Online research in philosophy

In both the search for ever smaller and faster computational devices, and the search for a computational understanding of biological systems such as the brain, one is naturally led to consider the possibility of computational devices the size of cells, molecules, atoms, or on even smaller scales. Indeed, it has been pointed out Braunstein, 1995] that if trends over the last forty years continue, we may reach atomic-scale computation by the year 2010 Keyes, 1988]. This move down in scale (...) takes us from systems that can be understood (to a good enough approximation) using classical mechanics alone, to those which require a quantum mechanical understanding. Thus, it should not be surprising to nd that the idea of quantum computation is not new (see, e.g.,Error: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMapError: Illegal entry in bfrange block in ToUnicode CMap Deutsch, 1985] and Feynman, 1982]).. (shrink)

A letter from Martin Heidegger.--On the way to being; reflecting on conversations with Martin Heidegger, by Z. Adamczewski.--Heidegger's view and evaluation of nature and natural science, by E. G. Ballard.--Truth as art: an interpretation of Heidegger's Sein und Zeit (sec. 44) and Der Ursprung des Kunstwerkes, by C. D. Keyes.--The language of the event: the event of language, by T. Kisiel.--Heidegger: the problem of the thing, by T. Langan.--The late Heidegger's omission of the ontic-ontological structure of Dasein, by R. (...) Powell.--Towards the movement of reversal: science, technology, and the language of homecoming, by J. Sallis.--Prolegomena to "Time and being": truth and time, by A. Schuwer.--Cosmos, nature, and man and the foundations of psychiatry, by A.-T. Tymieniecka.--Heidegger and the existential a priori, by J. Wild. (shrink)

Mayo Clinic is recognized as a worldwide leader in innovative, high-quality health care. However, the Catholic mission and ideals from which this organization was formed are not widely recognized or known. From partnership with the Sisters of St. Francis in 1883, through restructuring of the Sponsorship Agreement in 1986 and current advancements, this Catholic mission remains vital today at Saint Marys Hospital. This manuscript explores the evolution and growth of sponsorship at Mayo Clinic, defined as “a collaboration between the Sisters (...) of St. Francis and Mayo Clinic to preserve and promote key values that the founding Franciscan sisters and Mayo physicians embrace as basic to their mission, and to assure the Catholic identity of Saint Marys Hospital.” Historical context will be used to frame the evolution and preservation of Catholic identity at Saint Marys Hospital; and the shift from a “sponsorship-by-governance” to a “sponsorship-by-influence” model will be highlighted. Lastly, using the externally-developed Catholic Identity Matrix (developed by Ascension Health and the University of St. Thomas, Minnesota), specific examples of Catholic identity will be explored in this joint venture of Catholic health care institution and a secular, nonprofit corporation (Mayo Clinic). (shrink)

Abstract In this paper, we show that Greek distinguishes empirically ability as a precondition for action, and ability as initiating and sustaining force for action. In this latter case, the ability verb behaves like an action verb, and the sentence has the logical form of a causative structure φ CAUSE [BECOME ψ] (Dowty 1979). The distinction between ability as potential for action and ability as action itself has a venerable tradition that goes back to Aristotle, and is recently implied in (...) a number of analyses (Mari and Martin 2007, 2009, Thomason 2005). We show first that the phenomenon is not just aspectual ( pace Bhatt 1999, Hacquard 2006, 2009, Pinon 2003): actualized ability emerges with the ability verb also with imperfective aspect and present tense. They key, we argue is causation, which triggers a shift from pure ability, to ability as force (in the sense of Copley and Harley 2010, i.e. as action initiating energy). In Greek, the action reading of the ability modal comes about in an apparent co-ordinate causative structure, where the two clauses are connected with conjunction ke ‘and’— a pattern that we find also in other languages, including English, at least with some action verbs such as try, allow . Our analysis implies a meaning of ability richer than mere possibility ( pace Hacquard); and, by capitalizing on the causative meaning and the presence of force in causative structures, our analysis enables a principled explanation of the shift to action-ability without positing ambiguity for the ability verb ( pace Bhatt 1999). (shrink)

Aquinas, Aristotle, and the Promise of the Common Good claims that contemporary theory and practice have much to gain from engaging Aquinas's normative concept of the common good and his way of reconciling religion, philosophy, and politics. Examining the relationship between personal and common goods, and the relation of virtue and law to both, Mary M. Keys shows why Aquinas should be read in addition to Aristotle on these perennial questions. She focuses on Aquinas's Commentaries as mediating statements between (...) Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics and Politics and Aquinas's own Summa Theologiae, showing how this serves as the missing link for grasping Aquinas's understanding of Aristotle's thought. Keys argues provocatively that Aquinas's Christian faith opens up new panoramas and possibilities for philosophical inquiry and insights into ethics and politics. Her book shows how religious faith can assist sound philosophical inquiry into the foundation and proper purposes of society and politics. (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)

According to recent social interactionist accounts in developmental psychology, a child's learning to talk about the past with others plays a key role in memory development. Most accounts of this kind are centered on the theoretical notion of autobiographical memory and assume that socio-communicative interaction with others is important, in particular, in explaining the emergence of memories that have a particular type of connection to the self. Most of these accounts also construe autobiographical memory as a species of episodic memory, (...) but its episodic character, as such, is not typically seen as falling within the remit of an explanation in social interactionist terms. I explore the idea that socio-communicative interaction centered on talk about the past might also have an important role to play, quite independently of considerations about the involvement of the self in memory, in accounting for the emergence of memories that are episodic in character, i.e., memories that involve the recollection of particular past events. In doing so, I also try to shed light on a distinctive role that talk about the past plays in socio-communicative interaction. (shrink)

The E-Z Reader model (Reichle et al. 1998; 1999) provides a theoretical framework for understanding how word identification, visual processing, attention, and oculomotor control jointly determine when and where the eyes move during reading. In this article, we first review what is known about eye movements during reading. Then we provide an updated version of the model (E-Z Reader 7) and describe how it accounts for basic findings about eye movement control in reading. We then review several alternative models of (...) eye movement control in reading, discussing both their core assumptions and their theoretical scope. On the basis of this discussion, we conclude that E-Z Reader provides the most comprehensive account of eye movement control during reading. Finally, we provide a brief overview of what is known about the neural systems that support the various components of reading, and suggest how the cognitive constructs of our model might map onto this neural architecture. Key Words: attention; eye-movement control; E-Z Reader; fixations; lexical access; models; reading; regressions; saccades. (shrink)

We offer a case-study in irrationality, showing that even in a high stakes context, intelligent and well trained professionals may adopt dominated practices. In multiple-choice tests one cannot distinguish lucky guesses from answers based on knowledge. Test-makers have dealt with this problem by lowering the incentive to guess, through penalizing errors (called formula scoring), and by eliminating various cues for outperforming random guessing (e.g., a preponderance of correct answers in middle positions), through key balancing. These policies, though widespread and intuitively (...) appealing, are in fact ‘‘irrational’’, and are dominated by alternative solutions. Number-rightscoring is superior to formula scoring, and key randomization is superior to key balancing. We suggest that these policies have persisted since all stake-holders – test-makers, test-takers and test-coaches – share the same faulty intuitions. (shrink)

The system R## of true relevant arithmetic is got by adding the -rule Infer xAx from A0, A1, A2, .... to the system R# of relevant Peano arithmetic. The rule E (or gamma) is admissible for R##. This contrasts with the counterexample to E for R# (Friedman & Meyer, Whither Relevant Arithmetic). There is a Way Up part of the proof, which selects an arbitrary non-theorem C of R## and which builds by generalizing Henkin and Belnap arguments a prime theory (...) T which still lacks C. (The key to the Way Up is a Witness Protection Program, using the -rule.) But T may be TOO BIG, whence there is a Way Down argument that produces a better theory TR, such that R## TR T. (The key to the Way Down is a Metavaluation, on which membership in T is combined with ordinary truth-functional conditions to determine TR.) The result is a theory that is Just Right, whence it never happens that A C and A are theorems of R## but C is a non-theorem. (shrink)

The article claims that the concept of spirit or of incorporeal substance is a key concept in the thought of St. Augustine. It first recalls how the concept of spirit, which Augustine learned to conceive from the Platonists in Milan, permitted Augustine to extricate himself from Manicheism. Augustine, after all, was one of the very first in the Latin West to be able to think of God and of the soul as incorporeal. The paper shows how Augustine used the concept (...) of spirit in arguing against the corporealism of the Manichees and goes on to show from the Letters of Augustine how the bishop of Hippo used the concept of spirit against the Arians, how he held the spirituality of the soul as a fixed point of knowledge about the soul, how he used the concept of spirit to help Consentius to think correctly about God, to help Evodius to think correctly about the Trinity, to answer Volusian's questions about the incarnation, and to answer Italica's question about seeing God with the eyes of the body. In conclusion, the paper claims that the concept of a spiritual substance is one of the lasting elements of Neoplatonism in the thought of Augustine. /// O objectivo primordial do presente artigo é demonstrar que o conceito de espírito ou de substância incorporal constitui um conceito chave no pensamento de Santo Agostinho. Num primeiro momento, o artigo mostra de que modo o conceito de espírito, que Agostinho aprendeu a conceber dos Platónicos em Milão, permitiu a Agostinho libertar-se da influência do Maniqueísmo. Na realidade, Agostinho foi um dos primeiros na tradição do Ocidente Latino a ser capaz de pensar Deus e a alma como incorporais. O artigo mostra assim de que modo Agostinho usou o conceito de espírito na sua argumentação contra o corporealismo dos maniqueus, procedendo depois, a partir das Cartas de Agostinho, a uma demonstração do modo como o Bispo de Hipona usou o conceito de espírito contra os Arianos, de que modo ele defendeu a espiritualidade da alma como um ponto fixo no conhecimento acerca da alma, como ele usou o conceito de espírito em ordem a ajudar Consentius a pensar correctamente acerca de Deus, ou para ajudar Evodius a pensar correctamente acerca da Trindade, para responder às questões que Volusiano colocou acerca da incarnação, e para responder à questão de Italica acerca da visão de Deus com os olhos do corpo. Em suma, o artigo defende que o conceito de uma substância espiritual constitui um dos elementos remanescentes e duradoiros do Neoplatonismo no pensamento de Santo Agostinho. (shrink)

If I lose my key in Canada, for instance, and I search for it in the United Kingdom, how long will I take to find it? This paper argues that problems in education are caused by non-professional teachers who are employed when trained teachers move in search of promotion friendly activities or financially rewarding duties. This shift of focus means that policy makers in education act without adequate professional guidance. The problems in education, therefore, result from demands made on mainstream (...) education based on misconceptions about what education can offer. It is argued that the implementation of e-learning in education faces the risk of developing on the basis of unproven theories. This scenario increasingly sees the replacement of formal education activities in institutions of learning with non-formal and informal education practices. Given that the contents and influences of non-formal and informal education are not under the control of the teacher, the experiences that learners bring to education settings are increasingly difficult to manage. The paper proposes that by integrating e-learning in teacher education and rewarding 'good teaching', there is a potential for a successful e-learning revolution in education. (shrink)

The speed and degree to which e-commerce is infiltrating the very fabric of our society, faster and more pervasively than any other entity in history, makes an examination of its ethical dimensions critical. Though ethical lag has heretofore hindered ourexplorations of e-commerce ethics, it is now time to identify and confront them. In this paper we define e-commerce and describe thecharacteristics that set it apart from traditional brick and-mortar business. We then examine the ethical foundation of e-commerce, focusing on the (...) question, “Is there a special e-commerce ethics?” Our answer is “no.” We support our answer by showing that the current issues in e-commerce ethics and brick-and-mortar business are fundamentally the same, but that e-commerce issues have different manifestations and scope. We then demonstrate that ethical principles and rules in e-commerce and brick-and-mortar business are fundamentally the same, but have different manifestations at the most specific level. We elucidate this point by discussing the use of personal information and the opt-in, opt-out debate. We conclude with a call for research on trust, a key value in the success of e-commerce. (shrink)

E-inclusion is getting a lot of attention in Europe these days. The European Commission and EU Member States have initiated e-inclusion strategies aimed at reaching out to the e-excluded and bringing them into the mainstream of society and the economy. The benefits of mainstreaming the excluded are numerous. Good practices play an important role in the strategies, and examples can be found in e-health, e-learning, e-government, e-inclusion and other e-domains. So laudable seems the rationale for e-inclusion, few have questioned the (...) benefits. In fact, e-inclusion does raise ethical issues, and this paper discusses a few of the key ones. The paper draws several conclusions, principally regarding the need for some empirical research on what happens to the e-excluded once they have access to information and communications technologies, notably the Internet. (shrink)

La diffusione del libro nel Medioevo potrebbe essere riletta alla luce di una metafora attuale sebbene non scevra di aspetti dialettici: quella della “rete”. All’ubicazione spazio-temporale del libro nei monasteri medievali, contraddistinta da fisicità e permanenza, si sotituisce oggi un formato digitale e virtuale, che porta ad una sorta di decontestualizzazione e alla continuità del flusso di informazioni, contribuendo alla diffusione capillare del sapere. L’ottica di universalità e globalità accomuna tuttavia entrambe le epoche. Alcuni concetti-chiave dell’informatica potrebbero infatti declinarsi in (...) ambito medievale: Server-Client per la raccolta, la conservazione e la trasmissione delle conoscenze da parte dei monasteri, quali centri del sapere in Europa, agli uomini di cultura; Firewall, per alludere alla necessità di tutelare i manoscritti, mediante la copiatura e la diffusione dei codici; Community, ad indicare non solo la comunità religiosa o monastica in senso stretto, bensì l’apertura ad una costruzione del sapere mediante un’azione partecipativa. I problemi dell’autenticità delle fonti, dell’acriticità delle informazioni e la pratica delle citazioni trovano un precedente significativo nelle Sententiae di Pietro Lombardo: una sorta di “biblioteca virtuale” grazie alla collezione di passi dalla Sacra Scrittura e da fonti latine e greche, paragonabile a un moderno modello enciclopedico di sapere. The diffusion of the book in the Middle Ages could be critically read through a modern metaphor: the “net”. The space-temporal coordinates of the book shift from being physical and permanent in the Medieval monasteries, to being de-contextualized and continue in the flow of information of digital and virtual format. However the universal and global perspective is common to the contemporary and the Medieval periods. In fact some key-words of computer science could be applied to the Medieval context: Server-Client, for the collection, the preservation and the transmission of knowledge from monasteries, as cultural centers in Medieval Europe, to men of culture; Firewall, for the necessary protection of manuscripts, through copying and diffusing codes; Community, referred not only to the monastic and religious groups, but also to an open sharing of the building of knowledge. Problems like the authenticity of the sources, the lack of criticality in the reception of data, and the practice of quotations are well represented in Peter Lombard’s Sententiae: this work can be compared to a modern encyclopedia thanks to the collection of passages from the Holy Scripture and from Latin and Greek sources, as well as a “virtual library”. (shrink)

