According to the received account of guilt in the philosophical literature, one cannot feel guilt unless one takes oneself to have done something morally wrong. But ordinary people feel guilt in many cases in which they do not take themselves to have done anything morally wrong. In this paper, I focus on one kind of guilt without perceived wrongdoing, guilt about being merely causally responsible for a bad state-of-affairs. I go on to present a novel account of guilt that explains (...) guilt about mere causal responsibility, according to which guilt represents part of the self as bound up with what is bad. (shrink)

What is the relation between small-scale collaborative plans and the execution of those plans within interactive contexts? I argue here that joint attention has a key role in explaining how shared plans and shared intentions are executed in interactive contexts. Within singular action, attention plays the functional role of enabling intentional action to be guided by a prior intention. Within interactive joint action, it is joint attention, I argue, that plays a similar functional role of enabling the agents to act (...) in a collaborative way such that their actions are rationally guided by a prior shared intention. This understanding of joint attention – as having a key functional role of enabling the rational guidance of joint intentional action by a prior shared intention – allows for an alternative understanding of the kind of minimal cooperation that infants can engage in. On this understanding, infants’ capacity to engage in joint actions is already an incipient capacity to engage in rational and intentional joint actions, albeit a capacity that is necessarily scaffolded by an adult rational co-partner. (shrink)

The fact that Gilbert Ryle and J.L. Austin seem to disagree about the ordinary use of words such as ‘voluntary’, ‘involuntary’, ‘voluntarily’, and ‘involuntarily’ has been taken to cast doubt on the methods of ordinary language philosophy. As Benson Mates puts the worry, ‘if agreement about usage cannot be reached within so restricted a sample as the class of Oxford Professors of Philosophy, what are the prospects when the sample is enlarged?’ (Mates, Inquiry 1:161–171, 1958, p. 165). In this chapter, (...) we evaluate Mates’s criticism alongside Ryle’s and Austin’s specific claims about the ordinary use of these words, assessing these claims against actual examples of ordinary use drawn from the British National Corpus (BNC). Our evaluation consists in applying a combination of methods: first aggregating judgments about a large set of samples drawn from the corpus, and then using a clustering algorithm to uncover connections between different types of use. In applying these methods, we show where and to what extent Ryle’s and Austin’s accounts of the use of the target terms are accurate as well as where they miss important aspects of ordinary use, and we demonstrate the usefulness of this new combination of methods. At the heart of our approach is a commitment to the idea that systematically looking at actual uses of expressions is an essential component of any approach to ordinary language philosophy. (shrink)

Our aim in this paper is to present the distinct ways in which Wolff, Baumgarten, and Kant understand the relationship between necessitation, constraint, and reluctant action in an effort to illustrate the subtle ways in which their conceptions of obligation differ from each another. Whereas Wolff conceives of natural or moral obligation as incompatible with constraint, Baumgarten holds that constraint and reluctant action are, in some instances, compatible with natural obligation. Kant departs from Baumgarten by conceiving of obligation as necessarily (...) involving constraint: as Kant’s reply to Schiller’s famous objection reveals, obligation must take on the character of constraint to reluctant action on account of the fact that human beings possess inclinations that always threaten to impel them in directions that oppose morality. (shrink)

What is the relation between joint attention and common knowledge? On the one hand, the relation seems tight: the easiest and most reliable way of knowing something in common with another is for you and that other to be attentively aware of what you are together experiencing. On the other hand, they couldn’t seem further apart: joint attention is a mere perceptual phenomena that infants are capable of engaging in from nine months of age, whereas common knowledge is a cognitive (...) phenomenon involving (so it seems) complex, overlapping metarepresentational states that require the kind of sophisticated mindreading skills that developmental psychology has shown to be beyond the capabilities of young children. In 'The Shared World: Perceptual Common Knowledge, Demonstrative Communication, and Shared Social Space', Axel Seemann attempts, inter alia, to makensense of this conundrum. (shrink)

An Essay on Human Action seeks to provide a comprehensive, detailed, enlightening, and (in its detail) original account of human action. This account presupposes a theory of events as abstract, proposition-like entities, a theory which is given in the first chapter of the book. The core-issues of action-theory are then treated: what acting in general is (a version of the traditional volitional theory is proposed and defended); how actions are to be individuated; how long actions last; what acting intentionally is; (...) what doing one thing by doing another is; what basic action is; and what omitting to do something is. Attention is also given to the concepts of causation, intention, volition, deciding, choosing, and trying. Finally, a libertarian account of free action is tentatively proposed and defended. (shrink)

