One of the scholars who have provided important contributions to the field of American studies in Romania is Professor Marius Jucan, PhD. The present paper is an attempt to decode, in only some pages, the type of discourse/writing that his books construct. The texts that make the subject of professor Jucan’s studies invite the reader and the writer to engage in a type of discovery that conditions understanding and induces revelations of diverse facets of ‘truth’– the interplay of text and (...) mind. Since such texts of the past, belonging to Henry James, H. D. Thoreau, Thomas Jefferson, frequently superimpose the aesthetic discourse on the philosophical, sociological, cultural and/or political one, it is understandable why they can be consistently studied only by an erudite specialist. (shrink)

This article examines several key aspects of maternity homes for ‘unwed mothers’ in order to understand the overwhelming phenomenon of single mothers giving up their babies for adoption in South Korea and its naturalization as a common practice. Drawing upon Foucault’s concept of biopolitics, this article recasts maternity homes as an institution of biopolitical welfare and highlights two features of social governance that the maternity home extends over the population of single mothers and their children. First, I argue that this (...) unique, non-governmental social service agency functions as a hub of biopolitical technologies, where multiple social, legal, economic, and political forces work in concert to curb single motherhood through the promotion of adoption via (1) containment, (2) classification, and (3) circulation. Second, attending to the intricate dynamics of maternity home practices, this article observes the ways in which a single mother relinquishes her motherhood via adoption and, in so doing, becomes a birthmother, a self-regulating and self-governable subject. (shrink)

800x600 Normal 0 21 false false false RO X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 st1:*{behavior:url(#ieooui) } /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Tabel Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";} Review of Joseph Steiff (ed.), Sherlock Holmes and Philosophy. The Footprints of a Gigantic Mind (Chicago and La Salle, Illinois: Open Court, 2011), 376 pages.

Review of Aurel Codoban, Imperiul comunicării: corp, imagine și relaționare (The Empire of Communication: Body, Image and Relation), (Cluj-Napoca: Idea Design &Print, 2011).

W.S.F. Pickering, Durkheim’s Sociology of Religion. Themes and Theories, Cambridge: James Clarke & Co, 2009, 576 pages.

Review of Pr. Ioan Chirilă, Scara cuvântului. Eseuri omiletice [ The Ladder of the Word. Homiletic Essays ],.

Claudiu Herţeliu, Metode cantitative în studiul fenomenului religios (Quantitative Methods in the Study of Religious Phenomena), (Cluj-Napoca: Ed. Napoca Star, 2009), 227 p.

Review of Joseph Kim, Reformed Epistemology and the Problem of Religious Diversity.

A logic in a finite language is said to be finitely presentable if it is axiomatized by finitely many finite rules. It is proved that binary non-indexed products of logics that are both finitely presentable and finitely equivalential are essentially finitely presentable. This result does not extend to binary non-indexed products of arbitrary finitely presentable logics, as shown by a counterexample. Finitely presentable logics are then exploited to introduce finitely presentable Leibniz classes, and to draw a parallel between the Leibniz (...) and the Maltsev hierarchies. (shrink)

A logic is selfextensional if its interderivability (or mutual consequence) relation is a congruence relation on the algebra of formulas. In the paper we characterize the selfextensional logics with a conjunction as the logics that can be defined using the semilattice order induced by the interpretation of the conjunction in the algebras of their algebraic counterpart. Using the charactrization we provide simpler proofs of several results on selfextensional logics with a conjunction obtained in [13] using Gentzen systems. We also obtain (...) some results on Fregean logics with conjunction. (shrink)

Homi Bhabha's attempts to recuperate Frantz Fanon's “black man” as a figure of resistance and subversion have relied on the simple fact of this figure's existence: because the black man's identity is irrevocably divided, Bhabha claims that its mere existence calls the unity of a normative identity into question. This essay broadly questions Bhabha's reading of Fanon by asking exactly how it is that the subject's potential for subversion can be realized in action, and suggests – drawing from Jacques Lacan's (...) work as well from the work of Jean-Paul Sartre – a new model for the figure of Fanon's black man which retains the possibility for a free subjectivity oriented toward resistance. The tacit belief that resistance must arise as a consciously developed response is belied by the suggestion that there are psychic tensions that might produce a subversive subjective orientation involuntarily, spontaneously. (shrink)

Computer simulations have conventionally been understood to be either extensions of formal methods such as mathematical models or as special cases of empirical practices such as experiments. Here, I argue that computer simulations are best understood as instruments. Understanding them as such can better elucidate their actual role as well as their potential epistemic standing in relation to science and other scientific methods, practices and devices.

