{"title":"Overcoming Substantivism-Determinism with Pragmatist Philosophy of Technology","authors":"A. Pietarinen","doi":"10.11590/abhps.2020.2.09","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11590/abhps.2020.2.09","url":null,"abstract":"Carl Sagan (1990) famously lamented how “we live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows about science and technology. This is a clear prescription for disaster”. One might add that in contemporary societies, people know about the philosophy of science and technology even less.","PeriodicalId":37693,"journal":{"name":"Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum","volume":"8 1","pages":"144-155"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-12-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41908174","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Heidegger’s Black Notebooks (1931–1941): Ponderings on Technology, National Socialism and Judaism","authors":"J. Pietarinen","doi":"10.11590/abhps.2020.2.10","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11590/abhps.2020.2.10","url":null,"abstract":"Controversy over Martin Heidegger’s Nazi past has lasted for over fifty years. Possibly the most direct light over the matter is now cast by the notes that Heidegger started to write in black-covered notebooks since autumn 1931. Closely kept from public scrutiny until 2014, three volumes of these Ponderings in densely written notebooks cover the fateful years of 1931–1941. All of the Ponderings are published in the Collected Works, which is mounting up to cover over one hundred volumes. In accordance with the philosopher’s own wishes, Ponderings will be published chronologically out of sequence, as the final volumes of the series.","PeriodicalId":37693,"journal":{"name":"Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum","volume":" 47","pages":"156-164"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-12-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41252575","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Challenges of Aligning Artificial Intelligence with Human Values","authors":"M. Sutrop","doi":"10.11590/abhps.2020.2.04","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11590/abhps.2020.2.04","url":null,"abstract":"As artificial intelligence (AI) systems are becoming increasingly autonomous and will soon be able to make decisions on their own about what to do, AI researchers have started to talk about the need to align AI with human values. The AI ‘value alignment problem’ faces two kinds of challenges—a technical and a normative one—which are interrelated. The technical challenge deals with the question of how to encode human values in artificial intelligence. The normative challenge is associated with two questions: “Which values or whose values should artificial intelligence align with?” My concern is that AI developers underestimate the difficulty of answering the normative question. They hope that we can easily identify the purposes we really desire and that they can focus on the design of those objectives. But how are we to decide which objectives or values to induce in AI, given that there is a plurality of values and moral principles and that our everyday life is full of moral disagreements? In my paper I will show that although it is not realistic to reach an agreement on what we, humans, really want as people value different things and seek different ends, it may be possible to agree on what we do not want to happen, considering the possibility that intelligence, equal to our own, or even exceeding it, can be created. I will argue for pluralism (and not for relativism!) which is compatible with objectivism. In spite of the fact that there is no uniquely best solution to every moral problem, it is still possible to identify which answers are wrong. And this is where we should begin the value alignment of AI.","PeriodicalId":37693,"journal":{"name":"Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum","volume":"8 1","pages":"54-72"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-12-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49597362","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Foreword","authors":"","doi":"10.11590/abhps.2020.2.00","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11590/abhps.2020.2.00","url":null,"abstract":"The current issue of Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum is dedicated to philosophy and history of technology—fields that have been gaining rapidly increasing attention catalysed by the ongoing digital turn with its deep impact on almost all walks of our lives.","PeriodicalId":37693,"journal":{"name":"Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-12-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42173555","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
R. Sartayeva, Natalya Seytakhmetova, G. Kurmangaliyeva, G. Nurysheva, Sholpan Zhandosova
