Letteratura scientifica selezionata sul tema "Scepticisme vert"

AbstractLorenzo Valla (1406-1457) has often been considered to be a sceptic. Equipped with an extremely polemical and critical mind, his whole oeuvre seemed to aim at undermining received philosophical and theological dogmas. More specifically he has been associated with the burgeoning interests in ancient scepticism in the fifteenth century. In this article the arguments in support of this interpretation will be critically examined and evaluated. Based on a discussion of two of his major works, De vero bono and the Dialectica, it will be shown that Valla was not a sceptic. Even though the first work betrays the techniques of the Academy as employed by Cicero, the appropriation of these strategies served an agenda which can hardly be called 'sceptical'. The second work contains his reform of Aristotelian dialectic, which seems to testify to a sceptical interest in arguments which rely on verisimilitude and dubious validity such as sorites and paradox. But rather than reflecting an endorsement of Academic scepticism, this work, on closer reading, shows Valla to be highly critical on such arguments. This raises the question of how scepticism is related to rhetoric. Their similarities and differences will be discussed in the final section: Valla the Christian orator was no proponent of doubt, uncertainty and a suspension of judgement, even though at times he used strategies derived from Academic scepticism.

Cet article propose une nouvelle analyse de la conception du rythme poétique qu’avait T.S. Eliot, ainsi que de sa pratique rythmique dans cette partie de sa poésie qui se déploie le long de la frontière mal définie entre vers libre et vers métrique. À travers une lecture de sa production critique et de sa correspondance, l’article démontre que la poésie, pour Eliot, doit être caractérisée par « le rythme poétique », et que ce rythme se définit selon lui par la présence d’une percussivité comparable à celle d’un tambour. Les présupposés de son modèle du rythme, ainsi que le scepticisme qu’il exprime vis-à-vis de la scansion par pieds, font d’Eliot un précurseur de la beat prosody, et justifient que le lecteur aborde sa poésie avec une prédisposition rythmique, c’est-à-dire l’attente d’une rythmicité forte. L’article présente quatre propositions pour une lecture rythmique d’Eliot, en insistant sur l’importance, pour la critique, des qualités auditives-perceptives de ses rythmes, et en se penchant sur les raisons pour lesquelles ceux-ci peuvent rester inaccessibles à certains lecteurs. Il inclut des scansions d’extraits de poèmes d’Eliot des années 1910 et 1920, établies selon les méthodes de la beat prosody.

L'évolution générale de la politique étrangère canadienne durant les années 1990 laisse croire que le Canada a gardé intactes certaines de ses composantes alors qu'il en a changé substantiellement certaines autres. Ainsi, dans le domaine de la sécurité, le Canada semble avoir opté pour une doctrine qui exprime un certain scepticisme à l'égard de ce que l'ordre multilatéral actuel peut offrir pour répondre aux défis de l'après-guerre froide. La présente étude cherche donc à comprendre quelle est la stratégie institutionnelle poursuivie par le Canada en trois occasions différentes, soit lors de l'élaboration de la convention sur les mines antipersonnel, lors du règlement de la crise haïtienne et dans le cadre de la réforme du Conseil de sécurité de VONU. Cette analyse, de type pattern matching, repose sur une grille comparative établie par Cooper et qui permet de déterminer la nature et la portée des actions diplomatiques d'un pays donné en utilisant les comportements diplomatiques traditionnels du Canada et de l'Australie comme idéaux-types. Comme il sera donné de le constater dans chacun de ces cas, le Canada semble privilégier une action diplomatique qui sort de plus en plus des sentiers battus pour défendre des positions novatrices. Ceci tend à confirmer que, sans renier son engagement envers certains principes de sa politique étrangère qui font davantage appel à l'universalisation et à la routine, le Canada a, récemment, plutôt tenté de fonder sa politique étrangère sur de nouvelles bases qui se caractérisent par une action plus concentrée et d'une nature plus héroïque. En ce sens, nous pouvons conclure qu'effectivement, le Canada tend vers une attitude de plus en plus semblable à celle de l'Australie eu égard aux paramètres identifiés par Cooper.

In the city of Carlsbad, New Mexico, where a deep geological repository named the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant receives regular shipments of military transuranic waste that will remain radioactive for 10,000 years, a group of local actors has been putting major efforts to extend their attachments to nuclear waste futures. In January 2012, Forbes magazine named Carlsbad ‘The Town that Wants America’s Worst Atomic Waste’. Obviously, linking the verb ‘want’ with ‘worst’ is meant to show how unexpected this desire might be. This paper offers an ethnographical account of activities undertaken by their Nuclear Task Force at a peculiar moment. Articulating the relationship between valuation and desiring, it develops the notion of proactive valuation undertakings to refer to local actors’ attempts to generate new attachments and to maintain existing ones through the succession of a series of mediated and equipped valuation undertakings. Rather than approaching desire for waste with scepticism, it follows what ‘desiring’ actors do and how they do it in ‘enterprise form’ and offers a novel, symmetrical and a more comprehensive approach to examine, not only, the co-production of places and techno political orders, but also the constitution of political and moral values at specific sites.

AbstractThe Vascular and Endovascular Research Network (VERN) was set up to promote research, to improve the treatment of vascular diseases and to improve the synthesis and dissemination of evidence. The network represents a particular form of collaboration involving trainee doctors and specialists from a wide variety of medical disciplines. It undertakes multicentre projects, which are mostly observational studies and the data collected are analysed and published in a short period of time. This form of research has several advantages including fostering collaboration between different institutes, countries and researchers with different levels of expertise. It also promotes accelerated delivery of evidence and individual professional development. The network has an executive committee that meets every 2 weeks to discuss projects and the entire committee meets every month. An appointed member of the executive committee coordinates the centres participating in projects. Although there has been some scepticism with respect to research collaboratives, raising concerns over the accountability and the contribution of authors, it is paramount that research conducted by a collaborative maintains the same scientific rigour and ethical standards as research conducted by individual academic units.

