Values are relational properties that can be defined only in relation to a goal-directed system. Biological values originated with living systems and subjective values originated with the origin of vertebrate (and possibly others’) mind through a conversion (subjectivization) of biological values. While this conversion is understandable in adaptive (functional) terms, the evolutionary mechanism whereby positive and negative meanings in the mind were assigned to molecular and/or neuronal configurations in the brain, so far defies our comprehension. Whatever their origin, the primary (...) subjective values are experienced by most if not all vertebrates, and the hominid conceptual values are all ultimately derived from experiential values. (shrink)

Most Enlightenment thinkers believed that the World’s order (as ultimately based on divine laws) is good and thus every gain of knowledge will have good consequences. Scientific process was assumed to entail moral progress. In fact some moral progress did occur in the Western civilization and science contributed to it, but it is widely incommensurate with the progress of science. The Enlightenment’s concept of a concerted scientific and moral progress proved largely wrong for several reasons. (1) Public morality and science (...) evolve largely independently and may either enhance or inhibit each other. (2) There are no objective values to be read in the World’s order and simply followed. Instead, our real, subjective values and the moral systems they fuel have all been generated and shaped by evolution rather than designed to be universally good, and thus ought to be managed rather than simply followed. (3) Our evolved morality is flawed, deficient, prone to doctrinal manipulation and refractory to progress. (4) The majority of people show metaethical incompetence in failing to take a reasoned critical stand toward the principles and assumptions of received morals. This makes moral progress largely dependent on those who reach metaethical competence by transcending the conventional stages of moral development. (shrink)

DARWIN’s (1859, 1871) discoveries have profound ethical implications that continue to be misrepresented and/or ignored. In contrast to socialdarwinistic misuses of his theory, Darwin was a great humanitarian who paved the way for an integrated scientific and ethical world view. As an ethical doctrine, socialdarwinism is long dead ever since its defeat by E. G. Moore although the socialdarwinistic thought is a hard-die in the biological community. The accusations of sociobiology for being socialdarwinistic are unfounded and stem from the moralistic (...) fallacy that is, a false assumption that morality is good by definition. Both social and developmental psychology demonstrate that the moral agency is a motivational device for executing reciprocity that remains at the core of any morality across all studied societies and throughout the ontogeny of moral judgment. The level of true universalizing ethical reflection (KOHLBERG’s postconvential stages or GIBBS’s existential phase) is achieved by a small minority of humans, thus showing that Homo sapiens is a moral but not an ethical animal. While the origin of reciprocity has been perfectly explained by sociobiology, the evolutionary assembly of affective and cognitive elements that make up the moral agency is being successfully studied by the social/personality/developmental psychology as extended to non-human primates. As DARWIN (1871) expected, the key innovation for the evolution of moral agency was the emergence of empathy that evolved independently at least three times: in elephants, dolphins and primates. Empathy has a motivational power of its own; it is also necessary for moral agency that requires two cognitive abilities: reflective self-consciousness and understanding of causality; the two make possible the attribution of responsibility. All these requirements are met by the chimpanzees whose moral agency operates in dyads. In contrast, the human moral agency allows for a third party intervention that opens up vast opportunities for ideologies, especially religions, to use and misuse the moral agency to enforce a reciprocation that may be harmful to both individuals and the entire group. Also, the moral agency is known to enforce enhanced intragroup cohesion and loyalty in response to conflict and war, which suggests that the two prima facie opposed human universals, morality and warfare, may have coevolved. The most important ethical consequence that follows from the increasing understanding of the primate moral agency is that every received morality is ethically flawed, none can be taken as a paragon of goodness, and each needs corrections by science-informed ethics. In fact, Darwin pioneered the integration of science and ethics, an approach that has come to be appreciated only recently under the heading of consilience. (shrink)

