Both bosons and fermions satisfy a strong version of Leibniz’s Principle of the Identity of Indiscernibles (PII), and so are ontologically on a par with respect to the PII. This holds for non-entangled, non-product states and for physically entangled states—as it has been established in previous work. In this paper, the Leibniz strategy is completed by including the (bosonic) symmetric product states. A new understanding of Pauli’s Exclusion Principle is provided, which distinguishes bosons from fermions in a peculiar ontological way. (...) Finally, the program as a whole is defended against substantial objections. (shrink)

This book provides a thorough and up-to-date introduction to the philosophy of quantum physics. Although quantum theory is renowned for its spectacular empirical successes, controversial discussion about how it should be understood continue to rage today. In this volume, the authors provide an overview of its numerous philosophical challenges: Do quantum objects violate the principle of causality? Are particles of the same type indistinguishable and therefore not individual entities? Do quantum objects retain their identity over time? How does a compound (...) quantum system relate to its parts? These questions are answered here within different interpretational approaches to quantum theory. Finally, moving to Quantum Field Theory, we find that the problem of non-locality is exacerbated. Philosophy of quantum physics is aimed at philosophers with an interest in physics, while also serving to familiarize physicists with many of the essential philosophical questions of their subject. (shrink)

The paper addresses the referring problem in quantum mechanics, by spelling out the alternatives with complete or individual concepts, with directly referential labels, and with intuition. The connection between the way of referring and some metaphysical theses about objects will be explained. Then, the paper intends to make plausible that the Kantian way is the best way for the quantum domain, including quantum field theories.

Games may seem like a waste of time, where we struggle under artificial rules for arbitrary goals. The author suggests that the rules and goals of games are not arbitrary at all. They are a way of specifying particular modes of agency. This is what make games a distinctive art form. Game designers designate goals and abilities for the player; they shape the agential skeleton which the player will inhabit during the game. Game designers work in the medium of agency. (...) Game-playing, then, illuminates a distinctive human capacity. We can take on ends temporarily for the sake of the experience of pursuing them. Game play shows that our agency is significantly more modular and more fluid than we might have thought. It also demonstrates our capacity to take on an inverted motivational structure. Sometimes we can take on an end for the sake of the activity of pursuing that end. (shrink)

At first glance, every metaphysics of laws can be combined with every ontology of time. In contrast, the paper intends to show that Humeanism requires eternalism and that Power metaphysics must presuppose an existentially dynamical view of temporal existence, i.e. growing block or presentism. The presented arguments turn out to be completely independent of whether the laws of nature are deterministic or probabilistic: the world is non-productive and static or productively dynamical, the future be ‘open’ or not.

There seems to be a deep tension between two aspects of aesthetic appreciation. On the one hand, we care about getting things right. On the other hand, we demand autonomy. We want appreciators to arrive at their aesthetic judgments through their own cognitive efforts, rather than deferring to experts. These two demands seem to be in tension; after all, if we want to get the right judgments, we should defer to the judgments of experts. The best explanation, I suggest, is (...) that aesthetic appreciation is something like a game. When we play a game, we try to win. But often, winning isn’t the point; playing is. Aesthetic appreciation involves the same flipped motivational structure: we aim at the goal of correctness, but having correct judgments isn’t the point. The point is the engaged process of interpreting, investigating, and exploring the aesthetic object. Deferring to aesthetic testimony, then, makes the same mistake as looking up the answer to a puzzle, rather than solving it for oneself. The shortcut defeats the whole point. This suggests a new account of aesthetic value: the engagement account. The primary value of the activity of aesthetic appreciation lies in the process of trying to generate correct judgments, and not in having correct judgments. -/- *There is an audio version available: look for the Soundcloud link, below.*. (shrink)

Kant’s ontology of appearances implies that the numerical distinctness of empirical objects is grounded in their appearance-aspect, more precisely in space as pure intuition, in which alone such objects can be given. With distinguishing concepts things can only be thought: in contrast to Leibniz’s complete concepts and to Kripke’s rigid designators, Kant’s general concepts do not entail their referents analytically. They must be applied to intuition, i. e. be completed synthetically. Consequently, Kant’s ontology of merely singular individuals is closely connected (...) with a genuine semantics of synthetic reference via intuition, expressed by irreducible demonstratives such as “this”, “here”, and “now”. Accordingly, the judgment “There can be indiscernibles” is synthetic-apriori, which distinguishes Kant’s view both from skeptical empiricism and from heavyweight ontological realism. (shrink)

