Everyday there are revelations of organizations behaving in discreditable ways. Sometimes these actions result in damage to an organization's reputation, but often they do not. In this article, we examine the question of why external stakeholders may overlook disclosed discreditable actions, even those entailing ethical breaches. Drawing on stigmatization theory, we develop a model to explain the likelihood of reputational loss following revelations of discreditable actions. The model integrates four properties of actions (perceived control, perceived certainty, perceived threat, and perceived (...) deviance), stakeholder motivation, and media coverage. Implications for theory and for practitioners concerned with reputation management are discussed. (shrink)

Chapter 1 serves as an introduction to the vast topic of laws of nature. Thus, it first outlines the alleged characteristics of the laws of nature, namely truth, objectivity, contingency, necessity, universality, grounding counterfactuals and their role in science. Among these aspects, the peculiar modal status of laws of nature will be identified as the ‘holy grail’ of the debate. The second part of this chapter is concerned with the three main families of theories of laws of nature – neo-humean, (...) ADT and dispositional theories – which are introduced and evaluated in regard to the aforementioned characteristics. It will then be argued that among those theories, the dispositional ones show the greatest promise of being able to account for the natural necessity of the laws of nature. -/- Before a dispositional account of laws of nature can be given, dispositions themselves need to be understood. Consequently, Chapter 2 introduces various analyses of dispositions. As dispositions are pre-theoretically close to conditionals, a lot of analyses try to reduce dispositions to conditionals. This chapter critically assesses some chosen accounts: the simple conditional analysis, Carnap’s reduction sentences, the simple counterfactual conditional analysis, Lewis’ reformed conditional analysis, Malzkorn’s sophisticated con- ditional analysis, Choi and Gundersen’s context-dependent analysis, Manley and Wasserman’s gradable dispostion ascriptions, and Fara’s habituals. The prevention problem, which poses a threat to any account of dispositions, is depicted. It is argued that, ultimately, none of the conditionalising attempts is able to convince since they all exclude the problem cases which leads to explanation gaps and outlaw areas. -/- Chapter 3 contains the synchronic part of my preferred solution to the prevention problem. The notion of ‘component causes’ is introduced, and the ontological status of components discussed. Millikan’s oil drop experiment is depicted en detail. In a first step, making a distinction between dispositions and the resulting behaviour is advocated. Via the symmetry argument, mani- festations and masks are shown to be ontologically on a par. In a second step, a triadic account consisting of dispositions, wirkungen and resultant behaviour, is established. Finally, the ontological interpretation of the trias is given. It is in the nature of the dispositions to bring about the wirkungen. These interact via combinations rules like the functions f and fa or vector addition, which are built-in into to dispositions. -/- The diachronic part of my favourite interpretation, the triadic process picture of dispositions (TPD), is presented in chapter 4. The dynamics of dispo- sition manifestation are discussed and it is argued that fiddling with the trigger works only up to a certain point. Diachronic masking cases turn out to be no- torious. An excursus to action theory shows that the ontology needs to include processes, as understanding disposition manifestations as processes solves the diachronic prevention problem. The (TPD) can account for all counterexamples by taking the stimulus as the beginning of the manifestation process. -/- Chapter 5 applies the (TPD) to the debate about laws of nature. In order to judge its adequacy, the characteristics of laws of nature given in chapter 1 are consulted. As a first step, the criteria truth, objectivity, universality, grounding counterfactuals and their role in science are covered. It is sketched how the (TPD) can account for these. The second part of the chapter deals with the modal status of the laws of nature. The dispositional essentialist’s view that laws of nature are metaphysical necessary is depicted and then criticised. It is argued that metaphysical necessity is not the appropriate modal status of the laws of nature. Finally, the (TPD) account of the necessity of the laws of nature is presented: laws of nature are naturally necessary and metaphysically contingent. (shrink)

Questions concerning the proof-theoretic strength of classical versus nonclassical theories of truth have received some attention recently. A particularly convenient case study concerns classical and nonclassical axiomatizations of fixed-point semantics. It is known that nonclassical axiomatizations in four- or three-valued logics are substantially weaker than their classical counterparts. In this paper we consider the addition of a suitable conditional to First-Degree Entailment—a logic recently studied by Hannes Leitgeb under the label HYPE. We show in particular that, by formulating the theory (...) PKF over HYPE, one obtains a theory that is sound with respect to fixed-point models, while being proof-theoretically on a par with its classical counterpart KF. Moreover, we establish that also its schematic extension—in the sense of Feferman—is as strong as the schematic extension of KF, thus matching the strength of predicative analysis. (shrink)

