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Showing 10,076 through 10,100 of 14,761 results

Philosophy of Cancer: A Dynamic and Relational View (History, Philosophy and Theory of the Life Sciences #18)

by Marta Bertolaso

Since the 1970s, the origin of cancer is being explored from the point of view of the Somatic Mutation Theory (SMT), focusing on genetic mutations and clonal expansion of somatic cells. As cancer research expanded in several directions, the dominant focus on cells remained steady, but the classes of genes and the kinds of extra-genetic factors that were shown to have causal relevance in the onset of cancer multiplied. The wild heterogeneity of cancer-related mutations and phenotypes, along with the increasing complication of models, led to an oscillation between the hectic search of ‘the’ few key factors that cause cancer and the discouragement in face of a seeming ‘endless complexity’. To tame this complexity, cancer research started to avail itself of the tools that were being developed by Systems Biology. At the same time, anti-reductionist voices began claiming that cancer research was stuck in a sterile research paradigm. This alternative discourse even gave birth to an alternative theory: the Tissue Organization Field Theory (TOFT). A deeper philosophical analysis shows limits and possibilities of reductionist and anti-reductionist positions and of their polarization. This book demonstrates that a radical philosophical reflection is necessary to drive cancer research out of its impasses. At the very least, this will be a reflection on the assumptions of different kinds of cancer research, on the implications of what cancer research has been discovering over 40 years and more, on a view of scientific practice that is most able to make sense of the cognitive and social conflicts that are seen in the scientific community (and in its results), and, finally, on the nature of living entities with which we entertain this fascinating epistemological dance that we call scientific research. The proposed Dynamic and Relational View of carcinogenesis is a starting point in all these directions.

Philosophy of Communication (Palgrave Philosophy Today)

by Giacomo Turbanti

By comprehensively exploring the theoretical questions raised by professional communication, this book provides an introduction to the philosophy of communication. Key Features:Arranged in three parts encompassing the theory of communication, conflict transformation and the role communication plays within organizations. Examines how agreement is reached through communication, how such agreement is negotiated between different perspectives and how such negotiation produces our organizations. Includes a full range of pedagogical features, including study questions, essay questions. chapter summaries, focus points and suggestions for further reading. Philosophy of Communication is essential reading for all students of the philosophy of communication.

The Philosophy of Computer Games (Philosophy of Engineering and Technology #7)

by John Richard Sageng, Hallvard Fossheim and Tarjei Mandt Larsen

Computer games have become a major cultural and economic force, and a subject of extensive academic interest. Up until now, however, computer games have received relatively little attention from philosophy. Seeking to remedy this, the present collection of newly written papers by philosophers and media researchers addresses a range of philosophical questions related to three issues of crucial importance for understanding the phenomenon of computer games: the nature of gameplay and player experience, the moral evaluability of player and avatar actions, and the reality status of the gaming environment. By doing so, the book aims to establish the philosophy of computer games as an important strand of computer games research, and as a separate field of philosophical inquiry. The book is required reading for anyone with an academic or professional interest in computer games, and will also be of value to readers curious about the philosophical issues raised by contemporary digital culture.

Philosophy of Computing: Themes from IACAP 2019 (Philosophical Studies Series #143)

by Björn Lundgren Nancy Abigail Nuñez Hernández

This book features a unique selection of works presented at the 2019 annual international conference of the International Association for Computing and Philosophy (IACAP). Every contribution has been peer-reviewed, revised, and extended. The included chapters are thematically diverse; topics include epistemology, dynamic epistemic logic, topology, philosophy of science and computation, game theory and abductive inferences, automated reasoning and mathematical proofs, computer simulations, scientific modelling, applied ethics, pedagogy, human-robot interactions, and big data, algorithms, and artificial intelligence.The volume is a testament to the value of interdisciplinary approaches to the computational and informational turn. We live in a time of tremendous development, which requires rigorous reflection on the philosophical nature of these technologies and how they are changing the world. How can we understand these technologies? How do these technologies change our understanding of the world? And how do these technologies affect our place as humans in the world? These questions, and more, are addressed in this volume which is of interest to philosophers, engineers, and computer scientists alike.

