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This book addresses two interrelated discourses of crisis in contemporary Europe: the migrant crisis vs. the economic crisis. The chapters shed light on the thread that links these two issues by first examining immigration and the transformations regarding its control and administration via border technologies, as well as on the centrality of the body as a means and carrier of border within contemporary biopolitical societies. In a second step, the authors proceed to a genealogy of the current discourses regarding the financial and political crisis through a Foucauldian and Lacanian perspective, focusing on the co-articulation of scientific knowledge and biopolitical power in Western societies.
The publication of Thomas S. Kuhn's "Structure of Scientific Revolutions" in 1962 stands for a turning point in the history and philosophy of science. The repercussions of this work have rearticulated the theoretical framework of history and philosophy of science and have also generated discussions that contributed to the formation of the communities of historians as well as philosophers of science in many parts of the world. Different approaches to history of science have since emerged and most of them have the "Structure" as their reference point. In October 2012, a conference at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science brought together some of the historians of science whose wo...
This volume provides information and analyses to better grasp the social implications of geographical borders as well as the individuals who travel between them and those who live in border regions. Sociologists, anthropologists, philosophers, linguists, and scholars of international relations and public health are just some of the authors contributing to Rethinking Borders. The diversity in the authors’ disciplines and the topics they focus on exemplify the intricacies of borders and their manifold effects. This openness to so many schools of thought stands in contrast to the solidification of stricter borders across the globe. The contributions range from case studies of migrants’ sens...
Scientific research in different nations, particularly after World War II.
S.D. Tucker delves into the Nazi and Soviet historical hijacking of science by extreme ideologies, revealing the dangerous consequences of pseudoscientific narratives in today's world. In today’s world, science itself, which we are constantly being told is a neutral vehicle for wholly objective ideas and theories, is increasingly being hijacked and abused by the toxic modern cult of identity politics, of both left and right. But should we be too surprised by any of this? No, because this exact same sorry process has happened time and again before, under the rule of totalitarian political cults like the Nazis and the Soviets, both of which vigorously promoted various pseudoscientific theori...
The term "open borders" refers to a policy of allowing free movement between countries without restrictions or border control. In an era characterized by the Brexit referendum and the Trump administration's policy of restricting immigration in the U.S., the prospect of borders being open may seem improbable. A number of politicians, policymakers, economists, and citizens assert that referendums and restrictions are the best way to address the economic and social issues that the international community faces today. This volume helps readers examine the issue of open borders from a variety of angles, examining its economic, social, political, moral, and legal aspects.
These fourteen essays by leading historians and philosophers of science introduce the reader to the work of Albert Einstein. Following an introduction that places Einstein's work in the context of his life and times, the essays explain his main contributions to physics in terms that are accessible to a general audience, including special and general relativity, quantum physics, statistical physics, and unified field theory. The closing essays explore the relation between Einstein's work and twentieth-century philosophy, as well as his political writings.
Though the concept of "the universe" suggests the containment of everything, the latest ideas in cosmology hint that our universe may be just one of a multitude of others-a single slice of an infinity of parallel realities. In The Copernicus Complex, the renowned astrophysicist and author Caleb Scharf takes us on a cosmic adventure like no other, from tiny microbes within the Earth to distant exoplanets and beyond, asserting that the age-old Copernican principle is in need of updating. As Scharf argues, when Copernicus proposed that the Earth was not the fixed point at the center of the known universe (and therefore we are not unique), he set in motion a colossal scientific juggernaut, forev...
Robert Musil's The Man without Qualities is perhaps the most important novel in German written in the twentieth century - certainly it is among the most brilliant, puzzling and profound. This, the first comprehensive study of the work to appear in English, guides the reader towards Musil's central concerns. It examines how Musil laboured through draft after draft to produce material that would pass his own strict literary 'quality control' and traces major themes through different layers of narrative with the aid of close textual analysis. It details how Musil subjects leading figures of fin-de-siecle Vienna to intense ironic scrutiny and how, by drawing on his extensive knowledge of philosophy, psychology, politics, sociology and science, he works into his novel essayistic statements which record the state of contemporary European civilisation. Through a disturbing and deeply serious liaison with his sister, Musil's hero Ulrich, is shown to struggle through to the brink of self-discovery and enlightenment.
A pioneer in legal and political theory, Schmitt traces the prehistory of political romanticism by examining its relationship to revolutionary and reactionary tendencies in modern European history. Both the partisans of the French Revolution and its most embittered enemies were numbered among the romantics. During the movement for German national unity at the beginning of the nineteenth century, both revolutionaries and reactionaries counted themselves as romantics. According to Schmitt, the use of the concept to designate opposed political positions results from the character of political romanticism: its unpredictable quality and lack of commitment to any substantive political position. Th...