I propose to study one problem for epistemic dependence on experts: how to locate experts on what I will call cognitive islands. Cognitive islands are those domains for knowledge in which expertise is required to evaluate other experts. They exist under two conditions: first, that there is no test for expertise available to the inexpert; and second, that the domain is not linked to another domain with such a test. Cognitive islands are the places where we have the fewest resources (...) for evaluating experts, which makes our expert dependences particularly risky. -/- Some have argued that cognitive islands lead to the complete unusability of expert testimony: that anybody who needs expert advice on a cognitive island will be entirely unable to find it. I argue against this radical form of pessimism, but propose a more moderate alternative. I demonstrate that we have some resources for finding experts on cognitive islands, but that cognitive islands leave us vulnerable to an epistemic trap which I will call runaway echo chambers. In a runaway echo chamber, our inexpertise may lead us to pick out bad experts, which will simply reinforce our mistaken beliefs and sensibilities. (shrink)

An adequate theory of rights ought to forbid the harming of animals to promote trivial interests of humans, as is often done in the animal-user industries. But what should the rights view say about situations in which harming some animals is necessary to prevent intolerable injustices to other animals? I develop an account of respectful treatment on which, under certain conditions, it’s justified to intentionally harm some individuals to prevent serious harm to others. This can be compatible with recognizing the (...) inherent value of the ones who are harmed. My theory has important implications for contemporary moral issues in nonhuman animal ethics, such as the development of cultured meat and animal research. (shrink)

Value capture occurs when an agent’s values are rich and subtle; they enter a social environment that presents simplified — typically quantified — versions of those values; and those simplified articulations come to dominate their practical reasoning. Examples include becoming motivated by FitBit’s step counts, Twitter Likes and Re-tweets, citation rates, ranked lists of best schools, and Grade Point Averages. We are vulnerable to value capture because of the competitive advantage that such crisp and clear expressions of value have in (...) our private reasoning and our public justification. There is, however, a price. In value capture, we take a central component of our autonomy — our ongoing deliberation over the exact articulation of our values — and we outsource it. And the metrics to which we outsource usually engineered for the interests of some external force, like a large-scale institution’s interest in cross-contextual comprehensibility and quick aggregability. That outsourcing cuts off one of the key benefits to personal deliberation. In value capture, we no longer adjust our values and their articulations in light of own rich experience of the world. Our values should often be carefully tailored to our particular selves or our small-scale communities, but in value capture, we buy our values off the rack. In some cases – like decreasing CO2 emissions – the costs of non-tailored values are outweighed by the benefit of precise collective coordination. In other cases, like in our aesthetic lives, they are not. This suggests that we should want different values suited to different scales. We should want value federalism. Some values are perhaps best pursued at the largest-scale level, others at smaller scales. The problem occurs when we exhibit an excess preference for the largest-scale values – when we consistently let the universal metrics swamp our quieter interests. (shrink)

We offer an account of the generic use of the term “porn”, as seen in recent usages such as “food porn” and “real estate porn”. We offer a definition adapted from earlier accounts of sexual pornography. On our account, a representation is used as generic porn when it is engaged with primarily for the sake of a gratifying reaction, freed from the usual costs and consequences of engaging with the represented content. We demonstrate the usefulness of the concept of generic (...) porn by using it to isolate a new type of such porn: moral outrage porn. Moral outrage porn is representations of moral outrage, engaged with primarily for the sake of the resulting gratification, freed from the usual costs and consequences of engaging with morally outrageous content. Moral outrage porn is dangerous because it encourages the instrumentalization of one’s empirical and moral beliefs, manipulating their content for the sake of gratification. Finally, we suggest that when using porn is wrong, it is often wrong because it instrumentalizes what ought not to be instrumentalized. (shrink)

