Hannes Gustav Melichar

This article examines how rational normativity can be integrated into nature without reduction or dualism. Drawing on Thomas Nagel’s critique of reductive naturalism and Husserl’s refutation of psychologism, it argues that adequate accounts of mind must respect the transcendental status of reason while also explaining how rational subjects belong to the natural world. The paper de- velops this problem through the philosophy of life, focusing on Hans Jonas’s conception of the organism and the enactive notion of operational closure. While enactivism o ers a non-reductive, multi-level account of living organization, it re- mains metaphysically underdetermined. I argue that its core commitments are best understood within an Aristotelian metaphysics of life, in which substantial form and formal causation ground a realist ontology of life–mind continuity. This Aristotelian naturalism situates cognition and rationality within nature without eliminating their normative character, while phenomenological analysis remains indispensable for explicating the rst-personal and normative dimensions of mind.

Wie kann man nach Kants fundamentaler Kritik an der philosophischen Theologie das ontologische Argument fur die Existenz Gottes verteidigen? Dieser Frage geht Hannes Gustav Melichar mit Hilfe der hegelschen Philosophie nach. Um verstandlich zu machen, wie Hegel verschiedene Faden der vorkantischen Metaphysik und der kritischen Philosophie in seinem Hauptwerk "Wissenschaft der Logik" zusammenfuhrt, analysiert er zunachst Kants Widerlegungsversuche grundlich. Anschliessend argumentiert er, dass Hegel in seinem Werk zwei Argumentationslinien verfolgt. Die erste soll zu einem inhaltsvollen und widerspruchsfreien Gottesbegriff fur die Philosophie fuhren. Und die zweite zeigt, wie Hegel versucht, diesem Gottesbegriff eine abschliessende Begrundung zu geben, ohne in einen Begrundungsregress zu verfallen. Damit leitet Hegel aus der absoluten Notwendigkeit dieses Gottesbegriffes dessen objektive Geltung ab und legt so seine Version des ontologischen Gottesbeweises vor.

Enactivism needs to be supplemented by a transcendental perspective, as Evan Thompson elaborates in „Mind in Life.” The reason for this is not only the irreducibility of consciousness but also of human rationality. The contribution argues for this thesis as follows: First, I will show with Hegel’s philosophy that rationality is a necessary explanandum of anthropology. Second, I will conclude from this that an emergentist worldview is more plausible than a reductive one. Third, I will identify enactivism as a contemporary, non-reductive anthropology with explanatory potential for cognition. Fourth, I will reassert the problem of naturalizing cognitive abilities. Fifth, I will argue that epistemic goals must be understood in terms of transcendental philosophy and, at the same time, as goals of cognitive systems.

Neo-Aristotelian metaethics is conceived as a suitable alternative to a Kantian-style ethics. Instead of grounding moral duties in practical reason and an abstract and categorical imperative, the appeal to the concept of human nature promises a rich and detailed picture of virtues and vices. As an objection by John McDowell indicates, practical reason turns out to be crucial for the concept of human nature as well. In Hegel’s philosophy of the subjective spirit, we can find an early attempt to combine the Kantian and the Aristotelian approaches. The attempt is still interesting because of the interpretation of human faculties as directed towards the capacity for practical reasoning. This paper presents Hegel’s argument as the attempt to transcendentalize the concept of human nature and as offering a synthetic metaethical stance.

Trust in other people and our environment is undoubtedly one of the prerequisites for social cohesion in general, but also for a flourishing life of the individual. In philosophy, trust as a central theme has received increased attention in the last three decades. Many of the conceptualizations understand trust as an expectation of reliability to which another factor is added. In contrast, the present article argues that trust consists in an attitude that balances the autonomous goals of other beings with one’s own purposes. This attitude is characterized as an Aristotelian attitude because of its life-world foundation of goal orientation. That living beings are goal-oriented is explained following the philosophy of biology of Hans Jonas and enactivism. The ability to perceive this goal-orientation is analyzed by the article with the help of Tomassello’s theory of developmental psychology and the phenomenological understanding of empathy. Finally, to demonstrate the fruitfulness of the concept of trust thus unfolded, it is shown how trust is effective as a central building block in the context of psychotherapies.

