Der 16. Band des bei Gallimard erschienenen Gesamtwerkes enthält, auf drei Seiten, Aufzeichnungen, die Tocqueville um 1836/37 über Platon gemacht hat. In Briefen an Louis de Kergorlay (OC XIII, 1, 388) und Pierre-Paul Royer-Collard (OC XI, 19), beide im August 1836 in Baden verfasst, weist Tocqueville darauf hin, dass er u. a. dabei ist, Platon zu lesen. Obwohl Tocqueville die spiritualistische Grundausrichtung der Platonischen Philosophie mit ihrem strikten Dualismus gutheißt, gibt es doch einige Elemente dieser Philosophie, die im Widerspruch (...) zu den liberalen Prämissen des Tocquevilleschen Denkens stehen. (shrink)

Die Studie bemüht sich um eine Rekonstruktion des ästhetischen Denkens Goethes bis zur Weimarer Klassik. Im Untersuchungsgebiet zeichnen sich schon sehr früh Tendenzen zur Autonomisierung der Kunst- und Literaturtheorie ab. In Anlehnung an Pierre Bourdieus Konzept des literarischen Feldes werden paradigmatische theoretische Schriften einer intertextuellen Mikroanalyse unterzogen und zugleich sowohl mit den unmittelbaren Entstehungsumständen und künstlerischen Bezugspunkten, als auch v.a. mit ihren europäischen Kontexten in Beziehung gesetzt. Die Spezifik wie auch die Exemplarität der nicht-systematischen Ästhetik Goethes sind somit vor (...) einem erweiterten Horizont neu zu diskutieren. (shrink)

Der 16. Band des bei Gallimard erschienenen Gesamtwerkes enthält, auf drei Seiten, Aufzeichnungen, die Tocqueville um 1836/37 über Platon gemacht hat. In Briefen an Louis de Kergorlay und Pierre-Paul Royer-Collard, beide im August 1836 in Baden verfasst, weist Tocqueville darauf hin, dass er u. a. dabei ist, Platon zu lesen. Obwohl Tocqueville die spiritualistische Grundausrichtung der Platonischen Philosophie mit ihrem strikten Dualismus gutheißt, gibt es doch einige Elemente dieser Philosophie, die im Widerspruch zu den liberalen Prämissen des Tocquevilleschen Denkens (...) stehen. (shrink)

An examination of the fundamental role cybernetics played in the birth of cognitive science and the light this sheds on current controversies. The conceptual history of cognitive science remains for the most part unwritten. In this groundbreaking book, Jean-Pierre Dupuy—one of the principal architects of cognitive science in France—provides an important chapter: the legacy of cybernetics. Contrary to popular belief, Dupuy argues, cybernetics represented not the anthropomorphization of the machine but the mechanization of the human. The founding fathers of (...) cybernetics—some of the greatest minds of the twentieth century, including John von Neumann, Norbert Wiener, Warren McCulloch, and Walter Pitts—intended to construct a materialist and mechanistic science of mental behavior that would make it possible at last to resolve the ancient philosophical problem of mind and matter. The importance of cybernetics to cognitive science, Dupuy argues, lies not in its daring conception of the human mind in terms of the functioning of a machine but in the way the strengths and weaknesses of the cybernetics approach can illuminate controversies that rage today—between cognitivists and connectionists, eliminative materialists and Wittgensteinians, functionalists and anti-reductionists. Dupuy brings to life the intellectual excitement that attended the birth of cognitive science sixty years ago. He separates the promise of cybernetic ideas from the disappointment that followed as cybernetics was rejected and consigned to intellectual oblivion. The mechanization of the mind has reemerged today as an all-encompassing paradigm in the convergence of nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology, and cognitive science. The tensions, contradictions, paradoxes, and confusions Dupuy discerns in cybernetics offer a cautionary tale for future developments in cognitive science. (shrink)

El artículo analiza los aportes de la teoría sociológica de Norbert Elías y Pierre Bourdieu al campo de las ciencias sociales. Siguiendo a Corcuff, podemos ubicar las obras de estos dos autores dentro de las teorías constructivistas. Teorías que producen un desplazamiento mismo del objeto de la sociología: ni la sociedad ni los individuos, concebidos como entidades separadas, sino las relaciones entre individuos. Con ello, se abordan el rechazo a la teoría pura; el abordaje multidisciplinar y la vigilancia (...) epistemológica en la construcción del objeto de estudio; la superación de la oposición subjetivismo-objetivismo; la explicación social, histórica y relacional de los fenómenos sociales; la concepción agonista de lo social; y, por último, el eje temático que atraviesa las obras de dos autores con diferencias pero complementarios. (shrink)