Dieses Buch liefert dem Leser eine aktuelle und fundierte Einführung in die Philosophie der Quantenphysik. Obwohl sich die Quantentheorie durch spektakuläre empirische Erfolge auszeichnet, wird bis heute kontrovers diskutiert, wie sie zu verstehen ist. In diesem Werk geben die Autoren einen Überblick über die zahlreichen philosophischen Herausforderungen: Verletzen Quantenobjekte das Prinzip der Kausalität? Sind gleichartige Teilchen ununterscheidbar und daher keine Individuen? Behalten Quantenobjekte in der zeitlichen Entwicklung ihre Identität? Wie verhält sich ein zusammengesetztes Quantensystem zu seinen Teilen? Diese Fragen werden (...) im Rahmen verschiedener Deutungsansätze der Quantentheorie diskutiert. Ein Ausblick in die Quantenfeldtheorie verschärft das Hauptproblem der Nichtlokalität. Philosophie der Quantenphysik richtet sich an Philosophen mit Interesse für Physik, macht Physiker mit den philosophischen Fragen ihres Faches vertraut und liefert Anregungen für den gymnasialen Physik-Unterricht. Das Buch schließt damit eine Lücke zwischen populären Einführungen und spezialisierten Monografien zur Philosophie der Quantenphysik. In der vorliegenden zweiten Auflage wurde das Kapitel zu Verschränkung und Nicht-Lokalität deutlich erweitert und jedes Kapitel mit Übungsaufgaben und Musterlösungen ergänzt. (shrink)

Kant rejects Leibniz’s Principle of the Identity of Indiscernibles. In quantum mechanics, Leibniz’s principle is also apparently violated. However, both ways of rejecting the PII differ significantly. In particular, Kant denies that spatiotemporal objects are unique individuals and establishes appearances as merely singular ones. The distinction between ‘unique’ and ‘singular’ individuals is crucial for the role that intuition plays in cognition: it will be shown that Kant’s way of rejecting the PII goes against the standard versions of conceptualism and non-conceptualism (...) which, in turn, points out the relevance of this issue for the understanding of transcendental idealism. Finally, the systematic relevance will be checked by defending a Kantian interpretation of quantum individuality. (shrink)

Recent conversation has blurred two very different social epistemic phenomena: echo chambers and epistemic bubbles. Members of epistemic bubbles merely lack exposure to relevant information and arguments. Members of echo chambers, on the other hand, have been brought to systematically distrust all outside sources. In epistemic bubbles, other voices are not heard; in echo chambers, other voices are actively undermined. It is crucial to keep these phenomena distinct. First, echo chambers can explain the post-truth phenomena in a way that epistemic (...) bubbles cannot. Second, each type of structure requires a distinct intervention. Mere exposure to evidence can shatter an epistemic bubble, but may actually reinforce an echo chamber. Finally, echo chambers are much harder to escape. Once in their grip, an agent may act with epistemic virtue, but social context will pervert those actions. Escape from an echo chamber may require a radical rebooting of one's belief system. (shrink)

In The Case for Animal Rights, Tom Regan argues that although all subjects-of-a-life have equal inherent value, there are often differences in the value of lives. According to Regan, lives that have the highest value are lives which have more possible sources of satisfaction. Regan claims that the highest source of satisfaction, which is available to only rational beings, is the satisfaction associated with thinking impartially about moral choices. Since rational beings can bring impartial reasons to bear on decision making, (...) Regan maintains that they have an additional possible source of satisfaction that nonrational beings do not have and, consequently, the lives of rational beings turn out to have greater value.. (shrink)

