Conclusion

The concluding chapter addresses an apparent aporia: on the one hand, we have the Nietzschean argument that one must be causa sui for guilt to be justified, but on the other hand, we have the Heideggerian argument that not being causa sui is a necessary condition for guilt to be possible. The conclusion explains why this is only an apparent aporia. An alternative conception of guilt is sketched, one that rejects Nietzsche’s view of guilt as a form of self-punishment but retains Heidegger’s view that guilt expresses our normative commitments. This conception shows how guilt might nevertheless be justified.

EU Competition Law Devours Its Children: The Proliferation of Anti-Competitive Object and the Problem of False Positives

In the last decade, EU competition law reached a major turning point in its history. Anti-competitive object became an elusive and unpredictable rule, which boosts the risk of false positives and has a significant chilling effect. This article analyses this metamorphosis and the social damages it is causing, and proposes an alternative conception. The article demonstrates that the emerging new concept of anti-competitive object erroneously conflates ‘contextual analysis’, which has been part of the object-inquiry from the outset, and ‘effects-analysis’, which has no role to play here. It submits that both doctrinal and policy reasons confirm that anti-competitive object should be a category-building principle of ‘judicial rule-making’ (‘definition of the definition’) and not applicable to individual arrangements directly.

El uso expresivo de las palabras: Daño sexual, narración y transformación

Resumen: Marta Suria escribe Ella soy yo como parte de su respuesta a la irrupción del recuerdo de las agresiones sexuales que había sufrido desde su infancia. Confía en que la forma en que narra su experiencia, la transforme y la libere. ¿Cómo es posible, sin embargo, que una forma de narrar nos transforme, tenga el poder de liberarnos? En este escrito, describiremos, primero, la concepción de la relación entre lenguaje y experiencia que da pie a esta perplejidad; esbozaremos, posteriormente, una concepción alternativa en la que esa perplejidad se disuelve y desde la que es fácil reconocer el poder transformador de ciertas formas de narrarnos. Descansará esta concepción alternativa en la idea de expresión y en la capacidad de percibir aspectos. Mostraremos, en primer lugar, que el lenguaje no solo sirve para describir o para valorar nuestra experiencia, sino también para expresarla; argumentaremos, posteriormente, que la expresión lingüística o gestual de una experiencia no solo la anuncia o manifiesta, sino que le da forma y la modula; subrayaremos, finalmente, el poder transformador de ciertos usos expresivos del lenguaje. Abstract: Marta Suria writes Ella soy yo as part of her response to the irruption of the memories of the sexual aggressions she had suffered since childhood. She is convinced that the way she narrates her experience will transform and liberate her. How is it at all possible that a certain kind of narrative may transform and liberate us? In this paper, we will first describe the conception of the relationship between language and experience that lies behind this perplexity and, secondly, we will sketch an alternative conception that will hopefully allow us to account for the transformative power of certain kinds of narratives. This alternative conception will hinge on the idea of expression and on the concept of aspect perception. For this purpose, we will firstly argue that language can be used not only to describe or evaluate our experience, but also to express it; we will, then, defend the view that linguistic or gestural expressions of our experiences not only announce or manifest them, but contribute to shaping and modulating them; finally, we will highlight the transformative, humanizing power of certain expressive uses of language. Palabras clave: daño sexual, narración, expresión, percepción de aspectos, escena de triangulación, jugar, transformación. Keywords: sexual harm, narrative, expression, aspect perception, scene of triangulation, playing, transformative.

Exploring and Transforming Spaces Through High-Dimensional Gestural Interactions

Almost every map or globe we come into contact with is distorted in some way, be it through cartographic projection, vertical exaggeration or data-driven morphing of distances in cartograms. And yet, once we utilize Virtual Reality technologies to position ourselves in a virtual reconstruction of a real or planned space, we usually default to a strict adherence to its real-world proportions and spatial relations. In search of an alternative conception of how such environments can be explored, this paper investigates a novel way of using the embodiment and high interactivity afforded by current VR technology to let users apply a wide range of transformations to their surroundings. Instead of utilizing a large number of predefined gestures that need to be learned before use, the full state of a user’s hand (including rotation, position, and joint angles) is tracked, directly mapped to a transformation matrix, and then selectively applied to the 3D environment. This is a complex and high-dimensional form of interaction, but through its embodied nature users can develop familiarity with it by unguided trial and error. Once accustomed, they can bend, shear, and manipulate the space around them with a variety of self-discovered gestural interactions. In the course of this paper, we discuss technical considerations, physiological limitations, possible use cases, as well as a number of recognizable gestures that emerged from the space of possible interactions after prolonged use.

Agency: What Does It Mean to Be a Human Being?

This paper will look at the results of what has been termed “the crisis of modernism” and the related rise of postmodern perspectives in the 19th and 20th centuries. It concentrates on what is arguably the chief casualty of this crisis – human agency – and the social science that has developed out of the crisis. We argue that modern and postmodern social science ultimately obviate human agency in the understanding of what it means to be a human being. Attention is given to the contemporary intellectual world and the way in which it has been deeply informed by neo-Hegelian and other postmodern scholarly trends, particularly in accounting for how agency has come to play little role in social science understanding of human action. The paper also offers an alternative conception of human agency to the commonly endorsed libertarian model of free choice. Finally, the paper argues that this view of agency preserves meaning and purpose in human action and counters the pervasive social science worldview that sacrifices agency and meaning to powerful invisible abstractions.

