The paper examines Amartya Sen’s seminal work Development and Freedom (1999) in relation to his underlying conception of justice and particularly in relation to the tension that arises in the correlation between basic freedom and basic goods. The idea is to address the question as to which of the two elements (basic goods or basic freedoms) takes precedence to the enactment of global justice. The paper advances a particular distinction between a foundational approach and a functional approach when addressing the (...) question of the priority and primacy of any of the two elements and sheds light on a contentious answer, namely, that basic goods are foundationally primary in relation to basic freedoms and that such a primacy does not rule out the functional priority of basic freedoms. (shrink)

El tema de la hospitalidad fue suficientemente analizado por Jacques Derrida, el pensador francés de la deconstrucción. Este artículo busca investigar la cuestión de la hospitalidad considerando la oposición radical, la aporía, entre la ley de la hospitalidad incondicional, en su singularidad universal, y las leyes de la hospitalidad condicional. ¿Quién se encuentra apto para la hospitalidad? ¿Alguien que dice su nombre? ¿Una sujeto de derecho? ¿Un extranjero? Exploraremos algunas de las condiciones para responder a esta pregunta: la hospitalidad como (...) un asunto del lugar, como un asunto del lenguaje y como un asunto del nombre. (shrink)

This study aimed to determine the predictive character of organizational socialization and occupational positive mental health on organizational commitment in higher education teachers. A sample of 279 teachers from higher education institutions who signed an informed consent form was used. Fifty-four point five percent of the participants were women, with a mean age of 44.05 years. The participants completed the Organizational Socialization Inventory, the Positive Occupational Mental Health Questionnaire and the Organizational Commitment Scale, and for data analysis descriptive statistics, correlation (...) analysis and multiple linear regression with stepwise method were applied, entering each dimension of organizational commitment separately as a dependent variable. As a result, moderate to weak correlations were identified between the study variables, and it was found that the final models indicate that the future perspectives and socio-affective dimensions predict affective commitment by 38%; that future perspectives, spirituality and age predict normative commitment by 22.8%; and that the future perspectives dimension predicts commitment of continuity by 9.2%. It is concluded that teachers’ expectations about their development in the institution, as well as their interactions at the socio-affective and spiritual level with the work context, are factors that partially influence their attachment to the educational organization. (shrink)

El artículo examina una serie de tensiones y conflictos propios del así llamado cosmopolitismo institucional y su correlato: la idea de la justicia global. Se persiguen dos tipos de reflexión, a saber, una reflexión propositiva respecto del sentido de la idea de justicia global y su vínculo con la justicia doméstica (nacional), y, por otro lado, una reflexión defensiva y dirigida a los escépticos respecto de la posibilidad de una teoría de la justicia conglomerante, según lo denomina Amartya Sen. Se (...) dibujarán las líneas argumentativas básicas en defensa del cosmopolitismo institucional, desde las cuales se hace posible capturar, sin contradicción, las demandas de la así llamada justicia social doméstica, esto es, la justicia en el contexto estricto de los Estado-nación particulares. (shrink)

Psychological flexibility is a key concept of acceptation and commitment therapy. This factor has been linked with psychological wellbeing and associated factors, such as quality of life, in cancer patients. These and other positive results of acceptation and commitment therapy in cancer patients found in previous research could be enhanced by using mhealth tools. A three-arm randomized superiority clinical trial, with a pre-post-follow-up repeated measures intergroup design with a 1:1:1 allocation ratio is proposed. A hundred and twenty cancer patients will (...) be randomly assigned to one of the following interventions: face-to-face ACT + mobile application, face-to-face ACT, and Waitlist control group. The primary expected outcome is to observe significant improvements in psychological flexibility acceptance and action questionnaire- II in the face-to-face ACT + app group, after comparing baseline and post-treatment scores, and the scores will remain stable in the two assessment points, 3 and 6 months after the intervention. Secondary expected outcomes are significant increasing scores in quality of life and post-traumatic-growth, and significant decreasing scores in anxiety and depression, insomnia and fatigue at the same assessment points. Also, it is expected that the scores of this group will be higher than the scores of the face-to-face ACT group and the waitlist control group. This study aims to assess the efficacy of a combined intervention for psychological flexibility and associated symptoms in cancer patients. The results of this protocol may help to consider the use of acceptation and commitment therapy and mhealth applications in cancer settings as a valid therapeutic choice.Clinical Trial Registration[www.ClinicalTrials.gov], identifier [NCT05126823]. (shrink)

