This paper analyzes the necessity and operation of conceptual macromolecule inside Edgar Morin’s school of thought due to the significant connection of his epistemological proposal and the language transformation with which the knowledge of reality is expressed in complex thought. This paper is organized as follows. First, we pointed the essential link between conceptualizer/observer subject and the macro-conceptualization. Second, we interpret the system or complex basic unity expounded in Method I based on complexity principles. Finally, it may be concluded that (...) the linguistic resources used by this paradigm are in accordance with the new ways to understand complexity. (shrink)

Tradicionalmente, la experiencia mística tiene como uno de sus propósitos fundamentales alcanzar la liberación. Esta puede entenderse como el resultado de la superación de los condicionamientos del ego que permite el encuentro con nuestra mismidad. Se analiza la liberación desde un discurso epistemológico naturalizado, entendiéndola como un proceso de desautomatización que repercute sobre el sistema nervioso central y que suscita una transformación radical en la relación habitual que el hombre tiene con el mundo. According to the tradition, one of the (...) objectives of the mystic experience is to achieve liberation. The latter can be understood as the result of overcoming the conditioning of the ego in order to find our selfhood. The article analyzes liberation from the perspective of naturalized epistemological discourse, understanding it as a process of deautomatization that affects the central nervous system and promotes a radical transformation of the human being's customary relationship to the world. Tradicionalmente, a experiência mística tem como um de seus propósitos fundamentais alcançar a liberação. Esta pode ser entendida como o resultado da superação dos condicionamentos do ego que permite o encontro com nossa mesmi-dade. Analisa-se a liberação a partir de um discurso epistemológico naturalizado, que a entende como um processo de desautomatização que repercute sobre o sistema nervoso central e provoca uma transformação radical na relação habitual que o homem tem com o mundo. (shrink)

Tradicionalmente, la experiencia mística tiene como uno de sus propósitos fundamentales alcanzar la liberación. Esta puede entenderse como el resultado de la superación de los condicionamientos del ego que permite el encuentro con nuestra mismidad. Se analiza la liberación desde un discurso epistemológico naturalizado, entendiéndola como un proceso de desautomatización que repercute sobre el sistema nervioso central y que suscita una transformación radical en la relación habitual que el hombre tiene con el mundo.

Este artículo traza una relación entre tres de los autores más influyentes de la doctrina del atomismo lógico a partir de la noción de análisis lógico, sin embargo, dicha relación busca no solo la constatación de su cercanía doctrinal sino la concepción ontológica que subyace a la posibilidad de dicho análisis, para el caso de Russell y Wittgenstein, o su ausencia, para el caso de Carnap, lo cual, no obstante, no aleja a este de preocupaciones de carácter metafísico, ya que (...) en los tres autores la relación entre lenguaje y mundo, ya sea desde la dimensión ontológica o epistemológica, comporta una reflexión de primer orden. Para exponer lo anterior se recurre a dilucidar la relación entre nombres propios y hechos (Russell), objetos simples y estado de cosas (Wittgenstein) y la postura de la Ciencia Unificada (Carnap) con respecto a la representación de hechos o cosas. (shrink)

El estudio de la experiencia mística se ha hecho desde diversos campos del conocimiento humano. Sin embargo, se ha considerado que un estudio que involucre la ciencia y la mística sólo podría conducir a una visión desacralizada de esta experiencia. Pero esta postura refleja más bien un desconocimiento en el cambio de paradigma que ha tenido la ciencia desde inicios del siglo XX. El propósito de este artículo es contextualizar este diálogo entre ciencia y mística a partir de una postura (...) naturalizada que permita comprender la experiencia mística en su dimensión biológica, al estudiar el rasgo singularísimo de la pasividad mística, justamente, desde este enfoque naturalizado. (shrink)

Es celebre la definición que hiciera James de la experiencia mística a partir de cuatro rasgos: la inefabilidad, la cualidad noética, la pasividad y la transitoriedad. Por su parte la fenomenología de la mística contemporánea ha señalado la necesidad de distinguir las experiencias místicas de otros tipos de experiencia de trascendencia, y para ello autores como Juan Martín Velasco han rescatado la relevancia de un rasgo que para James era secundario, a saber, la pasividad. A partir de este aporte, es (...) posible entablar un diálogo entre ciencia y mística y lograr así una definición naturalizada de la experiencia mística que revele la importancia tanto de la pasividad mística como de las técnicas para lograrla, de modo que se considere la experiencia mística en su calidad de vía mística. (shrink)

