Das Altern ist nicht nur eine biologische, sondern auch eine kulturelle Tatsache. Als Objekt der Verhandlungen zwischen Wissensdiskursen erscheint Alter als ein ebenso heterogenes wie problematisches Phanomen, das von Werturteilen und Weltanschauungen bestimmt wird. Des Weiteren sind Alter und Medizin in der offentlichen Meinung moderner Gesellschaften eng miteinander verbunden. Das interdisziplinare Forschungsprojekt "Kulturelle Variationen und Reprasentationen des Alters" geht von einem erweiterten, die geistes-, sozial- und medizinwissenschaftlichen Diskurse integrierenden Konzept von Alterskulturen und Potentialen des Alters aus. Dies bedeutet, Alter als (...) Gegenstand des Wissens und als Konzept zu begreifen. Alterskonzepte, das heisst Vorstellungen, Wertungen und, Bilder des Alters, sind Deutungsmuster fur elementare Bedurfnisse an der Schnittstelle von individuellem und kollektivem Leben. Mit Beitragen von David Blane und Gopalakrishnan Netuveli, Johannes Siegrist und Morten Wahrendorf, Peter Rusterholz, Anouk Janssen, Hiltrud Westermann-Angerhausen, Stefanie Knoll, Jean-Claude Schmitt, Gerd Gockenjan, Giovanna Pinna, Hans-Georg Pott, Monika Gomille, Miriam Seidler, Pat Thane, Simone Moses, Heiner Fangerau und Jorg Vogele, Anja Schonlau, Thomas Kupper". (shrink)

Von philologischer Nüchternheit und humanistischem Engagement... Der Band dokumentiert exemplarisch die Verbindung von Altertumswissenschaft und moderner Kulturwissenschaft auf hohem philologischem und kritisch reflektierendem Niveau.

We test the role of like-minded and cross-cutting political discussion as a facilitator of online and offline political participation and examine the role of strong versus weak network ties. Most prior research on the topic has employed cross-sectional designs that may lead to spurious relationships due to the lack of controlled variables. The findings of a two-wave panel survey controlling the autoregressive effects suggest that cross-cutting talk with weak ties significantly dampens online but not offline political participation. However, no such (...) effects were detectable for cross-cutting talk with strong ties. In addition, we found no effect of discussions involving like-minded individuals in either weak or strong network connections on online and offline forms of political engagement. Implications are discussed. (shrink)

Video gaming, specifically action video gaming, seems to improve a range of cognitive functions. The basis for these improvements may be attentional control in conjunction with reward-related learning to amplify the execution of goal-relevant actions while suppressing goal-irrelevant actions. Given that EEG alpha power reflects inhibitory processing, a core component of attentional control, it might represent the electrophysiological substrate of cognitive improvement in video gaming. The aim of this study was to test whether non-video gamers, non-action video gamers and action (...) video gamers exhibit differences in EEG alpha power, and whether this might account for differences in visual information processing as operationalized by the theory of visual attention. Forty male volunteers performed a visual short-term memory paradigm where they memorized shape stimuli depicted on circular stimulus displays at six different exposure durations while their EEGs were recorded. Accuracy data was analyzed using TVA-algorithms. There was a positive correlation between the extent of post-stimulus EEG alpha power attenuation and speed of information processing across all participants. Moreover, both EEG alpha power attenuation and speed of information processing were modulated by an interaction between group affiliation and time on task, indicating that video gamers showed larger EEG alpha power attenuations and faster information processing over time than NVGs – with AVGs displaying the largest increase. An additional regression analysis affirmed this observation. From this we concluded that EEG alpha power might be a promising neural substrate for explaining cognitive improvement in video gaming. (shrink)

The vast majority of empirical research on stakeholder management has traditionally focused on multinational corporations. Only in recent years, scholars have begun to pay attention to the stakeholder management concept in relation to small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The few existing studies in this area, however, discuss SMEs as a context free category or remain focused on single country analysis. This cross-national empirical research investigates SME owner–managers’ perceptions of stakeholder management in six European countries. The comparative analysis is followed by (...) a discussion of how institutional, cultural and linguistic contexts can influence owner–managers’ sensemaking of stakeholder management. Our study questions the universality of specific management terms and proposes that more attention should be paid to the institutional, cultural and linguistic environments that shape economic activity in different parts of Europe. (shrink)