Despite several decades of feminist activism and scholarship, women’s bodies continue to be sites of control and contention both materially and symbolically. Issues such as reproductive technologies, sexual violence, objectification, motherhood, and sex trafficking, among others, constitute ongoing, pressing concerns for women’s bodies in our contemporary milieu, arguably exacerbated in a neoliberal world where bodies are instrumentalized as sites of human capital. This book engages with these themes by building on the strong tradition of feminist thought focused on women’s bodies, (...) and by making novel contributions that reflect feminists’ concerns—both theoretically and empirically—about gender and embodiment in the present context and beyond. The collection brings together essays from a variety of feminist scholars who deploy diverse theoretical approaches, including phenomenology, pragmatism, and new materialisms, in order to examine philosophically the question of the current status of gendered bodies through cutting-edge feminist theory. (shrink)

The Fitch paradox poses a serious challenge for anti-realism. This paper investigates the option for an anti-realist to answer the challenge by restricting the knowability principle. Based on a critical discussion of Dummett's and Tennant's suggestions for a restriction desiderata for a principled solution are developed. In the second part of the paper a different restriction is proposed. The proposal uses the notion of uniform formulas and diagnoses the problem arising in the case of Moore sentences in the different status (...) propositional letters receive. The new proposal is able to avoid some of the criticism on its predecessors. (shrink)

The leitmotif of the German contribution to the 12th Architecture Biennial in Venice, “desire“, is at the same time the topic of a survey among architects ; answers are given through drawings. What are you longing for? The response drawings are highly individual, diversity becomes programme: both in picture language and in the presentation in terms of content, reactions are quite different. But there is one thing they all have in common: the burning desire of something concrete. Sometimes it spreads (...) lightning-like on the observer, sometimes time is required for a contemplative involvement with form and content. The architectural sketch, as it may seem, degenerated into a side product of architectural work within the last years, is back! (shrink)

In this paper I seek to identify different sorts of freedom putatively linked to moral responsibility; I then explore the relationship between such notions of freedom and the Consequence Argument, on the one hand, and the Frankfurt-examples, on the other. I focus (in part) on a dilemma: if a compatibilist adopts a broadly speaking "conditional" understanding of freedom in reply to the Consequence Argument, such a theorist becomes vulnerable in a salient way to the Frankfurt-examples.

This paper argues that the value of acting freely and responsibly is a species of the value of self-expression. When I act freely, I write a sentence in the story of my life, and this gives my life the shape of a narrative, which, in turn, gives my life a unique sort of meaning and value.

In this chapter, I sketch some recent developments in feminist thought and present these alongside John Dewey’s work to assess what place pragmatism might assume in debates on contemporary, post-linguistic turn feminism. My task for this chapter is threefold: I redress the elision of pragmatism in the conversation around affect theory, new materialisms, and contemporary feminist theorising; I trace some of the confluences between Dewey’s work on nature and materiality, and the new materialist work of Stacy Alaimo and Karen Barad; (...) and finally, I argue that pragmatism can form a useful resource for those interested in addressing new materialist concerns about concrete embodiment and materiality in post-linguistic turn feminist theory. (shrink)

We assessed the automaticity of spatial-numerical and spatial-musical associations by testing their intentionality and load sensitivity in a dual-task paradigm. In separate sessions, 16 healthy adults performed magnitude and pitch comparisons on sung numbers with variable pitch. Stimuli and response alternatives were identical, but the relevant stimulus attribute (pitch or number) differed between tasks. Concomitant tasks required retention of either color or location information. Results show that spatial associations of both magnitude and pitch are load sensitive and that the spatial (...) association for pitch is more powerful than that for magnitude. These findings argue against the automaticity of spatial mappings in either stimulus dimension. (shrink)