Este artículo se propone dilucidar las prácticas zen como prácticas desde la vacuidad, situando su comprensión a partir de una dilucidación de la expresión nietzscheana de estar _más allá del bien y del mal. _Para esto, este texto se divide en dos partes, la primera, titulada Sobre la expresión nietzscheana _más allá del bien y del mal,_ trabaja la sentencia del filósofo alemán en el contexto de su reflexión sobre el nihilismo; la segunda, titulada _Zazen _y _Shikan-taza: _estar más allá (...) del bien y del mal desde la vacuidad, relaciona las prácticas de _zazen _y de _shikan-taza _con el término vacuidad y, a través de esta relación, se lee este situarse más allá del bien y el mal desde la perspectiva budista que aquí se estudia. El artículo concluye al retomar a Nietzsche y la importancia de mantener presente la referencia a la vacuidad. (shrink)

Podría pensarse que el discurso epistemológico no puede abordar la experiencia mística, sin embargo desde el siglo XX diversos autores se han dado a la tarea de formular modelos epistemológicos que permitan comprender el estatus epistemológico de dicha experiencia. A partir del auge de perspectivas lingüísticas y sociológicas que se apoyaron en la filosofía de Wittgenstein y en la importancia que éste dio al lenguaje, a la experiencia que en él se expresa y a la comunidad que se entiende con (...) este lenguaje, el modelo constructivista dominó las discusiones epistemológicas sobre la experiencia mística. Sin embargo, este modelo también fue criticado desde varias perspectivas que consideraban que el constructivismo terminaba por reducir la experiencia a la doctrina. A partir de un análisis de este debate, el presente artículo argumenta a favor de un modelo naturalizado y propone algunos criterios para su constitución; muestra, también, la pertinencia de este modelo para una concepción epistemológica de la experiencia mística. (shrink)

In this paper, we argue that, under a specific set of circumstances, designing and employing certain kinds of virtual reality (VR) experiences can be unethical. After a general discussion of simulations and their ethical context, we begin our argu-ment by distinguishing between the experiences generated by different media (text, film, computer game simulation, and VR simulation), and argue that VR experiences offer an unprecedented degree of what we call “perspectival fidelity” that prior modes of simulation lack. Additionally, we argue that (...) when VR experiences couple this perspectival fidelity with what we call “context realism,” VR experiences have the ability to produce “virtually real experiences.” We claim that virtually real experiences generate ethical issues for VR technologies that are unique to the medium. Because subjects of these experiences treat them as if they were real, a higher degree of ethical scrutiny should be applied to any VR scenario with the potential to generate virtually real experiences. To mitigate this unique moral hazard, we propose and defend what we call “The Equivalence Principle.” This principle states that “if it would be wrong to allow subjects to have a certain experience in reality, then it would be wrong to allow subjects to have that experience in a virtually real setting.” We argue that such a principle, although limited in scope, should be part of the risk analysis conducted by any Institutional Review Boards, psychologists, empirically oriented philosophers, or game designers who are using VR technology in their work. (shrink)

In this article, we apply the literature on the ethics of choice-architecture (nudges) to the realm of virtual reality (VR) to point out ethical problems with using VR for empathy-based nudging. Specifically, we argue that VR simulations aiming to enhance empathic understanding of others via perspective-taking will almost always be unethical to develop or deploy. We argue that VR-based empathy enhancement not only faces traditional ethical concerns about nudge (autonomy, welfare, transparency), but also a variant of the semantic variance problem (...) that arises for intersectional perspective-taking. VR empathy simulations deceive and manipulate their users about their experiences. Despite their often laudable goals, such simulations confront significant ethical challenges. In light of these goals and challenges, we conclude by proposing that VR designers shift from designing simulations aimed at producing empathic perspective-taking to designing simulations aimed at generating sympathy. These simulations, we claim, can avoid the most serious ethical issues associated with VR nudges, semantic variance, and intersectionality. (shrink)

