This book challenges the widespread view of Kierkegaard’s idiosyncratic and predominantly religious position on mimesis. -/- Taking mimesis as a crucial conceptual point of reference in reading Kierkegaard, this book offers a nuanced understanding of the relation between aesthetics and religion in his thought. Kaftanski shows how Kierkegaard's dialectical-existential reading of mimesis interlaces aesthetic and religious themes, including the familiar core concepts of imitation, repetition, and admiration as well as the newly arisen notions of affectivity, contagion, and crowd behavior. Kierkegaard’s (...) enduring relevance to the malaises of our own day is firmly established by his classic concern for the meaning of human life informed by reflective meditation on the mimeticorigins of the contemporary age.​ -/- Kierkegaard, Mimesis, and Modernity will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working on Kierkegaard, Continental philosophy, the history of aesthetics, and critical and religious studies. (shrink)

This article engages the considerations of imagination in Kierkegaard and Ricoeur to argue for a moral dimension of the imagination and its objects. Imaginary objects are taken to be mental representations in images and narratives of people or courses of action that are not real in the sense that they are not actual, or have not yet happened. Three claims are made in the article. First, by drawing on the category of possibility, a conceptual distinction is established between imagination and (...) fantasy, (1) I claim that imagination has a moral dimension because it is engaged in considering real-life possibilities. Second, (2) drawing on Kierkegaard and Ricoeur, it is argued that mental representations of selfhood in imagination have a moral dimension because they essentially allow people to understand the development of agency in human selfhood by means of representations of would-be selves and narrative figurations of the self. Third, (3) mental representations of human selves have a moral dimension because they form important points of reference for moral orientations in the field of human praxis (moral pointers). (shrink)

By spelling out the affective dimension of admiration, this paper challenges the view of admiration as a trustworthy means of detecting morally desirable qualities in exemplars. Such a view of admiration, foundational for the current debate on exemplars in moral education, holds that admiration is a self-motivating emotion essentially oriented toward the good and the excellent. I demonstrate that this view ignores the affective aspects of admiration explored widely in the history of philosophy on which the debate on moral exemplars (...) substantially draws. Focusing on Spinoza, Smith, Kierkegaard, and Nietzsche, I bring to light their largely skeptical views of the moral value of admiration. These thinkers indicate that admiration can be influenced by, and is often conflated with, other emotions, and can arise in us through behavioral mimicry; moreover, admiration is often oriented toward the mediocre and corrupt, is contagious, self-referential, collective, and has limited motivational power. Their remarks on the affective dimension of admiration call into question admiration’s applicability and usefulness in moral exemplarity. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This article argues for a unique role of imagination and mental images in the moral education of students. Imagination is rendered here as a capacity oriented toward realizable and salient goals; mental images are understood as particular future-oriented self-representations (FOSRs) devised by and held in imagination. FOSRs have four moral attributes: they are 1) expressive of us as moral agents, 2) shape our moral identity, 3) serve as moral pointers, and 4) help devise mitigating strategies. FOSRs can be created (...) and utilized in educational settings to further the goals of moral education by i) fostering sensitivity to moral situations among students, ii) motivating learners to act morally, iii) facilitating environments supportive of moral practice and moral habituation, and iv) helping strengthen cross-situational consistency of moral action. The four moral attributes of future-oriented self-representations (FOSRs) (1–4) that are to be engaged in moral education to further its goals (i–iv) are correlated with four elements of moral education, namely: a) moral awareness; b) moral competency; c) moral motivation; and d) moral capacity. To argue for the special role of imagination and mental images in moral education this paper integrates philosophical research and conceptual and empirical studies in psychology and education on the morality of imagination and mental images. (shrink)

This article reevaluates the origins of Kierkegaard’s concept of imitation. It challenges the general approach to the genealogy of the phenomenon in question, which privileges the influence of various religious traditions on the thinker and ignores his exposure to the non-Christian literature. I contend that a close reading of the Apology, the Sophist, the Republic, and the Phaedo alongside Kierkegaard’s texts from the so-called second authorship reveals in the dialogues of Plato the three crucial aspects of Kierkegaard’s concept of imitation, (...) namely the phenomenon of following after, the existential, and the non-imitative character of imitation. Lastly, I show that, apart from striving to be a follower/an imitator of Christ, Kierkegaard perceives himself as a follower/an imitator of Socrates. This means that the life of the imitator of Christ is the examined life in the Socratic sense. (shrink)