In this paper I argue that Artificial Intelligence and the many data science methods associated with it, such as machine learning and large language models, are first and foremost epistemic technologies. In order to establish this claim, I first argue that epistemic technologies can be conceptually and practically distinguished from other technologies in virtue of what they are designed for, what they do and how they do it. I then proceed to show that unlike other kinds of technology (_including_ other (...) epistemic technologies) AI can be uniquely positioned as an epistemic technology in that it is primarily designed, developed and deployed to be used in _epistemic contexts_ such as inquiry, it is specifically designed, developed and deployed to manipulate _epistemic content_ such as data, _and_ it is designed, developed and deployed to do so particularly through _epistemic operations_ such as prediction and analysis. As has been shown in recent work in the philosophy and ethics of AI (Alvarado, AI and Ethics, 2022a), understanding AI as an epistemic technology will also have significant implications for important debates regarding our relationship to AI technologies. This paper includes a brief overview of such implications, particularly those pertaining to explainability, opacity, trust and even epistemic harms related to AI technologies. (shrink)

Bioethics, Volume 36, Issue 2, Page 121-133, February 2022.

In Rudolph Camap (,) established himself as a professor in Vienna. The philosophical atmosphere awaiting him there was not new to him: the year before he ...

The best known algebraizable logics with a conjunction and an implication have the property that the conjunction defines a meet semi-lattice in the algebras of their algebraic counterpart. This property makes it possible to associate with them a semi-lattice based deductive system as a companion. Moreover, the order of the semi-lattice is also definable using the implication. This makes that the connection between the properties of the logic and the properties of its semi-lattice based companion is strong. We introduce a (...) class of algebraizable deductive systems that includes those systems, and study some of their properties and of their semi-lattice based companions. We also study conditions which, when satisfied by a deductive system in the class, imply that it is strongly algebraizable. This brings some information on the open area of research of Abstract Algebraic Logic which consists in finding interesting characterizations of classes of algebraizable logics that are strongly algebraizable. (shrink)

Leibniz filters play a prominent role in the theory of protoalgebraic logics. In [3] the problem of the definability of Leibniz filters is considered. Here we study the definability of Leibniz filters with parameters. The main result of the paper says that a protoalgebraic logic S has its strong version weakly algebraizable iff it has its Leibniz filters explicitly definable with parameters.

The positive fragment of the local modal consequence relation defined by the class of all Kripke frames is studied in the context ofAlgebraic Logic. It is shown that this fragment is non-protoalgebraic and that its class of canonically associated algebras according to the criteria set up in [7] is the class of positive modal algebras. Moreover its full models are characterized as the models of the Gentzen calculus introduced in [3].

Technologies that deploy data science methods are liable to result in epistemic harms involving the diminution of individuals with respect to their standing as knowers or their credibility as sources of testimony. Not all harms of this kind are unjust but when they are we ought to try to prevent or correct them. Epistemically unjust harms will typically intersect with other more familiar and well-studied kinds of harm that result from the design, development, and use of data science technologies. However, (...) we argue that epistemic injustices can be distinguished conceptually from more familiar kinds of harm. We argue that epistemic harms are morally relevant even in cases where those who suffer them are unharmed in other ways. Via a series of examples from the criminal justice system, workplace hierarchies, and educational contexts we explain the kinds of epistemic injustice that can result from common uses of data science technologies. (shrink)

