Radically reoriented presentation of Einstein's Special Theory and one of most valuable popular accounts available derives relativity from Newtonian ideas, ...

It is a trite and often lamented fact that every academic discipline suffers from the malady of overspecialization and expertise. Who, in his scholarly experience, has not encountered technical gibberish and the jargon of the pundit? The contributors to this work have aUempted to remove the artifi­ cial barriers between these respective disciplines. The purpose of this volume is to explore the ever present links between logic, physical reality, and history. Indeed there are not two or three or four cuItures: (...) there is only one culture; our generation has lost its awareness of this. Though serious, it is not tragic. All we need is to free ourselves from the fetters of mere "technicalese" and search for a comprehensive interpretation of logical and physical theories. His'torians, logicians, physicists - all are banded in one common enterprise, namely in their desire to weave an enlightened fabric of human knowledge. It is a current, and perhaps weJcome, trend in philosophie inquiry to de-psychologize systems, methods, and theories. However, there is an equally fashionable tendency to minimize or even eschew the historical aspects of logical and physical theories, and analogously, there is a deep­ seated mistrust among physicists and cosmologists against the seemingly pure abstractions of logical formalisms. (shrink)

Describe cómo ha sido el pensamiento hispanoamericano y si ha tenido una filosofía original; cómo debe ser la filosofía hispanoamericana si quiere lograr autenticidad, y se plantea si lo hispanoamericano debe o puede ser tema de reflexión filosófica.

Selection of Salazar Bondy's works with new critical materials.

La experiencia del valor -- El problema del sentido del lenguaje valorativo en la axiología contemporánea -- Una hipótesis sobre el sentido valorativo -- La exigencia estimativa -- Nota sobre mostración y sentido estimativo -- La plurivocidad de "bueno." -- Confusiones axiológicas -- Razón y valor: el problema de la fundamentación en el debate axiológico -- Objetividad y valor -- La dificultad de elegir -- La jerarquía axiológica -- Valor y objeto de estética -- El factor estimativo y antropológico en (...) las ciencias sociales.--Implicaciones axiológicas en la fundamentación de la ciencias humanas -- El problema del valor en el primer Wittgenstein: a propósito de Tractatus logico-philosophicus, 6.4-6.421 -- Tendencias contemporáneas de la filosofía moral británica -- La axiología de Francisco Romero. (shrink)

Schmitz zieht in diesem Buch die Bilanz eines mehr als fünfzigjährigen Fortschreitens im Dienst der Aufgabe, den Menschen ihr wirkliches Leben begreiflich zu machen. Er stellt zu diesem Zweck vier Säulen seines Werkes vor - unter den Titeln: Subjektivität, Mannigfaltigkeit, Leib und Gefühl, Welt - und bringt grundlegende Fragestellungen der Neuen Phänomenologie zur Sprache: Der Leib war seit der...

Epistemic Value Epistemic value is a kind of value which attaches to cognitive successes such as true beliefs, justified beliefs, knowledge, and understanding. These kinds of cognitive success do of course often have practical value. True beliefs about local geography help us get to work on time; knowledge of mechanics allows us to build vehicles; … Continue reading Value, Epistemic →.

In this paper, we will focus on the implications of, and relationships between, the concepts of mediation and media. We will focus in particular on the notion of body and linguistic practice as complex actors of mediation between the world and subjective engagements. In the post-phenomenological traditions, the critical theory of Harmut Rosa, and Citton's media studies, it has been pointed out that body and language represent the very prototypes of the construction of media as sensible, affective and formal environments. (...) Thus, the body and language as mediums obey two criteria that seem typical of any anthropologically located technology: they are prostheses that amplify experience and, at the same time, create specific environments which inaugurate ecological diversification. (shrink)

In Truthfulness and Tragedy Stanley Hauerwas provides an account of moral existence and ethical rationality that shows how Christian convictions operate, or should operate, to form and direct lives. In attempting to conceptualize the basis of Christian ethics in a manner that will render Christian convictions morally intelligible, the author casts fresh light on traditional theoretical issues and articulates the distinctive Christian response to contemporary concerns such as suicide, medical ethics, and child care. The first section of the book deals (...) with methodological issues: the meaning and nature of practical reason, obligation claims, natural law, and self deception, and the affinity of story and ethics. It focuses on the relation of truthfulness and tragedy and the need for a story--a set of religious convictions or "grammar of theology"--that does justice to the tragic character of human existence. The second section addresses substantive issues: suicide, euthanasia, and the value of survival; the moral limits of population growth; the definition of "person" for medical reasons; and social involvement and Christian ethics. The overall theme is the need for a community in which truthfulness is a way of life. In the final section, devoted to the problem of how to care for retarded children, the implications of the author's ethical position are given concrete expression. He discusses the assumptions underlying the willingness to have children, criteria for humanness, medical ethics, and how truthful communities deal with suffering. In Truthfulness and Tragedy Stanley Hauerwas extends and clarifies the ethical position set forth in his earlier books Character and the Christian Life and Vision and Virtue. He is associate professor of theology at the University of Notre Dame. He was a senior fellow in Christian medical ethics at the Joseph and Rose Kennedy Institute for the Study of Reproduction and Bioethics, and taught medical ethics at the University of Texas medical branch in Galveston. (shrink)