The use of chimney technique in endovascular repair of abdominal aortic aneurysms (ChEVAR) has had a secondary role. Although it was first developed in an emergent/urgent setting, the publication of various important studies has helped overcome scepticism towards this technique in elective procedures. This paper reviews current evidence about ChEVAR, focusing on clinical results, technical notes and comparisons with other techniques. The new ChEVAR findings show favourable mid- and long-term clinical outcomes, even in elective patients. These results, comparable to those related to fenestrated endografts, have been achieved through standardisation in planning and materials. An adequate endograft oversizing associated to the right aortic neck length is fundamental to avoid ChEVAR-related complications, such as type 1a endoleaks. These data indicate that ChEVAR, compared to other complex endovascular treatments, has comparable outcomes along with features that could make it an essential option in every clinical setting.

Abstract In recent years an increasing scepticism has arisen concerning the Deuteronomistic character of the Book of the Four (Hos, Amos, Mic, Zeph). Many themes and motifs have been regarded as “inspired” by or “oriented” towards the Deut and DtrH, but not exclusively Dtr. redaction. Hosea 1*, the beginning of the composition, however, has been neglected in this respect. Unlike 2 Kgs 9–10, which reflects a positive view of Jehu’s fulfilment of Yhwh’s command at Jezreel, Hos 1 condemns him for the bloodguilt at the same place. The discrepancy is often explained through different theological backgrounds. In contrast, this article shows that both thematically (the end of the Jehuites) and in terms of phraseology (“harlotry,” idioms with the noun “blood,” “bow,” symbolic use of the verb “lift up,” nouns belonging to the semantic field of riding), there is a close literary connection between Hos 1* and 2 Kgs 9–10. Thus, for good reasons Hos 1* can be considered Dtr.

ÚrtakEvnið í hesi grein er ætlanir um at stovna tukthús í Havn, upprunaliga sum partur av herdum stríði móti ullarbidding og reiking um landið, og við fyrimynd í líknandi stovnum í øðrum pørtum av danska-norska kongsríkinum. Umframt at vera fongsul vórðu tukthús í samtíðini umtalað sum búskaparligar og sosialar nýskipanir, sum klekingarstøðir fyri nýggjar vinnugreinir og sum siðbøtandi stovnar, har lógbrótarar skuldu tyktast til góðan arbeiðssið til egið og samfelagsins gagn. Tíðarandin var í størri mun at nýta revsiarbeiði heldur enn likamsrevsing fyri t.d. stuldur og bidding. Tukthúsætlanin varð fyrstu ferð borin fram í 1770-árunum og uppafturtikin í fleiri umførum í 19. øld, men varð ongantíð framd í verki, og klagurnar um ullarbidding og reiking um landið hildu fram. Embætismenn sóu tað sum eina høvuðsgrund til ta áhaldandi biddingina, at fólk hildu fram at geva biddarum gávur og olmussur heldur enn at melda teir. Hesin hugburður verður tulkaður sum ein tvístøða: bæði sum opinleiki fyri samfelagsbroytingum í anda upplýsingartíðarinnar, og sum trekleiki at lata frá sær vald at skilja millum rangt og rætt, millum verdugar og óverdugar biddarar, til politi- og rættarmyndugleikar, og ivasamt álit á hesar myndugleikar. Abstract This paper is a study of the intended building of a workhouse in the Faroe Islands in the late 18th century, originally in connection with a law reform introduced to restrict begging and vagrancy of the poor. Explicit aims were to install a work ethic and moral uplift of the criminal poor, and to promote new industries, especially manufacture. The plans were aborted after some years, but resumed in three instances in the 19th century, modelled by contemporary poor politics and criminal politics, the spirit of which was to use imprisonment with hard labour rather than corporal punishment for lawbreaking, such as begging and stealing. The workhouse never came into being, and complaints of begging vagrants continued. Public officials in charge of implementing the planned institutions saw a main obstacle to restricting begging in the failure of farmers and other well-to-do people to give up the old habit of giving alms to the poor rather than reporting them to the police authorities for prosecution. This ambiguity is interpreted as on one hand openness to modernization in the spirit of Enlightenment, and on the other hand a slowness to concede the power of discriminating between right and wrong, between worthy and unworthy beggars, and a scepticism in an extended system of police and juridical authorities.

