DISSERTAÇÃO DE MESTRADO BUENO, Marcos Paulo de Oliveira. A arte de crer na contemporaneidade : possibilidades e limites do cristianismo segundo Gianni Vattimo. 2012. 127 folhas. Dissertação (Mestrado) – Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Minas Gerais, Programa de Pós-graduação em Ciências da Religião, Belo Horizonte.
Neste artigo defendo que a Teoria da Informação Fortemente Semântica de Floridi (2004) – TIFS – está correta ao assumir a Tese da Veracidade, que por sua vez orienta a definição de informação semântica como “p é informação se e somente se p é constituído por dados bem-formados, com significado e verdadeiros”. Argumento que a teoria não é arbitrária, pois dá conta do desembaraço de conundrums filosóficos importantes, principalmente por evitar o paradoxo de Bar-Hillel e Carnap (1953), que é gerado (...) a partir da teoria clássica da informação semântica. Primeiro é discutido um dos principais resultados da teoria clássica, o de produzir “sentenças muito informativas para serem verdadeiras”. Depois são resumidas as motivações para a elaboração de uma “lógica de estar informado” e é mostrado como o sistema KTB-IL é montado e modelado mantendo-se entre os seus axiomas o da veracidade – K ou A4. Finalmente, a TIFS é examinada e defendida ao mostrar que ela restringe aleticamente a extensão do conceito clássico de informação para evitar problemas com tautologias e contradições. A TIFS oferece uma solução original ao capturar nossas intuições modais a respeito da informatividade como noção básica. (shrink)
Este trabalho tem como objetivo, investigar como se deu o surgimento do que Hannah Arendt denominou esfera do social, assim como a formação do homem de massa após a vitória do animal laborans na era moderna. Para tanto recorreremos Grécia antiga com o fito de conceituar o que esta autora denominou de público e privado, em seguida mostraremos como está configurado tais domínios na era moderna e suas influências na formação do que se denomina esfera do social na filosofia política (...) arendtiana. Resumé Cette étude a pour objectif analyser l’origine de ce que Hannah Arendt appelait la sphère social, ainsi que la formation de l'homme de masse après la victoire de l’ animal laborans dans l'ère moderne. De ce fait, nous recourrerons à la Grèce antique dans le but de conceptualiser ce qui s’appelais autrefois public et privé, puis nous montrerons comment sont configurés tels domaines dans l'époque moderne et leurs influences sur la formation de ce qu'on appelle la sphère social dans la philosophie politique de Hannah Arendt. Mots-clé : sphère social, homme de masse, animal laborans , sphère public, sphère privé. (shrink)
O texto discute o pensamento ambiental contemporâneo na perspectiva filosófica e política. Tal pensamento tornou-se um quadro hermenêutico de referência para a compreensão e a interpretação de vários campos de conhecimento, do ponto de vista do ser, do conhecer e da ação política do ser no mundo atual, o que justifica o realce à relação entre Filosofia e Política. O pressuposto geral que orienta a discussão é que a atual configuração epistêmica do pensamento ecológico é tributária de um ideário filosófico (...) e político gestado pelos movimentos que defendiam a transformação do pensamento social, da ordem cultural e do sistema político das sociedades avançadas do contexto político resultante do após II Guerra Mmundial. O foco específico da discussão são as ideias filosóficas de Mmax Weber e Jürgen Habermas, com ênfase para os conceitos de racionalização, ação estratégica/ação comunicativa, respectivamente. As ideias desses autores convergem para explicar o pensamento ambiental como portador de uma racionalidade cultural estrategicamente orientada para a ação política, mas comunicativamente vinculada ao mundo da vida. (shrink)
http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/1808-1711.2012v16n2p229 Tanto no Tratado da Natureza Humana como na Investigação sobre o Entendimento Humano , Hume mostra-se convencido de que “não há acaso no mundo”, e que “aquilo que o vulgo chama de acaso não passa de uma causa secreta e escondida”. Essa tese desempenha papel crucial em sua análise do livre-arbítrio e, conseguintemente, da responsabilidade moral; é também um elemento importante em sua discussão sobre os milagres. No entanto, o próprio Hume ofereceu, no Tratado , um argumento convincente para (...) mostrar que o princípio de causalidade, segundo o qual tudo o que começa a existir tem uma causa, não pode ser conhecido a priori , por intuição ou demonstração. Logo, essa “opinião tem necessariamente de provir da observação e experiência”. O presente trabalho examina essa tese, mostrando, inicialmente, qual era a proposta de Hume para fundar na experiência o princípio de causalidade, e depois qual, de fato, teria sido o mais robusto fundamento para esse princípio: a mecânica newtoniana. Explica-se, por fim, como esse fundamento empírico indireto e o próprio argumento de Hume foram solapados pela física quântica, no século XX. (shrink)
This contribution tries to assess how the Web is changing the ways in which scientific knowledge is produced, distributed and evaluated, in particular how it is transforming the conventional conception of scientific authorship. After having properly introduced the notions of copyright, public domain and (e-)commons, I will critically assess James Boyle's (2003, 2008) thesis that copyright and scientific (e-) commons are antagonistic, but I will mostly agree with the related claim by Stevan Harnad (2001a,b, 2008) that copyright has become an (...) obstacle to the accessibility of scientific works. I will even go further and argue that Open Access schemes not only solve the problem of the availability of scientific literature, but may also help to tackle the uncontrolled multiplication of scientific publications, since these publishing schemes are based on free public licenses allowing for (acknowledged) re-use of texts. However, the scientific community does not seem to be prepared yet to move towards an Open Source model of authorship, probably due to concerns related to attributing credit and responsability for the expressed hypotheses and results. Some strategies and tools that may encourage a change of academic mentality in favour of a conception of scientific authorship modelled on the Open Source paradigm are discussed. (shrink)
Computer ethics, or more broadly, Information Technology (IT) ethics, is often concerned with issues about privacy, accuracy, property and accessibility and framing of policies and rules on the features. While ethical issues on these topics are important, issues about IT ethics apply more broadly. The purpose of ethics is not just to draft new policies or legal codes. Ethics also aims to probe and bring into limelight for ethical deliberations those issues, which have escaped policy formulations or human introspection. This (...) paper tries to address one such ethical issue. This paper concerns with email ethics and with one of the features of emailing - ‘forwarding’. As an applied ethics domain, I have tried to use some samples of forwarded mails. Through the analysis of the given sample mails, I claim that (1) this issue of ‘forwarding’ falls well outside the domain of framing ethical policies and (2) it is a matter of ethical concern. I have addressed this ethical concern by drawing a criterion to judge if one’s act of ‘forwarding’ a mail is ethical act or not. (shrink)
[Jennifer Hornsby] The central claim is that the semantic knowledge exercised by people when they speak is practical knowledge. The relevant idea of practical knowledge is explicated, applied to the case of speaking, and connected with an idea of agents' knowledge. Some defence of the claim is provided. /// [Jason Stanley] The central claim is that Hornsby's argument that semantic knowledge is practical knowledge is based upon a false premise. I argue, contra Hornsby, that speakers do not voice their (...) thoughts directly. Rather, our actions of voicing our thoughts are justified by decisions we make (albeit rapidly) about what words to use. Along the way, I raise doubts about other aspects of the thesis that semantic knowledge is practical knowledge. (shrink)
Book review of 'More Kinds of Being: A Further Study of Individuation, Identity, and the Logic of Sortal Terms' (2009, Wiley-Blackwell). By E. J. LOWE.
An important contribution to the foundations of probability theory, statistics and statistical physics has been made by E. T. Jaynes. The recent publication of his collected works provides an appropriate opportunity to attempt an assessment of this contribution.
