakeholders, we argue that DNA testing is not conclusive about the meaning of family. While the technology may facilitate decision making for both would-be immigrants and state officials, our study shows hesitancy among the latter to let DNA testing make the final determination. We introduce the concept of social validity—whether the interpretation of test results matches social or political meanings in a given local context—in order to make sense of the complexities and challenges of DNA testing in practice. We show that DNA testing is not just a technology of belonging or a way to claim citizenship rights. It may also enable exclusion and denial of rights. (shrink)

Scientific research that requires space flight has always been subject to comparatively strong external control. Its agenda has often had to be adapted to vacillating political target specifications. Can space scientists appeal to one or the other form of the widely acknowledged principle of freedom of research in order to claim more autonomy? In this paper, the difficult question of autonomy within planned research is approached by examining three arguments that support the principle of freedom of research in differing ways. (...) Each argument has its particular strengths and limitations. Together they serve to demonstrate particular advantages of scientific autonomy, but in the case of space science, their force ultimately remains limited. However, as the arguments highlight the interrelations between scientific autonomy, the democratic process and the collective interest in scientific knowledge, they suggest that a coherent and sustained space science agenda might best be ensured by increasing the transparency of science policy decisions and involving the democratic public. (shrink)

This chapter provides an analysis of the long process of introducing an electronic identity for online authentication in Germany. This process is described as a multi-facet innovation, involving actors from different policy fields shifting over time. The eID process started in the late ‘90s in the context of eGovernment and eCommerce with the legislation on e-signatures, which were supposed to allow for online authentication of citizens. When after 5 years it was recognized that this was not the case, a new (...) digital ID card, which had meanwhile been announced, was chosen as token for the eID. This process was dominated by the concerns for visual inspection and border control, including the storage of digital fingerprints. Under the leadership of the Ministry of the Interior (BMI) and technical guidance of the Federal Agency for Information Security (BSI), technical specifications have to a large extent been adopted from the electronic passport, which had been smoothly introduced 2 years before. However, in the legislative process some concern regarding digital fingerprints on the eID card was raised and led to an opt-in solution. In 2009, a bill on the new ID card was passed which regulates the eID function for online authentication as well. This is characterized as a radical innovation by introducing a double-sided, mutual authentication of the citizen and the service provider and implementing the principle of proportionality regarding the access of service providers to data on the chip. At the time of writing, field tests are conducted. Roll-out of the new eID card is to start in November 2010. Therefore no figures about adoption can be provided here. (shrink)

In recent years, the philosophy of Ludwig Boltzmann has become a point of interest within the field of history of philosophy of science. Attention has centred around Boltzmann’s philosophical considerations connected to his defense of atomism in physics. In analysing these considerations, several scholars have attributed a pragmatist stance to Boltzmann. In this paper, I want to argue that, whatever pragmatist traits may be found in Boltzmann’s diverse writings, his defense of atomism in physics can not be analysed this way. (...) In other words, I wish to show that he did not defend atomism as “preferable for its practical virtues”, as has been alleged.1 On the contrary, Boltzmann considered the atomist picture to be indispensable — more precisely, an indispensable prerequisite for making the application of continuous differential equations an understandable enterprise. (shrink)

Nominalism faces the task of explaining away the ontological commitments of applied mathematical statements. This paper reviews an argument from the philosophy of logic that focuses on this task and which has been used as an objection to certain specific formulations of nominalism. The argument as it is developed in this paper aims to show that nominalism in general does not have the epistemological advantages its defendants claim it has. I distinguish between two strategies that are available to the nominalist: (...) The Evaluation Programme, which tries to preserve the common truth‐values of mathematical statements even if there are no mathematical objects, and Fictionalism, which denies that mathematical sentences have significant truth‐values. It is argued that the tenability of both strategies depends on the nominalist’s ability to account for the notion of consequence. This is a problem because the usual meta‐logical explications of consequence do themselves quantify over mathematical entities. While nominalists of both varieties may try to appeal to a primitive notion of consequence, or, alternatively, to primitive notions of logical or structural possibilities, such measures are objectionable. Even if we are equipped with a notion of either consequence or possibility that is primitive in the relevant sense, it will not be strong enough to account for the consequence relation required in classical mathematics. These examinations are also useful in assessing the possible counter‐intuitive appeal of the argument from the philosophy of logic. (shrink)

To study how religiosity affects family business goals, we merge literatures on goal setting, temporal orientation, and family business to argue that family business goals can be distinguished into short-term and long-term orientations and propose that religiosity affects both orientations, but to varying degrees. Drawing on a sample of private U.S. family businesses and applying partial least squares structural equations modeling, we find tentative support that religiosity has a stronger positive effect on long-term goal orientation than on short-term goal orientation. (...) We discuss implications for theory development and future research involving religiosity and family business goals. (shrink)

To study how religiosity affects family business goals, we merge literatures on goal setting, temporal orientation, and family business to argue that family business goals can be distinguished into short-term and long-term orientations and propose that religiosity affects both orientations, but to varying degrees. Drawing on a sample of private U.S. family businesses and applying partial least squares structural equations modeling, we find tentative support that religiosity has a stronger positive effect on long-term goal orientation than on short-term goal orientation. (...) We discuss implications for theory development and future research involving religiosity and family business goals. (shrink)