OPSOMMING Tradisionele benaderings in hoofstroomkriminologie formuleer misdaadbekamping as 'n voortdurende of voortslepende konflik waarin geweld as 't ware met geweld beveg moet word. In teenstelling hiermee word nuwer rigtings in kritiese kriminologie in hierdie artikel verken en onderskryf - benaderings wat positiewe vrede beskou as 'n effektiewe en blywende(r) "antwoord", selfs al is dit net ten dele, op die probleem van misdaad. Die ietwat onkonvensio-nele benadering in rigtings wat krities teenoor hoofstroomkriminologie staan, in die besonder die vertakking bekend as "vredemakende kriminologie" (Quinney en Pepinsky se bydrae), word in samehang met belangrike werk in die breër konfliktransformasiebeweging beskou. Op grond daarvan word betoog dat vrede wat op vreedsame wyse bewerkstellig word, groter voordeel inhou as die mislukte pogings tot dusver om geweld met geweld te (probeer) beveg. Dit verg egter 'n paradigmaverskuiwing. In hierdie bydrae word daar spesifiek gevra na die wenslikheid daarvan om die Suid-Afrikaanse gevangeniswese te transformeer van 'n openbare instelling wat negatiewe vrede (in die vorm van die afwesigheid van misdaad) verskans, tot 'n instelling wat positiewe vrede as 'n waardestelsel onderskryf. Hierdie waardevolle gedagte staan sentraal by Galtung. Daar word veral aan die hand gedoen dat die bekendstelling van oop gevangenisse (soos in Zimbabwe, Mosambiek en die Seychelle) en ander modelle wat in Suid-Afrika ondersoek word, 'n goeie tussentydse maatreël is. Wat sentraal staan in my redenasie rakende die trans-formasie van die gevangeniswese in Suid-Afrika, is dat so 'n voorstel slegs haalbaar is indien daar aan (vrygelate) gevangenes se basiese menslike behoeftes (Burton se belangrike bydrae) - werkverskaffing, respek, ens. - voldoen word. Teen die agtergrond van Pat Carlen se waarskuwing dat die rehabilitasieparadigma ontoereikend geword het weens politieke onwilligheid om grondliggende veranderinge aan te bring, word enkele besware oor die gevaar van 'n sogenaamde oorkoepelende "carceral spread" (aldus Foucault), gemik teen alternatiewe vir gevangenisstraf, oorweeg. Hierdie bespreking vind plaas in die konteks van die breër gevangenistransformasiediskoers hier te lande. Hoewel ek skepties staan teenoor die moont-likheid dat akademiese diskoers, soos hierdie bydrae, beleidsoorwegings wesenlik kan beïnvloed, doen ek nietemin aanbevelings in die hoop dat hierdie verkennende studie belangstelling in 'n vreedsame alternatief vir misdaadbekamping sal prikkel. Trefwoorde: vredemakende kriminologie; konfliktransformasiebeweging; vrede deur vreedsame wyses; hervestiging van vrygelate gevangenes; positiewe vrede as waardestelsel; transformasie van die gevangeniswese; fel stigmatiserende beskamingskulture; integrerende beskamingskulture; basiese menslike behoeftes; paradigmaverskuiwing ABSTRACT This exploratory project deals with a topic not common in the subject literature, namely an attempt to break with the traditional approach to the management of crime, which is seen as protracted (Galtung) or deep-rooted (Burton) social conflict. The traditional approach to the phenomenon of crime is to fight violence with violence, which can be described with the well-known military metaphor of waging a trench war against crime. By blending one of the branches of critical criminology, known as peacemaking criminology (the seminal work of Quinney and Pepinsky, in particular), with the broader movement of peace-building in conflict transformation, I argue that fighting violence by peaceful means instead is arguably a worthwhile effort, even though it would require a considerable paradigm shift. The alternative - attempting to combat crime with violence - has failed repeatedly. In this contribution, the question is raised whether or not the prison service as a public institution in South Africa is capable of being transformed from an institution propagating negative peace (in the form of the absence of crime) into one advocating positive peace (in the sense of achieving peace by peaceful means). The idea of positive, as opposed to negative, peace is especially Galtung 's. I contend that South Africa's relatively conservative climate makes the suggestion of de-incarceration unlikely to fall on sympathetic ears, even though the case for decriminalising petty crime (with its unmistakable colonial roots) and alternative models to imprisonment is a compelling one. The South African view is conditioned by issues such as the politicisation of crime, the corruption of our understanding of crime by phenomena such as the prison-industrial complex (PIC) and the profit motive embedded in crime management as it has come to shape the PIC. The endless recycling of ex-offenders in our stigmatising shaming culture is an important, though certainly not exclusive, driver of South Africa's alarmingly high rates of incarceration and recidivism. I argue that the idea of open prisons (as found in some European countries, in particular Finland, and in countries such as Zimbabwe and the Seychelles), may well take root, but that the further-reaching objective of prison abolition should be postponed indefinitely. I am sceptical, along with academic authors from both the East and the West, about the possibility of academic knowledge - even if it is supported by evidence - influencing public policy formulation in the field of crime management. My argument is built around Eugene McLaughlin's contention that mainstream conventional criminology is complicit in the state's uncritical fusing of its electoral mandate with the agenda of Big Business, which causes far more injury and death than so-called conventional crime; and that the influence of academic criminological discourse on the formulation of public policy on crime control and management has waned, while vested interests in criminal justice and the privatisation of the "crime control industry" have in fact filled the gap. Add to these disturbing trends the view of both Colin Leys and Colin Crouch that while government embraces neo-liberal interests, it pays mere lip service to the academic recommendations of experts in the field. My research design, conceptual and theoretical framework, and research question and objectives are meant to stimulate debate along the lines suggested. Central to these proposals is the idea that the transformation of the prison system in South Africa would be feasible only if ex-offenders'basic human needs are realised. It is worth noting that Burton has contributed substantially to the theory that realising basic human needs would prevent prolonged social conflict. Against the background of Pat Carlen's warning that the rehabilitation paradigm has become redundant because of political reluctance to effect fundamental change, concerns over the widening of the so-called "carceral spread" (Foucault) are highlighted in the context of the broad prison transformation discourse in South Africa. I justify my scepticism about the possibility of public policy formulation being influenced in any meaningful way by an academic discourse such as this, but nonetheless offer seven recommendations in this regard. The recommendations range from urgently addressing the worst features of this country's harshly stigmatising shaming culture - which leads to the endless recycling of those who are subject to that culture and form a very marginalised group - to arguing in favour of criminalising the stigmatisation of ex-offenders by having it declared hate speech and an offence that carries both civil and criminal sanctions. I conclude the article by expressing the hope that this exploratory approach to a decidedly novel view of conflict management and crime transformation would stimulate debate and new thinking about the notion of addressing the issue of crime by peaceful means rather than the outmoded methods and repeated failures of attempting to fight violence with violence. Keywords: peacemaking criminology; broader movement of peace-building in conflict transformation; offender re-entry; open prisons; stigmatising shaming cultures; integrative shaming cultures; basic human needs; transformation of the prison system; peace by peaceful means; positive peace; paradigm shift; conflict management; public policy formulation