Philosophy Of Education: The Key Concepts (Routledge Key Guides)

by John Gingell Christopher Winch

This new edition of Philosophy of Education: The Key Concepts is an easy to use A-Z guide summarizing all the key terms, ideas and issues central to the study of educational theory today. Fully updated, the book is cross-referenced throughout and contains pointers to further reading, as well as new entries on such topics as: Citizenship and Civic Education Liberalism Capability Well-being Patriotism Globalisation Open-mindedness Creationism and Intelligent Design. Comprehensive and authoritative this highly accessible guide provides all that a student, teacher or policy-maker needs to know about the latest thinking on education in the 21st century.'

Philosophy of Engineering, East and West (Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science #330)

by Carl Mitcham Bocong Li Byron Newberry Baichun Zhang

This co-edited volume compares Chinese and Western experiences of engineering, technology, and development. In doing so, it builds a bridge between the East and West and advances a dialogue in the philosophy of engineering. Divided into three parts, the book starts with studies on epistemological and ontological issues, with a special focus on engineering design, creativity, management, feasibility, and sustainability. Part II considers relationships between the history and philosophy of engineering, and includes a general argument for the necessity of dialogue between history and philosophy. It continues with a general introduction to traditional Chinese attitudes toward engineering and technology, and philosophical case studies of the Chinese steel industry, railroads, and cybernetics in the Soviet Union. Part III focuses on engineering, ethics, and society, with chapters on engineering education and practice in China and the West. The book’s analyses of the interactions of science, engineering, ethics, politics, and policy in different societal contexts are of special interest. The volume as a whole marks a new stage in the emergence of the philosophy of engineering as a new regionalization of philosophy. This carefully edited interdisciplinary volume grew out of an international conference on the philosophy of engineering hosted by the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing. It includes 30 contributions by leading philosophers, social scientists, and engineers from Australia, China, Europe, and the United States.

A Philosophy of Gun Violence

by Alan J. Reid

This book uses a philosophy of technology to demonstrate that guns are predisposed for an intentional use, making them inherently non-neutral artifacts. This argument rejects the often-cited value neutral thesis and instrumentalist view that “guns don’t kill people; people kill people”, and instead, explains the lethality of the gun through the lenses of affordance theory, behavioral design, and choice architecture. Ultimately, this book proposes an ethical and value-sensitive model for gun reform, which embodies the perspective of French philosopher Bruno Latour, who said, “You are different with a gun in your hand; the gun is different with you holding it.”

The Philosophy of Information Quality (Synthese Library #358)

by Luciano Floridi Phyllis Illari

This work fulfills the need for a conceptual and technical framework to improve understanding of Information Quality (IQ) and Information Quality standards. The meaning and practical implementation of IQ are addressed, as it is relevant to any field where there is a need to handle data and issues such as accessibility, accuracy, completeness, currency, integrity, reliability, timeliness, usability, the role of metrics and so forth are all a part of Information Quality.In order to support the cross-fertilization of theory and practice, the latest research is presented in this book. The perspectives of experts from beyond the origins of IQ in computer science are included: library and information science practitioners and academics, philosophers of information, of engineering and technology, and of science are all contributors to this volume.The chapters in this volume are based on the work of a collaborative research project involving the Arts and Humanities Research Council and Google and led by Professor Luciano Floridi, University of Oxford.This work will be of interest to anyone handling data, including those from commercial, public, governmental and academic organizations. The expert editors’ contributions introduce issues of interest to scientists, database curators and philosophers, even though the issues may be disguised in the language and examples common to a different discipline.