What is a game? What are we doing when we play a game? What is the value of playing games? Several different philosophical subdisciplines have attempted to answer these questions using very distinctive frameworks. Some have approached games as something like a text, deploying theoretical frameworks from the study of narrative, fiction, and rhetoric to interrogate games for their representational content. Others have approached games as artworks and asked questions about the authorship of games, about the ontology of the work (...) and its performance. Yet others, from the philosophy of sport, have focused on normative issues of fairness, rule application, and competition. The primary purpose of this article is to provide an overview of several different philosophical approaches to games and, hopefully, demonstrate the relevance and value of the different approaches to each other. Early academic attempts to cope with games tried to treat games as a subtype of narrative and to interpret games exactly as one might interpret a static, linear narrative. A faction of game studies, self-described as “ludologists,” argued that games were a substantially novel form and could not be treated with traditional tools for narrative analysis. In traditional narrative, an audience is told and interprets the story, where in a game, the player enacts and creates the story. Since that early debate, theorists have attempted to offer more nuanced accounts of how games might achieve similar ends to more traditional texts. For example, games might be seen as a novel type of fiction, which uses interactive techniques to achieve immersion in a fictional world. Alternately, games might be seen as a new way to represent causal systems, and so a new way to criticize social and political entities. Work from contemporary analytic philosophy of art has, on the other hand, asked questions whether games could be artworks and, if so, what kind. Much of this debate has concerned the precise nature of the artwork, and the relationship between the artist and the audience. Some have claimed that the audience is a cocreator of the artwork, and so games are a uniquely unfinished and cooperative art form. Others have claimed that, instead, the audience does not help create the artwork; rather, interacting with the artwork is how an audience member appreciates the artist's finished production. Other streams of work have focused less on the game as a text or work, and more on game play as a kind of activity. One common view is that game play occurs in a “magic circle.” Inside the magic circle, players take on new roles, follow different rules, and actions have different meanings. Actions inside the magic circle do not have their usual consequences for the rest of life. Enemies of the magic circle view have claimed that the view ignores the deep integration of game life from ordinary life and point to gambling, gold farming, and the status effects of sports. Philosophers of sport, on the other hand, have approached games with an entirely different framework. This has lead into investigations about the normative nature of games—what guides the applications of rules and how those rules might be applied, interpreted, or even changed. Furthermore, they have investigated games as social practices and as forms of life. (shrink)

Анотація. У статті проаналізовані досягнення Соціального Вчительства Католицької Церкви, репрезентовані працями Лева ХІІІ, Пія ХІ, Пія ХІІ, Івана Павла ІІ, що розкривають змістовні характеристики поняття «принцип субсидіарності», його роль і значення в системі християнських цінностей. Принцип субсидіарності робить можливими такі взаємовідносини в соціальному житті, коли спільнота вищого порядку не втручається у внутрішнє життя спільноти нижчого порядку, перебираючи на себе належні тій функції; заради спільного добра, спільного блага вона надає їй у разі потреби підтримку й допомогу, узгоджуючи у такий спосіб її (...) взаємодію з іншими соціальними структурами. Принцип субсидіарності скеровує соціальну практику на утвердження спільного блага в людському співтоваристві. Поширення і застосування принципу субсидіарності протистоїть небезпеці «одержавлення» суспільства та найзагрозливіших проявів колективізму, обмежує абсолютизацію влади, бюрократизацію державних і соціокультурних структур, стає одним із гарантів дотримання прав і свобод громадян своєї країни. (shrink)

In her BBC Reith Lectures on Trust, Onora O’Neill offers a short, but biting, criticism of transparency. People think that trust and transparency go together but in reality, says O'Neill, they are deeply opposed. Transparency forces people to conceal their actual reasons for action and invent different ones for public consumption. Transparency forces deception. I work out the details of her argument and worsen her conclusion. I focus on public transparency – that is, transparency to the public over expert domains. (...) I offer two versions of the criticism. First, the epistemic intrusion argument: The drive to transparency forces experts to explain their reasoning to non-experts. But expert reasons are, by their nature, often inaccessible to non-experts. So the demand for transparency can pressure experts to act only in those ways for which they can offer public justification. Second, the intimate reasons argument: In many cases of practical deliberation, the relevant reasons are intimate to a community and not easily explicable to those who lack a particular shared background. The demand for transparency, then, pressures community members to abandon the special understanding and sensitivity that arises from their particular experiences. Transparency, it turns out, is a form of surveillance. By forcing reasoning into the explicit and public sphere, transparency roots out corruption — but it also inhibits the full application of expert skill, sensitivity, and subtle shared understandings. The difficulty here arises from the basic fact that human knowledge vastly outstrips any individual’s capacities. We all depend on experts, which makes us vulnerable to their biases and corruption. But if we try to wholly secure our trust — if we leash groups of experts to pursuing only the goals and taking only the actions that can be justified to the non-expert public — then we will undermine their expertise. We need both trust and transparency, but they are in essential tension. This is a deep practical dilemma; it admits of no neat resolution, but only painful compromise. (shrink)

