This paper is a starting chapter of my dissertation. The chapter aims at illustrating three institutional factors: enterprises (state-owned and private), labor market, government policies which altogether frame the work context of an individual. The work context represents an important piece of evidence for understanding the overall picture of one’s career choices and work-related behaviors.
Tullio Viola is going to present a working paper on ‚Intersubjectivity and Disagreement‘
This text is a slightly revised version of a chapter of my Ph.D.
dissertation, entitled Peirce on the Uses of History (defended: Humboldt
University, 2015). I am currently transforming the disssertation into a
book, which will be published by De Gruyter in 2020. It is about the
relation between philosophical understanding and historical knowledge
in Peirce’s work, and in pragmatism more broadly. The chapter I am
presenting here is the fifth. It deals with Peirce’s conception of
intersubjectivity and sociality, and on its implications for the argument
presented throughout the book. I present Peirce’s communitarian
understanding of science and philosophy, discuss his rather scattered
ideas about social and political philosophy, and also move a major
objection against him: in my view, Peirce has not reflected hard enough
on the differences between science and philosophy with regard to the
irreducibility of disagreement. I try to spell out some implications of this
criticism.
Gabriel Abend presents a working paper on ‚Thick Concepts and Sociological Research‘
In this paper I ask how to do social scientific things with thick concepts, what’s unique about thick concepts, and what’s unique about creatures in whose lives there are thick concepts
Kathi Beier presents a working paper on ‚Being good: Aristotelian Naturalism and the naturalistic fallacy‘
This is the first (and yet unfinished) draft of my contribution to a German anthology on the naturalistic fallacy in philosophy, logic and law. I first explain the two senses of the concept ‘naturalistic fallacy’ in philosophy, distinguishing between (i) G.E. Moore’s claim that it is impossible to define ‘good’, and (ii) David Hume’s suggestion that one cannot deduce ought-conclusions from is-premises. Based on that, I argue that Aristotelian Naturalism does not rest on a naturalistic fallacy in the Humean sense. It should, however, take Moore’s claim more seriously. In order to do so, Aristotle’s idea of ‘good’ as a transcendental term might be helpful.
David Palme gives a working paper on ‚Speaking about “forms of life” ‚
My second contributon focuses on the term “form of life”
in the title of my project. It tries to synthesize my
preliminary results and put them into the context of the
overall project. It claims that there can two strands
identied how the term “form of life” is used. These two
usages do have diferent implicatons on normative theory
but are not handled with sufcient care. I try to object both
of these strands with my own interpretaton of
Witgenstein.
Jana Ilnicka presents a working paper on ‚Augustine in the Wartburg manuscript‘
In the newly discovered Wartburg manuscript (Ms Eisenach
1361) small texts are collected, which Franz Pfeiffer
classified in his edition of the works of Meister Eckhart as
„Proverbs“. These „sayings“ have so far been predominantly
inauthentic and inspired by Meister Eckhart. The latest
research into the content of the manuscript has shown that
these texts must have been written by Meister Eckhart
himself. It is often quoted in Augustine, and the analysis of
these citations shows that they correspond to the manner of
the citation in Meister Eckhart and can be included in the
index Auctorum Patristicorum.
Martin Repohl gives a working paper on ‚The relationship quality of the material world – perspectives of a worldrelationship sociological approach for the analysis of materiality‘
The aim of my dissertation project is to formulate a consistent world
relationship sociological terminology for analyzing materiality under the
aspect of relationship quality. The premise is that material entities are
parts of social relationships and have an influence on the dynamic and
quality of the concrete relationship by their own material constitution.
The question of materiality is a key problem of sociological research and
is addressed in many different ways. But the aspect of relationship
quality only appears in an implicit way. The sociology of world
relationship provides a new perspective on that aspect, but has no clear
concept for describing materiality by its own terms. The inclusion of a
phenomenological approach to materiality offers a solution for that
conceptual lack, because this perspective describes the self activity of
material entities. An inclusion into the terminology for world relationship
sociology opens the perspective for the transformative part of material
entities in the dynamic of relationships. It’s planned to make empirical
case studies on specific material entities (for example plastic particles,
toxins or wood) to describe its influence on world relationship in an
exemplary way. These case studies will be used to develop a valid and
applicable concept for analyzing materiality under the aspect of
relationship quality.
The social theory & social philosophy-group cordially invites everybody to „social theory movie night“ at the MWK.
We will get together informally and discuss issues of social theory/social philosophy based on movies we watch together. The first Movie Night took place last week with „Battlestar Galactica“ (Canada 2006), season 3.16: „STRIKE“! It is dealing with labour politics & diversity & conflict … We hope to see you at our next Movie Night.
For mor information please contact: christoph.henning@uni-erfurt.de
A short bookreview on Hans G. Kippenberg’s newest book ‚Regulierungen der Religionsfreiheit: Von der Allgemeinen Erklärung der Menschenrechte zu den urteilen des Europäischen Gerichtshofs für Menschenrechte‘ – by Jörg Rüpke
Hans G. Kippenberg, former fellow of the Max Weber Centre has written a book on legal regulations of freedom of religion from 1948 onwards, from the „Universal Declaration of Human Rights“ of 1948 to the „International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights“ of 1966/76. Written with an international perspective, the focus of the book shifts to European developments, the European Convention on Human Rights and the European Commission on Human Rights and the European Court in the second half of the book. Individual cases and legal developments from Italy to the United Kingdom, from Switzerland to Greece and Turkey are analyzed. The historicization of the process is interesting for the history of religion in general as for the problems of religious beliefs, actions, and institutionalizations in urban contexts and urban religion. The book demonstrates the manifold strands and quick changes in the perspectives on and the contents of legal matters, but it also demonstrates how the trace of such texts and court cases produces lasting changes. The historicization of this process from the point of view of History of Religion is a big asset of the book (Hans G. Kippenberg, Regulierungen der Religionsfreiheit: Von der Allgemeinen Erklärung der Menschenrechte zu den urteilen des Europäischen Gerichtshofs für Menschenrechte, Baden-Baden: Nomos, 2019, 190 pp.).
Simone Wagner gave a working paper on ‚Authority and gender. Abbesses and priors of collegiate churches in South-Western Germany (15th/16th century)‘
Abbesses and priors of collegiate churches („Stifte“) faced similar conditions of theiroffice. Despite comparable evidence they were treated very differently by academia. Inorder to overcome this deficit this dissertation project takes a comparative approach andfocuses on the authority of abbesses and priors of civic collegiate churches in SouthWestern Germany (15th/16th century). It explores how different agents i.e. the cities,bishops and the chapters helped shaping and dismantle religious authority. Thus,primarily sources produced by conflicts between abbesses or priors and these agents areused. The project’s aim is to show that intersectionality was very important for religioussuperior’s authority. Religious lifestyle, status, gender and civic discourses all played arole in constructing authority