Claudia Blöser | University of Cologne (original) (raw)

Papers by Claudia Blöser

Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung, 2022

The central question of this article is what hope contributes to a good life. The starting point ... more The central question of this article is what hope contributes to a good life. The starting point is the assumption that living a good life involves having a good relation to the past, present and future. Hope is a central attitude towards the future that contributes, I argue, to having an own future. I distinguish three ways in which there is reference to an "own future" and thus different ways in which hope contributes to the good life. Finally, I discuss the objection that hope is detrimental to a good life precisely because of its reference to the future, insofar as a good life essentially takes place "in the present".

Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 2022

Development economists have suggested that the hopes of the poor are a relevant factor in overcom... more Development economists have suggested that the hopes of the poor are a relevant factor in overcoming poverty. I argue that Kant’s approach to hope provides an important complement to the economists’ perspective. A Kantian account of hope emphasizes the need for the rationality of hope and thereby guards against problematic aspects of the economists’ discourse on hope. Section 1 introduces recent work on hope in development economics. Section 2 clarifies Kant’s question “What may I hope?” and presents the outlines of his answer. Crucially, hope is rational if it is rational to trust in the structures of reality on which the realization of one’s hope depends. Section 3 argues that central tenets of Kant’s account of what makes hope rational can be applied to the context of poverty. It becomes apparent that the poor often have good reason to be hopeless since they may not trust fundamental structures that are necessary for realizing their hope. Thus, the insight that the poor need more...

Historical and Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Hope, 2020

This chapter discusses accounts of hope found in the works of important Enlightenment thinkers: R... more This chapter discusses accounts of hope found in the works of important Enlightenment thinkers: René Descartes, Thomas Hobbes, Baruch de Spinoza, David Hume, and Immanuel Kant. The paper’s guiding questions are: Where are discussions of hope located within these thinkers’ works? Do the authors provide an account of what hope is? Do they ascribe a certain function to hope? Most authors of the Enlightenment, with the exception of Kant, write about hope in the context of a general account of the passions. Their characterization of hope closely resembles the “standard definition” of hope in contemporary debates. According to this definition, hope consists of a desire and a belief in the possibility, but not the certainty, of the desired outcome. It turns out, however, that Descartes, Hobbes, and Hume advocate a stronger evidential condition for hope than is common today: According to their view, we do not hope for what we take to be merely possible, no matter how unlikely it is; we hope...

Akten des XI. Kant-Kongresses 2010, 2013

Kantian Review, 2015

It has been argued that Kant’s practical philosophy cannot allow for degrees of responsibility fo... more It has been argued that Kant’s practical philosophy cannot allow for degrees of responsibility for one’s actions. However, it would be uncompromising to allow for only two possibilities: either full responsibility or none. Moreover, in theMetaphysics of MoralsKant himself claims that there can be degrees of responsibility, depending on the magnitude of the obstacles that have to be overcome when acting. I will show that this claim is consistent with Kant’s theory as a whole and thereby make transparent how degrees of responsibility are possible for Kant. The solution is based on the distinction between two senses of responsibility: taking oneself to be anaccountableperson is an all-or-nothing affair, whereaspraise- or blameworthinessfor a particular action can still be a matter of degree.

Defeasibility in Philosophy, 2013

Zurechnung bei Kant, 2014

I argue for a novel answer to the question "What is hope?". On my view, rather than aiming for a ... more I argue for a novel answer to the question "What is hope?". On my view, rather than aiming for a compound account, i.e. analysing hope in terms of desire and belief, we should understand hope as an irreducible concept. After criticizing influential compound accounts of hope, I discuss Segal and Textor's alternative of describing hope as a primitive mental state. While Segal and Textor argue that available developments of the standard definition do not offer sufficient conditions for hope, I question the deep--seated idea that desire and belief are even necessary conditions for hope. My suggestion is that we should take seriously the fact that we hope in a great variety of ways and should question the search for elements that are common to all cases. A promising alternative follows the Wittgensteinian idea that cases of hope are related in terms of family resemblance, i.e. are multiply realizable on the ontological level while falling under the non--definable concept of hope.