La primera de las virtudes sociales es la justicia. Una ley o institución que no se ajuste a la misma, debe ser reformada o abolida. En el siglo XVI, en la archidiócesis de Lima se emitió abundante legislación canónica que concernía de manera particular al indígena. Puesto que las leyes de la Iglesia ejercían un influjo directo sobre la vida del ciudadano tanto o más que las civiles, en este artículo se analizarán los cánones de los tres primeros Sínodos diocesanos (...) limenses que guardan relación con las “fiestas de guardar”, para comprobar su incidencia en la mayor o menor justicia que pudo impregnar el mundo laboral. Para alcanzar tal fin, nos hemos servido de los principios de justicia propuestos por John Rawls. Ellos nos ayudarán a descubrir si las constituciones sinodales emitidas fomentaron leyes e instituciones que mejoraron la vida de trabajo de los indios. (shrink)

The present paper deals with the ontological status of numbers and considers Frege ́s proposal in Grundlagen upon the background of the Post-Kantian semantic turn in analytical philosophy. Through a more systematic study of his philosophical premises, it comes to unearth a first level paradox that would unset earlier still than it was exposed by Russell. It then studies an alternative path, that departin1g from Frege’s initial premises, drives to a conception of numbers as synthetic a priori in a more (...) Kantian sense. On this basis, it tentatively explores a possible derivation of basic logical rules on their behalf, suggesting a more rudimentary basis to inferential thinking, which supports reconsidering the difference between logical thinking and AI. Finally, it reflects upon the contributions of this approach to the problem of the a priori. (shrink)

En este artículo se busca comprender las epistemologías de la manigua, entendidas como, un complejo sistema de conocimientos y vida, en diálogo con el monte y el agua en el Departamento de Chocó, Colombia. Las categorías de ‘conocimiento ancestral’ y ‘tradicional’ le asignan un carácter involutivo al ribereño; lo anclan al pasado. Las epistemologías de la manigua como metodología implican un diálogo interepistémico entre el método genealógico y las mañas de Tío Conejo, Ananse, Miguel Caicedo, Jaime Arocha, Sergio Mosquera, Lydia (...) Cabrera, en especial, Rogerio Velásquez. La oralidad representa potentes guayacanes3. Los ribereños son portadores de conocimientos propios: espiritualidad, ombligamiento, partería, etc. Esta racionalidad se encuentra amenazada por el colonialismo. (shrink)

This paper aspires to meet a philosophical challenge posed to the author to give treatment to what was seen as a particularly nice Meinongian case1; namely the case of Galician Meigas. However, through the playful footpaths of enchanted Galician Meigas, I rehabilitate some relevant discussion on the justification of belief formation and come to some poignant philosophical insights regarding the understanding of possibilities. I hope both the leading promoter of the challenge and, of course, other philosophical readers are satisfied with (...) the outcome. (shrink)

Boghossian’s (2003) proposal to conditionalize concepts as a way to secure their legitimacy in disputable cases applies well, not just to pejoratives – on whose account Boghossian first proposed it – but also to thick ethical concepts. It actually has important advantages when dealing with some worries raised by the application of thick ethical terms, and the truth and facticity of corresponding statements. In this paper, I will try to show, however, that thick ethical concepts present a specific case, whose (...) analysis requires a somewhat different reconstruction from that which Boghossian offers. A proper account of thick ethical concepts should be able to explain how ‘evaluated’ and ‘evaluation’ are connected. (shrink)

We propose that marketing of unhealthy foods and beverages to Black and Latino consumers results from the intersection of a business model in which profits come primarily from marketing an unhealthy mix of products, standard targeted marketing strategies, and societal forces of structural racism, and contributes to health disparities.