This paper challenges the general approach to Kierkegaard ’ s engagement with imitation, which privileges a strictly religious reading. Heretofore imitation has been apprehended as a coherent concept shaped within the context of imitatio Christi in the devotio moderna. I locate Kierkegaard ’ s writings in the broader context of mimesis. Analysing particular mimetic structures woven into the text, I show that a plurality of imitative models that are different fromChrist occurs therein. Addressing the distinction between the religious and the (...) aesthetic in Kierkegaard, I inquire into the status of these imitative models. Referring to the term “ Mellembestemmelserne ” and “ ekphrasis ”— the rhetorical de- vice of aesthetics — I show that the other models of imitation exhibit supportive roles to the highest type of prototype (Christ) and therefore question the solely religious rendering of mimesis and the aesthetic confines of Kierkegaard ’ s concept of aesthetics. (shrink)

Through an analysis of Kierkegaard’s and Dostoevsky’s approaches to the theme of the death of Christ – one of the major leitmotifs in the debate of their contemporaries conveyed through theological and philosophical considerations, but also expressed in novels and in art – I show how the thinkers comprehended and articulated in their works the religious challenges awaiting the modern man.

This essay discusses the role of mimesis in bringing about the images of the crucified Christ, the self, and the martyr as overlooked parts of Kierkegaard!s pseudonymous texts. With respect to mimesis I focus on imitation, representation and resemblance.3 With regard to Kierkegaard!s “Does a Human Being Have the Right to Let Himself Be Put to Death for the Truth?” I argue that its author H.H. introduces the mimetic concept of self and its textual process of formation. I claim that (...) H.H.'s concept of martyr is deeply mimetic and represents Kierkegaard's own vision of himself. In my exposition I employ Rene Girard's theory of “mimetic desire” and Paul Ricoeur's concept of “mimetic arc.”. (shrink)

Polskie przepisy prawne formułujące warunki dopuszczalności eksperymentu medycznego, a więc ipso facto wyznaczające jego granice, można różnorako interpretować, zwłaszcza w tym zakresie, w jakim określają wymagany dla przeprowadzenia eksperymentu bilans związanych z nim możliwych korzyści i szkód. W artykułach prawniczych komentujących te przepisy w zasadzie jednak brak prób systematycznego i (na tyle, na ile pozwala na to sam przedmiot analizy) ścisłego wyróżnienia tych interpretacji w języku tzw. teorii racjonalnego wyboru (rational choice theory), teorii szczególnie przydatnej w tym kontekście z uwagi (...) na jej rozbudowany aparat pojęciowy pozwalający badać różnorakie konfiguracje relacji między costs i benefits. Artykuł próbuje wypełnić tę lukę: wyróżnione w nim zostały różne interpretacje przepisów prawnych określających warunki dopuszczalności eksperymentu medycznego; interpretacje te zostały również poddane ocenie. (shrink)

The monograph of Jacek Zieliński, The Concept of Creatio ex Nihilo in the Thought of the Greek Apologists of the 2nd century, published by Wroclaw’s Atut in 2013, discusses an important problem of the theory of creation from nothing. It also asks an important question, how far the elements of the concept, articulated in its final form only by Augustine of Hippo can be found in the writings of the Christian apologists of the 2nd century. It is an important question, (...) especially that the Bible in its canonical form, the early extra-biblical Jewish literature or – even more – Greek tradition does not unambiguously advocate the concept creatio ex nihilo. Hence the question how, when and why the concept was articulated, since it played such an important role in the Christian thought of later centuries. In addition, the book of Jacek Zielinski is important in Polish market, because there are only a few serious publications dealing with the issue. The article gives a description and short analysis of the book, pinpointing its strong sights and showing areas, which could be strengthened in this and — hopefully — following publications on creatio ex nihilo by Jacek Zieliński. (shrink)

We explore how conspiracy beliefs change the effectiveness of gain- vs. loss-framed messages in promoting health-protective behavior. We focused on various recommended COVID-19 protective measures, not only vaccinations but also other preventive (like wearing masks) and detection behaviors (like testing). Our results indicate that conspiracy beliefs moderate the effectiveness of gain vs. loss framing. When participants endorse conspiracy worldviews above the average level, the gain frame may be more effective than the loss frame. In other words, in the loss frame (...) condition, conspiracy beliefs negatively and significantly predicted attitudes toward the behavior recommended. However, in the case of the gain frame, the relationship between conspiracist views and attitudes toward promoted behavior was weaker or even nonsignificant. We also found, although only in the case of one behavior, that when participants' eagerness to look for conspiracies almost does not exist, the loss frame may be a better option than the gain frame. Finally, neither of these effects was mediated by emotional reactance or anxiety. (shrink)