Philosophy of Justice (Contemporary Philosophy: A New Survey #12)

by Guttorm Fløistad

This book presents surveys of significant trends in contemporary philosophy. Contributing authors explore themes relating to justice including natural rights, equality, freedom, democracy, morality and cultural traditions. Key movements and thinkers are considered, ranging from ancient Greek philosophy, Roman and Christian traditions to the development of Muslim law, Enlightenment perspectives and beyond.Authors discuss important works, including those of Aristotle, Ibn Khaldun, John Locke, Immanuel Kant and Mary Wollstonecraft. Readers are also invited to examine Hegel and the foundation of right, Karl Marx as a utopian socialist and the works of Paul Ricœur, amongst the wealth of perspectives presented in this book.Through these chapters, readers are able to explore the relationship of the state to justice and consider the rights of the individual and the role of law. Contributions presented here discuss concepts including Sharia law, freedom in the community and Libertarian Anarchism. Readers may follow accounts of justice in the Scottish Enlightenment and consider fairness, social justice and the concept of injustice. The surveys presented here show different approaches and a variety of interpretations. Each contribution has its own bibliography.

The Philosophy of Kenelm Digby (International Archives of the History of Ideas Archives internationales d'histoire des idées #239)

by Laura Georgescu Han Thomas Adriaenssen

This book examines the philosophical and scientific achievements of Sir Kenelm Digby, a successful English diplomat, privateer and natural philosopher of the mid-1600s. Not widely remembered today, Digby is one of the most intriguing figures in the history of early modern philosophers. Among scholars, he is known for his attempt to reconcile what perhaps seem to be irreconcilable philosophical frameworks: Aristotelianism and early modern mechanism.This contributed volume offers the first full-length treatment of Digby’s work and of the unique position he occupied in early modern intellectual history. It explores key aspects of Digby’s metaphysics, epistemology, and philosophical method, and offers a new appraisal of his contributions to early modern natural philosophy and mathematics.A dozen contributors offer their expert insight into such topics asBody, quantity, and measures in Digby's natural philosophyEcumenism and common notions in DigbyAristotelianism and accidents in Digby's philosophyDigby on body and soulDigby on method and experimentsThis book volume will be of benefit to a broad audience of scholars, educators, and students of the history of early modern science and philosophy.

The Philosophy of Language: Historical Foundations and Contemporary Issues

by A. Borgmann

This book deals with the philosophy of language and with what is at issue in the philosophy of language. Due to its intensity and diversity, the philosophy of language has attained the position of first philosophy in this century. To show this is the task of Part Two. But the task can be accomplished only if it is first made clear how language came to be a problem in and for philosophy and how this development has influ­ enced and has failed to influence our understanding of language. This is done in Part One. What is at issue in the philosophy of language today is the question regarding the source of meaning. More precisely the question is whether we have access to such a source. Again Part One presents the necessary foil for Part Two in showing how meaning was thought to originate in Western history and how the rise of the philosophy of language and the eclipse of the origin of meaning occurred jointly. Today the question of meaning has come to a peculiarly elaborate and fruitful issue in the philosophy of language, and the fate of the philosophy of language is bound up with the future possibilities of meaning.

Philosophy of Language (Synthese Library #71)

by F. Von Kutschera

This book has arisen out of lectures I gave in recent years at the Uni­ versities of Munich and Regensburg, and it is intended to serve as a textbook for courses in the Philosophy of Language. In my lectures I was able to presuppose that the students had taken an introductory course in logic. Some knowledge of logic will also be helpful in studying this book - as it is almost everywhere else in philosophy -, especially in Section 3. 2, but it is no prerequisite. I would like to give my sincere thanks to Prof. Terrell for his excellent translation of the book, which is based on the second, revised and en­ larged German edition. Regensburg, May 1975 FRANZ VON KUTSCHERA INTRODUCTION Language has become one of philosophy's most important and pressing themes during this century. This preoccupation with language has its ori­ gins in the most diverse areas of philosophical inquiry.

