Die Idee zu der in diesem Band dokumentierten Tagung ist im Rahmen des disziplinübergreifenden Nachwuchswissenschaftsnetzwerkes THESIS entstanden. Der Dialog über die fachlichen und disziplinären Grenzen hinweg hat bei THESIS seit dessen Gründung im Jahre 1990 stets einen großen Raum eingenommen. Anderen Fächern Respekt und Interesse entgegenzubringen und sich nicht von stereotypen Vorurteilen leiten zu lassen, ist konstitutiver Bestandteil im Selbstverständnis des Netzwerkes. Selbstverständlich gibt es in einem solchen Verbund eine Reihe von Gelegenheiten (darunter auch den einen oder anderen entwicklungsfördernden Konflikt), (...) das eigene Bild vom Anderen und das andere Bild vom Eigenen zur Sprache zu bringen und zu hinterfragen. Auf der Basis dieser bestehenden Kommunikationsstrukturen trafen sich am 11. Oktober 2003 in Göttingen 12 junge Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler zwischen, über und auch auf den Grenzen ihrer eigenen Herkunftsdisziplinen, um den Trendbegriff [alpha]Transdisziplinarität" auf seine Substanz zu prüfen. (shrink)

Objective: To analyse the process of end of life decisions in a neurosurgical environment.Methods: All 113 neurosurgical patients, who were subject to so called end of life decisions within a one year period were prospectively enrolled in a computerised data bank. Decision pathways according to patient and physician related parameters were assessed.Results: Leading primary diagnoses of the patients were traumatic brain injury and intracranial haemorrhage. Forty-five patients had undergone an emergency neurosurgical operation prior to end of life decision, N = (...) 69 were conservatively treated, which included intracranial pressure recording, or they were not offered neurosurgical care because of futile prognosis. N = 111 died after a median of two days. Two, in whom the end of life decisions were revised, survived. Clear decisions to terminate further treatment were made by a senior staff member on call being informed by the senior resident on call , difficult decisions on the basis of extensive round discussions , and very difficult decision by an interdisciplinary ethical consult . Decisions were further substantiated by electrophysiological examinations in N = 59.Conclusion: End of life decisions are to be considered standard situations for neurosurgeons. These decisions may reach a high rate of “positive” prediction, if substantiated by electrophysiological examinations as well as on the grounds of clinical experience and respect for the assumed will of the patient. The fact that patients may survive following revision of an end of life decision underlines the necessity for repeated reassessment of these decisions. Ethical training for neurosurgeons is to be encouraged. (shrink)

I consider three questions concerning the relation of the good will to the moral worth of actions. (1) Does a good will consist simply in acting from the motive of duty? (2) Does acting from the motive of duty presuppose that one has a good will? (3) Does the fact that one has a good wilI entail that all of one’s duty-fulfilling actions have moral worth, even if they are not (directly) motivated by duty? I argue that while only persons (...) with a good will are capable of acting from the motive of duty, it does not follow either that a good will consists in acting from duty or that if one has a good will, all of one’s dutiful actions will be motivated by duty. Whereas the good will is constituted by the agent’s highest-order maxim (the moral law itself), moral worth is a function of the agent’s first-order maxims. (shrink)

In a behavioral study we analyzed the influence of visual action primes on abstract action sentence processing. We thereby aimed at investigating mental motor involvement during processes of meaning constitution of action verbs in abstract contexts. In the first experiment, participants executed either congruous or incongruous movements parallel to a video prime. In the second experiment, we added a no-movement condition. After the execution of the movement, participants rendered a sensibility judgment on action sentence targets. It was expected that congruous (...) movements would facilitate both concrete and abstract action sentence comprehension in comparison to the incongruous and the no-movement condition. Results in Experiment 1 showed a concreteness effect but no effect of motor priming. Experiment 2 revealed a concreteness effect as well as an interaction effect of the sentence and the movement condition. The findings indicate an involvement of motor processes in abstract action language processing on a behavioral level. (shrink)