Norbert Elias (1897-1990) is now widely regarded as one of the greatest sociologists of the 20th century. The challenge and profundity of his work are still being assimilated. Some have suggested that in time, he will be regarded as the Copernicus or Darwin of sociology, the man who set the subject on its scientific course. These four volumes provide a comprehensive and penetrating survey of Elias's life and work. They pinpoint the main fields of research which Elias and his (...) followers have explored: the civilizing process; state-formation; knowledge, religion and science; informalization; power; established-outsider figurations in fields such as class, gender and race; the sociology of the body; the sociology of the emotions; the sociology of leisure, sport and the arts; the sociology of the professions; medicine and psychoanalysis; crime and punishment; drug use and abuse. The collection also explores the various critiques of Elias's `figurational' or `process' sociology and counter-critiques by Elias's followers. The volumes successfully locate the work of Elias and his followers in the context of modern sociology, especially in relation to writers such as Mannheim, Adorno, Parsons, Goffman, Foucault and Bourdieu. In the penetrating, original and informative Introduction, Eric Dunning and Stephen Mennell elucidate Elias's sociological contributions and the bearing his life experiences had on his work. The collection is an invaluable resource for anyone interested in the sociological contribution of Norbert Elias. The collection is organized in the following 4 volumes: Volume 1 Focuses on Elias's work in the context of his life and career, and reviews his place in the contemporary social sciences, especially in relation to such figures as Michel Foucault and Pierre Bourdieu. Also discussed in this volume are Elias's pathbreaking contributions to such issues as: the 'agency-structure' dilemma; habitus; power; involvement and detachment; knowledge and the sciences; time; and the relations between history and sociology. Volume 2 Addresses Elias's major empiricallybased contributions to sociological theory, especially the theories of the civilizing process, state formation and established-outsider figurations. Also discussed are informalization and de-civilizing processes, and the applications of the established-outsider theory to such fields as race, gender and sexuality. Volume 3 Examines figurational contributions to special areas of sociology such as: the sociology of the body; the sociology of the emotions; the sociology of everyday life, sport, leisure, lifestyles, taste, music and the arts; deviance and crime; the sociology of health and illness; psychiatry, psychoanalysis, and psychology; death and dying; and drugs and tobacco use. Volume 4 Focuses on criticisms of Elias's work and the responses of Elias and his sociological followers. Key themes are: civilization and the Holocaust; sports violence, especially soccer hooliganism; the meanings and value of concepts like 'development', 'evolution' and 'change'; and the relative merits of long-term and short-term approaches. The end of the volume returns to the issue of Elias's place in contemporary sociology and the growing worldwide recognition of the significance of his contribution. Eric Dunning is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at the University of Leicester; Stephen Mennell is Professor of Sociology, University College Dublin. (shrink)

Ernst Rüdin was the founder of psychiatric genetics and was also a founder of the German racial hygiene movement. Throughout his long career he played a major role in promoting eugenic ideas and policies in Germany, including helping formulate the 1933 Nazi eugenic sterilization law and other governmental policies directed against the alleged carriers of genetic defects. In the 1940s Rüdin supported the killing of children and mental patients under a Nazi program euphemistically called “Euthanasia.” The authors document these crimes (...) and discuss their implications, and also present translations of two publications Rüdin co-authored in 1938 showing his strong support for Hitler and his policies. The authors also document what they see as revisionist historical accounts by leading psychiatric genetic authors. They outline three categories of contemporary psychiatric genetic accounts of Rüdin and his work: those who write about German psychiatric genetics in the Nazi period, but either fail to mention Rüdin at all, or cast him in a favorable light; those who acknowledge that Rüdin helped promote eugenic sterilization and/or may have worked with the Nazis, but generally paint a positive picture of Rüdin’s research and fail to mention his participation in the “euthanasia” killing program; and those who have written that Rüdin committed and supported unspeakable atrocities. The authors conclude by calling on the leaders of psychiatric genetics to produce a detailed and complete account of their field’s history, including all of the documented crimes committed by Rüdin and his associates. (shrink)

We propose a modular ontology of the dynamic features of reality. This amounts, on the one hand, to a purely spatial ontology supporting snapshot views of the world at successive instants of time and, on the other hand, to a purely spatiotemporal ontology of change and process. We argue that dynamic spatial ontology must combine these two distinct types of inventory of the entities and relationships in reality, and we provide characterizations of spatiotemporal reasoning in the light of the interconnections (...) between them. (shrink)

Compilation of the most important documents and speeches by Pierre de Coubertin on Olympism and the Olympic Games.

