Concentrating on Weber's engagement with political issues and their influence over his more theoretical concepts, Mommsen offers a critical analysis of Weber's notion of democracy, distinguishing its liberal and elitist features.

Max Weber's magnum opus Economy and Society was for the most part published only after his premature death in June 1920. Only the chapters on basic sociological terms, the categories of social action, and the Three Times of Legitimate Domination were sent to the publishers by Weber himself; the other manuscripts were found in a pile on his desk. The editions by Marianne Weber and Melchior Palyi and by Johannes F. Winckelmann are in many ways unsatisfactory, and the controversy about (...) the correct composition of Economy and Society persists. This article reconstructs the origins of the various texts of Economy and Society on the basis of the available source material, notably the correspondence between Weber, Marianne Weber, and the publishers. It shows that in many ways the editions available at present do not live up to Max Weber's own intentions. Both the arrangement and the precise wording of the texts are unreliable, and the time sequence of the texts written from 1909 to 1914 and then in part rewritten and reorganized in 1919–1920 is uncertain. A segment of an earlier draft of parts of the chapter on Communities found among Weber's papers allows the conclusion that as early as 1905–1906, Weber had outlined a universal historical scheme of all known civilizations. This is to say that Economy and Society is not as closely linked to Weber's work on the Outline of Social Economics as has been previously assumed. This article offers a precise reconstruction of the complicated history of Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. Soziologie-the exact title agreed upon by Weber and his publisher Paul Siebeck shortly before his death. It shows the development of Weber's theoretical conceptions and the corresponding changes of his terminology much more clearly, and paves the way to a better understanding of his magnum opus. (shrink)

At the Seventh Congress of German Historians held at Heidelberg in April, 1903, Prof. Eduard Meyer delivered an address on the subject of Augustus, in which he expressed his view that the restitution of the republic was a genuine act of renunciation. ‘Augustus desired to dwell among his fellow-citizens not as a ruler but as a citizen, of course as the first among them all, as the princeps, like Camillus and the Scipios of old.’ If with Mommsen you described (...) the dual control of Caesar and Senate as a Dyarchy you ought not to forget that’ of the two the Senate in theory held complete predominance,1 the Emperor was ‘its executive, or as Tiberius expressed it, its servant, the Senate was the master .’. (shrink)

All students of Greek epigraphy are familiar with the abecedarium discovered in 1805, ‘prope Bastam ruri quodam dicto Melliche,’ by Luigi Cepolla, amongst whose papers Mommsen found and published it in his Unteritalische Dialekte . Cepolla's copy, though inaccurate, is not so bad, as I hope to show, as has usually been supposed. To be sure, he proposed to interpret an alphabet as a complete inscription, and actually ‘translated’ it! Nor, I think, could it be properly deciphered until more (...) Messapic inscriptions than were known to Mommsen had been collected and their alphabet more closely studied. It has, however, long been recognized that the Vaste alphabet should be rightly regarded as essentially a Messapic alphabet, although, as is well known, the alphabet of the Messapic inscriptions agrees in the main with the Tarentine-Ionic variety of the Western Greek alphabet; but the proposed explanations of Cepolla's transcript of the Vaste alphabet have been most diverse, not to say perverse—certainly they have been largely arbitrary. They may be sought in the places cited in the footnote below. (shrink)

Scientists and laypeople alike use the sense of understanding that an explanation conveys as a cue to good or correct explanation. Although the occurrence of this sense or feeling of understanding is neither necessary nor sufficient for good explanation, it does drive judgments of the plausibility and, ultimately, the acceptability, of an explanation. This paper presents evidence that the sense of understanding is in part the routine consequence of two well-documented biases in cognitive psychology: overconfidence and hindsight. In light of (...) the prevalence of counterfeit understanding in the history of science, I argue that many forms of cognitive achievement do not involve a sense of understanding, and that only the truth or accuracy of an explanation make the sense of understanding a valid cue to genuine understanding. (shrink)

This paper argues that for the purposes of any sort of serious discussion about immoral conduct in sport very little is illuminated by claiming that the conduct in question is cheating. In fact, describing some behavior as cheating is typically little more than expressing strong, but thoroughly vague and imprecise, moral disapproval or condemnation of another person or institution about a wide and ill-defined range of improper advantage-seeking behavior. Such expressions of disapproval fail to distinguish cheating from many other types (...) of immoral conduct. The discussion shows that we should set the concept aside and assess the moral disapproval implied by claims of cheating by reference to the moral and other principles that underlie the practice of sport. This allows us to consider carefully the complexity of the issues that are raised when allegations of cheating are made and not be distracted by the emotionally loaded, conversation-stopping tendency of the concept. This means that some types of disputes in sport will be messy and demand more effort to resolve, but the payoff will be better informed and more thoughtful discussions and greater awareness of the moral complexity of sport and of its principled underpinnings. (shrink)

