New concepts may prove necessary to profit from the avalanche of sequence data on the genome, transcriptome, proteome and interactome and to relate this information to cell physiology. Here, we focus on the concept of large activity-based structures, or hyperstructures, in which a variety of types of molecules are brought together to perform a function. We review the evidence for the existence of hyperstructures responsible for the initiation of DNA replication, the sequestration of newly replicated origins of replication, cell division (...) and for metabolism. The processes responsible for hyperstructure formation include changes in enzyme affinities due to metabolite-induction, lipid-protein affinities, elevated local concentrations of proteins and their binding sites on DNA and RNA, and transertion. Experimental techniques exist that can be used to study hyperstructures and we review some of the ones less familiar to biologists. Finally, we speculate on how a variety of in silico approaches involving cellular automata and multi-agent systems could be combined to develop new concepts in the form of an Integrated cell (I-cell) which would undergo selection for growth and survival in a world of artificial microbiology. (shrink)

While the control of cell migration by biochemical and biophysical factors is largely documented, a precise quantification of cell migration parameters in different experimental contexts is still questionable. Indeed, these phenomenological parameters can be evaluated from data obtained either at the cell population level or at the individual cell level. However, the range within which both characterizations of cell migration are equivalent remains unclear. We analyse here to which extent both sources of data could be integrated within a unified description (...) of cell migration by considering the motility of the endothelial cell line EAhy926. Using time-lapse video-microscopy and associated analysis of digital image time series, we quantified EAhy926 random motility coefficient, migration speed and trajectory persistence time in two different migration assays: the in vitro wound healing assay, and the cell-populated agarose drop assay. In order to analyse the agreement between independent quantifications of cell motility based either on individual cell analysis or cell population dynamic analysis, a theoretical multi-agents cellular model was developed and discussed as a possible theoretical framework able to unify these multi-scale data. Model simulations especially reveal the potential bias induced by cell proliferation and cell-cell adhesion when cell migration parameters are estimated from the extensively used in vitro wound healing assay. (shrink)

The first aim of simulation in virtual environment is to help biologists to have a better understanding of the simulated system. The cost of such simulation is significantly reduced compared to that of in vivo simulation. However, the inherent complexity of biological system makes it hard to simulate these systems on non-parallel architectures: models might be made of sub-models and take several scales into account; the number of simulated entities may be quite large. Today, graphics cards are used for general (...) purpose computing which has been made easier thanks to frameworks like CUDA or OpenCL. Parallelization of models may however not be easy: parallel computer programing skills are often required; several hardware architectures may be used to execute models. In this paper, we present the software architecture we built in order to implement various models able to simulate multi-cellular system. This architecture is modular and it implements data structures adapted for graphics processing units architectures. It allows efficient simulation of biological mechanisms. (shrink)

Simulation of complex biological systems with agent-based models is becoming more relevant with the increase in Graphics Processing Unit power. In those simulations, up to millions of virtual cells are individually computed, involving daunting processing times. An important part of computational models is the algorithm that manages how agents perceive their surroundings. This can be particularly problematic in three-dimensional environments where agents have deformable virtual membranes. This article presents a GPU algorithm that gives the possibility for agents to integrate the (...) signals scattered on their virtual membrane. It is detailed to be coded in languages like OpenCL or Cuda. Its performances are tested to show its speed with current GPU devices. Finally, it was implemented inside an existing software to test and illustrate the possibilities it offers. (shrink)

How might good work – skilled, autonomous work which affords workers opportunities for meaningful social cooperation in decent conditions – be made available to all? I evaluate five commonly advanced strategies: an unregulated labor market, egalitarian redistribution of resources, state regulation, collective bargaining, and workplace democracy. Each, I argue, has significant limitations. An unregulated labor market ignores workers' unduly weak bargaining power vis-à-vis employers. Egalitarian redistribution alone fails to solve this problem due to distinctive and endemic imperfections of labor markets. (...) Direct state regulation is insufficiently context-sensitive and insufficiently dynamic in the face of technological and other developments. Collective bargaining gives workers only indirect and sometimes costly influence over their working conditions. And workplace democracy leaves workers vulnerable to collective action problems induced by competition between firms. I argue, however, that these strategies can be complemented in a promising way by ‘syndicalist economic democracy’: direct worker participation in the government of the economy, largely specific to particular occupations or economic sectors but above the level of the individual workplace. (shrink)