Rawls’s theory of justice has been criticized for allowing individuals by their own voluntary choice to make themselves members of the ‘least advantaged’ class and thereby eligible, albeit undeservedly, for the benefits mandated by the Difference Principle. I argue, first, that this criticism overlooks the fact that the Difference Principle applies only to the lifetime expectations of representative persons and, second, that it is possible to implement the Difference Principle (and the social minimum) through policies that do not create work (...) disincentives or require making objectionable moral judgments about who is and who is not deserving of assistance. (shrink)

Den Plan, seine Untersuchungen zur Deskriptiven Psychologie in einem umfassenden Werk zur Darstellung zu bringen, hat Brentano nicht verwirklicht. Neben kleineren Schriften zu diesem Gedankenkreis sind aber die Kollegmanuskripte der 1887 bis 1891 unter wechselnden Titeln gehaltenen Wiener Vorlesungen zur Deskriptiven Psychologie erhalten.

I consider three questions concerning the relation of the good will to the moral worth of actions. (1) Does a good will consist simply in acting from the motive of duty? (2) Does acting from the motive of duty presuppose that one has a good will? (3) Does the fact that one has a good wilI entail that all of one’s duty-fulfilling actions have moral worth, even if they are not (directly) motivated by duty? I argue that while only persons (...) with a good will are capable of acting from the motive of duty, it does not follow either that a good will consists in acting from duty or that if one has a good will, all of one’s dutiful actions will be motivated by duty. Whereas the good will is constituted by the agent’s highest-order maxim (the moral law itself), moral worth is a function of the agent’s first-order maxims. (shrink)

Die Kontroverse Jacobi - Schelling über die Frage, wie Gott zu denken sei, war zugleich Ausdruck und Anregung für die Diskussion des Verhältnisses von Glaube, Wissen, Philosophie und Theologie, die seit der Neuzeit lebendig ist. Der unterschiedliche Weg des Denkens beider Philosophen bis zum Streit und die Kontroverse selbst mit ihren Themen sind Marksteine. Die offenbar gewordene Aporie beider «Lösungen» verweist auf die Notwendigkeit, über ihre Aussagen hinaus weiterzudenken (Hegel, Schellings Spätphilosophie, Gegenwartsdenken). Daraus lassen sich religionsphilosophische und wissenschaftstheoretische Prolegomena zu (...) einer theologischen Behandlung des Themas Denken und Transzendenz eruieren. (shrink)

Behaviourism is the view that preferences, beliefs, and other mental states in social-scientific theories are nothing but constructs re-describing people's behaviour. Mentalism is the view that they capture real phenomena, on a par with the unobservables in science, such as electrons and electromagnetic fields. While behaviourism has gone out of fashion in psychology, it remains influential in economics, especially in ‘revealed preference’ theory. We defend mentalism in economics, construed as a positive science, and show that it fits best scientific practice. (...) We distinguish mentalism from, and reject, the radical neuroeconomic view that behaviour should be explained in terms of brain processes, as distinct from mental states. (shrink)

Pets are truly great companions. Some individuals feel that owning a pet can help them prepare for a growing family by giving them a taste of what it would be like to have children. This study also looks into the psychological well-being and life experiences of LGBT fur parents. Employing the Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis, the findings of this study were: (1) With the presence of fur babies, participants had the ease to overcome stressful events, especially the ones that affect their (...) mental health. With these, they have the desire to take care of their fur babies under all circumstances because they see their fur babies as family members. Fur babies are excellent sources of motivation, confidence, and happiness for fur parents. They are treated as family members because they contribute to the mental and emotional aspects of fur parents. Moreover, the majority of respondents valued their pets far more than their actual family members, however, some didn't spend as much time with their relatives and friends. This study comes to the conclusion that a stronger bond with one's dog was also linked to higher anxiety about being unloved and rejected by family members and people surrounding us, which was linked to a heavier impact on one's psychological well-being. In reality, fur parents, especially LGBT parents, offer their fur babies a lot of love and attention compared to other things. (shrink)