On Moral Certainty, Justification and Practice presents a view of morality that is inspired by the later Wittgenstein. Hermann explores the ethical implications of Wittgenstein's remarks on doubt, justification, rule-following, certainty and training, offering an alternative to interpretations of Wittgenstein's work that view it as being intrinsically ethical. The book scrutinises cases in which doubt and justification do not make sense, and contrasts certain justificatory demands made by philosophers with the role of moral justification in concrete situations. It offers (...) an account of moral certainty, which is linked to a view of moral competence. Contrary to the views propounded by philosophers who emphasise the importance of moral principles, it is argued that moral agency is first and foremost a matter of having certain capacities. The book takes an anti-intellectualist stance and remains close to concrete practices. The practice-based view of morality it endorses has implications for moral education, intercultural moral dialogue and the prospects for moral agreement, change and progress. (shrink)

Any account of “what is special about the human brain” (Passingham 2008) must specify the neural basis of our unique ability to produce speech and delineate how these remarkable motor capabilities could have emerged in our hominin ancestors. Clinical data suggest that the basal ganglia provide a platform for the integration of primate-general mechanisms of acoustic communication with the faculty of articulate speech in humans. Furthermore, neurobiological and paleoanthropological data point at a two-stage model of the phylogenetic evolution of this (...) crucial prerequisite of spoken language: (i) monosynaptic refinement of the projections of motor cortex to the brainstem nuclei that steer laryngeal muscles, presumably, as part of a “phylogenetic trend” associated with increasing brain size during hominin evolution; (ii) subsequent vocal-laryngeal elaboration of cortico-basal ganglia circuitries, driven by human-specificFOXP2mutations.;>This concept implies vocal continuity of spoken language evolution at the motor level, elucidating the deep entrenchment of articulate speech into a “nonverbal matrix” (Ingold 1994), which is not accounted for by gestural-origin theories. Moreover, it provides a solution to the question for the adaptive value of the “first word” (Bickerton 2009) since even the earliest and most simple verbal utterances must have increased the versatility of vocal displays afforded by the preceding elaboration of monosynaptic corticobulbar tracts, giving rise to enhanced social cooperation and prestige. At the ontogenetic level, the proposed model assumes age-dependent interactions between the basal ganglia and their cortical targets, similar to vocal learning in some songbirds. In this view, the emergence of articulate speech builds on the “renaissance” of an ancient organizational principle and, hence, may represent an example of “evolutionary tinkering” (Jacob 1977). (shrink)

Outlines of Metaphysic - dictated portions of the lectures of Hermann Lotze is an unchanged, high-quality reprint of the original edition of 1884. Hansebooks is editor of the literature on different topic areas such as research and science, travel and expeditions, cooking and nutrition, medicine, and other genres. As a publisher we focus on the preservation of historical literature. Many works of historical writers and scientists are available today as antiques only. Hansebooks newly publishes these books and contributes to (...) the preservation of literature which has become rare and historical knowledge for the future. (shrink)

Epistemological theories of knowledge and justification draw a crucial distinction between one's simply havinggood reasons for some belief, and one's actually basingone's belief on good reasons. While the most natural kind of account of basing is causal in nature--a belief is based on a reason if and only if the belief is properly caused by the reason--there is hardly any widely-accepted, counterexample-free account of the basing relation among contemporary epistemologists. Further inquiry into the nature of the basing relation is therefore (...) of paramount importance for epistemology. Without an acceptable account of the basing relation, epistemological theories remain both crucially incomplete and vulnerable to errors that can arise when authors assume an implausible view of what it takes for beliefs to be held on the basis of reasons. Well-Founded Beliefbrings together seventeen essays written by leading epistemologists to explore this important topic in greater detail. The collection is divided thematically to cover a wide range of issues related to the epistemic basic relation. The first section of essays covers the nature of the basing relation and attempts to articulate defensible accounts of what it takes to believe on the basis of a reason. Section II explores the kind of things that can be reasons on the basis of which we hold beliefs. Finally, the last section addresses the basing relation as it bears on particular problems in epistemology, such as skepticism, the analysis of knowledge, and the contingencies of our epistemic upbringing. (shrink)

Judges and jurors must make decisions in an environment of ignoranceand uncertainty for example by hearing statements of possibly unreliable ordishonest witnesses, assessing possibly doubtful or irrelevantevidence, and enduring attempts by the opponents to manipulate thejudge''s and the jurors'' perceptions and feelings. Three importantaspects of decision making in this environment are the quantificationof sufficient proof, the weighing of pieces of evidence, and therelevancy of evidence. This paper proposes a mathematical frameworkfor dealing with the two first aspects, namely the quantification ofproof (...) and weighing of evidence. Our approach is based on subjectivelogic, which is an extension of standard logic and probability theory,in which the notion of probability is extended by including degrees ofuncertainty. Subjective Logic is a framework for modelling humanreasoning and we show how it can be applied to legalreasoning. (shrink)

Hermann Karl Usener published his monumental Epicurea in 1887. The volume is a collection of Epicurean texts and citations from a wide range of classical authors including Arrian, Cicero, Diodorus, Euripides, Plato and Seneca. The volume includes critical texts of Epicurus' most important letters: Letter to Menoeceus, Letter to Herodotus and Letter to Pythocles, preserved by the third-century compiler Diogenes Laertius. The letters give important summaries of Epicurus' philosophy. Usener's pioneering work represented the first attempt to deal critically with (...) the manuscript traditions behind Epicurean texts. His reconstructions of the texts included in this volume are based on a thorough understanding of the trajectories of textual transmission. Each text is supported by a detailed critical apparatus, and another apparatus records manuscript glosses and scholia. This work provided for the first time accurate and reliable texts for the critical study of Epicureanism. (shrink)

1. Ursprünge und Entfaltungen.--II. Abenteuer der Seele.--v. 3. Wandel der Reiche.