Conscious awareness comprises two distinct states, autonoetic and noetic awareness. Schizophrenia impairs autonoetic, but not noetic, awareness. We investigated the strategic regulation of relevant and irrelevant contents of conscious awareness in schizophrenia using a directed forgetting paradigm. Twenty-one patients with schizophrenia and 21 normal controls were presented with words and told to learn some of them and forget others. In a subsequent test, they were asked to recognize all the words they had seen previously and give remember, know or guess (...) responses according to whether they recognized words on the basis of autonoetic awareness, noetic awareness, or guessing. Overall, patients showed the same degree of a directed forgetting effect as normal subjects. However, whereas the effect was observed both for remember and know responses in normal subjects, it was observed for know, but not for remember, responses in patients. These results indicate that patients with schizophrenia exhibit an impaired strategic regulation of contents of autonetic awareness for relevant and irrelevant information. (shrink)

This a clear and concise introduction to Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard.ichael Watts uses Kierkegaard's own writings to introduce his theoriesbout living a truthfu; and spiritual life, while explaining the enormousnfluence of the philosopher's personal life on his work and beliefs. As theounder of 20th century existentialism, and the first philosopher to definehe idea of angst, Kierkegaard's profound influence on modern life is clearlyefined in accessible terms in this guide for students and general readers.

A particular feature of this book is substantial "Stretch and Challenge" material throughout which allows students to develop further.

Concepts and Cases in Nursing Ethics is an introduction to contemporary ethical issues in health care, designed especially for Canadian audiences. The book is organized around six key concepts: beneficence, autonomy, truth-telling, confidentiality, justice, and integrity. Each of these concepts is explained and discussed with reference to professional and legal norms. The discussion is then supplemented by case studies that exemplify the relevant concepts and show how each applies in health care and nursing practice. This new fourth edition includes an (...) added chapter on end-of-life issues, and it is revised throughout to reflect the latest developments on topics such as global health ethics, cultural competence, social media, and palliative sedation. (shrink)

Als Philosoph, Literat, Prediger und Pädagoge gehört Herder zu den bedeutendsten Vertretern der Weimarer Klassik. Diese aktuelle und kenntnisreiche Biografie bringt Leben und Werk Herders einem breiteren Publikum nahe.

Opponents of medically assisted dying have long appealed to ‘slippery slope’ arguments. One such slippery slope concerns palliative care: that the introduction of medically assisted dying will lead to a diminution in the quality or availability or palliative care for patients near the end of their lives. Empirical evidence from jurisdictions where assisted dying has been practiced for decades, such as Oregon and the Netherlands, indicate that such worries are largely unfounded. The failure of the palliation slope argument is nevertheless (...) instructive with respect to how slippery slope arguments can be appraised without having to await post-facto evidence regarding the effects of a proposed change in public policy. Close attention in particular to the norms operative in a given institution and how changes to policy will interact with those norms enable slippery slopes to be credibly appraised. (shrink)

SummaryThis article approaches eighteenth-century views on scientific academies by examining Haller's utterances, public and private, especially those occasioned by the founding of the Göttingen Society. It deals in turn with his understanding of the distinctive purpose of academies, with his explanation of the chief ways in which they realized this end, with his thoughts on their broader usefulness, and finally with his various reasons for considering close ties with the state to be essential to their productive and harmonious operations.

This article sets the dancing of religious and saints and their role models in the perspective of imitation in terms of an essential cultural technique of the Middle Ages. Since the religious were compelled in their search for God by the imitation of Christ and the saints, their dancing was also to be integrated into the symbolic order of the monastery. Given that dance and religious practice are both governed equally by two fundamental categories – regularity and ritualization on the (...) one hand, and ecstasy, unboundedness from all being and in result ascension to God on the other – this heterogeneous phenomenon could not be seamlessly integrated into another phenomenon. Here, it clashed with the symbolic ordering of the monastery; the ambiguities contained in this dualism could be reinforced or cancelled out. With the individual and his or her conscience becoming more appreciated, and the ushering-in of a more plural society, as well as the rearrangement of old role models which had been typical of mysticism towards Christ, had clear consequences for the image of God, which in the Late Middle Ages received a new more human face with the ‘playing’ God. As a result, believers re-anchored dance and all its facets in the order-oriented thinking of the European-Christian Middle Ages. Christ had become the best of all dancers, someone every believer had to imitate, at least in his or her soul. (shrink)