Nel febbraio 1912 Wittgenstein venne ammesso al Trinity College con Russell come supervisor, e iniziò a seguire le lezioni di Moore. E’ probabile che leggesse il libretto di Moore, Ethics, pubblicato al suo arrivo a Cambridge, o che ritrovasse nelle lezioni di Moore alcune delle suggestioni presenti nel libro. Ma dopo il Tractatus Wittgenstein dedicò poco spazio alle riflessioni sull’etica e quel poco in un periodo ristretto di tempo, agli inizi degli anni ‘30, dalla Conferenza sull’etica2 alle lezioni del ’32-33. (...) Alle lezioni del 32-33 assistettero sia Alice Ambrose che George E. Moore, che ci lascianpo diversi tipi di appunti:3 Ambrose riporta frasi di Wittgenstein, Moore presenta e rielabora le sue idee. Una lettura comparata di questi appunti dà un’idea abbastanza chiara di quanto Wittgenstein in quegli anni riuscisse a fondere le sue idee sui giudizi morali con le sue idee sulla grammatica filosofica che veniva elaborando nel Big Typescript. (shrink)
Riassunto: in queste note presentouna breve panoramica della scienza cognitiva, che costituisce a tutt'oggi, a più di vent'anni dalla sua nascita, un coacervo di novità rilevanti nell'ambito della ricerca interdisciplinare. Dopo una prima presentazione generale (§1), traccio una breve storia della disciplina (§2) per passare poi a descrivere nel § 3 uno dei nuclei di fondo della scienza cognitiva: il funzionalismo e l'idea di mente come sistema di rappresentazioni o mappe cognitive. Nel § 4. accenno ad alcune tensioni interne alla (...) scienza cognitiva. Essa è tuttora un campo disciplinare con forti contrasti sui paradigmi da seguire nella descrizione dell'architettura della mente. Una sfida recente è venuta dalla robotica "situata" e dalla tesi che occorre fare a meno delle rappresentazioni mentali nella costruzione di robot intelligenti. Nel § 5 discuto questa sfida mostrando che, nonostante l'entusiasmo suscitato dai primi successi della nuova robotica, il cardine della scienza cognitiva resta solido, anche se bisognoso di completamento. Nella conclusione, al § 6, tocco di sfuggita il tema della coscienza dei sistemi intelligenti (umani e artificiali) e invito a cercare strade per affrontare i problemi che si porranno alle nuove generazioni di studiosi, ormai al di là della frattura tra cultura umanistica e scientifica, frattura che forse trova in Italia uno degli ultimi ambienti in cui sopravvivere. (shrink)
In his lifelong effort to overcome the limits of Panofsky’s iconological method, Max Imdahl tried to sketch out an «iconic understanding» which is pre-reflexive, performed below the level of conceptual and verbal explication. Under the auspices of Konrad Fiedler’s theoretical position, Imdahl opposed the Panofskian «recognizing view» with a more formalistic «seeing view», in order to gain access to a third form of vision which he called «knowing view». After outlining Imdahl’s critic of the reduced and unilateral significance of «form» (...) and «formal composition» in Panofsky’s approach, I will clarify how far Imdahl has gone in the analysis of what should be properly defined as an authentic logic of images . Then, focusing on a paradigmatic case study, I will show the importance of the syntax of an image (i.e. the positioning of its elements on the left or on the right, underneath or above, in the back or in the front) for its semantic meaning. (shrink)
Kant explicitou, talvez com maior clareza que qualquer outro filósofo antes do que ele, a essência do conflito que implica a relação da causalidade natural e a causalidade livre. Hegel assevera que com o dualismo fenômeno-coisa em si Kant deixa intacta como tal a incompatibilidade entre as noções de causalidade natural e causalidade livre, já que, conserva sua contraposição mesma para simplesmente localizá-la na estrutura do sujeito. Hegel aspira precisamente a fechar o ciclo da metafísica dualista que definiu a filosofia (...) dos seus começos e, com isso, a dar solução definitiva às dificuldades que lhe são inerentes; para esse fim exige o abandono do paradigma que a constituiu como tal e propõe no seu lugar uma autêntica revolução no campo da ontologia e a teoria do conhecimento. Neste contexto geral, Hegel oferece uma solução inovadora ao problema da incompatibilidade entre causalidade natural e causalidade livre, entre determinismo e liberdade. (shrink)
Let X be any infinite, coinfinite r.e. set. We show that the index set $\{e: W_e \equiv_1 X\}$ is Σ 0 3 -complete, answering a question posed by Odifreddi in [2].
Adriano Ardovino, Raccogliere il mondo. Per una fenomenologia della rete [Angela Maiello] • Clive Bell, L’Arte [Filippo Focosi] • Alessandro Bertinetto, Il pensiero dei suoni. Temi di filosofia della musica [Domenica Lentini] • Terrence Deacon, Incomplete Nature. How Mind Emerged From Matter [Mariagrazia Portera] • Roger Scruton, La bellezza. Ragione ed esperienza estetica [Filippo Focosi] • Miriam Bratu Hansen, Cinema and Experience. Sigfried Kracauer, Walter Benjamin and Theoder W. Adorno [Domenico Spinosa] • Lawrence Barsalou, scritti sulla “Grounded Cognition” [Gialuca Consoli] (...) • Dis-forme , Università degli Studi di Palermo, 28-29 maggio 2012 [Michele Bertolini e Pietro Conte]. (shrink)
The notion of “conception” plays a central role in Thomas Reid’s theory of perceptual knowledge, although “conception” might be studied for itself as a source of knowledge. In this study, we attempt to expose systematically the several contexts where Reid deals with the source of knowledge and the kind of mental operation called “conception”. The purpose is to understand a specific aspect of the deliverances of “conception” in Reid’s theory of perception, namely, a direct relationship, not mediated by ideas, between (...) knowing subject and external world. To understand the operation of conceiving, which is intrinsic to and constitutive of perception, is an efficient way to comprehend the nature and content of perceptual knowledge. At this step, reflections on the relationship between mind and external world, that is, mind and material world, have to be made. (shrink)
E-Z Reader 7 is a processing model of eye-movement control. One constraint imposed on the model is that high-level cognitive processes do not influence eye movements unless normal reading processes are disturbed. I suggest that this constraint is unnecessary, and that the model provides a sensible architecture for explaining how both low- and high-level processes influence eye movements.
Schleiemacher has been taken, historically, as a reception and divulgation via Dilthey, of a unilateral stress in its psychological character. The present article has as its scope to display that Gadamer came to join in this trend of thought. The aid of Manfred Frank will allow us to show the mistake in such reception and the possibility of another reading where the meaning of psychological interpretation is a complement of grammatical interpretation and vice-versa. The discussion is placed, basically, on the (...) interpretation with special focus in the “concept of divination”. (shrink)
Este ensaio pretende levantar as seguintes questões: 1. de que modo é possível reconstituir o sentido de moral segundo um amor-próprio cujo conteúdo é dado menos por um isolamento ou negaçáo do outro do que por um trabalho pessoal sobre si mesmo, em vista de um êthos , de uma ética? 2. em que medida o valor da moral hoje em dia pode ser deslocado da lei universal para uma atitude de diferença, da normalidade do comportamento para o cultivo de (...) si e, por fim, da verdade sobre o sujeito para uma subjetivaçáo ascética que náo exige a prerrogativa de uma identidade, mas a transformaçáo de si na relaçáo consigo e com os outros? Tais questões sáo levantadas a partir de Friedrich Nietzsche, Michel Foucault e Fernando Savater. Palavras-chave: Amor-próprio, Estética da existência, Ética, Identidade. (shrink)
The article is devoted to the four principle realization in the creative work of two poets, namely the English literature classic T.S. Eliot (1888-1965) and a representative of the Russian poetry Elena Swarz (1948-2010). Number four is a structural principle in their works composition and crucifix of Christ. On the example of the two poets the author shows that on the one hand, the symbol of four is a cosmic transversalism of being and the cross image, on the other. Thus, (...) two contradictory meanings are combined here: harmony and drama as truly Christian forms of dialectics. (shrink)
Traduçáo: Normal 0 21 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Retirado de Carlos E. Caorsi (Ed.). Ensayos sobre Strawson . Universidad de la República/Faculdad de Humanidades y Ciencias de la Educación, Montevidéo,1992, p. 55-71.