The study focuses on fasting as a means of recovering God’s grace, an act which was frequently ordered by authorities throughout the European Middle Ages. Crop failure in particular, as well as the famine which regularly resulted from it, were countered by fasting lasting several days. The famine of the years 805 to 806 is a special case of collective asceticism focussed on a distinct geographical entity and carried out using suitable rules e.g. fasting, prayer, alms-giving etc. At the same (...) time it is shown to be a paradigmatic example of medieval crisis management. In cases such as these, renunciation seems to have been a sort of religiously motivated inward-looking self-compulsion. Consequently asceticism of this type can be regarded as the product of an external compulsion which seeks to mediate the world of events through a collectively established religious order. (shrink)

In recent times, Kant’s theory of the moral feeling of respect has increasingly come to the centre of Kant research. His diverse and seemingly contradictory characterisations of this feeling in particular have led to continued controversial discussion. While a number of scholars try to understand the special role of respect in Kant by isolating this feeling from its conceptual context or solely referring to its role as moral motivation, I will concentrate on the systemic position of respect within the framework (...) of Kant’s theory of the autonomy of reason. Furthermore, I will try to elucidate the different characterisations of respect given by Kant, referring not only to his ethics, but also to his general theory of transcendental idealism. Examining the special place of respect within Kant’s transcendental idealism, I will plead for a compatibilist reading of respect, according to which the “intellectualist” as well as the “affectivist” view both hold true. This is motivated by interpreting respect as a volitional structure featuring rational as well as emotional dimensions. (shrink)

Aus dem Inhalt: Die Wissenschaftslehre als System der unvollendeten Vollendung (Sven Juergensen). - Fichtes Wechselwirkung und der implizite Hoerer der Wissenschaftslehre nova methodo (Guenther Zoeller). - Die Begrenzung: vom Anstoss zur Aufforderung (Jacinto Rivera de Rosales). - Die Idee des Leibes im Jenaer System (Virginia Lopez-Dominguez). - Fichtes politische und Rechtsphilosophie in der Deutung Richard Schottkys (Carla de Pascale). - Gibt es bei Fichte eine transzendentale Anthropologie? (Jose L. Villacanas).

Der Artikel untersucht das Verhältnis von Erkenntnis und Liebe bei Hans Urs von Balthasar. Die Liebe ist für ihn kein selbstbezogenes Streben nach dem, was man nicht besitzt, wie das Streben zur Fülle des Seins im griechischen bzw. zum Nichtsein im indischen Denken, sondern selbstlose Hingabe, etwa im Sinn eines innertrinitarischen Verschenkens des eigenen Seins, einer Herablassung Gottes zum Geschöpf in Schöpfung und Erlösung oder als ein reines Sein-für-das-Sein-des-Erkenntnis- gegenstandes im menschlichen Erkenntnisakt. Die Liebe ist zudem kein Moment der Erkenntnis, (...) sondern die Erkenntnis als von der Liebe umfaßt zu verstehen. Liebe aber zielt letztlich immer auf den singulären Gegenstand in seiner Singularität, womit sich die Bewegungsumkehr insbesondere als eine Umkehr der indischen Abwendung vom Individuellen bzw. des griechisch-antiken Aufstiegs vom Besonderen zum Allgemeinen erweist. (shrink)

Die abendländische Philosophie ist von einer durchgängigen Vorherrschaft des Allgemeinen gegenüber dem Individuellen geprägt. Da Erkennen wesentlich heißt, das Partikulare als Fall des Allgemeinen zu verstehen, besteht eine Art fatale Tendenz zur Unterordnung, eine Tendenz, deren Opfer nicht nur der einzelne Mensch ist, sondern heute auch die als beliebig ersetzbares Wegwerfprodukt verstandene Natur. Am Leitfaden der Philosophie Hans Urs von Balthasar weist das Buch den Weg zu einer Metaphysik, deren ausgezeichneter Gegenstand das individuelle, bzw. unwiederholbar singuläre Sein ist. Dabei finden (...) auch zwei vom Autor entdeckte, noch unveröffentlichte, philosophische Arbeiten des Schweizer Theologen Berücksichtigung. Über die auf anthropologischer Ebene in Existentialismus, Phänomenologie oder dem dialogischen Denken sich andeutenden Ansätze hinaus wird in kritischer Auseinandersetzung mit Hans Urs von Balthasars Denken die Frage eines ontologisch-gnoseologischen Primats des Singulären erörtert. (shrink)

This study intends to vindicate Thomas Aquinas' theory of perception as a key element which is systematically constituent for his theory of knowledge generally. The causal conditions for perception, the physical framework and the resulting perceptual knowledge are analysed.

