-
90What makes bodies beautifulJournal of Medicine and Philosophy 28 (2). 2003.Health and beauty are the most important physical ideals. This paper seeks to compare and contrast these ideals, based on a value theory of human abilities. Health is comprehended as a potential ability to act grounded in bodily functions. Beauty is explained as a symbolising reference to happiness, physical beauty as a combination of organic orientation to purpose and virtuous orientation to action. Physical beauty is the implicit symbolic expression of mental and physical health. This teleolog…Read more
-
19G.A. Cohens materialistische Geschichtstheorie: Einige Einwände Überblick zu einer DiskussionAnalyse & Kritik 4 (2): 131-158. 1982.During the last years Anglosaxon discussion about Marx and Marxism has been characterized by an intensified interest in historical materialism as a general theory of history. The most extensive, careful and analytically rigorous among several new treatments is the one by G.A. Cohen, which is the subject of four critical articles in the present issue of Analyse & Kritik. To make these articles and Cohen’s project understandable to the German reader, an attempt is made in the following to summariz…Read more
-
34The Long Goodbye: On the Development of Critical TheoryAnalyse & Kritik 30 (2): 331-354. 2008.It is not easy to give up on a tradition that promises to rationalize, explain, and thereby ultimately help improve, society. This article narrates the history of Critical Theory in three stages, following the dynamics of its own self-criticism during distinct historical periods and within different societies. Horkheimer/adorno, Habermas and Honneth are read as participating in a philosophical project of societal rationalism which can be criticized by appeal to a pragmatist view of social theori…Read more
-
4Die sanktionistische Theorie des SollensIn Moral Als Vertrag?: Beiträge Zum Moralischen Kontraktualismus, Walter De Gruyter. 2002.
-
42Potentials of CooperationAnalyse & Kritik 33 (1): 7-34. 2011.Since Hobbes' Leviathan was published in 1651, the 'problem of order' has been known for some time. Despite this long gestation period for social theory even today we do not have a universally agreed upon answer to this 'problem'. One of the reasons behind this lacuna may be the overly dispersed work being done in the economic and sociological traditions. Whereas one tradition favours 'collective action' as a central answer, the other thinks of the problem itself being dissolved by the acceptanc…Read more
-
31Klima auf GegenseitigkeitJahrbuch für Wissenschaft Und Ethik 16 (1): 159-178. 2012.Name der Zeitschrift: Jahrbuch für Wissenschaft und Ethik Jahrgang: 16 Heft: 1 Seiten: 159-178
-
7Back MatterIn Ethik der Beziehungen: Versuche Über Eine Postkantianische Moralphilosophie, Akademie Verlag. 2005.
-
40Individuelles Handeln und Macht: Foucaults HerausforderungAnalyse & Kritik 13 (2): 170-183. 1991.Foucault’s twofold attack on the modem concept of power gives us something to think about. Backed by ingenious historical analyses he devises an idea of systemic and productive power, abstracted from the conceptual connections between power and individual power-sources, viz. power and restrictions of freedom. The article probes Foucault’s historical sketches on. these two tasks. It defends the less radical view of power as constraining interests and freedom.
-
53Action in Context (edited book)De Gruyter. 2007.The book illustrates the concept of action in three different contexts - the justification of actions, people's life history, and pragmatism.Because of ...
-
4Trust and Community on the Internet (edited book)Lucius & Lucius (Analyse und Kritik 26(1). 2004.