O problema da causação descendente é um ponto central na formulação do fisicalismo não-redutivo e na compreensão da emergência de propriedades. Duas interpretações possíveis da causação descendente, nas quais a contribuição do pensamento aristotélico é importante, são examinadas. Os requisitos do programa de matematização da natureza na mecanica clássica, que levaram ao abandono de três dos modos causais aristotélicos, nao parecem igualmente importantes nas ciencias especiais. Isto sugere que a contribuição de Aristóteles pode ser, de certa maneira, retomada. Uma definição (...) de propriedade emergente é apresentada, sendo a causação descendente interprerada de acordo com os modos causais formal e funcional.The problem of downward causation is a key subject in the formulation of nonreductive physicalism as well as in the understanding of property emergence. Two possible interpretations of downward causation, to which Aristotelian thought is relevant, are examined. In the mathematical understanding of nature in classical mechanics, the principle of causality should meet requirements that entailed the rejection of three among the four Aristotelian causal modes. Those requirements do not seem equally important in the special sciences and one may suggest, then, that Aristotle’s contribution may be taken into account. A definition of an emergent property is proposed, in which downward causation is interpreted according to the formal and functional causal modes. (shrink)

The system R## of true relevant arithmetic is got by adding the ω-rule Infer ∀xAx from A0, A1, A2, .... to the system R# of relevant Peano arithmetic . The rule ⊃E (or gamma ) is admissible for R##. This contrasts with the counterexample to ⊃E for R# (Friedman & Meyer, Whither Relevant Arithmetic ). There is a Way Up part of the proof, which selects an arbitrary non-theorem C of R## and which builds by generalizing Henkin and Belnap arguments (...) a prime theory T which still lacks C. (The key to the Way Up is a Witness Protection Program, using the ω-rule.) But T may be TOO BIG, whence there is a Way Down argument that produces a better theory TR, such that R## ⫠TR ⫠T. (The key to the Way Down is a Metavaluation, on which membership in T is combined with ordinary truth-functional conditions to determine TR.) The result is a theory that is Just Right, whence it never happens that A ⊃ C and A are theorems of R## but C is a non-theorem. (shrink)

A relação de Hegel com o ceticismo está longe de ser clara. A par de existirem alguns poucos trabalhos sobre o assunto, e de Hegel abordar o tema em várias obras, não está bem determinado se Hegel possui uma teoria global sobre o ceticismo ou se apenas é um mero crítico de posturas céticas clássicas na antiguidade e na modernidade. Em que pese Hegel ser um crítico ferrenho do ceticismo moderno (por ex., em textos como Sobre a relação do Ceticismo (...) com a Filosofia, as Preleções sobre História da Filosofia e a Enciclopédia das Ciências Filosóficas), a sua crítica não se restringe a esta ou aquela forma de ceticismo, mas se funda numa teoria geral do saber que compreende o ceticismo como uma atividade negativa constitutiva da consciência e pretende refutá-lo enquanto ele reifica essa negatividade numa pretensão de verdade. A refutação consiste na descrição do modo como o ceticismo filosófico seria um saber parcial, e por isso auto-refutativo. O presente trabalho pretende sugerir que isto ocorre, sobretudo, na Fenomenologia do Espírito, cujo caráter “fenomenológico” propriamente dito não parece poder ser bem compreendido, sem tomar como pano de fundo o problema do ceticismo. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Hegel. Fenomenologia. Ceticismo. Refutação. ABSTRACT Hegel’s position towards skepticism is far from being clear. On the one hand, there are just a few studies on the subject and Hegel faces the issue in several of his writings; on the other hand, it is not established yet if Hegel has a global theory about skepticism or if he is just a critic of Ancient and Modern skeptical attitudes. In spite of Hegel being known as a sharp critic of Modern skepticism (for example, in works like On the relationship of skepticism to philosophy, Lectures on the history of philosophy and Encyclopedia of philosophical sciences), his criticism is not restricted to specific forms of skepticism, but it is rather founded upon a general theory of knowledge which takes skepticism as a negative activity constitutive of our natural consciousness and intends to refute the skeptical attitude as that negative activity of self-consciousness is reified and turned out into a special kind of truth claim. Hegel’s refutation consists in describing the way philosophical skepticism would be understood as a partial and self-defeating attitude of knowing. The present study suggests that this procedure is to be seen above all in the Phenomenology of Mind, whose “phenomenological” character cannot be rightly understood without taking properly into account the problem of skepticism. KEY WORDS: Hegel. Phenomenology. Skepticism. Refutation. (shrink)

Neste artigo, o autor apresenta, primeiramente, reflexões de cunho histórico sobre a relação entre as Ciências Naturais e as Ciências do Espírito, seguidas de observações, de caráter mais sistemático, sobre o conceito das próprias Ciências do Espírito. Com fundamento nessas observações, tece algumas reflexões sobre até que ponto podemos esperar da globalização efeitos sobre as Ciências Naturais e as Ciências do Espírito. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Ciências Naturais. Ciências do Espírito. Globalização. ABSTRACT In this article, the author presents, firstly, reflections of historical (...) character about the relationship between natural sciences and human sciences. Remarks of more systematic character on the very concept of human sciences follow those reflections. Grounded on such observations, the author discusses possible effects of globalization upon human sciences and natural sciences as well. KEY WORDS – Natural sciences. Human sciences. Globalization. (shrink)

E.F. Geoffroy's table of different relations ( rapports ) between different chemical substances is mainly based on empirical knowledge accumulated in 16th and 17th century metallurgy and pharmacy. The substances listed in the left half of the table were basic for the formation of salts which were produced for medical ends in the chemical-pharmaceutical practice of the 17th century. The right half of the table refers to substances and operations of metallurgy which had already been described in the metallurgical writings (...) of the 16th century. Even Geoffroy's ordering of the substances within the columns of his table has its origin in metallurgical and pharmaceutical practice. The key concept of the conceptual framework underlying the table and its commentary is the concept of chemical compound which emerged at the end of the 17th century. Geoffroy extends the range of application of this concept, which was first limited to chemical artefacts, to include natural bodies. Eliminating the peripatetical distinction between natural bodies and chemical artefacts he formulates a new research program, consisting in the determination of the laws of the relations ( rapports ) between different chemical substances. (shrink)

O objetivo deste artigo é mostrar que a concepção de liberdade situa-se no rol da crítica levinasiana à ontologia ocidental e no cenário da ética como filosofia primeira. Levinas concebe, então, a liberdade como acolhimento do Outro. A liberdade deve cessar de manter-se na certeza solitária da supremacia do Mesmo sobre o Outro. Assim, Levinas distancia-se da ontologia e recorre à proximidade não como estado de consciência que conceitua, mas como relação proximal que clama por justiça e responsabilidade. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – (...) Levinas. Liberdade. Proximidade. Ética. Ontologia. Justiça. Outro. ABSTRACT The aim of this article is show that the conception of freedom lies in the roll of levinasian’s critique on the occidental ontology and on the scenery of ethics as first philosophy. Levinas conceives freedom as reception of Other. The freedom must cease maintaining on the solitary certainty of the Same’s supremacy above Other. Consequently Levinas distances himself from the ontology and runs over the proximity not as state of conscience that judges but as proximate relation that claims for justice and responsability. KEY WORDS – Levinas. Freedom. Proximity. Ethics. Ontology. Justice. Other. (shrink)

The framework for this contribution is the transformation of the textual community, namely, modern society, into a digital community, in other words, a network society. This paper analyzes two theses. The first holds that the text, due to its genetic and historic nature, is always IMMUTABLE, STABLE, and never mobile. For this reason, the text represents the foundational element of a specific society, modern society. The second thesis is based on the assertion that within information and hypertext technologies two diverse (...) views confront and contrast each other. I locate these tendencies in the following key words: “dream” (Nelson) and “intellect” (Engelbart). Hypertext technology and culture represent the most transformative location and agency, they are the actors of the paradigm shift in which we are implicated. The hypertext revolution is based on the criticism of and attack against the material supports of writing and reading, as well as typographic technologies. Hypertext fights and wins this battle. However, hypertext technology is not able to reach the deep structure of alphabetic culture that is made not only of material support but also mental and bodily experience, consolidated and evolving, and of social relationships that are implied in the materiality of the support. La cornice di riferimento di questo contributo è la trasformazione della società testuale, cioè della società moderna, in società digitale, ovvero nella società dei network. Nell’intervento vengono analizzate due tesi: la prima afferma che il testo, per sua natura genetica e storica, è sempre IMMUTABILE, STABILE e non è mai mobile e per questo è fondativo di una società specifica, quella che noi chiamiamo la società moderna. La seconda tesi si basa sull’assunto che all’interno della cultura informatica e tecnologica che genera gli ipertesti si confrontano e si scontrano due idee diverse. Identifico queste due tendenze nelle parole chiave: dream (Nelson) e intellect (Engelbart). La tecnologia e la cultura ipertestuale sono il luogo e l’agente più fortemente trasformativi, gli attori del cambio di paradigma che ci coinvolge. La rivoluzione ipertestuale ha le sue basi nell’attacco e nella critica dei supporti materiali della scrittura e della lettura e sulle tecnologie tipografiche. L’ipertesto combatte e vince questa battaglia. La tecnologia ipertestuale non riesce però a raggiungere la struttura profonda della cultura alfabetica che è composta non solo da supporti ma da esperienze sia della mente sia del corpo, da relazioni sociali consolidate e mutanti che sono sottese e operanti con la materialità del supporto. (shrink)

Este estudo tem como objeto a recepção da teoria scotista da vontade no início do século 14. Interesse precípuo é o modo como autores, sobretudo franciscanos, a partir das Universidades de Paris e de Oxford, discutiram sobre a possibilidade de uma escolha livre ou de um ato da própria vontade, por parte dos bemaventurados, quando da visão de Deus. Para tanto, pressuposições gerais da teoria scotista da vontade são apresentadas, bem como as inovações dos filósofos influenciados por Scotus. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – (...) Teoria scotista da vontade. Visão beatífica. Liberdade. Influência do pensamento scotista no século 14. ABSTRACT This study aims to analyse the reception of Scotus’s theory of will in the beginning of the 14th Century. The main interest is the way some authors, specially Franciscan thinkers, departing from the Universities of Paris and Oxford, discussed about the possibility for the blessed of a free choice or an act of the will itself concerning the vision of God. For this purpose, general pressupositions of Scotus’s theory of will shall be presented, as well as the innovations of those philosophers influenced by Scotus. KEY WORDS – Scotus’s theory of will. Beatific vision. Freedom. Influence os Scotistic thought in the 14th Century. (shrink)

Minha intenção é mostrar, contra o realismo em relações internacionais, que, ao abordarmos os conceitos de justiça internacional e de direitos humanos, a partir de uma perspectiva contratualista, o denominado conflito entre o interesse nacional e as exigências da moralidade se mostra bem menos problemático. Apresento os principais argumentos em favor do contratualismo através de uma reconstrução da teoria moral de David Gauthier. Em seguida, procuro mostrar que o tipo de contratualismo defendido por Rawls e seus seguidores não é capaz (...) de evitar as críticas feitas pelo realismo à tentativa de defendermos uma concepção de justiça e de direitos humanos no âmbito das relações internacionais. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Contratualismo. Realismo. Direitos humanos. David Gauthier. John Rawls. ABSTRACT In this paper I argue against realism in international relations by showing that a contractarian approach to the concepts of international justice and human rights renders the socalled conflict between national interest and morality far less pressing than it seems to be. I discuss the thrust of the contractarian approach by means of a presentation of David Gauthier’s moral theory. Then, I show that the kind of contractarian approach advanced by Rawls and his followers is not able to counter the realist contention against the ideas of justice and human rights in the context of international relations. KEY WORDS – Contractarianism. Realism. Human rights. David Gauthier. John Rawls. (shrink)

O artigo apresenta a posição ocupada pela teoria discursiva de Jürgen Habermas no debate entre liberalismo e multiculturalismo. Adotando uma perspectiva universalista sensível às diferenças, resultante da tese da relação interna entre democracia e estado constitucional, Habermas enfoca três aspectos interligados e diretamente vinculados à questão do reconhecimento: a idéia liberal de igualdade, os direitos de grupos e o igual tratamento das culturas. A defesa da conjugação do ideal igualitário da cidadania democrática com as demandas legítimas de indivíduos e grupos (...) se funda numa abordagem peculiar situada entre o liberalismo cego e o multiculturalismo forte. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Igualitarismo. Liberalismo. Multiculturalismo. Reconhecimento. ABSTRACT The article presents the position occupied by Jürgen Habermas’s discourse theory in the debate between liberalism and multiculturalism. Adopting a difference-sensitive universalistic perspective, resulting from the thesis of the internal relation between democracy and constitutional state, Habermas focuses on three linked aspects that are directly connected with the question of recognition: the liberal idea of equality, group rights, and the equal treatment of cultures. The defense of the connection of the egalitarian ideal of democratic citizenship with the legitimate demands of individual persons and groups is based on a peculiar approach situated between blind liberalism and strong multiculturalism. KEY WORDS – Egalitarianism. Liberalism. Multiculturalism. Recognition. (shrink)