Trotz anhaltender kontroverser Debatten ist der Konstruktivismus ein Grundpfeiler syste- mischer Therapie. Der vorliegende Artikel argumentiert, dass es nicht an Kritik des Konstruk- tivismus mangelt, sondern an einem konstruktiven Ausgang aus der Debatte. Einen solchen bietet der Begriff des sense-making, der im Enaktivismus, einem verkörperungstheoretischen Ansatz aus den Kognitionswissenschaften, entwickelt wird. Sense-making ersetzt die Konstruk- tion von Vorstellungen durch den relationalen Begriff der Interaktion mit der Welt und anderen Menschen, getragen von den Bedürfnissen eines lebendigen Individuums. Die Grundidee ist die bekannte Interpretation von Organismen als autopoietische Systeme. Lebewesen können sich nur selbst erhalten und regenerieren im Austausch mit der Umwelt. Dafür nimmt das Le- bewesen eine Bewertung der Umwelt vor, wobei die Eigenheiten der Gegenstände keinesfalls irrelevant sind. Diese Bewertung wird als sense-making beschrieben. Menschliche Formen des sense-making sind durch soziale Einflüsse geprägt: Wir beeinflussen unser sense-making wech- selseitig. Der Artikel erläutert das als participatory sense-making. Uns durch den Begriff des sense-making als interaktive Wesen zu verstehen, kann die Nachteile des Konstruktivismus um- gehen, ist aber zugleich fruchtbar für das Verständnis systemischer Methoden und hat ethische Vorteile, wie im Artikel argumentiert wird.

In 2020, M. Summa developed a promising approach to understanding the concept of illness. This approach combines a theory of organisms with Responsive Phenomenology to gain a concept of illness. Following on from this, the present article shows that the normative presuppositions can be further explicated and justified by drawing on the theoretical resources of Aristotelian naturalism as propounded by Michael Thompson. Aristotelian naturalism does provide a theoretical option to grasp the normative foundations of human life. However, this article argues that Aristotelian naturalism requires another criterion besides human nature to make the concept of illness intelligible. Following John McDowell’s critique of Aristotelian naturalism, it will be shown that this criterion consists in the capacity for autonomy. From this a concept of (mental) illness is developed which describes an impairment of the self-regulated and autonomous realisation of the human form of life.

This essay describes the linguistic phenomenon of false statements being made in public without their falsity being concealed. The phenomenon is referred to as spitting. It consists in the demonstration of the ability to make false statements and thus indicates a powerful discourse position. Through its speech act, it also makes a comment on the character of discourse in the public sphere: this is detached from the orientation of truth and reduced to a power play. The essay distinguishes the phenomenon of spitting from lying and from Harry Frankfurt’s concept of bullshitting. In the analysis of the speech act of spitting, its linguistic character is explained and linked to psychological and social functions. Finally, the essay argues that there are certain political positions that have a greater tendency to spit due to their background beliefs. The essay concludes with reflections on how to counter the destructive effects of spitting.

This paper examines how interactions within online environments affect the experience of shared reality by eroding trust. Trust has often been described as the ‘glue’ of society, essential not only for personal relationships, groups, and institutions but also for the very fabric of shared reality. One of its forms, epistemic trust, is of particular importance as it concerns the acquisition, acceptance, and establishment of shared knowledge, as well as the dynamics that sustain it. As online environments reshape our social interactions, they also modify significant conditions for epistemic trust—its requirements, incentives, and challenges. The aim of the paper is to illustrate these modifications, showcasing how online environments affect the various dimensions of epistemic trust that significantly shape how we experience shared reality. The paper unfolds in four steps. First, we present and discuss central cognitive and affective dimensions of epistemic trust and illustrate how it forms an inextricable aspect of social life and our sense of a shared reality (“Section 1: Epistemic trust and the experience of shared reality”). Second, we briefly present and discuss the phenomenon of conspiracy theories (“Section 2: The case of conspiracy theories”), and argue that their central features amount to a significant modification of our practices of epistemic trust (“Section 3: Epistemic trust and the experience of shared reality in the context of conspiracy theories”). Against this backdrop, we finally suggest that structural and phenomenological features of online environments can create epistemic scenarios that increase susceptibility to conspiratory mentalities and corresponding epistemic trust dynamics. We conclude that online environments may challenge our sense of a shared reality by shifting our propensities for epistemic trust (“Section 4: How online environments favor the development of conspiracy thinking”).