The ecology of fear has become a common rhetoric in efforts to support climate mitigation. The thesis of the collapse is an extreme version, asserting the inevitable collapse of the world. Fear, then, becomes the ultimate emotion for spurring action. In this article, drawing on the work of the pragmatist John Dewey, we show that fear is an ambiguous emotion. Dewey stressed the quality of an emotion. Following his reasoning, this article draws a distinction between intense and moderate fear. Intense (...) fear annihilates action, while moderate fear fulfils the conditions for an emotion of quality (in the Deweyan sense), which enables action. For this reason, the thesis of the collapse must be rejected, while an ecology of fear, drawing on moderate fear, may be maintained. (shrink)

Fair Trade has changed considerably since its early days. In this article, we argue that these changes have led to a depersonalization of ethics, thus raising serious questions about the future of Fair Trade. In particular, the depersonalization of ethics which is seen to accompany the current changes has led to greater variety in the interpretations of Fair Trade. Hiding these divergences behind the labels is increasing the risk that the movement will lose its credibility.

Thick terms and concepts, such as honesty and cruelty, are at the heart of a variety of debates in philosophy of language and metaethics. Central to these debates is the question of how the descriptive and evaluative components of thick concepts are related and whether they can be separated from each other. So far, no empirical data on how thick terms are used in ordinary language has been collected to inform these debates. In this paper, we present the first empirical (...) study, designed to investigate whether the evaluative component of thick concepts is communicated as part of the semantic meaning or by means of conversational implicatures. While neither the semantic nor the pragmatic view can fully account for the use of thick terms in ordinary language, our results do favour the semanticist interpretation: the evaluation of a thick concept is only slightly easier to cancel than semantically entailed content. We further discovered a polarity effect, demonstrating that how easily an evaluation can be cancelled depends on whether the thick term is of positive or negative polarity. (shrink)

How evaluative are legal texts? Do legal scholars and jurists speak a more descriptive or perhaps a more evaluative language? In this paper, we present the results of a corpus study in which we examined the use of evaluative language in both the legal domain as well as public discourse. For this purpose, we created two corpora. Our legal professional corpus is based on court opinions from the U.S. Courts of Appeals. We compared this professional corpus to a public corpus, (...) which is based on blog discussions on the internet forum Reddit. While many linguistic phenomena can give insights into evaluativity, we investigated the use of a wide selection of evaluative adjectives (more specifically, thick adjectives) to gain a more comprehensive picture of the degree of evaluativity in the legal domain. Our analysis shows that legal professionals use thick terms less evaluatively than laypeople, which suggests that legal texts are less evaluative than ordinary discussions. This result, more generally, supports the philosophical idea that thick concepts may vary in their evaluative intensity. (shrink)

Environmental ethics and environmental justice have followed widely disparate paths, and this disassociation has resulted in an analytical schism. On the one side, environmental ethics embraces humankind’s relations with nature; on the opposite side, environmental justice embraces human-to-human relations via the medium of nature. Hans Jonas’ work is a bridge that crosses this conceptual divide: he spotlights the narrow correlation between human identity and responsibility, and insists on their inextricable bond with nature. However, this bond is a de facto bond (...) that all human beings have with each other. (shrink)

Une relecture de ce philosophe anglais (1676-1729), à la lumière de ce que disaient de et contre lui ses adversaires théologiens (Clarke, Berkeley), et surtout, de ce qu'il disait de lui-même. Pour ce libre-penseur, le concept de Dieu est vide de sens ou contradictoire, le dualisme créationniste une hypothèse intenable, et le christianisme un simple produit du besoin anthropologique de croire.