Donald Davidson foi um dos filósofos mais influentes da tradição analítica da segunda metade do século. A unidade de sua obra é constituída pelo papel central que reflexão sobre como podemos interpretar os proferimentos de um outro falante desempenha para a compreensão da natureza do significado. Davidson adota o ponto de vista metodológico de um intérprete que não pode pressupor nada sobre o significado das palavras de um falante e que não possui nenhum conhecimento detalhado de suas atitudes proposicionais. Neste (...) artigo, eu apresento inicialmente a estrutura e os pressupostos da filosofia da linguagem de Davidson; passo depois a uma discussão sobre a importância do princípio de caridade para seu projeto interpretativo e, por fim, procuro apontar as diferenças do projeto de Davidson com a hermenêutica filosófica. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Interpretação radical. Princípio de caridade. Hermenêutica. ABSTRACT Donald Davidson was one of the most influential philosophers in the analytic tradition in the last half of the twenthy century. The unity of his work lies in the central role that the reflection on how we are able to interpret the speech of another plays in undestanding the nature of meaning. Davidson adopts the standpoint of the interpreter of the speech of another whose evidence does not, at the outset, pressupose anything about what the speaker’s words mean or any datailed knowledge of his propositional attitudes. This is the position of the radical interpreter. In this paper, I begin with an account of the assumptions and structure of Davidson’s philosophy of language; after this I discuss the philosophical importance of the principle of charity for the theory of radical interpretation and, at the end, I compare Davidson’s interpretative project to the philosophical hermeneutic. KEY WORDS – Radical interpretation. Principle of charity. Hermeneutics. (shrink)

Segundo Ser e tempo, o cuidado, como ser do ser-aí, é definível pela expressão complexa “ser-já-precedentemente-a-si-em (o mundo) como ser-junto-a (ente intramundano que vem ao en-contro)”, a qual é apresentada deste modo no Parágrafo 41, que trata de “O ser do ser-aí como cuidado”. Nesta expressão, pretende Heidegger indicar cada um dos existenciais (disposição, compreender, fala, assim como também decair e mundo), e condição da correta compreensão do sentido desta estrutura é o entendimento de que há co-originariedade (Gleichursprünglichkeit) entre eles, (...) isto é, de que a abertura de mundo só ocorre como resultado dos existenciais conjuntamente. Sem pretender contestar tal co-originariedade entre os existenciais no que diz respeito à abertura de mundo (e, portanto, do ser), pretendemos apenas chamar a atenção para o fato de que tal condição da abertura não implica necessariamente que os caracteres do ser do ser-aí tenham que ser entendidos como simultaneamente genéticos na abertura, mas apenas da abertura, e que o ser do ser-aí como cuidado tem seu fundamento originário no carecer. Este último constitui os Em-virtude-de-quê? (Worumwillen) que determinam as disposições, a partir das quais vem a ser as totalidades conformativas (Bewandtnisganzheiten) estabelecidas, como significâncias, no compreender interpretativo, sendo ambos, disposição e compreender, articulados pela fala, com o que tem origem, então, abertura de mundo. Sendo assim, já que o ser do ser-aí é disposição compreensiva e falante no mundo, percebe-se por que se afirma aqui que o fundamento do cuidado como ser do ser-aí é o carecer. Contudo, só é possível dizer que o ser do ser-aí é o cuidado caso a angústia, disposição que corresponde ao saber da morte como compreender projetivo, se manifeste, própria ou impropriamente. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Ser-aí. Disposição. Compreender. Fala. Impessoal. Angústia. Cuidado. ABSTRACT According to Being and Time, care, as the being of Dasein, is definable by the complex expression “ahead-of-itself-Being-already-in-(the world) as Being-alongside (entities encountered within-the-world)”, which is presented this way in Paragraph 41, that approaches “Dasein’s Being as Care”. Through this expression, Heidegger intends to point out each one of the existentialia (state-ofmind, understanding, discourse, as well as falling and world), and as condition to the correct understanding of the meaning of this structure is the understanding of the fact that there is equiprimordiality (Gleichursprünglichkeit) among them, that is, that the world disclosedness only occurs as a result of the existentialia in conjunction. Without intending to contest this equiprimordiality among the existentialia with respect to the disclosedness of world, (and, therefore, of Being) we just intend to call attention to the fact that this condition of the disclosedness does not necessarily mean that the characters of the Being of Dasein have to be understood as simultaneously genetic in the disclosedness, but only for the disclosedness, and that the being of Dasein as care has its original basis in the need. The latter constitutes the for-the-sake-ofwhich (Worumwillen) that determine the state-ofmind, from which the totality of involvements (Bewandtnisganzheiten) are established, as significance, in the interpretative understanding, where both – state-of-mind and understanding – are articulated by discourse, with which there is, therefore, the origin of world disclosedness. This way, as the being of Dasein is a discoursing and understanding state-of-mind in the world, it is possible to realize why it is said here that the basis of care as being of Dasein is the need. However, it is only possible to affirm that the being of beingthere is care if anxiety, the state-of-mind that corresponds to the awareness of death as a projective understanding, manifests itself, either properly or improperly. KEY WORDS – Dasein. State-of-mind. Understanding. Discourse. Anxiety. Care. (shrink)

Este artigo está organizado do seguinte modo: na primeira seção, apresento as raízes histórico-filosóficas dos problemas do conhecimento e da justificação; na segunda, traço a distinção entre verdade e justificação epistêmica; a terceira seção é dedicada ao problema da circularidade, problema tradicionalmente imputado ao coerentismo; na quarta seção, apresento uma noção heterodoxa de justificação, a justificação sistêmica; na quinta, apresento e critico uma outra noção heterodoxa de justificação, a justificação inferencial não-linear; na sexta seção, apresento mais algumas distinções importantes e (...) destaco as formas proposicional e doxástica da justificação; o exame destas formas é desenvolvido subseqüentemente na sétima seção; concluo o artigo com uma reflexão acerca da natureza e dos limites de minha proposta. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Conhecimento. Coerentismo. Circularidade. Justificação epistêmica. Justificação proposicional. Justificação doxástica. ABSTRACT This paper has the following structure: on the first section, I report on the historical and philosophical roots of the problems of knowledge and justification; on the second, I lay out the distinction between truth and epistemic justification; the third section is devoted to the problem of circularity, a problem often attributed to coherentism; on the fourth section, I introduce an unorthodox notion of justification, systemic justification; on the fifth, I present and criticize another unorthodox notion of justification, non-linear inferential justification; on the sixth, I discuss a few other distinctions and focus on the propositional and doxastic forms of justification; the examination of those forms is subsequently developed on the seventh section; I conclude with a reflection on the nature and limits of my proposal. KEY WORDS – Knowledge. Coherentism. Circularity. Epistemic justification. Propositional justification. Doxastic justification. (shrink)

The present paper traces the trajectory of the development of Husserl’s phenomenology from its incipient eidetic phase over the transcendental to the lifeworld-phenomenological, and ascertains that, in spite of all their complexities, the idea of Zu den Sachen selbst is the very objective of all those ‘phenomenological’investigations. The search after the ‘immediately given’ (Vorgegebenheiten) finally discovers that the concrete cultural life-worlds are the authentically ‘immediatelypre-given’ and all kinds of knowledge and sciences (higher cultural configurations) are nothing but idealizations of those (...) floor-like concrete life-worlds. Phenomenology previously as rigorous first science is now re-oriented as phenomenology as rigorous (i.e., transcendental) regional studies. Transcendental regional studies (i.e., life-world phenomenology), I’d like to argue, is the very key to the resolution of the ambiguities of the concept of life-world as well as the key to the understanding of the vague future direction of phenomenological philosophizing that Husserl himself left open. (shrink)

A Reforma em território alemão possui duas figuras, por vezes próximas entre si, por vezes muito distantes: Lutero e Tomás Müntzer. À medida que foi se envolvendo na vida de seus fiéis, Müntzer foi tomando caminhos próprios, discordando de Lutero que este tomava a “Palavra, em sua realidade objetiva, como constitutiva da Igreja, e afirmando que os verdadeiros fiéis são os que possuem a experiência subjetiva do “Espírito”. Também contra Lutero, que defende a resistência à autoridade, mas em questões seculares (...) aceita a tirania, Müntzer, que vê a fé fortemente inserida no social, defende a revolução armada contra os príncipes. Müntzer não nega a graça, mas esta possui papel secundário em seu pensamento, enquanto, para Lutero, ela se coloca no centro de suas preocupações teológicas. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Reforma. Palavra. Graça. Experiência subjetiva. Resistência. Revolução. ABSTRACT The Reform in german territory has two figures, sometimes very close to each other, and sometimes very distant: Luther and Thomas Müntzer. As he got envolved in the lives of his followers, Müntzer began taking his own paths, disaccording of Luther that took the “Word” in its objective reality, as constitutive of the Church, and affirming that the true followers are the ones who own the subjective experience of the “Spirit”. Also against Luther, that stands for the resistance against authority, but in secular matters accepts tyranny, Müntzer, that sees tyranny deeply inserted in the social, stands for the armed revolution against the princes. Müntzer does not deny grace, but it has a secondary role in his thought, as, for Luther, it is placed in the center of his theological worries. KEY WORDS – Reform. Word. Grace. Subjective experience. Resistance. Revolution. (shrink)

O maior problema do controle de constitucionalidade – um dos institutos básicos do Estado de direito –, com relação à sua justificação democrática, é a chamada dificuldade contra-majoritária [countermajoritarian difficulty], já apontada por Bickel. O texto apresenta o tratamento dessa questão em Habermas, Rawls e Dworkin, a partir da bioética, especialmente o caso do aborto, da eutanásia e da eugenia. Argumenta-se que a justificação moral de boa parte do controle de constitucionalidade encontra sua base em fundamentos morais impostos ao legislador, (...) a partir de uma perspectiva liberal. Tais fundamentos são reconstruídos, tendo em vista a posição tolerante de Locke concernente à problemática religiosa. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Bioética. Constitucionalidade. Liberalismo. Liberadade religiosa. ABSTRACT The major problem of the control over constitutionality – one of the basic institutes of the rule of law –, with regard to its democratic justification, is the so-called countermajoritarian difficulty, already highlighted by Bickel. The article shows how this issue is tackled by Habermas, Rawls, and Dworkin, from the standpoint of bioethics, especially in matters of abortion, euthanasia, and eugenics. It argues that the moral justification of a great deal of the control over constitutionality finds its basis on moral grounds imposed to the legislator from a liberal perspective. Such grounds are reconstructed with a view to recasting Locke’s tolerant position concerning religious affairs. KEY WORDS – Bioethics. Constitutionality. Liberalism. Religious freedom. (shrink)

O trabalho pretende mostrar como a filosofia da idéia de infinito em Levinas se articula com a concepção da temporalidade diacrônica. A referência filosófica mais explícita e recorrente da idéia de infinito em Levinas é o pensamento cartesiano da Terceira Meditação, porém outras influências muito relevantes para este tema provêm dos textos talmúdicos. Procuramos aproximar as duas fontes do pensamento levinasiano, filosofia e judaísmo, pela análise de dois conceitos fundamentais da obra de Levinas, infinito e temporalidade. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Infinito. Temporalidade. (...) Ética. ABSTRACT The article seeks to show how the philosophy of the idea of infinite in Levinas is articuled with the conception of diachronic temporality. The more explicit and recurrent philosophical reference of the idea of infinity in Levinas’s thinking is the Cartesian proposition of the Third Meditation; however, other very important influences concerning this theme come from the Talmudic Lectures. We try to approximate the two sources of the Levinasian thinking through the analysis of two fundamental concepts of his work, infinity and temporality. KEY WORDS – Infinity. Temporality. Ethics. (shrink)

A filosofia moral tradicional estabelece o critério da posse da razão como exigência para a definição da pertinência ou não de um sujeito à comunidade moral humana, e, pois, a ser considerado digno de respeito ético e justiça. Contrariando a tradição moral, Kenneth E. Goodpaster, Tom Regan e Paul W. Taylor redefinem a constituição da comunidade moral e o alcance da justiça, estabelecendo a perspectiva dos que são afetados pelas ações morais, não a dos sujeitos morais agentes, como a referência (...) para se tomar decisões éticas relativas à justiça. Enquanto a filosofia moral tradicional considera apenas a categoria dos sujeitos morais agentes, estes autores desdobram a sujeição moral em duas possibilidades: a da agência e a da paciência moral. Com este desdobramento, mantêm-se a estatura dos agentes racionais como responsáveis pela moralidade, enquanto a vulnerabilidade às ações e decisões dos sujeitos morais agentes é levada em conta, permitindo a inclusão na comunidade moral e da justiça de interesses nãoracionais, de animais e ecossistemas nãoanimados, por exemplo. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Agentes morais. Pacientes morais. Agência moral. Paciência moral. Responsabilidade. Vulnerabilidade. Kenneth E. Goodpaster. Tom Regan. Paul W. Taylor. ABSTRACT Traditional moral philosophy establishes reason as the only criterion for someone being morally considerable or recognized as member of the moral community. In contrast, Kenneth E. Goodpaster, Tom Regan and Paul W. Taylor do not agree with the moral tradition. On their perspective, the standpoint not of the agent but of the “patient” should be the central question of ethics in defining to whom principles of morality apply. While traditional philosophy operates only with the category of moral agents, these authors operates with both categories, moral agent and moral patient. They maintain that responsibility is the most significant question in defining the framework of human morality, a necessary condition to someone being considered a moral agent, possible only for rational beings, while vulnerability is the condition of being subjected to moral decisions and actions, independently of being rational or non rational. Being subjected to human morality is not a prerogative of rational beings. There are non rational interests common to humans, animals and plants, the inherent worth of life, for example, that are continuously subjected to human decisions. So, those have to be considered by ethics and justice. In order to be morally considerable it is not necessary to be rational, it is sufficient to be vulnerable to moral agency. KEY WORDS – Moral agent. Moral patient. Moral agency. Moral patience. Responsibility. Vulnerability. Kenneth E. Goodpaster. Tom Regan. Paul W. Taylor. (shrink)

