Philosophy of biology before biology -/- Edited by Cécilia Bognon-Küss & Charles T. Wolfe -/- Table of contents -/- Cécilia Bognon-Küss & Charles T. Wolfe. Introduction -/- 1. Cécilia Bognon-Küss & Charles T. Wolfe. The idea of “philosophy of biology before biology”: a methodological provocation -/- Part I. FORM AND DEVELOPMENT -/- 2. Stéphane Schmitt. Buffon’s theories of generation and the changing dialectics of molds and molecules 3. Phillip Sloan. Metaphysics and “Vital” Materialism: The Gabrielle Du Châtelet Circle and French (...) Vitalism 4. John Zammito. The Philosophical Reception of C. F. Wolff’s Epigenesis in Germany, 1770-1790: Herder, Tetens and Kant -/- Part II. ORGANISM & ORGANIZATION 5. François Duchesneau. Senebier and the Advent of General Physiology 6. Tobias Cheung. Organization and Process. Living Systems Between Inner and Outer Worlds: Cuvier, Hufeland, Cabanis. -/- Part III. SYSTEMS 7. Georg Toepfer. Philosophy of Ecology Long Before Ecology: Kant’s Idea of an Organized System of Organized Beings 8. Ina Goy. "All is leaf". Goethe's plant philosophy and poetry 9. Snait Gissis. ‘Biology’, Lamarck, Lamarckisms -/- POSTSCRIPTS 1. Lynn Nyhart. A Historical Proposal Around Prepositions -/- 2. Philippe Huneman. Philosophy after Philosophy of Biology before Biology -/- Cécilia Bognon-Küss and Charles T. Wolfe. Conclusion . (shrink)

This paper seeks to characterize how the study of nutrition processes contributed to revisit the problem of vital organization in the late eighteenth century. It argues that focusing on nutrition leads to reformulate the problem of the relation between life and organization in terms of processes, rather than static or given structures. This nutrition-centered approach to life amounts to acknowledge the specific strategic role nutrition played in the development of a materialist approach to the generation of vital organization. The paper (...) proposes a clarification of the multiple meanings of the concept of organization in the context of Enlightenment physiology and nascent biology, before focusing on the century long analogy between nutrition and generation. It shows how, by contrasting different uses of this analogy, nutrition was employed as a key vital phenomenon in the development of epigenetic theories of generation, i.e. how a nutritive modeling of generation was used in the undermining of preformationism. To this purpose I contrast two seemingly opposite theories of generation, Buffon’s and Bonnet’s, and show that despite the obvious metaphysical discontent, their views of generation share a common mechanical conceptual frame in which nutrition is conflated with growth and repair. I then turn to the role nutrition played in the epigenetic conception of generation in C. F. Wolff’s embryology and analyze this rival understanding of nutrition as an organizing process. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to elucidate the vital meaning and strategic role that nutrition holds in Claude Bernard’s “biological philosophy”, in the sense Auguste Comte gave to this expression, _i.e._ the theoretical part of biology. I propose that Bernard’s nutritive perspective on life should be thought of as an “interfield” object, following Holmes’ category. Not only does nutrition bridge disciplines like physiology and organic chemistry, as well as levels of inquiry ranging from special physiology to the organism’s total (...) level, including the cell and protoplasm, but it also forms the genetic and structural foundation for Bernard’s two fundamental axioms in general physiology: the necessary complementarity of destruction and creation (1) and the uniformity of this physiological law across all life forms, be it plants or animals (2). Because Bernard’s nutritive theory is a major pivot for the re-ordering of life and its characterization, I argue that it must be located and understood in the scientific and metaphysical context of his time, of which he claims to be the heir and challenger—what I propose to characterize as the “epistemic space” of nutrition, on the background of which Bernard builds his own “logic”. I then set out this _logic of nutrition_, focusing on three interrelated bernardian theses: the establishment of the theory of indirect nutrition as the basis for the notion of “milieu intérieur”; the enduring conception of nutrition as a continuous generation; the emphasis on nutrition as a way of reshaping the form/matter relationship. (shrink)

Fifty years ago Hartman studied the barrier transmission time of wave packets (J Appl Phys 33:3427–3433, 1962). He was inspired by the tunneling experiments across thin insulating layers at that time. For opaque barriers he calculated faster than light propagation and a transmission time independent of barrier length, which is called the Hartman effect. A faster than light (FTL or superluminal) wave packet velocity was deduced in analog tunneling experiments with microwaves and with infrared light thirty years later. Recently, the (...) conjectured zero time of electron tunneling was claimed to have been observed in ionizing helium inside the barrier. The calculated and measured short tunneling time arises at the barrier front. This tunneling time was found to be universal for elastic fields as well as for electromagnetic fields. Remarkable is that the delay time is the same for the reflected and the transmitted waves in the case of symmetric barriers. Several theoretical physicists predicted this strange nature of the tunneling process. However, even with this background many members of the physics community do not accept a FTL signal velocity interpretation of the experimental tunneling results. Instead a luminal front velocity was calculated to explain the FTL experimental results frequently. However, Brillouin stated in his book on wave propagation and group velocity that the front velocity is given by the group velocity of wave packets in the case of physical signals, which have only finite frequency bandwidths. Some studies assumed barriers to be cavities and the observed tunneling time does represent the cavity lifetime. We are going to discus these continuing misleading interpretations, which are found in journals and in textbooks till today. (shrink)