Le scepticisme du consommateur envers les entreprises va en augmentant. Cependant, les études sur les déterminants et les conséquences de ce phénomène sur les produits bio/vert font défaut. Afin de combler partiellement cette lacune, cette thèse porte sur le scepticisme vert en explorant et comparant des consommateurs issus de trois milieux culturels différents. Le premier essai vise à étudier la relation entre le scepticisme et le comportement d'achat des cosmétiques bio en se basant sur la théorie attitude-comportement-contexte (ABC). Le deuxième essai met en lumière l'effet psychologique du scepticisme sur le comportement de consommation verte. Le troisième essai aborde la question suivante : le scepticisme à l’égard des aliments biologiques pourrait-il expliquer en partie l'écart entre les nombreuses attitudes positives à l'égard des aliments biologiques exprimées par les consommateurs et leurs choix réels ? À partir des données collectées auprès des consommateurs en Tunisie, en Italie et en France, nous avons effectué une comparaison par pays, en adoptant l'approche de modélisation par équations structurelles. Les résultats ont révélé que le scepticisme vert est un puissant inhibiteur de l'adoption de produits bio et verts par les consommateurs dans les trois pays. Considérés ensemble, ces trois essais contribuent à la littérature en soulignant l'importance des déterminants psychologiques et inhibiteurs de la consommation de produits bio et verts
Consumer skepticism towards companies is on the rise. However, studies on the determinants and the consequences of this phenomenon on organic /green products are lacking. In order to partially fill this gap, this thesis focuses on green skepticism by exploring and comparing consumers from three different cultural backgrounds. The first essay investigated the relationship between, green skepticism and the purchasing behaviour of organic cosmetics, based on the attitude-behaviour- context (ABC) theory. The second essay aimed at providing a better understanding on the psychological effect of skepticism on green consumption behaviour. The third essay demonstrated whether organic food skepticism could partly explain the gap” or discrepancy between the great deal of positive attitudes towards organic food expressed by consumers and their actual choices. Based on data collected from consumers in Tunisia, Italy and France, we conducted a cross-country comparison adopting the structural equation modeling approach. Results revealed that green skepticism is strong inhibitor towards adoption of organic and green products among consumers in the three countries. Together, the three essays contribute to the literature by highlighting the importance of the psychological determinants and inhibitors of the adoption of organic and green products

Cette recherche s‘attache à comprendre le phénomène de la contestation de la publicité environnementale. En effet, peu de recherches ont été conduites sur ce sujet. L'objectif de cette thèse est d'explorer les contours de la notion de contestation publicité environnementale tout en identifiant les raisons, les manifestations et les risques qui lui sont associés. Trois études empiriques, une qualitative et deux expérimentales, montrent que qu'il existe des motifs de contestation rattachés aux éléments de la publicité et d'autres liés à la confiance du consommateur envers les publicités vertes. En outre, les manifestations de la contestation peuvent aller de mouvements collectifs et visibles à des comportements plus individuels comme l'évitement et le rejet de la publicité environnementale. De plus, la contestation semble présenter un impact négatif sur l'image de l'entreprise et sur le comportement d'achat du consommateur. Enfin, les résultats indiquent que la provocation - un moyen utilisé par les entreprises selon la littérature pour éviter pas la contestation- a d‘effets négatifs sur les perceptions et les des consommateurs envers la publicité. À la lumière des résultats obtenus, les limites de la thèse sont exposées et les futurs axes de recherche sont proposés
This research seeks to analyze the phenomenon of environmental advertising contestation. In effect, there is a shortage of studies on these issues. The objective of this thesis is to explore the contours of the environmental advertising contestation concept while identifying the reasons, the manifestations and the risks associated with it. Three empirical studies, one qualitative and two experimental, show that that there are reasons of contestation related to creative elements of advertisement and discourse advertisements and others linked to advertising medium and confidence of consumer toward the advertising source. Moreover, the manifestations of contestation can range from collective and visible movements to more individual behaviors such as avoidance and the rejection of environmental advertising. In addition, the contestation seems to have a negative impact on consumer buying behavior and on the firm's image. Finally, the results indicate that provocation- a tool used by companies according to literature to avoid contestation- has negative effects on consumers‘ perceptions and attitudes toward the advertisement. In the light of the obtained results, the limitations of the thesis are outlined and future avenues of research are proposed

L'objectif de ce mémoire est de replacer la contribution d'Arcésilas de Pitane dans notre compréhension de l'histoire du platonisme et du scepticisme ancien. La double nature philosophique, sceptique et platonicienne, de ce scholarque de l'Académie ne peut être bien comprise qu'en la situant dans son contexte hellénistique. Quoique, son passage à l'Académie ait soulevé des critiques de la part de ses contemporains et plus tard de la tradition platonicienne, ce mémoire veut tenter de montrer la pertinence d'étudier sa philosophie dans le contexte platonicien. La compréhension de l'histoire du platonisme en différentes lectures a su mettre de l'avant la nature polymorphe de cette doctrine philosophique qui invite à saluer la présence de ce philosophe original. L' absence de sources de premières mains et la tardivité des sources à son sujet ne laissent qu'un portrait sommaire de la personnalité philosophique d'Arcésilas de Pitane. Néanmoins, ce mémoire propose qu'Arcésilas comprend l'observation des choses du monde comme adêla , et que sa méthode discursive relève de l'elenchos socratique, de l'isosthénie dans les arguments et de l'argumentation pro et contra . Ces deux postulats l'amènent toujours au résultat de l' épochê peri panton . Il est donc possible de démontrer qu'Arcésilas a réitéré non pas l'impossibilité de la connaissance, mais le simple constat de la nécessité de poursuivre les recherches. De cette manière, il est envisageable de supposer qu'Arcésilas de Pitane serait bien un platonicien sceptique plutôt qu'un dogmatiste négatif.