Este estudo sintetiza as leituras de Merleu-Ponty sobre a ciência moderna, e procura esclarecer como elas desautorizam uma concepção determinista da Natureza. Ao contrário da física newtoniana e de outras ontologias substancialistas, que submetem a contingência ao entendimento, Merleau-Ponty desvela um registro do descontínuo, onde os seres reduzem-se a “feixe de probabilidades”. Assim, ao fornecer sentido ontológico ao polimorfismo do tempo e do espaço percebidos, Merleau-Ponty intercepta em teóricos pós-newtonianos renovada concepção da matéria: “éter dos acontecimentos”, ela se esclarece menos (...) pelas longas cadeias causais que pela “pululação ilimitada das categorias”. A conseqüente refutação dos princípios de identidade é oportunidade para investir individualidades em devir e modos de existência ubiqüitários, atestados pelas modernas embriologias, elementos que ajudam a reformular o cenário ontológico. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Natureza. Ciência. Acontecimento. Individualidade. Ontologia. ABSTRACT This paper summarizes Merleau- Ponty lectures about modern sciences and tries to enlighten how he disavows a determinist conception of Nature. Adversely to Newtonian physics and others substantialistic ontologies that translate contingency into understanding, Merleau- Ponty reveals a register of discontinuity in Nature where beings amount to be a “bundle.of probabilities”. Therefore, in getting ontological sense to the polymorphism of perceived time and space, Merleau-Ponty identifies in post- Newtonian theorists a renewed conception of matter as “ether of events”. Matter do not have to be shaped by long causal chains but by “unlimited profusion of categories”. A consequent refusal of identity principles is an opportunity to a close examination of individualities in progress and ubiquitous ways of existence, both attested by moderns embryologies. In doing so, Merleau-Ponty aims to reformulate ontological scene. KEY WORDS – Nature, science, event, individuality, ontology. (shrink)

Com base na metafísica dos transcendentais, quer-se mostrar a análise scotista do conceito de infinito como transcendental disjuntivo e como conceito filosófico adequado para a realidade de Deus. Pressuposição para uma função positiva do conceito de ente infinito na teologia filosófica de Scotus é, ademais, a teoria da univocidade do ente. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Infinito. Teologia e filosofia de Duns Scotus. Transcendentais. Univocidade do ente. ABSTRACT Based on Scotus’s metaphysics of transcendental concepts, this essay analyses the Scotist concept of the infinite (...) as a disjunctive transcendental and as the most proper philosophical concept for the reality of God. Decisive presupposition to a positive function of the concept of infinite being in Scotus’s philosophical theology is, furthermore, the theory of the univocity of being. KEY WORDS – Infinite. Duns Scotus’s theology and philosophy. Transcendentals. Univocity of being. (shrink)

Este texto é uma análise da caracterização dos princípios morais elaborada por Richard Holton, no seu conhecido trabalho de 2002. Defende-se aqui a tese de que a idéia de Holton sobre a premissa “Isso é tudo” envolve um círculo vicioso. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Metaética. Particularismo. Universalismo. ABSTRACT This is an analysis of the characterisation of moral principles presented by Richard Holton in his influential paper of 2002. It is argued here that Holton’s idea of a premise ‘That’s it’ involves a vicious (...) circle. KEY WORDS – Metaethics. Particularism. Universalism. (shrink)

Este estudo compara elementos do pensamento ético de Duns Scotus e de Mestre Eckhart. Na base desta relação, está a ética de Tomás de Aquino e a sua doutrina da felicidade, cuja análise, aqui, se centra particularmente na noção de lumen gloriae. Interessa ao autor a forma como o tema tomasiano foi abordado sistematicamente por Duns Scotus e Eckhart, oportunizando uma aproximação teórica entre os dois filósofos. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Duns Scotus. Mestre Eckhart. Felicidade humana. “Luz da glória”. ABSTRACT This study (...) compares the ethical thought of Duns Scotus and Master Eckhart. Based on this comparison stays the ethics of Thomas Aquinas and his doctrine of human happiness. The analysis of that doctrine is made here particularly through the notion of lumen gloriae. The author is interested on the way this theme from Thomas Aquinas was approached systematically by Duns Scotus and Eckhart, opening the way for a theoretical dialogue between both philosophers. KEY WORDS – Duns Scotus. Master Eckhart. Human happiness. “Light of glory”. (shrink)

Este artigo analisa a relação entre razão e violência, com base na abordagem de Jürgen Habermas. Pretende-se resgatar, contra uma concepção que interpreta de modo exclusivo a razão como dominação e violência, as perspectivas de emancipação presentes na racionalidade moderna. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Razão. Modernidade. Violência. Emancipação. Habermas. ABSTRACT This article analyzes the relation between reason and violence, in the light of Jürgen Habermas’s work. It seeks to rescue perspectives of emancipation inherent in modern rationality, as over against a conception that (...) regards reason solely as domination and violence. KEY WORDS – Reason. Modernity. Emancipation. Violence. Habermas. (shrink)

O autor apresenta aborda, primeiramente, a relação entre poder e razão no pensamento político de Maquiavel. Num segundo momento, apresenta, no pensamento de Hobbes, a trajetória que se estende da razão impotente do estado de natureza até à razão poderosa do Estado, dispensador de segurança. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Maquiavel. Hobbes. Poder. Razão. ABSTRACT The author analyses in a first moment the relationship between power and reason in the political thought of Machiavelli. In a second moment, he exposes, according to Hobbes’s political (...) philosophy, the path to be gone through from the powerless reason of the state of nature towards the powerful reason of the State, which grants security. KEY WORDS – Machiavelli. Hobbes. Power. Reason. (shrink)

A responsabilidade enquanto princípio ético, embora seja evocada pelos filósofos clássicos, desde a antiguidade ao existencialismo, assume novas perspectivas a partir do pensamento de Hans Jonas e Levinas. Ambos a colocam como centro da ética. Com Jonas a responsabilidade não é mais centrada no passado e no presente. A sua preocupação é com o futuro da humanidade, com as gerações futuras e com a sobrevivência das mesmas. Diferente de Platão, Jonas não está preocupado com a eternidade, mas com o tempo (...) vindouro, compatível com a era da ciência e da tecnologia, cuja responsabilidade passa a ser o alicerce, o princípio orientador para as decisões que possam interferir nas diferentes formas de vida. Levinas, por sua vez, também se afasta da tradição filosófica na medida em que não aceita mais a tese de que a responsabilidade é decorrente da liberdade. A responsabilidade não nasce de uma boa vontade, de um sujeito autônomo que quer livremente se comprometer com o outro ser. Ela nasce como resposta a um chamado. A responsabilidade é o fundamento primeiro e essencial da estrutura ética, a qual não aparece como suplemento de uma base existencial prévia. Aquém do ser se encontra uma subjetividade capaz de escutar a voz, sem palavras de um dizer original, e aponta para uma outra dimensão do eu. Prévio ao ato de consciência, anterior ao sujeito intencional, o eu já responde a um chamado. A responsabilidade pelo outro ser precede a representação conceitual ou a mediação de um mandamento ético. Ela é obediência a uma vocação, a uma eleição pelo bem além do ser. A responsabilidade determina a liberdade do eu, pois esta não consegue mais se justificar por ela mesma. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Ética. Liberdade. Jonas. Levinas. Responsabilidade. ABSTRACT Responsibility qua ethical principle, however evoked by classical philosophers from Antiquity through existentialism, assumes new perspectives since the contributions of Hans Jonas and Levinas. Both place it at the center of ethics. With Jonas, responsibility no longer focuses on past and present. His concern is rather with the future of humankind, with future generations and their survival. Contrary to Plato, Jonas is not concerned with eternity, but with the time to come, compatible with the era of science and technology, whose responsibility becomes the groundwork and guiding principle for decisions that might interfere in different life forms. As for Levinas, he also departs from the philosophical tradition insofar as he rejects the thesis that responsibility results from freedom. Responsibility does not stem from a good will, from an autonomous subject who freely wants to be engaged with another being. Responsibility rather emerges as response to a call, it is the first, essential ground of ethical structure, which cannot appear as a supplement of a previous existential basis. Even before Being, one finds a subjectivity capable of listening to a voice, without words, of an originary saying, and points to another dimension of the self. Previous to the act of consciousness, anterior to the intentional subject, the self already responds to the call. Responsibility towards the other being precedes the conceptual representation or the mediation of an ethical commandment. It is obedience to a vocation, to an election by the Good beyond Being. Responsibility determines the freedom of the self, since the lattercan no longer be justified by itself. KEY WORDS – Ethics, Freedom, Jonas, Levinas, Responsibility. (shrink)

Este ensaio se ocupará de uma noção que debuta muito recentemente no cenário do debate epistemológico contemporâneo, a saber, a noção de virtude intelectual. Vamos discutir, aqui, uma das abordagens da noção de virtude, aquela moldada na forja confiabilista. Receberão destaque especial os trabalhos de Alvin Goldman e Ernest Sosa, nesta ordem. Veremos que ‘virtude intelectual’ será entendida, grosso modo, como uma evolução da noção de ‘processo confiável de formação de crenças’, evolução motivada por três críticas à teoria confiabilista. Pretendemos (...) mostrar, ainda, que uma destas críticas não é resolvida, exatamente a crítica que ataca um dos pilares do programa confiabilista: a dispensa de crenças de segunda ordem sobre a justificação. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Justificação. Confiabilismo. Virtude intelectual. ABSTRACT This essay is concerned with a notion that was recently introduced in the contemporary epistemological debate, the notion of an intellectual virtue. We will be discussing one of the approaches to the notion of virtue, that which comes from the reliabilist forge. I will be especially concerned with the works of Alvin Goldman and Ernest Sosa, in that order. We will see that ‘intellectual virtue’ will be, by and large, understood as the evolution of the notion of ‘reliable belief-forming process’, an evolution that is prompted by three objections to reliabilist theory. We intend to show that one of those objections is not removed, precisely the one that is aimed at one of the pillars of the reliabilist program: the avoidance of a condition requiring second-order beliefs about justification. KEY WORDS – Justification. Reliabilism. Intellectual virtue. (shrink)

This article provides a critical view on the development and deployment phase of the e-ID in Belgium since 1999. It is based on extensive desk research and fifteen in depth-interviews with experts and stakeholders from government, administration, academia and industry who have been key in the development of the e-ID. The article identifies different elements that influenced, both in a positive and negative way, the societal, technical and political aspects of the Belgian e-ID. It shows that no severe problems occurred (...) during the initial deployment phase, which came to an end in 2009 providing over eight million Belgian citizens with an e-ID. The pre-existence of a National Register and the preliminary experiences with the exchange of digital information between administrative entities in the field of Social Security enabled and facilitated the development and the distribution of the e-ID. However, the research also reveals that usage of the e-ID by citizens and uptake of e-ID based services by administration and business remains limited due to multiple factors. The complex system of state structures in Belgium and as a consequence the dispersion of competences across different governmental entities makes that no unified approach to e-government and e-ID based services has been developed. From the industries’ point of view the privacy framework and the strictly regulated use of the National Registration Number provides no clear view on the allowed use of data accessible through the e-ID hampering take up in this area. (shrink)

This article provides a critical view on the development and deployment phase of the e-ID in Belgium since 1999. It is based on extensive desk research and fifteen in depth-interviews with experts and stakeholders from government, administration, academia and industry who have been key in the development of the e-ID. The article identifies different elements that influenced, both in a positive and negative way, the societal, technical and political aspects of the Belgian e-ID. It shows that no severe problems occurred (...) during the initial deployment phase, which came to an end in 2009 providing over eight million Belgian citizens with an e-ID. The pre-existence of a National Register and the preliminary experiences with the exchange of digital information between administrative entities in the field of Social Security enabled and facilitated the development and the distribution of the e-ID. However, the research also reveals that usage of the e-ID by citizens and uptake of e-ID based services by administration and business remains limited due to multiple factors. The complex system of state structures in Belgium and as a consequence the dispersion of competences across different governmental entities makes that no unified approach to e-government and e-ID based services has been developed. From the industries’ point of view the privacy framework and the strictly regulated use of the National Registration Number provides no clear view on the allowed use of data accessible through the e-ID hampering take up in this area. (shrink)

A impossibilidade de se fundamentar os direitos humanos hoje de maneira satisfatória, sem recorrer a modelos essencialistas ou metafísicos, parece correlata à universalidade de sua defesa e promoção. Uma abordagem fenomenológica favorece uma leitura perspectivista da alteridade, tornando altamente defensável e razoável que se aplique uma semântica transcendental ao problema da fundamentação dos direitos humanos. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Alteridade. Direitos humanos. Fenomenologia. Perspectivismo. Semântica transcendental. Universalidade. ABSTRACT The impossibility of satisfactorily grounding human rights today, without resort to essentialist or metaphysical models, (...) seem correlated to the universality of their defense and promotion. A phenomenological approach favors a perspectivist reading of alterity, making highly defensible and reasonable that a transcendental semantics be applied to the problem of the foundations of human rights. KEY WORDS – Alterity. Human rights. Perspectivism. Phenomenology. Transcendental semantics. Universality. (shrink)