In the age of surveillance capitalism, the prevailing business model underlying the use of social media applications (“apps”) foresees the exchange of personal data for the allowance to use an online service. Such a data business model comes with many potential negative side effects ranging from violation of privacy issues to election manipulation. Therefore, it is of utmost importance to think of alternatives to the current data business model. The present study investigated how strong the support would be for a (...) monetary payment model among a sample of 210 participants. Participants were asked about their willingness to pay for social media, if in turn their data would be private and other problems concerning social media use would be tackled. Only one-fifth of participants (21.43%) supported such a model. From the Big Five Personality traits, Agreeableness was positively associated with support of such a model. Finally, data are also provided on how much participants would be willing to pay for social media on a monthly basis. The present study’s findings are of a preliminary nature and will contribute to the start of an important discussion. (shrink)

“Analytical construct. The Culture as construct and the constitution of the social – fallowing Max Weber”. The key of this paper is the chalange to determinate theplace of the cultural sociology in the context of the general sociology and of the other cultural sciences, like cultural anthropology and ethnology. For doing that it is necessary to analize Max Weber’s concept: Gedankenbild.

Seit dem byzantinischen Bilderstreit und dem Bildersturm der Reformation ist nicht mehr in solcher Intensität über Bilder nachgedacht worden wie in den letzten Jahrzehnten. Neben der Archäologie und der Kunstgeschichte haben sich zahlreiche weitere Fächer an Fragestellungen rund um das Bild geradezu festgebissen. Angesichts dessen geht einer der bedeutendsten Kunsthistoriker der Gegenwart der Frage nach, warum Begriff und Geltung sowie Macht und Ohnmacht von Bildern so hartnäckig verfolgte Themen unserer Tage geworden sind.

The sociobiological and socio-political aspects of human existence have been the subject of techno-rationalistic control and manipulation. The investigation of the mutual complementarity of anthropological and ontological paradigms under these circumstances is the main purpose of present publication. The comparative conceptual analysis of the bio-power and bio-politics in the mentality of the modern technological civilization is a main method of the research. The methodological and philosophical analogy of biological and social engineering allows combining them in the nature and social implications (...) as part of a High Hume technologies class. As result of the transformation of somatic foundations of the human being and his behavior, stereotypes in the object of control and management the technogenic risk reached the existential level. The rapidly growing status of biopower and biopolitics in the conceptual field of contemporary political science becomes by phenomenological expression of these processes. (shrink)

This textbook describes and explains the fundamentals of applying empirical methods for theory building and theory testing in marketing research. The authors explain the foundations in philosophy of science and the various methodological approaches to readers who are working empirically with the purpose of developing and testing theories in marketing. The primary target group of the book are graduate students and PhD students who are preparing their empirical research projects, e.g. for a master thesis or a dissertation.

Shaping the Future maps out the ascetic practices of a Neitzschean way of life. Hutter argues that Nietzsche's doctrines are attempts and "temptations" that aim to provoke his free-spirited readers into changing themselves by putting philosophy into practice in their lives.

Expulsion of senses. Acustic spaces: call and listening in interpretive sociology. Following the 'mental constructs' that are illustrative for Max Weber's Idealtypologie, the 'acustic spaces' in the cultural concept of education are developed. The study is an analysis of the organization of command and obedience in Weber's sociology of domination. His interpretive sociology is taken from Martin Heidegger. Another subject of the paper is an excursion into the sociology of music of Weber and Adorno. In the acoustic sounds of music, (...) especially in the organ and piano works, we find the process of rationalization of the Western culture. (shrink)

English summary: The relationship between science and politics can hardly be reduced to a simple formula. On one hand they appear to be completely separate systems that follow only their own internal logic. On the other hand, mutual references can be identified. It is quite possible to consistently align political decisions to scientific evidence, whereby the autonomy and the legitimacy of democratic policy would however inevitably be affected. In four sections the relationship between science and politics are analyzed under the (...) viewpoint of a specific key question: Does true policy require powerful decision and therefor specifically the absence of science? And is science not conversely determined by it being free of value and policy? What about concepts that tend to want to replace policy with science? Finally, there is the question of what legitimate role science can play in today's politics, and whether this can be in the form of policy advice. This book, with contributions from renowned authors from different disciplines, is systematically devoted to answering these questions. German text. German description: Das Verhaltnis zwischen Wissenschaft und Politik ist kaum auf eine einfache Formel zu bringen. Einerseits erscheinen sie als vollig getrennte Systeme, die nur ihrer eigenen inneren Logik folgen. Andererseits lassen sich wechselseitige Bezugnahmen ausmachen. So ist durchaus denkbar, politische Entscheidungen konsequent an wissenschaftlichen Erkenntnissen auszurichten, wodurch aber unweigerlich die Autonomie auch und gerade demokratisch legitimierter Politik betroffen wuerde.In vier Sektionen wird das Verhaltnis von Wissenschaft und Politik unter einer bestimmten Leitfrage analysiert: Setzt wahre Politik kraftvolle Dezision und somit gerade die Abwesenheit von Wissenschaft voraus? Und ist Wissenschaft nicht umgekehrt durch ihre Wert- und damit Politikfreiheit bestimmt? Wie steht es um Konzepte, die Politik tendenziell durch Wissenschaft ersetzen wollen? Schliesslich fragt sich, welche legitime Rolle Wissenschaft heutzutage in der Politik spielen kann, etwa in Form der Politikberatung.Der Band mit Beitragen renommierter Autoren unterschiedlicher Disziplinen geht diesen Problemkonstellationen in systematischer Weise nach. (shrink)