-
7Eine individualistische Theorie sozialen Handelns. Zu Raimo Tuomelas "A Theory of Social Action"Analyse & Kritik 7 (2): 180-205. 1985.This critical review concentrates on four important parts of Raimo Tuomela’s analytical theory of social action. It examines the book’s reconstructions of social action, of practical reasoning in this context, of social norms and it investigates its claim to a conceptual individualism. The result is critical in several aspects. Tuomela’s most original idea in the analysis of joint action, that of we-intentions, is not broad enough to cover more than a part of social action in the commonly unders…Read more
-
13Social Relations Instead of Altruistic PunishmentAnalyse & Kritik 27 (1): 158-171. 2005.Ernst Fehr’s experimental research on altruistic behaviour aims at superseding the classical homo oeconomicus in micro-economic behaviour theory. This essay discusses Fehr’s results from two points of view: first, in regard to the understanding of social action associated with the term “altruism”; second, in regard to the ‘anthropological’ strategy of research that is based on the laboratory method. Against the emphasis on altruism it will be argued that it misleads into providing a distorted de…Read more
-
41Sustainability is currently the term dominating environmental policy. Its extensive political diffusion is in stark contrast, however, to the extent to which there is agreement over its meaning. Its ability to motivate is not in question, but a certain scepticism surrounds its ideological content. Since ideological terms have no objective basis, it is therefore important for the purposes of environmental policy to establish whether such scepticism is justified.
-
1III. Moral und GesellschaftIn Ethik der Beziehungen: Versuche Über Eine Postkantianische Moralphilosophie, Akademie Verlag. 2005.
-
1Überlebt der Utilitarismus? Peter Singer und das TötungsverbotStudia Philosophica 50 (n/a): 143-161. 1991.
-
9I. Abkehr von KantIn Ethik der Beziehungen: Versuche Über Eine Postkantianische Moralphilosophie, Akademie Verlag. 2005.
-
13Why Participate in Pro-Environmental Action? Individual Responsibility in Unstructured CollectivesAnalyse & Kritik 36 (2): 397-416. 2014.The degradation of natural resources in the environment is, technically speaking, a form of depleting a public good. Public goods are notorious for free-riding among egoists, but the marginality of individual contributions provides no less an obstacle, both to moral duty and motivation. This article discusses the problems of minimized and missing causal involvement on the empirical side; and, in the applicability of classical moral arguments, on the ethical side. It. suggests that individual res…Read more
-
Am Abgrund der Grunde Zu: Rudiger Bittner: Doing Things for ReasonsDeutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie 51 (2): 335. 2003.
-
13Gerechtigkeit bauen – Variationen mit HumeDeutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie 62 (6): 1029-1061. 2014.Among philosophers and social scientists, Hume’s idea of justice is generally identified with a system of rules based on mutual advantage, their moral quality playing either an insignificant or no part at all. This conventional or contractarian model, respectively, is not adequate to the special institution of morality or, in Hume, to the virtues, artificial or natural. It is not self-interest but sympathy in combination with the indirect passions of pride and humility that gives conventions the…Read more
-
20Troubling oneself with endsIn Paul Blackledge & Kelvin Knight (eds.), Virtue and politics: Alasdair MacIntyre's revolutionary Aristotelianism, University of Notre Dame Press. 2011.
-
83Ethik der Abtreibung: Ein ÜberblickZeitschrift für Philosophische Forschung 45 (3). 1991.The article gives an overview on arguments typically used within discussions on the ethical aspects of abortion. Five types of argument especially are analyzed more closely. Only one type withstands critical scrutiny: so-called interest-arguments, arguments referring to whether or when being killed (as involved in abortion) is against the interest of the fetus. In critical revision of a proposal due to Peter Singer the result is that abortion should be seen as morally neutral up to four months o…Read more
-
2Rorty, oder: Kann man alles bestreiten und dennoch Philosoph bleiben?Deutsche Zeitschrift für Philosophie 44 (2): 255-258. 1996.
-
10Kollektive Güter und individuelle VerantwortungAnalyse & Kritik 11 (2): 179-196. 1989.In acting within large groups the single actor typically suffers from the symptom of irrelevance of his contribution. A single contributory effect may be extremely small or, due to ‘threshold effects’, even non-existent. Given such conditions not only self-interested action, also purely altruistically motivated contribution seems to be rendered irrational. The article reasons that the famous ‘principles of generalization’ are of no help on this problem. However, a ‘principle of division’ could b…Read more
-
2IV. Ökologische DemokratieIn Ethik der Beziehungen: Versuche Über Eine Postkantianische Moralphilosophie, Akademie Verlag. 2005.
Areas of Specialization
Metaphilosophy |
Meta-Ethics |
Normative Ethics |
Social and Political Philosophy |