True Darwinian Ethics -/- Darwin’s model for the evolution of morality as presented in Descent of Man (1871) is shown to comprise three major stages that are here referred to as empathic premorality, tribal morality, and universalizing morality. Empathy, the key component of Darwin’s “social instincts” that started moral evolution, is here recognized as the principal cognitive device that conveys epistemic credibility to moral agency. The two constitutive elements of the tribal morality are conscience that Darwin conceived of as a (...) conflict between a lasting social motive and an immediate selfish impulse, and true altruism that evolved as a result of group (community) selection. Darwin’s genius recognized the uniqueness of group selection in human evolution as being dependent on mental faculties and speech that facilitated habit formation through praise and blame form other group members, with empathy as a gauge of others’ emotional reactions. Contrary to repeated claims, Darwin did not derive morality from reciprocity that he (and his contemporaries) considered to be “a low motive”, and adduced it only as a mechanism of habit formation. The universalizing morality was brought about by the increasing powers of intellect that led to respecting individual lives (rather than group interests only) and extending humane concerns beyond one’s group, ultimately to all sentient beings, which places Darwin among the spiritual fathers of modern humanitarianism. In terms of substantive ethics, Darwin’s views support moral individualism that requires to treat each subject according to his/her individual characteristics rather than any group membership. Darwin’s moral individualism and universalism have been elaborated by Peter Singer as the principle of equal consideration of interests and the expanding circle of ethics, respectively. Darwin’s model of moral evolution, which starts with intuitive but epistemically reliable moral agency and then allows for its rational improvement, provides a way out of the moral subjectivism of evolutionary ethics that reduces morality to an adaptation to social life. The primary or core morality that relies on empathy and implements reciprocity supports welfare (wellbeing) of a group and its members. Welfare (which has been defined by Darwin) is a basic “terminal” (ultimate) value that constitutes an objective, measurable fact. Since the primary morality supports welfare, it is objectively good, which justifies an ethical reasoning that such morality ought to be extended (with appropriate adjustments) to all sentient beings. Confusion over the status of morality is largely due to the lack of appreciation of its complexity: not only had its motivational apparatus (known as the moral agency) evolved by superposition of many emotional and pure cognitive mechanisms, but it has subsequently been co-opted to implement prudential, religious and possibly other norms that are accidental and sometimes contrary to its original social function. Those secondary morality norms are now enforced by the moral agency but lack moral objectivity and thus may support the perception of moral subjectivism and relativism. In short, true Darwinian ethics is based on the scientific axiology that recognizes evolutionary origins of all values, requires respecting all values that are experienced by each and every subject according to its individual characteristics, and calls for a critical assessment of each and every received morality. (shrink)

Aside from the local (mostly Western) efforts to subject animal experimentation to public scrutiny, the extent of animal experimentation, the acceptance of alternative methods and the fate of animals in laboratories depend on experimenters’ morality (as defined by social psychology), whose shaping is of crucial importance for the future of animal use in science. Meanwhile, sociological and ethnographic research in laboratories demonstrates that in the matter of animal use the experimenters are unreflective, ethically incompetent, and incapable of taking a critical (...) view of the received morality. This appears to result largely from their higher education which is known to cause a regression in moral development, inculcate a routine exploitation and/or objectification of animals, and ignore both the scientific premises and moral consequences of animal subjectivity. From all we know, it is researchers’ morality rather than pressing needs and expectations of humanity that interferes with a major restriction of invasive animal research in general and a wide, proactive acceptance of alternative methods in particular. (shrink)