Philosophy of Language in the Brentano School: Reassessing the Brentanian Legacy (History of Analytic Philosophy)

by Arnaud Dewalque Charlotte Gauvry Sébastien Richard

This collection of fourteen original essays addresses the seminal contribution of Franz Brentano and his heirs, to philosophy of language. Despite the great interest provoked by the Brentanian tradition and its multiple connections with early analytic philosophy, precious little is known about the Brentanian contribution to philosophy of language. The aim of this new collection is to fill this gap by providing the reader with a more thorough understanding of the legacy of Brentano and his school, in their pursuit of a unique research programme according to which the analysis of meaning is inseparable from philosophical inquiries into what goes on in the mind and what there is in the world. In three parts, the volume first reconstructs Brentano’s pathbreaking thoughts on meaning and grammatical illusions, exploring their strong connections with the Austro-German tradition and analytic philosophy. It then addresses the multifaceted debates on the objectivity of meaning in the Brentano School and its aftermath (Meinong, Husserl, Ingarden, Twardowski and the Lvov-Warsaw School). Finally, part three explores Brentano’s wider legacy, namely: Husserl’s theory of modification and typicality, Bühler’s theory of linguistic and non-linguistic expressions, and Wittgenstein’s thoughts on guidance and rule-following. The result is a unique collection of essays which shows the significance, originality and timely character of the Brentanian philosophy of language.

Philosophy of Law: The Supreme Court’s Need for Libertarian Law (Palgrave Studies in Classical Liberalism)

by Walter E. Block Roy Whitehead

Looking at discrimination, education, environment, health and crime, this volume analyses United States Supreme Court rulings on several legal issues and proposed libertarian solutions to each problem. Setting their own liberal theory of law, each chapter discusses the law at hand, what it should be, and what it would be if their political economic philosophy were the justification of the legal practice. Covering issues such as sexual harassment, religion, markets in human organs, drug prohibition and abortion, this book is a timely contribution to classical liberal debate on law and economics.

Philosophy of Law in Korea: Acceptance, Engagement and Social Change (Routledge Studies in Asian Law)

by Jeong-Oh Kim Hak Tai Kim Joon-Seok Park Dong-Ryong Shin

When Korea began as a newly independent state in 1948, its economy was very underdeveloped and the rule of law was just established. The journey of democratization in Korea was not without challenges. This book traces the history of the legal philosophy development in Korea and highlights Korea's unique experience. This book shows how Western legal philosophy has been accepted in Korea, a non-Western country that has newly introduced the Western legal system and what role the legal philosophy has played in social context. The book also examines academic scholars' intellectual activities in a historical context and how their intellectual products are yielded through their continuous response to the circumstances of the time. It specifically looks at the many challenging tasks legal philosophers had to overcome in a society when the rule of law and democracy had not yet settled. The book explores how Korean legal philosophers coped during such unique historical situations. It also illustrates how Korean scholars accepted legal philosophies of Germany and jurisprudence and integrated them to change social realities of Korea. Through Korea’s experience, this book will provide insights into how modern legal philosophy develops in a new state and what legal philosophers' responses would be like during such a process. The developing process of legal philosophy in Korean society will interest not only readers in countries who have had similar experiences to Korea, but also readers in the West.

Philosophy of Law in Korea: Acceptance, Engagement and Social Change (Routledge Studies in Asian Law)

by Jeong-Oh Kim Hak Tai Kim Joon-Seok Park Dong-Ryong Shin

When Korea began as a newly independent state in 1948, its economy was very underdeveloped and the rule of law was just established. The journey of democratization in Korea was not without challenges. This book traces the history of the legal philosophy development in Korea and highlights Korea's unique experience. This book shows how Western legal philosophy has been accepted in Korea, a non-Western country that has newly introduced the Western legal system and what role the legal philosophy has played in social context. The book also examines academic scholars' intellectual activities in a historical context and how their intellectual products are yielded through their continuous response to the circumstances of the time. It specifically looks at the many challenging tasks legal philosophers had to overcome in a society when the rule of law and democracy had not yet settled. The book explores how Korean legal philosophers coped during such unique historical situations. It also illustrates how Korean scholars accepted legal philosophies of Germany and jurisprudence and integrated them to change social realities of Korea. Through Korea’s experience, this book will provide insights into how modern legal philosophy develops in a new state and what legal philosophers' responses would be like during such a process. The developing process of legal philosophy in Korean society will interest not only readers in countries who have had similar experiences to Korea, but also readers in the West.