La pluridisciplinarité artistique contemporaine, qui remonte à l’humanisme et au romantisme, est-elle encore liée à un désir de connaissance et de totalité, ou s’inscrit-elle dans un spectre de fragmentation ? Les défaillances reconnues du savoir, du sujet et de l’œuvre forment une résistance à la puissance des technostructures. La sphère de l’art, détachée de la division du travail artistique, s’inscrit dans une négativité non dialectique. Par la sape méthodique des référents et des maîtrises, l’œuvre s’ouvre au désordre et au manque. Poursuivant simultanément plusieurs démarches distinctes dans les arts visuels, la musique et l’écriture, passant de l’art populaire à l’art intellectualisé, étant autant témoin qu’acteur de mon travail, je propose une approche de l’art qui se définit plus par l’errance et la pluralité que par un projet unitaire. La position mineure et dispersée se ressource dans une poïétique prolifique : simultanéité divergente, transposition négative, hétérogénéité, confusion des temps, présence du vide et du fantomatique…
Is artistic pluridisciplinarity, which goes back to Humanism and Romanticism, still connected to a desire for knowledge and for holistic apprehension, or does it reveal the prospect of fragmentation? The known shortcomings of knowledge, of the subject, and of the work of art resist the power of techno-structures. Once the artistic sphere gets disconnected from the division of artistic labor, it is amenable to a non-dialectical negativity. As the work of art methodically subverts referents, mastery and know-hows, it becomes accessible to loss and disorder. Being as much the witness as the agent of the work I produce, I propose an approach to art conceived as wandering and plural—an approach based on various forms of practice in visual arts, music, and writing, which shift from popular to intellectual art. This artistic stance, minor and scattered, draws its strength from a prolific poietics: divergent simultaneity, negative transposition, heterogeneity, confusion of temporalities, void, and haunting presences…

Throughout history, scepticism and the urge to question accepted truths has been a powerful force for change and growth. A healthy amount of scepticism is widely encouraged, but when is such scepticism legitimate and when is it problematic? Scepticism: A Very Short Introduction explores both the advantages of scepticism and how it can have unhelpful social consequences in generating distrust. It considers the role of scepticism as the source of contemporary social and political movements such as climate change denial, post-truth politics, and fake news. It also examines the philosophical arguments for a radical form of scepticism, which maintains that knowledge is impossible.

What is knowledge? How does it differ from mere belief? Do you need to be able to justify a claim in order to count as knowing it? Knowledge: A Very Short Introduction considers these epistemological questions alongside new puzzles arising from recent discoveries about humanity, language, and the mind. It explains the formation of major historical theories of knowledge, and shows how contemporary philosophers have developed new ways of understanding knowledge, using ideas from logic, linguistics, and psychology. Covering topics ranging from relativism and the problem of scepticism to the trustworthiness of internet sources, this VSI uses everyday examples to explain the key issues and debates.

Ethics: A Very Short Introduction highlights the importance of an understanding of approaches to ethics and its foundations. Today, we are confronted with an uncertain world of eroding trust, swirling conspiracy theories, and a dismaying loss of respect in public discourse. Our self-image as moral, well-behaved creatures is dogged by scepticism, relativism, hypocrisy, and nihilism, and by the fear that science has unmasked us as creatures fated by our genes to be selfish, competitive, and aggressive. This VSI tackles the major moral questions surrounding birth, death, happiness, desire, and freedom. It shows us how we should think about the meaning of life.

This chapter shows that the four types of support and scepticism characterize very different people within member states. Loyal supporters, and policy, regime, and exit sceptics differ in terms of socio-demographical background as well as their issue positions and priorities. The chapter shows that the arch Eurosceptic, an exit sceptic, is not economically deprived as much of the existing literature would predict, but rather economically relatively well-off. What is more, different types of sceptics within the same country as well as across different country contexts characterized by varying levels of economic and political performance hold starkly different issue priorities and positions. These findings are important because they suggest that European and national elites are faced with the difficult task of developing a policy response that would appease these constituencies simultaneously, both within and across countries. This will most likely prove to be a very difficult undertaking.

Aesthetic property realism would seem to be committed to at least some version of the following two claims: (a) there is a distinctive category of predications or attributions used in describing art works and other objects of our aesthetic attention; and (b) it is correct to construe these attributions as asserting that certain aesthetic properties exist and are objectively true of art works and other objects. Although anti-realist challenges have focused mainly on deconstructing (b), there has also been considerable scepticism over (a), i.e. over the very concept of aesthetic properties. The distinction between the aesthetic and the non-aesthetic is one of those distinctions that has strong intuitive credibility but yields grudgingly to philosophical analysis.

This chapter shows how “the Hobbesian hypothesis” (the claim that everyone is better off in a state society with a private property system than they could reasonably expect to be in any society without either of those institutions) appeared in Nineteen-Century Political Theory. As in the Eighteen Century, disagreement about the truth of the hypothesis produced virtually no debate. G. W. F. Hegel, Frédéric Bastiat, and others asserted it with very little supporting evidence. Henry David Thoreau, Herbert Spencer, Henry George, Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, John Robert Seeley, Henry Sidgwick, Henry Sumner Maine, and Peter Kropotkin all voiced various levels of scepticism, and some, especially Kropotkin, produced considerable evidence. Yet supporters went on asserting the hypothesis as if it were an unchallengeable and obvious truth.

Pierre Bayle was a defender of toleration whose distinctive contribution was to show that the limits of religious toleration could not coherently be drawn by an appeal to religious truth. In circumstances in which the truth of the matter was at issue, any such move would lead its advocate to beg the question: an appeal to religious truth could not help adjudicate a dispute about religious truth. The wider implication of this is that the limits to toleration cannot be drawn by appeal to moral truth either—at least in circumstances in which moral truth is disputed. If toleration is limited, it will have to be on very different grounds. The result of this will be an account of the basis of politics that denies the possibility of moral foundations, and pushes us in the direction of a kind of realism, and a scepticism about the legitimacy of political authority.