The ArgumentThe political changes in Czechoslovakia and in other Eastern European countries in 1989 are closely related to Jan Patoĉka's philosophy. He was one of the first speakers for the human rights manifesto “Charta 77” and died following his political interrogations in 1978. Vàclav Havel, the president of the ĉSFR, was one of his students. Patoĉka's philosophy is sketched here following his interpretation of Comenius, beginning with an early work of 1932 and until his interpretation of Comenius' The Paradise of (...) the World and the Labyrinth of the Heart in his book Die Philosophic der Erziehung des J. A. Comenius.As a phenomenologist who transcends both Husserl and Heidegger, Patoĉka's conflict with the political system of his country was inevitable. The regime could not put up with his thesis on the “open soul” which, due to its existential openness, can hear the “call of conscience.” Behind this thesis stands Patocka's teaching of the three movements of existence. And out of this follows his “Education of the Turning.” Patoĉka's theory of education leads straight to some nondogmatic conceptions of education such as the “Communication Pedagogics” which dates back to the dialogical education of Martin Buber. (shrink)

Insect and pathogen attacks activate plant defense genes within minutes in nearby cells, and within hours in leaves far distant from the sites of the predator attacks. A search for signal molecules involved in both the localized and distal signalling has resulted in the identification of an 18‐amino‐acid polypeptide, called systemin, that activates defense genes in leaves of tomato plants when supplied at levels as low as fmols/plant. Several lines of evidence support a role for systemin as a wound hormone. (...) As with animal polypeptide hormones, systemin is derived from a larger precursor protein, called prosystemin, by limited proteolysis. Systemin has been shown by autoradiography to be phloemmobile and, by antisense technology, to be an essential component of the wound‐inducible, systemic signal transduction system leading to the transcriptional activation of the defensive genes. A search for the receptor of systemin has led to the identification in plant plasma membranes of a systeminbinding protein. However, this protein has properties not of a receptor, but of a furin‐like proteinase that cleaves systemin into smaller polypeptides. Systemin and its precursor prosystemin provide prototypes for the emerging possibilities that polypeptide hormones may have broad roles in signalling environmental stress responses, and in regulating plant growth and development as well. (shrink)

Adaptationist explanations for well-known phenomena are of limited value to psychological science. To be truly useful, evolutionary psychological research programs must produce novel discoveries about contemporary cognitive and behavioral processes. The concept of special design is especially useful. Even if special design cannot be convincingly demonstrated, rigorous attempts to meet this evidentiary standard can produce novel scientific contributions.

Agents are often assumed to have degrees of belief (“credences”) and also binary beliefs (“beliefs simpliciter”). How are these related to each other? A much-discussed answer asserts that it is rational to believe a proposition if and only if one has a high enough degree of belief in it. But this answer runs into the “lottery paradox”: the set of believed propositions may violate the key rationality conditions of consistency and deductive closure. In earlier work, we showed that this problem (...) generalizes: there exists no local function from degrees of belief to binary beliefs that satisfies some minimal conditions of rationality and non-triviality. “Locality” means that the binary belief in each proposition depends only on the degree of belief in that proposition, not on the degrees of belief in others. One might think that the impossibility can be avoided by dropping the assumption that binary beliefs are a function of degrees of belief. We prove that, even if we drop the “functionality” restriction, there still exists no local relation between degrees of belief and binary beliefs that satisfies some minimal conditions. Thus functionality is not the source of the impossibility; its source is the condition of locality. If there is any non-trivial relation between degrees of belief and binary beliefs at all, it must be a “holistic” one. We explore several concrete forms this “holistic” relation could take. (shrink)