The physical possibility of spacetimes containing closed timelike curves (CTCs) challenges the philosophy of time in the way that temporal ordering is, at best, remarkably non-standard: events on CTCs precede themselves. Apparently, such universes do not possess a consistent time order but only a consistent time direction. Thus, temporal directionality seems to be more fundamental than ordering in earlier-later or past-present-future. I will argue that this favors presentism as the adequate ontology of spacetimes: only presentism consistently copes with the idea (...) that temporal ordering depends on empirical constraints. The presentist Now is fundamentally undivided and productively directed towards existence. Time order arises by extending the Now, which can fail and in fact fails in universes containing CTCs. (shrink)

According to Kant, concepts can be used in three different ways, i.e. an empirical (= pre-philosophical) use, a transcendentally real (= philosophically inadequate) use, and a transcendentally ideal (= philosophically reasonable) use. Regarding the concept of the world as a whole, however, Kant misrepresents the empirical meaning and therefore overlooks the transcendentally ideal understanding of “everything”. Along this guiding line, the paper defends Kant’s program of showing that spatiotemporal objects are conditioned by subjective, non-empirical conditions against the charge that it (...) is inconsistent with Kant’s alleged solution of the antinomies. It turns out that Kant’s program is consistent both with ontological realism about the world and with empirical realism about, e.g., the Big Bang. The remaining problem is how to formalize in modal logic unrestricted quantification in its transcendentally ideal usage. (shrink)

The paper spells out the thesis that the crucial, substantial move of presentism should be to temporalize modality. The present is not simply actual, and the future not simply possible, but the present is becoming actual, and the present’s becoming actual is future’s becoming possible (and past’s becoming necessary). I will argue that by so temporalizing modality, as modes of becoming rather than of being, the presentists can make room for the future (and the past), can answer the triviality-objection raised (...) against them, and can provide a specific account of presentist change. (shrink)

According to most accounts of trust, you can only trust other people (or groups of people). To trust is to think that another has goodwill, or something to that effect. I sketch a different form of trust: the unquestioning attitude. What it is to trust, in this sense, is to settle one’s mind about something, to stop questioning it. To trust is to rely on a resource while suspending deliberation over its reliability. Trust lowers the barrier of monitoring, challenging, checking, (...) and questioning. Trust sets up open pipelines between yourself and parts of the external world. Trust permits external resources to have a similar relationship to one as one’s internal cognitive faculties. This creates efficiency, but at the price of exquisite vulnerability. We must trust in this way because we are cognitively limited beings in a cognitively overwhelming world. Crucially, we can hold the unquestioning attitude towards objects and technologies. When I trust my climbing rope, I stop worrying about its reliability. When I trust my online calendaring system, I simply go to the events indicated, without question. But, one might worry, how could one ever hold such a normatively loaded attitude as trust towards mere objects? How could it ever make sense to feel betrayed by an object? Trust is our engine for expanding and outsourcing our agency — for binding external processes into our practical selves. Thus, we can be betrayed by our smartphones in the same way that we can be betrayed by our memory. When we trust, we try to make something a part of our agency, and we are betrayed when our part lets us down. To unquestioningly trust something is to let it in—to attempt to bring it inside one’s practical functioning. This suggests a new form of gullibility: agential gullibility, which occurs when agents too hastily and carelessly integrate external resources into their own agency. (shrink)

Recent discussions in the just war literature suggest that soldiers have a duty to assume certain risks in order to protect the lives of all innocent civilians. I challenge this principle of risk by arguing that it is justified neither as a principle that guides the conduct of combat soldiers, nor as a principle that guides commanders in the US military. I demonstrate that the principle of risk fails on the first account because it requires soldiers both to violate their (...) strict duty of obedience and loyalty and to exceed their special obligations to protect their fellow comrades, the state, the state's constituents and other protected civilians. I then illustrate that the principle of risk fails on the second account since it conflicts with the commander's primary obligation to protect and promote the welfare and lives of his or her soldiers. I conclude by arguing that we cannot reasonably expect soldiers and commanders to adhere to the principle of risk until there is a radical, institutional-level transformation of militaristic goals, values, strategies, policies, warrior codes and expectations of service members in the US Armed Forces. (shrink)