Analyses on the so-called “Arab Spring” mainly focus on its possible consequences. But which are its causes? In attempting to provide an answer to this question, the author evaluates the multifaceted relationship between authorities and citizens – especially the youngest ones – underlining the occurrence of specific phenomena (youth bulge, high educational levels, widespread ICTs, unemployment, pervasive corruption, human rights violations) in the countries involved. The conclusion which is reached is that the wave of protests might have been generated by (...) the complete detachment existing between citizens and institutions, detachment which, paradoxically, might have been created and nourished by those in power themselves, through the “modernizing” reforms they have imposed in recent years. (shrink)
William E. Connolly’s writings have pushed the leading edge of political theory, first in North America and then in Europe as well, for more than two decades now. This book draws on his numerous influential books and articles to provide a coherent and comprehensive overview of his significant contribution to the field of political theory. The book focuses in particular on three key areas of his thinking: Democracy: his work in democratic theory - through his critical challenges to the traditions (...) of Rawlsian theories of justice and Habermasian theories of deliberative democracy - has spurred the creation of a fertile and powerful new literature Pluralism - Connolly's work utterly transformed the terrain of the field by helping to resignify pluralism: from a conservative theory of order based on the status quo into a radical theory of democratic contestation based on a progressive political vision The Terms of Political Theory - Connolly has changed the language in which Anglo-American political theory is spoken, and entirely shuffled the pack with which political theorists work. (shrink)
Dworkin respondeu afirmativamente à pergunta título do seu texto “Não existe mesmo nenhuma resposta certa em casos controversos?”. Posner criticou Dworkin e respondeu a mesma pergunta negativamente. Discute-se neste artigo as diferentes maneiras como cada filósofo entendeu a pergunta que acarreta diferentes respostas a ela, isto é, de que modo diferenças na concepção do que é o Direito acarretam diferenças a respeito da existência de respostas certas para questões jurídicas.
This is the first collected edition of the writings of the poet, critic, and philosopher T.E. Hulme (1883-1917). Hulme wrote some of the first "modernist" poems in English, helped introduce the philosophy of Henri Bergson to Britain and the U.S., and was one of the first English critics to write about modern art. This edition contains extensive notes to Hulme's writings, together with a substantial biographical and critical introduction.
A ideia intuitivamente plausível de que pelo menos alguns de nossos estados mentais teriam aspectos fenomenais qualitativos aos quais nós teríamos um acesso cognitivo privilegiado é considerada por muitos filósofos como incompatível com a ontologia fisicista. Alguns defensores radicais do fisicismo preferem simplesmente negar a existência de aspectos qualitativos, ao passo que outros materialistas procuram reinterpretar a cognição do caráter fenomenal da nossa experiência do mundo como a aquisição de uma habilidade, isto é, como uma forma de know-how , em (...) oposição à aquisição de informação ( know-that ). O presente trabalho expõe e examina criticamente algumas tentativas recentes de compatibilização da natureza sui generis da apreensão cognitiva do caráter fenomenal da nossa experiência com a tese materialista de que o conteúdo proposicional dessa cognição é constituído exclusivamente por fatos físicos. doi: http://dx.doi.org/ 10.5007 / 1808-1711.2011v15n3p415. (shrink)
The essays in this volume were written to celebrate the sixtieth birthday of G. E. L. Owen, who by his essays and seminars on ancient Greek philosophy has made a contribution to its study that is second to none. The authors, from both sides of the Atlantic, include not only scholars whose main research interests lie in Greek philosophy, but others best known for their work in general philosophy. All are pupils or younger colleagues of Professor Owen who are indebted (...) to his practice of philosophical scholarship as a first-order philosophical activity. At the heart of G. E. L. Owen’s work has been a preoccupation with the role of philosophical reflection on language in the metaphysics and epistemology of Plato, Aristotle and other ancient Greek thinkers. This is accordingly the general topic of the present volume, which includes five papers on Plato’s critical dialogues and seven on Aristotle, prefaced by two on Heraclitus and followed by a study of the debate in Hellenistic philosophy on the sorites. This is a book for specialists in Greek philosophy and philosophers of language which will also be of interest to some linguists. (shrink)
Everyone knows a picture is worth a thousand words. But sometimes, especially in journalism, a picture can be worth much, much more. This added value isn't always positive. Pictures can inflict lasting pain on victims of grief and tragedy. This paper by an undergraduate journalism student explores the ethical dilemmas photographers face when capturing such traumatic incidents on film and explores the lack of professional guidelines available to guide them.
When animals choose between completing a cognitive task and “escaping,” proper interpretation of their behavior depends crucially on methodological details, including how forced and freely chosen tests are mixed and whether appropriate transfer tests are administered. But no matter how rigorous the test, it is impossible to go beyond functional similarity between human and nonhuman behaviors to certainty about human-like consciousness.
Intuitions play an important role in contemporary epistemology. Over the last decade, however, experimental philosophers have published a number of studies suggesting that epistemic intuitions may vary in ways that challenge the widespread reliance on intuitions in epistemology. In a recent paper, Jennifer Nagel offers a pair of arguments aimed at showing that epistemic intuitions do not, in fact, vary in problematic ways. One of these arguments relies on a number of claims defended by appeal to the psychological literature (...) on intuitive judgment and on mental state attribution (also known as “theory of mind”, “mindreading” and “folk psychology”). I call this the "theoretical argument". The other argument relies on recent experimental work carried out by Nagel and her collaborators. It is my contention that in setting out her theoretical argument, Nagel offers an account of the relevant scientific literature that is, in crucial respects, flawed and misleading. My main goal in this paper is to rectify these errors and to make it clear that, once this is done, Nagel’s theoretical argument collapses. Since Nagel’s experimental work has not yet been published, and available details are very sketchy, I do not discuss this work in detail. However, in the final section of the paper I offer some critical observations about Nagel’s strategy for dealing with empirical data that does not support her view – both other people’s and her own. (shrink)
A century after its publication, G.E. Moore''sPrincipia Ethica stands as one of theclassic statements of anti-naturalism inethics. Moore claimed that the most basic ethicalproperties were denoted by `good'' and `bad'' andthat all naturalist accounts of thoseproperties were inadequate. His open-questionargument aimed to refute any proposedidentification of good with some naturalproperty, and Moore concluded from theargument that good must be a nonnaturalproperty.The received view is that the open-questionargument is a failure. In this paper,my aim is to breathe some life back intoMoore''s (...) argument. My plan for doing so beginsby presenting the standard interpretation ofthe argument and then showing that there isan alternative to that interpretation. Thealternative is not developed at any length byMoore and stands in need of some elaboration. Isuggest a way of elaborating theargument and then show that the standardcriticisms of Moore fail to undermine thisalternative version of the open-questionargument. (shrink)
Contemporary discussions of race and racism devote considerable effort to giving conceptual analyses of these notions. Much of the work is concerned to investigate a priori what we mean by the terms ‘race’ and ‘racism’ (e.g., Garcia 1996; Garcia 1997; Garcia 1999: Blum 2002; Hardimon 2003; Mallon 2004); more recent work has started to employ empirical methods to determine the content of our “folk concepts,” or “folk theory” of race and racism (Glasgow 2009; Glasgow et al 2009; (...) Faucher and Machery 2009). In contrast to both of these projects, I have argued elsewhere that in considering what we mean by these terms we should treat them on the model of kind terms whose reference is fixed by ordinary uses, but whose content is discovered empirically using social theory; I have also argued that it is not only important to determine what we actually mean by these terms, but what we should mean, i.e., what type, if any, we should be tracking. (Haslanger 2000, Haslanger 2006) My own discussion of these issues, however, has been confused and confusing. In giving an account of race or gender, is the goal to provide a conceptual analysis? Or to investigate the kinds we are referring to? To draw attention to different kinds? To stipulate new meanings? Jennifer Saul has raised a series of powerful objections to my accounts of gender and race, suggesting that they are neither semantically nor politically useful, regardless of whether we treat them as revisionary proposals, or as elucidations of our concepts. (Saul 2006) Joshua Glasgow has also offered a critique of my externalist approach to race as an effort to capture “our concept” (Glasgow 2009, Ch. 6-7). I agree with much of what they say, but I also believe that there is something I was trying to capture that.. (shrink)
This paper discusses privacy and the monitoring of e-mail in the context of the international nature of the modern world. Its three main aims are: (1) to highlight the problems involved in discussing an essentially philosophical question within a legal framework, and thus to show that providing purely legal answers to an ethical question is an inadequate approach to the problem of privacy on the Internet; (2) to discuss and define what privacy in the medium of the Internet actually is; (...) and (3) to apply a globally acceptable ethical approach of international human rights to the problem of privacy on the Internet, and thus to answer the question of what is and is not morally permissible in this area, especially in light of recent heightened concerns about terrorist activities. It concludes that the monitoring of e-mail is, at least in the vast majority of cases, an unjustified infringement of the right to privacy, even if this monitoring is only aimed at preventing the commission of acts of terrorism. (shrink)
Abstract: G. E. Moore claimed to know a variety of commonsense propositions. He is often accused of being dogmatic or of begging the question against philosophers who deny that he knows such things. In this paper, I argue that this accusation is mistaken. I argue that Moore is instead guilty of answering questions of the form ‘Do I know p?’ in bad faith.