Le sceptique nous demande " Comment sais-tu que tu as deux mains? Peut-être rêves-tu, ou es-tu trompé par quelque Malin Génie? Peut-on même définir ce que c'est que la connaissance? Va savoir! " Lui rétorquer, comme le faisaient G.E. Moore et la tradition de la philosophie du sens commun : " Mais je sais bien que j'ai deux mains! " semble à la fois une pétition de principe et une bien mauvaise réponse. Le mieux, depuis que nous avons perdu le (...) souci de fonder nos croyance sur des raisons ultimes, serait, tout simplement, de ne pas se soucier des questions du sceptique. Ce que l'on sait dépend, nous dit-on, des circonstances, et toutes nos connaissances sont faillibles. N'y a-t-il pas plutôt des savoirs, dont l'histoire nous montre combien leurs modes de validations sont variés? Ce livre entend refuser ce type de réponse contextualiste et relativiste. Il propose de revenir à la réponse de sens commun de Moore, à partir des reformulations contemporaines des raisonnements sceptiques issues de la philosophie analytique de la connaissance. Personne ne peut nous envoyer savoir quelque chose que nous ne pourrions pas savoir. De fait, nous savons, mais notre savoir n'est pas transparent : nous n'avons pas besoin de savoir que nous savons. Pour parvenir à cette réponse, il faut replacer la notion de connaissance, plutôt que celle de croyance justifiée ou rationnelle, au centre de l'épistémologie, et reformuler des questions traditionnelles comme celles de la nature de la perception, du témoignage, et de la connaissance a priori. On peut aussi reprendre le vieux projet d'une enquête sur la nature de la connaissance en général. (shrink)

Volume 15, Issue 2, August 2019, Page 85-88.

Le commerce équitable nous invite à un réexamen des relations entre care et théories de la justice. Le commerce équitable se présente comme inscrit dans le care. Parallèlement, il réhabilite une justice aristotélicienne dite particulière. Ce faisant, il montre que éthique du care et théorie de la justice convergent, à condition que la justice ne se résume pas – comme trop souvent – à une justice dite générale. La justice particulière permet donc d’envisager autrement et de façon plus pertinente l’articulation (...) entre justice et care. Classification JEL : B11, B40, D63. (shrink)

This case study introduces the QIT Madagascar Minerals (QMM) SA mining project at Fort-Dauphin, Madagascar, as a development project that has produced issues concerning justice. Although QMM appears to be a model company with a project that is seen as a success story, its consequent displacement of populations has been problematic in many respects, as have been the social effects that arise due to migration to the area by others who are attracted by the project. We suggest that the root (...) of many of these problems is that the people to be displaced have played an insignificant role in forming the project itself: consultation has instead been centred on corporate, government and environmental NGO concerns and interests. Compensation for losses has been inadequate. As non-mining land has been set aside as an offset for the purpose of conservation, traditional livelihoods have been curtailed. A narrow and Western conception of natural conservation that forbids access by the people has ensued for lands that hav.. (shrink)

Marx says of alienated labor that it does not "belong" to the worker, that it issues in a product that does not belong to her, and that it is unfulfilling, unfree, egoistically motivated, and inhuman. He seems to think, moreover, that the first of these features grounds all the others. All of these features seem quite independent, however: they can come apart; they share no obvious common cause or explanation; and if they often occur together this seems accidental. It is (...) not clear, then, how Marx's concept of alienated labor could possess the strong unity which he takes it to have. I defend a reinterpretation of the concept which explains this unity. The various features of alienated labor, I argue, all follow from a single, hitherto underappreciated feature of its formal motivational structure: the fact that such labor is motivated not by its product but by an incentive. (shrink)