In this text, I consider two examples in the history of emancipation and manumission of enslaved, Black populations in the Caribbean and South America in order to theorize a colonial mode of conceiving of freedom at play in the first half of the nineteenth century. This mode is marked by the figure of the promise, enacting a notion of freedom as a constantly deferred, external compensation. Indeed, instead of an immediate decision deeming the practice of enslavement and trade of human (...) beings unacceptable, and an effective liberation of the enslaved Black populations in these different emancipation proclamations, the various histories of manumission in Latin America and the Caribbean show a long series of political and legal attempts to reduce and limit the extent of the slave trade that deferred the process of liberation for decades. Moreover, in many of these territories the practice did not end with the official proclamation of emancipation but was continued by illegal practices and mutations into legal forms of exploitation and oppression that are still operative today. After outlining this first trajectory, reconstructing the promise of manumission in the historical examples of Martinique (as read by Édouard Glissant) and La Gran Colombia and the Republic of Nueva Granada (contemporary Panamá, Colombia, Venezuela, and Ecuador), I analyze a second mode of investigation in examples of individual and collective strategies of liberation coming from the enslaved themselves, as reconstructed by contemporary feminist scholars in South America. These strategies appropriate liberation not as a promise, but as a negotiation and calculation that begins with the enslaved’s resistance to their oppressive conditions and that ultimately depends on the external concession by juridical authorities. In the third section of the chapter, I read these practices not as marronage, as they are sometimes approached, but as a different mode of turning back to these glimpses of freedom that more effectively challenge the narrative of emancipation and, with it, the promise of manumission in our present. -/- . (shrink)

Faria (2021) presenta una extraordinaria discusión sobre temas que rara vez suelen entrelazarse en la tradición analítica: el cambio en el contenido mental, su relevancia para la validez inferencial y las consecuencias que esto tiene para la responsabilidad (tanto en la acción como en el pensamiento). La meta de Faria (2021) es defender que la impermanencia del contenido, la vulnerabilidad de nuestras inferencias, el azar y la falta de control en nuestros pensamientos y acciones forman parte ineludible de nuestra forma (...) de vida. En este trabajo argumentaré que dichos argumentos son exitosos, aunque pondré en duda las consecuencias específicas que Faria (2021) obtiene de estos, argumentando que si bien hay impermanencia, vulnerabilidad y azar, no son tan radicales como para afectar nuestra concepción intuitiva de contenidos, creencia y racionalidad. (shrink)

This paper attempts to be a contribution to the epistemological project of explaining complex conceptual structures departing from more basic ones. The central thesis of the paper is that there are what I call “functionally structured concepts”, these are non-harmonic concepts in Dummett’s sense that might be legitimized if there is a function that justifies the tie between the inferential connection the concept allows us to trace. Proving this requires enhancing the russellian existential analysis of definite descriptions to apply to (...) functions and using this in proving the legitimacy of such concepts. The utility of the proposal is shown for the case of thick ethical terms and an attempt is made to use it in explaining the development of natural numbers. This last move could allow us to go one step lower in explaining the genesis of natural numbers while maintaining the notion of abstract numbers as higher order entities. (shrink)

CONTENIDO: Lo político, el arte y la religión, expresiones de identidad y diferencia - Nietzsche y Heidegger, precursores de la diferencia - Vattimo y los caminos de la diferencia - Identidad o diferencia como opción política.

Background The prioritization protocols for accessing adult critical care in the extreme pandemic context contain tiebreaker criteria to facilitate decision-making in the allocation of resources between patients with a similar survival prognosis. Besides being controversial, little is known about the public acceptability of these tiebreakers. In order to better understand the public opinion, Quebec and Ontario’s protocols were presented to the public in a democratic deliberation during the summer of 2022. Objectives (1) To explore the perspectives of Quebec and Ontario (...) citizens regarding tiebreakers, identifying the most acceptable ones and their underlying values. (2) To analyze these results considering other public consultations held during the pandemic on these criteria. Methods This was an exploratory qualitative study. The design involved an online democratic deliberation that took place over two days, simultaneously in Quebec and Ontario. Public participants were selected from a community sample which excluded healthcare workers. Participants were first presented the essential components of prioritization protocols and their related issues (training session day 1). They subsequently deliberated on the acceptability of these criteria (deliberation session day 2). The deliberation was then subject to thematic analysis. Results A total of 47 participants from the provinces of Quebec (n = 20) and Ontario (n = 27) took part in the online deliberation. A diverse audience participated excluding members of the healthcare workforce. Four themes were identified: (1) Priority to young patients - the life cycle - a preferred tiebreaker; (2) Randomization - a tiebreaker of last resort; (3) Multiplier effect of most exposed healthcare workers - a median acceptability tiebreaker, and (4) Social value – a less acceptable tiebreaker. Conclusion Life cycle was the preferred tiebreaker as this criterion respects intergenerational equity, which was considered relevant when allocating scarce resources to adult patients in a context of extreme pandemic. Priority to young patients is in line with other consultations conducted around the world. Additional studies are needed to further investigate the public acceptability of tiebreaker criteria. (shrink)

This commentary has three parts. The first one is based on fundamental questions in the field of philosophy of medicine, linked to relevant epistemological and ethical considerations in the analysi...