The goal of this article is to put to the fore the importance and the relevance of the “second persons” in the framework of the relational ethics where the person has being related as a primacy over the individual as an isolated subject. While using the psychiatric team of an emergency unit (E.R.I.C.) as a leading thread we seek to show the anthropology of being related, which underlines the practical ethics of such emergency team.
Shortly before G. E. Moore wrote down the formative for the early analytic philosophy lectures on Some Main Problems of Philosophy (1910–1911), he had become acquainted with two books which influenced his thought: (1) a book by Husserl's pupil August Messer and (2) a book by the Greifswald objectivist Dimitri Michaltschew. Central to Michaltschew's book was the concept of the given. In Part I, I argue that Moore elaborated his concept of sense-data in the wake of the Greifswald concept. Carnap (...) did the same when he wrote his Aufbau, the only difference being that he spoke not of sense-data but of Erlebnisse. This means, I argue, that both Moore's sense-data and Carnap'sErlebnisse have little to do with either British empiricists or the neo-Kantians. In Part II, I try to ascertain what made early analytic philosophy different from all those philosophical groups and movements that either exercised influence on it, or were closely related to it: phenomenologists, Greifswald objectivists, Brentanists. For this purpose, I identify the sine qua non practices of the early analytic philosophers: exactness; acceptance of the propositional turn; descriptivism; objectivism. If one of these practices was not explored by a given philosophical school or group, in all probability, it was not truly analytic. (shrink)
In this article, we discuss the relationships between discrimination, harassment, and the glass ceiling, arguing that many of the factors that preclude women from occupying executive and managerial positions also foster sexual harassment. We suggest that measures designed to increase numbers of women in higher level positions will reduce sexual harassment. We first define and discuss discrimination, harassment, and the glass ceiling, relationships between each, and relevant legislation. We next discuss the relationships between gender and sexual harassment, emphasizing the influence (...) of gender inequality on sexual harassment. We then present recommendations for organizations seeking to reduce sexual harassment, emphasizing the role that women executives may play in such efforts and, importantly, the recursive effects of such efforts on increasing the numbers of women in higher level positions in organizations. (shrink)
— Alla domanda «Che cosa esiste?» Quine rispondeva con un semplice «Tutto». Dire «tutto», però, equivale a dire nulla, a meno che non si forniscano indicazioni più dettagliate. Vogliamo sapere in che cosa consiste questo tutto, vogliamo un elenco dettagliato delle entità che vi rientrano, vogliamo una loro caratterizzazione. Il testo che segue cerca di fare il punto sulla possibilità di fornire queste indicazioni e chiarire in tal modo la questione ontologica senza avventurarsi in questioni metafisiche di portata più ampia.
“Identità” qui si intende nel senso già precisato da Aristotele di “identità numerica”, che si ha “quando i nomi sono parecchi, ma la cosa è una sola” e, non nel senso di “identità specifica”, che si ha invece “quando gli oggetti, pur essendo parecchi, non rivelano differenze quanto alla specie”.1 In questo articolo intendo fornire al lettore indicazioni introduttive (non certo esaustive) sul posto che la nozione di identità numerica occupa nella logica contemporanea e nell’area di riflessione filosofica del Novecento (...) più strettamente legata alla logica, la filosofia analitica. Nella terza parte proporrò qualche spunto per un’indagine originale. (shrink)
Cominciamo da lontano. Supponiamo che un giorno ci si presenti l’occasione di poter chiedere a un oracolo onnisciente di dirci, una volta per tutte, che cosa c’è. Non sto pensando al sogno dello scienziato pigro, che vorrebbe sentirsi dire senza troppi sforzi come è fatto il mondo. Sarebbe eccessivo, e del resto non è detto che saremmo in grado di capire la risposta. (Potrebbe essere formulata nel linguaggio di una teoria scientifica che non conosciamo.) Sto semplicemente pensando all’opportunità di sentirci (...) dire che cosa c’è e che cosa non c’è, in modo da poter concentrare in nostri sforzi – quelli della ricerca scientifica come quelli un po’ più speculativi della riflessione filosofica – sullo studio delle cose reali, evitando così inutili sprechi di energie. Se, per esempio, l’oracolo ci dicesse che la fontana della giovinezza non esiste, come è probabile, faremmo bene a smettere di cercarla, così come se tempo fa ci avesse detto che il flogisto non esiste non avremmo sprecato il nostro tempo a cercare di studiarne le proprietà. E se ci dicesse che nell’universo non esistono altre forme di vita oltre a quelle esemplificate sul nostro pianeta, cosa peraltro improbabile, allora potremmo dirottare i cospicui investimenti dedicati alla loro ricerca verso obiettivi più realistici e, di conseguenza, più utili. (shrink)
The paper provides a selective analysis of the main theories of trust and e-trust (that is, trust in digital environments) provided in the last twenty years, with the goal of preparing the ground for a new philosophical approach to solve the problems facing them. It is divided into two parts. The first part is functional toward the analysis of e-trust: it focuses on trust and its definition and foundation and describes the general background on which the analysis of e-trust rests. (...) The second part focuses on e-trust, its foundation and ethical implications. The paper ends by synthesising the analysis of the two parts. (shrink)
My critical comments on Part I of P. J. E. Kail's Projection and Realism in Hume's Philosophy are divided into two parts. First, I challenge the exegetical details of Kail's take on Hume's important distinction between natural and philosophical relations. I show that Kail misreads Hume in a subtle fashion. If I am right, then much of the machinery that Kail puts into place for his main argument does different work in Hume than Kail thinks. Second, I offer a brief (...) criticism of Kail's argument for reading Hume "as a realist about the external world" (Kail, 67). The two parts are (loosely) tied together because it turns out that Kail and I disagree about how Hume thinks of philosophers' activity generally.One caveat: .. (shrink)
Several proponents of the 'buck-passing' account of value have recently attributed to G. E. Moore the implausible view that goodness is reason-providing. I argue that this attribution is unjustified. In addition to its historical significance, the discussion has an important implication for the contemporary value-theoretical debate: the plausible observation that goodness is not reason-providing does not give decisive support to the buck-passing account over its Moorean rivals. The final section of the paper is a survey of what can be said (...) for and against the buck-passing account and Moore's views about goodness and reasons. (shrink)
Insieme a John McDowell, Robert Brandom è uno dei filosofi emergenti della reazione al naturalismo filosofico; seguace Wilfrid Sellars, è l'autore americano che più si avvicina al dialogo con la filosofia continentale e propone una rivalutazione di Kant e Hegel nella filosofia analitica. Già allievo di Richard Rorty, Brandom è diventuo famoso con la pubblicazione di Making it Explicit. Questo ponderoso volume di 900 pagine non ha avuto però ancora una sufficiente attenzione nel dibattito filosofico italiano (a parte alcuni inteventi (...) pubblicati su Iride). Forse questo dipende in parte dalla peculiarità e difficoltà del suo approccio, in parte dalla mole stessa del citato volume. Anche per questo motivo Brandom ha presentato una serie di lezioni2 ove riprende i temi del libro maggiore e ne approfondisce alcune parti. In quanto segue si presentano i temi fondamentale di Making it Explicit, arricchiti con elementi presi dal nuovo approfondimento. (shrink)
Secondo una terminologia oggi piuttosto diffusa, l’ontologia si occuperebbe di stabilire che cosa c’è, ovvero di redigere una sorta di inventario di tutto l’esistente, mentre la metafisica si occuperebbe di stabilire che cos’è quello che c’è, ovvero di specificare la natura degli articoli inclusi nell’inventario 1. Per esempio, la tesi in base alla quale esistono entità come i colori o le virtù competerebbe all’ontologia, mentre rientrerebbe nei compiti della metafisica stabilire se queste entità siano forme platoniche, universali aristotelici, accidenti individuali, (...) tropi, e così via. Allo stesso modo, spetterebbe all’ontologia determinare se quando parliamo di Pinocchio, dei numeri naturali, delle passeggiate di Sebastian o dello stile Biedermeier stiamo parlando di cose che esistono o sono esistite davvero, ma sarebbe la metafisica a dirci qualcosa di preciso in merito ai loro tratti salienti, per esempio che Pinocchio è un concetto individuale, che i numeri sono oggetti astratti, che le passeggiate sono eventi irripetibili estesi nello spazio e nel tempo, e così via. (shrink)