We introduce a “reason-based” framework for explaining and predicting individual choices. It captures the idea that a decision-maker focuses on some but not all properties of the options and chooses an option whose motivationally salient properties he/she most prefers. Reason-based explanations allow us to distinguish between two kinds of context-dependent choice: the motivationally salient properties may (i) vary across choice contexts, and (ii) include not only “intrinsic” properties of the options, but also “context-related” properties. Our framework can accommodate boundedly rational (...) and sophisticatedly rational choice. Since properties can be recombined in new ways, it also offers resources for predicting choices in unobserved contexts. (shrink)

When one thinks—knows, believes, imagines—that something is the case, one’s thought has a topic: it is about something, towards which one’s mind is directed. What is the logic of thought, so understood? This book begins to explore the idea that, to answer the question, we should take topics seriously. It proposes a hyperintensional account of the propositional contents of thought, arguing that these are individuated not only by the set of possible worlds at which they are true, but also by (...) their topic: what they are about. The book then builds epistemic, doxastic, probabilistic, and conditional logics based on this view. It applies them to issues ranging from dogmatism, scepticism, and epistemic fallibilism, to imagination and suppositional reasoning, belief revision, framing effects, and the acceptability of indicative conditionals. (shrink)

Virtues are standardly understood as (1) essentially dispositions to perform certain actions and (2) having only instrumental value as motives to fulfill moral duties which can be fulfilled by persons lacking the virtue because the duties mandate only certain act-types. The argument of this article is that the duties of beneficence, gratitude and self-respect cannot be stated in terms of obligatory act-types because they cannot be fulfilled (except in deficient form) by persons lacking the appropriate virtue; they are, rather, duties (...) to cultivate specific virtues which therefore cannot themselves be defined in terms of obligatory actions. (shrink)

Suppose several individuals (e.g., experts on a panel) each assign probabilities to some events. How can these individual probability assignments be aggregated into a single collective probability assignment? This article reviews several proposed solutions to this problem. We focus on three salient proposals: linear pooling (the weighted or unweighted linear averaging of probabilities), geometric pooling (the weighted or unweighted geometric averaging of probabilities), and multiplicative pooling (where probabilities are multiplied rather than averaged). We present axiomatic characterisations of each class of (...) pooling functions (most of them classic, but one new) and argue that linear pooling can be justified procedurally, but not epistemically, while the other two pooling methods can be justified epistemically. The choice between them, in turn, depends on whether the individuals' probability assignments are based on shared information or on private information. We conclude by mentioning a number of other pooling methods. (shrink)

Which rules for aggregating judgments on logically connected propositions are manipulable and which not? In this paper, we introduce a preference-free concept of non-manipulability and contrast it with a preference-theoretic concept of strategy-proofness. We characterize all non-manipulable and all strategy-proof judgment aggregation rules and prove an impossibility theorem similar to the Gibbard--Satterthwaite theorem. We also discuss weaker forms of non-manipulability and strategy-proofness. Comparing two frequently discussed aggregation rules, we show that “conclusion-based voting” is less vulnerable to manipulation than “premise-based voting”, (...) which is strategy-proof only for “reason-oriented” individuals. Surprisingly, for “outcome-oriented” individuals, the two rules are strategically equivalent, generating identical judgments in equilibrium. Our results introduce game-theoretic considerations into judgment aggregation and have implications for debates on deliberative democracy. (shrink)

We propose a new account of indicative conditionals, giving acceptability and logical closure conditions for them. We start from Adams’ Thesis: the claim that the acceptability of a simple indicative equals the corresponding conditional probability. The Thesis is widely endorsed, but arguably false and refuted by empirical research. To fix it, we submit, we need a relevance constraint: we accept a simple conditional 'If φ, then ψ' to the extent that (i) the conditional probability p(ψ|φ) is high, provided that (ii) (...) φ is relevant for ψ. How (i) should work is well-understood. It is (ii) that holds the key to improve our understanding of conditionals. Our account has (i) a probabilistic component, using Popper functions; (ii) a relevance component, given via an algebraic structure of topics or subject matters. We present a probabilistic logic for simple indicatives, and argue that its (in)validities are both theoretically desirable and in line with empirical results on how people reason with conditionals. (shrink)