This work challenges the common belief that Aristotle’s virtue ethics is founded on an appeal to human nature, an appeal that is thought to be intended to provide both substantive ethical advice and justification for the demands of ethics. It is argued that it is not Aristotle’s intent, but the view is resisted that Aristotle was blind to questions of the source or justification of his ethical views. Aristotle’s views are interpreted as a ‘middle way’ between the metaphysical grounding offered by Platonists and the scepticism or subjectivist alternatives articulated by others. The commitments implicit in the nature of action figure prominently in this account: Aristotle reinterprets Socrates’ famous paradox that no one does evil willingly, taking it to mean that a commitment to pursuing the good is implicit in the very nature of action. This approach is compared to constructivism in contemporary ethics.

Growing unease in the scientific community has stimulated reception of classical authors as Karl Jaspers. By drawing on existential philosophy Jaspers has given GP a depth which allows reflecting the methodological premises of psychopathology. Anthropologic phenomenology of Edmund Husserl was received with scepticism by Jaspers as was V. v. Weizsäcker’s psychosomatic medicine and Mitscherlich`s psychoanalysis. Jaspers refined mainstream psychopathology by understanding their nature and defining precise criteria. Delusion and psychotic symptoms are examples. The observation of patient`s and psychiatrist`s “vicarious self-representations” gained acceptance although low reliability was expected. Substantial critique on GP is rare. Some authors consider Jaspers’ work as replica of French psychiatrists. However, Jaspers’ work is unique in getting in touch philosophy and psychiatry. The comprehensiveness of the material is one merit of GP. Amazing that in times when psychopathological concepts are short lived a book published one hundred years ago still exerts influence. This steady interest may be an indication that GP touches upon the very roots of mental life.

This article examines three moments of the post-Kantian philosophical tradition in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries: Kantianism, Post-Kantian Idealism, and Neo-Kantianism. It elucidates the distinctive methods of a tradition that has never entirely disappeared and is now acknowledged once again as the source of contemporary insights. It outlines two problematics—naturalist scepticism and historicist nihilism—threatening the possibility of metaphysics. The first concerns sceptical worries about reason, emerging from attempts to extend the methods of natural science to the study of human beings. Kant’s project of a critical and transcendental analysis of reason, with its distinctive methods, should be considered a response. The second arises from the development of new methods of historical inquiry, seeming to undermine the very possibility of individual agency. Also considered are Kant’s successors’ revisions of the critical and transcendental analysis of reason, undertaken to overcome challenges confronting the original versions of Kant’s methods.

Scepticism concerns doubt, primarily doubt about what is true. So construed, the sceptic is not proposing that truth is just subjective opinion in the way that the relativist is. Indeed, what is motivating scepticism is rather the worry that our beliefs might not be true in an objective sense. However, scepticism can slide into relativism if the former becomes extensive enough. ‘What is scepticism?’ asks how we would differentiate between a healthy scepticism that targets only specific claims, and a more generalized radical scepticism that has pernicious consequences. It considers different types of knowledge—propositional, ability, and perceptual—and why it might matter to us that we do have the widespread knowledge that we take ourselves to have.

Abstract This chapter explores ancient thinking into the concepts of reason, knowledge, and scepticism. It starts with the assumptions of knowledge, wherein is expected to be a matter of being in the right relation to facts or information. Socrates assumed that Apollo's oracle meant that he is the most aware of his own ignorance after he was dubbed to be the wisest person. Meanwhile, Plato develops the most ambitious model for knowledge: mathematics. The chapter then elaborates on ancient scepticism being concerned with holding beliefs as with knowledge and is best thought of as an intellectual position concerning the powers of reason. It mentions how the empiricist theories of knowledge are the minority stream in ancient epistemology.

‘Defending knowledge’ considers some of the different philosophical responses to the problem of radical scepticism. It begins with the natural response to a philosophical puzzle: to insist on our commonsense principles and work back from there, focusing on the work of G.E. Moore. It then looks at a different kind of response to the sceptical problem, which involves the idea that perhaps there is some sort of context-shift in play in the sceptical reasoning. Finally, it discusses a more radical approach to the problem of radical scepticism outlined by Ludwig Wittgenstein. There is no one particular solution to radical scepticism, but numerous philosophical responses to the problem.

‘Scepticism as a way of life’ considers the case for a moderate scepticism, by looking at the work of the philosopher Aristotle (384–322 bce). This idea concerns the role of the virtues, and the intellectual virtues in particular, in the ‘good life’ of human flourishing; what the ancient Greeks called eudaimonia. Understanding the role that the intellectual virtues play in the good life enables us to see how embracing a moderate scepticism could be necessary for living such a life. It also helps us to resolve a possible tension between adopting a healthy moderately sceptical attitude while at the same time living a life of genuine conviction.

‘Is knowledge impossible?’ considers an influential argument that purports to show that we do not know much of what we take ourselves to know. If this argument works, then it licenses a radical sceptical doubt. It first looks at Descartes’s formulation of radical scepticism—Cartesian scepticism—which employs an important theoretical innovation known as a radical sceptical hypothesis. The closure principle is also discussed along with the radical sceptical paradox. If this radical sceptical argument works, then we not only lack knowledge of much of what we believe, but we do not even have any good epistemic reasons for believing what we do.

