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21 results on '"Gerber, Dominik"'

8. Can hybrid cultures be normative?: the challenge of indeterminacy for multiculturalism

Author

Gerber, Dominik Andréas and Gianni, Matteo

Subjects
Political Theory, ddc:320, Culture, John Dewey, Pragmatism, Multiculturalism
Abstract

This dissertation takes up a theoretical problem that prejudices justifications of multiculturalism. If we understand multiculturalism as a position holding that cultures are valuable entities that deserve respect and recognition, we must not only show that there indeed are such things as cultures, but also that culture is the right kind of entity to possess value. However, these assumptions have been widely criticized for being unrealistic and naïve. Culture, it has been objected, is too indeterminate a concept to possess value of the sort required by multiculturalism. The present study elucidates the philosophical underpinnings of the challenge of indeterminacy. Drawing on the pragmatism of John Dewey, it then proposes a theoretical framework for thinking about cultural normativity that countenances the indeterminacy of culture. Its central aim is to show that a culture's hybrid and political character does not disqualify it as a normative category.

Published
2016

9. Voters are not fools, or are they? Party profile, individual sophistication and party choice

Author

Gerber, Dominik, Nicolet, Sarah, Sciarini, Pascal, Gerber, Dominik, Nicolet, Sarah, and Sciarini, Pascal

Abstract

This article builds on V.O. Key's postulate that voters are not fools and that they function as an echo chamber reflecting the clarity of alternatives presented to them. We first propose a reassessment of Key's claim by examining whether and to what extent the impact of issue preferences on the vote choice depends on the clarity of parties' profile on these issues. Our empirical tests are based on data from the 2007 Swiss election study and cover three different issues that voters may use as decision-making criteria. Our results confirm that the clearer a party's profile on a given issue, the higher the impact of that issue on the vote for the party. Second, we offer a refinement of Key's argument by arguing that voters' political sophistication conditions the strength of issue voting. Empirical evidence supports this argument, but shows that the effect of political sophistication is curvilinear: sophistication exerts a stronger mediating role when a party has a moderately clear profile than when it has a low or high profile

Published
2017

10. Intro Special Issue: Pragmatism and Epistemic Democracy

Author

Lever, Annabelle, Gerber, Dominik, and Lever, Annabelle

Subjects
[SHS] Humanities and Social Sciences
Abstract

What do truth and democracy have to do with each other? Not much, one might think. After all, the whole point of democracy is that people are entitled to vote no matter their knowledge or virtue, let alone their wealth or lineage. So, in principle, and sometimes in practice, the foolish and corrupt are entitled to rule over the wise and virtuous, just as the foreign-born and/or poor may come to govern rich natives. Such possibilities should be understood as a feature, not a bug, of democratic politics. Hence democracy has historically been the object of derision, aversion and contempt by those who suppose that knowledge and/or virtue are important qualifications for government.

Published
2011

13. Voters are not fools, or are they? Party profile, individual sophistication and party choice.

Author

Gerber, Dominik, Nicolet, Sarah, and Sciarini, Pascal

Abstract

This article builds on V.O. Key’s postulate that voters are not fools and that they function as an echo chamber reflecting the clarity of alternatives presented to them. We first propose a reassessment of Key’s claim by examining whether and to what extent the impact of issue preferences on the vote choice depends on the clarity of parties’ profile on these issues. Our empirical tests are based on data from the 2007 Swiss election study and cover three different issues that voters may use as decision-making criteria. Our results confirm that the clearer a party’s profile on a given issue, the higher the impact of that issue on the vote for the party. Second, we offer a refinement of Key’s argument by arguing that voters’ political sophistication conditions the strength of issue voting. Empirical evidence supports this argument, but shows that the effect of political sophistication is curvilinear: sophistication exerts a stronger mediating role when a party has a moderately clear profile than when it has a low or high profile. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Published
2015
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18. Democracy and Epistemic Egalitarianism