In his Encyclopedia, the late Hegel makes the highest demands on truth and justification from the first paragraph onward. With this, Hegel takes up the skeptical challenge and believes that he can overcome this problem. However, it is not easy to see how Hegel tries to meet this challenge in the Science of Logic, which plays a fundamental role in Hegel’s encyclopedic project. The present article argues that the question of the justification of the claim to truth is a fruitful perspective for the interpretation of the Science of Logic. For this purpose Hegel’s answer to the Agrippan Trilemma is examined, which P. Franks analyzed as a basic problem for Classical German Philosophy. One possible interpretation of Hegel sees him solving the skeptical trilemma at the beginning of the Logic. The article argues against this possibility that the Logic of the Concept contains Hegel’s actual solution. This solution consists in (1) that the concept represents the principle of logic and (2) that the concept itself must be presented in the form of an apagogical argument. Finally, the article gives a reason why Hegel sees an analogy to the ontological argument in this attempt of an ultimate justification.

The relation between Kant’s conception of modalities in the Postulates of Empirical Thought and Hegel’s conception in the Logic of Essence has not been addressed in the current scholarship. I argue that there is in fact a close connection that becomes visible if the desideratum which is implied by Kant’s conceptions is understood. Thus, after an analysis of the Kantian modal postulates, the article shows that they are sufficient to characterize the necessity of Kant’s Grundsätze and, hence, a specific form of synthetic propositions a priori. However, I will prove that they are insufficient to characterize Kant’s synthetic propositions a priori about transcendental philosophy. This insufficiency in the characterization of transcendental philosophy itself brings into the arena Hegel, who supplements the Kantian modalities with a self-reflexive form of transcendental modality.

Ancient philosophy has been a source of inspiration for contemporary philosophy in recent decades. An outstanding example is the renaissance of hylomorphism in the field of philosophy of biology. For the philosophy of mind, hylomorphism has been little discussed so far. Therefore, ancient models in the philosophy of mind are still of interest. This article argues that Plato’s Phaedo can act as a source for contemporary debates. As a starting point, Simmias’s objections to the immortality of the soul are analyzed. Plato does not simply reject these objections, but introduces conditions for a hylomorphistic understanding of the soul in Socrates’ reply. These conditions are the following: (A) the mind supervenes on the body; (B) this supervenience must allow the strong emergence of the mind; (C) the mind comprises causal powers; (D) teleological explanations are a necessary ingredient of a suitable model for the mind-body problem. With these conditions, Plato already introduces central components that are present in contemporary philosophical debates, but have not yet been unified into a hylomorphistic concept in the philosophy of mind. The present article proposes this unification.

Large parts of the Western philosophical tradition, powerful in Kant’s transcendental conception, have reserved the concept of autonomy for rational subjects that think and act on reasons. While this captures an essential aspect of autonomy, the dimensions of embodiment and vulnerability remain unreflected or are subsumed under the heteronomous conditions of the human subject. If the conception of autonomy, though, doesn’t start with the concept of a rational subject but from the perspective of living beings, autonomy and vulnerability seem intrinsically connected, as Jonas’ (1973; 1997) concept of “needful freedom” suggests. This article argues for a deep connection between human autonomy and vulnerability. Methodologically, the argument follows the life-mind-continuity thesis (Thompson, 2007) and lays out the embodied account of autonomy that enactivism offers. Two crucial moments are: 1. The organism can distance itself from the environment. 2. This enables it to establish its own norms. However, the norms of bodily self-regulation also render the organism vulnerable. This conception, though, needs specification for capturing human autonomy. As enactivists like E. Thompson assume, phenomenology is essential to theorizing about human autonomy. I will develop a phenomenological concept of autonomy starting from three notions of selfhood (Zahavi, 2008) and arguing for a central role of the reflective self for human autonomy. Reflection grounds both moments of autonomy: Self-distancing and the possibility of taking a stance by relying on reasons. In the phenomenological sense, autonomy is thus the ability to respond to reasons for which reflection is necessary. However, this ability is bound to a particular form of vulnerability that manifests in some psychopathologies. This vulnerability will be shown in conclusion by Blankenburg’s reflections on the role of autonomy in mental diseases.