Radical scepticism is the contention that little or no knowledge of one’s ‘external’ surroundings might be possible. Most modern forms of scepticism have their roots in René Descartes’ Meditations which first advocated a method of ‘radical doubt’: imagining, for the sake of argument, that all one’s beliefs are false in the hope of finding some indubitable ones that will survive this acid test. Descartes employs three types of argument in order to motivate scepticism about one’s beliefs: an argument from perceptual illusion; the dreaming argument; and the evil demon scenario. The argument from perceptual illusion exploits the idea that our senses sometimes mislead us – e.g. a straight stick appears bent in water; a square tower will appear round from afar – thus inviting the thought that perception, our main route to knowledge of the world, might not be fully reliable. The dreaming argument is a form of ‘indistinguishability argument’ (see §2) that trades on the impossibility of phenomenologically distinguishing a waking experience from a dreaming experience merely by attending to the ‘qualitative feel’ of the experience itself. The conclusion seems to be that if one cannot so distinguish, one can never know that one is not dreaming. But if one cannot know that one is not dreaming, one cannot have ordinary knowledge of the world, as one must be certain that one really has knowledge as opposed to ‘dream-knowledge’ (cf. Stroud 1984; Wright 2002). The evil demon argument is a radicalisation of the dreaming argument: Descartes asks us to imagine an all-powerful mind that is constantly deceiving us, so that whatever we believe, it turns out to be false. If we cannot rule out that we might be the victims of such a scenario, we cannot, it seems, know anything. Ever since Descartes’ evil genius first made us wonder whether we might not be trapped in an undetectable global illusion, epistemologists have sought ways of resisting the radical sceptical hypothesis that knowledge of the world might be impossible. In contemporary discussion, the idea of an evil genius who is systematically tampering with our beliefs has given way to a more ‘modern’, ‘sci-fi’ scenario: how can we be sure that we are real persons interacting with an actual, ‘external’ world rather than mere brains-in-a-vat hooked up to a super-computer that is feeding us experiences as of an ‘external’ world? Now, one might wonder why anyone should take such a scenario seriously. For, after all, in the actual world, brains-in-a-vat are impossible and there is no evidence of evil alien activity. Hence, we seem to be dealing here with a completely unmotivated error-possibility (cf. Pritchard 2012) – i.e. with an error-possibility that not only has no positive grounds speaking in its favour, but, what is more, could have none. For if the radical sceptical scenario is true, any reason cited in its favour will be false (because it is also part of the ‘grand illusion’). As Hilary Putnam (1981) famously noted, a brain-in-a-vat, if such were to exist, could never truly think ‘I am a brain-in-a-vat’, since ‘brain-in-a-vat’ in the brain-in-a-vat’s simulated world could never refer to an actual brain-in-a-vat, only to a simulated one. For unless we assume a ‘recent envatment’ scenario, whereby I have been grabbed in my sleep and turned into a brain-in-a-vat, the ‘lifelong’ brain-in-a-vat has never had experience of anything real outside of the simulation and so cannot refer to what it has never had contact with. If Putnam is right about this, is it enough to undermine radical scepticism? One might think not for the following reasons. Even though, if we were brains-in-a-vat, we could never truly think that we were – or, for that matter, that we were not – this might not be thought sufficient to rule out the possibility that, despite its inarticulability, we could nevertheless be in such a situation. For surely it is to be expected that if we were in such a lamentable predicament, we could not say that we were, since in such a scenario nothing that we said about the ‘world’ could be true? Nevertheless, one might wonder why the onus should be on the anti-sceptic to rule out such bare logical possibilities rather than on the sceptic to further motivate them. Some philosophers, such as Pritchard (2016) and Stroud (1984), for example, believe that the reason for this is that radical scepticism is not really a position or an epistemological claim that anyone would seriously endorse, but rather is a paradox forced upon us by our very conception of knowledge. And if this is true, it seems that radical scepticism requires an answer, if we want to be able to retain this conception.

Chapter Eight returns to the topics with which Chapter One ended, and it completes Part Two’s reading of Hume through the Pyrrhonian Fourfold. The chapter examines Hume’s so-called Title Principle and argues that Hume is a doxastic sceptic and that his sceptical theory of belief is very much like that of the non-epistemic, non-realist Academic scepticism articulated by Clitomachus of Carthage as he reinterpreted Carneades. The chapter argues furthermore that Hume’s theory of probability is pointedly non-epistemic and non-metaphysical. Comparing Hume’s non-dogmatic probabilism to Locke’s Metrodorian realism, Chapter Eight examines Hume’s so-called gentlemanly scepticism, as well as his understanding of scientific standardsand the non-dogmatic quality of common life.

Concepts of measurement in psychology are particularly noteworthy for having encountered scepticism. While people have been happy to accept that psychological attributes can be compared, many are suspicious about the possibility of assigning numerical scores to such concepts. The earliest success stories in psychological measurement occurred in the realm of psychophysics, the area most closely linked to the physical sciences. ‘Measurement in the behavioural sciences’ explains that there are different high level purposes for which psychological measurement might be undertaken, and that these purposes require different kinds of procedures. It looks at some particular challenges of measuring the mind, including the measurement of sensation and of intelligence.

According to large number scepticism, intuitions about the Repugnant Conclusion and related problems in normative ethics shouldn’t be trusted because we can’t adequately grasp the very large numbers involved. This chapter argues that the case for large number scepticism is unconvincing. I respond to arguments for large number scepticism offered by John Broome and Michael Huemer, as well as more empirically grounded arguments due to Joshua Greene and Adam Cureton. I consider what we can learn from evidence of scope insensitivity in contingent valuation, people’s diminishing sensitivity to increasing numbers of lives lost or saved, well-established limitations of the mind/brain’s core number systems, and evidence that people are more moved by single victims than by groups. In each case, I argue that the case for large number scepticism should not convince us.

Abstract Scepticism about knowledge is a thesis that, even in a very strong form, many people find forceful and appealing. In my paper, ‘A Defense of Scepticism’, I have argued for this thesis. And, I suspect that even the universal form of it—the view that nobody ever knows anything to be so—may well be correct. While one may first find it shocking to have this thesis thrust upon one, the blow may be softened by accepting the idea that even if one never knows anything, one may at least be reasonable and justified in various things. For if this idea is correct, then in particular one may be justified and reasonable in believing certain things to be so. One of these things might even be the thesis of scepticism about knowledge.