Author

Gerber, Dominik and Gerber, Dominik

Abstract

Dans leur approche non-instrumentaliste fondée sur l’épistémologie pragmatiste de Charles Sanders Peirce, Cheryl Misak et Robert Talisse proposent une version unique et importante des justifications épistémiques de la démocratie, suivant l’argument que la démocratie est un élément constituant de l’idéal peircien de l’enquête. Cet article interprète cet idéal comme reposant sur une conception relationnelle de l’égalité épistémique. L’article avance aussi que cette conception ne peut pas donner lieu à une justification sans équivoque d’institutions réalisant une conception d’égalité politique. L’objectif plus général est de mettre en garde contre l’emploi des affinités conceptuelles entre l’égalité démocratique, ses incitations à l’autoréflexion parmi les citoyens, et les relations épistémiques intrinsèquement valables pour fonder une justification de la démocratie., Because of its non-instrumentalism, Cheryl Misak’s and Robert Talisse’s Peircean theory of democratic justification constitutes a unique and important variety of epistemic democracy. At its core is the claim that democracy is a constituent component of the Peircean epistemic ideal of inquiry. This article offers a relational egalitarian reading of this ideal and argues that Peircean epistemic egalitarianism fails to provide unambiguous support for our commitment to uphold politically egalitarian institutions. It cautions against using conceptual affinities between democratic equality, the self-reflexivity it enables among citizens, and worthwhile epistemic relationships as a basis for justifying democracy.

20. Voters are not fools, or are they? Party profile, individual sophistication and party choice

Author

Gerber, Dominik, Nicolet, Sarah, Sciarini, Pascal, Gerber, Dominik, Nicolet, Sarah, and Sciarini, Pascal

Abstract

This article builds on V.O. Key's postulate that voters are not fools and that they function as an echo chamber reflecting the clarity of alternatives presented to them. We first propose a reassessment of Key's claim by examining whether and to what extent the impact of issue preferences on the vote choice depends on the clarity of parties' profile on these issues. Our empirical tests are based on data from the 2007 Swiss election study and cover three different issues that voters may use as decision-making criteria. Our results confirm that the clearer a party's profile on a given issue, the higher the impact of that issue on the vote for the party. Second, we offer a refinement of Key's argument by arguing that voters' political sophistication conditions the strength of issue voting. Empirical evidence supports this argument, but shows that the effect of political sophistication is curvilinear: sophistication exerts a stronger mediating role when a party has a moderately clear profile than when it has a low or high profile

21. [Ganzfeld and multifocal electroretinography in Malattia Leventinese and Zermatt Macular Dystrophy].

Author

Gerber DM and Niemeyer G

Subjects
Adult, Age Factors, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Chromosome Aberrations, Corneal Dystrophies, Hereditary genetics, Diagnosis, Differential, Female, Genes, Dominant, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted, Visual Acuity physiology, Visual Field Tests methods, Corneal Dystrophies, Hereditary diagnosis, Electroretinography methods
Abstract

Background: To show the value of Ganzfeld electroretinography (ERG) in Malattia Leventinese (ML, or Hereditary Dominant Drusen) and Zermatt Macular Dystrophy (ZMD) and to illustrate multifocal electroretinography (mfERG) in 2 cases of ML., Patients and Methods: In 15 patients with ML and 14 with ZMD we recorded Ganzfeld ERGs along with clinical examinations. In two patients with ML, and an we also performed a mfERG and an automated and Goldmann perimetry. All patients had a genotypic confirmation of the respective disease. For ERG measurements, the UTAS-3000 system was used, the mfERG was recorded using the RetiScan system., Results: In ML, the visual acuity remained at 0.8 or higher until the 5 (th) or 6 (th) decade of life, followed by a rapid drop. In ZMD, the decrease in acuity began already in the 3 (rd) decade and followed a more continuous time course. The time course of the decrease of the ERG b-wave amplitudes was nearly identical for either disease. The mfERG showed in one case of ML a marked reduction in the macular response density but, in the second case, a normal density response pattern despite large degenerative changes at the posterior pole. In both of these patients, we found no visual field defects., Conclusions: Patient history and clinical testing raised the suspicion of a hereditary macular dystrophy. By means of Ganzfeld and multifocal electroretinography the course of the disease could be observed. However, definite diagnosis could only be established by genetic identification.

Published
2002
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