Hacemos una lectura del “Tratado sobre los principios de la teología” de Guillermo de Occam, y echamos un vistazo a la Escolástica tardía que esta obra representa tan bien, revisando diferentes referencias bibliográficas, que me han permitido conocer y analizar diferentes conceptos y enfoques acerca de este singular tema. De hecho, se trata de una obra mayor, de gran calibre, pero de autor incierto, generalmente atribuida a Occam, aunque la autoría real está en disputa. Lo cierto es que se trata (...) de un momento culminante de una época de la historia del pensamiento occidental; una en la que su autor, con briosa arquitectura, levanta un edificio que perenniza el pensar occamista, comentándolo, glosándolo y dándole forma enciclopédica, minuciosa, como la que uno esperaría encontrar en un diccionario o un manual del Nominalismo naciente. (shrink)

El propósito de este artículo consiste en mostrar el carácter social del contractualismo de Fichte. Para realizar ese propósito se comienza examinando la conexión entre trabajo y ciudadanía como una condición de la legitimidad política. Luego se presenta esa conexión en el marco del siempre posible desarrollo histórico de la naturaleza humana. Por último, se indican las razones de la recepción de Fichte como un precursor del socialismo germánico.

In this paper, it is presented a historical account of the formulation of the quantum relativistic wave equation of an electron – the Dirac equation, issues regarding its interpretation that arose from the very beginning, and the later formulation of this equation in relation to a quantized electron-positron field, which implies a new interpretation. The way in which solutions obtained under each interpretation of the equation relate to one another is also considered for the simple case of hydrogen-like problems.

Review of: Communauté (Gemeinschaft), Martin Buber (2018) Paris: Éditions de l’éclat, 157 pp., ISBN 978-2-84162-432-4, p/bk, €10.

With special relativity, we seem to be facing a conundrum. It is a very well-tested theory; in this way, the Minkowski spacetime must be “capturing” essential features of space and time. However, its geometry seems to be incompatible with any sort of global notion of time. We might only have local notions of now (present moment) and time flow, at best. In this note, we will explore the possibility that a pretty much global notion of now (and time flow) might (...) be hiding in plain sight in the geometry of the Minkowski spacetime. (shrink)

The circularity problem states that the representationalist about phenomenal consciousness gives a circular explanation if she adopts the classic view about secondary qualities, such as colours, that characterises them as dispositions to produce experiences with a specifi c phenomenal character. Since colour primitivism faces severe diffi culties, it seems that colour physicalism is the only viable option for the representationalist. I will argue that the representationalist is not committed to colour physicalism because she can adopt an anti-realist theory of colour. (...) My diagnosis is that the alleged commitment to colour physicalism rests upon the acceptance of colour realism which is due to the approval of externalist versions of representationalism, such as tracking representationalism. I will argue that the representationalist can deal with the circularity problem by adopting figurative projectivism, which holds that colours are contingently non-instantiated properties that only figure in the representational contents of colour experiences. (shrink)

This book is about politics, political theory, and political philosophy. Although these disciplines are often conflated because they interact, they actually are distinct. Political theory is part of political science, whereas political philosophy is a hybrid of political theory and philosophy. The former discipline is descriptive and explanatory, whereas the latter is prescriptive--to the point that it is often called "normative theory." It is in fact the evaluative study of political societies. Whereas political theorists describe and explain politics, political philosophers (...) examine it critically and venture to suggest improvements and, on occasion, radically different social futures. Political philosophers propose scenarios and dreams where political scientists offer snapshots of existing polities. While these disciplines are distinct, Mario Bunge asserts that they must inform each other. Political philosophy is not yet a well-defined field: it hovers between political theory and utopian fantasizing. Few, if any earlier thinkers could have anticipated any of the most pressing political issues of our time, such as the need to stop global warming, reduce nuclear armaments, stop the rise of inequality between individuals and nations, and fight authoritarianism, particularly when it comes disguised as democracy or as socialism. Not even more recent social thinkers had much to say about such topical issues as environmental degradation, gender and race discriminations, participative democracy, nationalism, imperialism, the North-South divide, resource wars, the industrial-military complex, or the connections between poverty and environmental degradation, and between inequality and bad health. Beyond ideological divergences, most political philosophers have been nearly unanimous in their indifference to the plight of the Third World. Bunge does not share that indifference. He also believes that political philosophers should pay more attention to numbers, such as the standard index of income inequality and the more comprehensive United Nations human development index for the various nations. It is pointless to write about redistributive policies unless we have some of idea of current wealth distribution. This is, in short a modern treatise of inherited concerns. (shrink)

