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This essay takes Arthur Danto’s end-of-art thesis as a case in point of a substantive philosophy of history. Such philosophy explains the direction that art has taken and why that direction could not have been different. Danto never scrutinized the philosophy of history that his end-of-art thesis presumes. I aim to do that by drawing a distinction between what I refer to as the common view of history and the philosophical view of history, and by arguing that we need the (...) latter if we want to properly assess the plausibility of the end-of-art thesis. (shrink)

The “exemplification theory of history” is proposed to account for the relationship between the past and historical narratives. The theory states that what belongs to the past according to some narrative does so in order to exemplify the historical thesis of that narrative. As such the theory explains how the past receives its meaning. This implies that the past has no intrinsic historical meaning itself. Moreover, it follows that historical narratives possess an autonomy of their own with regard to the (...) past. It is argued that the exemplification theory of history goes to the heart of narrativist philosophy of history. This claim is supported by the key arguments of three narrativist philosophers: Arthur Danto, Louis Mink and Frank Ankersmit. The distinction between the history of social individuals and the identification of such individuals turns out to be fundamental in this respect. The article concludes by distinguishing between a Platonic and an Aristotelian view on narrative and by explaining why we ought to prefer the former to the latter. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe normative ideals and feasibility of deliberative democracy have come under attack from several directions, as exemplified by a recent book version of a special issue of this journal. Critics have pointed out that the complexity of the modern world, voter ignorance, partisanship, apathy, and the esoteric nature of political communications make it unlikely that deliberation will be successful at creating good outcomes, and that it may in fact be counterproductive since it can polarize opinions. However, these criticisms were aimed (...) at “micro” theories of deliberative democracy. The new “systemic” turn in deliberative democracy avoids these problems by positing a system-wide division of labor in a nation-state: experts and ordinary citizens “check” each other's opinions; partisanship and even ignorance can spur deliberation among citizens; and citizens may remain apathetic about some issues but deliberate about others. So long as the overall level of systemic deliberation increases, instead of decreases, the ideal of deliberation is still relevant in a society as complex as ours. (shrink)

The problem how to ascertain the truth about the past is as old as history itself. But until the work of Louis Mink, no clear distinction was made between questions concerning the truth of statements on the past and questions concerning the truth of historical narratives as a whole. A narrative, Mink argues, is not simply a conjunction of statements on the past. Therefore its truth cannot be a function of the truth of its individual statements. The problem of narrative (...) truth is according to him thus: although each statement asserting a relation between events is subject to confirmation and disconfirmation, the combination of interrelations as established by the historical narrative is not, even though such combination of interrelations represents a real combination in past reality and is claimed to be true. As if to further complicate the problem, Mink maintains that history shares its form with fiction. Three and a half decades after Mink formulated the problem of narrative truth, it has not been dealt with in a satisfying manner. Mink does not solve nor dissolve the problem he posed. That task is taken up in this essay. It will move us away from the vocabulary of literary theory towards a pragmatist account of narrative truth. (shrink)

At times we are told that our habitual way of thinking has become obsolete given the new challenge we are facing. Some of the conceptual resources at our disposal are no longer capable of addressing the challenge at hand. Therefore, they lose their appeal and are rejected. But only in contrast to these intellectual resources does the challenge appear as a challenge. So it seems that we are confronted with a paradox: we need the intellectual resources for their uselessness. For (...) a proper understanding of this paradox and to unravel it, I will distinguish between de dicto and de re readings of philosophical texts. This distinction is borrowed from the neo-pragmatist Robert Brandom. A de dicto reading of a text is concerned with what its author says. A de re reading of a text is concerned with what its author talks about. Unpacking this distinction allows us to evaluate the method of engaging with our stock of conceptual resources as part of scholarly argument. (shrink)

Skvortsova showed that there is a factor of the Medvedev lattice which captures intuitionistic propositional logic. However, her factor is unnatural in the sense that it is constructed in an ad hoc manner. We present a more natural example of such a factor. We also show that the theory of every non-trivial factor of the Medvedev lattice is contained in Jankov’s logic, the deductive closure of IPC plus the weak law of the excluded middle ¬p∨¬¬p\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} (...) \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${\neg p \vee \neg \neg p}$$\end{document}. This answers a question by Sorbi and Terwijn. (shrink)

We study the model-theoretic aspects of a probability logic suited for talking about measure spaces. This nonclassical logic has a model theory rather different from that of classical predicate logic. In general, not every satisfiable set of sentences has a countable model, but we show that one can always build a model on the unit interval. Also, the probability logic under consideration is not compact. However, using ultraproducts we can prove a compactness theorem for a certain class of weak models.

