Few would contest the fact that analytical philosophy has dominated philosophical practice in the English speaking world for about the last century. But dispute continues about both its origins and nature; whilst others question its value. Michael Dummett wholly embraced the analytical approach to philosophy, as he conceived of it. For him analytical philosophy marked itself off from its precursors and its alternatives, embodied in the Continental tradition, by taking the linguistic turn. And Frege was unequivocally the first philosopher to (...) take that auspicious turn, which ushered in a new method in philosophy. Henceforth philosophers were to approach the business of analyzing thought via the enterprise of analyzing language. So Dummett is presenting us with both a history lesson and a recommendation about how we ought to do philosophy. But is his reading of the history accurate? And is his conception of the nature of analytical philosophy viable? In order to reflect on these questions this collection brings together eight scholars who have made a serious business of reading Dummett. (shrink)

In the debate on peace ethics in Germany, it is constantly argued that the ‘doctrine of just war’ must be replaced by a ‘doctrine of just peace’. The criteriology of just war can at best be preserved within a doctrine of just peace. However, it is often overlooked that—although the word ‘peace’ may sound nicer than ‘war’—a doctrine of just peace is also fraught with great difficulties in terms of content. The concept of peace can be interpreted in different ways; (...) the concept of justice must even be differentiated if it is to have meaning at all. Ultimately, the two concepts point to a different understanding of tradition and historicity: while the doctrine of just war takes its criteria from the tradition, the idea of just peace attempts to draw conclusions for the present from drafts or blueprints of the future. However, since the drafts can turn out differently, new conflicts will arise precisely for this reason. Talk of ‘just peace’ might be more pleasing to the public, but does not necessarily have to be more restrictive in terms of violence. (shrink)

Responsive ethics stands out against every sort of communicative ethics merely orientated towards common aims, general norms, and utility calculation. It is based on a clear contrast between being responsible for what one has done and responding to the Other′s appeal and claim. The logic of response includes aspects like temporal delay, inevitability, gifts and freedom arising from elsewhere. Both – being responsible for and responding to – meet through the Third Party which intervenes in terms of habits and rules, (...) yet without being able to cover the extra-ordinary demands of the Other. Responsive ethics defends the unsocial within sociality. (shrink)

The target article proposes a model involving the important but not well-investigated topics of curiosity and creativity. The model, however, falls short of providing convincing explanations of the basic mechanisms underlying these phenomena. We outline the importance of mechanistic thinking in dealing with the concepts outlined in this article specifically and within psychology and cognitive neuroscience in general.

The issue of how basic sensory and temporal processing are related is still unresolved. We studied temporal processing, as assessed by simple visual reaction times (RT) and double-pulse resolution (DPR), in patients with partial vision loss after visual pathway lesions and investigated whether vision restoration training (VRT), a training program designed to improve light detection performance, would also affect temporal processing. Perimetric and campimetric visual field tests as well as maps of DPR thresholds and RT were acquired before and after (...) a 3 months training period with VRT. Patient performance was compared to that of age-matched healthy subjects. Intact visual field size increased during training. Averaged across the entire visual field, DPR remained constant while RT improved slightly. However, in transition zones between the blind and intact areas (areas of residual vision) where patients had shown between 20 and 80% of stimulus detection probability in pre-training visual field tests, both DPR and RT improved markedly. The magnitude of improvement depended on the defect depth (or degree of intactness) of the respective region at baseline. Inter-individual training outcome variability was very high, with some patients showing little change and others showing performance approaching that of healthy controls. Training-induced improvement of light detection in patients with visual field loss thus generalized to dynamic visual functions. The findings suggest that similar neural mechanisms may underlie the impairment and subsequent training-induced functional recovery of both light detection and temporal processing. (shrink)