Der Begriff der Form bildet eines der Zentren des Aristotelischen Denkens. Seit langerer Zeit herrscht jedoch Uneinigkeit daruber, was genau Aristoteles darunter verstanden wissen wollte. Die Vorschlage reichen von der Identifizierung der Form mit der Art bis hin zur Behauptung, sie sei ganz im Gegenteil gerade etwas Individuelles, so dass die Form des Sokrates eine andere ware als die Platons. Im Fokus der Auseinandersetzung stehen dabei die sogenannten Substanzbucher (Met. Z, H, ies hat zwar einen guten Grund, weil dort die (...) Theorie der Form und damit die Ontologie des Aristoteles ihren Hohepunkt erreicht, ihr Voraussetzungsreichtum wird jedoch oft unterschatzt. Andreas Gasser versucht daher, die Entwicklung des Form-Begriffs von der fruhen Kategorienschrift bis zu seiner entscheidenden Modifikation durch die Einfuhrung des komplementaren Materie-Begriffs im ersten Buch der Physik nachzuzeichnen und dadurch einer neuen Interpretation der Substanzbucher den Boden z u bereiten. (shrink)

In this work, attention is drawn to the abundant use of metaphor and analogy in works of logic. I argue that pervasiveness of figurative language is to be counted among the features that characterize logic and distinguish it from other sciences. This characteristic feature reflects the creativity that is inherent in logic and indeed has been demonstrated to be a necessary part of logic. The goal of this paper, in short, is to provide specific examples of figurative language used in (...) logic that yield insights into the nature of the subject. I encourage the reader to take metaphors seriously, and to accept that they are not mere embellishments but key elements in our understanding of logic. (shrink)

Der Glaube an Unsterblichkeit ist Bestandteil praktisch aller Religionen und seit ihren Anfängen ein zentrales Thema der Philosophie. Dieser Sammelband bietet einen Überblick zum aktuellen Stand klassischer Debatten über Unsterblichkeit (Unsterblichkeit der Seele, Wiedergeburt, Auferstehung), bringt aber auch neue und bisher vernachlässigte Aspekte mit in die Diskussion (z.B. digitale Unsterblichkeit, Unsterblichkeit und Gender, Unsterblichkeit der Tiere). Die Beiträge skizzieren den Stand der philosophischen Forschung und entwickeln eigene Positionen der Autorinnen und Autoren. Der Band richtet sich an Forschende und Studierende in (...) den Bereichen Religionsphilosophie, Theologie und Religionswissenschaft und eignet sich nicht nur als Grundlage für Lehrveranstaltungen, sondern auch für eine wissenschaftliche Einarbeitung in das Thema. (shrink)

The key political writings of one of the leading philosophers of the 20th century.

One of leading philosophers of the twentieth century addresses some of the central questions of political philosophy and ethics.

Despite the opening of the market and partial privatization of state‐owned companies in China, the state still represents the controlling shareholder in larger companies. By analyzing the weaknesses of Chinese corporate governance we illustrate the framework for harmful corruption. China is characterized by a weak legal system and strong influences of traditions such as guanxi. In this article we analyze the influence of guanxi on the Chinese corporate governance system. We find that guanxi is in general a double‐edged sword, but (...) business‐to‐government guanxi in particular can harm the weak Chinese corporate governance system and hamper its further economic development and growth. (shrink)

Dans cet essai inédit regroupant trois textes issus d'une conférence donnée en 1967 (sous le titre "Sens et fonction d'une communauté ecclésiale"), Paul Ricoeur s'intéresse en philosophe à l'idée d'Eglise. Il s'interroge d'abord sur la société, son obsession technique, son incapacité à produire du sens et sur la manière dont cette "communauté" pourrait être un contrepoint d'utopie en son sein. Il cherche ensuite un langage capable d'intégrer en même temps les critiques externes de la religion (Marx, Nietzsche, Freud), et, d'une (...) manière interne à la foi, une "déconstruction" des pseudo-rationalisations qui masquent la vivacité des textes bibliques, déconstruction inspirée par la "démythologisation" du théologien Rudolf Bultmann. Il propose ainsi une parole porteuse de sens pour l'ensemble de la société. Jamais publiés jusqu'ici, ces textes de Paul Ricoeur offrent une réflexion philosophique rare sur le rôle d'une communauté confessante au coeur d'une société désenchantée et qui reste d'une troublante actualité. (shrink)