La littérature économique s’intéresse aux enjeux du développement soutenable, mais elle aborde rarement le pilier social, car elle se concentre sur l’imbrication entre les piliers économique et environnemental. Quand il est pris en compte, le pilier social l’est comme interface qui facilite la jointure entre les deux autres. Les analyses économiques soulignent unanimement l’importance d’effectuer cette jonction, qu’il s’agisse d’évoquer les conditions de vie des populations ou l’acceptation sociale des transformations vers une transition écologique. Pourtant, les études consacrées au développement (...) soutenable ne considèrent guère le social autrement que comme une simple interface. Le social doit trouver sa juste place dans les politiques économiques de développement soutenable. Pour cela, il importe de reconceptualiser ce pilier en le faisant entrer en résonance avec les thèmes à l’origine du développement soutenable. De nouvelles justifications se présentent alors pour des politiques publiques pensées jusque là en dehors du développement soutenable. Classification JEL : Q01, Q56, Z13. (shrink)

The Abidjan School is a school of thought that developed in the 1980s and 1990s in the Côte d'Ivoire inspired by the work of Louis-Joseph Lebret and Amartya Sen. It follows the empirical approach i...

Lorsqu’elle nous reçoit à Conakry, en république de Guinée, ce 22 janvier 2002, Mme Kadidiatou Diallo prépare la commémoration de la « journée des pendus » au cours de laquelle, le 25 janvier 1971, de nombreuses personnes furent exécutées par pendaison à travers toute la Guinée, sur ordre du président de la République Ahmed Sékou Touré. Mme Diallo Telli a déjà accordé de nombreux entretiens à des journalistes qui l’ont interrogée sur son époux, Boubacar Diallo Telli, une des plus célèbres (...) per... (shrink)

Largement déterminée par la « scène primitive » de la Révolution française, notre conception de la citoyenneté est encore souvent associée à l’exercice des droits de suffrage et d’éligibilité. Le moment révolutionnaire, en abolissant les privilèges d’Ancien Régime et en promulguant la Déclaration des droits de l’homme et du citoyen, a, de fait, fondé une citoyenneté juridique définie par un ensemble de droits « naturels », civils et politiques. Or l’histoire des femmes et du genre, comme les...

Since its origin, bioethics has attracted the collaboration of few social scientists, and social scientific methods of gathering empirical data have remained unfamiliar to ethicists. Recently, however, the clouded relations between the empirical and normative perspectives on bioethics appear to be changing. Three reasons explain why there was no easy and consistent input of empirical evidence into bioethics. Firstly, interdisciplinary dialogue runs the risk of communication problems and divergent objectives. Secondly, the social sciences were absent partners since the beginning of (...) bioethics. Thirdly, the meta‐ethical distinction between ‘is’ and ‘ought’ created a ‘natural’ border between the disciplines. Now, bioethics tends to accommodate more empirical research. Three hypotheses explain this emergence. Firstly, dissatisfaction with a foundationalist interpretation of applied ethics created a stimulus to incorporate empirical research in bioethics. Secondly, clinical ethicists became engaged in empirical research due to their strong integration in the medical setting. Thirdly, the rise of the evidence‐based paradigm had an influence on the practice of bioethics. However, a problematic relationship cannot simply and easily evolve into a perfect interaction. A new and positive climate for empirical approaches has arisen, but the original difficulties have not disappeared. (shrink)

Presents results of free‐recall experiments conducted in France, Gabon and Nepal, to test predictions of a cognitive model of religious concepts. The world over, these concepts include violations of conceptual expectations at the level of domain knowledge (e.g., about ‘animal’ or ‘artifact’ or ‘person’) rather than at the basic level. In five studies we used narratives to test the hypothesis that domain‐level violations are recalled better than other conceptual associations. These studies used material constructed in the same way as religious (...) concepts, but not used in religions familiar to the subjects. Experiments 1 and 2 confirmed a distinctiveness effect for such material. Experiment 3 shows that recall also depends on the possibility to generate inferences from violations of domain expectations. Replications in Gabon (Exp. 4) and Nepal (Exp. 5) showed that recall for domain‐level violations is better than for violations of basic‐level expectations. Overall sensitivity to violations is similar in different cultures and produces similar recall effects, despite differences in commitment to religious belief, in the range of local religious concepts or in their mode of transmission. However, differences between Gabon and Nepal results suggest that familiarity with some types of domain‐level violations may paradoxically make other types more salient. These results suggest that recall effects may account for the recurrent features found in religious concepts from different cultures. (shrink)