En este trabajo realizo un examen crítico del reciente libro de Silvana Gabriela Di Camillo sobre la crítica de Aristóteles a la teoría platónica de las Ideas. El libro de Di Camillo es un trabajo muy serio cuya lectura recomiendo ampliamente. Sin embargo, considero que cuatro de las principales tesis que la autora defiende tienen varias dificultades y mi objetivo aquí es presentar argumentos detallados en contra de ellas: la interpretación de la distinción entre argumentos más y menos rigurosos del (...) tratado Sobre las Ideas; la tesis de que la separación es el blanco esencial de las críticas aristotélicas a las Ideas; la interpretación de las opciones que Platón tiene para responder al argumento del tercer hombre, y la tesis de que la separación de las Ideas debe entenderse como homonimia. In this paper I examine Silvana Gabriela Di Camillo's recent book on Aristotle's criticisms of Plato's theory of Ideas. Di Camillo's book is a very serious work that I highly recommend. Nevertheless, I consider that four of the main theses that the author defends face several difficulties and my aim here is to offer detailed arguments against them: the interpretation of the distinction between more and less accurate arguments of the treatise On Ideas; the thesis that separation is the essential target of Aristotle's criticisms against Plato's Ideas; the interpretation of the options available to Plato to reply to the third man argument; and the thesis that the separation of Ideas should be understood as homonymy. (shrink)

In 1890, the famous Jena Glass Works of Carl Zeiss released the Anastigmat photographic lens to great fanfare. The nearly faultless realism it generated seemed to conclude a chapter in optical technology that had progressed in a predetermined manner since photography’s origins. But why exactly had Zeiss developed its expensive mechanism, and what drove photographers to buy it? This article proposes that the consistent focus and varied depth of field that the Anastigmat provided were not in and of themselves the (...) desired goals of the new corrected lens, but that they were instead visible signals of a pictorial model that makers and consumers had been circling since the public introduction of photography in 1839. The goal was a strict verisimilitude that remained stubbornly external to the medium, an illusionistic standard that had largely been mediated by painting and was now apparently possible in photography as well. But this history of pictorial perfection and the Anagstimat was not inevitable. Other lenses developed around the same time answered to dramatically different technological and aesthetic imperatives. They tell an alternative story of photography’s identity that is less tethered to mimetic fidelity and the idealized human vision with which photography was increasingly associated. (shrink)

This article discusses Hilary Putnam's views on the mind-body problem, by locating them in the general context of a satisfying pluralistic naturalism that he tried to articulate throughout his entire philosophical career. The first attempt in this direction was computational functionalism, his version of psychological functionalism centered on the analogy between mind/body and software/hardware, which (differently from David Lewis and others) he came to think of as an empirical hypothesis. That was a very successful proposal; however, later Putnam abandoned it (...) and embraced what he called 'liberal functionalism'. The reason for this change of mind was twofold: on the one hand, Putnam reached the conclusion that computational functionalism was incompatible with his views on semantic externalism; on the other hand, he began to think that mental states, besides being compositionally plastic (i.e., two entities can be in the same psychological state without being in the same physical state), are also computationally plastic (i.e., two entities can be in the same psychological state without being in the same functional state).In conclusion, I will argue that 'liberal functionalism' opened an interesting perspective for a successful non-reductive version of naturalism. (shrink)