We give natural examples of factors of the Muchnik lattice which capture intuitionistic propositional logic , arising from the concepts of lowness, 1-genericity, hyperimmune-freeness and computable traceability. This provides a purely computational semantics for IPC.

How can advocates of global democracy grapple with the empirical conditions that constitute world politics? I argue that flexibility mechanisms - commonly used to advance international cooperation - should be employed to make the institutional design project of global democracy more tractable. I highlight three specific reasons underpinning this claim. First, flexibility provisions make bargaining over different institutional designs more manageable. Second, heightened flexibility takes seriously potential concerns about path-dependent institutional development. Finally, deliberately shortening the time horizons of agents by (...) employing flexibility provisions has cognitive benefits as it forces designers to focus specifically on issues of feasibility as well as desirability. I discuss a range of flexibility mechanisms and highlight the utility of sunset provisions and escape clauses. From this analysis, I build an argument for the usage of small-scale democratic experiments through which citizens have a say in global policy making. (shrink)

Die Forderung einer Philosophie als strenger Wissenschaft, von Husserl zum ersten Mal in dem bekannten Logosaufsatz erhoben, richtet sich nicht, wie meistens gedacht und auch von Dilthey selbst so verstanden ist, gegen den Historizismus von Dilthey, sondern vielmehr gegen dessen Identifizierung von Philosophie mit Weltanschauungsphilosophie und damit mit Weisheitslehre. Husserl hat vom Anfang an bis zum Ende seines Lebens sich der Herausarbeitung dieer Idee gewidmet und die Phänomenologie als Verwirklichung dieser Idee betrachtet. Dementsprechend soll man auch der geläufigen Auffassung zuwider (...) die Phänomenologie vor allem als Wissenschaftslehre auffassen und interpretieren. Die Ablehnung aller Weltanschauungsphilosophie ruft nicht nur das Problem hervor, wie Husserl sich verhält zur Metaphysik, sondern was er unter strenger Wissenschaft versteht. Einerseits ist nach ihm die Trennung und Unterscheidung von Philosophie und Weltanschauung oder Metaphysik in Übereinstimmung mit dem modernen Denken, das gerade erst dadurch zur Herausbildung einer Universitas von strengen positiven Wissenschaften (Mathematik, Naturwissenchaften, aber auch strengen Geisteswissenschaften) gekommen ist, andererseits steht aber seine Auffassung und Ausarbeitung von Philosophie als apodiktischer Wissenschaft im Gegensatz zum modernen Denken. Husserl betrachtet die Phänomenologie als die Realisierung der zuerst von Piaton gestellten Idee von Philosophie als einer endgültigen, einzigen und universalen Wissenschaft, welcher Descartes eine radikale Wendung in die Richtung einer egologischen Apodiktizität gegeben hat. Infolgedessen hat die transzendentale Phänomenologie auch die Aufgabe alle Einzelwissenschaften, sowohl die positiven Tatsachenwissenschaften als die positiven apriorischen, vernunftkritisch zu durchleuchten und dadurch zu Abzweigungen der Philosophie als universaler Wissenchaft zu machen. Wie dieses Verhältnis zwischen positiver Wissenschaft und Phänomenologie als strenger Wissenschaft gedacht werden muss, ist immer ein wichtiges Thema für Husserl gewesen. Die positiven Wissenschaften teilt Husserl ein in Tatsachenwissenschaften und apriorische Wissenschaften (Leibniz' Idee von Wissenschaft der Möglichkeiten kombiniert mit der Idee von invarianten Strukturen). Husserl ist nun der Ansicht, dass eine positive Tatsachenwissenschaft nur eine exakte und strenge Wissenschaft werden kann, wenn sie eine apriorische Wissenschaft neben sich zur Entwicklung bringt oder sich darauf stützen kann, wie es z. B. der Fall gewesen ist mit der empirischfaktischen Naturwissenschaft in Beziehung zu der Mathematik und der reinen Mechanik. Dasselbe Verhältnis soll man sich denken