The second word in the subtitle of this article is crucial. For there can be no doubt but that the possibility of sociobiology below the human level has already been abundantly realized in, for instance, the main body of E. O. Wilson's enormous and encyclopedic treatise Sociobiology: The New Synthesis. What may more reasonably be doubted, and what is in fact questioned here, is whether, as Wilson and others hope and believe, there is much room, or indeed any, for a (...) sociobiology of our own notoriously wayward and idiosyncratic species. In proposing this particular project Wilson and his colleagues have seen themselves as promoting a climactic conquest for evolutionary biology. For surely, they seem to have thought, now, more than a century after Darwin, it is high time and past time to launch the final assault upon the last citadel. But, as we shall proceed to argue, there are reasons—reasons which were available at least in outline even to Darwin himself—why the ideas which have been so triumphantly successful in explaining The Origin of Species cannot properly be applied to what is in truth a fundamentally different task. They cannot, that is to say, properly be transferred to explain developments either within or out of the particular problem species of which the author of that book, along with both all the authors and all the readers of all other books, have been themselves members. (shrink)
Unbound anaphoric pronouns or ‘E-type pronouns’ have presented notorious problems for semantic theory, leading to the development of dynamic semantics, where the primary function of a sentence is not considered that of expressing a proposition that may act as the object of propositional attitudes, but rather that of changing the current information state. The older, ‘E-type’ account of unbound anaphora leaves the traditional notion of proposition intact and takes the unbound anaphor to be replaced by a full NP whose semantics (...) is assumed to be known (e.g. a definite description). In this paper, I argue that there are serious problems with any version of the E-type account as well as the (original form of the) dynamic account. I will explore a new account based on structured propositions, which can be considered a conservative extension of a traditional proposition-based semantics, but which at the same time incorporates some crucial insights of the dynamic account. (shrink)
These thirteen original essays, whose authors include some of the world's leading philosophers, examine themes from the work of the Cambridge philosopher G. E. Moore (1873-1958), and demonstrate his considerable continuing influence on philosophical debate. Part I bears on epistemological topics, such as skepticism about the external world, the significance of common sense, and theories of perception. Part II is devoted to themes in ethics, such as Moore's open question argument, his non-naturalism, utilitarianism, and his notion of organic unities.
We show that the contemporary debate surrounding the question “What is the norm of assertion?” presupposes what we call the quantitative view, i.e. the view that this question is best answered by determining how much epistemic support is required to warrant assertion. We consider what Jennifer Lackey ( 2010 ) has called cases of isolated second-hand knowledge and show—beyond what Lackey has suggested herself—that these cases are best understood as ones where a certain type of understanding , rather than (...) knowledge, constitutes the required epistemic credential to warrant assertion. If we are right that understanding (and not just knowledge) is the epistemic norm for a restricted class of assertions, then this straightforwardly undercuts not only the widely supposed quantitative view, but also a more general presupposition concerning the universalisability of some norm governing assertion—the presumption (almost entirely unchallenged since Williamson’s 1996 paper) that any epistemic norm that governs some assertions should govern assertions—as a class of speech act—uniformly. (shrink)
Educating the gaze is easily understood as becoming conscious about what is 'really' happening in the world and becoming aware of the way our gaze is itself bound to a perspective and particular position. However, the paper explores a different idea. It understands educating the gaze not in the sense of 'educare' (teaching) but of 'e-ducere' as leading out, reaching out. E-ducating the gaze is not about getting at a liberated or critical view, but about liberating or displacing our view. (...) It is not about becoming conscious or aware , but about becoming attentive , about paying attention . E-ducating the gaze, then, is not depending on method, but relying on discipline; it does not require a rich methodology, but asks for a poor pedagogy, i.e. for practices which allow to expose ourselves. One example of such practice is that of walking. Consequently e-ducating the gaze could be about an invitation to go walking. This idea is explored b way of a comment on two quotations, one by Walter Benjamin and one by Michel Foucault. (shrink)
Propósito deste ensaio é apresentar uma nova abordagem ao velho problema que é o acesso filosófico ao Deus cristão. Isto acontece dentro do esquema de uma nova metafísica cujo ponto de partida é a capacidade que a mente tem de percepcionar a totalidade do ser, facto este que o artigo apresenta como sendo justamente uma estrutura central do intelecto. Dado que as distinções entre intelecto e mundo, conceitos e realidade, sujeito e objecto, etc., já pressupõem a totalidade do ser dada (...) perceptivamente e nela está baseada, esta totalidade, assim concebida, torna-se mais fundamental que todas aquelas famosas distinções. A tarefa dessa nova metafísica aqui em questão consiste em explicitar uma explicação desta totalidade. No presente artigo, esta explicação é desenvolvida apenas numa direcção, a saber, a explicação no sentido de como proceder da totalidade do ser para o Deus cristão. Neste sentido, uma distinção fundamental é feita entre "o Absoluto" e "Deus (cristão)". A filosofia (cristão) tradicional acreditou frequentemente que a filosofia só poderia explicitar a "determinação" do absoluto como criador do universo finito. O autor do artigo visa justamente demonstrar que outras determinações do Absoluto podem ser filosoficamente alcançadas; mas isto pressupõe que a história da liberdade do Absoluto seja radicalmente tomada em consideração. Ora isto, por sua vez, significa que a história e interpretação da religião - especialmente da religião segundo a tradição judaico-cristã - tem de ser vista como um tópico filosófico verdadeiramente central. Assim compreendido, o Absoluto é apropriadamente designado por "Deus (cristão)". Segue-se que uma das consequências desta abordagem é a de que uma vincada distinção entre filosofia tradicional e teologia tradicional cristã deve ser abandonada. /// The purpose of this essay is to present a new approach to the old problem of philosophical access to the Christian God. This is done within the frame of a new metaphysics whose starting point is the mind's perception of the totality of being which is shown to be a central structural feature of the mind as such. Since the distinctions between mind and world, concepts and reality, subject and object, and the like, already presuppose the perceptually given totality of being and are based on it, this totality, so concei-ved, is more fundamental than all those famous distinctions. The task of the envisaged new metaphysics consists in working out an explication of this totality. In this paper this explication is developed only in one direction: the explication in the sense of how to proceed from the totality of being to the Christian God. To this effect, a fundamental distinction is made between "the Absolute" and "(Christian) God". Traditional (Christian) philosophy had constantly believed that philosophy could only work out the "determination "of the Absolute as the creator of the finite universe. The paper endeavours to demonstrate that further determinations of the Absolute can be philosophically reached; but this presupposes that the history of the freedom of the Absolute is radically taken into account. And this, in turn, amounts to the claim that the history and interpretation of religion - most especially according to the Judaic-Christian tradition -must be seen as a central philosophical topic. Thus understood, the Absolute is appropriately called "(Christian) God". One of the consequences of this approach is that the sharp distinction between traditional philosophy and traditional Christian theology should be abandoned. (shrink)