Through a detailed study of Spinoza's concept of 'experience', Moreau shows how Spinoza extends the power of reason to capture the singularity of individuals: their lives, languages, passions and societies.

In this article, Pierre Hadot examines the late philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein and the so-called “linguistic turn” in philosophy and the social sciences. Although certain interpreters of Wittgenstein have thought that Philosophical Investigations shows philosophy to be predicated on a series of confusions based on the misuse of language, Hadot argues contrarily that an understanding of Wittgenstein’s idea of “language games”—far from ending philosophy—allows us to see it anew and to discern the source of some of its deepest perplexities. (...) Of particular concern is the notion of the ancient idea of philosophical discourse as intrinsically connected to various forms of apprenticeship or spiritual formation. It is in this context that the supposed inconsistencies and unusual repetitions of ancient philosophy can be understood. Only from the Middle Ages do philosophical language games begin slowly to become detached from certain kinds of training, of pedagogies connected to forms of life, and become texts—and “systems”—in the sense of being written for the purposes of merely conventional reading. (shrink)

This paper assesses the so-called “direct-perception” model of empathy. This model draws much of its inspiration from the Phenomenological tradition: it is offered as an account free from the assumption that most, if not all, of another’s psychological states and experiences are unobservable and that one’s understanding of another’s psychological states and experiences are based on inferential processes. Advocates of this model also reject the simulation-based approach to empathy. I first argue that most of their criticisms miss their target because (...) they are directed against the simulation-based approach to mindreading. Advocates of this model further subscribe to an expressivist conception of human behavior and assume that some of an individual’s psychological states (e.g. her goals and emotions, not her beliefs) can be directly perceived in the individual’s expressive behavior. I argue that advocates of the direct-perception model face the following dilemma: either they embrace behaviorism or else they must recognize that one could not understand another’s goal or emotion from her behavior alone without making contextual assumptions. Finally, advocates of the direct-perception model endorse the narrative competency hypothesis, according to which the ability to ascribe beliefs to another is grounded in the ability to understand narratives. I argue that this hypothesis is hard to reconcile with recent results in developmental psychology showing that preverbal human infants seem able to ascribe false beliefs to others. (shrink)

Crucial in Pierre Hadot’s account of ancient philosophy as a way of life is the phenomenon of conversion. Well before he encountered some of the decisive influences upon his understanding of philosophy, Hadot already understood ancient philosophy and its long legacy in later thinkers of the West as much more than a formal discourse. Philosophy is an experience, or at least the exploration and articulation of a potential for experience. The energy of this potential originates in a polar tension (...) between epistrophe and metanoia. The two poles, which are grounded in primal experiences of the living organism, motivate and model the conversion which must be lived by the philosopher. The genius of Western philosophical experience lies in the effort to synthesize return and rebirth, and thereby recover the self as an ontological point of identification with and origin of the cosmos. (shrink)

Alvin Goldman contends that, in addition to the familiar sense or use of the term “knowledge” according to which knowledge is at least true justified belief, there is a weaker yet strict sense or use of the term “knowledge” according to which knowledge amounts to nothing more than information-possession or mere true belief. In this paper, I argue that Goldman has failed to show that there is such a weaker sense, and that, even if he had shown this, he has (...) not shown that this putative weaker sense is a strict one by his own criterion for strictness. (shrink)

Introduction Major scientific revolutions are rarely, if ever, started deliberately. They can be "in the air" for a long time before the first recognizable ...

Programmed cell death (PCD) in unicellular organisms is in some instances an altruistic trait. When the beneficiaries are clones or close kin, kin selection theory may be used to explain the evolution of the trait, and when the trait evolves in groups of distantly related individuals, group or multilevel selection theory is invoked. In mixed microbial communities, the benefits are also available to unrelated taxa. But the evolutionary ecology of PCD in communities is poorly understood. Few hypotheses have been offered (...) concerning the community role of PCD despite its far-reaching effects. The hypothesis we consider here is that PCD is a black queen. The Black Queen Hypothesis (BQH) outlines how public goods arising from a leaky function are exploited by other taxa in the community. Black Queen (BQ) traits are essential for community survival, but only some members bear the cost of possessing them, while others lose the trait In addition, BQ traits have been defined in terms of adaptive gene loss, and it is unknown whether this has occurred for PCD. Our conclusion is that PCD fulfils the two most important criteria of a BQ (leakiness and costliness), but that more empirical data are needed for assessing the remaining two criteria. In addition, we hold that for viewing PCD as a BQ, the original BQH needs to include social traits. Thus, despite some empirical and conceptual shortcomings, the BQH provides a helpful avenue for investigating PCD in microbial communities. (shrink)