zwischen einer apriorischen (phänomenologischen) Psychologie, einer allgemeinen apriorischen Sprachwissenchaft und Historie und den dazu gehörenden empirischen Tatsachenwissenschaften. Philosophie und Wissenschaft sind für Husserl identisch mit Rationalismus. Dennoch unterscheidet er grundsätzlich zwischen positiver und transzendentaler Rationalität. Durch eine Verbindung von Rationalität und Verständlichmachung (die Methode des Verstehens der Geisteswissenschaften auf das höchste Niveau eines transzendentalen Verständnisses gebracht durch die konstitutive Phänomenologie) hebt die Phänomenologie als absolute Geisteswissenschaft den Gegensatz zwischen Natur-und Geisteswissenschaften auf und entwickelt sich zur sapientia universdis. Im dritten Teil kehrt der Autor zu der Frage zurück, ob Husserl immer die Trennung zwischen wissenschaftlicher Philosophie und Weltanschauung aufrecht erhalten hat auch in den Krisisabhandlungen. Im allgemeinen muss das bejaht werden. Noch in 1924 wird sogar die Frage erhoben, ob Kant, der doch auch Philosophie als strenge Wissenschaft entwickeln wollte, wohl eine echte Philosophie gebracht hat und nicht darin verfehlt hat eben durch die Vermischung von wissenschaftlicher Philosophie mit Weltweisheit, die auch von ausserwissenschaftlichen Quellen schöpft, und durch den Mangel an dem Radikalismus der Apodiktizität. Husserl hat die Idee der Philosophie als strenger Wissenschaft tatsächlich zur Ausführung gebracht als transzendentale Wissenschaft der Subjektivität d. h. als Deskription oder Hermeneutik des Bewusstseinslebens. Es gibt abo bei ihm eine Verbindung zwischen Wissenschaftslehre und Ratio oder Logos einerseits und Vernunft, Subjektivität und Leben andererseits. Der spätere Husserl hat diese Verbindung immer mehr vertieft in die Richtung einer wissenschaftlichen Lebensphilosophie mit Aufrechterhaltung der Idee der Philosophie als apodiktischer Wissenschaft. Er hat nicht nur den Objektivismus der positiven Wissenchaften zu erhellen und aufzuklären versucht von ihrem Ursprung aus der Lebenswelt, die auch ihr bleibender Boden ist, sondern in dem phänomenologischen Idealismus schliesslich als geistiger Weltanschauung die Lösung aller geschichtsphilosophischen und ethischen Probleme gesehen, die besonders durch die Krise der europäischen Kultur hervorgerufen sind. Die Urstiftung der Griechen und besonders vos Platon findet in der transzendentalen Phänomenologie ihre Endstiftung und in einer geschichtsphilosophischen Deutung des Sinnes der Geschichte, die nach Husserl notwendig universal-teleologisch sein muss, hat die Phänomenologie und die Geschichte der Philosophie die Aufgabe als Selbstverwirklichung der Vernunft zu fungieren (Husserliana VI, § 73). Die Philosophie als strenge Wisenschaft schafft die Möglichkeit dem menschlichen Sein und Werden apodiktische Ziele zu geben und sich berufen zu wissen zu einem Leben und Streben in der Apodiktizität d. h. auf Vernunft hin, was den Menschen allein „selig” machen kann. (shrink)

Does the politicization of international authority help to reduce democratic deficits beyond the state? In this paper I argue that politicization provides a useful springboard for remedying democratic deficits at the EU and global level. Despite this promise, there are a range of concerns that inhibit a direct relationship between politicization and increased democratic legitimacy. The paper unpacks what politicization is and how it might relate to democratic legitimacy. It then argues that problems surrounding representation – in particular the constructivist (...) view of representation – complicates this relationship. Significantly the notion of mobilization generates suspicions of democratic representational legitimacy. In response, the paper details a framework for assessing the democratic legitimacy of representative claims under conditions of politicization that responds to the aforementioned concerns. This framework is briefly applied to the cases of TTIP and TPP to show its merits. (shrink)