In this paper, I shall be concerned with the phenomenon that has been labeled silencing in some of the recent philosophical literature. A speaker who is silenced in this sense is unable to make herself understood, even though her audience hears every word she utters. For instance, consider a woman who says “No”, intending to refuse sex. Her audience fails to recognize her intention to refuse, because he thinks that women tend to be insincere, and to not say what they (...) really mean, especially in sexual situations.1 This speaker’s utterance then goes astray in the manner that constitutes silencing in my sense. Regarding this phenomenon, philosophers such as Rae Langton and Jennifer Hornsby have argued, first, that women are particularly liable to be thus affected, i.e., silenced; second, that, as a result of this silencing, they are systematically disadvantaged; and third, that pornography is responsible for this silencing. (shrink)
These thirteen original essays, whose authors include some of the world's leading philosophers, examine themes from the work of the Cambridge philosopher G. E. Moore (1873-1958), and demonstrate his considerable continuing influence on philosophical debate. Part I bears on epistemological topics, such as skepticism about the external world, the significance of common sense, and theories of perception. Part II is devoted to themes in ethics, such as Moore's open question argument, his non-naturalism, utilitarianism, and his notion of organic unities.
Orthodoxy in epistemology maintains that some sources of belief, e.g. perception and introspection, generate knowledge, while others, e.g. testimony and memory, preserve knowledge. An example from Jennifer Lackey B the Schoolteacher case B purports to show that testimony can generate knowledge. It is argued that Lackey's case fails to subvert the orthodox view, for the case does not involve the generation of knowledge by testimony. A modified version of the case does. Lackey's example illustrates the orthodox view; the revised (...) case refutes it. The theoretical explanation of knowledge from testimony as information transmission explains how testimony transfers knowledge and why it can generate knowledge. It also reveals the real difference between so-called generative"" and so-called ""preservative"" sources. The former extract information. (shrink)
Abstract I argue for a new interpretation of the argument for the non-identity of Being and Difference at Sophist 255c-e, which turns on a distinction between modes of being a property. Though indebted to Frede (1967), the distinction differs from his in an important respect: What distinguishes the modes is not the subject's relation to itself or to something numerically distinct, but whether it constitutes or conforms to the specification of some property. Thus my view, but not his, allows self-participation (...) for Forms. Against Frede and the more traditional interpretation, I maintain that the distinction is not introduced by way of the pros alla / kath' hauta distinction, or by way of uses or senses of the verb `to be', but is established prior to the argument and is deployed in its frame. Moreover, since I read the argument's scope as restricted to properties in what I shall call the attribute mode, my interpretation can explain, as its rivals cannot, why the criterion of difference at 255d6-7 does not apply to the Form, Difference, itself. (shrink)
La Legge di Non-Contraddizione (LNC) dice che nessuna contraddizione può essere vera. Ma cos’è una contraddizione? E cosa occorrerebbe perché una contraddizione fosse vera? Come ha mostrato Patrick Grim1, un rapido sguardo alla letteratura rivelerà una grande varietà di interpretazioni differenti dei termini di base e, conseguentemente, della LNC. In effetti, Grim identifica qualcosa come 240 diverse opzioni (con un conteggio prudente), e non credo occorra indugiare ulteriormente sulla combinatoria concettuale che si nasconde dietro questo comune frammento di terminologia logica. (...) Intendo tuttavia concentrarmi su una delle principali ambiguità elencate da Grim – un’ambiguità che, a mio avviso, è al cuore della questione. E intendo proporre un argomento in virtù del quale, risolvendo l’ambiguità in un certo modo, la LNC risulta non negoziabile, mentre, risolvendola in un altro modo, è perfettamente plausibile supporre che la LNC possa, in circostanze molto speciali e forse poco desiderabili, venir meno. (shrink)
Dei numerosi libri che hanno iscritto Nelson Goodman tra i giganti della filosofia del Novecento, questo può a buon diritto considerarsi il più fortunato ma anche il più difficile, il più discusso, il più scomodo. Pochi giorni dopo la sua comparsa in libreria, nell’autunno del 19781, la New York Review of Books ne pubblicò una recensione a firma di W. V. O. Quine che non esitava a definirlo «una congerie».2 Si parla di stile, di teoria della citazione, di illusioni ottiche, (...) di filosofia della natura e filosofia dell’arte. Si citano Peirce, Gombrich e Kanizsa a fianco di Kant, Dummett, Woody Allen. Si coniano neologismi («acquacentrico») quando pure esistono parole che fanno al caso («idrocentrico»). Insomma, c’è un po’ di tutto, e «la fragilità del tutto riflette la filosofia che lo tiene insieme: la dottrina secondo cui ci sono svariati mondi, nessuno dei quali onnicomprensivo»3. A Goodman la recensione non piacque e la risposta non si fece attendere. In una lettera all’Editore pubblicata due settimane dopo4, il filosofo ringraziava per la pronta recensione ma accusava il Professor Quine di aver taciuto ai lettori che il libro era da leggersi sullo sfondo delle opere che l’avevano preceduto: La struttura dell’apparenza, Fatti, finzione e previsione, I linguaggi dell’arte e Problemi e progetti.5 E assicurava che.. (shrink)
John E. Smith has contributed to contemporary philosophy in primarily four distinct capacities; first, as a philosopher of religion and God; second, as an indefatigable defender of philosophical reflection in its classical sense ( a sense inclusive of, but not limited to, metaphysics); third, as a participant in the reconstruction of experience and reason so boldly inaugurated by Hegel then redically transformed by the classical American pragmatists, and significantly augmented by such thinkers as Josiah Royce, william Earnest Hocking, and Alfred (...) North Whitehead; fourth, as an interpreter of philosophical texts and traditions (Kant, Hegel, and Nietzsche no less than Charles Peirce, WIlliam James and John Dewey; German idealism as well as American; the Augustinian tradition no less than the pragmatic). Reason, Experience, and God provides an important and comprehensive look at the work of John E. Smith by collected essays which each address aspects of his life-long work. A response by John E. Smith himself draws a line of continuity between the pieces. (shrink)
This is the first comprehensive study of the ethics of G. E. Moore, the most important English-speaking ethicist of the twentieth century. Moore's ethical project, set out in his seminal text Principia Ethica, is to preserve common moral insight from skepticism and, in effect, persuade his readers to accept the objective character of goodness. Brian Hutchinson explores Moore's arguments in detail and in the process relates the ethical thought to Moore's anti-skeptical epistemology. Moore was, without perhaps fully realizing it, skeptical (...) about the very enterprise of philosophy itself, and in this regard, as Brian Hutchinson reveals, was much closer in his thinking to Wittgenstein than has been previously realized. This book shows Moore's ethical work to be much richer and more sophisticated than his critics have acknowledged. (shrink)
Chi viene da fuori prima o poi si imbatterà nel cartello. Potrebbe essere cento metri piu in là e non cambierebbe nulla. Ma è lì. È lì perché è lì che Torino comincia (o finisce, per chi venisse da dentro). Uno dice «Ah» e tira dritto. Eppure in quel cartello conficcato nel terreno si nasconde una lunga storia; nel varcare quella linea di confine si entra in uno spazio nuovo al cui interno, magicamente separati da tutto il resto, ci si (...) chiama torinesi—si parla la stessa lingua, ci si affida alle stesse autorità, ci si batte per risolvere gli stessi problemi e migliorare la qualità di una vita in comune. I confini sono fatti così: sono linee sottili ma potenti; linee che, separando, uniscono; linee definitore che spesso non riusciamo a vedere perché non risiedono nelle cose, ma solo nei segni a matita dei cartografi e nei vomeri immaginari degli amministratori, e dalle quali tuttavia dipende il nostro senso di appartenenza a un luogo; linee per le quali, ahimè, a volte si è anche combattuto, sebbene oggi scompaiano sempre più nella confusione delle tangenziali, dei cavalcavia, dei raccordi, delle rotatorie, delle serpentesche circonvoluzioni che svaniscono tra zone industriali, aree di residua campagna, retroscena di distributori invecchiati male. (shrink)