It has recently been argued that normative considerations play an important role in causal cognition. For instance, when an agent violates a moral rule and thereby produces a negative outcome, she will be judged to be much more of a cause of the outcome, compared to someone who performed the same action but did not violate a norm. While there is a substantial amount of evidence reporting these effects, it is still a matter of debate how this evidence is to (...) be interpreted. In this paper, we engage with the three most influential classes of explanations, namely, (a) the Norm‐Sensitive Cognitive Process View, (b) the Normative Concept View, and (c) the Pragmatics View. We will outline how these theories explain the empirical results and in what ways they differ. We conclude with a reflection on how well these strategies do overall and what questions they still leave unanswered. (shrink)

Ritualized behavior, intuitively recognizable by its stereotypy, rigidity, repetition, and apparent lack of rational motivation, is found in a variety of life conditions, customs, and everyday practices: in cultural rituals, whether religious or non-religious; in many children's complicated routines; in the pathology of obsessive-compulsive disorders (OCD); in normal adults around certain stages of the life-cycle, birthing in particular. Combining evidence from evolutionary anthropology, neuropsychology and neuroimaging, we propose an explanation of ritualized behavior in terms of an evolved Precaution System geared (...) to the detection of and reaction to inferred threats to fitness. This system, distinct from fear-systems geared to respond to manifest danger, includes a repertoire of clues for potential danger as well as a repertoire of species-typical precautions. In OCD pathology, this system does not supply a negative feedback to the appraisal of potential threats, resulting in doubts about the proper performance of precautions, and repetition of action. Also, anxiety levels focus the attention on low-level gestural units of behavior rather than on the goal-related higher-level units normally used in parsing the action-flow. Normally automatized actions are submitted to cognitive control. This “swamps” working memory, an effect of which is a temporary relief from intrusions but also their long-term strengthening. Normal activation of this Precaution System explains intrusions and ritual behaviors in normal adults. Gradual calibration of the system occurs through childhood rituals. Cultural mimicry of this system's normal input makes cultural rituals attention-grabbing and compelling. A number of empirical predictions follow from this synthetic model. (Published Online February 8 2007) Key Words: childhood ritual; compulsion; event boundaries; evolutionary psychology; obsessive-compulsive disorder; ritual; thought intrusion. (shrink)

What is truth? What value should we see in or attribute to it? The war over the meaning and utility of truth is at the center of contemporary philosophical debate, and its arguments have rocked the foundations of philosophical practice. In this book, the American pragmatist Richard Rorty and the French analytic philosopher Pascal Engel present their radically different perspectives on truth and its correspondence to reality. Rorty doubts that the notion of truth can be of any practical use (...) and points to the preconceptions that lie behind truth in both the intellectual and social spheres. Engel prefers a realist conception, defending the relevance and value of truth as a norm of belief and inquiry in both science and the public domain. Rorty finds more danger in using the notion of truth than in getting rid of it. Engel thinks it is important to hold on to the idea that truth is an accurate representation of reality. In Rorty's view, epistemology is an artificial construct meant to restore a function to philosophy usurped by the success of empirical science. Epistemology and ontology are false problems, and with their demise goes the Cartesian dualism of subject and object and the ancient problematic of appearance and reality. Conventional "philosophical problems," Rorty asserts, are just symptoms of the professionalism that has disfigured the discipline since the time of Kant. Engel, however, is by no means as complacent as Rorty in heralding the "end of truth," and he wages a fierce campaign against the "veriphobes" who deny its value. _What's the Use of Truth?_ is a rare opportunity to experience each side of this impassioned debate clearly and concisely. It is a subject that has profound implications not only for philosophical inquiry but also for the future study of all aspects of our culture. (shrink)