Este é um estudo sobre o conceito de vontade na história da filosofia. O centro de interesse está na obra De libero arbitrio, de Agostinho. Tanto se procura descrever a suposta “descoberta” da vontade por Agostinho quanto analisar a coerência do conceito obtido. Trata-se do primeiro de dois estudos sobre a vontade e a liberdade em De libero arbitrio I. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Vontade. Liberum arbitrium. Liberdade. Razão. Desejo. Ação. Psicologia da ação moral. Assentimento. Juízo. Erro. Teodicéia. ABSTRACT – This is (...) a study on the concept of will in the history of philosophy. Its main concern is a work of the young Augustine, namely De libero arbitrio. Aim of the investigation is both to describe the alleged “discovery” of the will through Augustine and to examine the coherence of such concept. This is the first of two studies on will and freedom according to Augustine in De libero arbitrio I. KEY WORDS – Will. Liberum arbitrium. Freedom. Reason. Action. Psychology of moral action. Assent. Judgement. Error. Theodicy. (shrink)

Esta é uma análise de um item do “externalismo de função própria” de Alvin Plantinga. A seguir, exponho o argumento de Peter Klein, contra o conceito de autorização [warrant] de Plantinga, no qual é mostrado por que ela não contém condições suficientes para o conhecimento, bem como as reações de Plantinga, nas quais se verifica um aprimoramento da mesma teoria. Sugiro uma avaliação teórica dos conteúdos propostos e exponho revisitas à condição do ambiente cognitivo, enfocada no debate. Proponho, ao final, (...) uma resolução do problema, restrita aos termos da teoria de autorização por função própria. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Autorização epistêmica. Acidentalidade. Problemas de Gettier. Externalismo. Função própria. Ambiente cognitivo. ABSTRACT This is an analysis of an aspect of Alvin Plantinga’s “proper function externalism”. I expound Peter Klein’s argument against Plantinga’s concept of warrant, where it is shown why it doesn’t contain sufficient conditions for knowledge, as well as Plantinga’s reactions, where an improvement of the same theory is put forward. I propose a theoretical evaluation of the views in question and discuss recent analyses of the condition of cognitive environment, which is one of the focal points of the debate. Finally, I propose a resolution to the problem within the confines of the proper function theory of warrant. KEY WORDS – Epistemic warrant. Accidentality. Gettier problems. Externalism. Proper function. Cognitive environment. (shrink)

Kant divide a filosofia moral em duas partes: Ética e Teoria da Justiça. Cada uma é composta de diferentes descrições de deveres e direitos. A Ética contém deveres e direitos internos, voluntários e não-coercitivos. A Teoria da Justiça contém deveres e direitos externos e coercitivos. Os dois tipos de deveres e direitos são definidos em sua relação um com o outro. O que distingue os deveres éticos, ou deveres de virtude, dos deveres jurídicos, é que a compulsão externa para o (...) dever jurídico é moralmente possível, enquanto o dever de virtude é baseado na livre coerção própria. Assim, a finalidade deste artigo é pesquisar a noção de dever, e a relação entre dever, liberdade e coação. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Dever. Liberdade e coação. ABSTRACT Kant divides moral philosophy into two parts: Ethics and the theory of justice. Each is composed of different sets of duties and rights. Ethics contains internal, voluntary, and unenforceable duties and rights. The theory of justice contains external, enforceable, and coercive duties and rights. Both types of duties and rights are defined in relation to each other, and therefore can be understood only in relation to each other. What distinguishes ethical duties or duties of virtue from juridical ones is that external compulsion to a juridical duty is morally possible, whereas a duty of virtue is based on free selfconstraint. So, the main purpose of this article is to research the notion of duty, and the relationship between duty, freedom and coercion. KEY WORDS – Duty. freedom and coercion. (shrink)

A especificação de lógico e político no animal rationale serviu historicamente como determinativo da dimensão humana, e o humano resumiu-se no desenvolvimento destas faculdades. Esta interpretação é contestada no século XX por Scheler, Arendt e Levinas, entre outros, que repõem a questão da relação entre ser, natureza e humano. A problematização ontológico- naturalista leva a repensar a crença naturalista sobre a qual repousa o pensamento antropológico ocidental e desafia a ressignificar o humano a partir de novas compreensões, sobretudo a partir (...) da alteridade. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Animal rationale. Sentido do humano. Alteridade. ABSTRACT The specificity of the logical and the political in the animal rationale has historically served to determine its human dimension, as the human comes down to the development of these faculties. Such an interpretation has been questioned in the 20th century by Scheler, Arendt and Levinas, among others, who recast the question of the relation between being, nature and the human. The ontological-naturalist problematization leads us to rethink the naturalist belief on which lies Western anthropological thought, as it defies the signification of the human anew from the standpoint of new understandings, especially from alterity’s viewpoint. KEY WORDS – Animal rationale. Sense of human. Alterity. (shrink)

O propósito deste artigo é analisar as relações de Rawls com o pensamento político de Hegel – considerado pelo primeiro como um “liberalismo da liberdade” – no que diz respeito ao tema da reconciliação. Primeiramente, vamos analisar o conceito hegeliano de reconciliação. Em segundo lugar, procederemos a uma leitura de alguns aspectos da teoria rawlsiana a partir deste conceito para, finalmente, destacar a valorização do mesmo na obra de Rawls. Tratase, portanto, de verificar de que forma a recepção crítica do (...) tema hegeliano da reconciliação pode estimular um ajuste do liberalismo político às exigências da realidade histórica das sociedades liberais modernas, cobrindo, assim, um déficit do liberalismo político em relação às críticas comunitaristas, sobretudo, a questão do normativismo abstrato. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Hegelianismo. Liberalismo. Liberdade. Reconciliação. ABSTRACT The purpose of this article is to analyze the relations between Rawls and Hegel’s political thought – considered by the former as a “liberalism of freedom” – regarding the theme of reconciliation. Firstly, we will analyze the Hegelian concept of reconciliation. Secondly, we will proceed to a reading of some aspects of the Rawlsian theory based in that concept, in order to eventually underscore its value in Rawls’ work. Therefore, the article verifies in which way the critical reception of the Hegelian theme of reconciliation can stimulate an adjustment of the political liberalism to the demands of the historical reality of modern liberal societies, covering, in this manner, a deficit of political liberalism in relation to communitarian criticisms, especially, the question of abstract normativism. KEY WORDS – Hegelianism. Liberalism. Freedom. Reconciliation. (shrink)

Este artigo procura examinar a avaliação de Rawls acerca de alguns aspectos da filosofia política de Hegel. Rawls interpreta Hegel como um liberal de mente moderadamente reformista, e seu liberalismo é um importante exemplar na história do liberalismo da liberdade. Pretendemos, primeiramente, examinar o estatuto do liberalismo de Hegel, particularmente a questão da liberdade individual. Em segundo lugar, apresentamos alguns aspectos do entendimento de Rawls acerca deste liberalismo. A plausibilidade da filosofia política de Hegel é questionada, quando Rawls analisa a (...) sua possível contribuição à luz do liberalismo político. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Liberalismo. Liberdade. Liberalismo politico. Hegelianismo. ABSTRACT This article seeks to examine Ralws’s evaluation about some features of Hegel’s political philosophy. Rawls interprets Hegel as a liberal, with a moderately reforming mind, and his liberalism is an important exemplar in the history of liberalism of freedom. We intend, first, to examine Hegel’s liberalism statute, particularly the individual freedom issue. Second, we present some aspects of Rawls’s understanding about this liberalism. Hegel’s political philosophy plausibility is questioned, when Rawls analyses his possible contribution in the light of political liberalism. KEY WORDS – Liberalism. Freedom. Political liberalism. Hegelianism. (shrink)

A filosofia, sendo um discurso antípoda ao discurso das ciências, no sentido de que não produz um conhecimento sobre particularidades, situa-se a priori no espaço interno de uma clivagem, de uma diferença e de uma dobra onde este discurso e este saber são produzidos e apresentados. Na cena contemporânea três pensadores, Lacan, Apel e Gadamer, tematizam a experiência do humano como ligada estritamente à linguagem enquanto elemento estruturador do humano, na medida em que este é situado no interior do espaço (...) de uma dobra e de uma clivagem. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Apel. A priori. Gadamer. Lacan. Linguagem. Ser humano. ABSTRACT Philosophy as a speech opposite to the speech of sciences as long as it does not pursue a knwoledge on specialities, it is situated a priori at the internal space of a fold where this knowledge is produced and presented. At the contemporary scene there are three thinkers, Lacan, Apel and Gadamer which think human experience as deeply linked towards language as the structural frame of the human being, hence he is situated within the space of this fold. KEY WORDS – Apel. A priori. Gadamer. Human being. Lacan. Language. (shrink)

Em boa parte do Artigo 68 do Livro Primeiro de seu Estado e Pranto da Igreja, Álvaro Pais, O. Min. (c. 1270-1349) refuta 5 proposições com implicações políticas atribuídas a Marsílio de Pádua (1280-1342). Neste artigo, analisamos a refutação dessas proposições feitas pelo Menorita galego, comparando-as, de um lado, com os textos, efetivamente escritos pelo Médico paduano, que se encontram em sua obra Defensor da Paz (1324) e, de outro, cotejando-o com uma Epistula ad quosdam cardinales, de autoria do mencionado (...) Frade, escrita pelo menos dois anos antes. Desse estudo resultaram as seguintes conclusões: 1 – Frei Álvaro, sem fazer nenhuma alusão, apoiou-se basicamente na mencionada Epistula. 2 – Sob o aspecto doutrinal, essencialmente, não há diferença entre ambos os textos alvarinos. 3 – Nos dois textos, o Franciscano galego não compulsou o Defensor da Paz, tendo utilizado as teses que os censores dessa obra imputaram ao seu autor; em 1327, quando o Papa João XXII condenou-a como herética. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Álvaro Pais. Marsílio de Pádua. Plenitude do poder. Filosofia política. ABSTRACT In a large part of the Article 68 of the Book one of his Status et Planctus Ecclesiae, Alvarus Pelagius O. Min. (c. 1270-1349) refutes five propositions, having political implications, attributed to Marsilius Patavinus (1280-1342). In this study, we analyze the refutation of these propositions made by Alvarus, comparing, on the one hand, with the texts, really, written by Marsilius, which are in his book entitled Defensor pacis (1324), and on the other hand, quoting Alvarus’ text with the Epistula ad quosdam cardinales, also written by the mentioned Franciscan friar two years before. From this study, resulted the following conclusions: 1 – Without to do any mention in the Article 68, the principal Alvarus’ source was the referred Epistula. 2 – Considering the two texts written by Fr. Alvarus, according the doctrinal aspect, they are essentially equal. 3 – In both texts we could see that Alvarus not had in his hands the Defensor Pacis, having used the thesis which the censors of this book imputed to Marsilius in 1327, when this book was condemned as heretic by the Pope John XXII. KEY WORDS – Alvarus Pelagius. Marsilius of Padua. Plentitude of power. Political philosophy. (shrink)

Neste estudo, a história mundial, tal como concebida por Hegel, é analisada a partir dos §§ 330-360 da Filosofia do Direito. Em seguida, procura-se coordenar estes parágrafos com as teses de Kant sobre a guerra e a paz. Finalmente, as abordagens de Kant e de Hegel são retomadas à luz do estudo de Hobsbawm sobre o cenário político internacional nos séculos 20 e 21. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Hegel. Filosofia do direito. História mundial. ABSTRACT In this study, the history of the world (...) as conceived by Hegel is investigated on the basis of §§ 330-360 of his Philosophy of Law. Hegel’s theory is afterwards linked to Kant’s theses concerning the pax perpetua. Finally, Kant’s and Hegel’s approaches on war and peace shall be assessed by comparing them to Hobsbawm’s views on the political international scene of the 20th. and 21st. Centuries. KEY WORDS – Hegel. Philosophy of law. World history. (shrink)

Um Estado democrático de Direito fundamenta suas bases em princípios de justiça universalizáveis. Aplicados a uma Constituição, objetivam-se nos direitos e liberdades fundamentais dos cidadãos. O dever de obedecer a leis injustas, a desobediência civil e a objeção de consciência pressupõem senso de justiça e uma concepção do bem, capacidades morais de uma “pessoa ética”. PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Direitos fundamentais. Justiça. Constituição. Desobediência civil. ABSTRACT A democratic State of law puts its bases on principles of justice capable of universal validity. Applied (...) to a constitution, such principles are objectivied in the fundamental rights and liberties of the citizens. The duty of obeying unjust laws, civil disobedience and consciousness objection presuppose a sense of justice and a conception of the good, that is, moral capacities of an “ethical person”. KEY WORDS – Fundamental rights. Justice. Constitution. Civil desobedience. (shrink)

The author comments on the article “The Neurobiology of Addiction: Implications for Voluntary Control of Behavior,‘ by S. E. Hyman. Hyman’s article suggests that addicted individuals have impairments in cognitive control of behavior. The author agrees with Hyman’s view that addiction weakens the addict’s ability to align his actions with his judgments. The author states that neuroethics may focus on brains and highlight key aspects of behavior but we still risk missing explanatory elements. Accession Number: 24077912; Authors: Levy, Neil 1,2; (...) Email Address: nlevy@unimelb.edu.au; Affiliations: 1: University of Melbourne, Parkville 3010, Australia; 2: University of Oxford; Subject: ADDICTIONS; Subject: ALCOHOLISM; Subject: COGNITION; Subject: BEHAVIOR; Subject: JUDGMENT; Subject: HYMAN, S. E.; Subject: NEUROBIOLOGY; Number of Pages: 2p. (shrink)