The Philosophy of Logical Mechanism: Essays in Honor of Arthur W. Burks, With his responses (Synthese Library #206)

by Merrilee H. Salmon

This work is divided into two parts. Part I contains sixteen critical es­ says by prominent philosophers and computer scientists. Their papers offer insightful, well-argued contemporary views of a broad range of topics that lie at the heart of philosophy in the second half of the twen­ tieth century: semantics and ontology, induction, the nature of prob­ ability, the foundations of science, scientific objectivity, the theory of naming, the logic of conditionals, simulation modeling, the relatiOn be­ tween minds and machines, and the nature of rules that guide be­ havior. In this volume honoring Arthur W. Burks, the philosophical breadth of his work is thus manifested in the diverse aspects of that work chosen for discussion and development by the contributors to his Festschrift. Part II consists of a book-length essay by Burks in which he lays out his philosophy of logical mechanism while responding to the papers in Part I. In doing so, he provides a unified and coherent context for the range of problems raised in Part I, and he highlights interesting relationships among the topics that might otherwise have gone un­ noticed. Part II is followed by a bibliography of Burks's published works.

The Philosophy of Michael Dummett (Synthese Library #239)

by B. F. McGuinness G. Oliveri

The present collection of papers derives from a philosophy conference organised in the Sicilian town of M ussomeli in September 1991. The con­ ference aimed at providing an analysis of certain aspects of the thought of Michael Dummett, whose contributions have been very influential in several aspects of the philosophical debate continuing within the analyt­ ical tradition. Logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the interpretation of Frege's philosophy, and metaphysics are only some of the areas within which Dummett's ideas have been fruitful over the years. The papers contained in this book, and Dummett's replies, will, it is hoped, not merely offer a partial reconstruction of a philosopher's life­ work, but provide an exciting and challenging vantage point from which to look at some of the main problems of contemporary philosophy. The First International Philosophy Conference of M ussomeli - this is what the conference was called - was an extraordinary event in many ways. The quality of the papers presented, the international reputa­ tion of many of the participants, the venue itself, together with the unavoidable, and sometimes quite funny, organisational hiccups, made that meeting memorable. Perhaps principally memorable was the warmth and sympathy of the people of Mussomeli who strongly supported and encouraged this initia­ tive. A special mention is also due to the City Council Administrators, who spared no effort to make the Conference a success.

Philosophy of Science: Between the Natural Sciences, the Social Sciences, and the Humanities (European Studies in Philosophy of Science #9)

by Alexander Christian David Hommen Nina Retzlaff Gerhard Schurz

This broad and insightful book presents current scholarship in important subfields of philosophy of science and addresses an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary readership. It groups carefully selected contributions into the four fields of I) philosophy of physics, II) philosophy of life sciences, III) philosophy of social sciences and values in science, and IV) philosophy of mathematics and formal modeling. Readers will discover research papers by Paul Hoyningen-Huene, Keizo Matsubara, Kian Salimkhani, Andrea Reichenberger, Anne Sophie Meincke, Javier Suárez, Roger Deulofeu, Ludger Jansen, Peter Hucklenbroich, Martin Carrier, Elizaveta Kostrova, Lara Huber, Jens Harbecke, Antonio Piccolomini d’Aragona and Axel Gelfert. This collection fosters dialogue between philosophers of science working in different subfields, and brings readers the finest and latest work across the breadth of the field, illustrating that contemporary philosophy of science has successfully broadened its scope of reflection. It will interest and inspire a wide audience of philosophers as well as scholars of the natural sciences, social sciences and the humanities. The volume shares selected contributions from the prestigious second triennial conference of the German Society for Philosophy of Science/ Gesellschaft für Wissenschaftsphilosophie (GWP.2016, March 8, 2016 – March 11, 2016).