Most discussions of near-death experiences (NDEs) in both the academic and popular literature contend that they establish ('prove') supernaturalism (about NDEs): they show that the mind is not the brain (and can continue after the brain stops functioning), and they bring us into contact with non-physical realms. I believe that the evidence provided by NDEs for supernaturalism is not persuasive, but I offer an alternative, naturalistic interpretation of these phenomena. On this interpretation, NDEs are 'real' in both senses of the (...) term: they really occur (people really have them, with the experiential content ascribed to them), and they are accurate. On this interpretation, NDEs are fundamentally about a journey from the known to the unknown, guided by a trusted mentor. Thus, NDEs accurately depict the possibilities for dying. Negative NDEs indicate the possibility of dying in cold, sterile, lonely circumstances, whereas positive NDEs point to the possibility of 'dying well', surrounded by loved ones. This is an interpretation that avoids the problems for supernaturalism of the gap between evidence and conclusion, and the commitment to causal interaction between physical and non-physical realms. (shrink)

The paper presents a novel account of nature and genesis of some philosophical problems, which vindicates a new approach to an arguably central and extensive class of such problems: The paper develops the Wittgensteinian notion of ‘philosophical pictures’ with the help of some notions adapted from metaphor research in cognitive linguistics and from work on unintentional analogical reasoning in cognitive psychology. The paper shows that adherence to such pictures systematically leads to the formulation of unwarranted claims, ill-motivated problems, and pointless (...) theories. To do so, the paper proceeds from a case-study on a lastingly influential development in early modern philosophy: the adoption of the doctrine of secondary qualities, and its principal consequences. The findings motivate a new approach to an arguably extensive and important class of philosophical problems: to the problems we raise in the grip of philosophical pictures. (shrink)

Let be an o-minimal structure expanding a real closed field R. We show that any definable set in Rn can be stratified into cells, whose defining functions are smooth Lipschitz continuous functions with constant 2n3/2, which have additional regularity conditions on the derivatives of higher order.

The past three decades of policy process studies have seen the emergence of a clear intellectual lineage with regard to complexity. Implicitly or explicitly, scholars have employed complexity theory to examine the intricate dynamics of collective action in political contexts. However, the methodological counterparts to complexity theory, such as computational methods, are rarely used and, even if they are, they are often detached from established policy process theory. Building on a critical review of the application of complexity theory to policy (...) process studies, we present and implement a baseline model of policy processes using the logic of coevolving networks. Our model suggests that an actor’s influence depends on their environment and on exogenous events facilitating dialogue and consensus-building. Our results validate previous opinion dynamics models and generate novel patterns. Our discussion provides ground for further research and outlines the path for the field to achieve a computational turn. (shrink)

Von der offenen Ablehnung Bertrand Russells bis zur positiven Einschätzung durch Arthur Danto hat Nietzsche einen schlechten Ruf als Philosoph in der Analytischen Tradition gehabt. Im Wiener Kreis, der eine nicht wegzudenkende Rolle in der Geschichte der Analytischen Philosophie spielt, wurde Nietzsche jedoch schon immer zutiefst respektiert als jemand, durch dessen Werk Rolle und Funktion der Analyse historisch verständlich wird. Dies gilt vor allem für Moritz Schlick und Rudolf Carnap, aber auch für Ludwig Wittgenstein und für Otto Neurath, Ludwig von (...) Mises und Kari Popper. Sie alle nehmen Nietzsche als Denker ernst, ohne sich ihm mit analytischem Begriffsinventar zu nähern. (shrink)

Nicolai Hartmann, einer der bedeutendsten Philosophen des 20. Jahrhunderts, zeichnet das Bemühen um eine Rekonstruktion der philosophischen Tradition in der Auseinandersetzung mit den Wissenschaften aus. Er hat, um diesen Gedanken zu unterstreichen, das Wort "systematische Philosophie" geprägt. Die Praxis systematischen Philosophierens wird erstmals in der hier in kommtierter Fassung vorgelegten Auswahl der "Cirkel-Protokolle" fassbar. Es handelt sich um das Dokument eines Disputierkreises, den Hartmann von 1920 bis 1950 geleitet hat. Hartmann hat in seiner Marburger, Kölner, Berliner und Göttinger Zeit mit (...) einem wechselnden Kreis von persönlich eingeladenen Studenten, Studentinnen und älteren Schülern zu verschiedenen philosophischen Themen und Problemen Gespräche geführt. Aufgrund ihrer dialogischen Form geben die im Nachlass Hartmanns befindlichen Cirkelprotokolle einen unvergleichlichen Einblick in die geistige Kultur des 20. Jahrhunderts. (shrink)