In this paper, I accomplish a conceptual task and a historical task. The conceptual task is to argue that (1) Einstein’s Principle of Separability (henceforth “separability”) is not a supervenience principle and that (2) separability and entanglement are compatible. I support (1) by showing that the conclusion of Einstein’s incompleteness argument would still follow even if one assumes that the state of a composite system does not supervene on the states of the subsystems, and by showing that what Einstein says (...) in “Quantum Mechanics and Reality” (1948) strongly suggests that separability is not a principle about how subsystem states relate to the state of composite systems. I support (2) by showing that if separability was incompatible with entanglement, then Einstein’s argument would be incoherent in a trivial way. Thus, by arguing for (1) and (2) I directly challenge what has been, and still is, a very common reading of separability. The historical task is to offer the first detailed review of the different ways in which separability has been defined by physicists and philosophers in the last 60 years. Among other things, such a review distinguishes three different definitions of the principle, and shows that since the 1990s and up until the present date, it became standard to take separability (as presented by Einstein) to be a supervenience principle. (shrink)

In this article, the authors bring two personal journeys together: one author’s liberationist journey, sparked by a search for justice and liberation in the slums of Guatemala City, and the other’s lifelong commitment to practical theology and spatial justice in South Africa. A practical theology of liberation is the result of life experiences in countries of the Global South amidst the search for justice and liberation. The worlds that come together in this article are René Girard’s mimetic theory, liberation theology (...) and practical theology. This article raises the question of the cross-contextuality of practical theology and the theological application of mimetic theory to develop innovative theological methodologies that respond to the collective woundedness of the urban context in the Global South.Contribution: The main contribution of this article is the use of three seemingly different theological approaches in conjunction. This article opens the door to inform practical theology with René Girard’s mimetic theory and liberation theology. (shrink)

The purpose of this essay is to look at whether Aquinas teaches in De veritate [DV], q. 1, a. 4, that truth is a form inherent in things. I take up this investigation because I am examining Lawrence Dewan's account of Aquinas's teaching on truth.1 On Dewan's account, a significant development occurs in Aquinas's teaching as regards truth as it is found in things. Before the Summa theologiae [ST], Aquinas thought that in addition to truth being in the intellect, it (...) was also in things. In ST, most explicitly in I, q. 16, a. 6, Aquinas no longer thinks that it is in things, but only in the mind. When Dewan says that before the ST truth is "in things" and in the ST it is not "in things," in both cases, by "in things," Dewan means "as a form inherent in things." What exactly this means for Dewan will be gradually brought out as I examine the text Dewan thinks most clearly teaches that truth is a form inherent in things: DV, q. 1, a. 4. (shrink)

Imagine that we are on a train playing with some mechanical systems. Why can’t we detect any differences in their behavior when the train is parked versus when it is moving uniformly? The standard answer is that boosts are symmetries of Newtonian systems. In this paper, I use the case of a spring to argue that this answer is problematic because symmetries are neither sufficient nor necessary for preserving its behavior. I also develop a new answer according to which boosts (...) preserve the relational properties on which the behavior of a system depends, even when they are not symmetries. (shrink)

It is often said in physics that if two models of a theory are related by a symmetry, then the two models provide (or could provide) two different representations of the very same situation, alike the case of two maps of different color for the very same city. It is also said that the situations represented by two models of a theory are indiscernible in some ways when the models in question are related by a symmetry of the theory, just (...) like the situation in the interior of the cabin of a train when the train is at rest in the station is empirically indiscernible from the situation in the interior when the train is moving uniformly (in classical mechanics, these two situations are represented by two models related by a boost). In recent years, philosophers of physics have focused a lot of attention in developing various principles that aim to elucidate these and similar remarks on symmetries, models, physical equivalence, and representation that are widespread in physics practice. The goal of the current article is to provide a critical review of these principles, and suggest a new framework for thinking about these kinds of questions. One important upshot of the paper is that questions of indiscernibility, and questions of the representational capacity of models, must be distinguished from one another. (shrink)