{"title":"The Phenomenon of Information in the Modern World: A Philosophical Approach","authors":"R. Sartayeva, Natalya Seytakhmetova, G. Kurmangaliyeva, G. Nurysheva, Sholpan Zhandosova","doi":"10.11590/abhps.2020.1.06","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11590/abhps.2020.1.06","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":37693,"journal":{"name":"Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum","volume":"8 1","pages":"107-125"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43402972","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A Measurement-Theoretic View on the Early Evolution of the Ordering of Chemical Elements","authors":"Ave Mets","doi":"10.11590/abhps.2020.1.01","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11590/abhps.2020.1.01","url":null,"abstract":"Mets (2019) analyses the periodic system of chemical elements notably from the perspective of, inter alia, Patrick Suppes’ and Joseph Zinnes’ measurement theory (1962), taking for granted its applicability particularly to atomic weight and atomic number—the “primary” ordering principles. Here the applicability of the said theory to these aspects of the periodic table is critically scrutinised from its pre-evolution, or quantification of chemistry and inter-element relations at the end of the 18th century, to some stages of the evolution—briefly the contemporary one, and certain nineteenthcentury versions of the table. It is shown that measurement-theoretic terms, particularly scale types, are not applicable in this subject matter without complications. In addition, there emerges a development towards more substantial exactitude.","PeriodicalId":37693,"journal":{"name":"Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum","volume":"8 1","pages":"5-32"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49305640","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"From Vitalism to Animal Magnetism: The Mesmerist Experiments of Dr Jean-Emmanuel Gilibert (1741–1814)","authors":"A. Parent","doi":"10.11590/abhps.2020.1.04","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11590/abhps.2020.1.04","url":null,"abstract":"in 1766, the German physician Franz Anton mesmer (1734–1815) presented at the faculty of medicine in Vienna his doctoral thesis on the Influence of the Planets on the Human Body (De planetarum influxu in corpus humanum), which was inspired by the De imperio solis ac lunae (1704), a work by richard mead (1673–1754), a disciple of newton. in the thesis, Mesmer asserted that the cosmos and bodies floated in a universal fluid, which he called ‘animal magnetism’. Diseases resulted from disorders of animal magnetism within individuals, and he proposed brand-new treatments to cure these disorders. Around 1775, mesmer sent his small monograph to different academies of science in Europe and to selected scientists. Only the Berlin Academy answered, but dismissed his work. in February 1778, he arrived in Paris, where he began to cure patients. A French physician from lyon, Dr Jean-emmanuel Gilibert (1741–1814), started to show interest in this mesmerist doctrine. Gilibert was a renowned physician and botanist. in 1775, he went to the Grand Duchy of lithuania where he founded a medical school and a hospital in the town of Grodno (in present-day Belarus), where he worked from 1775 until 1781. He then moved to Vilnius to teach natural history at the Principal school of the Grand Duchy of lithuania (schola Princeps magni Ducatus lithuaniae, today Vilnius university), before returning to France in 1783. Gilibert was a strong believer in vitalism, a medical doctrine which stated that the physician should intervene as little as possible in healing the sick and letting nature do the healing. He saw animal magnetism as an expression of vitalism and carried out numerous experiments, which he described in letters addressed to his friend Antoine-","PeriodicalId":37693,"journal":{"name":"Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum","volume":"8 1","pages":"72-95"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48139784","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"‘On the Transition to Quantitative Inquiry in Chemistry’","authors":"Rein Vihalemm","doi":"10.11590/abhps.2020.1.07","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11590/abhps.2020.1.07","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":37693,"journal":{"name":"Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum","volume":"8 1","pages":"126-132"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43280668","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
G. Konayeva, G. Nurysheva, Zh. Amirkulova, A. Ramazanova, K. Mukhtarova
{"title":"Al-Farabi’s Doctrine on the Head of the Virtuous City in the Context of Contemporary Kazakhstan","authors":"G. Konayeva, G. Nurysheva, Zh. Amirkulova, A. Ramazanova, K. Mukhtarova","doi":"10.11590/abhps.2020.1.05","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11590/abhps.2020.1.05","url":null,"abstract":"Abū Naṣr al-Farabi is rightfully considered one of the greatest thinkers in the world whose teachings have always been and will remain relevant through all stages of human history. Al-Farabi’s greatness lies in the fact that every man, nation, and state can find answers to their questions in their encyclopedic heritage and define a path of future development. When speaking about the role of philosophy in human life and society, the well-known Kazakh writer Mukhtar Auezov described al-Farabi as a ray of light in the dark labyrinths of the human path to the truth.","PeriodicalId":37693,"journal":{"name":"Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum","volume":"8 1","pages":"96-106"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42263905","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"In Memoriam: Academician Jānis Stradiņš (1933–2019)","authors":"Alīda Zigmunde","doi":"10.11590/abhps.2020.1.08","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.11590/abhps.2020.1.08","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":37693,"journal":{"name":"Acta Baltica Historiae et Philosophiae Scientiarum","volume":"8 1","pages":"133-136"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2020-05-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45696483","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}