Much research in the last two decades has demonstrated that human responses deviate from the performance deemed normative according to various models of decision making and rational judgment (e.g., the basic axioms of utility theory). This gap between the normative and the descriptive can be interpreted as indicating systematic irrationalities in human cognition. However, four alternative interpretations preserve the assumption that human behavior and cognition is largely rational. These posit that the gap is due to (1) performance errors, (2) computational (...) limitations, (3) the wrong norm being applied by the experimenter, and (4) a different construal of the task by the subject. In the debates about the viability of these alternative explanations, attention has been focused too narrowly on the modal response. In a series of experiments involving most of the classic tasks in the heuristics and biases literature, we have examined the implications of individual differences in performance for each of the four explanations of the normative/descriptive gap. Performance errors are a minor factor in the gap; computational limitations underlie non-normative responding on several tasks, particularly those that involve some type of cognitive decontextualization. Unexpected patterns of covariance can suggest when the wrong norm is being applied to a task or when an alternative construal of the task should be considered appropriate. Key Words: biases; descriptive models; heuristics; individual differences; normative models; rationality; reasoning. (shrink)

Locke on Human Understanding, is a comprehensive introduction to John Locke's major work, Essay Concerning Human Understanding . Locke's Essay remains a key work in many philosophical fields, notably in epistemology, metaphysics and the philosophies of mind and language. In addition, Locke is often referred to as the first English empiricist. Knowledge of this influential work and figure is essential to Enlightenment thought. E. J. Lowe's approach enables students to effectively study the Essay by placing Locke's life and works in (...) their intellectual and historical context. The book provides a critical examination of the leading themes in the Essay , illuminating the main lines in Locke's thinking. Such topics include innate ideas, perception, primary and secondary qualities, personal identity, free will, action and language. Finally, E. J. Lowe examines the comtemporary work being done on this highly influential English philosopher. (shrink)

The evolution of life on Earth has produced an organism that is beginning to model and understand its own evolution and the possible future evolution of life in the universe. These models and associated evidence show that evolution on Earth has a trajectory. The scale over which living processes are organized cooperatively has increased progressively, as has its evolvability. Recent theoretical advances raise the possibility that this trajectory is itself part of a wider developmental process. According to these theories, the (...) developmental process has been shaped by a larger evolutionary process that involves the reproduction of universes. This evolutionary process has tuned the key parameters of the universe to increase the likelihood that life will emerge and develop to produce outcomes that are successful in the larger process (e.g. a key outcome may be to produce life and intelligence that intentionally reproduces the universe and tunes the parameters of ‘offspring’ universes). Theory suggests that when life emerges on a planet, it moves along this trajectory of its own accord. However, at a particular point evolution will continue to advance only if organisms emerge that decide to advance the evolutionary process intentionally. The organisms must be prepared to make this commitment even though the ultimate nature and destination of the process is uncertain, and may forever remain unknown. Organisms that complete this transition to intentional evolution will drive the further development of life and intelligence in the universe. Humanity’s increasing understanding of the evolution of life in the universe is rapidly bringing it to the threshold of this major evolutionary transition. (shrink)

Authors frequently refer to gene-based selection in biological evolution, the reaction of the immune system to antigens, and operant learning as exemplifying selection processes in the same sense of this term. However, as obvious as this claim may seem on the surface, setting out an account of “selection” that is general enough to incorporate all three of these processes without becoming so general as to be vacuous is far from easy. In this target article, we set out such a general (...) account of selection to see how well it accommodates these very different sorts of selection. The three fundamental elements of this account are replication, variation, and environmental interaction. For selection to occur, these three processes must be related in a very specific way. In particular, replication must alternate with environmental interaction so that any changes that occur in replication are passed on differentially because of environmental interaction. One of the main differences among the three sorts of selection that we investigate concerns the role of organisms. In traditional biological evolution, organisms play a central role with respect to environmental interaction. Although environmental interaction can occur at other levels of the organizational hierarchy, organisms are the primary focus of environmental interaction. In the functioning of the immune system, organisms function as containers. The interactions that result in selection of antibodies during a lifetime are between entities (antibodies and antigens) contained within the organism. Resulting changes in the immune system of one organism are not passed on to later organisms. Nor are changes in operant behavior resulting from behavioral selection passed on to later organisms. But operant behavior is not contained in the organism because most of the interactions that lead to differential replication include parts of the world outside the organism. Changes in the organism's nervous system are the effects of those interactions. The role of genes also varies in these three systems. Biological evolution is gene-based (i.e., genes are the primary replicators). Genes play very different roles in operant behavior and the immune system. However, in all three systems, iteration is central. All three selection processes are also incredibly wasteful and inefficient. They can generate complexity and novelty primarily because they are so wasteful and inefficient. Key Words: evolution; immunology; interaction; operant behavior; operant learning; replication; selection; variation. (shrink)

Category-specific impairments of object recognition and naming are among the most intriguing disorders in neuropsychology, affecting the retrieval of knowledge about either living or nonliving things. They can give us insight into the nature of our representations of objects: Have we evolved different neural systems for recognizing different categories of object? What kinds of knowledge are important for recognizing particular objects? How does visual similarity within a category influence object recognition and representation? What is the nature of our semantic (...) knowledge about different objects? We review the evidence on category-specific impairments, arguing that deficits even for one class of object (e.g., living things) cannot be accounted for in terms of a single information processing disorder across all patients; problems arise at contrasting loci in different patients. The same apparent pattern of impairment can be produced by damage to different loci. According to a new processing framework for object recognition and naming, the hierarchical interactive theory (HIT), we have a hierarchy of highly interactive stored representations. HIT explains the variety of patients in terms of (1) lesions at different levels of processing and (2) different forms of stored knowledge used both for particular tasks and for particular categories of object. Key Words: category-specific deficits; functional imaging; hierarchical models; interactive activation models; neuropsychology; object recognition; perceptual and functional knowledge. (shrink)

Does a hard-headed realist approach to international politics necessarily involve scepticism towards progressive foreign policy initiatives and global reform? Should proponents of realism always be seen as morally complacent and politically combative? In this major reconsideration of the main figures of international political theory, Bill Scheuerman challenges conventional wisdom to reveal a neglected tradition of progressive realism with much to contribute to contemporary debates about international policy-making and world government. Far from seeing international reform as well-meaning but potentially irresponsible idealism, (...) progressive realists like E.H. Carr, John Herz, Hans J. Morgenthau, and Reinhold Niebuhr developed forward-looking ideas which offer an indispensable corrective to many presently influential views about global politics. Progressive realism, Scheuerman argues, offers a compelling and provocative vision of radical global change which - when properly interpreted, can help buttress current efforts to address the most pressing international issues. After recovering key subterranean strands in mid-twentieth century realism, Scheuerman underscores their relevance to contemporary international theory. Criticizing more recent realists for abandoning their tradition's best insights, he also demonstrates that reform-minded international theories - including versions of cosmopolitanism, constructivism, the English School, liberalism, and republicanism - could all benefit from taking Progressive Realism seriously. A major contribution both to the history of international relations and contemporary debates in international theory, The Realist Case for Global Reform concludes by considering how progressive realism informs the foreign policies of US President Barack Obama. (shrink)

As science has become more heavily mathematical and as computers continue to infiltrate life in affluent societies, the philosopher's concern with mathematics has, paradoxically, dwindled. It has come to be tacitly presumed that mathematics is nothing but logic. Concentrating on three key figures in the philosophy of mathematics--Frege, Russell, and Hilbert--Mary Tiles seeks to dispel the misconception that scientific rationality and the character of reason is merely pure logic --and therefore inherently at odds with imagination. Tiles argues against those (...) who see mathematics as uncreative and irrelevant to our postmodern, post-structuralist age. Mary Tiles writes in a lively, refreshingly non-technical style and succeeds in combining the highest degree of rigor with imagination and insight to provide a valuable book for students of the philosophy of logic and mathematics, epistemology, as well as for philosophically minded mathematicians and computer scientists. (shrink)

This paper articulates a formal theory of belief incorporating three key theses: (1) belief is a dyadic relation between an agent and a property; (2) this property is not the belief's truth condition (i.e., the intuitively self-ascribed property which the agent must exemplify for the belief to be true) but is instead a certain abstract property (a thought-content) which contains a way of thinking of that truth condition; (3) for an agent a to have a belief about such-and-such items it (...) is necessary that a possesses a language of thought, M a , and that a (is disposed as one who) inwardly affirms a sentence of M a in which there are terms that denote those objects.Employing an extended version of E. Zalta's system ILAO, the proffered theory locates thought-contents within a typed hierarchy of senses and their modes of presentation, the provisional definitions of which (suppressing complications added later to accommodate the contents of beliefs about beliefs) are as follows. A mode of presentation of e is a ternary relation of the sort [xyz z is a name in M y that denotes x, and D e yz] in which D e is an e-determiner – a relation between agents and their mental expressions imposing a syntactico-semantic condition sufficient for such an expression to denote e therein. A sense of an entity e is an abstract property that contains a mode of presentation R e of e by dint of encoding its property-reduct [x(y)(z)R e xyz]. In particular, a thought-content is a sense T of an ordinary first-order property P containing a mode of presentation whose P-determiner D P is such that, for any y and z, D P yz entails that z is a -abstract [ v S] of M y in which S is a sentence whose non-logical parts stand in appropriate semantic relations to the constituents of T's (some of which may themselves be senses). (shrink)

The frequency of earnings restatements has been increasing over the last decade. Restating previous earnings erodes perceived trustworthiness and competence of management, giving firms strong incentives to take actions to enhance perceived credibility of future financial reports [Farber, D. B.: 2005, The Accounting Review 80(2), 539–561.]. Using an experimental case, we examine the ability of post-restatement actions taken by a firm to positively influence non-professional investors’ perceptions of management’s financial reporting credibility. Our examination considers credibility judgments following two types of (...) restatements – those resulting from fraud in which the character, ethics, and values of an organization may be called into question [cf. Copeland, Jr., J. E.: 2005, Accounting Horizons 19(1), 35–43.], and those resulting from non-fraud (i.e., aggressive accounting). Based on the information in the experimental case, non-professional investors take the role of potential equity investors and make a judgment about management’s financial reporting credibility after reviewing a set of post-restatement actions taken by a firm. The possible actions include changes in four corporate governance mechanisms (i.e., internal audit function, external audit firm, board of directors, CFO) and a buyback of company stock. Our results provide an important contribution to the literature by demonstrating that among non-professional investors, perceptions of management’s financial reporting credibility are affected both by the post-restatement action taken and the nature of the restatement. These results offer insight into the formation of a key credibility judgment made by non-professional investors following a trust-destroying event, an earnings restatement. (shrink)

In 2005, The International Federation of Organic Agricultural Movements (IFOAM) developed four new ethical principles of organic agriculture to guide its future development: the principles of health, ecology, care, and fairness. The key distinctive concept of animal welfare in organic agriculture combines naturalness and human care, and can be linked meaningfully with these principles. In practice, a number of challenges are connected with making organic livestock systems work. These challenges are particularly dominant in immature agro-ecological systems, for example those that (...) are characterized by industrialization and monoculture. Some of the current challenges are partly created by shortages of land and manure, which encourage zero-grazing and other confined systems. Other challenges are created in part by the conditions for farming and the way in which global food distribution systems are organized, e.g., how live animals are transported, how feed is traded and transported all over the globe, and the development of infrastructure and large herds. We find that the overall organic principles should be included when formulating guidelines for practical organic animal farming. This article explores how the special organic conceptions of animal welfare are related to the overall principles of organic agriculture. The aim is to identify potential routes for future development of organic livestock systems in different contexts and with reference to the specific understanding of animal welfare in organic agriculture. We include two contrasting cases represented by organic livestock systems in northwestern Europe and farming systems in tropical low-income countries; we use these cases to explore the widely different challenges of organic livestock systems in different parts of the world. (shrink)

Written by a prominent historian, this work develops a highly Original argument in the context of recent debates. Against naive empiricism, Mary Fulbrook argues that all historians face key theoretical questions, and that an emphasis on the facts alone is not enough. Against postmodernism, she argues that historical narratives are not simply inventions imposed on the past, and that some answers to historical questions are more plausible or adequate than others. Focusing on central theoretical issues and strategies for bridging (...) the gap between the traces of the past and the interpretations of the present, and deploying a range of substantive examples to illustrate the argument, this study provides an essential guide to and through major debates about the nature of history and representations of the past. (shrink)

in a 2nd task (e.g., pleasant vs. unpleasant words for an evaluation attribute). When instructions oblige highly associated categories (e.g., liower + pleasant) to share a response key, performance is faster than when less associated categories (e.g., insect + pleasant) share a key. This performance difference implicitly measures differential association of the 2 concepts with the attribute. In 3..