In the evolution of the vertebrates and probably a few other animals (Metazoa), biological values have been translated (subjectivized) into affective experience that necessarily involves the consciousness of external objects/events (as different from one’s body), which is tantamount to the origins of subjectivity. Mammals, birds and other vertebrates are experiencing subjects even though their negative and positive experience greatly vary in scope. Some mammals are capable of vicarious experience and may act as empathic agents, and some of them, at least (...) the great apes, use true reflective self-consciousness and thus perceive themselves as agents, which generates attributive feelings. The balance of positive and negative experience determines the intrinsic value of (an individual) life. Every subjective life is autotelic in striving to maximize this balance. A subjective life may also have a social value that is measured in terms of the impact on intrinsic values of other lives. The social value of life is contingent upon an agency, that is, conscious intentional actions that impact intrinsic value of other lives. The difference between the social value of a subjective life and an instrumental value of an individual comes down to the difference between agent causation and event causation. The moral agency refers to a subcategory of agent causation that involves the awareness of impact on another subject’s wellbeing (interests). The moral agency is at present known only in the hominids (including the chimpanzees) which understand causality and use reflective self-consciousness, which in turn enables them to perceive themselves as agents and attribute to themselves responsibility. The moral agency originated as a motivational mechanism of reciprocity execution , and thus as an adaptation for group life, which is why it favors ingroup members and often promotes norms that harm other groups. The human moral agency is frequently used by third parties to implement group norms that are based on ideologies (religious or secular) and may actually harm both group members and the entire groups. Any received, bioculturally evolved morality is unlikely to be good in either absolute or universal sense. Therefore, the moral capacity alone does not make a human life categorically more valuable, even if human motivation were dominated by moral agency (which is true only of some people). The life of a vertebrate has, therefore, two values, intrinsic and social. Each can be negative or positive, and may vary to a large extent independently of the other, whereby a joint value of a subjective life cannot be sensibly assessed and compared without prior assessments of the intrinsic and social component separately. In the absence of objective reasons to rate the intrinsic value of a human life as categorically higher than that of other mentally advanced mammals, and in consideration of the observed range of social values of human lives, some of which approach zero and some are highly negative (lower than any thinkable negative values of non-human lives), the doctrine of extraordinary and inalienable (innate) human „dignity” is groundless and unethical, as it leads to a depreciation of the lives of non-human subjects, and often preempts the need to impart a real social value to one’s own life. (shrink)

Having positive experience is, by defintion, in the interest of every subject. Whether being alive per se, in addition to having positive experiences, is in a subject's interest depends of her/his cognitive development. Only a reflectively self-conscious subject can take and thus have an interest in one's own individual existence and may not want to die regardless of the expected experience. Since most non-human subjects (except for a few mammalian and avian species) are not aware of their subjective existence they (...) cannot take and thus have interest in their lives per se. However, they do have interest in maximizing rewarding experience and minimizing suffering. (shrink)

The issue widely discussed under the heading of “naturalization of morality” in-volves at least three major components of “morality”: value-laden experience which is the source of all genuine values; received morality, a system of behaviors and attitudes that are transmitted from generation to generation and control the exchange of primary values; and an analytic-evaluative agency, here referred to as ethics, that assesses norms and assumptions underlying received moralities against an independent knowledge of values. This task requires the use of both (...) scientific information and domain-specific ways of ethical reasoning that are appropriate for the subject. While the transmission of moral systems is fully explicable and thus naturalized in terms of evolutionary theory and psychology, the ongoing naturalization of ethics appears to be more complex. (shrink)

In a recent article in this journal, Remsen attacked moral objections to killing birds for museum collections, objections that are frequently raised by the general public and scientific community alike. The only grounds for moral objections against killing birds that Remsen considers and rejects are reverence for all life or personal, that is sentimental reasons. What Remsen ignores is avian sentience and the moral imperative of respecting it.

The paper consists of two parts, outlined in the title.I. In the historical science time appears as an element of the historian’s workshop. The historian collects source information, evaluates them and assigns respective dates. Only on the ground of thus “processed” sources may he reproduce the past: events and longer development processes, setting them in time. This dated time is understood colloquially as something objective, which runs one way and may be measured.II. A historian who studies the past reality depends (...) on the extent to which those sources are preserved. As a result of their interpretation, with the use of increasingly excellent research methods, he reproduces that reality. He must carry out an ongoing selection of historical facts found. This exposes him to temptations of such selection of those facts so as to adjust the historical knowledge to serve well the national interests, his own political opinions, etc. In this way the historian exerts influence on social awareness, which may consists of various myths and stereotypes, which sometimes lead to negative social behaviors: aggression, chauvinism, etc. Therefore, for researcher honesty’s sake and in the sense of moral responsibility, he must be careful to be as impartial as possible in his work. (shrink)