Imagine you and your friend Pierre agreed on meeting each other at a café, but he does not show up. What is the difference between a friend’s not showing up meeting? and any other person not coming? In some sense, all people who did not come show the same kind of behaviour, but most people would be willing to say that the absence of a friend who you expected to see is different in kind. In this paper, I will spell (...) out this difference by investigating laypeople’s conceptualisation of absences of actions in four experiments. In languages such as German, French, Italian, or Polish, people consider a friend’s not coming an omission. Any other person’s not coming, in contrast, is not considered an omission at all, but just a mere nothing. This use of the term omission differs from the usage in English, where ‘omission’ refers to all kinds of absences. In addition, ‘omission’ is not even an everyday term, but invented by philosophers for the sake of philosophical investigation. In other languages, ‘omission’ is part of an everyday vocabulary. Finally, I will discuss how this folk concept of omission could be made fruitful for philosophical questions. (shrink)

The field of bioethics is increasingly coming into contact with empirical research findings. In this article, we ask what role empirical research can play in the process of ethical clarification and decision-making. Ethical reflection almost always proceeds in three steps: the description of the moral question,the assessment of the moral question and the evaluation of the decision-making. Empirical research can contribute to each step of this process. In the description of the moral object, first of all, empirical research has a (...) role to play in the description of morally relevant facts. It plays a role in answering the “reality-revealing questions” (what, why,how, who, where and when), in assessing the consequences and in proposing alternative courses of action. Secondly, empirical research plays a role in assessing the moral question. It must be acknowledged that research possesses “the normative power of the factual,” which can also become normative by suppressing other norms. However, inductive normativity should always be balanced out by a deductive form of normativity. Thirdly, empirical research also has a role to play in evaluating the decision-making process. It can rule out certain moral choices by pointing out the occurrence of certain unexpected consequences or effects. It can also be useful, however, as a sociology of bioethics in which the discipline of bioethics itself becomes an object of research. (shrink)

The last two decades have seen a massive increase in the scholarly interest in technology, and have provoked new lines of thought in philosophy, sociology and cultural studies. Gilbert Simondon (1924 - 1989) was one of Frances's most influential philosophers in this field, and an important influence on the work of Gilles Deleuze and Bernard Stiegler. His work is only now being translated into English. Chabot's introduction to Simondon's work was published in French in 2002 and is now available in (...) English for the first time. It is the most accessible guide to Simondon's important but often opaque work. Chabot provides an excellent introduction to Simondon, positioning him as a philosopher of technology, and he describes his theory of individuation including his crystalline ontology. He goes on to offer a bridge between these two concerns, exploring how they are related. (shrink)

Acts that are considered undesirable standardly violate our expectations. In contrast, acts that count as morally desirable can either meet our expectations or exceed them. The zone in which an act can be morally desirable yet not exceed our expectations is what we call the zone of moral indifference, and it has so far been neglected. In this paper, we show that people can use positive terms in a deflated manner to refer to actions in the zone of moral indifference, (...) whereas negative terms cannot be so interpreted. (shrink)

Pourquoi a-t-on raison de se révolter contre l'homme-machine et le monde mécanique qu'entraînent les mutations technologiques incontrôlées? Et si, contre les robots, la fragilité faisait l'humanité? Un traité philosophique, un manuel de combat. Dans cet essai de philosophie contemporaine, Pascal Marin rassemble un large faisceau d'arguments contre ceux qui entendent faire de l'homme une machine. De chapitre en chapitre, il dénonce le fantasme du transhumanisme californien, qui s'exporte aujourd'hui à travers des médias en mal de sujets. Mais selon Marin, (...) cette crise du sens de l'humain est peut-être une chance pour la pensée : elle contraint à mieux prendre la mesure de la vie qui demeure énigmatique à la science. Cette enquête d'anthropologie radicale progresse donc par des chemins insolites jusqu'à atteindre à l'ironie d'un constat paradoxal : ce pouvoir technicien fascinant, qui semble sans limite, aurait pour cause le rapport intime que l'homme entretient depuis toujours avec le raté, la panne, le bug, bref tout ce qui peut mettre justement une machine en défaut. Un cri d'alerte, où l'intelligence et le style convainquent à chaque page. (shrink)