The presented study includes an analysis of the category of ‘good’ on the basis of philosophy and economics. Particular attention was paid here to the factors determining the monetary value (price) of an economic good. While achieving the assumed objective of the research, answers to the following questions were sought: What is the difference, therefore, in the interpretation of good as an axiomatic category and good which the economy deals with? What is the basis for the valuation of goods which (...) are the subject of economic analysis? While seeking answers to these questions, an attempt was made to justify the thesis according to which contemporary understanding of the way of valuating goods by the market is limited to accepting the price understood as a variable representing a kind of relationship set in a given time period. (shrink)

Qu'est-ce que l'homme? En se basant sur l'anthropologie à la fois d'Aristote et de Saint Thomas d'Aquin, Maritain propose une conception de l'homme dans laquelle la morale est étroitement liée aux composantes ontologiques dans l'être humain. Le personnalisme de Maritain met l'accent sur le caractère communautaire de l'humanisme. L'homme s'accomplit au moment où il se donne à soi-même et aux autres. Ces deux dimensions du don sont constitutives pour que l'homme s'épanouisse intégralement et pleinement : le don à l'égard de (...) soi-même (la surexistence en connaissance et en amour) et le don à l'égard des autres (le service du bien commun). (shrink)

The article is dedicated to the problems of European political identity and European identity as a whole conception and as a foundation for European integration. Before 24 February 2022, European political identity had been in crisis. The contradictions between the EU member states seemed to be hardly resolvable. The Russian aggression against Ukraine gave a strong impetus to the formation of European identity. However, it is still a negative incentive for unity and solidarity rather than cohesion around positive values, as (...) well as from the outset the European integration was caused by devastating World War II as a negative experience, which should never be repeated. The text makes use of methods peculiar to the philosophical sciences, i.e. critical textual analysis, historical-analytical and comparative methods. (shrink)

The thesis that legal norms are rooted in theology is not new. It is worth considering, however, to what extent not only singular norms, but also models of normativity are the structural representation of theological concepts. In this article, I consider transubstantiation as one of such ideas. I analyse its place in two political theologies published at the same time (in 1922): Carl Schmitt’s Political Theology and James Joyce’s Ulysses. I argue that both thinkers used the idea of transubstantiation as (...) a normative mechanism to deal with anomie that encompassed European societies after the First World War. (shrink)

The presentation of the formal conception of noemata is the main aim of the article. In the first section, three informal approaches to noemata are discussed. The goal of this chapter is specifying main controversies and their sources concerned with different ways of the understanding of noemata. In the second section, basic assumptions determining the proposed way of understanding noemata are presented. The third section is devoted to the formal set-theoretic construction needed for the formal comprehension of noemata. In the (...) fourth section, definitions of noemata and their various kinds, as well as definitions of other phenomenological notions are formulated. In the last section, possibilities of further developing the proposed formal conception are indicated. (shrink)

The Limits of Cognition and the Shape of Being Based on the Thought of Karl Jaspers The article points out the elements of Karl Jaspers’ epistemological conception that cross out the possibility of a comprehensive account of being. The key issue here is the limits of cognition, which take the form of object cognition. The theme of limits points to the inadequacies of human thinking in the context of quantifiable and absolutist representations of reality. The impossibility of adequately grasping the (...) totality of reality will be illustrated here by means of the criticism Jaspers levelled at absolutising metaphysics. In connection with the description of the structure of cognition proposed by Jaspers, the article points out the conceptual proximity of the issue of worldview and metaphysics in the light of the thought of the cited author. (shrink)

Recenzja: Mark van Roojen, Metaethics: A Contemporary Introduction, New York and London, Routledge, 2015.

Tekst stanowi próbę pomyślenia instytucji stanu wyjątkowego w ramach logiki monistycznej, która by nie naruszała podstaw demokracji liberalnej: jako instrumentu prawnego do zwalczenia zagrożenia, przed którym stoi państwo, przy użyciu narzędzi z porządku norm sprzed wystąpienia sytuacji ekstraordynaryjnej. Autor analizuje trzy możliwości takiej logiki, wywodząc ją z koncepcji m. in. libertarianizmu Roberta Nozicka, instytucjonalizmu Nomi Claire Lazar czy liberalnego realizmu Jeremy’ego Waldrona i aplikując do zapisów Konstytucji RP z 1997 r.