Rousseau’s General Will

The advance of populist parties in the European Union can be interpreted as the sign of an expanding “frustration” about representation in a political sphere oppressed by economic austerity. In this context, the modern philosophical roots of an alternative conception of democracy, based on direct participation, appear to be worth of a careful scrutiny. This paper focuses on the notion of the General Will as described in The Social Contract. After a critical review of the antithetical conceptions of the General Will suggested by Rousseau, a coherent interpretation is proposed, obtained through an analysis of the text taken as a “self- -sufficient” unity: the General Will is pure “ambition” for an unknown common good, shared by all the members of a political community. However, it is argued that the participatory “machinery” of General Will is fundamentally incapable of resolving three serious problems that undermine the foundations of Rousseau’s ideal “République”, namely, 1. How the citizens can identify the common good without errors; 2. How the citizens can develop an ethical dimension by themselves, without any external influence; 3. How single individuals, seen not as active citizens but as passive subjects of the State, can protect themselves from the abuses of power.

Perception, Knowledge, and Understanding in Aristotle’s Epistemology

In this chapter I consider how we should approach questions about the relationship between perception and the more advanced cognitive states Aristotle thinks derive from it. I argue that it’s reasonable to talk of perceptual knowledge, and explain how I will be using various knowledge terms to capture the different cognitive states that feature in Aristotle’s epistemology. I then offer an account of scientific understanding (Aristotle’s epistemic ideal) as a form of theoretical expertise requiring a synoptic, reflective appreciation of the explanatory structure of some domain. I argue we should resist views that would make scientific understanding the sole locus of justification, and on which perception would therefore never play any significant epistemic role. I also raise some concerns about invoking talk of justification in this context, and suggest an alternative conception of epistemic value which I think better fits Aristotle’s descriptions of our learning.

HYPERLEXIS AND THE RULE OF LAW

On a popular understanding, the rule of law is valuable because it enables people to plan their lives. However, planning conceptions of the rule of law are undermined by the sheer quantity of legal rules, regulations, and policies characteristic of modern administrative states. Under conditions of hyperlexis, people cannot reasonably be expected to reliably use the law as a guide to conduct. Rather than conclude that the rule of law is inimical to the administrative state, however, I defend an alternative conception of the rule of law. On what I term a contestatory conception, the rule of law requires an adequate opportunity to challenge decisions made by officials in the exercise of their legal powers. The animating idea of a contestatory conception of the rule of the law is that officials should relate to citizens in the space of reasons rather than merely through the exercise of power.

QBism and the limits of scientific realism

QBism is an agent-centered interpretation of quantum theory. It rejects the notion that quantum theory provides a God’s eye description of reality and claims instead that it imposes constraints on agents’ subjective degrees of belief. QBism’s emphasis on subjective belief has led critics to dismiss it as antirealism or instrumentalism, or even, idealism or solipsism. The aim of this paper is to consider the relation of QBism to scientific realism. I argue that while QBism is an unhappy fit with a standard way of thinking about scientific realism, an alternative conception I call “perspectival normative realism” may allow for a reconciliation.

Trends in Peer Review

Peer review is primarily discussed in the literature with respect to its deficits, e.g. bias or inefficiency. In contrast, our synthesis asks why peer review is used ubiquitously and why it works despite such deficits. Historically, one answer lies in peer review not just providing expertise-based decisions on scientific resources (publication space, funding, jobs), but also providing an organized procedure to give these decisions legitimacy outside of science, e.g. in politics. The current situation is marked by a landscape of national and international funding and review activities that not only complement each other, but overlap, mirror, or rival each other. The current challenge rests in adapting peer review to different funding programmes within this landscape and without adding unnecessary burden on researchers and research organisations. To capture these aspects of scientific self-governance, we suggest an alternative conception of grant peer review that allows for thinking about peer review procedures as made up of different elements. Our key findings from such a conception are the following:- Peer review procedures have become more complex and formalized, as a result of being adapted to the different settings in publishing, funding, and hiring, on the national and international level. - The diversity and ubiquity of peer review rests upon its adaptability and scalability in reaching the ‘right’ decisions, i.e. based on scientific exellence, as well as in producing legitimate decisions, i.e. accepted by multiple stakeholders.- Peer review can be partitioned into eight elemental practices: four essential practices – postulating, consultative, decisive, and administrative – and another four – debating, presenting, observing, and moderating – that provide further combinatorial possibilities.- Through context-specific combinations of these elemental practices into a procedure, peer review generates legitimacy for judgements on scientific quality, inside and outside of science.- Peer review should not be seen as a 'measurement device' for scientific quality. Its diversity attests to the fact that issues of quality and legitimacy are intertwined and should be addressed openly.- Peer review procedures can act as laboratories for deliberation where the robustness and validity of research are equally relevant issues as participation, representation, accountability, or legibility; in effect, allowing for experiments and innovations in science policy.