Professionalization of the engineer, from the perspective of sociology of technology, registrant in the statements of principle and Canadian standards of accreditation of university engineering programs. The question of the development of technologies (production, dissemination and appropriation) is attached in all respects with personal and social qualities of which refer engineer schools of engineering and regulatory bodies. The engineering profession s’roots from elsewhere in industrial ans social sectors increasingly sensitive to the social dimensions of technology, considering the new dynamics that (...) s’are attached with regard to the technology impacts on society and businesses. (shrink)

I show that the common reading of Thomson, that she argues by analogy for the conclusion that abortion is permissible, is mistaken. The correct reading of Thomson is that she argues by counterexample, showing that arguments against abortion are unsound. The remainder of the paper highlights the lessons learned from Thomson once we read her aright.

Common knowledge is ubiquitous in our lives and yet there remains considerable uncertainty about how to model or understand it. Standard analyses of common knowledge end up being challenged by either regress or circularity which then give rise to well-known paradoxes of practical reasoning, such as the Two Generals’ Paradox. This paper argues that the nature and utility of common knowledge can be illuminated by appeal to Wittgenstein’s Hinge Epistemology. It is argued that those things that we standardly think of (...) as being common knowledge in our lives are the same as those that Wittgenstein identified as hinge certainties. This identification of common knowledge with hinge certainties allows us to resolve the regress problem for common knowledge and explain how the Two Generals’ Paradox arises. (shrink)

This book is a collage of ideas designed for eighth through twelfth grade students and their parents to have better relationships with one another and with the entire school community, to help and support their communities in different ways, and to appreciate the value of the experiences offered within and outside their communities.

Die Bedeutung des Spiels in der Lebenswelt der mittelalterlichen Klöster und Orden ist bislang nicht als Phänomen von kultureller Tragweite erörtert worden, denn der (scheinbare) Antagonismus aus kontemplativem Leben einerseits und heiterem Spiel andererseits verhinderte, dass der religiosus ludens wissenschaftlich Beachtung fand. Die im Band vereinigten, interdisziplinären Analysen der theologischen, liturgischen, kunstgeschichtlichen, rechtlichen und sozialen Dimensionen von Ball-, Würfel-, Brett-, Karten- und Wissensspielen verdeutlichen erstmals die gestalterische Kraft der Ordensleute zur Erfindung, Adaption und Vermittlung von Spielen wie deren Sinngehalten innerhalb (...) der vormodernen Gesellschaft. Im Aufzeigen der innovativen und mannigfaltigen Wege der Legitimation und Delegitimation monastischen und außermonastischen Spiels, aus denen Ordensleute zudem wegweisende und gesamtgesellschaftlich tragfähige Kategorisierungen des ludus entwickelten und nahezu sämtliche Lebensentwürfe der Vormoderne erklärten, stellt der Band nicht nur eine neuartige Perspektive auf das Spiel und die vita religiosa vor. Zugleich öffnet er ein noch unbekanntes Fenster zum Verständnis kultureller Mechanismen im Mittelalter. (shrink)

The problem with authenticity—the idea of being “true to one’s self”—is that its somewhat checkered reputation garners a complete range of favorable and unfavorable reactions. In educational settings, authenticity is lauded as one of the top two traits students desire in their teachers. Yet, authenticity is criticized for its tendency towards narcissism and self-entitlement. So, is authenticity a good or a bad thing? The purpose of this article is to develop an intimate understanding of authenticity by investigating its current interpretation (...) and criticisms, its struggle with narcissism and relation to freedom. Examining authenticity as multilayered self-exploration reveals a composite of understanding, care, and acceptance. While a side current of acceptable tension shifts our understanding of authenticity from the security of self-determination to the messy interplay involved in being “true to one’s self” and being “in-the-world”. (shrink)

Drawing on work of the past decade, this volume brings together articles from the philosophy, history, and sociology of science, and many other branches of the biological sciences. The volume delves into the latest theoretical controversies as well as burning questions of contemporary social importance. The issues considered include the nature of evolutionary theory, biology and ethics, the challenge from religion, and the social implications of biology today (in particular the Human Genome Project).

Ethical debates about assisted dying typically assume that only medical professionals should be able to provide patients with assisted dying. This assumption partially rests on the unstated principle that assisted dying providers may not be motivated by pecuniary considerations. Here I outline and defend a mixed provider model of assisted dying provision that contests this principle. Under this model, medically competent non-physician professionals could receive fees for providing assisted dying under the same terms and conditions as physicians can in those (...) juris- dictions where medically assisted dying is lawful. The mixed provider model blunts objections to assisted dying rooted in supposed clashes with medical values. In addition to generating a market likely to expand access to assisted dying, the mixed provider model would not create markets that are unjust because they are “noxious” in Satz’ sense or because they raise “semiotic” concerns about the value of human life. (shrink)

The third edition of a work that defines the field of cognitive neuroscience, with extensive new material including new chapters and new contributors.