Le Maitre de Claville należy do tradycji moralistycznej klasycyzmu francuskiego i stara się podołać niebagatelnemu zadaniu stworzenia portretu człowieka godnego, honnete homme’a. Usiłując zdefiniować pojęcie cnoty, odwołuje się do własnego smaku estetycznego, subiektywnych emocji radości, zachwytu i rozkoszy wynikających z obcowania z pięknem. Z dużą dowolnością wybiera to, co sam uważa za najdoskonalsze z antyku, Biblii i w najnowszych prądach myślowych swego czasu: m.in. racjonalizmu. Połączenie tych trzech elementow nie jest łatwe. W jego rozważaniach ujawnia się wysiłek moralisty starającego się (...) nadać swej koncepcji kształt logicznie uporządkowanej doktryny, z elementow swobodnie wybranych, nie zawsze ze sobą zgodnych. (shrink)

The main aim of this paper is to challenge the validity of the distinction between legal justice and social justice. It is argued that what we usually call legal justice is either an application of the more fundamental notion of social justice to legal rules and decisions or is not a matter of justice at all. In other words, the only correct uses of the notion of legal justice are derivative from the notion of social justice and, hence, the alleged (...) conflicts between criteria of social and legal justice result from the confusion about the proper relationship between these two concepts. Two views about the social justice/legal justice dichotomy are of particular importance and will provide the focus for the argument: this dichotomy is sometimes identified with a classical distinction between distributive and commutative justice and sometimes with the distinction between substantive and procedural justice. (shrink)

We propose a non-standard interpretation of Alternating-time Temporal Logic with imperfect information, for which no commonly accepted semantics has been proposed yet. Rather than changing the semantic structures, we generalize the usual interpretation of formulae in single states to sets of states. We also propose a new epistemic operator for ?practical? or ?constructive? knowledge, and we show that the new logic (which we call Constructive Strategic Logic) is strictly more expressive than most existing solutions, while it retains the same model (...) checking complexity. Finally, we study properties of constructive knowledge and other operators in this non-standard semantics. (shrink)

During the last half of the twentieth century, legal philosophy (or legal theory or jurisprudence) has grown significantly. It is no longer the domain of a few isolated scholars in law and philosophy. Hundreds of scholars from diverse fields attend international meetings on the subject. In some universities, large lecture courses of five hundred students or more study it. The primary aim of the Law and Philosophy Library is to present some of the best original work on legal philosophy from (...) both the Anglo-American and European traditions. Not only does it help make some of the best work avail able to an international audience, but it also encourages increased awareness of, and interaction between, the two major traditions. The primary focus is on full-length scholarly monographs, although some edited volumes of original papers are also included. The Library editors are assisted by an Editorial Advisory Board of internationally renowed scholars. Legal philosophy should not be considered a narrowly circumscribed field. (shrink)

With the meaning of trust, good faith and respect for promises made, protection, or assistance, fides in the non-exclusively religious sense of the word comes from the demand for ethical perfection: as such, it is omnipresent in human relations and in the dynamic of societies in the Middle Ages.

Unraveling molecular and functional heterogeneity of niche cells within the developing endoderm could resolve mechanisms of tissue formation and maturation. Here, we discuss current unknowns in molecular mechanisms underlying key developmental events in pancreatic islet and intestinal epithelial formation. Recent breakthroughs in single‐cell and spatial transcriptomics, paralleled with functional studies in vitro, reveal that specialized mesenchymal subtypes drive the formation and maturation of pancreatic endocrine cells and islets via local interactions with epithelium, neurons, and microvessels. Analogous to this, distinct intestinal (...) niche cells regulate both epithelial development and homeostasis throughout life. We propose how this knowledge can be used to progress research in the human context using pluripotent stem cell‐derived multilineage organoids. Overall, understanding the interactions between the multitude of microenvironmental cells and how they drive tissue development and function could help us make more therapeutically relevant in vitro models. (shrink)

