Should philosophy help address the problems of non-philosophers or should it be something isolated both from
other disciplines and from the lay public? This question became more than academic for philosophers working in
UK universities with the introduction of societal impact assessment in the national research evaluation exercise,
the REF.…[Read more]

Over the last 20 years the imbrication between capital and the university has grown much firmer. This
paper seeks to map one point at which this binding occurs: in critical theory. Recently scholars in strategic
management have turned to processual and relational ontologies in an attempt to reimagine the logics of
profit, value, and growth.…[Read more]

In this article, I will be focusing specifically on cryopreservation and two of the American biotechnomedical tenets introduced by Robbie Davis-Floyd and Gloria St. John in their technocratic model of medicine: the “body as machine” and “death as defeat.” These axioms are embraced by both the biotechnomedical establishment as well as the cryopre…[Read more]

Argues that the humanities do not need a replication drive like that being pushed for in the sciences.

On scholarly traditions, quantitative assessments and academic malpractices in Italy, and how these factors affect Italian scholarship in the history of science.

Book review of the book by Marco Leonardi (“Renaissance Quarterly,” Volume 71, n. 4, 2018, pp. 1489-1491).

The foundational gesture of New Materialism and Speculative Realism dismisses vast swaths of past philosophy and theory in order to signify their own avant-garde status. The violence of this gesture, which tries to corral difference within past texts in order to feign its own purity, can be considered as a theoretical quarantine. Examples of…[Read more]

Detailed manuscript description of the 15th century German manuscript Hamburg, Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek, Cod. germ. 1.

Arzneibuch – Volmar: ‚Steinbuch‘ – Kochrezepte – Gottfried v. Franken: ‚Pelzbuch‘ – Farb- und Tintenrezepte – ‚Lucidarius‘-‚Elucidarius‘-Kompilation – Johann v. Indersdorf (?): Sentenzen und Gebete – ‚Die sieben wei…[Read more]

Examines the role of the yeti in shaping Cold War popular science networks and relations between official and popular scientific practices in the Soviet Union.

This presentation presents a case study in philosophy and science policy surrounding Plan S and argues that we need new ways of evaluating such approaches to research.

The 2018 International Research Conference at UC Davis focuses on:

Changing political environment and its impact on international research
Increasing importance of networks and consortia in advancing international research
Role of interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary research in solving global challenges
Educating the next…[Read more]

Evaluation can be seen as an opportunity for transvaluation, or what Nietzsche called the revaluation of values. However, evaluation is often treated instead as the enforcement of standards – standardization rather than transformation. When evaluation as transvaluation and evaluation as standardization are both used to evaluate the same s…[Read more]

Description of the German geomantic and astologic multiple text manuscript Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Broxbourne 84.3 from 1469.

Marco Heiles, geomancia hais ich. Die geomantisch-astrologische Sammelhandschrift Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Broxbourne 84.3, in: Mittelalter. Interdisziplinäre Forschung und Rezeptionsgeschichte 1 (2018),…[Read more]

Edition and commentary of an German chiromantic text from about 1464 in the manuscript Linz, Landesbibliothek, Hs. 139, fol. 1r-5r.

Marco Heiles, Eine bisher unbeachtete deutsche Chiromantie in der Landesbibliothek Linz, in: Zeitschrift für deutsches Altertum und deutsche Literatur 145 (2016), S. 70-81.

C. Lloyd Morgan is mostly known for Morgan’s canon (1894), still a popular and frequently quoted principle in comparative psychology and ethology. There has been a fair amount of debate on the canon’s interpretation, function, and value regarding the research on animal minds, usually referring to it as an isolated principle. In this paper we…[Read more]

Transcription of a tract on the plague from a German manuscript from ca 1463, Hamburg, Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek, Cod. germ. 1, fol. 51ra-rb.

Die Tierphilosophie ist eines der lebendigsten Felder der Gegenwartsphilosophie. Im Mittelpunkt stehen bislang die Frage nach dem Geist der Tiere, das Problem des Tier-Mensch-Unterschiedes und die Themenfelder der Tierethik. Die auf drei Bände angelegte »Philosophie der Tierforschung« wirft einen neuen Blick auf dieses Gebiet und ergänzt es dur…[Read more]

This article shows the high degree of correlation between the ways in which the right and the left hemispheres process and organize information and Whitehead’s understanding of the two pure and direct modes of perception, causal efficacy and presentational immediacy. The neuroscience is drawn from the recent work of Iain McGilchrist and Robert…[Read more]

During the 1920s, the Philadelphia-based American Antivivisection Society turned to racialized metaphors in its circulating periodical, the Starry Cross, to excoriate the expanding practice of vaccination. Since vaccines were then made from animal-derived serums, the involvement of antivivisectionists in antivaccine arguments is not surprising.…[Read more]

This photoessay documents the 82nd Annual Louisiana Shrimp and Petroleum Festival, which took place in Morgan City, Louisiana over Labor Day weekend in 2018. It contains photographs of the festival, including images of pageant queens, food vendors, and the Blessing of the Fleet. The essay documents the authors’ experience of the festival, and c…[Read more]