Zwei Körper, die exakte Spiegelbilder voneinander sind, nennt Kant „inkongruente Gegenstücke”. Als Beispiel für solche Figuren, die strecken- und winkelgleich, aber nicht kongruent sind, mithin durch Translation und Drehung nicht zur Deckung gebracht werden können, gelten die rechte und die linke Hand eines Menschen. Obwohl diese beiden Objekte in den Relationen ihrer Teile und in der Größe ihrer Ausdehnung völlig gleich sind, sind sie dennoch nicht bloß hinsichtlich Ort und Lage verschieden. Beruht ihre Verschiedenheit auf einem inneren Grund oder auf (...) einem äußeren? Machen verschiedene intrinsische oder verschiedene extrinsische Eigenschaften sie verschieden? Nach der relationalen Raumauffassung, wie sie Leibniz vertritt, müßte die Verschiedenheit inkongruenter Objekte auf verschiedenen extrinsischen Eigenschaften beruhen. Im Gegensatz dazu vertritt Kant die Auffassung, der Unterschied solcher Objekte habe einen inneren Grund. Damit spreche das Phänomen inkongruenter Gegenstücke gegen die Leibnizsche Raumkonzeption. Andererseits aber sprechen gewichtige Gründe gegen die absolute Raumauffassung Newtons. Es bedürfe folglich, so Kant, einer neuartigen Konzeption des Raumes. Als eine solche kann die in der Kritik der reinen Vernunft entwickelte Auffassung gelten, die sich von den beiden vorgefundenen darin unterscheidet, daß der Raum ursprünglich subjektiv statt ursprünglich objektiv ist. (shrink)

Монографія "Функціональність релігії: український контекст".

Under the eternalist hypothesis that objects or events exist independently of being present two different views of persistence are on the market: Persisting objects endure if they are multiply located in time, and persisting objects perdure if they are singly located by having numerically different temporal parts. Recently, several authors have argued that special relativity favours perdurantism over its endurantist rival. In my talk, I want to show that in fact the purported arguments are only those against endurantism, and that (...) with similar ones we should argue against perdurantism, as well: Enduring and perduring entities are both in conflict with SR which undermines the eternalist hypothesis. For arguing in favour of perdurantism Yuri Balashov, on the one hand, considers spatially unextended objects in Minkowski space-time and claims that for the endurantists there are unwelcome consequences from an adequate concept of their coexistence. On the other hand, spacelike extended objects are under investigation. Concerning point-like objects, Cody Gilmore has convincingly shown that Balashov’s arguments fail and, therefore, I will confine me to extended object. My paper has two parts following the two different strategies – namely, concerning the problem of the endurantist “explanatory deficiency” according to Balashov, and the problem of criss-crossing hyperplanes according to Gilmore. (shrink)

Twitter makes conversation into something like a game. It scores our communication, giving us vivid and quantified feedback, via Likes, Retweets, and Follower counts. But this gamification doesn’t just increase our motivation to communicate; it changes the very nature of the activity. Games are more satisfying than ordinary life precisely because game-goals are simpler, cleaner, and easier to apply. Twitter is thrilling precisely because its goals have been artificially clarified and narrowed. When we buy into Twitter’s gamification, then our values (...) shift from the complex and pluralistic values of communication, to the narrower quest for popularity and virality. Twitter’s gamification bears some resemblance with the phenomena of echo chambers and moral outrage porn. In all these phenomena, we are instrumentalizing our ends for hedonistic reasons. We have shifted our aims in an activity, not because the new aims are more valuable, but in exchange for extra pleasure. (shrink)

Using meta-metaphysical instruments, the paper analyzes the dispute between ‘reductionist’ Humean categoricalism and ‘bold’ Anti-Humean dispositionalism. It is argued that both views are non-Quinean, hence, heavyweight ontological realisms: careful analysis of specific scientific theories alone is not sufficient. Further, sophisticated philosophical reasoning is needed to defend Anti-Humeanism as well as Humeanism. The paper finally suggests that most if not all ontological disputes are unavoidably “speculative” due to essentialism which cannot be read off contemporary physical theories.