1. Tout système juridique est production d’une histoire et d’une culture politiques déterminée, qui lui ont donné une organisation spécifique. Parler des limites de telles organisations peut s’entendre en deux sens, qui interagissent: premièrement, elles peuvent servir à différencier ces systèmes par rapport à d’autres ordres normatifs. Secondement, elles désignent ce que, par sa texture, le droit est hors d’état de réussir. 2. On comprend le concept de système comme une organisation aux structures différenciées de textes, de normes, d’acteurs. Ce (...) qui caractérise un système est son autoréférentialité et ses modes de clôture et ses modes d’ouverture. 3. Concernant la limite dans le second sens, on observera que la normativité comme mode d’action propre au droit le met souvent dans l’incapacité d’assumer pleinement les tâches de régulation qui lui sont confiées. Il s’agit d’une part d’une limite factuelle: celle de la technicité et du volume de ces tâches. D’autre part, la nécessité de plus en plus fréquente de prendre en compte les circonstances individuelles concrètes de l’application entraîne une légistique de diminution de la densité normative et, par conséquent, de déplacer une épistémologie fondée sur la répétition en direction de l’innovation. 4. Ces deux facteurs notamment font du droit un univers qui ne peut plus prétendre à une complétude cohérente: c’est un univers en constante évolution, qui exige pour sa mise en œuvre, de manière continue, l’apport d’informations provenant de son environnement. Ces apports circulent dans les modes d’ouverture du droit—la diminution de la densité normative et le recours à des expertises, des savoirs, des déontologies extérieures. Cependant, en vertu de l’autoréférentialité du droit, ces apports doivent être sélectionnés et juridicisés pour être intégrés dans le système juridique et préserver ainsi sa clôture. Il y a là une double programmation à respecter: la sélection doit d’une part respecter le cadre normatif du droit et de l’autre porter sur un choix correspondant aux attentes sociales qu’il s’agit de convaincre de son bien-fondé. Les limites du droit par rapport à d’autres ordres normatifs est ainsi définie par l’ordre juridique lui-même, dans le respect de cette double programmation. 5. Ce système a des présupposés politiques, culturels et historiques qui empêchent d’élaborer sans autre une essence du droit, valable urbi et orbi: notamment séparation des pouvoirs et liberté d’expression. Il n’est même pas certain qu’il puisse perdurer. En particulier, l’internalisation croissante du droit n’est guère conciliable avec son organisation telle que l’Occident l’a conçue. En outre, de plus en plus le droit devient l’objet d’une normativité supérieure, au nom de laquelle il est lui-même jugé: c’est le phénomène de l’économisation du droit. (shrink)

La formule célèbre d’Aristote « la nature ne fait rien en vain », telle qu’elle est utilisée dans le traité sur la Locomotion des animaux, invite à reformuler le problème général du finalisme en zoologie et de la conformité à la nature. Bien que cette formule, en première approche, semble aller dans le sens d’une téléologie cosmique ou globale, elle conduit en fait à privilégier une téléologie relative, c’est-à-dire locale, qui opère à l’échelle des êtres vivants. Elle s’applique en effet, (...) non pas de manière absolue, mais relativement aux possibilités définies par la nature de l’espèce (propriétés spécifiques et génériques). Toutefois, elle n’exprime pas seulement le rapport à la finalité organique stricto sensu, mais aussi les conditions nécessaires externes du mouvement animal, conditions qui définissent, pour les espèces et les genres, un régime commun d’organisation. (shrink)

Les anecdotes et la réalité de l'écoute sont infinies", affirmait Luciano Berio. L'attention portée à l'écoute musicale occupe aujourd'hui une part importante de la recherche musicologique et ethnomusicologique. Cet ouvrage s'inscrit dans cette actualité et rassemble dix-huit essais autour de quatre axes : paradigmes de l'écoute ; l'écoute comme expérience ; l'écoute analysée ; chemins d'écoute. Il interroge l'écoute en tant qu'elle est multiple ou qu'elle s'intéresse à des multiples. Multiple s'entend tour à tour au sens de divers, de varié, (...) de pluriel, mais aussi de soumis à une itération ou à une réplication. Multiple(s) des musiques à l'ère de la reproductibilité technique et des outils numériques, multiple(s) des musiques de transmission orale, multiple(s) des œuvres ouvertes ou improvisées, multiple(s) de la mémoire : autant de champs dans lesquels l'écoute est mise en question. (shrink)

Il est de plus en plus fréquent d'entendre parler d'éducation individualisée en même temps que communautaire grâce à l'échange et à l'entraide. Cet ouvrage présente sur le sujet une documentation très fouillée; la 1ère partie fait part des fondements et précurseurs de la méthode, les réalisations font l'objet de la 2e partie et tous les documents et exemples ont été placés en 3e partie.