El vínculo postmodernidad tecnológica/comunicación humana tiene en los mass-media, la TV, el cine, el internet y sus derivados; en las publicaciones sin censura y en la publicidad, herramientas de distorsión educativa y de salud comunitarias. La postmodernidad impacta en la organización social y en la cultura con su dicotomía de racionalismo vs. irracionalismo. La visión kantiana de la ciencia, la moral y el arte en pro de una sociedad más justa, libre y feliz, se desmorona en el intento de «superar (...) la modernidad».La sociedad cibernética burocratiza e impide la libertad del hombre. Los mass media y la sociedad de la comunicación no han generado una sociedad más «transparente» o consciente de sí misma, sino más compleja y caótica. Las dicotomías sujeto-objeto y público-privado hacen al individuo ajeno a su vida, un elemento de ciencia ficción, inmerso en un proceso virtual que lo desplaza a mundos electrónicos. En el éxtasis de la comunicación el medio predomina con su dispersión sobre el mensaje; el saber científico se orienta al desarrollo tecnológico y al poder, destacando su aspecto lingüístico, que no impide que cada vez más se hable y se escriba peor. El impacto de los mass media impulsa conductas antisociales y una «búsqueda de sensaciones intensas», para aplacar estados emocionales derivados del vacío existencial, de la frustración e insatisfacción vital de ciertas poblaciones.La persistencia de la divulgación enajenante, alienadora de la autoconciencia y falseadora de la realidad, no fomenta el desarrollo de una función personal, vincular y social saludables. (shrink)

This interview seeks to highlight some of the main characteristics of the new pandemic world, besides the main contradictions the philosophical thought runs into in this difficult time. Between a political world which is unable to react and the scientific world which is usually moved by political aims, this work tries to understand if there is any room for a role of a long range philosophical thought, which is able to defend its clarity prerogatives but it is also able to (...) speak with other disciplines which seem increasingly deafer. (shrink)

The article describes several representations of Alexander the Great which were current in medieval Arabic learned circles and proposes some ideas on the genesis of these representations in the Greek and Syriac civilizations: 1) Alexander as moralist; 2) Alexander as a mystical philosopher who knew the mysterious links governing the cosmos; 3) Alexander as a monotheist philosopher who was charged with responsibility for the d; 4) Alexander as a cunning politician.

Mele's modified definition of self-deception is consistent with evolutionary theory. Self-deception is most likely whenever ignorance confers (reproductive) advantage, namely, in impression management, deception, conformity, social norms, reproductive knowledge, and existential conflicts. Second-order self-deception (unawareness of unawareness) perpetuates self-deception and may be the reason for our misguided definitions.

In present times, social changes affect our ethos; it is a time plenty of issues and disputes on traditional ethical conceptions as well as on present ones which try to give ethical responses to new situations. With the aim of exploring a possibility of thinking our present, I will here try to explore the interpretation matrix with which modern ethos has been articulated, and which -with some modifications- still finds its way into present times. Starting from this precision, I will (...) move forward along a route of inquiry which opens up to us when we do not place ourselves from the point of view of "God's eye", i.e., when we cease to focus our reflections on what I have called the theological problem of modernity, and instead deal with the problem of the social construction of moral norms. The attempt to give reason of a secular moral position -freed from the presuppositionsof the beginnings of modern times- will lead to the distinction between moral, understood as a human group's customs and habits and ethics as the critique of established moral. I will hold that the construction of moral norms comes into play in the tension between moral and ethics.En nuestro presente, los cambios sociales afectan a nuestro ethos, así como abundan los cuestionamientos y disputas sobre las concepciones éticas tradicionales y también sobre las actuales propuestas que intentan dar respuestas éticas a las nuevas situaciones. Con el objeto de explorar una posibilidad de pensar nuestra actualidad, trataré aquí de precisar la matriz de interpretación con la que se ha articulado el ethos moderno y que perdura con modificaciones hasta nuestros días. A partir de tal precisión, avanzaré por un camino de indagación que se abre cuando no nos ubicamos en la perspectiva del "ojo de Dios", esto es, cuando dejamos de centrar la reflexión en el que he llamado problema teológico de la modernidad, para ocuparnos del problema de la construcción social de las normas morales. El intento por dar cuenta de una moral secular que no quede lastrada con presupuestos de los inicios de la modernidad, llevará a diferenciar entre la moral, entendida como los usos y costumbres de un grupo humano, y la ética como crítica de la moral establecida. En la tensión entre moral y ética sostendré que se juega la construcción de las normas morales. (shrink)