Dividing, Separating and Unifying. EPR Without Holism. In the standard interpretation of quantum mechanics parts of composed systems are correlated in a non-causal way, they are ontologically dependent on each other. In this paper I try to defend traditional realism giving a non-holistic interpretation of the EPR-paradox. An analysis of events in the macroscopic world shows that dividing and unifying objects is quite dif-ferent from changing (modifying) objects. In application to quantum mechanics I argue that a measurement at a given (...) single-system changes (modifies) this object, but the EPR-measurement divides the given object. Therefore this given object is an undivided and dividable One and not a composed system. If parts are produced (by EPR-measurement) correlations do not occur. (shrink)

This classic and controversial book examines the roots of the idea of virtue, diagnoses the reasons for its absence in modern life, and proposes a path for its recovery.

Die folgende Chronologie legt den Fokus auf die Grundlagen und Deutungen der Quantenphysik, sie ist keine Geschichte der Quantenphysik im Ganzen, insbesondere finden die speziellen Entwicklungen der Quantenfeldtheorie und der sich daraus entwickelnden Teilchenphysik keine Berücksichtigung.

Dieses Buch liefert dem Leser eine aktuelle und fundierte Einführung in die Philosophie der Quantenphysik. Obwohl sich die Quantentheorie durch spektakuläre empirische Erfolge auszeichnet, wird bis heute kontrovers diskutiert, wie sie zu verstehen ist. In diesem Werk geben die Autoren einen Überblick über die zahlreichen philosophischen Herausforderungen: Verletzen Quantenobjekte das Prinzip der Kausalität? Sind gleichartige Teilchen ununterscheidbar und daher keine Individuen? Behalten Quantenobjekte in der zeitlichen Entwicklung ihre Identität? Wie verhält sich ein zusammengesetztes Quantensystem zu seinen Teilen? Diese Fragen werden (...) im Rahmen verschiedener Deutungsansätze der Quantentheorie diskutiert. Ein Ausblick in die Quantenfeldtheorie verschärft das Hauptproblem der Nichtlokalität. Philosophie der Quantenphysik richtet sich an Philosophiestudierende mit Interesse für Physik, macht Physikerinnen und Physiker mit den philosophischen Fragen ihres Faches vertraut und liefert Lehramtsstudierenden und Lehrern Anregungen für den gymnasialen Physik-Unterricht. Das Buch schließt damit eine Lücke zwischen populären Einführungen und spezialisierten Monografien zur Philosophie der Quantenphysik im deutschsprachigen Lehrbuchmarkt. In der vorliegenden zweiten Auflage wurde das Kapitel zu Verschränkung und Nicht-Lokalität deutlich erweitert und jedes Kapitel mit Übungsaufgaben und Musterlösungen ergänzt. cord friebezurzeit="" vertretung="" der="" professur="" für="" analytische="" philosophie="" an="" universität="" des="" saarlandes.p. (shrink)

Psychoanalysis is concerned with neurotic behaviour that counts as an action if one takes into account “repressed” mental states. Freud's paradigmatic examples are a challenge for philosophical theories of action explanation. The main problem is that such symptomatic behaviour is, in a characteristic way, irrational. In line with standard interpretations, I will recap that psychoanalytic action explanation is not in accordance with Davidson's classical reason-explanation model, and I will recall that Freud's unconsciousness is not a second mind with its own (...) rationality but that it is non-propositional in character. However, I then will argue that this characterization is not discriminating enough to explain the dynamical unconscious and overlooks the crucial role of “counter-cathexis”. With counter-cathexis the relevant desire turns out to be a complex with two inseparable aspects , so that the causing belief–desire pair is still part of the space of reasons, although it cannot ratio.. (shrink)