The objective of the paper is a presentation and an interpretation of Władysław Stróżewski’s views on aesthetics. Built upon the foundation provided by classical metaphysics, Stróżewski’s aesthetics is simultaneously a continuation of the tradition of phenomenological interpretation of art. Stróżewski extends Roman Ingarden’s aesthetic theory by including the idea of numinous concretion, largely inspired by the works of Rudolf Otto. As a result, this new phenomenological perspective transcends the narrowly understood ‘aesthetics’ of the work of art towards the inherent dimension (...) of the sacred. Moreover, Stróżewski’s scrutiny of the aspect of art that goes beyond the aesthetic reveals an important relationship obtaining between his insights and the theological aesthetics of Hans Urs von Balthasar. Thus Stróżewski’s ideas turn out to be of significance to contemporary aesthetic and theological debates. In particular, he shows the movement of beauty from aesthetic to transcendental, and ultimately towards the sacred, where numinosum is manifested as Mystery. (shrink)

The article reviews the book Metodologia nauk [Methodology of the Sciences], by Adam Grobler.

This paper is concerned with n-localization property introduced by Newelski and Rosłanowski in [10] and getting it for CS iterations of forcing notions.

Książka stanowi wprowadzenie do twórczości Richarda Rorty'ego, a także próbę osadzenia jej na szerszym tle filozofii współczesnej, ze szczególnym uwzględnieniem filozofii postmodernistycznej. Obecne są w niej szersze analizy stanu kultury współczesnej, a także relacje z istotnych koncepcji obecnych we współczesnej humanistyce, bez których nie można zrozumieć ewolucji współczesnej humanistyki i specjalnej roli, jaką odegrała w niej filozofia Richarda Rorty'ego.

Natural Deduction Natural Deduction is a common name for the class of proof systems composed of simple and self-evident inference rules based upon methods of proof and traditional ways of reasoning that have been applied since antiquity in deductive practice. The first formal ND systems were independently constructed in the 1930s by G. Gentzen and S. Jaśkowski and … Continue reading Natural Deduction →.

Spouses exhibit two kinds of behaviours: protective and transgressive. Protective acts are those aiming to overcome current problems, leading to preserving some balance. Transgressive acts are deliberately overstepping everyday marital reality and doing new things in new ways. They lead to changing the relation with the hope of improving it, but also create the risk of deterioration. The more transgressive behaviours spouses exhibit, the more chances they have to get to know each other and experience the joy of being part (...) of a union. Transgressive tendencies stem from a network personality structure and consist of five psychons: cognitive, instrumental, motivational, emotional, and personal. The success of a marriage is the effect of a specific form of transgressive behaviours in marriage exhibited by both spouses, which is recognizing difficulties as they appear, finding their sources, and taking steps together to overcome them. (shrink)

In terms of psychotransgressionism, personality is a network of five equipollent psychons, the content of which determines the personality’s functioning. The strength and power of the individual psychons underlies the tendency to undertake transgressive actions. In this study, we hypothesized that transgressive spouses are characterized by greater potential strength, greater power of cognitive, instrumental, motivational, emotional, and personal psychons than protective spouses. We operationalized all psychons, created the appropriate research tools, and then studied married couples. Using the Transgression Scale developed (...) by Studenski, we found a group of spouses with higher levels of transgression, and a group of spouses with lower levels of transgression. Transgressive wives are characterized by better knowledge about their husbands’ operational sphere, and are more aware of personal beliefs than protective wives. Similarly, transgressive husbands have greater knowledge of their wives’ operational sphere, stronger cognitive needs, and weaker personal needs than protective husbands. Transgressive husbands are characterized by a positive affective shift and have a greater awareness of personal beliefs than protective husbands. The potential brought into interpersonal relationships by transgressive spouses may create a climate conducive to building a satisfying marital relationship. (shrink)