Come tutti gli ambiti teorici e pratici della civiltà occidentale anche la riflessione pedagogica viene investtita dalla potenza ideologica del neoliberismo, che intende trasformare e rivoluzionare a partire dagli anni '80 del Novecento tutte le forme in senso lato culturali sviluppatesi a partire dagli anni '60 e '70 del medesimo secolo. L'applicazione del principio della post-modernità frantuma e dissolve progressivamente le prospettive di cambiamento precedenti, assegnando alla civiltà capitalistica un'esistenza assoluta ed immodificabile. Tutti gli intenti che hanno di volta in (...) volta dimostrato di voler moderare e limitare (o condizionare) queste pretese non sono riuscite a raggiungere i propri scopi, favorendo al contrario la rincorsa regressiva operata dal sistema ideologico dominante. Solo la ripresa di una concezione di nuovo rivoluzionaria può invece, proprio a partire da una rinnovata pedagogia radicale e democratica, risolvere i problemi di mera sopravvivenza della civiltà umana e del suo contesto naturale, scatenati dalla illimitata volontà di potenza del neoliberismo economico e finanziario. (shrink)
I examine the treatment of metaphor by medieval logicians and how it stemmed from their reception of classical texts in logic, grammar, and rhetoric. I consider the relation of the word 'metaphor' to the notions of translatio and transumptio, and show that it is not always synonymous with these. I also show that in the context of commentaries on the Sophistical Refutations metaphor was subsumed under equivocation. In turn, it was linked with the notion of analogy not so much in (...) the Greek sense of a similarity between two proportions or relations as in the new medieval sense of being said secundum prius et posterius. Whether or not analogy could be reduced to metaphor, or the reverse, depended on the controversial issue of the number of acts of imposition needed to produce an equivocal term. A spectrum of views is canvassed, including those found in the logic commentaries of John Duns Scotus. (shrink)
This work advances a theory in the metaphysics of phenomenal consciousness, which the author labels “e-physicalism”. Firstly, he endorses a realist stance towards consciousness and physicalist metaphysics. Secondly, he criticises Strong AI and functionalist views, and claims that consciousness has an internal character. Thirdly, he discusses HOT theories, the unity of consciousness, and holds that the “explanatory gap” is not ontological but epistemological. Fourthly, he argues that consciousness is not a supervenient but an emergent property, not reducible and endowed with (...) original causal powers, with respect to the micro-constituents of the conscious entity. Fifthly, he addresses the “zombie argument” and the “supervenience argument” within the e-physicalism framework. Finally, he elaborates on the claim that phenomenal properties are physical and discusses the “knowledge argument”. (shrink)
Hylas. «Veramente, la distruzion de’ frulloni e delle madie, la devastazion de’ forni, e lo scompiglio de’ fornai, non sono i mezzi più spicci per far vivere il pane; ma questa è una di quelle sottigliezze metafisiche, che una moltitudine non ci arriva.» Devo dire che il fastidio di Manzoni verso le metafisiche inconcludenti mi sembra sacrosanto. Ma soprattutto mi sembra sacrosanto il suo richiamo al buon senso, quando aggiunge che «senza essere un gran metafisico, un uomo ci arriva talvolta (...) alla prima, finch’è nuovo nella questione.. (shrink)
La rivoluzionarietà della speculazione bruniana si esercita nei confronti della tradizione di alcuni testi aristotelici fondamentali nella trasmissione del pensiero e della civiltà occidentale. In modo principale essa attacca e demolisce i capisaldi della "Metafisica" di Aristotele, per poter cominciare ad affermare - o, se si vuole, a riaffermare (visto il richiamo esplicito del filosofo nolano alla riflessione dei primi Presocratici) - il principio dell'infinito creativo e doppiamente dialettico. Il breve saggio segue la formulazione e lo sviluppo progressivo del testo (...) aristotelico attraverso la critica esposta dalla riflessione bruniana. Alla fine viene presentata una breve bibliografia bruniana. (shrink)
Il volume raccoglie il lavoro di ricerca, di analisi e di commento, dedicati ai "Dialoghi Italiani" di Giordano Bruno, che è stato presentato quale tesi di dottorato in filosofia presso l'Università degli studi di Padova, nel febbraio del 2002. Il testo comprende un confronto fra la tradizione dei testi aristotelici della "Metafisica", "Fisica" e "Il cielo" ed i testi in volgare di Giordano Bruno, analizza i testi bruniani giungendo alla scoperta del principio dell'infinito creativo e doppiamente dialettico e presenta una (...) panoramica delle principali interpretazioni fornite al pensiero bruniano durante l'800 ed il '900. (shrink)
Hylas. «Veramente, la distruzion de’ frulloni e delle madie, la devastazion de’ forni, e lo scompiglio de’ fornai, non sono i mezzi più spicci per far vivere il pane; ma questa è una di quelle sottigliezze metafisiche, che una moltitudine non ci arriva.» Devo dire che il fastidio di Manzoni verso le metafisiche inconcludenti mi sembra sacrosanto. Ma soprattutto mi sembra sacrosanto il suo richiamo al buon senso, quando aggiunge che «senza essere un gran metafisico, un uomo ci arriva talvolta (...) alla prima, finch’è nuovo nella questione.. (shrink)
Il filosofo britannico Alfred North Whitehead—autore, insieme a Bertrand Russell, di quei Principia Matematica da cui è scaturita gran parte della logica del ventesimo secolo—una volta scrisse che l’intera tradizione filosofica europea potrebbe essere letta come una lunga serie di note in calce alle opere di Platone. Tra i filosofi europei vi è poi chi ha affermato che tutta l’opera di Platone potrebbe leggersi come una serie di note in calce ad Anassimandro. Quindi, per l’irresistibile transitività delle note alle note, (...) tutta la filosofia europea si ridurrebbe a un commentario di un solo autore presocratico, dei cui scritti peraltro ci è rimasta una sola frase intera. E poiché l’autore in questione era diretto discepolo di quel Talete di Mileto che molti considerano il primo vero filosofo dell’antichità, e dei cui scritti non ci resta nemmeno una frase, se ne potrebbe concludere che l’intera storia della filosofia europea non è altro che un paradossale sforzo esegetico, un esercizio di ermeneutica impossibile in cui le menti migliori si sarebbero cimentate nell’interpretazione di testi perduti o addirittura inesistenti. (shrink)
The fundamental problem on which Ilya Prigogine and the Brussels- Austin Group have focused can be stated briefly as follows. Our observations indicate that there is an arrow of time in our experience of the world (e.g., decay of unstable radioactive atoms like Uranium, or the mixing of cream in coffee). Most of the fundamental equations of physics are time reversible, however, presenting an apparent conflict between our theoretical descriptions and experimental observations. Many have thought that the observed arrow of (...) time was either an artifact of our observations or due to very special initial conditions. An alternative approach, followed by the Brussels-Austin Group, is to consider the observed direction of time to be a basic physical phenomenon due to the dynamics of physical systems. This essay focuses mainly on recent developments in the Brussels-Austin Group after the mid 1980s. The fundamental concerns are the same as in their earlier approaches (subdynamics, similarity transformations), but the contemporary approach utilizes rigged Hilbert space (whereas the older approaches used Hilbert space). While the emphasis on nonequilibrium statistical mechanics remains the same, their more recent approach addresses the physical features of large Poincar´. (shrink)
Questo breve volume prende in considerazione, analizza e commenta alcune interpretazioni magistrali della filosofia di Giordano Bruno, che hanno attraversato l'800 ed il '900, indirizzandone l'orizzonte di comprensione. Il testo inizia con l'interpretazione di G.W.F. Hegel e di B. Spaventa, per poi accedere a quella di G. Gentile. Il volume si conclude con l'analisi ed il commento dell'interpretazione fornita da N. Badaloni. Una piccola bibliografia bruniana conclude il testo.