Gegen die Zwei-Aspekte-Interpretation von Kants Unterscheidung zwischen Erscheinung und Ding an sich ist ein Einwand vorgebracht worden, wonach sich die Begriffe „Erscheinung“ und „Ding an sich“ nicht auf ein und denselben Gegenstand beziehen könnten, da sich nicht angeben lasse, was in beiden Perspektiven gemeinsam sei. Gegen diesen Einwand wird dafür argumentiert, dass die entsprechenden Begriffe sich gar nicht auf Gegenstände beziehen, sondern direkt auf Betrachtungsweisen und indirekt auf Aspekte von Gegenständen. Aus dem Gegenargument ergeben sich eine neue Lesart derjenigen Textstellen (...) bei Kant, die scheinbar für die Zwei-Welten-Interpretation sprechen, und – andeutungsweise – eine Aktualisierung von Kants Unterscheidung im Lichte der speziellen Relativitätstheorie. (shrink)

The problem of the motion of empirical objects, as it appears from Newton through Leibniz, Huygens and Mach down to Einstein, acquires a special twist in Special Relativity : the shape of object’s surfaces appears to vary depending only on their relative state of motion . Through comparison of SRT with the Lorentz/Poincaré-Theory the following claim is expounded and justified: According to SRT and in opposition to LPT contraction of moving objects does not consist in the change of properties in (...) the same object: instead of a modification of an object caused by another object there is a relativisation of the absolute proper shape "caused" by time. (shrink)

Im vierdimensionalen Raum-Zeit-Kontinuum der Speziellen Relativitätstheorie (SRT) gibt es (flache) dreidimensionale geometrische Objekte, sogenannte Hyperebenen, die für die Theorie von zentraler Bedeutung sind. Jede solche Hyperebene kann zum einen als raumartig charakterisiert werden und zum anderen als Gleichzeitigkeitsebene. Dasselbe geometrische Objekt ist also je nach Betrachtungsweise raumartig oder räumlich. Während der Ausdruck „raumartige Hyperebene“ ein lorentzinvariantes, absolutes Objekt bezeichnet, ist mit „Gleichzeitigkeitsebene“ etwas Beobachterabhängiges benannt. Daher läßt sich sagen: Dasselbe, das in seiner Beobachterabhängigkeit als räumlich charakterisiert ist, ist in seiner (...) Beobachterunabhängigkeit betrachtet raumartig. Ganz ähnlich argumentiert auch Kant bezüglich empirischer Objekte: Dasselbe ist auf zwei verschiedene Weisen betrachtbar – nämlich zum einen „als Erscheinung“ und zum anderen „an sich selbst“. Es als Erscheinung zu betrachten, bedeutet, es in seiner Subjektabhängigkeit zu erfassen, es an sich selbst zu betrachten, heißt, in ihm auch Subjektunabhängiges zu erblicken. Daß dies keine bloße Analogie ist, soll im ersten Teil gezeigt werden. Hier wie dort geht es letztlich um denselben Zweck – nämlich um die Charakterisierung empirischer Objekte als wirklicher: Ein wirkliches Objekt ist nach Kant subjektabhängig, aber nicht subjektiv. Weil subjektabhängig, ist es als Erscheinung betrachtbar; aber weil nicht subjektiv, auch immer an sich selbst. In der SRT wiederum ist ein empirisches Objekt in seiner Wirklichkeit nur dann voll erfaßt, wenn man es sowohl als räumliches wie als raumartiges betrachtet. Als bloß räumliches wäre es nämlich für verschieden bewegte Beobachter nicht zugleich gegenwärtig und nicht in allen seinen Teilen gleichzeitig; als bloß raumartiges hingegen wäre es noch gar nicht inhaltlich, sondern bloß formal bestimmt. Die SRT gibt mithin dem kantischen „an sich selbst“ einen neuen Namen („Raumartigkeit“), was man als eine Konkretisierung ansehen kann. (shrink)

The debate over Kant’s transcendental idealism focuses on two variants of the two-aspect view: an »ontological« reading challenges the Prauss /Allison interpretation, by arguing that Kant is ontologically committed to the existence of things as they are in themselves. With this paper the original view strikes back: it will be shown that its characterization as being merely »methodological« is a misunderstanding. The original view rather implies an ontology, according to which the appearance aspect is fundamentally more basic than the in-itself (...) aspect. This renews the sense in which Kant’s philosophy is as well a critical metaphysics as a transcendental idealism. (shrink)