Are we essentially human animals or persons? The aim of this paper is to find a middle way between animalism and constitutionalism and to develop a concept of a person's life which avoids their problems. I will argue for the following thesis: As humans we are persons, but we are persons not in the sense of certain abilities which distinguish our biological kind, but by an intersubjective form of our life. Therefore, I will strictly distinguish between the biological species form (...) of human beings and the life form of humans as persons. This allows me to develop an account of the personal life form which unifies metaphysics and value without succumbing to the naturalistic fallacy. (shrink)

Der Sammelband geht den Fragen nach, was eigentlich studierendenzentrierte Lehre ist, welche konkreten Herausforderungen bei der Umsetzung einer studierendenzentrierten Lehre auftreten und wie eine solche Lehre angesichts dieser Herausforderungen umgesetzt werden kann. Aber auch: Welche Hürden haben sich bisher als unüberwindbar erwiesen, und wie können Lehrende damit umgehen?

Cette réaction est suscitée par l’article de Laurent Le Maux, récemment publié dans ce Journal. Le Maux affirme que Ludwig von Mises était le défenseur d’un système de réserves fractionnaires et un précurseur des économistes contemporains partisans des réserves fractionnaires. Nous critiquons la manière dont Le Maux utilise la littérature ancienne dans ce domaine, et nous montrons qu’il n’est pas suffisamment au fait des travaux de Mises et des problèmes qui divisent les défenseurs et les opposants du système de réserves (...) fractionnaires. Les écrits de Ludwig von Mises fournissent la preuve accablante qu’il était, et il le disait lui-même, un économiste qui développait l’approche de la Currency School dans le domaine des problèmes bancaires.This paper takes issue with an article by Laurent Le Maux that recently appeared in this journal. Le Maux claims that Ludwig von Mises was an advocate of fractional-reserve banking and a precursor of presentday economists defending fractional reserves. We criticise Le Maux’s treatment of previous literature in the field, and show that he is insufficiently acquainted with Mises’ work and with the problems that divide advocates and opponents of fractional reserves. Ludwig von Mises’ writings provide overwhelming evidence that he was, and saw himself as, an economist who developed the approach of the Currency School toward problems of banking. (shrink)

The history of Western metaphysics is being unfold on the basis of nine outstanding philosophers. For ancient philosophy: Plato, Aristotle and Plotinus; for medieval philosophy: Augustine, Thomas Aquinas and William of Ockham; for the modern period: Descartes, Kant and Hegel. The final chapter outlines some prominent opponents of metaphysics in the 19th/20th Century (Feuerbach, Marx, Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, Heidegger). Metaphysics being a fundamental philosophical discipline, this book can also be read as an introduction to philosophy as such.

As a contribution to the emerging field of corporate social responsibility cognition, this article reports on the findings of an exploratory study that compares SME owner–managers’ mental models with regard to CSR and related concepts across six European countries. Utilising Repertory Grid Technique, we found that the SME owner–managers’ mental models show a few commonalities as well as a number of differences across the different country samples. We interpret those differences by linking individual cognition to macro-environmental variables, such as language, (...) national traditions and dissemination mechanisms. The results of our exploratory study show that nationality matters but that classifications of countries as found in the comparative capitalism literature do not exactly mirror national differences in CSR cognition and that these classifications need further differentiation. The findings from our study raise questions on the universality of cognition of academic management concepts and warn that promotion of responsible business practice should not rely on the use of unmediated US American management terminology. (shrink)

Levinas theory of a self is interpreted as a threefold model: an epistemic self, a lifeworld self and an intersubjective self. Against the modern idea of an identitiy of sovereignty and self-affirmation, Levinas wants to show that self-affirmation at its highest is reached where the self instead of being sovereign is in a position of dependence and passivity which is the case for the intersubjective self.