This paper sketches the ambitious outlines of an assessment of the place of Russian philosophy in philosophical history ‘at large’, i.e. on a global and world-historical scale. At the same time, it indicates, rather modestly, a number of elements and aspects of such a project. A retrospective reflection and reconstruction is not only a recurrent phenomenon in philosophical culture (which, the author assumes, has become global), it also is, by virtue of its being a philosophical reflection, one among many possible (...) perspectives. The central claim of the paper is that the key to an assessment of the world-historical place of Russian philosophy is to be found in the Soviet period, not only because it was, through its isolation policy and its subordination of philosophy to political and ideological goals, a determining factor for a large part of the 20th century, but also, and more importantly, because it has systematically distorted the perception of Russia’s philosophical history, including of the Soviet episode itself. The very undoing of these distortions, however, risks becoming a distortion because of, on the one hand, a demonization of the Soviet factor and, on the other hand, a disregard for its philosophical and meta-philosophical relevance. (shrink)

A teoria das virtudes epistêmicas (VE) sustenta que as virtudes dos agentes, tais como a imparcialidade ou a permeabilidade intelectual, ao invés de crenças específicas, devem estar no centro da avaliação epistêmica, e que os indivíduos que possuem essas virtudes estão mais bem-posicionados epistemicamente do que se não as tivessem, ou, pior ainda, do que se tivessem os vícios correspondentes: o preconceito, o dogmatismo, ou a impermeabilidade intelectual. Eu argumento que a teoria VE padece de um grave defeito, porque fracassa (...) ao se ajustar à natureza social dos questionamentos (epistêmicos) típicos. Esse e outros defeitos relacionados a esse infectam o paralelo que os teóricos VE traçam entre virtudes epistêmicas e morais. Ao prometer o incremento na proporção de crenças verdadeiras sobre crenças falsas, ou ignorância, as virtudes epistêmicas não podem desempenhar um papel paralelo àquele que Aristóteles reserva às virtudes morais ao prometer o incremento em nossa felicidade e no bem-estar da comunidade. A minha rota para essas críticas é feita das razões sobre por que os agentes (sociais) devem buscar a obtenção de seus objetivos morais e epistêmicos diferentemente nos papéis que atribuem às virtudes. PALAVRAS-CHAVES – Virtude epistêmica. Divisão de trabalho epistêmico. Diversidade. Conhecimento. Falibilidade. Virtude moral. ABSTRACT Epistemic Virtue (EV) theory holds that virtues of agents, like impartiality or openmindedness, rather than specific beliefs, should be at the center of epistemological evaluation, and that individuals with those virtues are better positioned epistemically than if they lacked them or, worse, if they instead had the corresponding vices: prejudice, dogmatism, or close-mindedness. I argue that EV theory suffers from a serious flaw because it fails to accommodate to the social nature of typical (epistemic) inquiries. This and related flaws infect the parallel that EV theorists allege between epistemic and moral virtues. In promising to improve our ratio of true beliefs to either false beliefs or ignorance, the epistemic virtues cannot play a roll parallel to that which Aristotle claims for the moral virtues in promising to increase our happiness and the well-being of the community. The path to these criticisms I introduce by offering reasons for why (social) agents should seek to realize their epistemic and moral goals very differently in the respective roles they accord to the virtues. KEY WORDS – Epistemic virtue. Division of epistemic labor. Diversity. Knowledge. Fallibility. Moral virtue. (shrink)

David and Mary Norton present the definitive scholarly edition of one of the greatest philosophical works ever written. This first volume contains the critical text of David Hume's Treatise of Human Nature (1739/40), followed by the short Abstract (1740) in which Hume set out the key arguments of the larger work; the volume concludes with A Letter from a Gentleman to his Friend in Edinburgh (1745), Hume's defence of the Treatise when it was under attack from ministers seeking to (...) prevent Hume's appointment as Professor of Moral Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh. (shrink)

Terminal kidney patients are faced with lower quality of life, restricted diets and higher morbidity and mortality rates while waiting for deceased donor kidney transplantation. Fortunately, living kidney donation has proven to be a better treatment alternative (e.g. in terms of waiting time and graft survival rates). We observed an inequality in the number of living kidney transplantations performed between the non-European and the European patients in our center. Such inequality has been also observed elsewhere in this field and it (...) has been suggested that this inequality relates to, among other things, attitude differences towards donation based on religious beliefs. In this qualitative research we investigated whether religion might indeed (partly) be the explanation of the inequalities in living donor kidney transplants (LDKT) among non-European patients. Fifty patients participated in focus group discussions and in-depth interviews. The interviews were conducted following the focus group method and analyzed in line with Grounded Theory. The qualitative data analyses were performed in Atlas.ti. We found that religion is not perceived as an obstacle to living donation and that religion actually promotes helping and saving the life of a person. Issues such as integrity of the body were not seen as barriers to LDKT. We observed also that there are still uncertainties and a lack of awareness about the position of religion regarding living organ donation within communities, confusion due to varying interpretations of Holy Scriptures and misconceptions regarding the process of donation. Faith leaders play an important educational role and their opinion is influential. This study has identified modifiable factors which may contribute to the ethnic disparity in our living donation program. We argue that we need to strive for more clarity and awareness regarding the stance of religion on the issue of living donation in the local community. Faith leaders could be key figures in increasing awareness and alleviating uncertainty regarding living donation and transplantation. (shrink)

This paper seeks to counter the argument that since Aquinas’s natural law obligations necessarily presuppose the ability of practical reason to prescribeand proscribe for the sake of eudaimonia, it is irrational in cases of inescapable suffering to characterize any natural law obligation as indefeasible. Four possiblerebuttals of this argument from suffering are examined; but only three are judged successful. Their key premises are that, as Aristotle and Aquinas pointed out, this life’s eudaimonia is defined in terms of human nature and (...) not in terms of individual psychological conditions, e.g., suffering; that suffering does not negate the rationality of hoping for attaining eudaimonia in the future; and that suffering necessarily precludes neither the virtuous acts that per se constitute this life’s eudaimonia nor the love that enables one to experience eudaimonic joy. (shrink)

Oncogenic hyperplasia is the first and inevitable stage of formation of a (solid) tumor. This stage is also the core of many other proliferative diseases. The present work proposes the first minimal model that combines homeorhesis with oncogenic hyperplasia where the latter is regarded as a genotoxically activated homeorhetic dysfunction. This dysfunction is specified as the transitions of the fluid of cells from a fluid, homeorhetic state to a solid, hyperplastic-tumor state, and back. The key part of the model is (...) a nonlinear reaction-diffusion equation (RDE) where the biochemical-reaction rate is generalized to the one in the well-known Schlögl physical theory of the non-equilibrium phase transitions. A rigorous analysis of the stability and qualitative aspects of the model, where possible, are presented in detail. This is related to the spatially homogeneous case, i.e. when the above RDE is reduced to a nonlinear ordinary differential equation. The mentioned genotoxic activation is treated as a prevention of the quiescent G0-stage of the cell cycle implemented with the threshold mechanism that employs the critical concentration of the cellular fluid and the nonquiescent-cell-duplication time. The continuous tumor morphogeny is described by a time-space-dependent cellular-fluid concentration. There are no sharp boundaries (i.e. no concentration jumps exist) between the domains of the homeorhesis- and tumor-cell populations. No presumption on the shape of a tumor is used. To estimate a tumor in specific quantities, the model provides the time-dependent tumor locus, volume, and boundary that also points out the tumor shape and size. The above features are indispensable in the quantitative development of antiproliferative drugs or therapies and strategies to prevent oncogenic hyperplasia in cancer and other proliferative diseases. The work proposes an analytical-numerical method for solving the aforementioned RDE. A few topics for future research are suggested. (shrink)

"Midgley writes perceptively -- and beautifully -- about many things. But, in the end, it is the poetry, including the poetry of Midgley's prose, that makes the book worth reading." --Philip Clayton, Nature Science, according to the received wisdom of the day, can in the end answer any question we choose to put to it -- even the most fundamental questions about ourselves, our behavior and our cultures. Many go as far as to claim that science is all we need (...) to explain the world. But for Mary Midgley, science, while undeniably a key element in this quest, can never be the whole story as it cannot truly explain what it means to be human. In this typically crusading work, universally acclaimed as a classic on first publication, she powerfully asserts her corrective view that without poetry (or literature, or music, or history, even theology) we cannot hope to understand our humanity. Reading this remarkable book, which draws equally on both the great artists and poets for its inspiration, the reader is struck by both the simplicity and power of her argument and the sheer pleasure to be gained from reading one of our most accessible philosophers. (shrink)

David and Mary Norton present the definitive scholarly edition of one of the greatest philosophical works ever written. This first volume contains the critical text of David Hume's Treatise of Human Nature (1739/40), followed by the short Abstract (1740) in which Hume set out the key arguments of the larger work; the volume concludes with A Letter from a Gentleman to his Friend in Edinburgh (1745), Hume's defence of the Treatise when it was under attack from ministers seeking to (...) prevent Hume's appointment as Professor of Moral Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh. (shrink)

Extant philosophical accounts of schizophrenic alien thought neglect three clinically signifi cant features of the phenomenon. First, not only thoughts, but also impulses and feelings, are experienced as alien. Second, only a select array of thoughts, impulses, and feelings are experienced as alien. Th ird, empathy with experiences of alienation is possible. I provide an account of disownership that does justice to these features by drawing on recent work on delusions and selfknowledge. Th e key idea is that disownership occurs (...) when there is a failure of rational control over one’s mind. Th is produces a clash between the deliverances of introspection and practical enquiry as ways of knowing one’s mind. Th is explanation places disownership on a continuum with more common aspects of our psychological life, such as addiction, akrasia, obsessional thinking, and immoral, selfi sh or shameful thoughts. I conclude by addressing objections, and exploring the relevance of my account to questions in the philosophy of psychiatry concerning the validity of our current taxonomy of symptoms, and the nature of psychiatric classifi cation.. (shrink)

Suppose our visual experiences immediately justify some of our beliefs about the external world — that is, justify them in a way that does not rely on our having independent reason to hold any background belief. A key question now arises: Which of our beliefs about the external world can be immediately justified by experiences? I address this question in epistemology by doing some philosophy of mind. In particular, I evaluate the following proposal: if your experience e immediately justifies you (...) in believing that p , then (i) e has the content that p , and (ii) e ’s having the content that p is fixed by what it is like to have e . I start by clarifying this proposal and surveying the case in its favour. I then argue against the proposal and develop an alternative. The discussion shows what role visual consciousness plays and does not play in the justification of perceptual beliefs. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that Book II, Chapter viii of Locke' Essay is a unified, self-consistent whole, and that the appearance of inconsistency is due largely to anachronistic misreadings and misunderstandings. The key to the distinction between primary and secondary qualities is that the former are, while the latter are not, real properties, i.e., properties that exist in bodies independently of being perceived. Once the distinction is properly understood, it becomes clear that Locke's arguments for it are simple, valid (...) and (in one case) persuasive as well. (shrink)

In this paper I argue for three distinct, albeit mutually illuminating theses: first I explain why well informed eighteenth-century thinkers, e.g., the pre-critical Immanuel Kant and Richard Bentley, who had a very important correspondence with Newton, would have identified important aspects of Newton’s natural philosophy with (a species of modern) Epicureanism. Second, I explore how some significant changes to Newton’s Principia between the first (1687) and second (1713) editions can be explained in terms of attempts to reframe the Principia so (...) that the charge of “Epicureanism” can be deflected. In order to account for this I call attention to significant political and theological changes in the wake of the Glorious Revolution; as has been documented by others, it turns out that Bentley plays a non-trivial role in these matters. Third, I argue that there is an argument in Kant’s (1755) Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens that undermines a key claim in Newton’s General Scholium. I suggest that this particular argument reopens the door to Epicurean “blind necessity,” in particular, Spinozism. -/- . (shrink)

This is an essay in compositional semantics: the project of understanding how the meanings of sentences depend systematically on the meanings of their parts, and the way those meanings are combined. One way to model this process is to adapt tools from the study of modal or other intensional logics (see eg (Montague, 2002), (Gamut, 1991), (von Fintel and Heim, 2007)), and that’s the method I’ll be pursuing here. My particular task in this essay is to use data about sentences (...) with embedded clauses to provide evidence for theories of what those clauses denote. Call whatever clauses denote, according to a particular theory, that theory’s ‘propositions’; then this essay tries to adduce some evidence about what propositions are like. Here’s the plan: in §1, I’ll discuss a traditional idea—that propositions are sets of possible worlds—and point out some familiar problems with such an approach. In §2, I briefly outline two possible improvements on possible-worlds propositions that solve these familiar problems—circumstantialism and structuralism. The remainder of the paper comprises arguments against structuralism and in favor of (a certain form of) circumstantialism: in §3 I present arguments against structuralism, and in §4, I consider structuralist responses to these arguments, as well as an influential argument against circumstantialism. If these arguments are correct, then some startling conclusions follow—in particular, that the negation of classical logic, whatever its other virtues, cannot provide a correct semantics for negation in natural language. Two key pieces of notational stuff: I use boldface type for quotation (cuts down on quotes everywhere), and double brackets to talk about denotations of linguistic items. So, if we think names denote their bearers, then Mary = Mary. Here we go! 1 1 Problems with the possible-worlds approach.. (shrink)

Among the many philosophers who hold that causal facts1 are to be explained in terms of—or more ambitiously, shown to reduce to—facts about what happens, together with facts about the fundamental laws that govern what happens, the clear favorite is an approach that sees counterfactual dependence as the key to such explanation or reduction. The paradigm examples of causation, so advocates of this approach tell us, are examples in which events c and e—the cause and its effect—both occur, but: had (...) c not occurred, e would not have occurred either. From this starting point ideas proliferate in a vast profusion. But the remarkable disparity among these ideas should not obscure their common foundation. Neither should the diversity of opinion about the prospects for a philosophical analysis of causation obscure their importance. For even those philosophers who see these prospects as dim—perhaps because they suffer post-Quinean queasiness at the thought of any analysis of any concept of interest—can often be heard to say such things as that causal relations among events are somehow “a matter of” the patterns of counterfactual dependence to be found in them. It was not always so. Thirty-odd years ago, so-called “regularity” analyses (so-called, presumably, because they traced back to Hume’s well-known analysis of causation as constant conjunction) ruled the day, with Mackie’s Cement of the Universe embodying a classic statement. But they fell on hard times, both because of internal problems—which we will review in due course—and because dramatic improvements in philosophical understanding of counterfactuals made possible the emergence of a serious and potent rival: a counterfactual analysis of causation resting on foundations firm enough to be repel the kind of philosophical suspicion that had formerly warranted dismissal.. (shrink)

How can mental properties bring about physical effects, as they seem to do, given that the physical realizers of the mental goings-on are already sufficient to cause these effects? This question gives rise to the problem of mental causation (MC) and its associated threats of causal overdetermination, mental causal exclusion, and mental causal irrelevance. Some (e.g., Cynthia and Graham Macdonald, and Stephen Yablo) have suggested that understanding mental-physical realization in terms of the determinable/determinate relation (henceforth, 'determination') provides the key to (...) solving the problem of MC: if mental properties are determinables of their physical realizers, then (since determinables and determinates are distinct, yet don't causally compete) all three threats may be avoided. Not everyone agrees that determination can do this good work, however. Some (e.g., Douglas Ehring, Eric Funkhauser, and Sven Walter) object that mental-physical realization can't be determination, since such realization lacks one or other characteristic feature of determination. I argue that on a proper understanding of the features of determination key to solving the problem of MC, these arguments can be resisted. (shrink)