In the last lines of Politics VII, 3, Aristotle states that the happy city acts nobly. This implies that the city has a practical life, and that this life has its end in itself. This claim seems to contradict the famous distinction, which has been made elsewhere by Aristotle, between the practical and theoretical lives. It is argued in this paper that there is, here, neither contradiction nor inconsistency in Aristotle’s conception of human action. Some readings, according to which this (...) passage deals with the role of the philosophers in the happy city, are also ruled out. The proposed solution consists in showing that this text refers to a broader conception of action, one that is beyond the sphere of human practical activities: any genuine praxis has its goal in itself, even when it produces external effects. (shrink)

Ce texte a déjà paru dans les Cahiers d'ethnomusicologie, n° 10, 1997, p. 3-16. Il est disponible en ligne également ici. Nous remercions Pierre Sauvanet et les Cahiers d'ethnomusicologie de nous avoir autorisé à le reproduire sur RHUTHMOS. Résumé : « L'ethnomusicologue et le philosophe » n'est pas le titre d'une nouvelle fable de La Fontaine, dont la morale serait « Rien n'est si dangereux qu'un ignorant ami / Mieux vaudrait un sage ennemi « (L'Ours et l'Amateur des Jardins) (...) ; mais, plus sérieusement, le (...) - Philosophie – Nouvel article. (shrink)

Ce texte a déjà paru dans la mineure « Rythmanalyses » de la revue Multitudes, n° 46, 2011. Nous remercions la revue Multitudes et Pierre Sauvanet de nous avoir autorisé à le reproduire ici. Premier temps. Regardons pour commencer Young and Innocent : la dernière scène de ce film de jeunesse d'Alfred Hitchcock est un grand moment de cinéma — mais pas seulement. Comme souvent chez le réalisateur, la trame du film se noue autour de ce jeune homme, accusé (...) d'un meurtre qu'il n'a pas - Pour une éthique et une politique du rythme – Nouvel article. (shrink)

Pourquoi Aristote semble-t-il refuser aux artefacts le statut de substances? Cette question fait l’objet d’interprétations divergentes. Partant d’un passage généralement négligé de Métaphysique H 3 et en s’appuyant sur plusieurs textes de Metaph. Z 7-9, on défend la thèse selon laquelle il ne suffit pas d’évoquer le fait que les formes des êtres naturels sont éternelles. La différence entre les artefacts et les êtres naturels repose surtout sur le statut ontologique et la fonction de leurs formes respectives. Le livre H (...) de la Métaphysique, pris dans son ensemble, fournit plusieurs arguments permettant d’établir que les formes d’artefact ne sont pas des formes substantielles, des formes de plein droit, mais seulement des « différences » de la matière prochaine et de simples déterminations « analogues » à la substance proprement dite. Elles ont un statut intermédiaire entre la matière prochaine et la forme substantielle ; l’artefact n’est lui-même qu’un composé accidentel. (shrink)

We show a transfer principle for the property that all types realised in a given elementary extension are definable. It can be written as follows: a Henselian valued field is stably embedded in an elementary extension if and only if its value group is stably embedded in its corresponding extension, its residue field is stably embedded in its corresponding extension, and the extension of valued fields satisfies a certain algebraic condition. We show for instance that all types over the Hahn (...) field $$\mathbb {R}((\mathbb {Z}))$$ are definable. Similarly, all types over the quotient field of the Witt ring $$W(\mathbb {F}_p^{\text {alg}})$$ are definable. This extends a work of Cubides and Delon and of Cubides and Ye. (shrink)

Our question is whether technicality can institute, and thus create a new power, or even legitimize and maintain institutions. It claims to do so, all haloed by sacredness or religiosity with the development of computers, networks and the Internet. But this would presuppose that technology could symbolize, i.e. embody an instance of Truth, an irrational core of beliefs or myths that would answer the question of 'why' we live in society. It claims to do so as an ‘applied science’ or (...) technoscience, science having become the authority of truth in Western societies. But technicity cannot symbolize and remains locked in the "how", in the order of rational action, utility and efficiency. (shrink)