Conspiracy theories, the belief that many significant events are secretly manipulated by powerful forces exist in all societies. However, in recent years, their influence and popularity are constantly increasing, especially in close connection with the rapid increase in the use of modern information and communication technologies, systems and means. Some conspiracy theories can be just harmless fun or an expression of a certain incredulity or scepticism. However, some can be very dangerous, they can be part of hybrid threats spread by state and/or non-state actors with the aim of influencing the opinion and behaviour of the population in the target countries in order to disrupt or undermine trust in democratic institutions, democratically elected representatives, democratic principles and in the ability to solve current problems of the given society. Some may even lead to the promotion of violence, extremism, radicalism, ethnic, racial, or religious intolerance. This is also why today conspiracy theories represent a threat as well as a challenge for human, especially democratic society, and this is also the reason why the author of this paper deals with them as part of the interdisciplinary scientific research carried out.

The number of areas of society that are being digitised continues to increase and so Internet offers are becoming increasingly important. This development also affects social work, whose specialists meanwhile see a trend to expand the internet-related offerings. This has been further strengthened in germany by the lockdowns since March 2020. This poses a particular challenge for youth workers, as their addressees, the so-called digital natives, did not experience the time before digitization and use the Internet as a matter of course to cultivate existing friendships and meet new people. Today’s young people no longer distinguish between offline and online, they are onlife. However, even in this age group there is every level of the digital divide, because not all have the same equipment, fast internet access or the necessary application skills.Up to now, they have only had limited success in switching to hybrid offers. In addition to the requirements of the recipients, this is partly due to the technical scepticism of the social work-ers, the relatively one-sided orientation of further training and the lack of equipment (Klein-schmidt/Scheibe). All this is still incomplete and does not apply equally to all social workers.This unfinished list shows that this phenomenon is interrelated and cannot be described and explained solely by describing the skills of the social workers. At this point, the actor-network theory (ANT) could be a useful theoretical perspective, because it allows the entanglement and reciprocal influences of human and non-human components in a network to be visible and then analysed. I take up the previous considerations on the use of the ANT in contexts of internet-related social work and think about them along the question of how a case study could be structured in which the individual situation of youth workers in relation to the respective conditions of success of their internet-related activities can be explored and subsequently analysed.To answer the question, I first outline the basic elements of the ANT, and then explore the potential of a thematic examination of specialists in case studies on object-related theory buil-ding. Based on this, I present a possible research design. Finally, I summarize the relevant findings and discuss ideas for further development. Stüwe, G., Ermel, N.: Lehrbuch Soziale Arbeit und Digitalisierung. Beltz, Weinheim, Basel (2019) Bossong, H.: Soziale Arbeit in Zeiten der Digitalisierung: Entwicklungspotenziale mit Schatten-seiten. neue praxis 4, 303 – 324 (2018) Buschle, C., Meyer, N.: Soziale Arbeit im Ausnahmezustand?! Professionstheoretische For-schungsnotizen zur Corona-Pandemie. Soziale Passagen 12, 155 – 170 (2020) Günzel, S.: Raum. Eine kulturwissenschaftliche Einführung. transcript, Bielefeld (2017) Waechter, N., Hollauf, I.: Soziale Herausforderungen und Entwicklungsaufgaben im Medienalltag jugendlicher Videospieler/innen. deutsche jugend 5, 218-226 (2018) Bundesministerium für Familie, Senioren, Frauen und Jugend (BMFSFJ): 16. Kinder- und Ju-gendbericht. Förderung demokratischer Bildung im Kindes- und Jugendalter. Rostock (2020) Iske, S., Kutscher, N.: Digitale Ungleichheiten im Kontext Sozialer Arbeit. In: Kutscher, N., Ley, T., Seelmeyer, U., Siller, F., Tillmann, A., Zorn, I. (eds.): Handbuch Soziale Arbeit und Digitalisie-rung. Beltz-Juventa, Weinheim, Basel, 115 – 128 (2020) Bossong, H.: Soziale Arbeit in Zeiten der Digitalisierung: Entwicklungspotenziale mit Schattenseiten. neue praxis 4, 303 – 324 (2018) Helbig, C., Roeske, A. (2020): Digitalisierung in Studium und Weiterbildung der Sozialen Arbeit. In: Kutscher, N., Ley, T., Seelmeyer, U., Siller, F., Tillmann, A., Zorn, I. (eds.): Handbuch Soziale Arbeit und Digitalisierung. Beltz-Juventa, Weinheim, Basel, 333 – 346 (2020) Kleinschmidt, N. S., Scheibe, M.: Der Digital Divide bei Fachkräften der Sozialen Arbeit. Abbild ge-sellschaftlicher Entwicklungen oder ein eingeschriebener „Konstruktionsfehler“ – Eine Untersuchung der Kinder- und Jugendhilfe. FORUM sozial 2, 47 – 49 (2021) Latour, B.: Existenzweisen. Eine Anthropologie der Modernen. Suhrkamp, Berlin (2018) Eßer, F.: Wissenschaft- und Technikforschung: Erklärungspotenziale für die Digitalisierung der Sozialen Arbeit. In: Kutscher, N., Ley, T., Seelmeyer, U., Siller, F., Tillmann, A., Zorn, I. (eds.): Handbuch Soziale Arbeit und Digitalisierung. Beltz-Juventa, Weinheim, Basel, 18 – 29 (2020) Hoff, W.: Vom Fallverstehen zur Theoriebildung. Über die epistemische Bedeutung einer ver-nachlässigten Wissensform. In: Birgmeier, B., Mührel, E., Winkler, M. (eds.): Sozialpädagogische SeitenSprünge. Einsichten von außen, Aussichten von innen: Befunde und Visionen zur Sozialpä-dagogik. Beltz-Juventa, Weinheim, Basel, 89 – 95 (2020)