Aphorismen-Bücher sind nicht systematisch und widersprechen eigentlich der Konsequenz des Denkens. Nietzsche indes fordert das «rück- und vorsichtige» Lesen der seinen, und in der Tat: In der Morgenröthe erschließen sich mehrere Gewebe von Verweisen. Hervor tritt eine Technik: mögliche Strukturen anzubieten, wie zum Beispiel Bildfolgen und Zahlenkomposition. Kontexte finden sich, die erstens alles Reden, selbst das philosophische, von den lästigen Verpflichtungen auf logische und empirische Sachverhalte und zu anderen, etwa ästhetischen Möglichkeiten des Denkens befreien, und die zweitens anbieten, den Kalkül (...) durch Zahlen- oder Bilderspiel zu ersetzen. Die kaleidoskopisch wechselnden Sinn-Angebote lassen die Wahrheitsfrage überflüssig und poetische Ideen sichtbar werden. (shrink)

It is time to transcend the arid debate between rationality and ir-, a-, or non-rationality as our basic assumption about human agency.1 There are powerful arguments and extensive evidence both for and against the rationality assumption, with heavily defended entrenchments on both sides. Managers and management scholars continually make at least tacit assumptions about how they expect others to behave. If only we could have in both theory and practice the coherence and precision of rational models as well as the (...) descriptive richness of ‘behavioural’ approaches. The message of this paper is that perhaps we can. The advent of consciousness studies and, more recently, neuroeconomics would seem to indicate the way forward to transcend the opposition in some kind of synthesis. This paper investigates rationality in the light of Daniel Dennett’s thesis that it is at the core of all intentionality that is the defining characteristic of mental phenomena. Neuroeconomics seeks to enhance understanding of agency by investigating new insights on the materialist basis of mental phenomenology in the neurophysiology of the brain and nervous system. Experimental evidence mapping intentional states onto neurophysiological states is emerging, some researchers even claiming to have found a ‘neurophysiological utility function’. Dennett closes the circuit by locating the existence of brain-hardware supporting satisficing intentional choice and action as the output of evolutionary ‘design’. The dichotomy is transcended: satisficing models (of which normative optimising rational choice models are a reasonable abstraction) are a good basis both for statistical prediction of the behaviour of large numbers, and as the first base on which to construct and refine a model of expectation-formation about particular types of agent and then of individual agents. Using both the old (‘external’) and the new (sub-individual) behaviourism as well as work on unpacking the abstract notion of rationality, we can concretise optimising rational choice both generally, for epistemic theory-building purposes, and specifically for understanding and deploying models of managerial agency. Such models will need to incorporate emotion with cognition in an integrated approach. (shrink)

The original edition of this book describes it as an attempt to develop a comprehensive understanding of traditional Judaism in conversation with contemporary ...

Die Frage nach der Verhaltnisbestimmung von Spiritualitat und Intellektualitat beruhrt eine sehr alte theologische Fragestellung, namlich die Bestimmung des Verhaltnisses von Glauben und Denken beziehungsweise von Glauben und Vernunft. Das jeweilige Zueinander von Spiritualitat und Intellektualitat kann nur dann als gelungen beurteilt werden, wenn es so geschieht, dass die Einheit beider gewahrt wird. Das Werk des katholischen Philosophen Richard Schaeffler kann als ein konsequenter Versuch interpretiert werden, die Einheit von Spiritualitat und Intellektualitat zu wahren. Die Arbeit geht diesem Versuch Richard (...) Schaefflers nach und gibt so eine erste Einfuhrung in das Werk des Philosophen.". (shrink)

Discussions of the nature or possibility of moral expertise have largely proceeded in atheoretical terms, with little attention paid to whether moral expertise depends on theoretical knowledge of morality. Here I argue that moral expertise is more theory-dependent than is commonly recognized: Moral expertise consists, at least in part, in knowledge of the correct or best moral theory, and second, that knowledge of moral theory is essential to moral experts dispensing expert counsel to non-experts. Moral experts would not be moral (...) experts absent knowledge of moral theory, nor could they play the testimonial role we would expect them to play in moral inquiry and deliberation absent such knowledge. (shrink)