La vaghezza è un fenomeno pervasivo del pensiero e del linguaggio ordinario. Abbiamo una buona idea di che cosa significhi dire che una persona è calva, alta, o ricca, ma a volte ci troviamo spiazzati. Alcuni uomini sono chiaramente calvi (Picasso), altri non lo sono (il conte di Montecristo), e altri ancora sono casi intermedi (Bertinotti): non c’è un numero esatto di capelli che segni il confine tra i calvi e i non-calvi. Allo stesso modo, è ridicolo supporre che vi (...) sia un’altezza precisa che segni il limite tra chi è alto e chi non lo è, o un’esatta somma di denaro che separi i ricchi dai nonricchi. Nella metafora di Frege, concetti come questi sono privi di una “frontiera precisa”.1 E ciò non vale soltanto per quei concetti che trovano espressione nella categoria grammaticale degli aggettivi: vale anche per molti concetti che corrispondono a sostantivi (qual è l’altezza minima di una montagna?), a verbi (qual è la velocità minima a cui si può correre?), e così via. Anche le espressioni di cui ci serviamo per identificare entità particolari possono essere indeterminate. Non solo è vago il nostro concet- to di montagna: sembra proprio che anche quando ci riferiamo a una montagna particolare—un oggetto al quale il concetto in questione si applica senza mezzi termini—il nostro riferimento possa risultare gravemente indeterminato. Non c’è dubbio che il Cervino sia una montagna. Ma quali sono esattamente i suoi confini spaziali? (A che punto lungo un percorso che dalla vetta conduce in pianura diremo di non essere più sul Cervino?) Quali sono i suoi confini temporali? (A che punto di un processo di corrosione diremo che il Cervino cessa di esistere?) Come ha scritto Russell, si potrebbe pensare che “tutto il linguaggio” sia vago.2 E siccome il linguaggio è lo strumento principale mediante il quale diamo espressione all’immagine che ci facciamo del mondo, si presenta una domanda di fondo.. (shrink)
Due programmi diversi si intersecano nel lavoro di Frege sui fondamenti dell’aritmetica: • Logicismo: l’aritmetica `e riducibile alla logica; • Estensionalismo: l’aritmetica `e riducibile a una teoria delle estensioni. Sia nei Fondamenti che nei Principi, Frege articola l’idea che l’aritmetica sia riducibile a una teoria logica delle estensioni.
La mente non è sempre esistita ma è stata inventata: inventata nel senso che, a un certo punto, qualcuno ha introdotto il concetto di mente. Chi lo abbia introdotto per primo è una questione controversa. Per esempio, Putnam a f f er ma c he , a nc he s e «i n que s t os e c ol os i pa r l a c ome s e l a me nt e f os s e qua s (...) i un’ i de a autoevidente», nondimeno la nozione attuale di mente «non è molto antica, o almeno la sua Ce r t o, «l e pa r ol e ‘ me nt e ’ e ‘ a ni ma ’ , o a l me no i l or o a nt e na t i egemonia non è molto antica».1.. (shrink)
Questo breve volumetto prosegue l'analisi iniziata a proposito del confronto fra la speculazione bruniana e la metafisica aristotelica. Ora la critica bruniana si appunta sul testo aristotelico della "Fisica", demolendo e disgregando la possibilità che non vi sia un principio ed un movimento infinito. Seguendo ed integrando le riflessioni precedenti, il pensiero di Giordano Bruno conserva l'unitarietà fra momento teoretico e momento pratico, approfondendo la determinazione dell'infinito creativo e doppiamente dialettico.
La prima fase della carriera filosofica di Saul Kripke è legata principalmente, se non esclusivamente, ai suoi contributi in ambito logico. Si tratta di contributi che hanno avuto un impatto enorme soprattutto in due capitoli centrali di questa disciplina, la logica modale e la teoria formale della verità, con conseguenze e ramificazioni che hanno interessato un po’ tutta la filosofia analitica contemporanea. In questo capitolo cerchiamo di ricostruirne i tratti principali e di evidenziare la loro portata con particolare riferimento alla (...) filosofia del linguaggio e alla metafisica. La sezione 1 è dedicata alla logica modale. Della teoria della verità, che è un po’ più complessa, ci occupiamo nella sezione 2. (shrink)
The present paper is an annotated transcription of an interview held on the 29th of August 2007 in E. Avé-Lallemant’s flat in Munich. He was Hedwig Conrad-Martius’ assistant, carried on her work and research, and filed her legacy, which is deposited at the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich. In this interview Avé-Lallemant remembers Conrad-Martius as a person and as a philosopher and discusses her philosophical evolution within Husserl’s phenomenological school, the relationship between biology and phenomenology, her rediscovering of Aristotelian philosophy, and, (...) mainly, the concepts of Energeia and Entelechia. The influence of her friend and colleague Edith Stein made Conrad-Martius gradually take up the Scholastics philosophy again. (shrink)
The Energy-Time Uncertainty (ETU) has always been a problem-ridden relation, its problems stemming uniquely from the perplexing question of how to understand this mysterious Δ t . On the face of it (and, indeed, far deeper than that), we always know what time it is. Few theorists were ignorant of the fact that time in quantum mechanics is exogenously defined, in no ways intrinsically related to the system. Time in quantum theory is an independent parameter, which simply means independently known (...) . In the early 1960s Aharonov (1961-64) and Bohm (1961-64) mounted a spirited attack against the ETU, which sealed its fate to the present date. By emphasising that time is always “well-defined” in quantum theory, they were led to the conclusion that no ETU should exist, a view shared by many in the 1990s, if Busch (1990) is to be believed. In a similar vein, I emphasize that (a) physical systems occupy a particular energy state at a particular instant of time, if at all; (b) even in absence of all time-measuring instruments, it is still trivially warranted that one can measure a system's energy as accurately as one pleases, and simply announce “The system's energy is exactly E NOW!”, a possibility which no quantum mechanics of any sort, or any physical theory whatsoever, can afford to tamper with or change, except circularly. One never loses one's own perception of time, when one measures the energy, a fact which no measurement conceivable can interfere with or affect. Both (a) and (b) uniquely entail that energy and time are compatible, if not indeed intimately interconnected, contrary to what the relevant uncertainty seems to affirm. In response to Aharonov's and Bohm's initial problem, I reinterpret ΔEΔt ≥ h , as directly derived from authentic quantum principles, without however having to assume a direct incompatibility between its related concepts, attributing their complementarity to conditions other than ordinarily assumed. (shrink)
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