It has long been widely agreed that some concepts can be possessed only by those who have undergone a certain type of phenomenal experience. Orthodoxy among contemporary philosophers of mind has it that these phenomenal concepts provide the key to understanding many disputes between physicalists and their opponents, and in particular offer an explanation of Mary’s predicament in the situation exploited by Frank Jackson's knowledge argument. I reject the orthodox view; I deny that there are phenomenal concepts. My arguments (...) exploit the sort of considerations that are typically used to motivate externalism about mental content. Although physicalists often appeal to phenomenal concepts to defend their view against the knowledge argument, I argue that this is a mistake. The knowledge argument depends on phenomenal concepts; if there are no phenomenal concepts, then the knowledge argument fails. (shrink)

G. E. M. Anscombe’s view that agents know what they are doing “without observation” has been met with skepticism and the charge of confusion and falsehood. Simultaneously, some commentators think that Anscombe has captured an important truth about the first-personal character of an agent’s awareness of her actions. This paper attempts an explanation and vindication of Anscombe’s view. The key to the vindication lies in focusing on the role of practical knowledge in an agent’s knowledge of her actions. Few commentators, (...) with the exception of Moran (2004) and Hursthouse (2000), have gotten the emphasis right. The key to a proper interpretation of Anscombe’s views is to explain her claims within the context of her teleological theory of action. The result is a theory ofintentional action that makes self-knowledge of one’s own actions the norm. (shrink)

Metaethics has recently been confronted by evidence from cognitive neuroscience that tacit emotional processes play an essential causal role in moral judgement. Most neuroscientists, and some metaethicists, take this evidence to vindicate a version of metaethical sentimentalism. In this paper we argue that the ‘dual process’ model of cognition that frames the discussion within and without philosophy does not do justice to an important constraint on any theory of deliberation and judgement. Namely, decision-making is the exercise of a capacity for (...) agency. Agency, in turn, requires a capacity to conceive of oneself as temporally extended: to inhabit, in both memory and imagination, an autobiographical past and future. To plan, to commit to plans, and to act in accordance with previous plans requires a diachronic self, able to transcend the present moment. While this fact about agency is central to much of moral philosophy (e.g. in discussions of autonomy and moral responsibility) it is opaque to the dual process framework and those meta-ethical accounts which situate themselves within this model of cognition. We show how this is the case and argue for an empirically adequate account of moral judgement which gives sufficient role to memory and imagination as cognitive prerequisites of agency. We reconsider the empirical evidence, provide an alternative, agentive, interpretation of key findings, and evaluate the consequences for metaethics. (shrink)

Bringing together some of the world's leading Locke scholars, this collection provides an entre;e into the cutting-edge of the study of John Locke's philosophy. The nine chapters cover the breadth of Locke's philosophical interests from natural philosophy to politics and theology, from Locke's famous Essay concerning human understanding to his Two Treatises of Government. This volume provides a fresh analysis of many of the key ideas of this seminal thinker while simultaneously exploring new territory by the examination of manuscript materials (...) and some of Locke's ancillary publications which have never before been discussed. Topics examined include: *method in natural philosophy *Locke's concept of justice *Locke and colonialism *Locke's moral philosophy *Locke's Christology *Lockean logic Building upon expertise in textual scholarship and a rich awareness of Locke's intellectual and political context, this collection takes us a step closer to the historical Locke. At the same time however, it impresses upon us the power that many of Locke's ideas still exert today. This book will be of vital interest to philosophers and to all students of the history of ideas. (shrink)

Dennett depicts human minds as both deeply different from, yet profoundly continuous with, the minds of other animals and simple agents. His treatments of mind, consciousness, free will and human agency all reflect this distinctive dual perspective. There is, on the one hand, the (in)famous Intentional Stance, relative to which humans, dogs, insects and even the lowly thermostat (e.g. Dennett (1998) p.327) are all pronounced capable of believing and desiring in essentially the same theoretical sense. And there is, on the (...) other hand, a noteworthy (and increasing) insistence that human minds are special in that they exhibit a distinctive kind of “informational organization”: one that confers consciousness (Dennett (1998) p.347), and creates the space for agency, purpose, self-control (Dennett (1984) p.100), and “significant suffering” (Dennett (1998) p.351). What follows is a critical examination of this dual perspective, and of Dennett’s account of the key factor that makes us special - human language and our immersion in the sea of culture (Dennett (1998) p.146, (1996) p.130, (in press) p.7). In particular, I shall ask whether Dennett’s dual perspective masks a deeper tension in his accounts of consciousness and personhood, and whether the appeal to the transformative power of human language and culture can bear the heavy explanatory burden Dennett places upon it. These turn out to be significant challenges but ones which also help clarify the scope and power of this complex, multi-layered account. I end by commenting briefly on the wider significance of Dennett’s project as a major contribution to current debates concerning the continuity (or otherwise) of evolved cognitive strategies and the essentially hybrid (biological and non-biological) nature of human minds and persons. (shrink)

If Sam empathizes with Maria, then it is true of Sam that (1) Sam is aware of Maria's emotion, and (2) Sam ‘feels in tune’ with Maria. On what I call the transparency conception of how they interact when instantiated, I argue that these two conditions are collectively necessary and sufficient for empathy. I first clarify the ‘awareness’ and ‘feeling in tune’ conditions, and go on to examine different candidate models that explain the manner in which these two conditions might (...) come to be concomitantly instantiated in a subject. I dismiss what I call the parallel and oscillation models for not satisfying the transparency condition, i.e. for failing to capture that, if Sam empathizes with Maria, then Sam's own emotional experience towards the object of Maria's emotion has to be mediated by Maria's own emotional experience. I conclude in favour the fusion model as the only model capable of satisfying the transparency condition, and I argue that the suggested proposal illuminates the difference between it and other ways in which we understand the emotions of others. Finally, I expand and clarify the conception of empathy as transparency through responses to obvious objections that the view raises. Key Words: empathy • emotion • philosophy • psychology • simulation. (shrink)

I focus on a key argument for global external world scepticism resting on the underdetermination thesis: the argument according to which we cannot know any proposition about our physical environment because sense evidence for it equally justifies some sceptical alternative (e.g. the Cartesian demon conjecture). I contend that the underdetermination argument can go through only if the controversial thesis that conceivability is per se a source of evidence for metaphysical possibility is true. I also suggest a reason to doubt that (...) conceivability is per se a source of evidence for metaphysical possibility, and thus to doubt the underdetermination argument. (shrink)

Abstract: Kant follows a substantial tradition by defining judgment so that it must involve a relation of concepts, which raises the question of why he thinks that single-term existential judgments should still qualify as judgments. There is a ready explanation if Kant is somehow anticipating a Fregean second-order account of existence, an interpretation that is already widely held for separate reasons. This paper examines Kant's early (1763) critique of Wolffian accounts of existence, finding that it provides the key idea in (...) his mature model of existential judgment, which is in fact sharply opposed to the Fregean strategy. By relating this to Kant's theory of judgment in general—in particular, to his claim for an isomorphism between the assertoric function of judgment and the category of existence—a preliminary case is made that absolute positing, far from being a marginal special case, accomplishes the primary function of judgment. This argument shows the importance of distinguishing between contexts in which Kant is treating judgment as a vehicle for inference (e.g. pure general logic) and contexts in which he is treating it, more robustly, as the cognition of an object. (shrink)

ABSTRACT: This paper serves two purposes: (i) it can be used by students as an introduction to chapters 1-5 of book iii of the NE; (ii) it suggests an answer to the unresolved question what overall objective this section of the NE has. The paper focuses primarily on Aristotle’s theory of what makes us responsible for our actions and character. After some preliminary observations about praise, blame and responsibility (Section 2), it sets out in detail how all the key notions (...) of NE iii 1-5 are interrelated (Sections 3-9). The setting-out of these interconnections makes it then possible to provide a comprehensive interpretation of the purpose of the passage. Its primary purpose is to explain how agents are responsible for their actions not just insofar as they are actions of this kind or that, but also insofar as they are noble or base: agents are responsible for their actions qua noble or base, because, typically via choice, their character dispositions are a causal factor of those actions (Section 10). The paper illustrates the different ways in which agents can be causes of their actions by means of Aristotle’s four basic types of agents (Section 11). A secondary purpose of NE iii 1-5 is to explain how agents can be held responsible for consequences of their actions (Section 12), in particular for their character dispositions insofar as these are noble or base, i.e. virtues or vices (Section 13). These two goals are not the only ones Aristotle pursues in the passage. But they are the ones Aristotle himself indicates in its first sentence and summarizes in its last paragraph; and the ones that give the passage a systematic unity. The paper also briefly consider the issues of freedom-to-do-otherwise, free choice and free-will in the contexts in which they occur (i.e. in the final paragraphs of Sections 6, 7, 12, 13). (shrink)

The Buddhist epistemologist Dharmakīrti (fl. ca. 7th century C.E.) developed a theory of yogic perception that achieved much influence among Buddhist thinkers in India and Tibet. His theory includes an odd problem: on Dharmakīrti’s view, many of the paradigmatic objects of the adept’s meditations do not really exist. How can one cultivate a meditative perception of the nonexistent? This ontological difficulty stems from Dharmakīrti’s decision to construe the Four Noble Truths as the paradigmatic objects of yogic perception. For him, this (...) ontological problem manifests in an epistemological corollary: “impermanence” (anityatā) and other features of the Noble Truths are conceptual, but the adept’s meditative perception of them must be nonconceptual. How can a nonconceptual cognition apprehend a conceptual object? A key aspect of Dharmakīrti’s theory of concepts provides a solution to this problem. Specifically, Dharmakīrti maintains that a concept, when taken as a mental event, can be considered a particular and thus an object of nonconceptual cognition. Taking this approach, Dharmakīrti downplays the notion that yogic perception is an encounter with real things in the world, in part because it is phenomenally akin to hallucination. Instead, what counts for Dharmakīrti—and what differentiates the adept’s realization from the madman’s hallucination—are the salvific effects induced by the meditative experience. (shrink)

Self-awareness represents the capacity of becoming the object of one’s own attention. In this state one actively identifies, processes, and stores information about the self. This paper surveys the self-awareness literature by emphasizing definition issues, measurement techniques, effects and functions of self-attention, and antecedents of self-awareness. Key self-related concepts (e.g., minimal, reflective consciousness) are distinguished from the central notion of self-awareness. Reviewed measures include questionnaires, implicit tasks, and self-recognition. Main effects and functions of self-attention consist in selfevaluation, escape from the (...) self, amplification of one's subjective experience, increased self-knowledge, self-regulation, and inferences about others' mental states (Theory-of-Mind). A neurocognitive and socioecological model of self-awareness is described in which the role of face-to-face interactions, reflected appraisals, mirrors, media, inner speech, imagery, autobiographical knowledge, and neurological structures is underlined. (shrink)

The enactive approach offers a distinctive view of how mental life relates to bodily activity at three levels: bodily self-regulation, sensorimotor coupling, and intersubjective in- teraction. This paper concentrates on the second level of sensorimotor coupling. An account is given of how the subjectively lived body and the living body of the organism are related (the body-body problem) via dynamic sensorimotor activity, and it is shown how this account helps to bridge the explanatory gap between consciousness and the brain. Arguments (...) by O'Regan, No¨e, and Myin that seek to account for the phenomenal character of perceptual consciousness in terms of 'bodiliness' and 'grabbiness' are considered. It is suggested that their account does not pay sufficient attention to two other key aspects of perceptual phenomenality: the autonomous nature of the experiencing self or agent, and the pre-reflective nature of bodily self-consciousness. (shrink)

There are two interrelated but distinct programs which go by the name evolutionary epistemology. One attempts to account for the characteristics of cognitive mechanisms in animals and humans by a straightforward extension of the biological theory of evolution to those aspects or traits of animals which are the biological substrates of cognitive activity, e.g., their brains, sensory systems, motor systems, etc. (EEM program). The other program attempts to account for the evaluation of ideas, scientific theories and culture in general by (...) using models and metaphors drawn from evolutionary biology (EET program). The paper begins by distinguishing the two programs and discussing the relationship between them. The next section addresses the metaphorical and analogical relationship between evolutionary epistemology and evolutionary biology. Section IV treats the question of the locus of the epistemological problem in the light of an evolutionary analysis. The key questions here involve the relationship between evolutionary epistemology and traditional epistemology and the legitimacy of evolutionary epistemology as epistemology. Section V examines the underlying ontological presuppositions and implications of evolutionary epistemology. Finally, section VI, which is merely the sketch of a problem, addresses the parallel between evolutionary epistemology and evolutionary ethics. (shrink)

By accepting that the formal structure of human language is the key to understanding the uniquity of human culture and consciousness and by further accepting the late appearance of such language amongst the Cro-Magnon, I am free to focus on the causes that led to such an unprecedented threshold crossing. In the complex of causes that led to human being, I look to scholarship in linguistics, mythology, anthropology, paleontology, and to creation myths themselves for an answer. I conclude that prehumans (...) underwent an existential crisis, i.e., the realization of certain mortality, that could be borne only by the discovery-creation of the larger realm of symbolic consciousness once experienced as the sacred (but today we know it as "the world" – as opposed to our immediate natural environment and that of other animals). Thus, although we, the human species, are but one species among innumerable others, we differ in kind, not degree. This quality is our symbolically enabled self-consciousness, the fortress of cultural identity that empowers but also imprisons awareness. (shrink)