Das Handbuch dokumentiert die Bedeutung der analytischen Philosophie für den religionsphilosophischen und theologischen Diskurs erstmalig in kompakter Weise für den deutschsprachigen Raum. Ausgehend von der analytischen Methode, den Vorboten und den maßgeblichen Vertretern der analytischen Religionsphilosophie, wird der Blick auf die wichtigsten etablierten Diskurse, wie etwa die Existenz und Eigenschaften Gottes, das Verhältnis Gott – Mensch und Gott – Welt, sowie auf aktuelle Debatten gelenkt. Dabei kommen sowohl der „Neue Atheismus“, die Attraktivität a-personaler Gottesbegriffe als auch der religiöse Pluralismus zur (...) Sprache. (shrink)

Aristotle tells us that contemplation is the most self-sufficient form of virtuous activity: we can contemplate alone, and with minimal resources, while moral virtues like courage require other individuals to be courageous towards, or courageous with. This is hard to square with the rest of his discussion of self-sufficiency in the Ethics: Aristotle doesn't generally seek to minimize the number of resources necessary for a flourishing human life, and seems happy to grant that such a life will be self-sufficient despite (...) requiring a lot of external goods. In this paper I develop an interpretation of self-sufficiency as a form of independence from external contributors to our activity, and argue that this interpretation accounts both for Aristotle's views on contemplation and for the role self-sufficiency plays in his broader account of human happiness. (shrink)

Aristotle's cognitive ideal is a form of understanding that requires a sophisticated grasp of scientific first principles. At the end of the Analytics, Aristotle tells us that we learn these principles by induction. But on the whole, commentators have found this an implausible claim: induction seems far too basic a process to yield the sort of knowledge Aristotle's account requires. In this paper I argue that this criticism is misguided. I defend a broader reading of Aristotelian induction, on which there's (...) good sense to be made of the claim that we come to grasp first principles inductively, and show that this reading is a natural one given Aristotle's broader views on scientific learning. (shrink)

Les aventures de l'État et la tâche des chrétiens -- Du marxisme au communisme contemporain -- Le socialisme d'aujourd'hui -- Hegel aujourd'hui -- Morale, éthique et politique -- Responsabilité et fragilité -- Les paradoxes de l'autorité -- Le bonheur hors lieu -- La crise : un phénomène spécifiquement moderne? -- L'argent : d'un soupçon à l'autre -- L'usure de la tolérance et la résistance de l'intolérable -- La condition d'étranger -- Fragile identité : respect de l'autre et identité culturelle -- (...) Quel éthos nouveau pour l'Europe? -- Le dialogue des cultures, la confrontation des héritages -- La crise de la conscience historique de l'Europe -- La lutte pour la reconnaissance et l'économie du don. (shrink)

In this paper I argue against rationalist readings of Aristotle's epistemology, on which our scientific understanding is justified on the basis of certain demonstrative first principles that are themselves justified only by some brute form of rational intuition. I then investigate the relationship between our intuition of principles and the broadly perceptual knowledge from which it derives. I argue that, for Aristotle, perceptual knowledge helps justify our intuition of principles, and also serves as an authority against which these principles and (...) their consequences must be assessed. I end by considering how we should understand the justificatory role played by perception, and sketching the nuanced, empirically-minded sort of foundationalism I take Aristotle to endorse. (shrink)

Panenetheism is the claim that God and the cosmos are intimately inter-related, with the cosmos being in God and God being in the cosmos. What does this exactly mean? The aim of this paper is to address this question by sheding light on four possible models of God-world-inter-relatedness. Being critical of those models, which understand maximal immanence in a literal, spatial sense, the paper argues in favor of a model, which cashes out immanence in terms of divine activity. God is, (...) where God acts. Since God acts upon all of creation everywhere and anytime, God is omnipresent to it at all times. Thus, the proposal is to read the ‘en’ in ‘panetheism’ in an ‘agential sense’: God is in the cosmos by creating and sustaining it and the cosmos is in God by constantly being within the sphere of divine activity. (shrink)