This article proposes a Kantian account of our reasons to forgive that situates our moral fallibi... more This article proposes a Kantian account of our reasons to forgive that situates our moral fallibility as their ultimate ground. I explore similarities and differences between Kant’s account in the Doctrine of Virtue and the more recent account offered by Eve Garrard and David McNaughton (2003). After tracing the connection between moral fallibility and moral luck, I discuss Kant’s argument for a duty to be forgiving. Kant’s strategy yields a plausible account of the normative status of forgiveness: Although we generally have a moral reason (a “wide duty”) to forgive others, forgiveness is not required in every case of wrongdoing. Kant’s argument is based on the assumption that we are all in need of forgiveness, the nature of which I go on to explain. Forgiveness has the power to relieve us of a burden that results from moral failure, which grounds both its standing as a duty and its importance in the lives of fallible moral agents.

This article considers the question ‘What makes hope rational?’ We take Adrienne Martin's recent ... more This article considers the question ‘What makes hope rational?’ We take Adrienne Martin's recent incorporation analysis of hope as representative of a tradition that views the rationality of hope as a matter of instrumental reasons. Against this tradition, we argue that an important subset of hope, ‘fundamental hope’, is not governed by instrumental rationality. Rather, people have reason to endorse or reject such hope in virtue of the contribution of the relevant attitudes to the integrity of their practical identity, which makes the relevant hope not instrumentally but intrinsically valuable. This argument also allows for a new analysis of the reasons people have to abandon hope and for a better understanding of non-fundamental, ‘prosaic’ hopes.

Discussions of hope can be found throughout the history of philosophy and across all Western phil... more Discussions of hope can be found throughout the history of philosophy and across all Western philosophical traditions, even though philosophy has traditionally not paid the same attention to hope as it has to attitudes like belief and desire. However, even though hope has historically only rarely been discussed systematically—with important exceptions, such as Aquinas, Bloch and Marcel—almost all major philosophers acknowledge that hope plays an important role in regard to human motivation, religious belief or politics. Historically, discussions of the importance of hope were often embedded in particular philosophical projects. More recent discussions of hope provide independent accounts of its nature and its relation to other mental phenomena, such as desire, intention and optimism.

Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 2010

The aim of this paper is to suggest that a necessary condition of autonomy has not been sufficien... more The aim of this paper is to suggest that a necessary condition of autonomy has not been sufficiently recognized in the literature: the capacity to critically reflect on one’s practical attitudes (desires, preferences, values, etc.) in the light of new experiences. It will be argued that most prominent accounts of autonomy—ahistorical as well as history-sensitive—have either altogether failed to recognize this condition or at least failed to give an explicit account of it.

Physica Status Solidi B-basic Solid State Physics, 2005

After the first observation of the Coherent Hall Effect in a GaAs/Al0.3Ga0.7As superlattice by me... more After the first observation of the Coherent Hall Effect in a GaAs/Al0.3Ga0.7As superlattice by means of THz-emission spectroscopy, the dynamics of impulsively excited electron wavepackets in crossed electric and magnetic fields has now been investigated in more detail by reflective electro-optic sampling (REOS). In agreement with the predictions of a semiclassical model, the experiments show the existence of two strictly separated regimes of charge-carrier motion depending on the ratio E/B of applied electric and magnetic field. Both, the magneto-Bloch regime for dominating electric field and the cyclotron-like regime of motion for dominating magnetic field, exhibit a characteristic frequency dependence of the wavepacket oscillations on the external fields. The REOS measurements supplement our results achieved by THz-emission spectroscopy by covering a much larger range of experimental parameters because REOS is not affected by absorption by the cryostat windows of our set-up as is the THz radiation at frequencies above 2 THz, and the detection of high oscillation frequencies is possible.