The posterior parietal cortex (PPC) is the most likely site where egocentric spatial relationships are represented in the brain. PPC cells receive visual, auditory, somaesthetic, and vestibular sensory inputs; oculomotor, head, limb, and body motor signals; and strong motivational projections from the limbic system. Their discharge increases not only when an animal moves towards a sensory target, but also when it directs its attention to it. PPC lesions have the opposite effect: sensory inattention and neglect. The PPC does not seem (...) to contain a “map” of the location of objects in space but a distributed neural network for transforming one set of sensory vectors into other sensory reference frames or into various motor coordinate systems. Which set of transformation rules is used probably depends on attention, which selectively enhances the synapses needed for making a particular sensory comparison or aiming a particular movement. (shrink)

Recent studies indicate that mammalian chromosomes contain discretecis‐acting loci that control replication timing, mitotic condensation, and stability of entire chromosomes. Disruption of the large non‐coding RNA gene ASAR6 results in late replication, an under‐condensed appearance during mitosis, and structural instability of human chromosome 6. Similarly, disruption of the mouse Xist gene in adult somatic cells results in a late replication and instability phenotype on the X chromosome. ASAR6 shares many characteristics with Xist, including random mono‐allelic expression and asynchronous replication timing. (...) Additional “chromosome engineering” studies indicate that certain chromosome rearrangements affecting many different chromosomes display this abnormal replication and instability phenotype. These observations suggest that all mammalian chromosomes contain “inactivation/stability centers” that control proper replication, condensation, and stability of individual chromosomes. Therefore, mammalian chromosomes contain four types ofcis‐acting elements, origins, telomeres, centromeres, and “inactivation/stability centers”, all functioning to ensure proper replication, condensation, segregation, and stability of individual chromosomes. (shrink)

Providing an original and systematic treatment of foundational issues in philosophy of religion, J. L. Schellenberg's new book addresses the structure of..

Philosophical Analysis Its Development between the Two World Wars.

The philosophical literature on sport and games has had little to say about boredom beyond presuming that sports and games can be important ways of overcoming or preventing it. But boredom is an interesting and often misunderstood phenomenon with overlooked implications in this context. Boredom has significant human value and motivates play in ways that contribute to well-being and culture, often through encouraging engaged agency and exploration of novelty. Understanding boredom can also help to clarify problems and tendencies in sports (...) and games that qualify them as havens from boredom. (shrink)

Ned Block argues that the higher-order (HO) approach to explaining consciousness is ‘defunct’ because a prominent objection (the ‘misrepresentation objection’) exposes the view as ‘incoherent’. What’s more, a response to this objection that I’ve offered elsewhere (Weisberg 2010) fails because it ‘amounts to abusing the notion of what-it’s-like-ness’ (xxx).1 In this response, I wish to plead guilty as charged. Indeed, I will continue herein to abuse Block’s notion of what-it’s-like-ness. After doing so, I will argue that the HO approach accounts (...) for the sense of what-it’s-like-ness that matters in a theory of consciousness. I will also argue that the only incoherence present in the HO theory is that generated by embracing Block’s controversial notion of what-it’s-like-ness, something no theorist of any stripe ought to do. Block is famous for (among other things) having introduced the notion of ‘phenomenal consciousness’ into contemporary philosophy of mind (Block 1995). This term is widely employed in the philosophical literature and it even appears in the empirical literature. But wide-speared usage has brought about divergent interpretations of the term. We can distinguish a ‘moderate’ and a ‘zealous’ reading of ‘phenomenal consciousness’. On the moderate reading, ‘phenomenal consciousness’ just means ‘experience’. Many people have embraced this sense of the term and use it to roughly pick out conscious experience involving sensory quality (states like conscious visual experiences or conscious pains, for example).2 On the zealous reading, however, phenomenal consciousness is held to be ‘distinct from any cognitive, intentional, or functional property’ (Block 1995: 234). That is, any explanation of phenomenal consciousness in exclusively cognitive, intentional, or functional terms will fail to capture, without remainder, what is really distinctive about phenomenal consciousness. Block, of course, is fully clear about embracing the zealous reading; indeed, his initial introduction of the notion is in those terms. The same ambiguity occurs with the much-used (and abused) idea of ‘what-it’s-like-ness’.. (shrink)

This book reconstructs the concept and practice of dialectics as a means of grounding a critical theory of society. At the center of this project is the thesis of phronetic criticism or a form of reason that is able to synthesize human value with objective rationality. This book argues that defects in modern forms of social reason are the result of the powers of social structure and the norms and purposes they embody. Increasingly, modern societies are driven not by substantive (...) values concerning human good but by the technical imperatives of economic management leading to a cultural condition of nihilism that has eroded dialectical consciousness. The first half of the book demonstrates the various ways that social power erodes and undermines critical-rational forms of consciousness. The second part of the book constructs an alternative basis for critical reason by showing how it requires seeing human value as essentially ontological: that is, constituted by objective forms of sociality that either promote human freedom or pervert our capacities and drives toward pathological forms of life. The philosophical claim is that a critical theory of ethics must be rooted in these concrete forms of life and that this will serve as a critical vantage point for critical political judgment and transformational praxis. Descent of the Dialectic will be of interest to researchers working in philosophy, political theory, social theory, and critical theory. (shrink)

Appearing in English for the first time, Schelling’s 1842 lectures develop the idea that many philosophical concepts are born of religious-mythological notions.