Przemiany społeczno-ekonomiczne, kryzysy polityczne, zmiany w kulturze, nauce i technice mogą postawić prawnika oraz „zwykłego” obywatela nie tylko przed koniecznością odpowiedzi na pytanie, „co jest zgodne z konstytucją?”, ale również przed kwestią, „czym jest sama konstytucja?”.Prezentowana monografia poświęcona jest dwóm teoriom konstytucji, których analiza pozwala uwydatnić dwa aspekty jej pojęcia. Konstytucja bowiem z jednej strony stanowi tzw. prawo wyższe, a z drugiej realizuje określoną ideę polityczną. Rozważania zawarte w niniejszej książce rozpoczynają od analizy odpowiedzi Immanuela Kanta na pytanie, w jaki (...) sposób w pojęciu konstytucji łączą się kwestie jej prawnej ważności oraz normatywnej słuszności. Następnie autor przechodzi do zbadania dwóch teorii, które wyrastają z Kantowskiej filozofii: czystej teorii prawa Hansa Kelsena i liberalizmu politycznego Johna Rawlsa. Pierwsza jest nastawiona na deskrypcję norm pozytywnych. Druga formułuje idee o charakterze normatywnym. Pierwsza chce opisywać, druga wyznaczać ustrojowe maximum, do którego powinniśmy zmierzać. W obydwu teoriach konstytucja zajmuje szczególne miejsce. Zawarta w niniejszej monografii ich interpretacja podporządkowana jest zagadnieniu istoty demokratycznej konstytucji, która w formie prawa wyższego wyraża demokratyczną treść.Na ich podstawie następuje próba odpowiedzi na pytanie o naturę demokratycznej konstytucji. (shrink)

In the paper there is presented the semantic interpretation of idealism/ realism controversy which is one of the most essential issues in Ingarden’s phenomenological project of ontology. The procedure of semantic paraphrase which is contemporary developed by Wolen´ ski, is the main interpretative tool. In the central part of the paper, there is formulated the formal theory of the semantic framework underlying idealism/realism discourse. Finally, there are formulated some notes showing that intentional conception of negation may be used for defending (...) various idealistic positions. (shrink)

In [4], I proved that the product-free fragment L of Lambek's syntactic calculus (cf. Lambek [2]) is not finitely axiomatizable if the only rule of inference admitted is Lambek's cut-rule. The proof (which is rather complicated and roundabout) was subsequently adapted by Kandulski [1] to the non-associative variant NL of L (cf. Lambek [3]). It turns out, however, that there exists an extremely simple method of non-finite-axiomatizability proofs which works uniformly for different subsystems of L (in particular, for NL). We (...) present it below to the use of those who refer to the results of [1] and [4]. (shrink)

In this paper, I present a new account of Richard Rorty’s interpretation of Michel Foucault, which demonstrates that in the course of his career, Rorty presented several diverse (often mutually exclusive) criticisms of Foucault’s political thought. These give different interpretations of what he took to be the flaws of that thought, but also provide different explanations as to the sources of these flaws. I argue that Rorty’s specific criticisms can be divided into two overall groups. Sometimes he saw Foucault’s rejection (...) of bourgeois democracies and bourgeois utopias as a specific case of his general critique regarding the structures of social life as inherently oppressive. At other times he seemed to attribute to Foucault a view that—while not all forms of social life are inherently oppressive—bourgeois democracies certainly are, in a very specific and radical way. In conclusion I show that Rorty’s interpretation of Foucault should be understood in the context of his approach toward the ‘American Cultural Left.’. (shrink)

In this paper, we present two experimental studies on reference of complex demonstratives. The results of our experiments challenge the dominant view in philosophy of language, according to which demonstrative reference is determined by the speaker's intentions. The first experiment shows that in a context where there are two candidates for the referent—one determined by the speaker’s intention, the other by some “external” factors—people prefer to identify the referent of a demonstrative with the latter object. The external factors for which (...) this prediction has been confirmed include the speaker’s demonstration and the descriptive content of a demonstrative. The second experiment shows that while this preference can be explained in terms of the speakers’ having different sorts of referential intentions, the relevant kind of intentions are fully opaque to the subjects. At the end of our paper, we point to some alternative accounts of demonstrative reference, including a pluralistic and hybrid approach, which can accommodate our experimental results. (shrink)

This is a completely revised and updated second edition of Rights Before Courts (2005, paper edition 2008). This book carefully examines the most recent wave of the emergence and case law of activist constitutional courts: those that were set up after the fall of communism in Central and Eastern Europe. In contrast to most other analysts and scholars, the study does not take for granted that they are a "force for good" but rather subjects them to critical scrutiny against a (...) background of wide-ranging comparative and theoretical analysis of constitutional judicial review in the modern world. The new edition takes in new case law and constitutional developments in the decade since the first edition, including considering the recent disturbing disempowerment of the Hungarian Constitutional Court (which previously was probably the most powerful constitutional court in the world) resulting from the fundamental constitutional changes brought about by the Fidesz government. (shrink)