We report three studies in which we applied a value dictionary to narratives. Our objective was to test a theory-driven value dictionary for extracting valuable information from autobiographical and narrative texts. In Studies 1 and 2, participants wrote short autobiographical narratives and in Study 3, participants wrote narratives based on ambiguous stimuli. Participants in all three studies also completed the Portrait Value Questionnaire as a self-report measure of values. Overall, our results demonstrate that it is possible to extract value-relevant information (...) from these narratives. Extracted values from autobiographical narratives showed average correlations of 0.07 and 0.12 with self-reports compared to an average correlation of 0.01 for the extracted values from implicit motive tasks. The correlations with self-reports were in line with previous validation studies. The most salient values in narratives diverged somewhat, with a stronger emphasis on achievement values compared to self-reports, probably due to the nature of salient episodes within one's life that require demonstrating success according to social standards. Benevolence values were consistently most important in both self-ratings and text-based scoring. The value structure emerging from narratives diverged from the theoretically predicted structure, yet broad personally vs. socially focused value dimensions were qualitatively discernible. We highlight opportunities and challenges for future value research using autobiographical stories. (shrink)

We study the Hardy field associated with an o-minimal expansion of the real numbers. If the set of analytic germs is dense in the Hardy field, then we can definably analytically separate sets in , and we can definably analytically approximate definable continuous unary functions. A similar statement holds for definable smooth functions.

In this article, “Object Lessons and the Desire of Psychoanalysis,” I meditate on the significance of Robyn Wiegman‘s 2012 monograph Object Lessons by examining the psychoanalytic significance of the concept of “transferential idealism” that Wiegman first introduced there. In doing so, I read Wiegman‘s Object Lessons through the lens of the book‘s psychoanalytic ethics and argue that the desire of Object Lessons is the desire of psychoanalysis: an enigmatic desire, borne from lack, which aims toward the proliferation of difference. By (...) foregrounding the psychoanalytic desire of Object Lessons, I also consider my own inheritances of the desire of Object Lessons as the desire of psychoanalysis, and argue for its urgent importance for the field of Trans Studies today. (shrink)

Der Aufsatz stellt einen Strang der experimentellen Philosophie vor, der sich nicht mit empirischen Umfragen begnügt, sondern bemüht, psychologische Experimente und Erklärungen für die philosophische Arbeit nutzbar zu machen: Das prominent propagierte, aber bislang nur vereinzelt praktizierte Forschungsprogramm der kognitiven Epistemologie (alias ‚sources project‘) verwendet bereits vorliegende experimentelle und theoretische Ergebnisse der Kognitions- und Sozialpsychologie, um ihrerseits experimentell überprüfbare Erklärungen philosophisch relevanter Intuitionen zu entwickeln, die deren epistemologische Bewertung erlauben. Während die Diskussion in und um die experimentelle Philosophie sich bislang (...) auf die Untersuchung von Intuitionen konzentrierte, die als Evidenz für oder gegen philosophische Theorien verwendet werden, behandelt dieser Aufsatz Intuitionen, die philosophische Paradoxa erzeugen und charakterisch philosophische Probleme aufwerfen. Er präsentiert Ergebnisse der Diskursprozessforschung aus Kognitionspsychologie und Psycholinguistik, insbesondere die empirisch gut untermauerte graded salience Hypothese und experimentelle Arbeiten zur Rolle von Stereotypen bei Verwendung und Interpretation von Verben. Auf dieser Grundlage entwickelt er eine ihrerseits experimentell überprüfbare Erklärung von Intuitionen, die ein klassisches Leitproblem der Philosophie der Wahrnehmung aufwerfen. Dieses (neuerdings schlicht so genannte) ‚Problem der Wahrnehmung‘ wird von einer Reihe von Paradoxa aufgeworfen, deren historisch einflussreichstes das sog. ‚Illusionsargument‘ ist. Der Aufsatz entwickelt eine Erklärung von Intuitionen, die diesem Argument als Prämissen dienen. Sie erlaubt uns – ohne naturalistischen Fehlschluss – zu zeigen, dass wir keine Berechtigung haben, diese Intuitionen zu akzeptieren. Der Aufsatz erläutert abschliessend, inwiefern dies zur Auflösung des Problems der Wahrnehmung beiträgt. Er führt exemplarisch vor, wie kognitive Epistemologie zu einer neuen Form philosophischer Problemauflösung beitragen kann. (shrink)