Kolmogorov introduced an informal calculus of problems in an attempt to provide a classical semantics for intuitionistic logic. This was later formalised by Medvedev and Muchnik as what has come to be called the Medvedev and Muchnik lattices. However, they only formalised this for propositional logic, while Kolmogorov also discussed the universal quantifier. We extend the work of Medvedev to first-order logic, using the notion of a first-order hyperdoctrine from categorical logic, to a structure which we will call the hyperdoctrine (...) of mass problems. We study the intermediate logic that the hyperdoctrine of mass problems gives us, and we study the theories of subintervals of the hyperdoctrine of mass problems in an attempt to obtain an analogue of Skvortsova’s result that there is a factor of the Medvedev lattice characterising intuitionistic propositional logic. Finally, we consider Heyting arithmetic in the hyperdoctrine of mass problems and prove an analogue of Tennenbaum’s theorem on computable models of arithmetic. (shrink)

SummaryIn this paper Russell's discovery of external relations and his refutation of the doctrine of internal relations is traced to Hume's view on “philosophical” relations. Next the concepts of internal and external relation are applied to the analysis of knowledge. The most widely received analysis, the Justified True Belief‐conception, is investigated for its resources in answering the question whether knowledge is an internal or an external relation between a person and a believed proposition. There are difficulties in each answer which (...) can be partially resolved by analysing knowledge in terms of betting. (shrink)

We introduce a hierarchy of degree structures between the Medvedev and Muchnik lattices which allow varying amounts of nonuniformity. We use these structures to introduce the notion of the uniformity of a Muchnik reduction, which expresses how uniform a reduction is. We study this notion for several well-known reductions from algorithmic randomness. Furthermore, since our new structures are Brouwer algebras, we study their propositional theories. Finally, we study if our new structures are elementarily equivalent to each other.

Bundel essays over aspecten van het denken van de Duitse filosoof Martin Heidegger (1889-1976).

De alledaagse leefwereld. Dingen die we zien en horen. De hedendaagse mens wordt opgeslokt door de consumptiecultuur van de markteconomie en verkeert haast permanent in een virtuele werkelijkheid. Individualisme. De liefdesrelatie als meest basale vorm van gemeenschap is hierdoor op de helling gekomen. Welke therapeutische perspectieven kunnen we verbinden aan de gestelde diagnose? We zijn aangewezen op een mentaliteitsverandering, die wordt bepaald door het ‘morele kapitaal’ waarmee een gemeenschap kan voortbestaan. De auteur opereert binnen de traditie die Montaigne en Kierkegaard (...) introduceren en waaiert voortdurend uit door geregeld zijn rol als dienende gastheer voor die van zoekende filosoof te verruilen. Hij laat tijdslijnen door elkaar lopen. Toch is sprake van intrinsieke ordening: ideeënimprovisaties worden weerspiegeld in een afwisseling tussen levende herinneringen en abstracte argumenten. Zo krijgt de alledaagsheid een filosofische lading. Kleine verhalen en anekdotes zijn nodig om grote verhalen een persoonlijk karakter te geven. Aldus ontstaat een collage, waarin niets is gelogen, maar alles is verzonnen. Een waargebeurde, fictieve levensgeschiedenis op grond van herinneringen, een portret waarin verslag wordt gedaan van een gedreven zoektocht naar zinvolheid. De lezer is genoodzaakt zich te laten meevoeren over hoofd- en zijwegen, bemodderde bospaden, drassige velden, gevaarlijke bochten, grillige slingerpaden, solide bruggen en wankele bruggetjes. (shrink)

Studies in the Eighteenth Century Background of Hume's Empiricism was first published in 1930. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions. A scholarly review of the influence of contemporary science and thought on the various phases of Hume's philosophy. The chapter headings are as follows: I. Introduction. II. Interpretations of Newtonian Science in the Eighteenth Century. III. Reverberations of the New Science in (...) Philosophy. IV. Hume's Empiricism in Relation to Contemporary Science and Philosophy. V. Empiricism in Morals. VI. Empiricism in Politics. VII. Hume's Historical Writing. Bibliography. (shrink)

Studies in the Eighteenth Century Background of Hume's Empiricism was first published in 1930. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions. A scholarly review of the influence of contemporary science and thought on the various phases of Hume's philosophy. The chapter headings are as follows: I. Introduction. II. Interpretations of Newtonian Science in the Eighteenth Century. III. Reverberations of the New Science in (...) Philosophy. IV. Hume's Empiricism in Relation to Contemporary Science and Philosophy. V. Empiricism in Morals. VI. Empiricism in Politics. VII. Hume's Historical Writing. Bibliography. (shrink)