" Dans la débâcle des croyances et des idéologies, il en est une qui résiste : l'économie. Elle a cessé d'être une science aride, une froide activité de la raison pour devenir la dernière spiritualité du monde développé. C'est une religiosité austère, sans élans particuliers, mais qui déploie une ferveur proche du culte. De cette mythologie, les nouveaux mouvements contestataires sont partie prenante : s'ils soulignent à bon droit les injustices du marché, ils continuent d'en faire le moteur de l'Histoire (...) et de lui imputer les moindres désordres de la planète. Une même croyance soude donc les " néo-libéraux " et leurs détracteurs. Ils se croient ennemis ; ils sont partenaires. Ce n'est pas du capitalisme qu'il faut sortir, mais de l'économisme. De la glorification, par tous les camps, d'une discipline qui prétend régir la société entière, nous transformer en hamsters laborieux réduits au simple rôle de producteurs, consommateurs ou actionnaires. Remettre les activités marchandes à leur place, retrouver la place de ce qui n'est pas marchand : il en va tout simplement du sens de nos vies. " P.B. (shrink)

Notre pensée s'enlise lorsqu'elle ne s'écarte plus de ses habitudes. Notre vie également. Par quelle stratégie interroger les grandes idées qui ont fait l'Europe, et qui semblent aujourd'hui en panne, pour redonner de l'élan et de l'allant à notre pensée et à notre vie? Comment ouvrir de nouveaux possibles? C'est en construisant un patient dialogue entre l'Europe et la Chine que le philosophe et sinologue François Jullien trace un chemin dans la pensée. Si la Chine est devenue la première puissance (...) économique mondiale, on ne saurait oublier qu'elle porte une tradition plus de trois fois millénaire qui déploie des manières de penser tout à fait déroutantes pour nous, Occidentaux, nous permettant de réinterroger nos partis pris et de retrouver prise sur notre pensée. Cet ouvrage introduit avec clarté et rigueur à la pensée de François Jullien. Il intéressera aussi bien ceux qui connaissent déjà ses travaux que tous ceux qui sont en quête d'un renouveau de la philosophie et se demandent comment, entre Chine et Europe, entretenir le dialogue, ouvrir des possibles et déployer des ressources pour vivre. (shrink)

L'herméneutique universelle, exposée dans "Vérité et méthode", se présente comme une philosophie de la "Sprache". Selon Gadamer, seule en effet une méditation de la "Sprachlichkeit" du Dasein permet de rendre compte de son historicité essentielle. Doit-on traduire "Sprache" et "Sprachlichkeit" par langue ou par langage? La question du rapport entre philosophie et langage ressurgit.

Pascal was a scientist and man of the world who came to be a passionately devout Christian. The fragments of his great defense of Christianity, left unfinished at his death in 1662, survive in the form of the Pensees. This series of brief, dramatic notes on his religious convictions are here translated into English. These thoughts expose Pascal's vision of the world and display powerful reasoning and a profound faith.

The omission effect, first described by Spranca and colleagues, has since been extensively studied and repeatedly confirmed. All else being equal, most people judge it to be morally worse to actively bring about a negative event than to passively allow that event to happen. In this paper, we provide new experimental data that challenges previous studies of the omission effect both methodologically and philosophically. We argue that previous studies have failed to control for the equivalence of rules that are violated (...) by actions and omissions. Once equivalent norms are introduced, our results show that the omission effect is eliminated, even if the negative outcome of the behavior is foreseen and intended by the agent. We show that the omission effect does not constitute a basic, moral disposition but occurs exclusively in complex moral situations. Building on these empirical results, we cast doubt onto two influential explanations of the omission effect, the Causal Relevance Hypothesis and the Overgeneralization Hypothesis, and provide a novel explanation of the phenomenon. Furthermore, we discuss various ramifications of the interplay between our understanding of omissions and legal systems. (shrink)