The Philosophy of Science and Economics

by Robert A. Solo

The philosophy of science proposes criteria to delineate true science and a theory to explain its progress. As a graduate student under the supervision of Lionel Robbins and Karl Popper, Solo first challenged the viability of those criteria and that theory in relation to economics and the social sciences. Here he explains how the foundations of that philosophy have been eroded through the advent of quantum mechanics and through Kuhn's "Structures of Scientific Revolution", and demonstrates its irrelevance to a social science that would comprehend social reality and contribute to the formation of social policy. He proposes a different mode of perception, and different rules for determining the acceptability of statement, a different language of discourse, and a different structure of organization than presently prevails.

The Philosophy of Science and Economics

by Robert A. Solo

The philosophy of science proposes criteria to delineate true science and a theory to explain its progress. As a graduate student under the supervision of Lionel Robbins and Karl Popper, Solo first challenged the viability of those criteria and that theory in relation to economics and the social sciences. Here he explains how the foundations of that philosophy have been eroded through the advent of quantum mechanics and through Kuhn's "Structures of Scientific Revolution", and demonstrates its irrelevance to a social science that would comprehend social reality and contribute to the formation of social policy. He proposes a different mode of perception, and different rules for determining the acceptability of statement, a different language of discourse, and a different structure of organization than presently prevails.

Philosophy of Syntax: Foundational Topics (Trends in Logic #29)

by Mieszko Talasiewicz

Since 1970-ties in the theory of syntax of natural language quite a number of competing, incommensurable theoretic frameworks have emerged. Today the lack of a leading paradigm and kaleidoscope of perspectives deprives our general understanding of syntax and its relation to semantics and pragmatics. The present book is an attempt to reestablish the most fundamental ideas and intuitions of syntactic well-formedness within a new general account. The account is not supposed to compete with any of today’s syntactic frameworks, but to provide a deeper understanding of why these frameworks succeed or fail when they do and to show a new way for cooperation between logicians and linguists which may lead in future to a unified, yet more specific account.

Philosophy of Technology: Practical, Historical and Other Dimensions (Philosophy and Technology #6)

by Paul T. Durbin

The corps of philosophers who make up the Society for Philosophy & Technology has now been collaborating, in one fashion or another, for almost fifteen years. In addition, the number of philosophers, world-wide, who have begun to focus their analytical skills on technology and related social problems grows increasingly every year. {It would certainly swell the ranks if all of them joined the Society!) It seems more than ap­ propriate, in this context, to publish a miscellaneous volume that em­ phasizes the extraordinary range and diversity of contemporary contribu­ tions to the philosophical understanding of the exceedingly complex phenomenon that is modern technology. My thanks, once again, to the anonymous referees who do so much to maintain standards for the series. And thanks also to the secretaries - Mary Imperatore and Dorothy Milsom - in the Philosophy Department at the University of Delaware; their typing and retyping of the MSS, and especially notes and references, also contributes to keeping our standards high. PAUL T. DURBIN vii Paul T. Durbin (ed.), Philosophy ofT echnology, p. vii.

Philosophy of Technology after the Empirical Turn (Philosophy of Engineering and Technology #23)

by Maarten Franssen Pieter E. E. Vermaas Peter Kroes Anthonie W.M. W. M. Meijers

This volume features 16 essays on the philosophy of technology that discuss its identity, its position in philosophy in general, and the role of empirical studies in philosophical analyses of engineering ethics and engineering practices. This volume is published about fifteen years after Peter Kroes and Anthonie Meijers published a collection of papers under the title The empirical turn in the philosophy of technology, in which they called for a reorientation toward the practice of engineering, and sketched the likely benefits for philosophy of technology of pursuing its major questions in an empirically informed way.The essays in this volume fall apart in two different kinds. One kind follows up on The empirical turn discussion about what the philosophy of technology is all about. It continues the search for the identity of the philosophy of technology by asking what comes after the empirical turn. The other kind of essays follows the call for an empirical turn in the philosophy of technology by showing how it may be realized with regard to particular topics. Together these essays offer the reader an overview of the state of the art of an empirically informed philosophy of technology and of various views on the empirical turn as a stepping stone into the future of the philosophy of technology.

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