Prolegomena : the ritual context for Ambrose's soteriology -- The case of Augustine's baptism -- The loss of harmonic unity : Ambrose's account of the fallen human condition -- The soul : Ambrose's true self -- Essential unity of soul and body : Ambrose's hylomorphic theory -- The body of death : the legacy of the fall -- Raised to new life : Ambrose's theology of baptism -- Baptism : sacrament of justification -- Resurrection and regeneration -- Baptismal regeneration : (...) participation in the new humanity -- The inner man's new desire -- Conclusion : the inner man's heavenly dwelling place. (shrink)

There is a simple, intuitive theory of the semantic reference of proper names that has been unjustly neglected. This is the view that semantic reference is conventionalized speakers reference, i.e. the view that a name semantically refers to an object if, and only if, there exists a convention to use the name to speaker-refer to that object. The theory can be found in works dealing primarily with other issues (e.g. Stine in Philos Stud 33:319–337, 1977; Schiffer in Erkenntnis 13:171–206, 1978; (...) Sainsbury in Erkenntnis 80:195–214, 2015; Sainsbury, Thinking about things, Oxford University Press, 2018), yet these authors provide no sustained discussion of it. Devitt (Designation, Columbia University Press, 1981) did formulate a view on which semantic reference is conventionalized speaker’s reference, yet his views are assimilated to causalist views. This is a mistake. While the conventionalized speaker’s reference view captures much of what is plausible in descriptivism and causalism, it remains distinct from both. (shrink)

In the Gorgias, Socrates argues that just punishment, though painful, benefits the unjust person by removing injustice from her soul. This paper argues that Socrates thinks the true judge (i) will never use corporal punishment, because such procedures do not remove injustice from the soul; (ii) will use refutations and rebukes as punishments that reveal and focus attention on psychological disorder (= injustice); and (iii) will use confiscation, exile, and death to remove external goods that facilitate unjust action.

Este volumen recoge las lecciones del X Curso de Cultura hispanojudía y sefardí de la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, organizado por la Asociación de Amigos del Museo Sefardí (Toledo, Septiembre 2000) y consagrado al Pensamiento y Mística hispanojudía y sefardí. Las quince conferencias aquí reunidas ofrecen una perspectiva amplia, representativa y completa de los momentos, autores y temas más significativos tratados por pensadores y místicos sefardíes desde la Edad Media hasta nuestros días. Se aprecia una continuidad en los problemas y (...) una búsqueda constante de nuevas soluciones, adaptadas a las circunstancias de cada época. Es la primera vez que aparece en lengua castellana una visión global de esta rica faceta de la cultura hispanohebrea, que permite al lector acercarse a la evolución del pensamiento de los judíos originarios de Sefarad antes y después de 1492, tanto en su faceta filosófica con en su faceta mística (cábala). (shrink)

Kripke (1977) views Donnellan's (1966) misdescription cases as cases where semantic reference and speaker's reference come apart. Such cases, however, are also cases where semantic reference conflicts with a distinct species of reference I call "public reference", i.e. the object that the cues publicly available at the time of utterance indicate is the speaker's referent of the utterance. This raises the question: do the misdescription cases trade on the distinction between semantic reference and speaker's reference, or the distinction between semantic (...) reference and public reference? I argue that Kripke's own construal in terms of semantic reference and speaker's reference is at best incomplete, and probably wrong. I also explain the general importance of the notion of 'public reference'. (shrink)

This paper gives a first theoretical formulation to a religious phenomenon which has not received much attention in philosophical discourse so far despite appearing in different highly heterogeneous religions. Vicarious religious ordinance refers to cases in which a living or deceased fully mature human being is knowingly or unknowingly assigned a religious affiliation without their consent or the consent of their dependents. I shall first offer three real-world examples of vicarious religious ordinance from Mormonism, Islam, and Shintoism and then raise (...) some normative concerns. I suggest (i) that vicarious religious ordinance does not fit neatly into current debates about religious epistemology, especially the recent debate on religious disagreement. I argue (ii) that normative questions as to why vicarious religious ordinance elicits indignation in its ‘victims’ is not easily explained through adducing similar examples. This paper aims to motivate further coordinated research on this topic. (shrink)

The task of this chapter is to investigate and assess Grossmann’s view of the ontological status of categories. It has two dimensions. Because Grossmann does not offer a full discussion of the ontology of categories, we first need to present an interpretation of his view. Our point of departure is Grossmann’s claim that a category is a fundamental property of being (which implies that he holds view 3 above). Our second task is to assess the adequacy of his view. We (...) do this by raising some problems with Grossmann’s account, offering as an alternative view a version of 4 above, and defending it against what we construe as Grossmann’s possible counter-arguments. We argue that the best way to view categories themselves is as ontologically neutral insofar as this opens the way for particular categories to be linguistic entities, mental acts, or properties of extra-mental things. This requires, in turn, a qualified defense of two views rejected by Grossmann—common natures and modes of being. (shrink)