Notoriously, state-building is a key enterprise in regard of addressing the international conflicts throughout the globe. The consolidation of peace associated to it is intimately connected with the institutionalization of liberal ideas in structuring realms such as the political, the economical and the social spheres. Departing from Foucauldian concepts such as dispositif, government, discipline and biopolitics, this paper aims to critically analyze the post-conflict state-building practice. In a first moment, the paper delineates how peace was operationalized during the Cold War (...) and post-Cold War periods. In a second moment, it will present the Foucauldian conceptual tools that enables the (re)problematization of the state-building practice as a post-conflict normalizing dispositif, rather than merely a conflict-resolution tool. (shrink)

En este artículo se exponen las principales ideas de Hans Kelsen y Carl Schmitt en torno a la guerra y la paz en las relaciones internacionales a partir de la idea de ‘pacif is- mo jurídico’ y se valora su sentido a la luz del debate contemporáneo sobre las lamadas “guerra humanitaria” y “guerra contra el terrorismo”.

La crítica de los valores ejercida por Nietzsche problematiza el origen de los valores. La filosofía tradicional considera que éstos tienen un origen privilegiado, ya sea de naturaleza teológica o metafísica. Este origen supremo es lo que les otorga una validez incuestionable. El pensador alemán se opone a esta convicción y propone la tesis contraria: los valores provienen, no de una región plena de realidad, sino de un ámbito sujeto al cambio, al azar y a la contingencia. Esto posibilita concebir (...) los valores sumos como creaciones humanas susceptibles de examen. La crítica de los valores suscita así un extrañamiento ante lo familiar, pues los valores heredados se tornan ajenos. De igual forma, conlleva un ejercicio de remoción de máscaras encubridoras que busca exhibir aquello que se oculta en los valores heredados, a saber, el carácter nihilista de los principios fundamentales de la cultura occidental. (shrink)

This paper explores a notion of “the strong version” of a sentential logic S, initially defined in terms of the notion of a Leibniz filter, and shown to coincide with the logic determined by the matrices of S whose filter is the least S-filter in the algebra of the matrix. The paper makes a general study of this notion, which appears to unify under an abstract framework the relationships between many pairs of logics in the literature. The paradigmatic examples are (...) the local and the global consequences associated with a normal modal logic, and the logics preserving degrees of truth and preserving truth associated with certain substructural and many-valued logics. For protoalgebraic logics the results in the paper coincide with those obtained by two of the authors in 2001, so the main novelty of the approach is its suitability for all kinds of logics. The paper also studies three kinds of definability of the Leibniz filters, and their consequences for the determination of the strong version. In a second part of the paper several case studies are developed, comprising positive modal logic, Dunn–Belnap’s four-valued logic, the large family of substructural logics, and some relevance logics. (shrink)

Tras el Descubrimiento de América por Cristóbal Colón, para cuya empresa contó con la decisiva ayuda del dominico fray Diego de Deza, fueron los miembros de la Orden de Santo Domingo los primeros que lucharon por la justicia en la defensa de la dignidad del indígena en la conquista de América durante las primeras décadas del asentamiento español en el Nuevo Mundo y los que, con el debate teológico y filosófico, pusieron en cuestión los Justos Títulos de ocupación por parte (...) de España de las lejanas tierras ultramarinas. También fueron los pioneros que intentaron poner en práctica la tesis evangelizadora aislacionista, seguida después por otras órdenes religiosas. Los nombres de Antonio Montesinos, Pedro de Córdoba, Bartolomé de las Casas, Francisco de Vitoria, Tomás de Berlanga, Domingo de Soto, Melchor Cano y tantos otros forman un grupo destacado de precursores que se adelantaron en el tiempo a la hora de proclamarse defensores de los Derechos Humanos. (shrink)

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 1996.

La corrupción política presenta diversas definiciones en la doctrina según se enmarque en términos legales estrictamente o abarque a supuestos de moral pública. De ahí deriva también la mayor o menor extensión del abanico de tipos de corrupción política y sus causas. Objetivo central del artículo es señalar y explicar los remedios para la aminoración de la corrupción política: la independencia y autonomía de los poderes públicos, la conciencia y práctica de la moral pública ciudadana, la asunción de responsabilidades políticas, (...) la institucionalización de la moral pública por medio de la creación de órganos de supervisión y control en las instituciones públicas y los partidos y la limitación de la discrecionalidad administrativa. (shrink)