ZusammenfassungTrotz einer bereits vor der COVID-Krise erkennbar großen gesellschaftlichen Bedeutung und möglicher Potenziale der Digitalisierung für den organisierten Sport, liegen bislang nur wenige aussagekräftige Befunde darüber vor, welchen Stellenwert Sportvereine der Digitalisierungsthematik innerhalb der Vereinsarbeit beimessen. Vor diesem Hintergrund geht der Beitrag folgenden Fragen nach: (i) Welche Priorität messen Sportvereine dem Thema Digitalisierung bei? (ii) Welche vereinsspezifischen Faktoren beeinflussen die jeweilige Priorisierung des Themas Digitalisierung? Die Priorisierung der Digitalisierung wird dabei in Abhängigkeit von Vereinszielen, einstellungs- und organisationskulturbezogenen Faktoren sowie den (...) unterschiedlichen organisationalen Kapazitäten der Sportvereine modelliert. Für die Analyse konnte eine Stichprobe von n = 787 Sportvereinen generiert werden. Die Befunde zeigen, dass Digitalisierung für Vereine vor der COVID-Krise zwar ein wichtiges Thema, aber kein Thema von herausgehobener Priorität innerhalb der Vereinsarbeit darstellt. Die Ergebnisse des logistischen Regressionsmodells deuten darauf hin, dass die Unterschiede in der Priorisierung vor allem auf Differenzen in der Organisationskultur und der Organisationskapazität zurückzuführen sind. (shrink)

Preliminary Material -- Einleitung -- Zerlegung in Elemente, Denken in polaren Gegensätzen und das Ideal umfassender Weisheit bei Demokrit -- Die Polarisierung von Weisheit in göttlichen Dingen und Weisheit in menschlichen Dingen bei den Sokratikern -- Generalisierung, Elementarisierung, Paradigmatisierung und die Unterscheidung zwischen Theorie und Praxis bei Platon -- Die Pros-hen-Aussage und die Unterscheidung zwischen Theorie und Praxis bei Aristoteles -- Ausblick -- Literaturverzeichnis -- Stellenregister -- Namensregister -- Sachregister.

What is the normative import of telling genealogies? Genealogies are historical accounts of our present reason-giving practices. They purport to show how certain reasons, forms of reasoning, norms, and concepts came to be authoritative for us, by looking at how these practices developed in concrete social and material settings. I argue in this dissertation that telling genealogies can challenge the legitimacy of found norms and thereby open up a space for normative transformation. To understand the central role that the concept (...) of power plays in genealogies, I develop a novel account of the ontology of power and the pragmatic effects of power attributions. I argue that power cannot play a useful role in social explanations; I show that a number of common strategies to account for power as an explanatorily useful social capacity fail. As an alternative, I develop a fictionalist account of power: When we attribute power to agents, we treat them as if they had social capacities, even if we are not strictly speaking entitled to do so. The resulting fiction of power is not simply an illusion, but is built into the structure of our material practices. Power attributions can play a constitutive role in the creation and maintenance of social order. On the basis of this view, I argue that power talk has an expressive function: Power attributions can make explicit the norms that are embodied in the social and material settings in which we act. I show that pragmatist accounts of reason-giving need such an expressive concept of power, because it allows us to raise questions about the default authority of found, embodied norms. This, I argue, is also the role that the concept plays in genealogies. For the genealogist, power is not a merely causal factor that distorts or undermines rational practices from the outside. Instead, she uses the concept to disrupt our familiarity with the everyday world by making explicit the embodied norms that structure it. As a result, a genealogy calls on us to take responsibility for these norms and practically transform the space in which we act. (shrink)

The notion of ecological rationality implies that the accuracy of a decision strategy depends on features of the information environment in which it is tested. We demonstrate that the performance of a group may be strongly affected by the decision strategies used by its individual members and specify how this effect is moderated by environmental features. Specifically, in a set of simulation studies, we systematically compared four decision strategies used by the individual group members: two linear, compensatory decision strategies and (...) two simple, noncompensatory heuristics. Individual decisions were aggregated by using a majority rule. To assess the ecological rationality of the strategies, we varied (a) the distribution of cue validities, (b) the quantity, and (c) the quality of shared information. Group performance strongly depended on the distribution of cue validities. When validities were linearly distributed, groups using a compensatory strategy achieved the highest accuracy. Conversely, when cue validities followed a J-shaped distribution, groups using a simple lexicographic heuristic performed best. While these effects were robust across different quantities of shared information, the quality of shared information exerted stronger effects on group performance. Consequences for prescriptive theories on group decision making are discussed. (shrink)

This paper offers an explanation of how philosophy of science in the second half of the 20th century came to be so conspicuously silent on the problem of how to explain the applicability of mathematics. It examines the idea of the early logicists that the analyticity of mathematics accounts for its applicability, and how this idea was transformed during Carnap's efforts to establish a consistent and substantial philosophy of mathematics within the larger framework of Logical Empiricism. I argue that at (...) the end point of this development, philosophical discussion of the applicability problem was terminated although important aspects of the logicists' original response to the applicability problem had had to be sacrificed along the way. (shrink)