The aim of the paper is to examine the nature of moral and legal norms in a broader context: first, taking into account logical and methodological assumptions, second, in the perspective of psychology of emotions and legal policy. The basic subject of the research carried out by Leon Petrażycki was represented by law. Originally, it had a psychological character, not an objective, eternal, and unchanging one. To fully understand the genesis and nature of morality and law, Petrażycki addressed the study (...) of mental phenomena, especially emotional experiences. First, however, he developed appropriate rules of logic and scientific methodology. Then he developed a new classification of mental phenomena, among which the fundamental role is played by bilateral emotions. At some stage, emotions begin to cooperate with cognitive processes, first of all with imaginations. Imaginations of acts, such as theft, betrayal, murder, can cause repulsive emotions, and type imaginations, such as truthfulness, charity, justice can evoke apulsive emotions. On the basis of such associations, judgments are created over time, the content of which becomes a basis for fundamental rules of conduct, that is, for norms. There are two fundamentally different types of norms: moral norms and legal norms. The norms of the first type are imperative and represent the nature of validity, while the norms of the second type are imperative-attributive and they also always entitle someone to something, i.e. they give someone a right. This division determines a fundamental difference between morality and law. (shrink)

John Gray argues that the modern conception of man is common for all variants of the liberal tradition. The version of liberalism which is defended in this paper cannot be called ‘classical’ because it refuses the conception in question (it refuses such elements of it as, for example, claims of universality, idea of neutral Reason, idea of human nature). That is why the best label which can be given to it is ‘postmodern’ or ‘communitarian’ liberalism. Moreover, postmodern liberalism does not (...) express any reluctance toward community as such. It only requires a community which respects the rights of individuals to autonomous, moral and comprehensive choices. In this sense one can say that postmodern liberalism renounces anti-social biases while remaining faithful to individualism, which - starting with the social and the common - arrives at the truly individual. In this way it can revitalize the sense and meaning of humanism understood as the idea of life of human beings who can create their own lives independently and freely in the political and social milieu, promoting justice and solidarity. (shrink)

The article reviews the book Metodologia nauk [Methodology of the Sciences], by Adam Grobler.

The studies of health care systems are conducted intensively on various levels. They are important because the systems suffer from numerous pathologies. The health care is analyzed, first of all, in economic aspects but their functionality in the framework of systems theory is studied, as well. There are also attempts to work out some general values on which health care systems should be based. Nevertheless, the aforementioned studies, however, are fragmentary ones. In this paper holistic approach to the philosophical basis (...) of health care is presented. The levels on which the problem can be considered are specified explicitly and relations between them are analyzed, as well. The philosophical basis on which the national health care systems could be based is proposed. Personalism is the basis for the proposal. First of all, the values, that are derived from the personalistic philosophy, are specified as the basic ones for health care systems. Then, general organizational and functional properties of the system are derived from the assumed values. The possibility of adaptation of solutions from other fields of social experiences are also mentioned. The existing health care systems are analyzed within the frame of the introduced proposal. (shrink)

During the global financial crisis of 2007–2009 and the currentCovid-19 debacle, central banks acted quickly, boldly, and effectively. The paper argues that they did so thanks to the lessons learned from the past financial crises, which provided them with opportunities to reconsider their previous beliefs. A case in point is the banking crisis in the United States during the Great Depression of the 1930s that taught central banks to act rapidly and decisively in order to prevent an initial liquidity crisis (...) from escalating into a solvency crisis leading to bankruptcies of banks with potentially disastrous consequences for the entire economy. The paper revisits the consequences of the currency crises of the 1990s, which transformed exchange rate regimes across the world: the EMS one of 1992–1993 that accelerated the launch of the euro, and the Asian one of 1997–1998 resulted in the proliferation of floating exchange rates in emerging economies. (shrink)

I shall outline the topic from a historical perspective, placing the main emphasis on the hundred years’ period spanning 1870–1970.

Dynamical Grammar explores the consequences for language acquisition, language evolution, and linguistic theory of taking the underlying architecture of the language faculty to be that of a complex adaptive dynamical system. It contains the first results of a new and complex model of language acquisition which the authors have developed to measure how far language input is reflected in language output and thereby get a better idea of just how far the human language faculty is hard-wired.