Paul Ricoeur's Freud and Philosophy was a major reinterpretation of psychoanalysis and its philosophical significance, but Ricoeur also wrote many important articles on similar themes. This volume makes available some of his key writings on Freud and psychoanalysis: together with Freud and Philosophy, they form a major part of his philosophical legacy. What kind of science is psychoanalysis? What kind of truth does it offer and what kind of proof does it provide? What does the concrete practice of psychoanalysis consist (...) of? What can it tell us about creativity and the work of art? What is its place within our culture and how can it transform culture? What is the role of narrative in psychoanalysis? Ricoeur reading Freud: this could have been the title of this volume, in which the focus is on the actual work of Freud and not on subsequent commentaries. An open reading of intellectual integrity. A critical reading which shuns definitive positions. A reading to understand Freud. -- Publisher description. (shrink)

When Paul Ricoeur died in 2005, the New York Times described him as "one of the most eminent philosophers of the twentieth century." In his lifetime, Ricoeur published influential works on language, memory, identity, and history, creating an innovative blend of hermeneutics and phenomenology. Despite his major interest in the imagination, however, he never wrote a complete text on the topic. The present volume, Lectures on Imagination, fills this gap, providing an indispensable resource for philosophically inclined readers from all backgrounds. (...) Over the course of these lectures, Ricoeur examines classical and contemporary philosophical theories of imagination, ranging from thinkers such as Aristotle, Pascal, Spinoza, Hume, and Kant to Husserl, Wittgenstein, Sartre, and Ryle. He argues that, with few exceptions, Western philosophy has focused on reproductive rather than productive imagination, thus diminishing the creative capacity of the human mind. For Ricoeur, productive imagination is a form of fiction-a new dimension of reality generated by the human mind. His theory has far-reaching implications. In all domains, we are not restricted by existing structures or institutions, because the productive imagination has the power to break through and transform our sense of our own horizons. (shrink)

A prominent version of mathematical structuralism holds that mathematical objects are at bottom nothing but "positions in structures," purely relational entities without any sort of nature independent of the structure to which they belong. Such an ontology is often presented as a response to Benacerraf's "multiple reductions" problem, or motivated on hermeneutic grounds, as a faithful representation of the discourse and practice of mathematics. In this paper I argue that there are serious difficulties with this kind of view: its proponents (...) rely on a distinction between "essential" and "nonessential" features of mathematical objects, and there's no good way to articulate this distinction which is compatible with basic structuralist commitments. But all is not lost. For I further argue that the insights motivating structuralism (or at least those worth preserving) can be preserved without formulating the view in ontologically committal terms. (shrink)

The first part of this paper reveals a conflict between the core principles of deterministic causation and the standard method of difference, which is widely seen as a correct method of causally analyzing deterministic structures. We show that applying the method of difference to deterministic structures can give rise to causal inferences that contradict the principles of deterministic causation. The second part then locates the source of this conflict in an inference rule implemented in the method of difference according to (...) which factors that can make a difference to investigated effects relative to one particular test setup are to be identified as causes, provided the causal background of the corresponding setup is homogeneous. The paper ends by modifying the method of difference in a way that renders it compatible with the principles of deterministic causation. (shrink)

The Swiss natural philosopher, physician, and radical reformer Theophrastus of Hohenheim (1493–1541), known as Paracelsus, endeavoured to reconcile his various perspectives in his extensive biblical exegeses. Symbolizing this effort were the two lights of nature and the Holy Spirit, which, on one hand, explored worldly and mortal aspects of nature and, on the other hand, led to eternal life. In response to the prevailing dispute between Luther and Zwingli over the interpretation of the Eucharist, Paracelsus developed his own viewpoint, introducing (...) the concept of the new human with a renewed corporeal body. His comprehensive interpretations of the Gospel of Matthew not only addressed theology but also engaged with the perspectives of a natural philosopher, physician, and advocate of natural magic. (shrink)